The Ladies of Managua (5 page)

But I've never entered a car with the expression I see on Mariana's face before she slides in and collapses against Mama, giggling. It's an expression I don't know if I've ever made, but one that I recognize, because it's the same unnameable emotion that would flash across her face as an infant, delight multiplied. When she was that small, always wet and squalling and covered in pureed banana, I would never have believed that she would grow up to be so beautiful, so vital that it hurts to look at her.

I close the door behind her and walk around to sit next to Don Pedro, to make enough room for her bag in the backseat, and so that we will all be a little more comfortable.

 

7

Maria

When I see the solid gray Accord I want to break into a run. It seems like I've been traveling for weeks, not a couple of days. And now I've finally made it here, exhausted after the VIP lounge and the flight to Managua, and Beth sweetly getting a baby-sitter last night and helping me find this dress for Abuelo's funeral upstairs on the sales rack at the Banana Republic on Lincoln Road, because there are some shopping trips, she said, that no one should have to make alone. And before that, Beth's house, which smells of macaroni and cheese and, here and there, of poop, thanks to her eighteen-month-old, Olivia, who says “cooka” for cookie and “up” when she means down and “Mawia” when she wants me. And before that, the flight from New York to Miami, and even before that, the fight with Allen—does it count as a fight, if no voices are raised? I guess so, since I stormed out, amping up the drama factor. If a woman storms out of her boyfriend's apartment, and no one runs after her, or even watches her leave, does she make a sound?

He was probably relieved when I first left, happy that he could finish painting in peace. And then, when he was done for the night and he realized I hadn't come back, he probably started feeling a little bit guilty, which he hates, so he began to rationalize: he always tells me not to bring up any serious topics while he's painting, he can't concentrate on anything other than the canvas right now, right at this minute. Ever since we got back from the Berkshires, I've wanted to do nothing but have this talk, make a choice one way or the other, and he's wanted to do nothing but paint. He wouldn't deny that the hazy, happy beginning stage of our relationship is officially over, that we do have to make some decisions. But he would insist, to himself, anyway, that nothing would have changed if I had just waited a day or two to bring up the topic of our future.

The thing is, it's all changing. Everything is different now. That's what he doesn't seem to understand. Months ago, the first time we ever had a fight—because he didn't show up at dinner, didn't even text because he was so absorbed in some painting or other, and I drank two glasses of wine and ate a plate of risotto I didn't want because I felt bad for the waiter and embarrassed that I'd been taking up a table for so long without ordering anything—Allen told me that he figured it was best to let me cool off before apologizing. Which was why, when he finally realized he'd stood me up, at eleven-thirty that night, he didn't call but texted an apology instead, then let the flowers he sent to the gallery the next day do the talking. I explained to him then that I'm not a person who flares up and cools off. That's my mother. And my Bela, too, if I think about it. I'm a fumer, a simmerer, a slow boiler. Every hour without an apology, every minute, is a minute spent with me shoring up my position, convincing myself how right I am, and how wronged I've been. I'm not proud of this aspect of my temperament. But there it is.

I made that clear to him long ago, after that very first argument. So Allen shouldn't have been surprised that, when he called me at six in the morning yesterday as I finished packing my roller bag, I let the call go to voicemail. By the time I got to Miami, the messages had collected on my voicemail, one after another, like layers of paint adding shading and depth. First embarrassed, then conciliatory, then angry, then back to apologetic.

But in none of the messages did he admit that everything had changed for us, and nothing would ever be the same; that the future was here, whether we liked it or not. And I'm tired of being the only person who realizes we're at a turning point. The night before last I sat in his studio, watching him paint, trying to talk to him, waiting for the right moment. He paints so differently than I do, all bold strokes and bright colors. He'd step back now and then and I'd think maybe he was at a stopping point, maybe we could talk now. I'd say something like, “I know it's a lot to consider, but it's important.” And he'd mumble, “Of course, very important,” and step right back toward the canvas, which is taller than I am and, obviously, more compelling.

