The Revolutionaries Try Again (29 page)

XVIII / THE NIGHT BEFORE ALMA'S FIRST VOICE OF WITNESS INTERVIEW

Or my brother Rolando returning the orange that was supposed to be / what was it supposed to be / our father was the princess you're the princess Dad I'm the purr asleep in the forest hide in the kitchen quick / the princess hides in the kitchen / the princess enters the forest with an orange in his hand / on tiptoe Dad go back / the princess reenters up on his toes / uff / waking me by tapping me on the shoulder two times the same pattern on purpose so I would remember him maybe my father once told me if you set the same song on repeat before bedtime you'll feel as if time hasn't passed when you awake tap / tap as if giving life to a door / reloj no marques las horas / no / our profe will not want to hear about tap / taps on my shoulder or an orange that was supposed to be what was it supposed to be our profe said he was volunteering for a book of interviews about undocumented immigrants please share your terrible experiences with me he didn't say terrible experiences he just said stories / experiences / lives / of course he meant terrible experiences nobody wants a book of wonderful immigrant experiences I didn't say yes to him when he asked wasn't even in his class / was in his class / wasn't there to learn / my friend Estela was there to learn basic English phrases every Wednesday before the meeting of the women's collective at El Centro Legal one day I arrived early none of the women were there usually Estela was there to talk to / how did you and Estela meet? / we'd been assigned to the same address two housecleaners were needed when we were done Estela said let's find us pupusas for dinner Estela sharing casual anecdotes about her life in Guatemala as if she'd practiced how to be amenable company at home look I'm okay / hello good day / a water truck in Estela's hometown had a horn that howled like an elephant Estela interrupting herself or something inside / outside of her interrupting her how can a human being do that to another human being to children the driver of the water truck a funnyman who mounted plastic elephant fangs atop his water truck elephants
don't howl what do they do / Estela interrupting herself and I holding Estela's hand what else could I do she was crying / not crying / hello good day / would Estela have been comforted if I'd shared with her that in the mountains in a camp in Guatemala / no / she wouldn't have been comforted how do you comfort a mother tell me that profe please in the mountains in a camp in Guatemala I'd been waiting to cross the border into the United States armed men barging inside abducting some of the men in our group who were sleeping on the floor around me I was asleep / wasn't asleep / scared / can't remember any sounds how is that possible barging inside with machine guns combat boots wrestling masks the men on the floor who were taken away didn't scream / I did / didn't / pretend you're asleep Alma / the men on the floor resigned to anything happening to them I wasn't resigned how can you not be resigned to anything happening to you when you haven't been able to wash in a week / twenty days a foul smell that turns out to be you is that what you want to hear in our interview tomorrow profe all the terrible things that I'll remember tonight you'll record from me tomorrow / not everything Alma / I'll never find comfort in this bed this room away from you and Dad Rolando / that's not true Alma / I know that Rolandish / our first interview tomorrow what will I share / not share with you profe the mold under my fingernails after not washing for a week / twenty days in the mountains of Guatemala how cold I felt the coldest I've ever felt in my life like being submerged in ice / no / like a wind from Antarctica sent after you / wherever she is find her / didn't know where I was we'd been hiding inside a bus Líneas Los Pajaros couldn't see the patrolmen searching for us / a cold wind descending on your skin staying there I can get used to this you think then across the earth another wind finds you wave after / wave a remote beach in Salinas where my brother Rolando and I are strolling into the sea the water not even reaching our knees little waves chasing one another / don't tell him about our beach Alma / quick hide in the kitchen Dad / why can't I tell him about our beach Rolando you think sharing our beach invalidates our memory somehow that's silly what if one day I forget about our beach we need a record maybe / a starfish look / find a
tape recorder and record yourself instead Alma / Estela crying / not crying during our pupusas dinner nobody at the tables nearby in that Salvadorian restaurant hidden behind a storefront on Mission Street thought it odd that she was crying an old man in a checkered gabardine suit approaching us he looked like one of those singers from Los Panchos with a raspy voice from a lifetime of cigarettes my father saying to our chainsmoking neighbor Don Pascacio even the drool on your pillow smells like smoke / what does your drool smell like Dad / ewww / an old man in a checkered gabardine suit approaching us so solemnly he probably has been starching his checkered suit every morning since before I was born holding up his soup plate placing it in front of Estela like a birthday cake saying here we are my dear / that was it / and Estela drank the old man's soup? / yes the whole thing profe / the waiter who hadn't starched his guayabera apologizing don't mind him he's a veteran from the ouster against Somoza / here we are / in the mountains in a camp in Guatemala avoiding the men in our group some of them had tried to abuse the women I was relieved when some of the men on the floor were abducted / they were trying to cross the border just like you Alma / I'm sorry / you don't know if they were the ones trying to abuse the women it was probably the ones in charge don't you think those men bunched on the floor were as scared as you / I'm sorry / arriving early for the meeting of the women's collective at El Centro Legal none of the women were there usually Estela was there to talk to / Estela is from Guatemala profe she didn't want to tell me what had happened to her in Guatemala the librarian at the San Francisco Library who spoke Spanish handed me four volumes from a report called Guatemala Never Again I didn't want to open Volume I / The Impact of Violence / Volume II / The Mechanism of Horror / maybe you were right to not tell me anything Estela what's the point of telling anybody anything profe / come listen to the remarkable story of Alma Alban Cienfuegos who pretends to endure in the end / The End / uff your story made us feel better thank you so much for pretending you're okay for us have a good one Alma / here we are / please take care Alma / the librarian who spoke Spanish smiling at me pushing a book cart with
crosseyed wheels I couldn't leave without at least opening Guatemala Never Again the librarian had looked so proud of me when I'd asked him about Guatemala finding the name of Estela's village in Volume I what's the point of repeating those atrocities here profe how can a human being do that to another human being to children arriving early for the meeting of the women's collective at El Centro Legal all the women were there twenty / twenty five of them inside the conference room a young man in a business shirt with stripes no starch talking in Spanish to them he's our brand new English teacher his name's Antonio José a volunteer nice one eh Estela said joining his class for the last five minutes no place to sit he removed the motorcycle helmet from his chair offered the chair to me holding a photocopy of a page from a study book with drawings of people at work the women repeating with him broom / bucket / chair I knew some of the women there already knew these words what were they doing there he said let's go around the room now Estela at least twenty years older than me fifty / sixty years old maybe ashamed of her English she'd been a schoolteacher in Guatemala she'd arrived to the United States alone didn't look so ashamed in front of you profe / broom / bucket / chair and you correcting her in Spanish her pronunciation a crossword they could solve together very good Estela you see bucket is tough for us Latin Americans that u sounds like a moo let me write it on the board how it sounds in Spanish boquet see / bo instead of bu / boquet / rolling up the sleeves of his business shirt with stripes above his elbows embarrassed that his shirt was too tight on the chest that his shirt probably cost more than the chairs / stacks of legal encyclopedias in that conference room he was about my age younger maybe please don't tell him I'm from Guayaquil Estela what if he knows Julio Esteros Guayaquil is so small for months I didn't think of him I was busy caring for an elderly woman who didn't look like my grandmother didn't like me claimed her sons were going to care for her berated me for not understanding most of her mumblings about a shameless waiter who'd sniffed a cocktail before serving it to the couple next to her table at an Argentinean steakhouse arriving at El Centro Legal the women older than our profe by twenty /
thirty years surprising him at the end of class with gifts Estela was there too she hadn't said anything to me about gifts I hadn't seen her that week we tried to see each other at least once a week / Almita let's meet for / Estelita I have a confession to make I can't stand those pupusas from your native country / don't blame me I'm not Salvadorian / oh ha ha / my brother Rolando and I watching a miniseries about aliens while my father hauled crates to the Isla Santay past midnight / my father putting us to bed flipping a coin whoever wins picks the bedtime story / me / me / me / my brother Rolando demanding we use the same coin every time / why is that? / couldn't say profe hey Rolando why is that / I told you that's between us Alma / if you don't tell me I'll invent something / don't believe you / my brother demanding we use the same coin every time because he loved fabricating useless talismans of luck / that's not why Alma / because he snuck it under his armpit when we weren't looking so as to bias the outcome somehow / ugh / can't remember even one of my father's bedtime stories anymore profe how is that possible / Rolando and I with a flashlight sneaking into the living room after hearing my father's snores searching for flying saucers out the window / growl / zzz / growl / I'm so sorry Estela I thought pupusas were from Guatemala whenever I complained about something Estela said don't blame me I'm not Salvadorian / here we are / the women at El Centro Legal surprising you with gifts Estela was there too she didn't tell me anything about gifts she was caring for a toddler who dragged his pink umbrella everywhere the tip of it leaving behind a trail of doodles on the gravel our profe unwrapping his gifts a tiny bodysuit with a tulip / rainbow mittens / a beanie hat with antlers / white bibs with owls / his girlfriend from Poland was having a baby how did the women know about the baby he thanked the women stunned you could tell he didn't want to say much he knew he would cry if he said anything Estela asked him if he'd picked a name / Lilia Klara he said / think of us Lilia Klara / thank you for being so patient with us profe the women said tomorrow's our first interview what do you want to hear from me profe tell me please / here we are / tap / tap / the kitten awakes in the forest / on tiptoe Dad / my toes can't handle the weight /
