The World in Half (24 page)

Dear Catarina,

Thank you for the photograph. I can hardly stand to look at it, although it’s all I want to look at. She looks so . . . No word, in either English or Spanish. It is cold there? Please send more. Take one every day so I can see how she’s growing.

Dear Catarina,

I don’t know why I write to you anymore, except that I can’t help myself. I feel compelled to share my life with you, even if you don’t want to receive it. I haven’t heard from you in months. The girl is nearly a year old now. I still think of her as “the girl.” It’s too painful, her name, what meaning it has. I wonder all the time what she looks like now. I see children on the street and have to duck into shops sometimes to weep.

I’m still working at the canal, although I’m on the maintenance crew now. Today we started cleaning and repairing one of the gate leaves. It was quite an operation, watching the crane barge lift the gate from its slot and take it to the dry dock at Mount Hope so that it could be laid down for us to work on it. One of the men on my crew told me that each gate weighs twelve tons. It’s all new to me.

I was moved from my previous post at the Miraflores control tower because of a stupid mistake. In all of canal history—forty ships passing through every day!—there’s never been a single collision, but I almost caused precisely that because of my carelessness. I was managing the log and somehow, because I was not paying close enough attention, I radioed to two separate vessels that they could enter the locks at the same time. I didn’t know what I’d done until the operator on the ground starting blowing his whistle frantically. Hector Jaén (do you remember him?) and I both ran to the window of the control tower to see what was going on. The operator was pointing toward the two oncoming ships and doing what, to be truthful, looked like a vigorous jumping-jack routine. When I looked, I saw one container ship and one coaster ship both headed toward the entrance of the locks from opposing angles. Hector Jaén grabbed the nearest radio receiver from the wall and called the captain of the coaster ship (it was smaller, so it could stop more quickly). The captain asked what the hell was going on. Hector Jaén implored the captain please to stop his boat. There were a few prolonged minutes of arguing, in which the captain tried all manner of threats and reasonings ranging from that he didn’t see why he should be expected to stop, to that he had been traveling for a week already, to that he knew the governor of California, and finally, to that his ship was carrying human hearts for people awaiting transplants in Africa, a falsehood which Hector Jaén didn’t even dignify with a response since both of us could see from the log that the ship was clearly headed to Asia and that it held 75,000 pounds of onions. When Hector Jaén told the captain of the coaster ship to stop, or else he would risk imperiling the crew’s life, the captain finally agreed. The container ship went through the locks and, an hour later, the coaster ship passed as well. I don’t think I exhaled once during the whole ordeal.

The
Panama Canal Spillway
ran a front-page story about it. Hector Jaén asked me what I could have been thinking. I didn’t tell him that I was distracted because I’m depressed. I think only of you. He wanted to fire me. I begged him to let me stay. I told him my job was all I had. It’s true. After you left, it became the last thing that mattered to me. I told him I would do anything. He took pity on me and recommended me for a job in the maintenance division.

Still yours

Dear Catarina,

All day at work I hear the shrieks of the howler monkeys echo throughout the rain forest. When I first started working at the canal, I hated that sound—I heard the shrill bursts in my dreams—but now I find that if I go too long without hearing it, I almost miss it.

Yours

Dear Catarina,

It’s the rainy season. You remember it well, no? The way the sky is given to fits of rain that pound down for a few minutes and shut off again. I walked you to the bus stop that night from the bar when it was raining and neither of us had an umbrella and your blouse clung to your skin.

The streets in the city flooded today.

Maybe you’re sitting on the other side of the ocean, writing letters to me, too, that you’ll never send. Maybe you still think of me. Is there a chance for us?

Dear Catarina,

This morning for breakfast I ate an overripe mango smothered in honey. I had a cup of coffee and then I went to work. Sometimes I go even on Sunday when I’m off. I stand around and watch the lumbering ships pass by in front of me. I stay until dusk and watch the sun set, the orange glow spreading out against the sky. After the lights in the water lanes and control towers flicker on, I return home. I wash my clothes. I have a drink. I sit in the dark and remember you.

