Fool's Journey (21 page)

           
"The angels woke me up. Said, 'Rosa, someone needs
you.'" She smiled at Deirdre and shrugged. "It happens all the time.
Those angels—they think I work for them."

           
"I think maybe you do."

           
“I think maybe they better start paying,” Mrs. Ruiz
complained good-naturedly.

           
Deirdre sat on a chrome-legged kitchen chair and sighed,
feeling at ease for the first time in days. Heated air from the register warmed
her feet, and she realized suddenly how cold she had become. One of the cats
she had seen outside, the ginger one, strolled into the kitchen, gave a soft
mew of greeting, and jumped onto her lap. Automatically, Deirdre scratched
under its chin, and the cat gazed up adoringly through slatted eyes, motor
going loud and strong. Deirdre knew how she felt: sitting safely in a place far
from trouble, being fussed over. If it were possible, she would be purring
herself.

           
"You go to bed as soon as Manny moves some of his
stuff out of his room," Mrs. Ruiz said. "Just take a minute."

           
Deirdre straightened at that, feeling suddenly awkward at
having come. "Please, just put me on a couch or the floor, Mrs. Ruiz.
Manny shouldn't have to move because of me."

           
"No, I'm the boss here, Deirdre," Mrs. Ruiz
told her firmly. "My room has twin beds. He can sleep there just fine—he’s
used to it. We get lots of company."

           
Thinking of the children she had seen sleeping in the
living room, Deirdre wondered whether to ask questions now, or wait for an
explanation. It wasn't her business, but she already felt a part of this
household. Did it have something to do with what Manny had hinted at in the
car? The people who needed his Aunt Rosa? People like Deirdre?

           
"I don't think I can sleep,” she said. “I don't know
if I even want to sleep. I just want to sit here and be safe."

           
Manny walked in just then. "You need to rest,
though. Your heart as much as your body, I think.” He gestured over his
shoulder. “Your bag is in the first room on the left down that hall."

           
"Look, Manny, I don't like
moving you out—"

           
"It's no good protesting," he interrupted with
a grin. "Nobody's going to listen. Right, Auntie Rosa?"

           
The older woman nodded her head. As the teakettle began
to sing, she took it off the element and poured the steaming water into a brown
crockery teapot. Almost immediately, a soothing aroma filled the room.

           
"Sweet sleepy tea,” Manny smiled. "That's what
I used to call it when I was a little boy. I think we could all use some."

           
He chose three thick mugs from the cupboard and brought
them to the table. Then he sat down next to Deirdre.

           
"Looks like you've made a friend," he said,
reaching over to give the cat a quick scratch on top of the head. "I hope
she's not bothering you."

           
"No," she murmured. "The purring makes me
feel better."

           
"Cats are good medicine." He nodded.

           
Mrs. Ruiz set the teapot on the table, and she pulled out
a chair, but before she could seat herself, a frantic cry came from another
part of the house: "
Mama! ¿Dónde
està Mama?"

           
"Sounds like somebody has a bad dream," she
said, shaking her head. "
Probecito
.
Sometimes I think there's no end to sorrow. You drink the tea, then try to
sleep, Deirdre. We talk in the morning."

           
Manny waited till his aunt had left the kitchen, then
said, "You see how it is—there are lots of other chicks under Auntie
Rosa's wing. You’re one more. Promise me you won't feel like you're putting
anyone out."

           
"Who are they," she asked, "the children
in the living room?"

           
His dark, solemn eyes caught hers for a moment. "I
don't know."

           
Deirdre frowned. How could he not—?

           
"That is," he went on, "I don't know who
they are in particular. I know the profile though. Lost kids, no mom, no dad—at
least none they can claim right now. It happens a lot in the Hispanic
community. Families come up to find work, but they don't have the right papers.
If they get caught, sometimes their kids aren't with them. Someone from the
community takes care of them, keeps them in school until they hear whether the
parents are coming back or not. Then they either hold on to them a little
longer, or find a way to send them back home."

           
"I didn't know that Seattle . . .” She didn't know
quite how to phrase the rest.

           
"You're right. Seattle itself doesn't have much of a
migrant community, but it's surrounded by farmland. There's a long growing
season and lots of picking. Anyway, it's best to get the kids away from where
their parents were picked up, get them to a location where no one's checking to
see if they've got papers. It's not good for kids to worry about this stuff.

           
"Aunt Rosa's part of a network that helps," he
continued. "When the parents come back, with or without papers, they know
how to find their kids again."

           
He took a deep sip of his tea, and Deirdre wondered how
often this home became someone else's haven, as it was for her tonight. It
certainly explained the boxes of clothing and toys. But the instinct, the need
to take care of others—where did that come from?

           
"You're good people," she said. "You and
your aunt."

           
He shrugged as if to say this was nothing special.
"We have a lot to be thankful for. People have taken care of us. We try to
pass it along. This house, for instance," he said, glancing around the
bright kitchen. "It belonged to one of the first people Aunt Rosa worked
for when she came here. An old man, bad-tempered, even cruel with his words
sometimes. He used to scare the pee out of me when I had to come along to help
out with the house cleaning. When he died, though, he left us the house. Later,
we found out he'd been dying of cancer all the time, was in terrible pain, but
he didn't want the morphine. He wanted his head clear till the end."

