Because We Are: A Novel of Haiti (43 page)

Libète quieted, holding tight to the Nurse’s back.

— I have another question.

— Yes?

— There is a man on this island.

— There are many men on this island.

— Yes, but there is a man on this island, a police officer, with the name Limyè. I don’t know his first name. He is with the police, or was. Do you know of him?

— A policeman? Named Limyè? I’m sorry, no. I have only been here since the earthquake.

Libète did not follow with another question.

— This aunt of yours, the Nurse asked. The sick one. What is her illness?

Libète searched for an appropriate one.

— AIDS.

— Ah. I hope she receives the treatment she needs.

They rode on in silence much of the way, and Libète was happy for it. She had not slept well on the street last night, and the bike’s dull vibrations made her doze on the long trip up and into the hills.

The Nurse let her off at a patch of road familiar to Libète, the exact spot where Limyè had taken her to board the taptap that took her away.

— Goodbye, madam
infimye
. Thank you for the help.

— It’s nothing. I hope you find your aunt well.

Libète nodded, her eyes following the Nurse as she continued her slow climb up the hazardous country roads. She proceeded onto a path she knew well, one that would take her past the old watering hole and toward home.

Two hours later, Libète nears the edge of the woods. The
lakou
she grew up in is not far now, and she can see the clustered houses laying before her. Anticipation makes her stomach leap and roll and crush. She runs, the excitement claiming her, wondering which of her neighbors she will find and how her goats are faring.

She is at the first home now. She slows, breathing hard as she locks eyes with her neighbors. But they are not neighbors, rather foreign faces she doesn’t know or recognize. Has her memory failed her?

She walks now, more self-conscious, eyes to the well-worn trail, making a point to no longer meet the heavy, suspicious stares. She counts the homes as she once did,
en, de, twa, kat
, reaching the end of the road.

There is not a fifth one.

It is gone.

Where her home once stood is charred soil. No goats. No hanging curtain. No lamp in the window, and most of all, no mother to greet her.

Elize rests on a mat on the floor of St. Sebastian’s hospital. It was madness getting him here.

Libète dipped deep into her hidden money to hire a truck and two men to carry him from his remote shack. There was no doubt in her mind it was worth it. He needed a doctor. That was that.

The children rode with him in the back of the truck, straight to the hospital. It was difficult to leave Titid behind, but there was no choice—a pig would not be welcome in a hospital ward.

Libète remained at Elize’s side as he came in and out of lingering sleep. Though his fever abated, he was weak and listless.

The activity at the hospital had ratcheted up as more cholera patients streamed in from all quarters, some on foot, others in the arms of loved ones, others on makeshift stretchers.

Jak looked about the ward wide-eyed. He had not been here since his leg was mended prior to the quake. The smell from buckets of waste pouring out of the patients was putrid, curling his nostrils and stomach. Groans could be heard spilling from patients, and many of the sick were relegated to sitting in buckets so that their watery diarrhea would not plop down on the floor.

He felt out of place. A few weary staff ran about tending to the nearly hundred sick who were trying to wait out the deadly bacterium that wrung the liquid out of them like a wrenched sponge. He saw only two nurses and two doctors, one being the white woman who spoke Kreyol. He wondered why there weren’t more on the ward floor.
Surely others will come soon?

Libète still rubbed Elize’s hand, trying to stir him. She kept her face low, trying to evade Sister Françoise, the sting of their last encounter not far from her thoughts. With even more cholera patients and so little help, the nun would once again be out of her depth. Despite her efforts, the exhausted Sister spotted Libète and hurried over after replacing a spent IV bag.

— Hello, Libète.

— Hello, Sister Françoise.

— You have a sick friend here?

She nodded.

The doctor felt the old man’s wrist for his pulse. How long has he been like this?

— Since when we woke this morning.

— Hmm. He needs more fluids and some food. But it’s not cholera, since there is no diarrhea. Otherwise, a man in his state might already be gone. I’ll have a nurse tend to him soon.

— Thank you.

— And Libète—I am sorry. For the way I spoke to you the last time.

Libète looked down. It’s alright. It was deserved. I stopped coming. I stopped helping.

— No. It’s not alright. Patience is not a gift I possess. I pray for it, every day, but God hasn’t given it yet.

Libète did not know what to say, or what the doctor nun wished to hear.

— Libète, she said. I need you. Right now. You can see we are jam-packed without enough help. We had visiting doctors, but they were called to the Artibonite to tend to the sick there. I have more doctors and nurses arriving from the United States tomorrow morning, but there are not enough hands here to care for everyone. I see you and your friend are not ill, and I’m very afraid for those who might die between now and then. I wonder if you could help us get through the rest of this day and night?

