God Loves Haiti (9780062348142) (16 page)

Hollywood went to work. Under Alain's jealous eyes, the man from the city of pretend heroes solemnly picked up and dragged each dead stranger's body with the help only of the bright moonlight over to the camp's cemetery, then dug a hole and buried them. Alain saw the foreigner tenderly bury his dead compatriots with disbelieving eyes and pangs of guilt from his inability to help. The graves were
crude, not that deep. The dirt covering them was thin. A good gust of prehurricane wind in the summer could unmask the dead and their seemingly slumbering faces. People around the world tended to presume the dead were innocent, or that each death, with its complete finality, deserved our pity, even sympathy, because a dead bastard, even though he was a bastard, is, after all, still dead, dealing with the great unknowns of fate, reinforcing our core belief that no one deserves to die, especially us. There had to be something self-serving in this view, Alain had come to think. It must mean that if one accepts that some or most people deserve to die—since until God tells us otherwise, everyone will die, and deservedly so, as far as He seems concerned—the implication is that I deserve to die too, and this idea sucks too much for a lot of people to accept. No one wants to die. Even people who believe in heaven don't want to die. Even the elderly, reduced to infantilism and practically mute, stunned with constant pain, always feel death is a dish that will be best served to their friends and not them, because, well, they are special, and their friends clearly less special and more deserving to die than they are, though they love their friends and wish them heaven. Those on their deathbeds are probably not unlike most of us in that way too. They believe deep in their bones that a last-minute escape from death will materialize and protect them when they need it most, when death comes calling, whether they expected her or not, and whether they believed they earned heaven or hell.

Alain stopped being one of those people after the earthquake. The second after he woke up on the dirt from the earth's blow, and for the many days afterward that he spent helplessly watching piles of extinguished human bodies grow and grow around him and be removed from sight like so much trash, he couldn't for the life of him figure out why he deserved to live and so many people deserved to die during and after those fateful thirty-five seconds. The numbers of dead from the earthquake and aftershocks were estimated to range from a few thousand to a million, according to news reports on Radio Ginen. Knowing full well that the correct number would fall somewhere in the middle, about a half million, if Haiti was lucky, Alain found the blow to his society to be particularly grotesque. He couldn't find the optimistic muscles to forgive God. He couldn't question God's sanity candidly, even to himself, so he did what so many people do when convulsed by divine deception: he put his own faith in question. He wondered whether he deserved another dawn, another dream, more human touch. He found himself wanting. His impulse was to negate his own existence. He accepted a growing belief that life was fleeting and trivial and death could be a respite, and even a reward, from it all. Though the presence of strange little Xavier occasionally pacified his spiritual torment, when the boy slept, Alain felt the misery in the people around him and across the island fall over his head, against his will, like an assault of a thousand jackhammers.
He'd sit on his cardboard cushion and stare at his stretched-out wounded leg and zone out. Anything was better than sleep and the recurring nightmare of an avalanche of crippled and dead Haitians asking him, Why? Why? Why? WHY? as he ran away. They were always in a fucking forest. Running and running and running, breathlessly. The dead kept chasing Alain from all angles. Their questions were louder each time. Why? Why? WHY? I don't know! I don't know! I don't know! Alain screamed while running for his life.

That's pretty good use of the word “fuck,” Hollywood said, ending Alain's reverie.

The movie star had plopped down on the ground next to him. Thoroughly exhausted, he looked at least fifty years old, about twice Alain's age. His face was heavily lined and pink and crinkly-eyed handsome. He radiated warmth, not grandiosity, probably to protect Alain's ego, probably out of habit. He unpacked his duffel bag and seemed to need to connect with Alain to work through the adrenaline high of his extraordinary efforts that evening.

I think I recognize your accent, he said. Brooklyn, right? You're a New Yorker.

Yeah, Alain said. Some of the time.

I was born there. Parents moved us to California not long after.

I was born here, Alain said, and moved out there soon afterward. California's nice. Good weather.

