Let Their Spirits Dance Read online

  “It’s OK, Mom, just some trouble over where Ray plays…at the club.”

  “With Ray? Did he do this? Call the police!”

  “No, Ray didn’t do this.” I walk back to the kitchen sink and soak paper towels, pressing them up to my face.

  “I thought you were here because you saw Jesse!”

  “Jesse!” The paper towels freeze in midair over my face. Saying my brother’s name raises the hair at the back of my neck. His name comes out of me like a shout. I look at Mom, half expecting to see Jesse standing behind her. She’s smiling. The wrinkles on her chin have disappeared and her eyes look as if she’s staring at a newborn baby—soft, tender.

  “I heard his voice—tonight! Ay, it’s as beautiful as ever. You remember, don’t you, Teresa?”

  Mom has her hand on my shoulder, shaking it, trying to make me believe what she just said. She doesn’t know I’ve never forgotten Jesse’s voice. I recorded it in my mind when it was still a boy’s voice and not a man’s.

  “Ouch—Mom, my shoulder hurts.”

  “Ay mija! How could this happen to you, and tonight, why tonight?”

  “I don’t know, maybe it’s part of a big plan. It doesn’t matter; she got the worst of it.”

  “Who? Sandra? Don’t tell me you were fighting in a bar with that woman!”

  “Not a bar, Mom, the club—the Riverside.”

  “But fighting…mija…she’s bigger than you. Did you hit her a few good ones at least? May God forgive me!”

  “She’ll remember me the rest of her life! I ripped off her dress too, the bitch, she had it coming.”

  “Don’t cuss, mija! Ray’s like your dad, another woman at his side. Sandra’s your Consuelo.”

  “Don’t even say that woman’s name, Mom! I don’t want to hear it.” Mom pulls me by the arm. “Look, let me show you…your brother is visiting us tonight!” I walk with her as she balances herself easily on her cane. I haven’t seen her walk this fast in years.

  “Be careful Mom, you’ll fall.” She ignores me and walks into her bedroom with me trailing at her side. The room is lit by veladoras flickering before the image of El Santo Niño de Atocha, a fancy name for the Christ Child. The Christ Child is dressed in a simple blue robe with a brown mantle over His shoulders. In one hand he holds a stalk of wheat, in the other a scepter topped with a globe of the world. His dark, wavy hair is down to his shoulders and frames His small, somber face. The picture is propped on top of a white-draped oak dresser. My mother decorates an altar in honor of El Santo Niño every Christmas and prays a nine-day novena. The candlelight is white, friendly. It hushes me, yet I feel the need to dispel its shadows and reach for the light switch.

  “No, mija! Spirits don’t like bright light.”

  “Spirits?”

  “Look.” She leads me to the window and lifts a corner of the drapes.

  “What do you see?”

  “Nothing but Cholo acting like he’s got the rabies.”

  “Look carefully.” My mother’s voice is urgent.

  I look intently. I’m glad there’s nobody around to see me next to Mom. My face is red and raw. The pink rayon bathrobe is tight around my shoulders, its frayed ribbon sags at my collarbone. I can’t imagine what my fellow teachers at Jimenez Elementary would say if they saw me now. It’s so ironic after the whole school worked on a unit on nonviolence. I’m already worried my face won’t heal in time to make it back to my second-grade class after Christmas break.

  Trees are still, not a leaf blowing. Through the misty air, I see the star of Bethlehem blinking over Blanche’s house across the street. Its light is multicolored, red, blue, yellow. I make out the white fence posts of the wooden pen in Blanche’s backyard that used to belong to her proud rooster, Fireball. After El Cielito was zoned “industrial” by the city, Blanche had to get rid of all her animals, including Chiva, the black and white goat that gave up her milk for Blanche’s kids. Fireball was gone long before that, captured and made into chicken soup by a local who got tired of being woken up at four in the morning.

  A souped-up Malibu with a muffler that sounds like a motorcycle pulls up into the driveway of the shiftless renters next door. A man opens the door and creeps out.

  “I see a guy getting out of a car next door.”

  “Never mind about him,” Mom says, exasperated that I don’t see anything else. “They come and go at that house all night long.”

  Cholo is standing in the spot where the passion vine used to grow, barking at me as I look out the window.

