Barnacle Love (11 page)

Antonio’s reaction was immediate; he shut his legs and gathered the marbles that stuck to the back of his sweaty knees. He saw his father and took a few steps
toward him but then saw the agitated look on his face. Antonio ran to his mother instead, who sat on a bench between her sister, Aunt Louisa, and her best friend, Carmen, whom she hadn’t seen since she had left more than ten years ago. Aunt Candida had refused to stay after the funeral. She had departed on the first flight home.

They sat lazily licking their
gelados.
His mother dabbed beads of sweat from her face with her kerchief and raised the burden of her hair with her forearm to cool the back of her neck.

“What is it,
filho
?” she asked as Antonio crawled up and slipped into her lap. She offered him a lick of her
gelado.
Terezinha came running after Antonio but stopped behind the bench and took the weight of her mother’s hair into her hands.

“Blow,
filha.
”

His mother closed her eyelids in the refreshing pleasure of it all and raised her glistening face to the sun. She sunk further into the bench and Antonio enjoyed sliding down with her.

“Was it all worth it, Georgina?” Carmen asked.

“Carmen,” she responded, “what my mother-in-law did will always remain with me. But, yes.” She lifted Antonio’s bangs with the side of her open palm. She looked at him through slit eyes and blew on his forehead through smiling lips. “I’d say it was all worth it.”

Aunt Louisa turned to Carmen and whispered, “That woman’s with the devil now.” Georgina responded with a reproachful glance, as if to suggest the children had been through enough already, witnessed far more than they should have at their age. Antonio stopped twirling his
mother’s gold crucifix. Undeterred, Aunt Louisa began to tell the story of the wedding preparation …

Antonio could almost picture his mother’s soft, plump arms and delicate fingers reaching up to the ceiling so that her mother and sister could shimmy the poof of white over her head. It was the town’s wedding dress, the same one that all young girls in the village of Lomba da Maia wore when they married men they were barely allowed to know. They would wiggle their hips to allow the communal dress to sit as well as it could before it was unstitched, pinned, and stitched and seamed once again for that week’s bride.

“Your father loved me,” Grandmother Theresa had said to her daughter.

“Manuel loves me too.”

“You are not the one he came for and—”

“And what,
Mãe
? Huh? Silvia was the one he came to Portugal for. Is that what you want to hear? Well, she said
no
… and I said yes.”

Georgina knew very little about Manuel, other than that he was twenty-six and he looked forward to sharing a life in Canada. They weren’t allowed to spend time together. She could only lean out the window as Manuel stood outside, his two feet planted firmly on the dirt road. That was just the way things were.

“That’s the way they still are,” Carmen added. The women laughed.

“I thought that what
was
there could grow.” Georgina contemplated her words lazily. The women all nodded in agreement; Carmen even sighed.

Terezinha cupped her mouth with her hand to stop herself from giggling. All this talk of romance and
marriage was too much for her. Luckily, Senhora Genevieve’s small dog came yelping into the square, chasing after the hens. Terezinha saw it as a necessary diversion and ran after it—
tormenting things smaller than her is her specialty
, Antonio thought. Antonio stayed still, hopeful that his mother had forgotten he was sitting on her lap, breathing in her smell of Skin-So-Soft; she had purchased the whole line from the Avon catalogue.

Georgina said that Manuel’s offer of marriage had been an ongoing topic of conversation for the better part of the week. It was his mother’s duty to propose on his behalf, and she had done so grudgingly.

“‘As you know, my son Manuel has chosen a different path,’” Aunt Louisa mocked. “I have heard, Maria,” had been Grandmother Theresa’s response. Grandmother Maria had held up her hand. This was something she
had
to do and it would be done as duty dictated.

“‘He has now chosen your daughter.’” Aunt Louisa could still mimic the bitterness in her voice. “‘One can only hope that your daughter is … a virgin.’”

The two women, Maria and Theresa, had been friends since childhood. Their words were few, but even back then Georgina had sensed they could read each other with an acuteness usually reserved for siblings.

“My mother was furious,” Georgina said. “‘That woman … she floats up to my front door in her black dress, saying,
You should be happy my Manuel has chosen your daughter.
’

“‘Stop
Mãe
, please,’ I had pleaded.

“‘
One would hope she’s a virgin, Theresa.
The nerve of that woman.’”