Dear Catarina,

It’s been another year, and still I’ve heard nothing from you. I feel crazy still expecting to.

I’ve been transferred to the canal’s dredging division since I last wrote. We scan for abnormal deposits of silt and mud on the floor of Gatún Lake—conditions that could lead to a mudslide. Every day, I ride in a little tugboat with four other men and drag a tool through the water that beeps when the floor levels are off. There are fish gliding through the water, too, and we place bets on whether one of us can catch a fish with his bare hands. Every time I try, I pull my hands up with nothing but water streaming through my fingers. Last week one of the men (Mario) did nab one (a big one!) and we took it to the cafeteria and had the cooks fry it for lunch.

Also last week I learned that one of my crew had made an arrangement to receive some baseballs from one of the ship captains who come through the canal often. Did you know that the New York Yankees visited Panamá once? I’ve never seen it, but at Balboa High School, in the Zone, there is a shattered window from when Joe DiMaggio hit a home run through it. That probably doesn’t impress you. In the United States, I imagine you see baseball stars all the time. But here, for us, well, you know how important baseball is. When the captain of the ship was lined up in anchorage, we steered our tugboat alongside and a young sailor came out onto the deck and tossed baseballs—one for each of us—overboard as we caught them. I put mine in my kitchen cabinet for safekeeping.

I hope you’re well.

Yours

Dear Catarina,

I was walking down Avenida Central this afternoon, looking for a new brown belt, when the rain roiled up out of nowhere. I stepped into a fabric shop to keep dry until it passed. In the front of the shop was a young woman, she couldn’t have been much older than you, sewing on a machine. I watched her as she pulled pins out of what had just been sewn, as she made folds and measurements in what still needed work, as she held the needle between her lips. I thought of your lips. And then, feeling like a creep, I moved to the back of the store. Bolts of fabric were propped up and leaning against the walls, one in front of the other. Where the fabric ran off the end of the roll, it hung down over the bolt behind it, as if in an embrace. I thought of you again. It seems there’s nothing in this world that doesn’t remind me of you.

Yours

Dear Catarina,

I went to a
quinceañera
for a friend’s daughter. Actually, I don’t know him so well. He’s the bartender at El Cuarto Paitilla, but he’s fond of me (probably for the money I spend there) and invited me to the celebration.

It was quite an event. When I arrived, the boys were in the driveway playing jacks, but they were all dressed in
montunos
with striped
chácara
bags slung over their shoulders and fine
ocueño
hats on their heads. Do you remember when we saw the men in the parade dressed like that? The girls wore
polleras,
and the bartender’s daughter wore a
pollera de gala
that he told me cost fifteen hundred dollars to have made. She wore another three hundred dollars’ worth of gold jewelry on top of that.

Nearly a hundred people were in the backyard, walking around in their finest clothes and perfumes. I wore starched pants and my best
guayabera.
And of course my hat. They must have spent a lot on decorating, too. Strands of colored bulbs were strung from beam to beam all the way around the perimeter of the yard, like walls of light. Round tables draped in pink tablecloths had been set up, with enough space left over for a dance floor. At the front was a head table with flower petals sprinkled over the length and an arrangement made from birds of paradise in the center. As soon as enough people were settled, waiters charged like bees from a nest with flutes of champagne for everyone. I didn’t know anyone there, so I sat at a half-occupied table with a few people who clearly didn’t know anyone, either.

The girl’s grandfather made a toast, telling us that he paid a lot of money for the party, enough that he could have bought a new car. He asked the crowd if we’d seen the new Alfa Romeo Quadrifoglio Verde. When no one answered, he said, “It’s very nice. Of course, not as nice as being able to celebrate my granddaughter in grand fashion. Of course! There is no comparison. Of course. But I paid a lot of money nonetheless, so I hope you enjoy yourselves.
¡Salud!”
Then he thrust his glass high above his head and finished his champagne, licking his lips when he was done.

