A Thunderous Whisper (15 page)

Mathias and I exchanged a quick glance. There was nothing fun about any of this.

TWENTY-SIX

A
strong breeze ruffled the leaves of the tree-lined street and whipped around a few loose strands of my hair. Mathias and I were aimlessly walking, neither of us saying a word. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the satin pouch Papá had given me. Tugging at the soft braided rope that kept the acorn inside, I flipped the bag over to let the seed tumble out. Rolling it in my palm, I thought about how people kept leaving me behind. First my father, now Mathias. Perhaps it was time I moved on too.… I could tell Mamá everything, and we could leave town before it was too late.

I sighed.

There was no way Mamá would leave, and all I’d get for my trouble was a serious beating. It would also be the end of my making a difference.

“Think it’ll really grow one day?” Mathias asked.

“Huh?” I glanced down at the acorn in my hand. “Oh, I hope so.”

Mathias pointed to an empty bench, and we headed toward it. “Where would you plant it?”

“I don’t know.” I squeezed the acorn before putting it back in its pouch and taking a seat. “I always thought I’d plant it somewhere in Garza’s field.”

“I’m sure Garza would let you.” Mathias sat down next to me. “I can ask him if you want.”

“Yeah. Guess that would be good.”

We didn’t say much more after that.

Sunset was approaching, and I knew Mathias had to be home for Shabbat. Over the course of the last few weeks, I’d learned a lot about him and how his parents worked to balance the fact that his mom was Jewish and his dad was Catholic. Shabbat dinner was something that they always tried to have, even though Mathias had been late a couple of times.

“Guess you need to head home,” I said, wishing there were something else to talk about. But Mathias would be gone in a few days, and that was all either of us was thinking about.

“Yeah, guess so.”

I decided to walk back with him. As we strolled past the darkened shopwindows and the noisy taverns, I felt a heavy veil of sadness weighing on my shoulders.

“I wish you didn’t have to go,” I said in a quiet voice as the last streaks of sunlight colored the sky in pink and purple hues.

“I know.” Mathias stepped off the sidewalk to let a family carrying suitcases walk by. “But there’s not much choice. We all have to make sacrifices.”

“Still don’t like it.”

“Yeah, me neither.” He bit at one of his fingernails, then analyzed all the others. “You’re the best friend I’ve had … well, in a long time.” His gaze fixed on the cuticles of his left hand.

“Thanks,” I said, shuffling my feet and finally kicking a loose pebble into the street. “You’re my best friend too.” My voice cracked a little as I spoke.

We reverted to a heavy silence until we reached the front of his apartment building.

“Enough!” Mathias broke the gloomy spell. He shook himself out like a dog drying off. “No more of this depressing stuff. In the movies the leading man doesn’t act all mopey when things don’t go his way. We need to have some fun … do something. What do you think?”

“Um, okay.” I paused, thinking about the movie I’d seen and how much had changed since that day. “I’ll take your word about the movies, though.… I only saw the first half.”

“You’re right.… I forgot! You never finished seeing it.”

“Nope, but that’s okay,” I said, knowing that half a movie was better than no movie at all.

Mathias tossed his
makila
from one hand to the other. “So that’s what we’ll do. Come over and I’ll have my father give us our own showing. That way you’ll get to see a whole movie.”

I shook my head, but smiled at the thought. “I can’t. You know I have to do the deliveries with Mamá tomorrow. But it was a nice thought.” I looked up to see his mother at the window. She waved at me.

Mathias glanced up too and signaled for her to give him one more minute. “I have to go in, but … Wait, I have
an idea. Why don’t you have your mother come too? She can have lunch with my family, and then we’ll all watch the movie.”

“Ha,” I chuckled. “That might work if I had anyone else’s mother.”

“No, we can do this. What if we do it on Sunday? You don’t make deliveries after church, right?”

“No.” I mulled the idea over. “I’m just not sure. You haven’t even asked your parents. You’re leaving in a few days, and they may not want to—”

“It’ll be fine. I know it.” He stepped closer to me. “My parents feel guilty about making me move. Why do you think Mother isn’t out here pulling me inside for Shabbat dinner? I know they’ll say yes. C’mon. Ask your mother.”

