Lost in the City: Tree of Desire and Serafin (4 page)

7

They walked toward a small park
with bare trees and dry earth. A group of dark children were playing soccer with a flabby ball that hardly budged. The dust made Cristina's eyes burn. Joaquín seemed to feel better when he saw the game, and he even dropped his sister's hand. The sun was setting in the distance.

Cristina saw a church at the end of the park, and her heart lightened. Maybe they could spend the night there. Also, its mere existence comforted her. She looked at the high belfry outlined against the afternoon and remembered the words of Father Roldán, an old friend of the family: “Only praying and being close to God will save us. All the rest is Hell.” And Cristina opened her eyes wide, “Hell? With fire?” The priest smiled and patted her cheek. “Yes, with a big fire, though we won't see it.” Mamá protested: “Father, what kind of things are you telling her?” The priest sat her on his lap: “So she'll know and begin to recognize the place she's fallen to.” And Cristina's mind was engraved with the image of the flames we do not see and the invisible fire that surrounds us. At times, even when she was happiest, she thought she could see high, rose-colored tongues around her, feel their heat, and imagine their quivering shadows making designs on the wall.

There were very few people around. All she could hear was the low murmur of a group of women in dark shawls saying their rosaries in the front pews. Cristina passed by one woman who glanced at her out of the corner of her eye, bent over, and hid her rosary even more in her hands, as if the girl might attack her or rob her. Cristina and Joaquín sat down in a pew; she held his hand very tightly and began to look around. A saint looked down on her from
the top of a column with a chiding gesture and pointing a finger on high as if signaling her guilt: “Ah, Cristina, ah!” Cristina shivered. Was this the place where she was going to feel calmer? In a stained glass window, where a bright yellow light filtered through, the Virgin Mary was holding the Christ Child in her lap with nebulous hands that seemed to rock him without moving him while she looked at him with half-closed eyes. Cristina concentrated on that window and, although she tried not to, remembered when she used to go to sleep in her mother's arms. She was sure the image—curiously similar to the one in the window—had been real some years earlier. Mamá had cuddled her, telling her to go to sleep, that nothing was going to happen, that she was there to take care of her and so was Papá. Joaquín was not yet born, and she felt she could abandon herself in her mother's arms without having to think of anything, simply close her eyes and be in another place where there were no conflicts, nor yelling, nor fire. She did not remember the feeling exactly, but was sure it was as she imagined.

However, something had changed that night when she awakened crying out because she dreamed Papá was burning in the flames. Mamá had come to her bedroom and had told her nothing had happened to Papá, he was sleeping very quietly, and she should do the same, and all three of them would always be very happy, and so would the expected little brother. And Mamá had tucked her in and blessed her, saying, my beautiful little girl, my princess, my little sweetness. That night—how long ago was it?—she did not believe that really nothing would happen to them, and the following day she moved around like a sleepwalker, not concentrating on anything. There seemed to be a presence, a shadow, hovering over her and Mamá and Papá, something indefinable that would happen soon.

Joaquín remained asleep in her lap as she stroked his hair. In spite of everything, she felt happy to be there with Joaquín. It would be good if they could spend the night in the church and tomorrow find out how to get out of the city . . . She leaned back in the pew.

She was awakened by the sharp voice of a priest with white hair
and dark eyebrows who was bending over them and looking at them furiously.

“Hey, hey, what are you doing here . . . We're going to close up the church. You have to leave.”

“Couldn't we . . .?”

“Come on. You have to leave. What are you doing here at this hour?”

“But, just tonight . . .”

“Tonight, what?”

“To sleep here, my little brother and me.”

“Are you crazy? Don't you have a home?”

“Yes, we do, but . . . just tonight.”

“What? I've already told you we have to close the church.”

The priest seemed to be really anxious, opening and closing his hands as if he were squeezing lemons.

“Where are your parents?” he insisted.

