The Summer We Came to Life (9 page)

JESSE SAT ALONE ON THE BEACH. HOW STRANGE to be so affected by all these memories from thirty years ago. A floodgate had opened, and suddenly Jesse couldn't get her head out of the late seventies.
Out of the gutter
, Jesse thought. But the thing was, as she told the stories, they kept popping into her mind and out of her mouth very differently than she intended. She wanted to help Samantha. After all of Jesse's tough talk over the years, she knew Sammy expected her to talk her out of her romantic notions of marrying Remy. Jesse sighed and pulled her beach towel around her. Was it all just talk or only some of it? The little flutters she'd been experiencing with Arshan reminded her of the girl she'd once been. When it had been possible to trust a man.

“Uh-oh,” Jesse muttered.
What have I done to my Isabel?

 

A twenty-three-year-old Jesse lay in a marble bathtub, a mound of soap bubbles covering her pregnant belly. She moved the bubbles back and forth over her belly button. She
pushed her navel in and out with her finger. With a sudden toss of her head, she dried her hand on a towel and picked up the cigarette from the ashtray on the ledge of the tub.

Without warning, Cesar burst through the bathroom door. Jesse froze with her cigarette in mid air.

“
Amor,
I'm ho—” Cesar's smile dropped off his face. “Are you smoking in the house? My mother will kill you!”

Jesse, recovered from the shock of seeing him, took a deliberate drag of the cigarette before snubbing it out slowly in the ashtray. “What are you doing home?”

Cesar ran his hand over his hair, his curls cut short at his father's insistence, as he ascertained his wife's mood. He frowned but didn't answer.

Jesse looked away. “Business trip” was all she'd been told, as usual. The Guerra women were never told anything more.

Jesse returned to playing with the bubbles and said in an even voice, “I smoke in here because I have nowhere else to go. If I walk outside of our room, I am approached by a servant. If I walk outside of the house, I am accompanied by guards. If I want to go somewhere in town, I am escorted by a fleet of security. I am a prisoner. And so I can damn well smoke in my cell. Darling.”

Cesar looked down on his wife, at her thick hair curled up in the steam, at her dainty eyelashes, her graceful hands amongst the bubbles. His look was one of sadness, the anger drained. Jesse chose not to acknowledge this, and jutted her chin out for a fight.

“I thought I prepared you for this,” Cesar said gently. “I told you about my childhood. About the claustrophobia.”

Jesse shook her head in fury, startling the loving look off her husband's face. “Yes, you told me about your indulgent childhood and childish rebellions. I am not a child, Cesar!” Jesse felt ready to murder him. She forced in a steadying
breath. “You promised me we would move out of your parents' house.”

“I know I did,
mi amor.
There hasn't been time. And with the baby, my father thinks—”

“That he owns me. Isn't that what he thinks? That I am just another piece of property of the Guerra
cartel
—”

“Oye!” Jesse had gone too far. “You be more careful,
señora.
Remember where you are, my spoiled little wife.”

Tears stung Jesse's eyes. She turned to face Cesar just as they spilled down her already moist cheeks. “Cesar, why didn't you tell me how it would really be?”

Jesse had asked him this countless times in the past year. But this time, Cesar heard the full weight of sorrow behind the question. Was he remembering his beautiful wife, in all her feisty glory in New York? Could he see her broken spirit? The trampled spirit of a stallion. He was a boy raised to be a prince in a patriarchal kingdom. Had he forgotten how different it would be for his wife—a fiercely independent woman? How could he have forgotten his mother's pain?

Cesar's eyes were wet as bathwater. “Jess, you're going to have to try to adapt, find ways to be happy. Appreciate everything you have,” Cesar said, gently sweeping an arm around the luxurious bathroom.

Jesse didn't look around. “I had money, Cesar. I bought whatever I wanted.”

Cesar raised an eyebrow. “Not like this,
princesa.
” When Jesse didn't budge, he said, “Look at my mother. She has her tea parties, and her charity work, and—”

Jesse sniffed in disdain. “I am not your mother, Cesar. We don't have the first thing in common. Is that how you expected me to be?” She lifted her gray eyes to his.

Cesar stepped toward the tub. He knelt before her and smoothed back her hair. Jesse lifted her chin again. With that simple act of defiance and dignity, Cesar's face filled with regret. “What
did
you expect, Jesse? What did you want?”

