The Brick People

by Alejandro Morales

  “Wash car, Mama.” Arturo chewed on the tasty morsel of tortilla, meat and chile as he went out.

  Nana listened to her son’s scrambled words. He was improving, but she wondered when he would translate the world into a language that was always understandable to other people. Tears came to her eyes and she fought back a sob. She heard Micaela’s voice. The family was reentering the safe zone of Simons and the house. Except for Octavio, who would return at one in the morning, or the next day if he played cards. She hated his gambling; she hated cooking for the family; she hated being where she was.

  The inside of the car carefully cleaned, Arturo started to wash the body. As he progressed, his Aunt Felicitas sneered at the way he pampered the automobile. Their eyes met once. A frozen silence and pause bridged the wooden fence. She screamed at her youngest son. He cried. She slapped. He wailed. She dragged him into the house.

  Arturo washed the tires. His thoughts wandered through the day to the dance he planned to attend. Saturday and Sunday he planned to work on the house, for the sooner it was completed the sooner he would be out of his grandparents’ house and away from their next-door neighbor, his Aunt Felicitas. Living crowded made him feel unclean. With a soft white cloth Arturo rubbed the car toward perfection. In forty-five minutes he finished. He proudly contemplated his magnificent machine. Aunt Felicitas, angered at what she interpreted as arrogance, furiously snapped the wet clothes before hanging them on the line. Arturo smiled, never noticed his aunt and walked into the kitchen where the family sat to dinner.

  Nana moved around the table serving everyone. Damian and Milagros sat at opposite ends, patriarch and matriarch as well as an estranged couple, ex-lovers, silently nursing and maintaining past wounds. Micaela and Arturo discussed the dance. Javier asked if he could study in Nana’s room. Flor offered pieces of meat to Gregorio, who threw them on the floor.

  “Don’t do that, Gregorio,” came a soft reprimand from his grandfather.

  “Eat, don’t play,” Nana scolded, stooping for the meat on the floor.

  Flor placed more meat on Gregorio’s plate. He flung three pieces toward his grandfather, Micaela and Arturo. One piece fell into Micaela’s bowl, splashing chile onto her blouse and into her eye. She lifted her head, her left eye closed, stinging. She desperately reached for a towel. Arturo, Javier, and Flor laughed.

  “Bull’s eye!” Javier yelled. The laughter continued at Micaela’s burning eye. Milagros smiled and wagged a finger at Gregorio.

  “This little devil will pay for it if he doesn’t behave,” Milagros admonished Gregorio who seemed to listen. He placed the meat in his mouth and ate satisfied. His brown eyes moved from face to face.

  Damian rose, thanked his daughter-in-law and walked out. Milagros silently contemplated the empty space which he left. Gregorio was on the left of Milagros and saw the others, one by one, leave the table. Nana washed the dishes while Gregorio and his grandmother sat at the table. Nana dried her hands and threw the towel over her shoulder.

  “Do you want anything else, Doña Milagros?” Nana reached for the plate.

  Arturo walked into the warmth of the kitchen and went to the door.

  “Be very careful, Arturo,” Nana called to him as the door closed.

  At last she was able to make a cup of tea and sit down. Gregorio continued contentedly entertaining himself with pieces of tortilla. Milagros stared into nothing. These trances which she fell into were bothersome to Nana. It was as if her mother-in-law’s brain had disconnected itself from the rest of the body, incapacitating it for physical motion and feeling. Milagros’ pupils would become intensely black, seeing beyond what surrounded her. Nana touched Milagros’ hand. No response.

  “Did you like the dinner?” Nana spoke almost into Milagros’ ear.

  The matriarch in black turned her head slightly. She was coming back from the place she contemplated.

  “How about some tea?” Nana touched her hand again.

  “Damian will not come home tonight,” Milagros said softly.

  Anger and a feeling of being dirty came over Nana. She regarded Milagros’ aggrieved face. What was it that made her endure? Why was Damian the way he was? Why did Octavio do the things he did? Nana was convinced it was because they were owners of nothing, as her father used to say. Suddenly the house became silent as if some horrible, unexpected, faraway cry insisted on complete attention. Loud unintelligible voices now dominated the outside.

