Finding Miracles (19 page)

Mom was nodding, like she understood. But Dad still had a problem with my story. And I didn’t blame him. It wasn’t just Kate, I could see now, it was everyone in the family having to rearrange the puzzle pieces so that all our stories fit in. What if we couldn’t get the pieces back together and be a family again? That girl, Pandora, popped into my head, how after she opened that box of trouble, the world was never the same. Suddenly, I was the one feeling scared.

“Honestly, Mil, I don’t know where we failed you.” Dad looked frustrated. “I thought you felt you could come to us.”

“It’s not like I went sneaking . . . it just kind of...” Soon I was sobbing too hard to even try to explain.

And this was how I knew my parents and I, anyhow, were going to be okay. When Dad saw me sobbing, he hurried over and put his arm around me. He remembered to be my father before he remembered to finish his lecture.

“I’m sorry, Dad,” I said between sobs. “You’ve got to believe me. You didn’t fail me. The whole reason I could even go to Los Luceros is that I have you guys.” It sounded lame, like I was blaming them for what I’d done.

But Dad was really listening, head bowed. Like maybe this was making sense to him.

“And I want you to know that I actually found what I was looking for.”

Dad’s head snapped up, his eyes a little worried. Mom looked surprised.

“No, no, I don’t mean I found my birth parents. I mean...” How to explain this feeling that I’d touched bottom in my heart? How did I say that to anyone? How did I say it to my parents? “It’s like . . . I found . . . Milagros. I mean, I’m still me, Milly . . . but now, I’m more me.” How could something so simple sound so confusing?

But Mom and Dad were nodding as if to encourage me as I stumbled along. When I was done, Dad said, “We understand,” which caught me totally by surprise. That was usually Mom’s line.

“We would love to go see this place with you.” Mom was smiling, her eyes soft and moist.

“Ditto.” Dad nodded. My good old eloquent father! My sweet mom! I couldn’t help throwing my arms around them. It felt so good for a moment, but then sort of embarrassing when we pulled apart and we all had red eyes and stupid grins on our faces.

We hired a driver with a jeep—Dad did insist on a four-wheel-drive vehicle. Pablo came along as our guide. Before we set out for the interior, Dad made a last-ditch effort to make this a family trip. But there was no budging Nate from Grandma’s side after she mentioned making reservations for a whale-watching excursion. Meanwhile, Kate was back in her angry mode, still refusing to accept the fact that I had a birth family at all. “We
are
your family!” she insisted. Before we left, I scribbled a note. “Remember, no matter what, sisters
for life.
I love you and always will.” I just hoped the cousins didn’t find it first. Something I only thought about
after
I slipped the note under the door to their suite.

So the
milagrito
that almost didn’t happen happened, but it turned out different from what I’d planned. Our first stop in Los Luceros was the little church. Mom bought a
milagrito
medal in the shape of a heart for Happy and Eli, then bought one for our family, and some for all the friends who were now a part of our circle of family. Dad bought a car—he was still worrying about road safety! I found this
milagrito
of two figures with joined hands, a medal to protect twins. For Kate and me, I thought. The other one I picked out was a tiny ring. When I turned to show Pablo, he was holding one up, too.

“What’s that one for?” Dad asked the old lady selling them at the back of the church. While she explained that the ring
milagrito
was for weddings, for anniversaries, for vows made by a young novice before she became a bride of Christ, Pablo and I headed for the statue of the Virgin at the front of the church.

“Tu y yo,”
Pablo said, pinning his tiny ring to the Virgencita’s skirt.

You and I, like the flower. I smiled, remembering my first morning on the island. So many memories since! I pinned my ring next to his.

Then, while Mom and Dad were snapping a photo of the old lady and her panel of
milagritos,
we sealed our wish with a kiss and a thank you to the Virgencita.