  “Stop, you mangy dog!” The dog runs around in a half circle and barks toward the chain link fence, cringes, snarls, barks again.

  “What’s wrong with the dog?”

  “He sees Jesse’s spirit. Los animales see the spirit world.”

  Cholo’s barking gets all the dogs in the neighborhood going. One by one, the dogs start barking, some louder, some softer, until an eerie howl sounds, and the last dog stops barking.

  “This is spooky.”

  Mom is insistent. “Do you see my mijito? Is he wearing his uniform?”

  “No, Mom, I don’t see Jesse.” I’m looking hard, scanning the dark, expecting what?

  “I heard his voice tonight. Jesse’s voice!”

  “You were dreaming.”

  “No! My eyes were open. I could barely hear him, but it was him talking to someone—other men. Voices. He promised me, don’t you remember, Teresa, promised me at the airport that I would hear his voice again!”

  “Con calma, Mom. Calm down. Jesse said all kinds of things. He said we’d read about him in a book, too.”

  “If only I had listened harder. I don’t know what he was trying to tell me.” My mother bursts into tears. The curtain slips from her hand. Cholo stops barking and is now whimpering. A solitary dog barks in the distance, then stops.

  “Ay, he’s leaving!” Mom turns and walks slowly back to bed, holding on to my arm. Suddenly, she is weak again, frail. I help her lie down, easing her head back on the pillow. She’s crying, her shoulders heaving with every sob. I take a Kleenex from the box on the nightstand and hand it to her, switching on the lamp. In the light, I notice her face is flushed. I put my hand on her forehead, and it feels warm. I know the pain in her legs is excruciating, but she’s stubborn and won’t take prescribed pain pills. I’m wondering if I should call Dr. Mann and tell him Mom’s hallucinating. There’s a part of me that wants to think this whole thing is a nightmare and I’ll wake up soon.

  “Ay, Teresa, your face looks horrible! You need to see a doctor.”

  “Don’t worry about my face. You feel hot. Do your lungs hurt?” I look closely at her for signs of the weariness I’ve come to identify as the pneumonia she’s battled with twice this winter.

  “Mom, you were dreaming. Go to sleep.”

  “No! I heard your brother’s voice.”

  “Why would Jesse be waking you up?” I play inside my mother’s head. It’s no use trying to force reality. The real and the invisible are clouds my mother moves in and out of without noticing the difference. She looks matter-of-factly at me.

  “Why would anyone wake me up at night? Jesse has something to tell me. Him and his friends.”

  “Friends?”

  “Voices…” She searches the dark again, straining to hear.

  “What were they saying?” I ask her.

  “Who knows? They were whispering! Ay, Santo Niño help me!” she cries. “What is it I have to do?” She looks over at the image of El Santo Niño and tears start again. I brush them off her face and feel I’m the mother, and she’s the child. I’m wondering if Elsa, my oldest daughter, will someday feel the same way about me. She’ll look at me and think I’m crazy for waking her up in the middle of the night.

  “Something in my chest is heavy, mija. There’s something I have to do.”

  Since Jesse’s death, my mother feels all her pain in her breastbone. It travels through the center of her chest and meets in her back between her sho
ulder blades. She holds on to the pain with one hand.

  “Don’t think about it. You need to rest.”

  “How can I rest when there’s something I have to do? Didn’t you hear anything?” She holds my hand and listens one more time. The action makes me cock my head to listen, too. If only I could hear my brother’s voice, now, in this house! I would cup my hand around it and seal it forever into the grooves of plaster on the walls.

  “Do you think Jesse forgave me? Ay, mijito! He suffered so much for me, que pena! Why didn’t I throw your father out?” She sits up and starts coughing, gasping for air.

  “Mom, stop accusing yourself! You’re making yourself sick.” I pat her back and give her a drink of water.

  “Is the room warm enough for you?” I look over at the orange coils of the electric heater. “It’s so cold in this house! Just like my dad to go off and die and never fix anything.”

  “It doesn’t matter, mija. The other world is catching up to me anyway, just think, I might have to put up with your father and Consuelo after I die. God knows, I should have buried their bones together!”

  “They’re probably in Hell, Mom. You’ll never see them.”

