America's Dream (28 page)

Not that the why mattered. Their fights had no logic to them, no clear pattern. The only thing certain about them was that Correa would hit her. He hit her if she paid attention to another man, and he hit her if she didn’t, because ignoring the other man meant she was pretending she didn’t know him and therefore hiding her true feelings of lust. He hit her if she didn’t look pretty and well groomed, but if she looked too well turned

out, he hit her because she was drawing too much attention to herself. He hit her if he’d been drinking. He hit her if he was sober. He hit her if he lost at dominoes, and if he won, he hit her because she didn’t congratulate him enough.

She doesn’t remember having an argument with Correa in which she hasn’t come out bruised, so that even on those instances when he’s sweet and contrite, she doesn’t trust him. He kisses her, brings her gifts, strokes her flank gently and tells her she’s beautiful. And she listens and sometimes believes him, but she’s still wary.

It’s hard for her to believe that Charlie, with his ropes and knives and brusque manner, isn’t violent when he’s angry. She wonders whether Karen and Charlie’s fights have been so polite because they know she’s there, at the end of the hall.

But she dismisses the thought. The forced closeness of living with the Leveretts, she thinks, affects her more than it affects them. It is their house. They can be themselves in it. She’s the one who has to watch every step and be always on the alert. She’s the one who must always be conscious of how they perceive her be- cause she’s dependent on them. But they depend on me too, she contradicts herself, at least Karen does. She presses hard on the pillowcase she’s been ironing. How stupid can I be, she chides herself; rich people don’t depend on anyone. I can be replaced with a phone call.

“I’m getting used to it,” América tells Ester when she reaches her at home after days of trying. “The hours are long, though. I’m exhausted by the time I go to bed.”

“Do they pay you extra for working late?”

“It’s just for a little while, until Karen settles into her new job.” “You didn’t work as hard here.”

“I didn’t work as long, but I worked as hard.”

There’s a long, slow inhalation as Ester drags on her cigarette. “I got your money order,” she says. “I used it to pay the electric and water.”

“Another one is coming this week.”

América doesn’t want to ask about Correa, doesn’t want Ester to know she’s curious as to whether he’s still looking for her. “I saw Paulina and the family last Sunday.”

She tells Ester the same things she described to Rosalinda, only it’s forced, not as interesting even to herself. “Elena is gorgeous, bien delicadita.” She talks about the visit, describes the view of a bridge from Paulina’s window, what she served for dinner, the clothes she gave América, but in the back of her mind is the gnawing question of Correa. She wants to give Ester the impres- sion that she’s moving on with her life, enjoying New York. But has he forgotten me already, she wants to know, does he still look for me?

Ester doesn’t mention Correa. América stretches the conversa- tion as long as she can, until there’s no more to tell, until she’s asked for news of everyone she can think of but not Correa, not him. Ester doesn’t summon Correa’s name, and América is ashamed to come right out and ask. She hangs up, frustrated, angry with herself. Why should she care what he’s doing and where he is? She’s left him for good, doesn’t ever want to see him again. It doesn’t matter what he’s up to. It’s over between us. It’s over. It’s over.

“Speak the Spanish?” The voice is hesitant, quiet, heavily accen- ted. The woman is short and plump, nut brown with straight black hair, black eyes, full lips that a movie star would envy.

“Sí, hablo español.” América has been pushing Meghan on a swing. She and the woman have been looking at each other for the past ten minutes while the children they brought to the playground run, jump, and swing from metal rings suspended from the play structure.

“My name is Adela.”

América introduces herself. She’s shivering. The damp March air, which Karen says means spring is just around the corner, feels no warmer to her than the air in February did. Meghan wants to play in the wooden tunnels, so Adela and América follow her, chatting and getting to know each other.

“I work interna,” Adela tells her, and points to the two little girls she cares for. She’s from Guatemala, where she worked as a nurse in a private clinic. “But here, as you know, we have to do what’s necessary.” Her husband lives in another town, where he does odd jobs and landscaping. “It’s hard to find work for a couple,” she says, “and when you do, they don’t want to pay as much.”

“But when do you see him?”

