America's Dream (15 page)
How sweet a child feels on your lap, her head on your bosom, her soft hair newly washed, damp, so fine it tickles your chin as you press your head closer to kiss her. How lovely the weight of a child against your breast, her little body coiled against your belly as you rock her back and forth, singing a lullaby. Her little heart beating so fast, her breath coming in slower and slower as she falls asleep, her thumb in her tiny mouth, the pupils shadows behind finely veined eyelids.
América holds Meghan, sings softly to her while across the room her brother sleeps, his breath parting the fur of the teddy bear he hugs. América could hold on to Meghan for hours, but sleep has made her heavy, and so she carries her to bed, tucks her in, pulls the sheet up around her neck, tightens the edges so that she won’t fall out. She watches her sleep, the sucking motion of her cheeks, her index finger hooked on her nose, the eyes fluttering as if she were watching a movie. She then fixes the blankets around Kyle, who pulls his teddy bear closer to his chest, mumbling something she can’t quite catch.
It is the Leveretts’ last night in Vieques, and she’s staying
with the children while they enjoy the last hours of their vacation. She’s never spent so much time with a guest’s children, and she knows that these two have won a place in her memory, unlike the countless others who have passed through this room. She’s sat with them four of their ten nights at La Casa, has taken walks with them after her shift, has stopped in the middle of mopping a hallway or making a bed to admire a seashell or the long seed pod called bellota, or a butterfly captured in a jar. Their innocence, their chatter, the way they listen to her, patiently trying to under- stand what she’s saying, have changed the rhythm of her days. And Meghan’s sweetness has awakened a longing she has sup- pressed for years, the desire to have another child, to hold a baby in her arms, to suckle an infant at her breast, to feel the warmth of a being she has carried in her belly.
How often she dreamed of a house full of children, girls and boys running in and out of a neat home with curtains fluttering in the breeze, gardens flowering in a million colors, birds singing sweetly in the shade. There was a husband in her dreams, a man not unlike Correa, tall and dark, muscular, with a lovely voice and thick black hair. They would stand on the porch of their sweet-smelling home, arms around each other’s waists, watching their children play under a mango tree. And they would be filled with love for each other, for what they had brought forth, for a future shiny with promise.
She shakes her head, chides herself for having such old-fash- ioned dreams when women nowadays want to be scientists and leaders of nations. But I never wanted that, she argues with her- self. All I ever wanted was a home and a family, with a mother and a father and children. She sits on the armchair, picks up one of the magazines Mrs. Leverett brought with her. It’s mostly fashions, skinny women with big faces and extraordinary outfits. She wonders if people in the United States really dress like that. Someone is coming up the stairs, across the hall. It’s too early for the Leveretts, but maybe they’re tired, or didn’t like the res- taurant they went to or the loud music in the bars on the board-
walk. The door opens.
“There you are.” Correa’s eyes are shiny with the unmistak-
able luster of too much liquor and suspicion. He stands just inside the door, listing a little to one side, licking his lips as if preparing for a feast.
It is the old Correa, the one she fears, not the one of her domest- ic dream. His expression softens her knees to jelly, hollows the inside of her chest. Her head drones with a million voices, replays of countless accusations over the years. There are no men on the island of Vieques whom Correa has not cited as someone she’s cheating with. Neither the longtime residents nor the casual vis- itors are immune from his suspicions, and América searches her mind for the last time she had contact with a man, asks herself who she has talked to, who she has even looked at in the recent past that would qualify as a candidate for Correa’s jealousy.
She looks toward the porch, and he follows her gaze and stumbles toward the sleeping children. She stands behind him as if afraid of what he will find in the little cots. He smiles, softening enough to make her feel that maybe this time he’ll just leave.
“Their mami and papi are having a good time at Eddie’s,” he says. “You should see those gringos dance!” He laughs, and it seems to her as if thunder has struck, so loud does it sound. She’s certain the children have awakened, but as he passes by her and throws himself on the armchair, she sees they are still asleep.
“You can’t stay here,” she says. She stands between him and the porch, on the shadowed edge of the light from the lamp by the armchair.