  “Maybe I will, and maybe I won’t. God knows what He will do with those two. May they rest in peace, even though they never gave me any peace!” She touches my aching face gently. “See, here’s my nightmare…your face, to tell me I should have left your father years ago. Why didn’t I fight them both? That’s why Jesse went to Vietnam. He couldn’t stand it anymore! Will my son ever forgive me?”

  “Mom, he’s forgiven you. Stop this! Look at me. Do you think I’m proud of what happened tonight? Mom, it was wrong, but I lost control. I’ve kept things inside for so long, and Jesse’s part of it, too.”

  “You remind me of your nana. Remember how she argued with Consuelo at church? Can you imagine…and on the day of Our Lady! Ay que mi ma! Here, let me help you, mija. I have medicine in the kitchen, peroxide.”

  “No. Mom, you need to rest. I’ll get the medicine. Don’t worry, I’ll rest, too, in my old room.”

  “What about the kids? And Ray, mija. Are you leaving him?”

  “For good this time, Mom. I’ll talk to the kids tomorrow. Cisco’s been wanting me to leave his dad for a long time. Lisa and Lilly are only fourteen. They’re so young to be going through all this. And Elsa—well, she’ll be mad at me.”

  “Elsa’s closest to Ray. Es su consentida. Remember how he cried when she was born? She’s always defended her dad.”

  “Just like I did sometimes.”

  “Did you want me to leave your dad?”

  “Mom, that was a long time ago. Stop making yourself miserable.” As I say the words, the phone starts ringing.

  “It’s Ray, already,” Mom says.

  Will this night ever end? I glance at a picture of St. Rita hanging in the hall as I make my way to the phone. St. Rita, the saint for desperate cases. St. Rita’s face has the pious look of someone in deep suffering. She was famous for putting up with her cruel husband. So great was her love for Christ’s passion that she asked to suffer in the same way he had. In answer to her prayer, a thorn from Christ’s crown struck her on the forehead and caused her terrible pain until the day she died. Imagine wanting to suffer! I brush my forehead with my hand, probably the only spot on my face that doesn’t hurt. I’m far from wanting a thorn stuck in it. St. Rita won Heaven for all her troubles. The only thing I feel I’m winning for my troubles is Hell.

  I grab the wall phone and hear Ray shouting on the other end. “Thanks for the big scene you made at the club. The manager canceled my contract! What a bitch!”

  “Canceled it? You liar! You’ll be playing there next weekend with Sandra at your side. Don’t give me that shit!”

  “If you’d listen…” I slam the phone down and unplug it from the wall. Ray always accused me of not listening to him. In my mind, he never listened to me. I never told Ray the dream about my left ear, and the fact that tonight I was listening in the dark for voices my mother says she heard. I’ve never told Ray any of my dreams. I tried a few times, and he only half-listened as if he was hearing a news report he didn’t care about. There are tears at the corners of my eyes, brimming over, falling down my face, stinging the swollen, cut places.

  I open the kitchen door and Cholo runs up to me, wagging his tail and jumping on my legs. Cholo’s ears are pointed straight up and look like the tips of my mother’s pruning shears. He’s furry like an Alaskan husky and short like a cocker spaniel. His fur is the color of straw except for a white x on his chest that looks like the work of an artist’s paintbrush. I remember Duke and the melancholy swish of his tail, slow-moving Duke who lived to be a hundred in dog years. Cholo’s jumping, sniffing at my legs. “Down boy, get down!” He runs to the oleander bushes growing against the back fence and starts barking again.

  “You’re not Duke! You didn’t even know Jesse!” I’m shivering, trying to stop my teeth from chattering. It’s dark, just like the mornings after Jesse’s death. I still can’t believe the passion vine bloomed until November the year he died.

  “Jesse?” I whisper his name. A breeze blows through the pink rayon bathrobe.

  “Mom’s sick, Jesse. And look at me. Ain’t I a sight for sore eyes! Ray and Sandra. You remember Consuelo? Well, like mother, like daughter. I’ve got Sandra.” I taste tears dribbling down my swollen lip. I do a pantomime in the dark, searching for the invisible with my hand. Pretending I’ve found Jesse’s hand, I hold on tight until my knuckles turn white. I look up at the sky. Clouds are huge ink spots floating overhead. Everything is quiet. Whatever was out there is gone. I hear a gunshot go off in the distance, once, twice. It scares Cholo, and he howls. Welcome back to El Cielito, the place I said I’d only come back to visit. Jesse would be surprised to know the old neighborhood sounds like Vietnam these days with everybody owning a gun.