“He picks me up every Saturday night. He doesn’t work on Sundays, so we spend the day together. We rent a room in a house with three other couples.”

Adela’s Spanish is so musical that América keeps asking questions, fascinated by the sound of Adela’s voice, the rhythm of her words.

“How long have you worked around here?”

“In May it will be three years, but I wasn’t, uhm, married when I first came.”

Adela asks América about herself, but América is not so willing to talk about her life and gives as little information as she can without being rude.

Meghan runs up, her hands between her legs. “I have to go peepee.”

“Okéi, we go home.” América scoops her up and calls Kyle from the slide.

“I don’t want to go yet!”

“We have to. Meghan needs toilet.” “You go and come back then!”

“Home too far. You come now.” She walks toward the car. He pretends to ignore her, but when he sees she’s not looking back, he reluctantly follows.

Adela runs up. “I live right up the street. You’re welcome to use the bathroom there.”

“Oh, no, thank you. It’s time we went home anyway.” “Meghan bounces on América hip. “I have to go bad!” “The little girl might have an accident,” Adela points out.

América looks at Meghan, whose face is scrunched into a grimace. “Okéi,” she says, “but we can’t stay long.”

She straps Meghan into her car seat. Kyle pulls his Game Boy from the backseat pocket, and before they’re out of the parking lot, he’s grunting at creatures hopping around the small screen. She’s so friendly, América thinks as she follows Adela’s Cara- van out of the playground lot. América doesn’t consider Adela’s friendliness a good thing. She thinks Adela is too open, that asking a woman she just met to come inside the house of the people she works for, not even her own house, is taking liberties that signal

disrespect for her employers.

She follows the van into a long driveway leading to a house that looks to América like the dwellings of murderers and ghosts that she’s seen in the movies. It’s painted dark brown. It has tur- rets on the second floor, a wraparound porch on the first, elabor- ately carved decorations that give the impression of lace around the eaves and along the porch.

“It looks like the Addams Family house!” Kyle squeals. “Who Adam’s family?” América asks.

Kyle hums a tune and snaps his fingers.

“Okéi, Meghan, let’s go. You stay in car, Kyle. We come out soon.”

Carrying Meghan on her hip, América follows Adela and the two girls into the house. A huge, elaborately carved door opens onto a dark, wood-paneled foyer.

“The bathroom is here.” Adela leads them to the back of the house. Meghan runs in and closes the door before América has a chance to come in with her.

“Would you like a drink or something?”

“No, thank you,” América responds, “I have to go home and make dinner.”

“Oh, you cook too?” “Yes. Don’t you?”

“No. I’m just a baby-sitter. La señora cooks.”

“I cook for the kids,” América lies, defensive all of a sudden. “All done.” Meghan comes out of the bathroom struggling to

snap her jeans herself.

“Big girl!” Adela compliments her, and América takes the little girl’s hand and starts down the hall.

“Thank you.”

“Maybe we can get together sometime,” Adela suggests. “Here, let me write my number down. You call me.”

América takes the scrap of paper, torn off a magazine, and dashes down the porch stairs.

“See you,” she calls out.

Adela is the first Spanish-speaking housekeeper she’s met since she came here, and she’s both excited and apprehensive about getting to know her. She’s so…América struggles to find the right word. Familiar. That’s it. Even though they addressed each other formally, using usted, América still feels as if Adela assumes they can be friends just because they’re both maids. But friendships, she tells herself, depend on much more than a common occupa- tion. She shakes her head, mutters. What am I talking about? I have no friends.

She pulls into the driveway of the Leverett house, walks to the back entrance and unlocks the door.

“You forgot Meghan!” Kyle screeches as América leads him into the house.

The little girl is weeping quietly and refuses to look América in the eye when América tenderly lifts her out of the car seat, hugs her tightly to her bosom, and carries her in.

She goes to the Bronx for the weekend because she doesn’t know where else to go. It’s a damp, windy Saturday morning when she climbs the steps up from the Fordham station. There’s no one to meet her. She stands under a store awning, shivering, wondering how long she should wait before calling Paulina. Across the street, a car pulls up with a piercing screech of brakes. When she turns toward it, Darío waves from the open window. She waves back and watches in horror as he does a U-turn from the right-hand lane, causing cars in both directions to swerve and brake in order to avoid him. He double-parks in front of her, ignoring the beeps and curses from other drivers.