“I expected you to save Panama.”
From people like your father
, Jesse thought. She met Cesar's eyes. “And all I wanted was you.”

Cesar cupped Jesse's face in his hands. He kissed her forehead and then her lips. Softly and then with hard passion. Jesse resisted and then gave in. Cesar pulled on Jesse's hands, helped her up. He kissed the enormous belly that emerged from the water, and gently toweled off her glistening body. He took his wife into his arms, and carried her off to the bedroom.

 

On a beach in Tela, Honduras, Jesse slumped forward and put her hands over her eyes. A second later she took in a huge breath, sat up and shook out her hair, raking her fingers along her scalp. She snatched up the pack of cigarettes on the sand. Empty.
Dadblammit
. She slapped her back against her chair and glared at the sea.

Arshan laid a hand on her shoulder.

“Shit!” Jesse yelped. She turned around and saw who it was. She grasped his hand. “You scared me.”

Arshan pulled a chair close to Jesse. “You looked about a million miles away. You okay?”

Jesse stared at the sea a long time before answering. “It's unsettling to remember all these things I've been trying
not to
for so long. You know, I really thought I wasn't thinking about them,” Jesse said with a weak smile. “Now I realize I may have spent my entire adult life reacting to—and thereby,
living for
—people long since gone and things long since over in my life. How crazy am I?”

Arshan took both of Jesse's hands in his. He rubbed them to warm them, tried to gauge the look on her face.

“Yes, it is pretty crazy.”

AHARI SCANNED THE BEACH LEFT AND RIGHT for anyone that might harm or bother his charges. He sniffed in satisfaction when he saw the beach empty but for the dark old man and American woman. Ahari had seen the way these two danced around each other, like children at play. Now the old man sat with the woman's hands in his. They sat stiller than palm trees in the eye of a storm. Ahari held his breath as they studied each other. He couldn't tell if they were speaking, but it appeared not. It appeared they were merely watching each other. It reminded Ahari how roosters squared off to measure each other's courage by the look in their eye. The woman dipped her head ever so slightly and Ahari knew it would happen before she did. The sad old man leaned in and kissed her, soft as the brush of a blade of grass. Soft as a warm handful of sand, Ahari thought, and wriggled his toes into the beach. They kissed without touching anywhere besides their lips, not hurrying through it like young lovers would. They didn't move at all, in fact, as if the slightest
breeze would tip them over. When the woman pulled away, they resumed their rooster stares. The woman's sudden loud laugh startled Ahari and the world rushed into his awareness again. Ahari could hear the rustling of the palms, the rhythm of the sea, the sighing of the stars. The man laughed, too. A laugh that did not sound as old as the man, nor as sad as his eyes. The pair resettled into their chairs and watched the citrus colors spread across the sky. The sun set at their backs, not over the water, but the colors subtly spilled across the sea like the sheen of soap bubbles. Ahari swelled with pride, seeing them watch his waves' nightly performance. He'd made a flower garden to match the colors of his piece of sky—orange, yellow and pink. Ahari closed his eyes. He knew the procession of colors by heart and imagined them now as the man and the woman must be seeing them. He stood with both feet planted firmly in the cooling sand and hooked his thumbs in his belt loops. It was a long time before the man and the woman got up to go inside.

 

Dinner was festive and loud. Arshan sat next to Jesse and waited on her attentively, serving her extra chicken and refilling her cup, as Isabel and I basked in compliments on our chop suey and our rum cocktails. Everybody joked about food poisoning and plan B to ditch the raw-food fad for the duration of their trip. Time to deep-fry and fricassee, in Jesse's language.

Cornell, who always complained of one ailment or another, groaned about heartburn and indigestion and everybody teased him. “My God, Cornell, what's left? Rabies?”

“No respect, no respect I tell ya,” he said to Arshan.

I watched the group and snuggled into the coziness of the evening. I kept thinking about the word
gezellig,
a word Wouter, my Dutch lover, had taught me in Argentina. A word with no English equivalent, it conveyed a mixture of homey, intimate and snug, but also described moments like
this one—old friends united by good food, candlelight and laughter.