  I walk by Mom’s room on my way to bed. She’s wide awake. The glow from the veladoras makes her look ghostly.

  “Did you find the peroxide? And ice, mija, don’t forget an ice pack. All this trouble, but Ray will get what he deserves. Remember all the bad things your father went through. Sandra will never compare to you, mija. Ray will regret all this, le va poder. Try to sleep now. Jesse will keep his promise.”

  I want to ask her what promise he’ll keep, but don’t say anything. After all these years, Mom doesn’t know I kept Jesse’s secret, like St. Rita’s thorn lodged deep in my flesh. Mom’s voice sounds far away to me.

  “El Santo Niño will let me know what all this means in the morning.” I look at the image of the Christ Child and wonder what His voice sounds like.

  Solitary Man ·

  El Cielito passes by as we ride down Buckeye Road to Sky Harbor Airport, the first week of January, 1968. Nana’s sitting in the front seat between Mom and Dad. Jesse’s sitting in the back between me and Priscilla with Paul on his lap. Paul’s nine years old and Mom says he’s too big to sit on Jesse’s lap. Dad grunts and says there’s nowhere to put him, unless he sits in the back of the station wagon on top of Jesse’s baggage.

  Jesse’s dark like my dad and not much taller than me. He was always a skinny kid who wore plaid shirts to make his chest look broader. His shoulders eventually filled out and toned up when he got into boxing. His eyebrows are two smooth, straight lines, not shaggy ones like Dad’s. When he talks, his voice fits into my ear like a seashell.

  “Just think, Los Tres Reyes are delivering gifts at the house right now,” Nana says. “We’ll have to open them later and mail yours to you, mijo,” she tells Jesse. It’s Nana’s way of trying to make us smile.

  “Yeah, the Three Kings,” Jesse says. “I forgot about them…sure, Nana, mail them to me.”

  The morning is cold, dark, looks like rain, or maybe it’s tears starting. I don’t know if what I’m doing now is part of Jesse’s funeral or his welcome home.

  Ol’ man Perez is sitting outside his dry-cleaning shop on a lawn
chair. He looks like a mannequin wearing a Stetson hat he dry-cleans once a year.

  “The cheapskate,” Dad says.

  “Pobrecito,” Mom says. “How old is he anyway?”

  “Who knows. He’s been there a hundred years.”

  “Wasn’t his daughter a little run-around, una cabroncita who went after anything in pants?” Nana asks. I know she’s giving my dad una in-directa, talking about Consuelo without really saying her name. Dad says nothing, just keeps his hands on the steering wheel.

  “She’s married,” says my mom.

  “No!” says Nana. She says the word like it’s a big joke.

  There’s El Rancho Drive-in, where you can chain your car up to a speaker and watch the latest thriller. Guys with cars are the lucky ones. They get to take their girlfriends to the old El Rancho, nicknamed El Rancho Grande, and fake watching the movie. All they really want is to make out and find out how far they can go. It’s pretty easy to tell who’s gone too far. The girlfriend drops out of school and pretty soon we see her working at Woolworth’s so she can make enough money to pay for diapers and formula, and if there hasn’t been a shotgun wedding, her boyfriend is back at El Rancho Grande with another girl.

  Neighborhood kids stand on rooftops and watch the movies all night. They make up dialogues and jump from rooftop to rooftop looking for the best angle to watch the movie. Chicano spidermen, they have the cartoons memorized. On nights when the moon is full, they play astronaut and fake a landing on the moon. Below them, the grown-ups sit on lawn chairs, sipping beer or Kool-Aid and talking about the time a big canal flowed right where the middle row of speakers now stands. It’s a wonder, they say, that the speakers don’t electrocute everybody, for sure there’s water down there.

  “What’s showing?” Jesse asks. “Hey, what? What does it say?”

  He really wants to know. I stoop low to watch the marquee from the window of my father’s Ford wagon. “Huh, D-A-R-K, oh, Dark Shadows!” I tell him.

  “Gotta see it when I get back,” he says and smiles. “Relax, sis, relax.”