  “What’s happening?” Nana moved to the door.

  “¡Ay Dios, Felicitas!”

  Milagros recognized Arturo’s voice as she rushed outside after Nana. Arturo raved, standing next to his car, wiping the mud spots which had splattered on it when Aunt Felicitas had thrown away several tubs of wash water. She was screaming insults to him as she and her older son were returning to spill another tub of wash water.

  “No, ya!” Arturo screamed.

  “Son-of-a-bitch, you are retarded! Go to hell!” Felicitas’ tongue lashed out.

  The tub was swung back and this time the water splashed onto Arturo and the car. He turned desperately toward the automobile, trying to protect it from the dirty water.

  “Stupid fucker! What do you think, that you own this place?” Aunt Felicitas warmed up.

  “Fuck you!” Arturo, infuriated, lashed out in her terms.

  “Your mother! Fuck your mother! And I hope she teaches you to speak, idiot! Intruders! All of you are a bunch of intruders!” Aunt Felicitas shouted before the neighbors and family.

  At that instant Arturo saw his mother standing near the apricot tree. Next to her were his brothers and sisters.

  “Fuck yours! You whoring aunt!”

  Aunt Felicitas, frenzied by the grave words, squatted and picked up a rock. Arturo rose with two bricks in hand. The combatants were only five feet apart.

  “Oh, no!” Nana stepped between them. Milagros came to her side. The two gravely hurt mothers stood daring their children. Aunt Felicitas ran to her house still shouting insults.

  “You should have allowed the boy to break her mouth! Someone has to shut that snake up!” a man yelled from another yard.

  Arturo dropped the bricks and sobbed. Nana embraced and held him as if he were a child. Javier and Micaela took Arturo into the house. Milagros sat under the apricot tree and stared towards the dairy. Nana approached and saw that her eyes were as black as obsidian. Nana said nothing. Terrible, deep-seated emotions had been expressed. Ugliness had smeared their life and at that moment they both realized that they had been damned by their own. Two women: one sat and waited and the other went into the house to do what was necessary. Nana knew she would never forget that evening. She would urge Octavio to finish quickly. She could not last in Damian and Milagros’ house much longer.

  Octavio arrived home at about one in the morning and found Nana waiting under the apricot tree.

  “You should have taken us to another place, Octavio. You always want to stay here. When something happens, you bring me to your mother’s house. When we were married you brought me here. Until I insisted on getting a house. And now here we are again,” she grumbled.

  “It’s not so bad. There was no other convenient choice,” Octavio said under countless stars.

  “We are tired of living in a corner. And with what happened today with your malicious sister! Your children and I saw what she did to Arturo. She threw crap on us. You must finish as soon as possible!” Nana continued.

  “It will be months before we finish. We’re hurrying. You must bear with this a little while longer.”

  Octavio stood and waited for her. They walked into the small room where they slept. She checked Gregorio who slept on Nana’s side of the bedroom on the floor on three folded blankets. Gregorio slept peacefully.

  The next morning Arturo did not speak to anyone. While Nana finished making breakfast, Octavio looked at the dirt on Arturo’s car and told him that he would wash it at the building site. An hour later, Arturo had the car flirting with perfectio
n. He looked for his father who nailed two-by-fours between eight-foot studs. Octavio gestured his approval and then pointed to a stack of short four-foot scraps.

  “Bring those over here and we’ll cut them,” Octavio shouted.

  Arturo reached for the bundle of wood tied with rope and flung it over his shoulder. He slowly carried the heavy bundle to his father who waited with a saw. As Arturo approached, the early morning sunlight darkened his crouched body into an anonymous silhouette. Octavio stared into the image and recognized himself thirty years earlier carrying wood for his mother’s comal. With each step Arturo took, Octavio journeyed from a building site in the present to a place in the past. He did this almost at will, controlling the images and visions of the journey.

