Finding Miracles (17 page)

“What exactly happened to him?” I almost didn’t want to find out. The story was already too much like
Romeo and
Juliet
to have a happy ending.

“Who knows,” Dulce said, shrugging. “Do you know, Doña Gloria?”

Doña Gloria shook her head. “God only knows. But if you go to the cemetery, you will see where his family put up a cross, a beautiful one his father made of mahogany.”

Pablo had been kicking at the ground as the story unfolded. Maybe he identified with Manuel, who had been his age when he disappeared. I was thinking about the boxes Manuel’s father used to make. Perhaps Manuel had given one to Alicia to keep her jewelry?

Bright sunshine was now pouring in the doorway. Dulce’s family would be wondering what was taking us so long. On our way out of town, Dulce had told
el viejo del
centro,
the old man on the square, where we were going. According to Dulce,
el viejo
was like the town crier. He would spread the word. But by now, her family would be expecting us back. Pablo, Dulce, and I looked at each other—time to go.

“I don’t know that either story belongs to you,” Doña Gloria concluded, nodding in my general direction. “But these are the only two girls born in the spring of that year.”

Suddenly, her great-granddaughter began violently shaking the back of the rocker. She made pained sounds, like she was trying to say something she had just remembered.

Doña Gloria reached out and seized the girl’s hand.
“¿Qué? ¿Qué?”
What is it? “Get the stick!” Doña Gloria ordered. “Write it for these people.”

The girl ran and grabbed a long stick propped up in the corner by the entrance. Its end had been sharpened, as if just for this purpose. She brushed off the dirt floor in front of her with a bare foot and painfully began to draw some letters. Each twisted shape took great effort—exactly how I used to write before all my tutoring lessons!

We waited as she scratched out the name.

“Dolores Alba,” we read out loud when she had finished.

“¡Ay, Dios santo!”
Doña Gloria exclaimed. “This girl remembers more than I do. There was a third girl born that spring. Dolores Alba had her baby some months before they captured her.”

“Dolores,” Doña Gloria said as she rocked forward. “Alba.” She rocked backward. “Dolores Alba. How could I forget the pride of Los Luceros!”

Dolores Alba, Dolores Alba,
the clacks of the rocker now seemed to repeat, over and over, forward, backward.

My hands had been totally calm since I’d landed in this country. Now—it wasn’t exactly that they itched, they were tingling with excitement.

“Dolores Alba was the first woman to join the rebels,” Dulce explained to Pablo and me. “Isn’t that so, Doña Gloria?”

Doña Gloria rocked forward as if nodding yes. “Dolores came from a long line of freedom fighters. On both sides, she was related to Estrella, the founder of our nation.” Doña Gloria nodded a reminder in my direction. “That was why the family had the custom to carry a
peso
with their ancestor’s picture on it—you’ve seen those old coins?”

My coin! It must have come from Dolores! Of course, the mahogany box could have come from Manuel and Alicia, the locks of hair braided together from Rosa and Pelo Negro. But Dolores was brave and her family were freedom fighters. I wanted her for my birth mother.

“Like all of the Estrellas, Dolores had a fire burning inside her,” Doña Gloria went on. “I don’t know how to explain it. They all seemed to be born with an itch they couldn’t get to. Thank the Lord that our Estrellas here in Los Luceros have always used that passion for the good. But there were scattered Estrellas who joined the military, and that same fire was used in the service of you know who.”

I wondered if, as a scattered member of the family, I would misuse that fire, too? Did I even have it in me? Maybe it had gone out when I was adopted and moved to another country? Maybe it had been reduced to the burning of a skin rash?

“This Dolores,
pobrecita,
by the time of her first bleeding, she was already an orphan. Her father had been taken away for organizing the coffee pickers. Two brothers were shot by the
guardia
during one of their massacres. The third was smuggled out of the country but then returned and was captured. After torturing him, they dumped him from one of their helicopters. Dolores’s mother could not bear up under all this grief. One morning—who knows if it was an accident—her body was found at the bottom of a cliff,
muertecita
.”

A little dead? Even in Spanish, you couldn’t make some things sound less horrible than they were.

