Irises (30 page)

“What about your sister? You said she's sixteen, right?” His phone rang. “Excuse me.” He picked it up and said, “Hold my calls, please.” He was taking her seriously, she realized. “How does she feel about this? Does she agree with you?”

“I'm pretty sure she would be opposed.”

“I see.” A look of concern came over his face.

“My minister says that without my sister's consent, this will be hard.”

“It could be.” He tilted his chair forward. He had the a
ir of someone who
had obtained all the information he needed to
act. “How was your father allowed to bring your mother home?”

“Dr. Rulfo, our family doctor, said that he would take care of her when the hospitals wouldn't do it anymore.”

“This Dr. Rulfo takes care of your mother now?”

“He comes every week to check on her. There's really not that much to be done. A nurse changes her nutrition and hydration bag daily. Mary and I clean her, massage her legs, comb her hair, change her diaper. Mary even listens to the radio with her.”

“Well, the first thing we need to do is talk to Dr. Rulfo. If he agrees with you and refuses to give your mother further treatment, things will go a lot easier. We'll have to petition the court to make you your sister's legal guardian, or if not you, someone who agrees that the course you want to take is also what's best for her. It sounds like you think it is.”

“Yes,” she said with conviction. “This is what is best for her.”
Thank God
,
she said to herself. Thank God for the certainty that this was best for Mary. Maybe there had to be a God just to have someone to thank.

Mr. Ortega continued, “We'd need to go to court to petition for the termination of your mother's life support. I would recommend moving fast, especially if you and your sister disagree. You don't want this to drag on. It could get ugly.”

Ugly. She was not prepared to think of what could happen between her and Mary as ugly. Hard, maybe. But ugly? There was nothing ugly about Mary, and here Kate was, about to force her into ugliness. She needed to find a way that wasn't ugly. “How long will it take?” she asked.

“I don't think you can go to Stanford this fall and do this at the same time,” he said.

“I'm not worried about Stanford. I've already called them to postpone my entrance for a year. I'm worried about my sister. I want to give her time to
.
.
.”

“You want time to convince your sister?” He finished the sentence for her.

It wasn't time to convince Mary that Kate needed. Mary might never be convinced. She needed time for something more important. “I don't want this to tear us apart. I need to make sure we're not torn apart.”

He nodded. “I understand. On the other hand, the sooner we do this, the sooner the healing process between you and your sister can start. It'll take a while, if you're lucky. I've seen brothers and sisters who never manage to reconcile over something like this.”

I am doing this for you, Mary
, Kate said in her mind.
I'll wait until you understand that and believe it in your heart. I'll take courses at UTEP and then after that, I'll go to Stanford and you can come with me.

Mr. Ortega was speaking. “I can't guarantee how long this will take. It's a little bit of an unusual situation, your mother being at home, so I'll need to do some research on how best to handle this. I would recommend moving ahead on the legal aspect of it. You can always postpone the actual removal of the feeding tube until you're ready. How have you been paying for your mother's care? I take it your father's medical insurance stopped paying a long time ago.”

“We've been paying out of Father's salary. It's expensive.”

“Well, you certainly can't afford to pay for those services now.” He stood up, and Kate stood up as well. “I'll get going on this. Oh, I'm going to need a five-thousand-dollar retainer from you before I can start working on your case. You can mail me the check, or better yet, drop it off with Linda up front.”

“How does a retainer work?” She felt stupid asking, but given the scarcity of funds, she needed to know.

“The retainer is money you give me up front. It means I'm your lawyer. If we spend less, I'll give the rest back to you. If more is needed, I'll ask you for more.”

“How much more?” She panicked for a moment as she tried to do the math in her head. They had thirteen thousand dollars, more or less, from what the church gave them and from Father's savings account. There was Father's pension, which was around forty thousand according to what Mr. Lucas had told Mary. How long could they live on that? Not for very long, if the medical bills and legal fees were too high.

“It depends. Five thousand will cover filing the papers a
nd a couple
of routine court appearances. Let's start with that.” He touched her shoulder as they walked. “I know you have limited funds. I'll keep the costs down. If there are n
o unanticipated problems
, we'll come in around ten thousand or close to it.” Once they reached the door, he told Linda to give her the client information sheet. “Give me a call in a couple of days and let me know how you made out with your sister.”

“Wait,” she said. “I'm not going to make any decisions today. I need time.”

“You're not sure about your mother?” he asked pointedly.

“She's not just
my
mother. I need time. I need to talk to my sister and I'm sure she'll need time to take it all in.”

“I see.”

“Please, I don't want to start this process before I feel she's ready.”

“Why don't you go ahead and fill out the form. That way, if
yo
u make a decision for me to proceed, you can just call.” Then he turned around and marched back into his office.

She took the form from Linda and went to the sofa to fill it out. When she got to the place on the form that asked for immediate family, she wrote down only
Mary Romero (sister)
.