“I’ll take you,” he says, coming around to open the door for her. “Doña Paulina sent me because Don Leo is not home.” He’s wet from head to toe, and his pale, bony figure reminds her of a

chicken after its feathers have been plucked out. América hides her smile as she slides into the passenger seat.

“I’m sorry you had to wait,” Darío apologizes as he gets into the car. “Doña Paulina called me at the last minute.”

He pulls into traffic without signaling, steps on the accelerator with his left foot on the brake. América searches for a seat belt but can’t find one. She grips the armrest, presses her right foot onto the floor until it seems she’ll go through it.

“It’s not far from here,” Darío says, taking his eyes off the road to address her.

“Oh, good,” she says, afraid that conversation will distract him and endanger her life further. He runs two stop signs without slowing down, making liberal use of his horn as he approaches the intersection. When she spies the tall green building at the end of the block, América breathes a sigh of relief. The street is crowded with parked vehicles. América is afraid Darío will want to drive around the block looking for a space, but he stops in front of the building to let her off.

“No sense in you getting wet,” he explains, coming around to open the passenger door.

América runs into the foyer, leans against the door to catch her breath and send a little prayer of thanks up to heaven. He’s a nut, she tells herself, buzzing Paulina’s apartment.

“Ay, mi’ja, he wouldn’t have been my first choice to pick you up,” Paulina tells her later. “But I didn’t want you to wait in the rain.”

“He was probably trying to impress you,” adds Elena. “By trying to kill me?”

“He’s a taxi driver,” Paulina explains. “They all drive like that.” “You’re going to scare América into walking everywhere,

Mami,” Elena says with a smile.

They have spent the day finishing new curtains; ruffled white eyelet in the living room, green voile in the kitchen, fruit patterns in the dining room. Standing on one of the sturdy kitchen chairs, Elena has hung the curtains and drapes, and the

three women now walk from room to room admiring their work and arranging furniture in new configurations.

“That’s the thing about dressing the windows with new cur- tains,” Paulina sighs; “everything else looks old and shabby.”

“Maybe we should paint,” Elena suggests, hands on hips, squinting critically at the pale blue walls.

“Ay, nena, please! I couldn’t stand the mess.”

“Just the living room. We could finish it in one afternoon.”

América slinks into the background, afraid Elena is including her in the “We.”

“It would look nice with a deeper blue on the ceilings,” she hears Elena say as she ducks into the kitchen and serves herself some juice. Outside, the rain continues in a steady, sheetlike tor- rent that reminds her of the tormentas that strike Vieques from time to time and wash the soil from the hills into the ocean. When she was a child, América followed one of the gullies from the hills of Puerto Real all the way to the beach, where the rainwater flowed into the sea, carrying leaves, twigs, and dead animals with it as if returning them from whence they came. It occurred to her then that if it continued to rain hard, the whole island of Vieques might wash out to sea. For weeks afterward she had nightmares that she was drowning. Rainstorms still leave her with a terror of imminent danger, with the sense that the ground beneath her is not solid and she might slip and fall at any time.

That can’t happen here, she tells herself, looking out the win- dow and seeing nothing but roofs. There’s no earth to wash away. It’s all hard cement, not a patch of soil. She’s filled with sadness, with a longing she can’t quite identify because it’s so new. She sips her orange juice and watches the rain pelt the dark roofs of buildings and wonders what this new sadness means. It takes her a while to realize she’s homesick for the familiar vistas of Vieques, the green hills and yellow light of the warm sun, the salty ocean breezes, the flat-roofed houses. She turns from the window as if to erase this new world so hard and gray, so cold, devoid of memories.

Darío stares at her throughout the Sunday dinner. His gaze is steady, lizardlike, fixed on her every move. But every time she

looks in his direction he lowers his eyes and a faint blush tints his pale complexion.

“He’s shy,” Elena tells América when the young women are gathered in her room after dinner.