“But what the mother couldn’t resist, the daughter learned to bear. She had been well named, Dolores. Sorrows. But her
apellido,
her last name, was Alba, the dawn, the sun coming up after the dark night. In this way, too, nature teaches us to hope.”

“Dios no nos abandona,”
Dulce agreed. God does not abandon us. Just hearing about Dolores seemed to be making Dulce more hopeful.

“The men who had not been killed joined up with the guerrilla and went away to their hidden camps in the mountains. Dolores’s cousin, Javier Estrella, among them. I don’t know how that boy lived to be a man. Since he was a little thing”—Doña Gloria motioned with her hand just above the floor—“that boy was fighting the dictatorship. One time the
guardia
came through Los Luceros, and from the roof of the feed store, Javier shot off the colonel’s cap with a slingshot!”

“
Ay, Dios santo,
I remember that day!” Dulce exclaimed. “
¡Ay, qué susto!
What a fright we had! The men were lined up in the square. We thought they would all be shot. But as they stood in plain sight, a second shot came and tore off a medal from the colonel’s chest. There was the proof! The culprit could not be one of our men.
Gracias a
Dios,
thanks be to God, they were all spared! Meanwhile, the
guardia
combed the town, but nada. Nothing. I don’t know how that little monkey got away!”

Doña Gloria kept nodding as Dulce recounted the incident. “
Ése mismo,
that same Javier, became a revolutionary
comandante
with the guerrilla. Young as he was, he had the love and trust of the people. Many in Los Luceros joined up. Dolores tried. She made several petitions, but the
comandante
turned her down. Back then, the guerrilla was not taking women. But the different cells needed a safe drop-off house for the whole area, so Dolores offered hers. Of course, the whole town knew. El viejo del centro—that old man repeats everything! His ears are connected to his mouth.”

“I hope
el viejo
told Mamá about our visit this morning,” Dulce worried out loud. The shaft of sunlight now cut deeper into the room, slicing the interior into brighter and darker portions. “Everyone now thinks the worst if one is late.”

“This will not take much longer,” Doña Gloria assured her. “
Lamentablemente,
such tragic lives make brief stories. A lamentable thing. The next time the
guardia
came through Los Luceros with their tortures, the weaker ones crumbled under the rod and revolver, and they talked. The name that kept coming up was Dolores Alba. Of course, the
guardia
raided her house. But it was not her
destino
to die that day. As it happens, she was down in the valley buying supplies, delivering messages. Someone got word to her there, and she knew not to come back to the village. There was nothing for it, Dolores was obligated to go underground. The guerrilla had to accept the first woman among them.”

“What a life for her!” Dulce was shaking her head. “A woman alone in a rebel camp with all that bombing and fighting.”

“But even in times of war, love reserves some arrows for the heart,” Doña Gloria reminded her. “Dolores and her cousin Javier fell in love. Fire joining with fire. They were going to save the world together.”

“Third cousins.” Dulce had worked it out. “They would not need a dispensation for marriage.”

“Marriage? Ha!” Doña Gloria gave a decisive shake of the head. “You didn’t know those two! They would come and stay with me from time to time. A night stolen from the revolution. After I fed them, we would go out and sit under the stars, and those two would start in on their theories and ideas. One time I mentioned marriage,
ay, Dios
mío,
why was that? Marriage was an oppressive, capitalist institution, an extension of the mentality of ownership.
¡Qué sé yo!
What do I know? It gave me a headache to hear them talk. I told them, how can you win a revolution with ideas that we simple people can’t understand? ‘You know more than all of us put together!’ they laughed back.”

“Marriage is a holy sacrament,” Dulce said, as if Javier and Dolores were there to be improved by her lecture. “Ay, Doña Gloria. You hear that kind of talk now all the time from the young people.” Dulce glanced over at Pablo, trying to look cross, but smiling in spite of herself.

“Marriage or no marriage, Dolores was soon with child,” Doña Gloria went on. “I remember one night she appeared here by herself and said to me, ‘Compañera Gloria’—oh yes, that was what she called me; she said
doña
was a title that promoted the capitalist class system—‘Compañera Gloria, a child is a luxury I cannot afford right now. I need to get rid of it.’”