           
"Most people would just accept a windfall like this
as their good luck," she said, "and not bother to reciprocate."

           
He smiled and glanced in the direction his aunt had gone.
"Most people don't have angels dropping in and out of their lives either.
It tends to make you more responsible."

           
Did he mean it literally or figuratively? It didn't
matter, of course. The result was the same. "I wonder if there's the other
kind of people," she mused quietly.

           
"What do you mean?"

           
She took a sip of her tea, not wanting to even voice the
thought which had occurred to her. After a moment she said, "The kind of
people who attract . . .demons instead."

           
Manny reached across the table and gave her hand a firm,
reassuring grip. "If there are, they can't come here. St. Michael’s posted
at the front door and St. Barbara at the back. Come on, Deirdre. I think it's
time you went to bed."

           
Manny led her down the hall a few feet, opened a door and
switched on a light. She had been reluctant to leave the glowing warmth of the
kitchen, but in this small bedroom there was another kind of security, a
masculinity that seemed at once to protect and embrace. It was a comfortable
room, not at all Spartan. Lots of books, a desk as littered with papers as her
own at home. She sat down on the bed cross-legged, and watched as he checked to
make sure the windows were locked. It was a show for her sake, she knew, not
something he normally did. It was almost a replay of his actions at her
apartment. Only a few days ago, she had sat on her own bed and watched as he
repaired her window and swung it to a locked position. So much had happened
between. Nothing was over yet. Freemont Willard had made that plain. If
anything, her troubles had just begun.

           
"I don't want to go to sleep," she said softly.
"I don't want to dream."

           
He didn't try to argue with her, but picked up a quilt
and tucked it around her. "Just lean back and try to relax then," he
said. "I'll sit with you for a little while, if you like."

           
She scooted into a pile of pillows in the corner, making
room for him on the bed. He sat down next to her, and draped an arm around her
shoulder. It felt warm and natural. The ginger cat pranced in from the kitchen,
leaped gracefully to the bed and made a nest between them.

           
"And here's Señora Cala to play duenna for us,"
he laughed.

           
"Cala?" she asked.

           
"Short for
Calabaza
—it
means pumpkin. When she was a kitten she was very round."

           
"And her eyes glow in the dark, like a
jack-o-lantern. I noticed when we drove up." She caressed the cat and
leaned back into the pillows. "You have lots of books," she
commented. "Looks like some of them are law books. I'd forgotten—detective
work isn't your main interest."

           
He nodded. "I'm taking this semester off from
school," he said. "I had to take a sudden trip to Mexico at the
beginning of September and missed the start, but I'll finish up next year. I
work for the detective firm during the summer and they let me stay on. It's
interesting sometimes—shows me the unraveling underside of the law they don’t
tell you about in school."

           
"Are you specializing?"

           
"Immigration and Family Law. No surprise,
right?"

           
"Right," she yawned. She could feel the spell
of sleep creeping over her like a cat in the shadows. Maybe she could shut her
eyes for just a little bit while he was here. Sleep for just a moment and let
Mrs. Ruiz's angels do their work.

XXVII.

           
When Deirdre awoke, she was alone, except for the cat,
Cala, who smiled up at her from a square of sunlight at the edge of the bed.
Her eyes followed the sunbeam up to the window where a patch of golden leaves
splashed against the clear blue sky.

           
Deirdre’s heart lifted. If only every day could begin
like this, without darkness, remembered or otherwise. This must be how some
people spent their childhoods. This must be what it felt like to awaken in a
happy home.

           
She had slept in her clothes under the quilt Manny had
tucked around her, but feeling rumpled was a small price to pay for the blessed
sleep she’d enjoyed. From the kitchen, she could hear the low murmur of
conversation: Mrs. Ruiz’s voice, and Manny’s.

           
How late was it, she wondered? She sprang from the bed,
and Cala gave a disgruntled mew before resettling herself. Deirdre peered into
a small mirror that hung on the wall and ran her fingers through her short
curls. She looked like a discarded troll doll, she thought with a wry smile. It
was a good thing she was among friends.

           
Out in the hall, she almost collided with the two
children she’d spotted the night before. As they emerged from the bathroom
directly across from her room, the sweet scent of bubble bath swirled about
them. They glanced up at her shyly and grinned. Poor little sweeties, she
thought. She wished she knew more Spanish, but she only had a few phrases at
her disposal.

           
“
Buenas días
,”
she said tentatively. The children exchanged a quick, conspiratorial glance.

           
“Good
morning, lady!” one of them crowed. His sister giggled and they ran off together
toward the front of the house. She shook her head, feeling a little chagrined.
So much for expectations.

           
At the kitchen doorway, Deirdre paused for a moment,
taking in the scene. Mrs. Ruiz shuffled her deck of tarot cards with seeming
unconcern. Manny stood at the stove, cooking something that smelled marvelous.

           
“How’d you sleep?” he asked without even glancing over
his shoulder. He must have heard her in the hall with the children.

           
“Great!” She smiled in his direction. “And not a single
dream, good or bad.”

           
Manny poured her a cup of coffee and handed it to her.
The warmth crept through the pottery, right to the bone.