Not as nice as the weather here.

You like it here, huh?

What's not to like? The weather, the women, the music, the art, the food, the dancing, the women, the women. Did I mention the women? I could be very happy here. Say, that leg looks fucked-up. Have you had someone look at it?

Yeah, then they looked away.

Funny. Get some rest. I'll be awake for another couple of hours.

No, man, you should get some sleep. You had a heck of a night. Just leave that bat with me.

I'd love to, but I can't sleep. I haven't been able to sleep since I saw the first CNN report on the earthquake. People running, crying, buildings falling, confused children. When I close my eyes and relax, I see them chasing me.

Me too.

Same dream?

Same nightmare.

Why don't you go home? You sound like someone who probably has a nice home in the hills here. You know they were largely untouched right?

I'm not surprised. God protects the rich.

Look, God had nothing to do with what happened here.

Was that supposed to make me feel better?

You know what I mean.

Why don't you go home? You have no business here.

In the black of the night, they heard a stirring. A crunch. It was creepy. Really, couldn't the earthquake have left at least one functional streetlight? Alain thought. Alain and Hollywood tensed up and tried to play it cool at the same time. The noise came from behind where they were sitting. New marauders were in Alain's tent. Fuck. A hand touched Alain's shoulder from the side. It was Xavier. Only he could sneak up and touch you without scaring the shit out of you. How the hell does he do that?

Xav
, c'est toi
! Alain said.

The six-year-old newly minted orphan nodded in a way that told Alain it was OK for him to breathe easy. He was in good hands.

Meet our new neighbor . . .

Steve.

Hollywood's real name was Steve, but Alain preferred calling him Hollywood, as he watched hands that had held Oscars shake Xavier's hand. Xavier held the star's hands in both of his and looked at the scars on Hollywood's wrists. Hollywood turned red with shame. Hollywood looked away.

Nice to meet you, little guy, he said. I'm going to get some rest now. It's been a long night.

With that, Hollywood crawled into the little tent he had pitched and promptly fell asleep. His Timberland boots poked outside it. Xavier looked at Alain and suggested he do the same. Alain dragged himself into their
tarp tent and promptly fell asleep too, despite the crowing of roosters and the azuring sky outside.

A
lain Destiné did not dream that evening, nor did he have time to write a diary entry to Natasha about the movie star who saved his life. In fact he didn't get to sleep much at all before a commotion outside his tent woke him up. He heard a happy voice, that of Philippe, his comrade in refugee leadership, calling his name.

Alain! Alain! You got to hear this!

Alain rolled over and began to crawl out of his tent. His upper-body strength had improved enough that his face no longer grazed the mud in his tent when he crawled out of it. Once his face had appeared outside the tent, Philippe and another buddy, Gilbert, gave him a hand to get on his feet. Shading his eyes from the bright sun, he saw Hollywood sitting on the ground outside his tent, sipping a cup of coffee, casually, so cool in fact he might as well have been in Saint-Tropez or Saint Bart's instead of disaster-struck Port-au-Prince. Beyond Philippe's entourage, a crowd of refugees were coming toward Alain's tent, no doubt to hear what the commotion was about too.

Man, listen to her, Philippe said. Her idea is genius! Genius.

A bright, freckle-faced little girl of about twelve years old emerged from the middle of the crowd. In that typically Haitian way of talking, as if addressing a nation
after a march on Washington, she said her name was Alyssa. Mr. Alain, she said, I think the camp could use a memorial in honor of the people who died during the earthquake.

A what?

A memorial, sir. A piece of architecture, art, or a quiet area where, if you see it, you are meant to pause in tribute to all the lives we lost and be grateful and optimistic about the future. I had an uncle who visited from New York after 9/11, and he said just reading about people arguing about what shape the memorial should take helped New Yorkers begin to recover from the 9/11 terrorist attacks. I think trying to put a memorial in Place Pigeon would do the same for people here.