“Well, they're not here because . . . they've gone on a trip. But if we can stay here, an aunt is coming tomorrow to get us . . .”

“Aunt or no aunt. Do you live near here?”

“Yes.”

“Then go home, go on.” And he grabbed her arm pulling her up.

“Joaquín, Joaquín!” Cristina said, trying to wake him, but he was sound asleep.

“Come on, come on, child!” and he almost made her fall.

“Joaquín!”

The boy woke up crying.

“We have to go, Joaquín.”

The child stood up, still crying, and his sister pulled him by the hand toward the big wooden door, followed closely by the priest, walking bent over and waving his arms to hurry them.

As she went out, Cristina turned to say please, but stopped when she saw those eyes in the silvery light from the street. They were eyes such as she had never seen, with a glare of cast iron. And then the half-open mouth, as if about to drool. She took two steps back and grabbed Joaquín's hand.

“All right, we're going.”

But the priest didn't hear her because he went back into the
church and Cristina heard the screech of the key in the lock. And then another key in the lock below, with turn after turn that seemed to harden the wood.

8

Cristina looked bleakly
at the night spreading over the park, deepening it, turning it into a well. Farther on, there were still lights and noise. They crossed the street and went to sit on a bench. It's so hard, Cristina thought, feeling the cold cement on her thighs. Joaquín began crying.

“I want my mamá.”

“Go back to sleep.”

“I'm hungry.”

They crossed the park and came out on a run-down street Cristina had not been on before. She turned and looked all around her and tried to remember which street the bus had left them on and which one they had taken to the park, but could not do it. It was strange. She felt lost, but the feeling stimulated her. There were dimly lighted shops on the street with small groups of men outside talking loudly, excitedly. She walked very close to the wall, with her arm around Joaquín, to the next corner, where they found a cart with roasted ears of corn. She asked for two and the woman attending it removed the metal sheet that served as a lid. A burst of steam escaped, and the woman asked if they wanted them with chile.

“One with a little and the other without, please. And a lot of lemon.”

Cristina held out a hundred-peso bill, took the ears of corn by the sticks at each end, and asked Joaquín to take the change.

“Put it in my purse.”

In trying to open the purse, the child dropped the bills and the coins.

“Oh, what a boy.”

Cristina had to put the ears down on the cart near the bottle of chile piquín to pick up the bills and look for the coins. Seven pesos were missing. The woman looked at them indifferently.

“Help me, Joaquín!”

But the child tried to reach one of the ears and almost knocked over the bottle of chile piquin. The woman screamed and managed to rescue the teetering bottle.

“Joaquín!” his sister yelled at him.

“I want my corn.”

“Get away from here, you little brats!” and she shook a huge hand in front of Cristina's face.

Cristina put in her purse the money she had retrieved from the ground without separating it, the bills rolled in a ball, then picked up the corn and told her brother to follow her because she could not hold his hand. The boy went down the dark street behind her. Before they got to the first group of men talking in front of a cantina or taco stand—she could not tell which it was—she told Joaquín to hold on to her dress.

The men turned to look at them and she tried to look natural, smiling at them. But her smile was a frigid, terrified grimace as one of the men, with a beer bottle in his hand, yelled “Boo!” at them and then burst out laughing. Cristina walked faster and told her brother to hold her dress tighter.

Reaching the park, she made sure no one was following them and looked for the bench in the best light, although darkness was deepening in the whole park.

“You see, you made us lose seven pesos, you dummy,” she said to her brother as they ate the ears of corn.

“I want some milk.”

“We don't have any milk. You'll have to wait.”

Joaquín only nibbled at the corn, and with the child's promise that he would eat it the next day, Cristina wrapped it in her hand-kerchief and put it in her purse.

Then she saw a bent, humpbacked woman coming near, leaning on a piece of broomstick. She wore a dress of frayed black netting. Cristina had no time to react, so she kept still, holding her breath and hugging her brother.

“What are you two doing here?”