Maybe it was the food poisoning that had brought them closer. Or the car accident. Or maybe it was natural to fill the sinkhole left by Mina's death by widening our circle. I experienced the expected pang of guilt at this thought, but it was more like being poked than kicked. I had no reason to fault these people. They were the ones who had raised me, for better or worse. An unlikely family, each loving me in their own way. Shouldn't that add up to enough?

“I love you guys,” I blurted out, interrupting Isabel's story about the tribulations of speed dating.

Nobody needed to ask where the sentiment came from. They raised their plastic cups on the porch by the beach and the palm trees.

“To family,” I said.

“To family, baby,” Lynette agreed.

“To surviving this trip!” Cornell laughed.

Jesse rolled her eyes and said with a puff, “Boys.” Then she raised her cup high. “To Mina!”

“To Mina!” we all echoed.

That made it feel all right somehow, hearing her name ring out like a mantra in a moonlit drum circle.

I sat back satisfied, and followed along with the resumption of conversation by firing off text messages to Kendra, relaying her the quotes of the night.

After the plates were cleared away, bathroom breaks were taken, and another round of rum smoothies was distributed (“if it ain't broke, buster, don't fix it,” said guess who), we reconvened on the porch. I brought out more candles in hurricane jars and shut off the lights. Everyone shifted to get comfortable.

“So,” I said, “you gonna tell us what happened in Panama?”

All heads turned to Jesse. She blew a ring of smoke at us and smiled. A smile that made me want to check my skin for fire ants.

“If I must,” she said.

“You started it,” was Isabel's equally misfired attempt at
playfulness, as she brought her knees up to her chest like the frontline lifting shields.

Jesse dragged her palm across the splintered wooden table, adding to my sense of foreboding. But when she began to speak, I was surprised. It was a happy story that danced in the flickering gleam of the candles, holding the looming darkness at bay.

 

Jesse arrived in Panama to a big family welcome party. Cesar's much older sister and his cousins were there, along with his parents, and thirty house staffers.

The house, described by Cesar as an estate, was more like a compound. The mansion was enclosed behind massive walls and a guarded gate that opened to an arced driveway stacked with a fleet of matching black security vehicles. The enormous house towered toward the sky with its stone front, looking down on two formidable structures on either side, homes for all the servants. In back of the house there was a helicopter pad, a glass-enclosed swimming pool, and a tennis court. Inside was a succession of fancy rooms all vying to outdo each other with splendor fit for Versailles.

An exuberant Jesse swirled through each room on a tour with her new family. The men chattered excitedly, showing off. The women quietly noted Jesse's long glossy hair and short paisley dress with platform heels. Señora Guerra walked gracefully behind her husband, modestly deflecting his boasts of her decorating talents. “My wife, my little queen, she spent Cesar's inheritance!” Alfredo Guerra exclaimed, taking Jesse onto his arm and laughing heartily. “That's why the boy has to work for me now!”

Jesse, a sucker for excess, dove headfirst into her new life as a princess. She giggled when served five-course breakfasts on silver platters at a dining room table that seated fourteen. She thought it delightful that maids turned down her beds, ran her baths, and waited outside her door in the morning
to escort her to breakfast. Three Pomeranians had their very own maid. The kitchen was industrial size, with a staff of six. Jesse prompted a round of laughter when she napped through supper one night and then tried to go down later to fix herself a snack. “My dear, the kitchen staff have gone home, of course. Call Ricardo, he'll go out and get you anything you desire.” Jesse waved off their suggestion and left them sipping cordials to walk to the kitchen. It was locked. She could hear them laughing at her from the other room.

There were other problems in paradise. Learning Spanish was taking far longer than Jesse had anticipated. She spent many meals staring off into space, trying not to look bored or unkind. Cesar would try to fill her in, but she found that more embarrassing.

When after two weeks Jesse still had yet to leave the mansion grounds, Cesar awkwardly explained that his father could not afford the general public knowing she was there. With a pained look, he bumbled through the revelation that his mother and sister were uncomfortable with the wedding, and disagreed about the best way to inform society with the least amount of scandal. At that time in Panama, Americans were no longer in style and were, in fact, resented and disdained for their role in the Canal Zone. Jesse was shocked. “But they've been so nice to me,” she exclaimed while Cesar only smiled wryly.

