Beyond the Ties of Blood (42 page)

“Did you tell Ignacio about it?”

“It didn't seem right to go into detail at that point. But when we got to the beach house, it was clear she'd talked to his sister about me. Plus she knew we were together, and she made us sleep in separate rooms, twin beds. Then the last morning, before we went out, she got into this thing about some old girlfriend of his who was coming to visit next weekend. She did this whole song and dance about how he was getting older, didn't have a social life, that she was worried, and I'm sitting right there the whole time! But that wasn't the worst of it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Turns out that the girlfriend's father had been in charge of a detention camp. When Ignacio found out, he broke up with her. His mother hadn't known about it. So it all came out, and he got going on how everyone is to blame for the dictatorship, even those like him who left the country. That's when we got in the car and drove north.”

Eugenia took out a fresh tissue and wiped her eyes and cheeks. “Ay, Nenita, I just don't know anymore. In Boston, I longed to come back. I felt like such a foreigner there! Maybe that's why I jumped at the chance when the Commission brought me back to testify. I was hoping to come home. But now, I feel even more out of place. Will I ever be more than a survivor? Can I ever be more than a bad memory for people like Ignacio's parents?

“Maybe it's for the best. As much as it hurts now, it would have been worse if I had let myself get in deeper with him. I was up all night thinking about it. When we first made love in Bucalemu and had that argument about age, I said to him that I'd like to make sure we had something together that wasn't about human rights. Only last night did I see that, for him, these are beautiful but abstract concepts. I carry the damage on my own skin.”

Eugenia began sobbing. Irene moved closer and took her sister in her arms. When Eugenia began to calm down, Irene took several tissues from the box, mopped her sister's cheeks, wiped her nose, and hugged her close once again. After a while Eugenia spoke, her voice little more than a whisper.

“I wanted to believe him when he said it wasn't about the math. My God, Nenita, I wanted to believe him so badly. Six years isn't that much, really. But when I did the math last night, it came out differently. For me it's a lifetime.”

It was late the next evening when
doña
Isabel made her statement, a bomb dropping, exploding in their midst. They were having dinner, three generations of women around the long table, Laura sporting her grandmother's pearl necklace as the gift that completed the circle. Sitting regally on one end, in a straight navy blue dress, no makeup, her hair pulled loosely into a knot on the crown of her head,
doña
Isabel looked absolutely majestic. The wavy wisps of silver that had fallen loose framed and decorated her face, matching the small pearls shimmering in her ears. The dense network of lines around her eyes made her look gentle, almost joyful, as if her life had left the marks of goodness in every crease.

Laura was telling her mother about her horseback outings with Irene. “You know, Mamita,” she said, “I mentioned to
tía
Irene the other day how comfortable I feel here, and how things seem so familiar, even though this is my first time.”

“That's wonderful,” Eugenia said. “Before we came down from Boston, I told your aunt that I hoped you'd feel comfortable here. I knew leaving your friends was hard, but I was hoping you'd discover a new sense of belonging here.”

“It's what I've been telling Laurita the past several days,” Irene said. “The blood pulls.”

Doña
Isabel sat up straighter, and a single fierce line appeared between her eyebrows. “It's not only about blood,” she said. “It's about commitment. About staying put. About being there when you're needed.”

“What are you talking about?” Irene asked. “Mamita, all we're saying is that—”

“Ever since your papa left me, the two of you have been my only family. Where were you when I needed you most? For almost a year I thought one of you was dead. The other was driving cars, late at night after curfew, putting herself in danger, for what? To throw another subversive over an embassy wall? Then, for a few minutes on her way out of the country, I get to hold my only granddaughter. And finally, my other daughter leaves the country and only comes back for a month in the summer.

“It's been sixteen years, sixteen years alone, by myself. My friends asked me constantly, where are your daughters? They're surrounded by their families, their grandchildren. And I'm all alone. Every time I look at Laura now, I think, my God. It's been sixteen years. And where were you? I sometimes think that, maybe, it would have been better if you had died. At least then I could have shut the door and made my peace with it. And now, after all this time, you just waltz in and expect to pick up where you left off?”

For a moment, all movement stopped. Eugenia gasped. Laura stood up and almost took the tablecloth with her.

“
Abuelita
Isabel, how can you say that?”

Her grandmother waved a trembling hand. “
Niña
, I know it's harsh. I know your life hasn't been a bed of roses. But you must see it from my point of view. I feel like I buried my family twenty years ago. Do I go now and open up the grave, just because you decide you're ready to come back?”

Laura walked out. Her harsh sobs echoed off the walls as she ran down the passageway to her room. With the hard closing of her door the silence was complete. Eugenia felt frozen to her chair, her lips nailed shut.

“Mamita, how could you say that?” Irene asked.

“You, of all people, should know. Have you ever told your sister how we cried that day after you went to her room and found they'd been taken? Does she know how much you suffered after she disappeared? How can you take her side now?”

They left early the next morning, like refugees, bags packed quickly and carelessly, as silently as they could so no one would wake up. By mid-morning they were on the outskirts of Santiago.

“So what do we do now, call Ignacio?” Laura asked once they returned the rented car and paid the bill.

“I don't think so. I didn't have a chance to tell you before, but Ignacio and I had a fight. So we really can't call him.”

“What happened?”

“It's kind of complicated, but let's just say that I didn't get along very well with his parents.”