  Chapter 23

  ... When I brought wood for my mama I was younger than Arturo. I worked like a mule. I walked along with my load of wood on my back, my body covered with mud. I would jump in the river, dive into the deepest part, against the strongest currents, to get branches and trunks that the river dragged downstream. I would take them to my mama and she would be very happy. I liked to see her smile. She had a round face, full of life. She worked a lot. My papa was hardly ever at home. He worked, but he was also enviciado with gambling and women. I, being the oldest, helped my mother the most. When my papa disappeared and would not return home for days, sometimes weeks, I found ways of getting food for my brothers and sisters. My mama was pregnant many times, but she lost some; some were born dead and others did not survive the year. When we came to this country my brothers were four: Federico, who followed me; Maximiliano, may he rest in peace; Jose and the child, Julio, may he be with God. My sisters were two: Rogaciana, who followed Jose, and Felicitas, the youngest of all of us. My grandparents, uncles and aunts on the side of my mother and father were already in Simons. They came under contract in 1907 and 1908. Because of the Revolution in Mexico, we had to come.

  Many incidents occurred that even now I cannot explain. First they killed my Uncle Cipriano and then they were saying that they wanted to kill my papa because he had shot at el Coyote, a bandit who wanted to take advantage of the rancho. My papa ran him off the ranch. Later we learned that government troops captured him. El Coyote’s family blamed my papa. The rumor was that they were planning to kill him.

  Soon after, another incident happened that mortified our family. This occurred when my grandparents and uncles still lived on the ranch. My Uncle Asuncion had married a girl from the ranch. Erlinda was her name. A few days after the wedding, my uncle contracted to go north. He came to Simons to earn money to send to Erlinda so that she could join him. It happened that my uncle worked for more than a year. Erlinda lived in my grandmother Carmela’s house patiently waiting for my Uncle Asuncion. One day my grandmother Tiburcia came to visit. My grandmother Tiburcia noticed Erlinda’s waist and back and told my grandmother Carmela that her daughter-in-law was pregnant.

  “That cannot be,” responded my grandmother Carmela.

  My grandmother Tiburcia insisted and they spoke with Erlinda who confessed that it was true. My grandmother Carmela found a switch and hit Erlinda until she told her the father’s name. Upon hearing his name, my grandmother Carmela became infuriated and grabbed Erlinda by the hair and threw her out, clothes and all, to the street.

  “Take her, comadre,” she told my grandmother Tiburcia who answered that she never wanted to see Erlinda again and least of all anywhere near her house.

  Well, the two grandmothers condemned Erlinda. My mama suffered greatly when she found out about the affair. My papa disappeared for several months. He returned home and began to leave very late at night, at times at one or two in the morning. He would say that he had to guard the sugarcane. I remember that once my mama followed him, and without anyone realizing, I also went out after the both of them. It was a night with a lot of light from the moon which illuminated the road. My mama saw my papa go to a shack about two miles from our house. A woman came out and embraced my papa. They both entered very happy into the shack. Upon seeing my mama wrapped in her shawl, wailing along that lighted road toward our house, I cried.

  All of us, my parents, brothers and sisters had to abandon the ranch. We had a lot of family living in Simons and because my grandfather Alvaro sent money to my mama to bring us over here, we decided to come. Then from the ranch we went to Quiseo de Abasolo and to Irapuato. This was at the beginning of 1918. We remained there almost seven months. My papa became ill with influenza. He was very grave, but little by little he became better. That disease infected everyone and we encountered corpses everywhere we went. Wherever we walked, death was our companion.

  During this time, no tickets to travel by train from Irapuato to Torreón were sold. They said that there were no more tickets because Pancho Villa had destroyed the tracks to the north. He had destroyed and burned rails throughout a large area. There were no more tickets. We stayed there in Irapuato. Our money ran out. We had to work in whatever job we found. The day came when we could not wait any longer and we took the road toward Torreón. Wherever we found work we stayed for a few days. We even picked cotton. At day’s end, we would go to the nearest town to see what we could find to eat. I worked a lot on the railroad and my papa worked in what he could, but I worked more. We advanced all along the tracks or on roads near the tracks in case they needed workers. My papa was still sick. Others began to get sick. The influenza epidemic got worse and smallpox attacked two of my brothers.

