Tarnished Beauty

by Cecilia Samartin

  Dr. Martinez was a small but imposing man with soft, thick hands. He began with the usual pleasantries, stating that his good friends the Millers had described the nature of Jamilet’s problem when they’d asked him to see her.

  “They’re good people,” he said to Lorena as he approached Jamilet. “And they’re fond of you and your daughter.”

  “We’re grateful to them,” Lorena mumbled. “And to you for seeing us.”

  He instructed Jamilet to lie facedown on the examining table and assured her that he was only going to look at the mark and that he would let her know if he was going to touch her and that, when he did, it would be only with his fingers, no instruments or needles. Jamilet relaxed considerably, although she could see her mother’s hands twisted into a knot on her lap.

  Dr. Martinez pulled Jamilet’s blouse up to her shoulders, and her skirt up to her hips to assess the full dimensions of the mark. She listened to his breathing, steady and low as it entered and exited his lungs, and felt the heat of his gaze on the mark. After a few minutes, she was surprised to hear, not derision, but fascination in his voice. “I’ve never seen anything quite like it,” he muttered. “The medical term for the mark, as you call it, is a hemangioma. The condition is not uncommon. Approximately one in every one hundred children are born with some sort of birthmark, but this particular one…” He seemed at a loss for words as he pressed down on the protrusion at the base of her neck, thick with veins, like noodles in a little broth. “This one is quite extraordinary.” After several more minutes, he asked Jamilet to sit up, indicating that his examination was finished.

  “In many ways you’re lucky,” he said. “A fair number of hemangiomas like these appear on the face. And I’ve even read of cases, although much rarer, where the entire body is affected, and then other complications come into play, but I gather you’ve not had problems, say, with your heart or liver…seizures?”

  “What are seizures?” Lorena asked, her hands white and stiff on her lap.

  “It’s a neurological problem,” Dr. Martinez said, searching for words his humble patients might understand. “Something that happens in the brain. The electrical impulses are interrupted and—”

  “Jamilet is as healthy as a horse, doctor,” Lorena said. “She’s never been sick, not even a sniffle.” She dropped her head and stretched her fingers out, as if looking at them for the first time and marveling at their ability to move independently. “But…sometimes she stares into space and won’t answer me when I talk to her. I believe she’s daydreaming.”

  “Is that so?” Dr. Martinez turned to face Jamilet. He produced a tiny flashlight from his jacket pocket, and passed the light across her eyes several times. He placed his hands on his hips. “Do you hear your mother at these times when she says you’re daydreaming?”

  “I like to make up stories, and sometimes I don’t hear anything but my own voice in my head.”

  Dr. Martinez furrowed his brow. “How long have you been making up these stories?”

  “Since I was little, even before I learned how to talk.”

  “Is it only your voice you hear? Or do you hear other voices as well?”

  Jamilet inched herself to the edge of the examining table. “I hear many voices. It’s like a whole play in my head, like the ones they do in church during Easter, except I’m the one who makes up all the words, and if the play is really good, I can see it all in my mind too.”

  Dr. Martinez smiled at the curiosity of this simple child, speaking with such zealousness about her stories. “I don’t think there’s anything to worry about here.” He gently thumped her forehead with his finger. “There’s a very good brain inside that lovely head.” He turned back to Lorena. “I should also add that there is some evidence to suggest that hereditary factors may be associated with this condition.” He considered the baffled expression on her face and continued. “It can be hereditary and passed down from relatives, like eye color and height. I assume you don’t have anything…”

  Lorena shook her head, her lips pressed together, preparing for what she knew would come next.

  “And the father? Do we know…?”

  “My husband died many years ago, Doctor, and he didn’t have the mark, or whatever it is that you called it.”

  “He was killed by bandits,” Jamilet added, as she’d recently decided that this was the version of his demise she found most worthy of retelling. “They shot him right between the legs.”

  Dr. Martinez’s eyebrows flickered in surprise, and then he politely coughed and reached for a chart on the counter.

  Lorena’s voice was shrill. “And what about a cure, doctor?”

  “A removal, you mean?”