“But you know how she is.…”

“So?” he said, his eyes twinkling with the possibility.

I shook my head. “She’ll probably just say no.”

Mathias gave me a half smile and leaned on his
makila
. “But she might say yes.”

I thought about it for a few more seconds.

He folded his arms like a little boy ready to pout. “Do you not
want
to come over?”

“No, no. I didn’t say that.” I just didn’t know if I wanted Mamá to go with me.

“Then let me handle my parents and you deal with yours,
vale
?”

I let out a short sigh. “
Vale
. Okay. I’ll ask Mamá. No promises, though.”

“Fine, but you have to ask.”

“Yes, I will.” I spun him around and pushed him toward the door. “But get inside before your mother gets angry.”

“Fine,” he answered. “I’ll expect you on Sunday.”

The shadows of the night were already growing longer, and I turned to head home myself. A permanent smile had replaced the sadness from a few minutes earlier.

Lunch and a movie with Mathias on Sunday. There was still some fun to be had.

As I reached the lamppost on the corner of the street, I heard the sound of a window opening, and from the darkness Mathias yelled, “Don’t forget to ask your mother!”

Mamá. This night was still not over.

TWENTY-SEVEN

I
stared at the wrinkles that darted from the corners of Mamá’s dark brown eyes.
Would I look like her when I was old?
I’d never really given it much thought, but now I wondered. Maybe she had been like me when she was young. Had there been a time when she wanted to be something else? Maybe I should tell her about leaving.… It could be a chance to start over … for both of us.

“¿Qué?”
Mamá asked, lifting her eyes to meet mine. “What are you staring at?”

“
Nada
, nothing,” I answered.

“Hmph, you’re acting different today. Something happen during your deliveries?” Mamá tore off a piece of bread and ran it along her plate, letting it sop up whatever sauce was left.

“Um, well, actually, there was—”

“You put the money you earned in the drawer, right?” she asked, wiping her mouth with the napkin.

“
Sí, señora
. In the box, by the Bible in the top drawer.”

She stood and took her plate over to the sink. “Don’t forget that I know how much money is in there at all times.”

I rolled my eyes since her back was to me. “I’d never take anything without permission.”

“It’s just a reminder,” she answered. “Were you saying something about what happened today?”

“Mathias’s family is moving next week.”

Mamá didn’t turn around. “Oh,” she said, not sounding too interested.

“We’d made a bunch of plans, and I thought—”

“No point in crying over what’s done.” Mamá paused for a moment, holding the plate under the running water. “You’ll keep his customers, right?”

“Kind of. The customers cut back their orders too. They only want deliveries once every two weeks.”

Mamá threw the sponge into the sink. “
¡Qué cosa!
We need the extra money now more than ever!”

I stayed quiet. Perhaps the timing wasn’t right to ask about the movies or mention moving.

“Well, we’ll just have to go out and try to do more sales every day. No more of this easy living for you. We’ll even work Sunday morning if we have to.”

“Um, about Sunday …” I picked at the edge of the napkin that rested on my lap.

“Let me guess.… You don’t want to work?” she said, still not bothering to turn around to look at me.

“No. I mean yes, um, just not this Sunday.” I twisted the napkin edge. “Mathias invited us to have lunch with his family.”

Now Mamá turned around. “Why? Aren’t they moving?

What’s the point?”

“To thank us for helping sell the sardines. We’ll also get to see a movie at the theater.”

Mamá shut off the faucet and wiped her hands on a cloth lying by the sink. I could see her thinking about it. “
El cine
, huh?”

I nodded. “Can we go?”

Mamá didn’t move or say anything. A chance to watch a movie was tempting for anyone … even her.

“I suppose … it would be the polite thing to do.”

I smiled. Seeing Mamá be gracious might be better than the movie.

“Mathias and I can also make some plans for when he comes back in the summer,” I said as Mamá walked out of the kitchen. “Maybe sell some more sardines,” I added for good measure.

She paused right outside the doorway and glanced back at me. “Summer? Ha! Once that boy leaves, he won’t come back. Best that you realize early on that people always leave. Look at your brother, and now your father. Can’t get too attached or else you won’t survive.”