shhh no talking Dad / the princess holding the orange in his hand canvasing the horizon the orange purposefully unattended behind his back the kitten swiping the orange from the princess's hand the princess sobbing / like a mime Dad no noises go back / the princess sobbing noiselessly / quick exit the stage Dad / The End / again / you're the audience Rolando / again / my brother Rolando must have been two years old so tiny didn't speak can't remember much of anything anymore profe what if I omit the terrible does that increase the chances of forgetting year / after year these memories dissipating from me that's not how it works Alma / how does it work Rolando tell me how it works or I'll share more than just our beach tomorrow / I'm sorry Alma / descending from a camp in the mountains of Guatemala patrolmen capturing us interrogating us one of them poured his glass on my head not much rum left melted ice one ice cube hadn't melted yet bounced on my head like a coconut isn't that funny the sawdust on the floor cut marks on my wrists the rope smelling of manure the policeman saying we can't waste our resources sending you back to Ecuador Luis Alberto dump this mongrel in Gracias a Dios with all the rest of them a forsaken place homeless people refugees transients like me I didn't want to feel the backwash of rum in my hair flattened carton boxes for Hitachi televisions on that sidewalk with bloodstains / food stains didn't have money for food scared of everyone rows of destitute refugees sleeping on every corner reclined against brick walls / fences like spiderwebs from those futuristic movies my brother Rolando and I used to watch past midnight the thick layers of dust on my face making me feel safer / that's silly Alma / I'm invisible look / someone rolling down from the sidewalk to the road like a caterpillar asleep immobile there embalmed there couldn't tell if he was alive / cover your face Alma / against a wall I slept / no / I'm sorry ask me about something else profe / do you call your father often? / something else profe please I / the night before I was to leave Guayaquil my father on the cement floor of our bedroom pleading / a smaller place / a loan from the priests / anything I'll do please stay Alma / Rolando didn't stir you could spork a saucer by his ear and he wouldn't stir my father bunched on the cement floor
sobbing could barely hear him how is that possible / please Alma / like a tortoise shell my father there / Alma corazón / Rolando returning the orange didn't speak so tiny no hair on his head one curl on his forehead my father in our room with scissors shhh cutting a piece of Rolando's curl placing it inside a Ziploc bag / growl / zzz / growl / quick let's switch I'll be the audience you'll be the kitten Rolando / a band of military men in Gracias a Dios drinking from the same two liter bottle blindfolding the shortest one with what looked like a white sheet too long the ends dangling behind his head Rapunzel ha ha the men spinning him once / twice on the sidewalk a game of kicking whoever the blindfolded one stumbled upon golazo Trujillo the military men strolling and kicking homeless people refugees transients like me and I thinking of all the good things / bad things I've done in my life was it my turn look at that female swine they said lifting me shouting at me mocking each other's broken English slapping me to wake me I was awake / resigned / I'm sorry / open your eyes mongrel / something else profe / Alma corazón / look at this dwarf here he's a graduate from the School of the Americas isn't he ugly / that's not what your mother said / my mother's a Catholic she wouldn't date a priest killer / look who's talking machete boy / my mother wouldn't date her own son you imbecile / viva la puta de tu madre / the blindfolded one removing his blindfold examining me disgusted at me / remember fellows if she's not green doesn't crawl she'll do / blindfolding himself again his breath their breath crabfish onions rum throw up spitting at me / missing / burro ha ha / again / spitting at me / missing / frío frío / punching me on the stomach good one chino de verga ha ha / laugh you wench / Bruce Lee ha ha / disinfect her down there first Trujillo / don't spill the rum and Coke I'm next / esophagus breath ha ha / here we are / Rolando answering the phone in our house in Guayaquil didn't know what to say to me his voice too businesslike how are you / where are you / can barely hear you / come back if you don't adjust to that accursed country Dad's not here I'll tell him you called that wasn't the first time I'd called home after leaving Guayaquil profe the first time I called home I couldn't contain myself what's the use of worrying my father I told