My heart had been soaring with pride for my chosen, freedom-fighting birth parents. Now it plummeted with the realization that the one mother I would have wanted hadn’t wanted me to even be born!

“I gave that girl a scolding like you would not believe.” Doña Gloria scowled, as if remembering that scene. “You see, that was the reason I didn’t remember this third birth right away. For a time, I assumed Dolores had found a way to abort that
criatura
. But then I heard from some of her
compañeros
that Dolores was fighting alongside them, wearing a man’s shirt to hide her growing belly. Sometime that spring, Dolores gave light to her little girl. When Javier went down to the capital to organize the urban guerrilla, Dolores went with him. That’s where they were captured.”

“Do you think she really didn’t want me?” I blurted out before I even realized what I was saying. “I mean, didn’t want her child?”

Pablo reached for my hand again. For the first time, Dulce seemed to notice another pair of young lovers right before her eyes. She blinked in surprise.

Doña Gloria squinted into the distance like she could see something that the rest of us could not make out. “If Dolores were alive today, she would thank me for the advice I gave her. Without our children, we lose the future. We lose our stories. Our dreams die!”

“I am sure that Dolores was very glad to be a mother in the end,” Dulce threw in. “Many times God spares us from making mistakes we will later regret.” I knew she was trying to make me feel better. But sometimes I wished she wouldn’t put her God spin on everything.

“What finally happened to Javier and Dolores?” Pablo asked. It was as if by holding my hand, he had absorbed the question which I both dreaded but needed to ask.

“Javier and Dolores were captured one night in the capital, delivering arms in a borrowed car. No one knows if the child was with them. But all three vanished without a trace. So many, so many”—Doña Gloria motioned with her hands in the air—“every story one tells these days marks a grave.”

By now, the room was bright with sunlight. It shone on Doña Gloria’s old face. I wanted to put my hands on it and soak in her stories. Dolores and Javier, Alicia and Manuel, Rosa and her colonel, any of them could have been my birth parents. Maybe I could claim a part of each one, just as there was a little detail from each story that fit into the puzzle of my past.

“Thank you for these stories, Doña Gloria,” Pablo spoke up for all of us. “We will not forget them,” he promised.

“You must do more than that!” Doña Gloria scolded, wagging her finger blindly at the air in front of her. “You are all we have left. You must bring about the harvest of what we have planted!”

Just hearing her say that made me feel trembly all over. Not only my hands were tingling now. It was as if Doña Gloria were lighting that Estrella flame inside me.

Doña Gloria had stopped her chair. She reached out, flailing her arms in the air until she found what she was looking for, her great-granddaughter’s arm. Slowly, she lifted herself to her feet and walked us to the door. We stood basking in the sunlight, enjoying the warm brightness shining down on us. It felt like a blessing after the dark stories in the dark house.

Dulce stepped up first, bowing her head for a blessing. “
La bendición,
Doña Gloria.”

“Your blessing, Doña Gloria,” Pablo echoed.

It was my turn to say goodbye, but I couldn’t get the words out. Suddenly, I could not help myself. I threw my arms around Doña Gloria, as if she were the birth mother I’d been searching for. I could feel her taking me in with her whole being. Doña Gloria had saved my life—not only by preventing my abortion, if Dolores and Javier were indeed my birth parents, but right now by telling me stories that made me feel lucky just to be alive.

“
Gracias,
Doña Gloria.” I was sobbing. I couldn’t seem to let go.

“Milagritos,” Doña Gloria was whispering in my ear, as if to put little miracles inside me, as if to give me back my name. When I had calmed down, Doña Gloria released me. I felt ready to go.

“La bendición,”
I asked, bowing my head.

Doña Gloria lifted her hand in blessing. Her blind eyes looked off toward the path, the van waiting below, the horizon, the whole world out there waiting for us. “I’m counting on you,” she said. It was like she was sending us out on a mission or something.

“To do what?” Pablo wanted to know.

“To bring more light,” Doña Gloria replied.