The main reason for coming to the mountains was for Mom and Dad to meet Doña Gloria. But that first night with Dulce’s family, the whole town came over to greet the special visitors. It turned out they thought Mom and Dad were here from yet another Truth Commission to collect testimonies. Everyone had a story about some missing son or murdered father or brother or husband. Mom couldn’t stop crying. Meanwhile, Dad hardly talked, which is what he does instead of crying when he’s really upset. It wasn’t that Mom and Dad didn’t know this stuff had gone on, but now, because of me, they felt intimately connected to it.

After Mom and Dad went to bed, Pablo and I took a walk around the square. I told him that I was having second thoughts about taking them to Doña Gloria’s.

He had noticed, too. “Your parents feel responsible.”

“It’s like they’ve benefited from someone’s tragedy. I mean, our happiness as a family comes out of somebody else having had a horrible life. It doesn’t, I know,” I added when Pablo looked like he was going to protest, “but then again, it does.”

“But you wanted so much for them to meet Doña Gloria, no?” Pablo’s voice felt soothing, like Mom’s hand on my forehead when I had a fever.

“I know.” I sighed. “But tonight, when I looked at Mom and Dad, they seemed so sad and helpless. I felt like, well, like
they
needed a mom and dad.”

Pablo smiled sadly, as if he was thinking of his own parents and what they had been through.
“Pobrecitos,”
he agreed.

“I haven’t exactly been easy to live with for the last eight months. No, seriously,” I said before Pablo tried to defend me again.

Pablo put his arm around me and squeezed. “The truth is, your parents are so
especial
. They are people who spread more light.”

I wondered how I could have missed it! It seemed so obvious now. Mom and Dad didn’t have to come to this country; they didn’t have to adopt some sick little orphan. In some ways, they weren’t that different from Dolores and Javier and Tío Daniel and Pablo’s brothers. Why make it any harder for them now?

“Ever since Doña Gloria, I’ve been thinking what big heroic thing I could do with my life,” I admitted to Pablo, who nodded as if he entertained these thoughts, too. “But it’s like how in Spanish everything is a little this and a little that.” I had pointed it out to him: how his mother and aunt were always talking about our little meals, our little appetites, our little outings in the little afternoon.

“Well, I’m not the big-hero, capital-letters type person,” I went on. “I’m more a lowercase type. Milagritos, not Milagros.” I had to smile, thinking how my nickname did fit me. “And here’s a chance to do a little something. I can choose to spare my parents more grief. And it’s not just them. Oh, Pablo, you know what’ll happen if we take them up there. Doña Gloria will want to share all the stories she told us, and then probably some others she’s thought about since. And like you saw, it’s so hard on her to talk about all that stuff.”

“Milagritos, Milagritos.” Pablo rocked me in his arms. “And I was worried Doña Gloria’s stories would be too much for you. But this country has made you strong!”

I crumpled in his arms. “Who, me? Strong?” I thought of telling him what Ms. Morris had said about stories saving your life, stories helping you find yourself when you got lost. But I thought it was something Pablo and his family already knew. Why else had they sat for hours in front of that TV listening to those awful testimonies?

We walked in silence for a while, holding hands, pointing out the stars. “Looks like the sky is keeping Doña Gloria’s promise. . . . To make more light,” I added, though I doubted Pablo had forgotten. It seemed like there were twice as many tonight as before.

Maybe it was from looking at their light that I got the idea. “It’d be great for Doña Gloria’s great-granddaughter to go to school. You think maybe we can talk Tía Dulce into arranging it?”

Pablo looked doubtful. “You know how Tía Dulce is about girls leaving home. But the truth is that Doña Gloria is becoming too frail to live so isolated. She should move to town. That way, her great-granddaughter can have an opportunity. I think it’s a brilliant idea.”

“I got it from on high,” I joked, pointing at the sky.

“Then Tía Dulce will approve for sure.” Pablo laughed.

I looked up and caught myself wishing on stars again.

The next morning at breakfast, Mom and Dad looked wasted. It turned out that they hadn’t slept a wink all night.