When the girl made her entrance, she strutted slowly, holding the corners of her long
pollera
skirt up like a crescent, showing off the intricate appliqué. She turned on the dance floor while people took photographs. The boys poked one another when they saw her. I clapped politely.

Later, after he had drunk too much champagne, the girl’s grandfather tipped backward in his chair and fell into the wall of lights behind him, pulling the whole thing to the ground like a bedsheet from a laundry line. After the initial shock, everyone broke out in laughter, but I didn’t have the heart. By then, I was lost in my own champagne and my own head, quiet and alone at the table.

Do I have to tell you that I missed our daughter? Is it possible to miss someone you’ve never met? And I wondered, as I often wonder, what she must be like. I believe she must be prettier and, I hope, far humbler than this girl was. I know it will be the great regret of my life that I’ll never meet her. I feel delirious with anger at you sometimes because of it.

Dear Catarina,

I don’t know why I didn’t think of it sooner. But today I had the idea that I could jump aboard one of these ships passing through and ride it to the United States, to see you. I looked at a map and Chicago’s in the middle, no? I could take a ship that docks on the eastern coast and then take a train from there. Is that possible? Will you want me to? I know you told me not to, but can that still be true? If I were to arrive, and there was nothing you could do about it, I think once you saw me again

I stopped this letter in the middle of writing it, because I scared myself. All of a sudden, anything seemed possible. What if I did it?

I got Hector Jaén to let me back up in the control tower to look at the log. There’s a ship sailing through to Savannah, Georgia, that leaves tomorrow. Tomorrow! I might see your face again! I want to lie next to you and hold your face in my hands. Listen to this! Me, getting so carried away. All is forgiven for never writing me back. I know your energy has been spent on other matters, like raising our daughter. Look for me soon.

Until then and always

Dear Catarina,

God must be watching over me. I didn’t board the ship. What a fool I would’ve made of myself! I promised I would stay away and I will.

I am yours.

Dear Catarina,

The comet Halley is supposed to pass tonight. People are gathering on the sandbank of the bay to watch the sky catch on fire. The newspaper ran an interview with a woman who was alive the last time it passed, in 1910. She said that back then there had been paranoia because everyone thought that the gas in the tail of the comet was a poison that would shower down. Of course, that did not happen. She said it was like an electric peacock flashing across the black sky. I can hardly imagine. Everyone is so excited. Everyone keeps talking about how spectacular it will be.

Yours

Dear Catarina,

I learned today that I’m sick. My lungs and liver are damaged and failing. I knew it was something, although I would’ve guessed it was my heart. The doctor said it was too much drinking and too many cigarettes. But then he looked at me and said, “Depression has taken its toll, hasn’t it?” He knew. I’ve been drinking and smoking for a reason. Not that it matters. In the end, it doesn’t matter whether it’s my liver or my lungs or my withered heart. God has a stubborn will; He takes each of us when He wants.

Off and on for five years now I’ve been writing you these letters. I woke each day with the dim hope that I would somehow hear from you. I’ve thought about you all this time. Are you still in Chicago? Are you in New York? The fact that I don’t know breaks my heart. I always thought that, after enough time had passed, I would find you again. I always thought that you would finally allow yourself to be found. I wonder sometimes what I meant to you, and whether I was only one in a parade of men, a lover easily eclipsed by others. I try not to think about it too much.

The doctor says that if I start to take care of myself, I could go another few years still. He says if I toss out the alcohol and cigarettes (and cigars!) and if I start exercising, I’ll improve for a time. I don’t know whether he’s telling the truth or just trying to make me feel better. No matter how long I can extend it, though, my time is limited.

Either way, with the news has come the urge to collect the pieces of my life, remember them, and soothe myself with them, like a baby with his blanket. Only I’ve found that there aren’t many pieces to gather—in my life there were my parents, there was the canal, and there was you. It seems pathetic to admit. Then again, I had real happiness once. A blinding, burning happiness. It was because of you.

I still love you, Catarina. I wanted to at least write those words down on paper one last time, to have a record of them in the world.

There’s nothing else to say.