10

finding miracles

WHEN I SAW the glint of silver in the distance, I started waving like crazy. We were waiting for Mom and Dad’s plane on the observation deck of the Aeropuerto Internacional de la Liberación del Pueblo. Liberated names seemed to go on and on. I often wondered what would happen if I ever had to say something fast in this country.

On the way, Pablo and I had stopped first at “our” cove for a quick dip and then a climb to the memorial stone. It was a weirdness I couldn’t get used to: how really fun stuff was all mixed up with really tragic stuff. Or maybe I was just noticing it more now?

At the airport bathroom, I looked in the mirror and wondered if my parents would even recognize me. My hair was wild and flyaway, my skin so deeply tanned that people came up to me and automatically started speaking Spanish.

“If you are not careful, you will forget all your English,” Pablo teased. “You will have to stay here forever.” He cocked his head, waiting for my reaction.

“No way, José!” I was not joking. I loved this country. But I missed home. I was looking forward to going back to Ralston. First, though, I wanted to share this place, where I had found a
familia
of friends, with my family. “That has to be their plane!” I insisted. The glint was now a tiny jet, getting bigger as it drew closer.

Pablo checked his watch. “I have never known the airlines to be early. But miracles happen—”

“As Tía Dulce always tells us,” I chimed in. Now that I had adopted her as my aunt, I could tease her all I wanted. If only she would stop trying to convert me. She had actually called Sor Arabia and found out that all babies at La Cuna had been baptized. According to Tía Dulce, I was already Catholic. Wait till my Jewish grandmother got a load of that!

Meanwhile, everyone, even Pablo, was calling me by my new nickname, Milagritos. Little miracles.

Only a few people were out on the observation deck with us. One woman held a parasol to keep the sun from darkening her skin. I mean, what’s the point of being on an observation deck, then obstructing your view under an umbrella?! But it was midday and it was hot. Most people preferred the air-conditioned lounge downstairs in the terminal. But I was so excited. I didn’t want a thick sheet of glass between me and my first glimpse of Mom and Dad!

I had called them the minute we got back from the mountains on Sunday night. They were so happy—actually, relieved was more like it. They had been worried, three whole days without hearing from me, no answer at the house. Dad had flipped out and bought a ticket to come down in search of me.

“You what?” I couldn’t believe it. “But I told you guys we were leaving for the weekend!”

“Why would we have worried if you’d told us?” Dad countered. “I called the State Department hotline, so I knew about the demonstrations.”

“What demonstrations?” I looked over at Pablo, who shook his head. He didn’t know of any demonstrations, either. “Dad, everything’s super peaceful here. You must have punched in the wrong extension and gotten a report for another country.”

“What do you think, I wouldn’t have noticed? I called more than once, you know.”

“I bet you did.”

Mom had been quiet at her end, listening to Dad and me bicker back and forth about whose fault it was that he was worrying. Finally, she got a word in. “We’re just glad to hear from you, honey. How are you doing?”

The gentleness in her voice did it. I burst into tears, right there in the Bolívars’ living room in the middle of all the unpacking. Everyone started tiptoeing out of the room. Except for Pablo, who came and put his arm around me and let me cry while he explained to my parents that I was fine. It had just been a hard weekend: the official ceremony in the capital, the trip up the mountains, the actual burial near his grandparents’ farm. Thank God, Pablo did not mention Los Luceros and Doña Gloria’s stories, given Dad’s present state of mind.

When I had calmed down, Pablo handed the phone back to me. “I’m sorry I worried you,” I said. “So much has been going on. Maybe I did forget to tell you.”

“I’m the one who’s sorry. I guess your old dad is turning into a real tyrant.”

Tyrant?
That was not a word I could use lightly anymore. And Dad was hardly a tyrant. Just a worrywart, overprotective, pain-in-the-butt parent I was suddenly missing like crazy. “So you’ve already bought a ticket, Dad?”

“Don’t worry, it’s refundable. I was just going to come down if I couldn’t get ahold of you.”

“But I want you guys to come.”

“Oh, honey, really?” Mom didn’t wait for me to have second thoughts. “We’ll have to see when we can get a flight down,” she told Dad on his extension.