  In two months we reached Torreón. All of the family was sick except for myself and my mama. We didn’t know anyone and there were no hotels. We had money to eat, but there was no place to stay. We huddled under a water tank there. It began to rain. My papa and I looked for a place to escape from the water above. We found a camp of workers, railroad people, and we crawled under the railroad cars. The water fell in torrents. There we slept that night, wet, cold, hungry and sick. In the morning we discovered that Julio was burning with fever. My papa and I went in search of a doctor. We found no one. About three in the afternoon the clouds in the sky struck each other. It was going to rain again and we ran to where our family was. I noticed that my papa still suffered from weakness. Upon seeing the railroad cars at a distance, we started to run with all the strength we had left. In that instant the sky opened. I saw my papa face a fear of not wanting to arrive where my mama was with the sick child. That foreboding came true because when we neared the railroad car where the family was, we saw my mama sitting crosslegged. In her lap and arms she rocked my brother Julio.

  We prepared a grave as best we could because the rain would not stop. When we went for him, my mama did not resist. She cleaned his face, combed his hair, buttoned his jacket and gave him up to my papa. We placed him in a hole lined with rocks. When we were burying him, my mama prayed the rosary, and with each rock my eight-year-old brother disappeared. If we cried, no one could tell because the rain drenched us and cleaned our faces. Together, we were a flood of tears united by the anguish of death. In those moments I hated, but I did not know at whom my hatred was directed. I crawled shivering underneath the railroad car until I finally fell asleep, and in my dreams I swore to Julio that all the family would make it to Simons. I knew that was what Julio wanted the most—to reach Simons ...

  Octavio watched Arturo struggle step by step with the bundle of wood ...

  After we buried Julio, we followed the tracks north. We worked on them until we arrived at a station called Ortiz near Chihuahua. It took a month on the road. My papa and brothers were still traveling sick. On moving further to the north, we found more dead. Hanged men, abandoned for weeks. Many times we would rest under a tree only to look up and find the bare feet of a hanged man. And then one could explain the foul smell that one became accustomed to from miles away. I think that all of the north smelled of rotting corpses. Villa had rebelled again and was recruiting men, gathering arms and executing those who resisted him. A carrancista was pursuing him, a General Francisco Murgia who got great pleasure
out of hanging any Villa sympathizers. This Murgia was in the habit of taking a town and hanging all the Villa sympathizers he found from all the posts on the main street leading to the plaza. There was much killing and fear during this time. And death appeared everywhere.

  It began to rain again when we arrived at Ortiz. Along the tracks were five railroad cars. We went there and went underneath the cars. We lived there for more than a month. We slept there also. One day a lot of government troops came near and began to shoot near the edges of the city of Chihuahua. Then a corporal from the troops that were stationed there came to us. He knew me. He told us that we should leave because Villa’s troops would be coming soon. We gathered our belongings and fled toward the north.

  Faraway from the city of Chihuahua the sky ripped open again. In the distance we saw a small ranch and we approached it. We were huddled against a wall when two older girls walked by. They asked my mama what happened and why we were huddled against the wall. I remember very clearly what my mama told them. She told them that it was because we did not have a place to live. One of the girls understood and told us to wait and she ran to a house nearby. There were about fifteen houses there in all. The girl went and she called the woman with whom she lived. She was the goddaughter of that woman and she went and called her and the woman came immediately.

  “What are you doing here? It’s pouring rain and this man is sick,” the woman said. She checked Rogaciana and Federico and she told my mama that the children were sick with smallpox. They had been reinfected.

  The woman took my mama by the arm and took us to her house. And when we arrived, we found out that the woman was a guest of her comadre. After a short while both of them stood before us and the woman asked her comadre, “Well, how are we going to do it?”

  “Let them come in and I will give them my room,” answered the comadre.

  “But where will you sleep?” asked the woman.

  “In the kitchen,” answered the comadre.