Grandmother Theresa had wiped the spittle from her lips, stepped back and sat on the wooden chair by the bedroom window. She had reached back, slid her black kerchief from her head and brought her graying hair up over her shoulder. She had begun to braid slowly as she gazed out the front window.

“‘She doesn’t want this to happen. She’ll make it a hell for you.’

“‘I’ll be far away from her,
Mãe
, in Canada.’

“‘She is a presence that will cross the oceans to Terra Nova. Mark my words. I know her. She has spoken of nothing else these last two years while her Manuel was away in Canada: Silvia, the heiress to forty head of cattle …
my Silvia, so
delicata,
will make him come home—will make a life for him here full of
fortuna.
I lost him once, I won’t lose him again.
’

“I knelt before my mother and looked up at her fragile neck. ‘I need to get away,
Mãe.
This is my chance.’ I looked out my window toward the church of
Nossa Senhora do Rosário.
My mother continued braiding her hair and mumbling her prayers. Soon, she would knot the few strands that remained at the tip tightly to keep her braid in place. My hand rested on the windowsill and I’ll always remember the heat of my mother’s hand when she placed it over mine.”

Antonio watched the dogs that lay carelessly in the middle of the road. Some had matted clumps or patches of fur peeling from their skin. Every so often, one would lift its head and lamely attempt to snap its crooked jowl at a fly before laying its head back down on the parched earth.

Antonio’s mother looked down at him. She kissed his nose, drew him in close to her, then rested her chin on his head.

“I remember looking down the dusty street of Rua Nova until it disappeared into a wide swatch of blue. Beyond was my future.”

Antonio rested the side of his head on his mother’s chest. He could feel the crucifix digging into his temple as he looked across the square and met with his father’s stern look. Antonio closed his eyes, pretended to sleep.

“Take this off,
filho.
” Georgina seemed agitated by the heat and Antonio’s drenched blazer. She fought to get him out of it. He slid down her bare legs and sat at her feet, just as Terezinha came bouncing along. She held her hands open, all plastered with white fur. Her worn Thumbelina was tucked under her arm. “
Mãe
, that stupid dog, Pocas or Pipocas or whatever, he was playing with my Thumbelina and look what he did!” Her doll’s feet had been chewed off right up to the ankles, leaving her with hollow tubes for legs.

“She didn’t work anymore, anyway,” Antonio giggled.

His sister was about to pounce when she heard the sound of shuffling slippers and turned to see Senhora Genevieve coming toward them. She waved her hands and mouthed angry sounds that no one really understood. The women frowned and made pleading gestures that they were sorry. Senhora Genevieve grabbed Terezinha’s hands and plucked at the white fur she had stripped from her dog’s back. Georgina assured her that her daughter would be kept far away from her little dog. Senhora Genevieve was not satisfied as she turned and
left. Terezinha stood behind her mother and picked what remained of the dog’s fur, soft like candy floss, from between the webbing of her sweaty fingers.

It was obvious from Georgina’s smile that she was fond of her daughter’s resilience. Even at six, Antonio knew his mother saw something in his sister’s spirit that reminded her of herself.

“To this day the village still speaks of your wedding, you know,” Carmen offered.

“And to think it almost never happened,” Georgina said.

“You had second thoughts?” Aunt Louisa sounded surprised.

Satisfied that she had roused interest, Georgina nodded. “I did, but I wouldn’t let her win.” She continued her story, spurred by the vision of Terezinha, who had kicked off her shoes and was now twirling barefoot in the afternoon sun.

The making-of-the-bed was to be held in her home. It was an old marriage ritual that many Portuguese had long since abandoned, especially those who lived in the larger cities. But for the women of Lomba da Maia, it was yet another opportunity to socialize and to preserve tradition, and her future mother-in-law had insisted. The house that evening had been filled with the warm smells of fresh corn-bread, and the scent of olive oil used to make sweet dough sprinkled with sugar had mixed with the warm evening air.

“But it was the smell of my mother, the way I breathed her in, that I remember the most; apricot soap with a hint of dried straw—the smell I knew I needed to carry with me to Canada.”

