After a while I drift into a thin sleep, waking to the soft whisper of Grandmother Maria, her breath pungent in my face. “Come.” She guides me to my feet, her hands gentler than when she’d pulled me from bed earlier.
Out the window, a pale strip of dawn leaks through the dark sky. I take the skirt and blouse my grandmother holds out, the stockings and shoes, and put them on without question. I am too tired to ask what we are doing. Grandmother Maria leads me out the front door, and we climb into the car. It isn’t until I see my teal luggage in the back seat—Nina Martinez embossed above the Samsonite label—that I worry. “Where are we going?”
My grandmother is already backing out of the driveway. “School.” She yanks the gear crank toward the steering wheel and takes off down the road with a screech of the tires. She always drives too fast.
“I’m not supposed to go back for another week,” I protest but half-heartedly. School suddenly seems promising, an escape. I never want to see Alfonso again, and I am afraid to face you in the light of day, afraid of what you will think of me.
A breeze whistles through the cracked open window, and I lean my head against the glass and let the air caress my forehead. You want to be rid of me. That was the look that passed between you and Grandmother.
I would want to be rid of me, too.
Grandmother Maria doesn’t like the freeway so we drive through Studio City and Toluca Lake on flat, wide roads lined with low buildings and large billboards where mustached men advertise Wilson cigarettes. In thirty minutes we are in Burbank, racing down the long driveway to Villa Cabrini Academy. The car circles the drive, and our brakes slam as we halt in front of the stone steps leading to the three arched doorways of the shaded portico.
Above the twisted columns, Jesus stands with his arms outstretched in welcome. But he is not the statue I pray to. On the hot, dusty lawn, flanked by stubby palms that look like overgrown pineapples, stands a ten-foot-tall statue of Mother Cabrini, a stone mantle frozen over her head. I do not believe in God, or Jesus, but I believe in that statue.
She was the first thing I saw from the back seat of the car when I arrived at Cabrini Academy as a little girl, squished next to Grandmother Maria who had strategically positioned herself between us, her fat thigh pinning me to the window. The sun beat off the stone figure, and the glare stung my eyes, but there was life in Mother Cabrini. I could see breath unfurling from her mouth like moisture in cold air. I decided right then and there that I would pray only to her, this larger-than-life statue of Mother Cabrini, and at night she’d kneel at my window, tall enough to see right in, and sing me to sleep like you used to.
Only today, in the shadow of a morning that doesn’t feel real, she looks lifeless. I stare into her huge, vacant eyes, wanting to make them shift and blink as I used to, but they don’t move. She is just stone. There is nothing to pray to. No Mother.
My grandmother and I climb out of the car, dust and gravel embracing us as we make our way up the wide steps. Old Sister Katherine is at the door, circling her arms around my grandmother, her chin leaking from under her habit like soft rubber. Grandmother Maria must have called her the moment the gong sounded at 4:00 a.m. Humiliated to think that Sister Katherine knows what happened, I drop my eyes to the floor as we move inside where Sister Caroline—a woman I suspect is quite pretty beneath her shrouds—hugs my grandmother with the same, sorry look on her face as Sister Katherine. She gives me a sickly sweet smile. “Come. Let’s get you settled in.”
Upstairs, the dorm room smells of bleach so strong it smarts my eyes. It is strange being the only one here. The twin beds are stripped bare, the desk is a clean slate of wood, the hangers are empty in the closet. It reminds me of a deserted ghost town I once saw in a book, shells of houses with missing walls and neatly arranged, abandoned furniture.
Sister Caroline pats my shoulder, her eyes a delicate brown. “Your suitcases are being brought up, and you can unpack before breakfast. You’ll get to eat with us in the dining room until the other girls arrive. Won’t that be fun? I assure you—” she leans in with a hand propped on each knee as if speaking to a small child “—the coffee cake is worth the boredom of Sister Mary detailing every ailment she’s ever had, but don’t say I said so.” She puts a conspiratorial finger to her lips, smiles and leaves Grandmother Maria and me to our goodbyes.
This is not the first time I’ve been left by my grandmother—when you were on set or singing in Palm Springs or at Radio City Music Hall—and yet the look on her face says that everything is different.
She plants a firm hand on each shoulder, holding me at arm’s length and looking me sharply in the eye. “Last night had nothing to do with you. Do you understand?” It had everything to do with me, but I nod in agreement. “It’s not your fault. There are wicked men in the world. Sometimes we stumble into their path, and there’s nothing we can do but hurry on out of it. I’m going to fix this, I promise you that.” She embraces me with strong arms. Her fleshy bosom and the smell of talc fill me with complicated sadness.
She doesn’t let go until I do.
Chapter Six
* * *
Perimeters
Daughter,
When I wake I am covered in sweat and hot sunlight and my head is pounding. I have fallen asleep in my slip, and it sticks like tape to the inside of my legs. There is a sick feeling in my stomach, as if something awful has happened, but I don’t remember what that is until I sit up.
I barely make it to the bathroom before I vomit over the toilet, strands of hair falling into my face. My stomach lurches over and over as if my body thinks it can purge the image of Alfonso in your bed. It can’t. When I am emptied, I kneel on the bathroom floor, the tiles cool under my calves, my heart pounding, my hair sticky with bile. The house is silent, and I wonder where everyone is. I know I should find you straightaway, but I don’t want you to see me like this so I pull myself to my feet and start the shower, stepping into scalding water and letting it pound over my face. I shampoo, condition, brush my teeth, towel dry my hair and lotion my face with the illusion that if I hold on to normalcy, I can defuse the severity of the situation.
I do not yet know that our lives have changed completely, and I will never be able to set things right.
Mamá’s hushed and hurried voice drifts down the hall as I make my way to the kitchen still zipping the back of my dress. I think she is talking to you until I step into the room and see that she is on the telephone. Sunlight peppers the red speckled Formica tabletop and the backs of the empty chairs. You are nowhere in sight. The clock on the wall says ten fifteen. You never sleep this late, and I am about to go to your room when I hear muffled Spanish through the line. I take a step toward Mamá, but she turns her back, cupping the receiver to her mouth and hunching over as if I mean to grab the phone from her.