What the fuck is this little girl talking about? Alain thought. To Alain, a moment of pause during these stressful times had come to mean time for reflection, and reflection meant time to cut yourself with soul-searing grief about the past events and the vagaries of the future, which was inevitably transformed into volcanic anger at the intolerably sunny but unknowable future of their people. “Our” people, that is the key word, isn't it? Chill out, Alain. The girl might be on to something.

Think about it, Alain, Philippe said. If Place Pigeon becomes the first refugee camp to establish a memorial for those suffering from goudou-goudou, we'll get more attention than the other camps, and more help. The world will know we're ready to work our way out of this mess.
We have to do it. Especially considering our location across from the Palais. Look how fucked-up it still is!

Alain didn't look. He avoided looking at it these days. Too disheartening.

And, if you pull it off, you'll show the world that Haitians can take care of and honor themselves, Hollywood said.

These were his first words to anyone other than Alain since he'd installed himself in Place Pigeon. Everyone turned their attention en masse to the blue-eyed man in their midst. It was as if they hadn't noticed he was there all that time. So he can talk, an old lady on Alain's right said.

As you guys can tell, I'm not from here.
Mon français est très moche
, Steve said.

Haitians don't say
moche
, Alain thought. The French do. But everyone got the gist of what Hollywood was trying to say anyway.

Where I come from, and around the world, everyone feels terrible about what happened to you. The damage the earthquake caused is horrible. It's mind-blowing, really. In fact, because we sense how great your need is, my people also know that whatever help we send you will only scratch the surface. It'll barely make a dent. We'll barely stop the bleeding. But that's OK. Yes, it is, really. You guys have taken care of yourselves for centuries. Before the white men came. Even before the Africans came. This place is never going to be Switzerland. It never was,
nor does it aspire to be, right? But you manage. You make the best of things anyway, don't you?

A few uh-huhs floated through the crowd. Not bad, Hollywood. Alain thought. I might have to rename you Oscar. Go on.

I'm pretty useless to your deep humanitarian needs. They're out of my league. I'm rich, but I ain't that rich.

A few people chuckled.

I'm here because I need redemption, Hollywood said. I need to work for you and for you to eventually tell me I'm an OK human being. My second wife left me last fall after twenty years of putting up with my dickhead ways. No one wants to talk to me where I live. Everyone took her side. And rightly so. Only my agent takes my calls these days.

C'est quoi ça
?

It was a teenager. He, like most of them, had no idea what an agent was. Get it together, Hollywood Alain thought. You might lose them.

An agent? An agent is your best friend in the world as long as your work gets them a percentage of your income so that they can enjoy it more than you. Anyway, my work is not that important. I'm not a doctor or an alchemist or Rambo. All of whom would be far more useful to you in the situation you live in these days than an actor.

Ah-ha, Alain thought. You really are that movie star! Shit, what was your best movie? The one when you played the rapist? Or the cokehead or the corrupt cop? Come to
think of it, you're damn good at playing creeps. No wonder you can't keep your women.

Good for nothing as I am, I think I can help you put together a great memorial. After all, spectacle is my forte. You guys are pretty ahead of the curve by thinking of this project this soon during the crisis. I think it's a terrific idea.

All right then, Alain said. Thank you. Everybody, this is Steve. Thanks also for choosing to help our community, Steve. We know you could be anywhere in the world but here. We're grateful for that. So . . . what's your name again?

Alyssa, said the girl.

Alyssa, do you have a particular type of memorial in mind? Across the Champ de Mars, there already exists a hideous tower bequeathed to us by an otherwise smart past president. Our memorial has to have two phases: one we could set up a quick and interesting foundation for in the short term, and another for long-term construction.

I don't know, Alyssa said. I like statues.

Good idea, Alain said. We all like statues, I think. Is there a sculptor around?

How about a beam of light like New York City did on the site of the twin towers? a boy named Gilbert said.

How about fireworks? another kid said.

Oy vey, Alain thought. This is going to take a while.

No, no, we should create something using the cheapest and most available material around us, a busty woman said.