Dad cleared his throat. “I, ah, I . . . I actually bought tickets for everyone . . . in case we all had to come down.” He sounded a little embarrassed about it. From her end, Mom said, “You did?”—like this was news to her. “I just thought . . . ,” Dad tried explaining.

“We’ll have to rebook Milly’s return so she can come back with us.” Mom was already thinking of everything.

Tía Dulce peeked in the doorway to make sure I was okay. I motioned for her and everybody to come back. It was raining outside. This was the only place to sit all together and have a bite before we crashed after the long drive.

“I’ll ask Pablo’s family about hotels around here.” I practically had to shout into the receiver above the voices of everyone returning to the living room.

Mrs. Bolívar overheard me as she brought in a tray of tea. “Tell them they have to stay here.” Everyone in the room started chanting, “Sí, sí, que vengan aquí.”

“You hear that?” I asked.

“Where are you?” Dad wanted to know. “It sounds like a bar.”

“Dad! I’m in the Bolívars’ living room.” Actually, the house was quieter than usual. The TV was off. And instead of the crowds we’d had before, now it was just
la familia,
eight human beings, and one jabbering parrot brought in off the rainy patio. After a long bout of silence, Pepito was now screeching all the swear words Riqui had taught him during the dictatorship.

Dad had to repeat their flight information several times. I could hardly hear. “Love you, guys,” I said before hanging up. We always said that for goodbye. It struck me it was our way of asking for
la bendición
.

On the way to the airport, Pablo and I had picked up the van Dad had reserved with his credit card. It seemed huge. But it was the only size left, and Dad had wanted something where we could all fit with our luggage. Before I even got a chance to ask, Mom had mentioned inviting Pablo to come along with us.

The plan was to spend a few days in the city followed by a couple of days traveling through the interior, then back to a beach resort near the capital for fun and relaxation. Dad was going to get his wish after all. Not the rocky coast of Maine, but palm trees and white sand and a lot warmer waves.

Part of my plan when we traveled inland was to take my family up to Los Luceros to meet Doña Gloria. Her voice still sounded in my head.
We’re counting on you,
she had said. But how was I, Milagros—I was taking my name back!—supposed to bring more light to my corner of the world? In a little over two weeks, my corner would be Ralston High. How would I even explain Doña Gloria to Em and our friends?

Pablo’s hands were on my shoulders.
“¿Qué pasa?”
I guess I did look like I was about to fall over from sunstroke.

“Just thinking about Ralston,” I explained. “It’s going to be so weird going back. I mean, such different worlds.”

“Yo sé,”
Pablo said quietly. Of course, he would know. He had looked so out of place that day in January when he stood in front of our class. “We are—what is it Jake and all of you call yourselves? The border people?”

“The borderliners.”

“Sí, los borderliners.” Pablo wove his fingers together. “We hold the worlds together. Without us”—he drew them apart—“everything falls apart.”

“I guess,” I agreed, smiling at the thought of “
los
borderliners”—Jake, Em, Dylan. I couldn’t wait to see them! This year, we were going to be the new leaders of our class. Maybe we could work our own little revolution, why not? I mean, look at everything that had happened to me since the day Pablo leaned across the lunch table and asked where I was from.

Thinking about it now on the observation deck, I felt such gratitude toward everyone and everything that had somehow brought me to this moment in my life.

“Thank you, thank you,” I whispered, closing my eyes. It would have shocked Tía Dulce to know this is the way I pray.

The roar overhead grew deafening. The plane was coming in for a landing.
“Vuelo de Nueva York,”
the voice over the speaker blared. Flight from New York. Ten minutes early!

Down on the runway, everyone was in motion. The jet-way wasn’t working, so stairs were being rolled forward by several workmen. Small carts buzzed around like bumper cars at the county fair. In a totally time-warp moment, a donkey with two baskets of flowers strapped to its saddle— like those ornaments people put on their lawns—was led out on the runway by a man wearing a
sombrero
. They were followed by a combo of musicians in colorful peasant costumes. “What’s going on?” I asked Pablo.

“It’s for
los turistas
.” The country was trying hard to draw tourists after twenty or so years of being a war zone. Our own flight hadn’t gotten this kind of reception because we had made a connection through Puerto Rico and weren’t targeted as tourist material.