“What's up with all these old Chileans, anyway? Why do so many of them have a broomstick up their—”

“Laurita!” her mother interrupted quickly.

“Sorry, but it's true! The only ones I've met so far who are different are
tía
Irene, who doesn't count because she lives in Boston,
tía
Tonia, who's Mapuche,
Bobe
Sara … Wait! That's what we do! We call
Bobe
Sara!”

Over Eugenia's protests Laura went back into the rental car office and asked to borrow the phone. After first trying the offices of the Committee, she found Sara at home.

“
Bobe
? It's me, Laura. Yes, we're back in Santiago. Well actually, my mama and me, we came back by ourselves. No, there's nothing wrong. Well … actually,
Bobe
, we don't have a key to Grandma Isabel's house, and we were wondering … No, we just returned the rental car, we're downtown, and … Oh,
Bobe
, that's so sweet. We'll just take a taxi out, okay? Yes. And
Bobe?
Thanks so much. Kisses from both of us. Yeah. See you soon.”

Sara was waiting by the gate when the taxi drove up. Once the driver brought the suitcases up to the front door and Eugenia paid him, they took their bags into the guest room.

“I'm sorry, darlings,” Sara fussed, “but the house is small. Shmooti and I … well, we never expected to have a lot of guests. There are two beds, but you'll have to sleep together in the same room. And the guest bathroom, it doesn't have a shower. I guess we'll just have to share the one off the master bedroom, but I can get you fresh towels and—”

“
Bobe
.” Laura put her arms around her grandmother. “Don't worry so much. You're a lifesaver.”

By lunchtime they'd washed their clothes and made the beds. Samuel wanted to barbecue, so he and Laura went to the local butcher in search of some chicken or lamb.

“It better be juicy,
Zeyde
Shmooti,” Laura said as they were heading out. “Can you tell at the store if it's gonna be juicy?”

“Shmooti always takes forever at the butcher,” Sara said when they closed the door. “He has to catch up on the local gossip, argue over the fine points of each cut, you know. Let's go sit outside. There's a nice cool breeze, and we can have some orangeade. I just made it fresh with oranges from the tree.”

For a while they were busy setting up the chairs and table, trying to get the right angle so they could have both sun and shade. Sara poured them each a glass of the sweet liquid. It was delicious, Eugenia thought as they sat down and she took her first sip.

“So what happened, really?” Sara asked.

Eugenia took another sip of the orangeade. She put the glass down on the table, picked up a napkin and wiped her mouth. She looked down at her hands for a moment, rubbing the fingers of one along the top of the other, then rubbing her thumbs together. She crossed her hands between her thighs, interlacing the fingers.

“It's hard to talk about it,” she finally said.

“I can understand that,
m'hija
, believe me.”

“I know you can. I'm sure you can understand that my mama, well, what happened back then, you know, she hasn't been able to … she's still angry. But it isn't Laura's fault, and I—”

“You don't have to say anything else, really. I get the general idea. You can stay here as long as you want, you know.”

“Thank you so much,
doña
Sara. But you understand that we'll have to get our own apartment, we can't be relying on you, and we'll have to find Laura a school for this March, if possible, and—”

“I can help with all that. I know some people who work at a good progressive school; it's quite near here. Nowadays it isn't easy to find openings at the private schools, but I'm sure they can help Laurita. Now I don't presume to know if Laura is baptized, but that doesn't matter at this school. It's often a problem at the private schools here, they're run by Catholic orders, you know. But don't worry about it anymore today,
hija
, let's just enjoy the afternoon.”

“Thank you. One last thing before they come back. When we got in this morning, we were wondering who to call. It was Laura who immediately thought of you.”

“Thank you,
hija
, for saying that. What a gift she is. I don't know exactly how to say this, but—I'm not sure, my dear, if your mother knows how lucky she really is.”

As it turned out,
doña
Isabel did not feel lucky at all. The phone rang the next day, and it was Irene. Eugenia was the one to pick up.

“Chenyita?” Irene's voice was hard to distinguish through all the static. “Thank God I found you. Look, I'm calling from San Jacinto. When Mama found the two of you gone, she prohibited my using the phone at the house to call you. Then she went back in her room and hasn't come out since.”

“She must be pretty mad.”

“I think she's hurt more than mad. She wanted to apologize, she said, she knew she'd gotten carried away, but when she got up you were gone.”

“I know she has a right to be mad at me. But not Laura. Why is it she's always there in the middle, taking the potshots meant for me? It's not fair.”

“I know, sweetie. But families, you know … and ours especially, don't you think?”

“Well, look. For now, we're doing fine. So let's just wait a while, maybe when Mama gets back to Santiago. Maybe then she'll see things differently.”

“Are you going to live with Manuel's parents?”

“No,
mi amor
. We'll find an apartment, a school for Laura. Once we're independent, maybe then it'll be easier to mend fences.”

“Hopefully that will happen before February.”

“How's that?”

“That's when I go back to MIT. My vacation only goes through the end of this month. And now that it's just me and Mamita, she's agreed to come back to Santiago by then.”

“But Nenita, you and I have barely had any time alone.”

“I know, sweetie, and especially now that so much is happening. But you know, my job … and besides, if I stay any longer, Amanda will …”

“You're right. Of course. By the beginning of next month I need to have Laura signed up for school, anyway, and we should be moved into our own place.”

“So you've decided to stay for good?”