He picks up the magazine she set down, flips through the pages, chuckles. “Look at how these women dress. Hangers with clothes on, that’s what they look like.” He throws the magazine across the room, picks up a stuffed animal on the shelf behind him, a lion with a silly grin. He turns it over, legs up.
“They never give them balls,” he says, and growls at it, then growls at her, pushing the stuffed lion in her direction in a manner that might be considered playful if she weren’t so scared.
She jumps back, and he laughs, growls, stands up, grabs her, tickles her with the toy.
She tries to free herself, but he holds her with one arm and, with the other, rubs the animal across her shoulders, follows it with a gentle growl and a soft bite with his lips. She pushes him, but he holds her, pretends to be a lion, growls, purrs, pokes her with clawed fingers, bites with his teeth now, her shoulder, her neck, her arms. “Correa, stop!”
She looks behind her, at the porch where the children sleep. Kyle turns over, holds his teddy bear closer. Meghan sucks on her thumb. Correa shoves her onto the bed, climbs on top of her, scratches her with clawed fingers, bites her thighs, her belly, her breasts. She resists him, tries to get his attention. “No, Correa. We’ll wake up the kids.” He rubs his erection against her legs, bites her lips, purrs into her ears, rolls her shirt up to her neck. She forces him away with more strength this time, and his face changes from playful to serious, and he weighs himself on her, fumbles for the zipper of her jeans, oblivious to anything she might say or do.
She can’t fight him. His breath comes in hot, rum-scented blasts, and still he bites her cheeks, her neck, her breasts, and bares her lower body. She wants to scream, but she imagines the scared faces of the children, who have nothing to do with this. She guides his head so that he will bite her where no one will see, below her shirt collar, on her chest, her shoulders, and he does. Bites into her and plunges his penis as if she were a hole, just a warm hole the right size and texture. She’d bite him back but doesn’t want him to think she’s enjoying this, is in any way participating in what he calls his pleasure, the taking of América whenever and however he wants her. Her thoughts are on the other side of the screen, on the sleeping porch where two innocents sleep, she hopes, oblivious to what’s happening not ten feet away. She prays as Correa rides her. Prays to Jesus protector of children, that He keep their eyes shut and their ears deaf to everything but the coquí singing outside the window, its shrill song more like a scream than a melody.
When he’s done, he rolls over, ready to sleep. She has to coax him, pull him up, convince him this is not his room, his bed. He looks about as if he has amnesia, not recognizing his surround- ings, not quite understanding what she says to him.
“You have to go, Correa,” she begs, helping him pull up his pants, tucking his shirt in for him. “I’ll get fired.” Childlike, he lets her turn him this way and that as she straightens his clothes, her own body naked from the waist down. He walks like a drunk bear, his weight settling on one foot, then the next. The cool air from the courtyard revives him, though, and at the door he lifts his finger at her. “I’ll wait for you downstairs.” He’s not done with her. What she’s just been through was a mere distraction. She closes the door as he moves down the hall, brushing his hair with his hand, while with the other he holds on to the wall as if the floor were waves.
She washes up, dries herself with toilet tissue so as not to soil the Leveretts’ towels. In the mirror, she examines the bite marks on her chest and breasts, her belly, her upper arms. Her face is swollen. She splashes cool water on it, brushes her hair, straightens her clothes. She places one of Mrs. Leverett’s scarves over the lampshade, to darken the room, soften the light, create shadows that will hide her bruises and deny the outrage commit- ted on their bed, in their room, not ten feet from where their children sleep.
he day the Leveretts leave she cleans their room, which feels different than it ever has before. Each corner has a significance
it never had. The little cot where Meghan slept seems emptier. Kyle’s fingerprints on the bathroom mirror appear deliberately placed, a secret message for her to decode.
It’s inexplicable, she puzzles, how fond I am of those children, how, in a few short days, they filled a place in my heart that I didn’t know was empty. Maybe, she tells herself, I’m just looking for a replacement for Rosalinda. But the theory sounds suspi- ciously like the ones Cristina Saralegüi propounds to distraught mothers on her talk show.