The old sheets had been placed on Georgina’s bed, and the table had been set outside for the men. Her mother moved through the house in a frenzy, sure that there was enough food, certain that the outhouse had been scrubbed and sufficiently stuffed with pine branches. She couldn’t think straight, everything had to be just right. “I remember wrapping my arms around her, holding on even tighter, and breathing in deeply.”

People arrived shortly thereafter. The women sat on the benches that had been brought in from the barn and placed closely against the thick earthen walls of the kitchen. For a while the men, in suits far too small for their farmers’ bodies, scurried to the backyard to be with the other men, to smoke and play cards and drink.

Theresa heard a knock on the front door. She opened it and met Maria’s gracious smile. It was far too large for the contempt she knew Maria felt toward this marriage.

“I saw Manuel looking over his mother’s shoulder to steal a glance at me. I was carrying a tray of buttered corn-bread across the hall. It’s funny the things you remember. I looked over and quickened my pace. I kissed that woman’s sagging cheeks, but all the while I looked into my Manuel’s round face and large blue eyes. I’ll never forget how he smiled at me.”

Antonio looked across the square to see where his sister had run off to. She sat on her father’s lap, swung her pink feet as she tried to play his hand of cards. He resisted at first, then gave in as he always did, blew his cigarette smoke from the side of his mouth and looked over at his wife and son.

“What did he say, Georgina?” Carmen was eager to get the romantic epic back on track.

“His mother looked at Manuel sternly. It was enough to get him to fidget nervously with his tie and then head straight for the back door to meet with the other men. He tripped when he looked back at me.” Georgina smiled at the recollection of her small victory.

All night, Georgina had tried to approach her future mother-in-law, but every time she got near, Grandmother Maria would turn and begin a conversation with someone beside her. They had shared a few forced smiles. But, Georgina was certain that soon the awkwardness and the contempt would have to give way to something more familial, whatever that was. “‘Time has a way of doing that,’ my mother used to say.” Georgina shook her head, still caught in disbelief.

Grandmother Maria had entered the kitchen and sat in the corner on a low wooden stool. She pretended to read her Bible; she couldn’t read and everyone knew this, but she was far too pious for anything to be said. The other women busied themselves with needlepoint or crochet. Some knitted while others enjoyed the unfolding drama.

She laid her Bible down on her lap.

“‘Two weeks ago your daughter was alone, with nothing, and now … well, tomorrow she’ll marry my son, who I already lost once. Soon, our two families will be forever bound.’” Theresa’s metal crochet needles clicked faster, and stumbled as she picked up her pace.

“And then my mother stopped,” Georgina said. “‘
We
,’ and she stressed the word while looking sideways at my
future mother-in-law, ‘are very happy with this blessed union.’

“‘I don’t know,’ my mother-in-law added. ‘My husband used to say that men are all barnacles. A barnacle starts out life swimming freely in the ocean. But, when it matures, it must settle down and choose a home. My dear husband used to say that it chooses to live with other barnacles of the same kind so that they can mate. He first chose Silvia … and then, well—’ Maria stopped.

“My mother rose from her bench. Her shoulders rolled back as if ready to spring.

“‘You’re trying my patience, Maria.’ But I moved to block my mother’s step. The anger had given her the strength to push against me and move toward my mother-in-law. I pleaded with her not to ruin my night. ‘I’m wasting my time with you, Maria. You have come into my home and insulted my family. For that you will pay dearly. Mark my words. You hold on to that Bible, now try to hold on to some self-respect. We have a ceremony to perform so that my daughter can marry, marry your son, and move
far away
to her new life.’

“My mother moved out of the kitchen, her long silver braid sweeping like a pendulum across her back, and slammed her bedroom door. The stress she placed on those two words,
far away
, had its desired effect. My mother-in-law’s eyes turned cold. But then her frown became a smug smile.”

It was the custom that each woman proceed alone to the bedroom, where she would leave a small token between the sheets, or tucked under the fitted one. There was no formal order, but it had long been understood
that the young women would first bring sweet and hopeful offerings; the older women then brought symbolic gifts, usually bitter, with little or no fondness for the innocence of what was once promised them. The list of possible offerings was long; sugar sprinkled over the sheets symbolized a life of sweetness, eggs nestled under the pillows blessed the bride’s fertility. Some of the scorned women brought roses: the petals reminded the bride of passion and the thorns of the pain and suffering love would inevitably bring. Each woman went in alone with her offering for the young couple.