Libète was shocked. Jak didn’t know how to feel. What could the two of us even do? Libète asked.

— You see these buckets? It’s a very important job to empty them in the container outside. If the hospital is not clean then the infection will spread. We also need to keep people drinking, keep them hydrated. I keep trying to get more assistance, but as I said, most who can are already working where it’s even worse.

Libète stood and took a deep breath, the odor nearly overtaking her. She coughed before moving toward Jak, whispering in his ear. What do you think? she asked.

— I’m afraid, he whispered back, his voice giving way.

— Me too. But I think we must do what we can. These people are us, from Cité Soleil. They need us.

He gave a slight, hesitant nod. Libète turned back to Sister Françoise.

— Tell us what to do and we’ll do it.

How could this have happened?
She staggers to the rectangular plot where her home once stood and drops to the ground. It looks like the remnants of an open fire, similar to what she saw after cooking fires burned in the camps, but writ large.

I need answers
.

An unrecognized woman, maybe in her thirties, watches Libète from the door of what used to be Marie Elise’s home.

— How? Libète calls out to her, dumbstruck. What happened?

— A fire, she calls back.

— But who set it?

— I do not know.

— How long ago?

— Awhile.

— But how long?

The woman shrugged. I am new here. It was before my time.

— Would the others know?

— They are new here, too.

Libète didn’t know what to make of it. She stared at the ground a while longer.

— Do you need something? the woman called.

The gnawing feeling in her belly made it difficult to process. Some food, she said.
And the truth,
she thought.

— Come, child.

Libète walked across the grassy expanse between the homes, looking over her shoulder once more.

She stepped inside while the woman bent over a stove to produce some mayi. She cut open an avocado and placed half in the bowl of steaming porridge she handed to Libète.

— Thank you for your kindness, madam. You’re very generous.

— You don’t look well. You’re from around here? You seem to know the place.

— I left. A long time ago. I do not seem to know it anymore. May I?

The woman nodded. Libète sat on the ground and began to eat the porridge, its temperature forcing her to go more slowly than she otherwise would.

— What is your name?

— Libète, she said, chewing with her mouth wide open to vent steam. The food made her break into a tentative sweat.

— And where are you from?

— From Port-au-Prince.

— Port-au-Prince? But who are you with?

— Myself. I am alone.

— But, I mean, who did you travel with?

— It’s as I said. Only me.

Surprised, the woman weighed this.

Libète asked a question through a bite of smooth avocado. Where is Marie Elise, the one who had this house before you? Where did she and her husband go?

The woman hesitated. I am not sure. Maybe down to the settlement? One of the big foreign organizations built shelters on the slopes. They are not too far. You know the trail to the north of here? Libète nodded. You can follow that by foot for about two hours. Many people went there. She could be one of them.

Libète blew on another spoonful of porridge before forcing it in her mouth. Where are you from? And what is your work?

The woman blinked uneasily, but answered anyway. My husband builds the shelters in the settlement. And I grow food at a community garden, not far.

— That is good. Your home is nice. You have food, and a bed, and a table, and a stove. That is more than I had when I lived here.

— Why did you leave?

— My mother died. Libète used her tongue to pick a bit of avocado out of a molar. And my father sent me away.

— Then your father is still here? What is his name?

Libète sighed. Limyè. Officer Limyè, with the police.

The woman gasped, dropping a plastic cup from which she sipped water. He’s…your father?

— Yes—and I can see that you know him to be a bad man. Don’t worry—I know it already.

— That doesn’t matter, she said, her countenance a gathering storm. Finish your food and be off. Maybe you will find who you look for down at the shelters, maybe not, but stay away from here. Tell another soul about who your father is, and I promise, trouble will follow.

The children toil into the night. The dull hum of overhead fluorescent bulbs makes sleep at the hospital seem wrong.

Other volunteers from the neighborhood have come, but only two older women. All of them were given masks, latex gloves, and plastic aprons to protect them from the buckets of cholera-ridden waste they carry, but this does not keep it from sloshing about and splashing upon their limbs and clothes. Each time it touches Libète, she shudders and reminds herself to bathe before touching anything. She steels herself, remembering her exhaustion can be nothing like that of the suffering sick. She sings softly and prays aloud.

— Libète?

She leaps at the voice. It is weak and low, and Elize’s.

Dropping her bucket, she rushes to his side. Yes? she smiles, careful not to touch him. You’re with us again!

— Water, please, he whimpers. I need some water. She pulls her gloves off and washes her hands carefully at a sink in the corner of the ward as instructed by Sister Françoise. There are many plastic cups stacked in a cabinet beneath the sink, and she rushes to fill one and return it to the old man.