Just before they leave, Mr. and Mrs. Leverett and the children find her in one of the rooms.
“We wanted to say good-bye.”
América has to fight back tears. The children hug and kiss her.
Mr. Leverett shakes her hand.
“You really made our vacation a vacation.” He hands her an envelope. Guests usually leave a tip for her on top of a dresser. Getting it handed to her is confusing. She’s not sure if she should look inside or if that would be rude. There’s some writing
on the front of it, block letters with all their names in a row. “We wrote our address and phone number,” Mr. Leverett explains. “If you’re ever in New York, call us.”
Mrs. Leverett embraces her warmly, and as they leave, América is jealous of their togetherness, their ability to move in and out of her life with such ease, with no thought to what they might have meant to her. She imagines that the minute they get on the plane to New York, she will be just another of their vacation memories. But she wishes to be remembered specifically, not as one of the smiling faces tourists encounter on their way to the beach or in a restaurant or quietly pushing a cleaning cart down a hall.
With the money she earned from the Leveretts, including the twenty-five dollars they gave her in the envelope, América is able to afford reinstalling telephone service. The first person she calls is Rosalinda. Their conversation consists of silence more than speech, as each word on either side is evaluated by the other for hidden meanings and innuendoes.
“How’s school?” “It’s okay.”
“Are the nuns nice?” “They’re okay.”
“Have you made any friends?” “Why do you want to know?”
“Well, it’s a new town and everything…” “I met some girls.”
“Do you like Tía Estrella and Prima Fefa?”
“They’re okay.” Silence. Silence. Silence. “Why do you ask so many questions?”
“How else will I find out how you’re doing?” “I’m fine!”
“I want to make sure—”
“If I need anything, I’ll call.”
“Will you come back for a visit, the long weekend maybe?” “I have exams.”
“Maybe I’ll come out and see you.” “If you want to.”
“All right then, take care of yourself.” “Okay.”
“Bye.”
“Bye.” América hangs up, feels like throwing the phone across the bedroom the minute she does. It is this rage in her that Ros- alinda must sense, this anger that dealing with Rosalinda gener- ates within her, which evolves into a painful, vacant longing to hold her close.
Every mother she knows talks about her children this way, a mixture of love and displeasure coloring the words, a sense of defeat lurking beneath the surface but never emerging fully, as if hope keeps squelching it down. She imagines she was a disap- pointment to Ester and concludes that it’s a mother’s fate to be continually disappointed by her children.
Maybe I expect too much, she considers, then shakes her head. I only expected her to do the opposite of what I did. That’s not so hard. She sees what getting pregnant at fourteen has meant. América turns over on her bed, punches her pillow a couple of times before settling her head.
But there’s hope. She’s in school, trying to get her life together. So what if she had sex? The fiery rage that bubbles beneath her skin explodes, and she beats on the pillow, her fists tight, again and again, beats the pillow until it’s flat in places, lumpy in others. She throws it across the room, cries quietly, her hands pressed against her belly.
If Rosalinda were a boy, she would be calling him a man. If Rosalinda were a boy and were having sex at fourteen, there would be sly looks and jokes, and pride that his “equipment” works. If Rosalinda were a boy, América would forgive him, be- cause that’s what men are, sexual creatures with a direct link from brain to balls.
It is expected that boys will be men, but girls are never sup- posed to be women. Girls are supposed to go directly from girl- hood to married motherhood with no stops in between, to have more self-control, to not allow passion to rule their actions, to be able to say no and mean it. When a boy has sex, it elevates him in the eyes of other people. When a girl has sex, she falls.
That was my mistake. I fell and never rose above it. América gets up, picks up her pillow, fluffs it up, sets it on her bed, and lies down again, on her side, hugging the pillow around her head. No, I fell and let Correa keep me down. The thought startles her, forces her eyes open to the dark. I let him. I let him because he’s a man. No other reason. He’s not smarter than me. He’s bigger, and stronger, and he frightens me. But I’m smarter. She shuts her eyes tight, and bright balls of light explode inside her head. Some kind of smart I am, letting Correa control my life. Real smart!