“No, that’s not what’ll happen. We’ll see each other again.… He told me so.”

Mamá walked away, shaking her head. “Eventually you’ll learn,
neska
. We all do.”

TWENTY-EIGHT

A
ll day Saturday Mamá and I walked the streets of Guernica trying to make as many sales as we could. We didn’t stop even when the air-raid warning sounded. As usual, Mamá regarded it as a false alarm, and she continued her calls of
“¡Sardinas, saaardiiiinas!”
over the sound of sirens and church bells. So far, she’d always been right, but it felt as if we were tempting fate.

And then, in what seemed like the blink of an eye, it was Sunday afternoon, and Mamá and I were walking toward the theater after Mass.

“¿
Me veo bien?
I look fine, ¿
verdad
?” Mamá asked me as some of the more refined women from church crossed the street in front of us.

“Of course you do.” I’d noticed Mamá sniffing her sleeve during Mass, probably wondering if her nicest white blouse, the one with the lace trim on the collar and cuffs, smelled just like all the rest of her clothes.

“You said they don’t put on airs, right? Because you know
I can’t tolerate self-righteous people.” Mamá tugged on her brown skirt, adjusting the waist, as we walked by one of the crowded cafés.

“No, his parents are very nice. They both speak Spanish and—”

“Spanish?” She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, causing a few people to maneuver around us. “Why wouldn’t they be speaking Spanish? Don’t tell me they’re foreigners?”

I looked down at my feet, regretting having said anything. It would have been better for Mamá to have realized that after she met them.

“Oh my Lord! An afternoon of stinkin’ foreigners telling me how superior they are! Well, I’ll tell them exactly where they can—”

“Mamá, please,” I begged, my stomach already churning.

“Don’t talk like that.”

“What?” She pursed her lips. “You think I’ll embarrass you?”

“No,” I whispered. “I just want to have a good time today.”

“Hmpf.” Mamá rolled her eyes and said nothing else.

As we continued walking, past storefronts that had heavy sandbags stacked along their doorways, I thought of how the war now surrounded us. It could come from Franco’s soldiers breaking through the front lines or from the Germans flying above us. That’s when I realized Mamá still didn’t know Mathias’s mother was German. Things could get very ugly during lunch.

I needed to say something. Make sure Mamá didn’t insult his family.

We were walking across the town’s center plaza, where the pigeons and people all gathered, which meant that Mathias’s apartment was around the corner. A few more seconds and we’d be there.

I glanced at Mamá’s profile as she stared across the street at the theater. There was no more time to come up with the right words, the right approach.… I had to tell her.

“Mamá, there’s something you should know. Mathias—”

“I’m not going in,” Mamá declared, cutting me off. She looked down at her well-worn shoes. In a low voice, she said, “I don’t fit in here.”

For a moment, a huge weight lifted off my shoulders; then I saw Mamá’s face. For the first time, she looked defeated.

I glanced up at the window above the theater. Mathias’s mother stood by the open curtains watching us.

Thoughts swirled in my head. I didn’t want to go and have Mamá cause a scene, but she also deserved to see a movie once in her life. “Mamá, they’re good people and, look … she’s already seen us.”

“I don’t know what I was thinking,” Mamá shook her head. “This isn’t me.”

“But we can’t just leave. We have to tell them something.”

Mamá sighed. After a few seconds, she simply said, “You should go.”

“Mamá, I—”

“No,” she said forcefully. “I’ve made up my mind. I won’t go in. You can.” She cupped my chin with her hand and stared straight into my eyes. “
Neska
, you don’t need to have my life.”

“But we can both have a new life,” I blurted out.

“What?”

I knew I had to tell her. Let her make the choice. Perhaps we could start over in Madrid. “Mathias’s family … they offered to help us move, too. If we want, we can go somewhere else … away from here. Papa can join us later.”

“Run away? From Guernica? Leave the place where I last saw your brother, God rest his soul.” She quickly made the sign of the cross. “All because of a silly war? Never!” Mamá rolled back her shoulders. “If Franco’s troops come in, so be it. We’ll sell sardines to them.” She shook her head. “I suppose I shouldn’t be too surprised to hear you say this.”