The wedding finally happened the next month. The press was “persuaded” to present the union as the greatest of all romances. Jesse was presented in a designer gown chosen by Señora Guerra. Jesse tried hard not to let anything dampen her fairy-tale wedding. She danced the night away in a ballroom lit by thousands of candles. Plenty of her friends came, and her father and mother were flown in for three days, though she hardly got in one word with them. Everybody proclaimed it the most beautiful wedding they'd ever seen.

And finally Jesse was allowed to sleep in an enormous gilded poster bed with her husband.

For months after, Cesar and Jesse would meet every night in their room. After a day filled with entertaining important guests during endless meals, they reveled in their precious time alone together. They would often stay up all night, giggling and discovering each other, making love, and laughing at Jesse's wide-eyed observations of her new life. They agreed it was the happiest they'd ever been.

 

By the next winter, Jesse's feelings had almost completely changed. She started having anxiety attacks about being watched all the time. She hid in her room for most of the day, unable to deal with never-ending visitors or maids, or with Señora Guerra's reproving looks. After four months at home, Cesar's father sent his son off on a nonstop business schedule, introducing Cesar to all the bigwigs in every part of the country and abroad. He was gone the majority of the time. When he returned, he was always sweet and polite, but exhausted. And the rounds of fancy family meals and dinner guests never ended. Jesse was scolded whenever she suggested time alone. “In Panama, family means everything,” Señor Guerra told Jesse over dinner one night when he spied her tugging at Cesar's shirtsleeve to be excused.

Cesar asked his sister to bring friends to meet Jesse, but that was a disaster. The women told stories of “friends” who had open sexual relationships, trapping Jesse into telling her own wild stories. Then the women maliciously turned on her and spread the stories far and wide through high society. Jesse was shunned from further contact. Señora Guerra was mortified—minus her husband's indiscretions, she was not carefully sheltered from hearing the gossip.

Eventually, Jesse barely recognized herself in the forlorn, timid ghost of a woman who tiptoed from room to room to avoid the servants' smiles and questions.

Then, just when the first thoughts of leaving him seeped into her mind, she found out she was pregnant. Everything changed again. She was no longer allowed to be a ghost. Her diet and health were suddenly of utmost importance to Señora Guerra. She bought Jesse a closet full of new “motherly” clothes and insisted she come to every family meal. She was sent outside every day to “get some sunshine on that yellow skin” of hers. Señora Guerra even forced a baby shower upon high society, which stopped the rumors but did not win Jesse any friends.

Six months later, Cesar came home from a supposed business trip to find his wife smoking in the bathtub.

Three months later, Isabel was born.

Jesse came alive again. She had given up on her happiness, but looking down on her tiny perfect daughter, she wondered why. Jesse, who hadn't had anyone to talk to besides Cesar in two years, poured out her heart to her infant daughter. Every misery, every humiliation, every fear, every wonderful memory, every hope and dream she'd ever had. And there, reflected in Isabel's turquoise eyes, Jesse remembered who she was and what she was worth.

 

“Well, look who finally decided to come to breakfast,” Señora Guerra said one morning, as Jesse entered the dining room with Isabel in her arms. “There's my precious little baby, come let me hold you,” she cooed to the little chocolate haired infant.

“Back off, bitch,” Jesse snarled. Then she walked into the kitchen and pushed past a chef to grab a banana from the refrigerator.

Jesse walked back into the dining room where Señora Guerra waited primly with folded, shaking hands. Jesse ignored her. She sat down at the table, unpeeled her banana and slipped it erotically deep into her throat before biting off
a mouthful. Then she flung the peel on the table and pulled up her shirt to offer an engorged breast to Isabel.

Señora Guerra said nothing, but even her eyeglasses shook with fury as she picked up her book and blocked Jesse from view.

The war of the queens had begun.

 

Jesse pulled out all the stops. She bounced around the house, singing Janis Joplin songs to Isabel. She moved a record player into her room, plugged Isabel's ears with cotton, and played The Clash and The Ramones at top volume. She befriended all the servants, and hung out in the kitchen learning how to cook Panamanian tamales wrapped in banana leaves, while Isabel cooed from her playpen.

On one of Alfredo and Cesar's rare nights home, Jesse talked the chefs into a surprise. Jesse emerged from the kitchen in an apron and served Tex-Mex burgers and beer in the bottle. This was when the war expanded to include Señor Guerra. Cesar looked back and forth between beaming Jesse and his seething mother and realized what had been happening. He put his hand over the knot in his stomach.