At one point his cell phone vibrated on the table next to me. He would have ignored it but I thought it might be an opportunity, an interruption that would be someone else's fault besides mine, and I could take advantage of it so we could finally talk. And when I saw his daughter's name lighting up the screen, I felt grateful to her, maybe for the first time. I knew he'd take her call. When I said, “It's Brianna,” he tossed his brush on the drop cloth on the floor and snatched the phone out of my hand. He said thank you as he took it, so maybe “snatched” is the wrong word. But even after saying thank you, he turned his back to me and walked into the bedroom, shutting the door so I couldn't hear him. I could, of course, every word. That's one advantage of dating a man old enough to be your youngest uncle; my hearing is much better than he can imagine. At night when he's in the bathroom, I can hear him brushing and flossing, even opening that jar of moisturizer he hides in his medicine cabinet. So when I stood against the bedroom door, I could make out the sound of him pacing back and forth as he listened to Brianna saying whatever it was on the other line.

“Tell Tad if he takes you where you want to go, I'll pay for his gas. And in a few days, we'll be at Gammy's, and I'll drive you wherever you want,” he promised. “Yes, just the three of us this time.” I slid down to the floor; this was going to be a long call. “Of course Maria had to get back to work, but that's not the only reason,” Allen said. “I would have loved to have stayed, but I also have to finish this painting, for that exhibit we talked about, remember?” His steps came closer to the door, then receded in the other direction. “No, sweetie, that's not it. You're the person I want to spend time with the most, you always will be. No one will ever be more important to me than you are.” I heard the bed creak. “So, other than Tad being a jerk about the car, how are things going? What are you up to?”

That's when I walked away from the door. There was no point in me waiting around; I wouldn't be strong enough to force a conversation when he walked back to his painting. Through some weird alchemy, Allen had succeeded in reordering the world so that I was angry, so angry, at myself, not him anymore. Because Brianna and her brother should come first. That's exactly how it should be. I knew all that but I was still so jealous I thought I might pass out from the physical pain, the burning in my throat. I hated that feeling and I hated myself for having it.

Once I stepped away from the door, Allen's voice was just a low rumble. Then it stopped and I heard footsteps and the toilet flush in the adjoining bathroom. And I didn't want to be there to watch him walk out of the bedroom, stride right past me, and head straight over to the painting at the other end of the studio. I was suddenly so tired of being the obstacle that makes it more difficult for a hero to do important work; I felt like I'd been playing that role my whole life. So I pulled on my coat and walked out the door, letting it slam behind me, even though I knew there was little chance Allen would hear it, or, even if he did, notice.

After I stormed out of the apartment, I didn't want to think about Allen or what happened next. Once I got to Miami, I wanted to play horsey with Olivia and cook dinner with Beth, hear how her fertility treatments were going, and shop for mourning clothes, and not think about a world without my grandfather in it.

Abuelo would know what to do about this situation. He always did. When war with the Contras broke out in 1981, he packed a couple of bags and drove all of us across the border to Honduras, where we waited out the worst of the fighting safely. Part of the reason that this situation with Allen is so overwhelming is that Abuelo's not here to help me decide whether we should be building a future or acknowledging the lack of one. My Bela is so emotional, she won't be able to lay things out for me, step by step, help me make a list of pros and cons, advise me on how to proceed. And Madre is the opposite, the stoic of the family; it's not that she won't have strong feelings, she'll just stew about them privately, staring at me like I should know what to do because she's been willing the idea into my head telepathically. But Abuelo, he would have had an opinion, one he could explain calmly but clearly. He seemed to understand that if I listened to his advice and then turned around and did the opposite, that didn't make me stupid or selfish, just opinionated, like all the women around him.

But I don't want to think about what I've lost with Abuelo's death. I want to pretend, just for a little bit, just for the car ride, maybe, that this is another happy homecoming, a chance for my Bela and Madre and me to catch up on what we still have, not mourn what has been taken from us. I want to lie against my Bela's soft, heavily perfumed shoulder and feel like I'm small enough to be taken care of, and like everything is going to be all right.

 

8

Isabela

“What have you brought me, mi reina?” I ask Mariana. “What do you have to show me?”

“Nothing.” She looks startled for a moment, almost guilty, like when she was a little girl, coloring on the walls of the apartment in Key Biscayne, even though I told her that we only draw on paper.