“Well . . . we were going to sleep.”

“To sleep here?”

“Yes, here . . . Or can't we?”

“Yes, you can. Of course you can. But don't you have a home?”

“Yes, but we ran away.” It was as though fear made her tell the truth.

The woman came closer to look at them, turning her head to one side as if looking through a magnifying glass. She had watery, bulging eyes and waxy skin tightly drawn over her bones. In her dirty white hair that came down to her shoulders there were wilted flowers, some almost all stem.

“And why did you run away? Tell me.”

“Because . . . we wanted to.”

The woman came a little closer and her breath made Cristina throw back her head, resting it on the back of the bench.

“So you just wanted to, huh?”

“Well, yes.”

“Your brother also wanted to?” and she looked at Joaquín, who turned shy and hid his head behind his sister's shoulder.

“No, he didn't want to, but later he will.”

“How come you're so sure?”

“Because I know.”

“Did your parents beat you much?”

“No, they never beat us.”

“Then, what's the problem?”

“Sometimes . . . they yelled.”

“Was that all?”

“Yes.”

The woman laughed loudly, exposing shriveled, pale pink gums.

“Stupid brat.”

Another loud laugh. She shivered as if she had a fever. Some withered flowers fell off her head like off a tree being shaken.

“So you're going to support this little boy?”

“Yes, I'm going to look for a job.”

“How old are you?”

Cristina's cheeks reddened.

“Ten . . . but I'm going on eleven,” she said, looking down.

“If I were ten and had parents like yours, do you know what I
would do?” and she came closer again, holding her head on one side, as if she saw only with one eye. “I'd lie in my bed with a cat, eating chocolates. Do you like cats?”

Joaquín's eyes lighted up when he heard the word
cat
.

“My brother adores them,” Cristina explained. “He lost his.”

“I love cats,” the woman said, holding out a bony hand toward Joaquín. “I take all the cats I find to my house. Wouldn't you like to sleep with a cat, child?”

Joaquín nodded his head, opening his eyes even wider.

Cristina was afraid, but let herself be guided through the vacant streets. Anyway, any place was better than a bench in the park. The night was clear and blue with a moon like a streetlight that made tall shadows: a woman bent over her broomstick and Cristina and Joaquín hand in hand.

9

The woman stopped
at some piles of garbage to look for food.

“You can always find something here,” she said.

Next to the metal door of what appeared to be a taco stand, she drove off a dog with her stick and found some bits of meat among greasy papers and empty beer bottles. Cristina felt nausea when she saw her chew on a bone until it was clean.

“Do you want some?” she asked, holding it up and smiling at them.

Cristina shook her head and moved her brother a little farther away.

“Have you already had supper?”

Cristina explained they had bought some ears of corn and almost a whole one was left over for Joaquín's breakfast. The woman left the garbage and wanted to see it. Cristina took it out of her purse and held it up without removing the handkerchief, but the woman grabbed it, threw the handkerchief on the ground, and began to eat it avidly.

“Hey, that's my brother's.”

“Bah, we'll get something else tomorrow.”

Cristina resigned herself. There was nothing else to do. She
added the cost of the corn to the lost pesos and decided not to say anything to the woman about the money she was carrying. She kept on walking.

“What kind of job do you have?”

“I don't need one,” the woman said. “From time to time some money falls into this little pouch,” as she pointed to the bulky pocket of her dress. “But in this lousy neighborhood everybody knows me, and they don't want to give me anything. Also, they're poor. So I go to the rich neighborhoods. I spend a while in one and when they get tired of me, I look for another. Although some days I don't get enough for the bus and have to walk back.”

Joaquín was falling asleep and held up his arms to ask his sister to carry him. But with only a hard look from her, he resigned himself and even walked faster, very serious. Cristina was astonished.

“Is it much farther, Señora?”

“No, we're almost there. And don't call me Señora . . . I hate Señoras. Call me Angustias.”