 

M
ary was in the toolshed, covering her paintings with burlap to protect them from moisture. She held the half-finished painting of the irises before her and couldn't imagine ever finishing it. At that moment, she couldn't see herself painting again.

She and Kate had hardly spoken since their last conversation, the afternoon after she went missing. Even when Mary told Kate about her visit with Mrs. Fresquez, Kate had listened quietly but not said anything. Kate didn't seem angry; she seemed preoccupied. If only Kate would tell her what was worrying her.

Just then she heard Renata's voice. Mary came out of the shed and there she was, with Marcos beside her.

“Look what the cat dragged in,” Renata said, proud of herself.

Mary walked toward them. As she got closer, she saw Marcos's face. There were bruises under both his eyes the color and shape of small eggplants, and his lip looked like it was torn in half. “What happened to you?”

“Is a long story.”

“He says that it's a long story,” Renata interpreted.

“Is Sadurday, 'member?” He took out the sketch of the eagles that he had shown them in the cafeteria.

“I'm sorry. I can't go. I have to take care of my mother.” Kate had gone out grocery shopping with Mr. Cisneros, the old gentleman who used to drive Papa around.

“That's why I'm here,” Renata piped up. “I can watch your mother while you take a look at this wall.”

“I don't think that's a good —”

“Mary!” Renata shot Mary her best
Don't be stupid
expression.

“I vut a sea beld in ma ca,” Marcos said.

“He says he put a seat belt in his car. Would you please go now? Go!”

“Eee only dake a secon.”

“He says
—”

“I know what he said. It's not going to take a second. It will take about an hour. The community center is way over in Socorro. And how did he get you to help him?”

“I vent and god her.”

“I couldn't say no to him,” Renata said, pretending to fli
rt.
She opened the gate and began to push Mary toward Marcos's car.

“Talita's number is on the wall by the telephone in case something happens,” Mary said as she walked. “Kate should be back soon.”

“All right already!” Renata shouted.

They drove a block before Mary asked him, “How did you know about my mother?”

“I ast awond about yu.”

“Why?”

His eyes were nearly closed and his lip was puffed up, but Mary saw him smile. As far as he was concerned, it was a question that didn't need to be answered.

“What happened to you anyway? Can you see? Are you sure you can drive?” She pulled on the newly installed seat belt to make sure it was tight. “You're doing community service for
some crime you committed and you're still getting into fights?”

“I ad to.”

“You had to? Here we go again with the I-had-tos.”

He gripped the steering wheel with both hands and only nodded. The rest of the trip they drove in silence. It was painful for him to talk, and she didn't feel like asking any questions out loud. Inside she was swarming with them. Why was she with him? She saw his busted face back at the house and st
ill she
got into the car with him. Why did she feel he was a good person when all over his face there was evidence that he was bad?

He parked the car directly in front of the community center. She never imagined the wall to be so wide and long. It was going to take him a year of Saturdays to complete. They stepped out of the car and stood in front of the wall. “It's huge,” she couldn't help saying.

He made a gesture with his hand as if to say it was no big deal. Then he opened the door to the backseat of the car and took out a large sheet of architectural drawing paper. He signaled for her to follow him to a picnic table, where he unfolded the paper and secured it with bricks and rocks.

She stood back, amazed. The two eagles he had sketched initially now flew inside two circles that overlapped. In the overlap, he had drawn two shaking hands. The perspective of the eagles' outstretched wings was perfect. One was light brown with a white crest and the other was all brown, but both had golden beaks. The circles themselves were blue, bu
t yello
w and orange and pink beams shot from their circumferences like bursting sun rays.

“Vat you sink?”

“First you'll need to paint the wall white,” Mary said, trying to keep herself from showing admiration.

“Yeah, den?”

“Then you'll have to move what's here to there.” She pointed first to the piece of paper and then to the wall.

“Ow?”

“You'll need to draw it on the wall with a thick pencil. First you'll have to locate where the eagles go by putting markers on the wall. Like for this tip of the wing, you draw a spot; for the curve of the wing, you put another spot. Then you connect the dots. You'll need to measure carefully to make sure everything is centered. It's like hanging a picture.”

“You elp me.”

“No way.”

“Vie not?”

“I can't, that's all.”

Just then a man came out of the building. “Hey, Marcos!” he called out. He came over and shook Marcos's hand and waited for Marcos to introduce her, but Marcos suddenly seemed flustered.

“I'm Mary,” she said. The man held out his hand and Mary shook it.

“Mary, nice to meet you. I'm Raul Canuto, the director here.” He turned to Marcos. “We have that money so you can buy the supplies. Why don't you go in and get it from Betty?”

Marcos limped away. Mary hadn't noticed the limp before. She wondered whether it was from the time he jumped over the fence into her yard.