“Nothing?” I take her hand back, holding it in mine. “Haven't you painted anything lately?”

She laughs and I realize how uncommon a sound laughter has been over the past few weeks. Months. Now she's holding her phone in front of me, covering the screen with her hand, hiding something. A photo. Mariana knows how to take pictures with her phone, she's always sending Ninexin an image to show me: an unexpected flower pushing through the pavement on her block, or the foot of a woman whose shoe she particularly admires.

“It's silly,” she says. “I should be focusing on discovering new artists for the gallery, not playing at being one.” She slides even closer to me on the leather upholstery. “I'm only showing you because you're my muse.”

Mariana makes the phone light up, and an image takes over the screen. “There's a bit of a glare from the overhead bulb,” she says, but I can see the canvas perfectly, starkly, almost; without a frame it appears as if the painting itself is naked, and I almost feel it's rude to look. In the right corner is a man, in profile or almost, less than that, but you can tell from the sliver of face peeking out under his hat that he's amused. He's wearing a striped suit and in the places where you can see flesh—his neck, his face, his hands—he seems to glow despite the shadow cast by his hat brim.

In the bottom left corner is a woman, a girl, really, in a full-skirted dress the color of a buttercup. Her body is curving downward, almost in half, but in a shape I've never seen in real life, or only at the ballet. She's not folded lazily, like one of Degas's ballerinas lacing up her shoes; there's urgency to her movement, tension in the curve of her pose. She's dropped something and what it is takes up the rest of the canvas. It's a book, splayed facedown on the sidewalk, but it looks as if the letters from the cover have been knocked loose in their fall, they're floating upward in an arc toward the man, spelling out the book's title, getting smaller and smaller as they rise up, so you can barely make out the phrase:
The Elements of Style.
It's the letters that are amusing the man in the hat. The letters or the girl who sent them flying.

*   *   *

The girl is me. Or how Mariana imagines I was then, in 1951, a sixteen-year-old girl at school far from home. She's gotten some things wrong in her painting: the bare hands, I would never have left campus without gloves keeping my hands safe and clean and mysterious. But the feeling is right, the flush visible in the arms that lead to those hands. It was not caused by embarrassment—it wasn't my fault I'd dropped the book. It was a flush of gratitude, of knowing that this was one of those moments when time slowed and that once it righted itself again, the world would be set on a new course.

It was a fall Friday and classes ended at one so that we could take the air now that the weather was cooler, and go out for some shopping or a snoball or to visit relatives who lived in town, and still be back on campus by dark. But the real reason classes ended early every other Friday was that those were the weekends the cadets from St. Michael Military Academy in Pass Christian came down from Mississippi and were allowed to pay court to whichever of the Sacred Heart girls their parents had told them to write and invite for a stroll in the park or tea at Commander's. If the girl had approval from the mistress general and a willing chaperone, a caller might even take her for a ride downtown on the streetcar to see a movie, although permission for the movies was hard to extract, even if the film was on the list of Church-approved pictures, because it was so dark in the theater that only the most eagle-eyed of chaperones could be trusted.

Dolly and I got more mail than most girls, but it was all from Madre, describing the antics of our brothers or her trips to Paris with Papa. No one ever wrote to ask permission to walk out with us, and we didn't expect them to—the only people our parents knew in New Orleans were the parents of other girls. Only girls came to Sacred Heart. Our brothers were younger, and while they might attend Loyola when they were done with high school, until then the Colegio Centro América in Granada was good enough, and would keep them close to home, close to the glove factory my father owned, so they could learn everything they needed to know about its management. It was different for Connie; her father had a cacao plantation in Mexico and did business with several prominent families in New Orleans. He was often invited to dinners at Arnaud's, lunches at Galatoire's, even a few Mardi Gras balls if he was in town during the season. It was only natural for his hosts to invite their other Latin friends, too, so that when the men and the women separated after dinner, his wife could have someone to talk to in Spanish. Connie had been out walking with two or three of the Mexican boys who attended St. Michael Military Academy. But none of them was what she expected, none was like the men she read about in books, men who weren't afraid of passion. Or of fathers.