“I think we should head back today,” I suggested. “We can be at the resort by tonight.”

They both tried not to look too eager. After all, they didn’t want to wimp out on our side trip. “Didn’t you want us to spend a couple of days here?” Dad asked, swallowing a yawn.

“I just wanted you to see this place,” I explained. “Next time, we can all come up together and stay longer. Now, it’s probably better if we get back.” I didn’t have to tell them about the tension between Kate and me. They could see it.

“Well, if you’re sure?” Mom asked.

“Totally,” I assured her.

Mom sighed with relief. “Then I think it probably is best, honey.”

We made plans to leave after lunch, stopping on the way to visit Abuelita. Pablo wanted my parents to meet his grandmother, and of course, he welcomed the opportunity to see her one last time. After all, he probably wouldn’t be back for another year.

“Is she the Doña Gloria you spoke of?” Mom wanted to know. “Or was that Dulce’s mother last night?” I couldn’t blame poor Mom. So many names and stories and people had come at them since they landed.

“Not really,” I said, hesitating. If I went into too much detail, Mom was going to feel she should visit Doña Gloria. And I was more and more convinced that I’d made the right choice by not taking my parents up to see her.

“Doña Gloria is one of the oldest inhabitants of this area,” Pablo stepped in. But I could see he didn’t know where to head with his explanation. “She knows many more stories.”

“I think we’ve heard enough stories for now,” Dad said grimly.

We rolled into the resort late that night. But no one was in their rooms, not even Nate, who was supposed to have a little cot in Aunt Joan’s room until Mom and Dad returned.

“What on earth?” Dad said.

“They are watching the stars,” the man at the front desk explained. He gestured toward the back of the hotel. “There is a shower of light,” he added, bowing politely as if he were announcing a special on the menu. We had heard about the meteor shower from Pablo’s brothers in the capital.

We walked down some steps to an outdoor courtyard that hung above the sea. I could hear the waves crashing on the cliffs below. Torches were flaring around the perimeter, like this was an episode from some
Survivor
-type show on TV. And this was the little miracle we found: my family, in all their splendid, complicated, ornery glory, sprawled on those lounge chairs that you can slide back to the exact degree you want to tan when the sun is showing. The cuzzes were arguing with Aunt Joan about what a meteor shower actually meant. Meanwhile, Nate was snuggled beside Happy, who sat next to Mr. Strong, holding his hand across the space between them. Off to the side, her towel wrapped around her like a protective cocoon, I spotted Kate.

Everyone twisted around to look at us.

“
What
are you doing
here
?” they all seemed to ask at the same time.

While Mom and Dad explained and Pablo went off to hunt down some more lounge chairs, I headed for Kate. It took her a second to acknowledge I was there. “What’re you guys doing back?” she asked, like she didn’t care.

“We missed you too much,” I said. So she wouldn’t think I was teasing her, I added, “It’s not the same without you, you know.” No response. It was like a Shakespeare soliloquy talking to my sister these days. Sometimes I’d ask myself, why keep trying? But then I’d hung in there with Happy, and Kate was like Mother Teresa in comparison. “So, can I scoot in beside you, sister-for-life?” I invited myself.

She didn’t say anything, but she did make room for me.

“Has it started yet?” I asked, glancing up. The stars looked pretty awesome already. I couldn’t imagine a meteor shower topping this sight.

“Not yet,” she murmured. “Though Nate keeps screaming every few minutes that he’s seen
something
.”

“Ah, family,” I sighed.

“You said it,” Kate sighed back, like she
was
Mother Teresa. But she was smiling. I was sure of it, even if I couldn’t really see her face in the dim light. She was my sister, I knew her moves. I could tell a smile from a scowl. I could sense she was starting to trust that love was going to hold us together after all. Give or take a few bumps.

Suddenly, attendants were hurrying around, snuffing out the torches. We looked up.

“Hey!” we all seemed to cry out at once. The light show was starting.