The musicians broke into a lively tune as the passengers began deplaning. The donkey guy bowed to each female passenger and handed her a flower. It was a little much, but that’s what I loved about this place. Stuff that was over the top in the States was no big deal here.

As each person stepped out of the plane, I felt a rise of anticipation, then a dip of disappointment when it wasn’t a member of my family.

But this time, the boy in the Boston Red Sox cap was Nate! He was looking around excitedly, probably thinking he was back in Disney World—the palm trees, the costumes, the little donkey. I waved, but he didn’t see me. Behind him came Kate looking oh-so-cool in a pair of snappy sunglasses and black capri pants with a hot pink belly shirt—stuff she’d probably gotten on her shopping spree with Grandma in New York. Mom and Dad followed, looking wonderfully like the same old Mom and Dad! I waved and hollered. But of course, they couldn’t hear me above the noise of luggage carts and the musicians playing.

That was it for my family, or so I thought. But then Dad turned to a familiar-looking woman emerging behind him. She was wearing a long, flowered caftan I had seen before. A pale, skinny man in an outrageously colorful Hawaiian shirt followed, a hand on her elbow.

Happy?! Eli Strong?! My hand froze in midair. And just then, Happy looked up and spotted me. She must have called down to the others, because suddenly my whole family began waving.

From the noisy reunion outside Customs, you’d think we hadn’t seen each other for months, not just under two weeks! So much had happened that we couldn’t wait until we were all in the van to tell each other about.

The biggest, immediate surprise was Happy’s presence. I guess Dad had called to confirm they were all leaving (on Happy’s credit card!), and Happy had invited herself along, adding that she was bringing someone special.

“That’s all she told us,” Mom said, picking up the story where Dad had left off. “We meet up with her at Kennedy this morning, and there she was with Mr. Strong.”

“Eli, please,” Mr. Strong corrected her. He really looked odd in his wild parrot-and-palm-tree shirt. Like the Mona Lisa with a mustache or something.

“And they’re gonna get married here!” Nate could not contain himself.

“Where?” I asked, though really the question could just as well have been why? when? what for?

“I’ve always wanted a wedding on a tropical island,” Happy said in a dreamy voice. I guess by number five she was entitled. She glanced over at Eli, whose fair complexion was already blushed under the sun. Did she really bat her eyes at him?

Pablo looked over at me. I knew what he was thinking. We knew the perfect place for a tropical wedding, our cove.

Somehow, with so much news to exchange and luggage to load, we managed to get everybody in the van. Now I could see why Dad had chosen such a big one. We actually ended up strapping some of the suitcases to the luggage rack on top. Happy was not one to travel light—certainly not to her own wedding!

First stop was the new hotel in the center of the old city. The Bolívars had insisted we stay with them, but even if all the Bolívars moved in with friends and relatives, which is what they were planning to do to make room for their guests—even so, their vacated house would have been too small for all of us. I mean, Happy was used to a whole mansion just to herself!

Besides, Happy wanted the whole family to be together. It turned out that Aunt Joan and the girls would be arriving tomorrow, without Uncle Stan, who unfortunately was recovering from a hemorrhoid operation. (Thank you, Aunt Joan, for the details!)

Although my family ended up declining the Bolívars’ invitation, I asked to be allowed to stay with them until we left the city. Mom must have seen the glance that passed between Pablo and me, because before Dad could start in that this was a family trip and we had to stick together, she spoke up. “I think it’s a good idea. That way, the Bolívars won’t be completely offended by our not staying with them. Besides, I sure hope we’re not going to all stick together
every
minute. It’d be kind of nice to have a little . . . tropical time alone.” Mom flashed Dad a look not unlike the one Happy had given Eli. At least she didn’t bat her eyes at him.

I wanted to tell Mom and Dad everything that had happened, but my heart was so full. I didn’t know where to start.

I kept thinking about Ms. Morris’s exercise where we wrote down a couple of details that revealed our secret heart and soul. I had a hundred on my mind. The donkey on the runway, the squalling babies in the nursery at the orphanage, Riqui’s infectious laughter, the sound of Doña Gloria’s voice.