  Lorena nodded anxiously, her eyes teary as she opened her purse in search of a tissue.

  Dr. Martinez’s expression, which had been so confident before, grew doubtful. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I’m afraid there’s little we can do at this stage in the way of removal. Perhaps when Jamilet was younger we could have treated it aggressively, but now it would be impossible to remove without risking severe injury.”

  “It’s okay, Mama,” Jamilet said when she saw the tears streaming down her mother’s face.

  “But, Doctor,” Lorena implored, no longer caring if she appeared composed or appropriate. “How can she go through life with that horrible thing living on her back? Look at her face. She’s a beautiful girl, my Jamilet. There must be something we can do, somewhere else we can go.”

  “I understand your concern,” Dr. Martinez said, and his eyes crinkled with well-rehearsed compassion. “There are some new treatments I have little experience with, involving the use of lasers, a kind of very intense light. There have been some promising studies, but I sincerely doubt that in your daughter’s case—”

  “Where can we find these treatments?” Lorena snapped.

  “In the north…in Los Angeles I believe a few clinics are beginning to use the laser on more superficial birthmarks.”

  Lorena wiped her brow for the third or fourth time. She was breathing heavily and her eyes appeared to float, as though loose in their sockets.

  “Are you quite all right, Señora?”

  “I’m fine,” she said, her head dropping. “Just a little tired.”

  “Mama!” Jamilet jumped off the examining table as her mother slipped off the chair and collapsed in a heap on the floor.

  Lorena was diagnosed with heart problems, and hospitalized for several days. When she was discharged, she was no longer able to work at the Miller house or anywhere else, for she was to rest her heart as much as she could and be spared any and all bad news. She was to sit on the porch during the day when the weather was agreeable, or stay in her bed and face the window overlooking the back field so she could watch Jamilet play and tend to the chili plants.

  The Miller family visited a couple of times, and brought along boxes filled with cans of beans, vegetables, and meats that were already cooked, a rare luxury. Not possessing a can opener, Gabriela demonstrated her proficiency with a hammer and knife, and was so delighted with the gifts that she barely flinched when the knife slipped and she cut her finger.

  Jamilet took the opportunity to show Mary the garden she’d tended for so many years. The peppers were bright and plump and considered to be the best in the market, she was proud to say. Mary considered them briefly, and agreed that they were indeed beautiful, although she did not care for peppers, as they burned her tongue and caused her to sweat profusely. Jamilet directed her attention next to the brook that ran several yards behind their modest house, which was even smaller than the shed where the Millers kept their car and gardening tools.

  “On the other side of that river is the end of the world,” Jamilet informed her friend, for she always thought it was so, and had never been any farther north than that.

  Mary nodded, not particularly impressed. She seemed much more concerned with the condition of her new shoes. After she’d stepped in the loose earth that Jamil
et had recently turned and watered, the satin finish became spotted with a fine smattering of mud. “That’s no river,” Mary said, swiping at her shoes with her bare hand. “If you want to see a real river, you should go to the Rio Grande. It’s a hundred times bigger than this.” She stood up, irritated with her lack of progress in removing the dirt. “Do you have a napkin or something for my shoes?”

  Jamilet looked about for something that would do, but seemed at a loss.

  Mary said, “That’s okay, just show me where the bathroom is.”

  Jamilet pointed to the river and smiled.

  That was the last time she ever saw Mary. Months later they learned that the Millers had moved back to Texas. Jamilet pictured her American friend with her blond ponytail swishing back and forth as she walked along the paved streets, smooth as plates, lying end to end. She was laughing and enjoying her reflection in the glass of the buildings, as tall as mountains. And she was happy, very happy, to have clean shoes.

  Lorena’s heart trouble, which had been well managed with repose and inane conversation, took a turn for the worse. Jamilet, now seventeen, evaluated her own practicality in the face of her mother’s imminent death and it troubled her. She should have been devastated by the prospect of losing the person she loved most in the world, but her sadness was suspended somehow and hovering just out of her reach, and she was strengthened by a yearning she could not easily explain to herself or to anyone else.

  She’d become aware of it when she saw the mark for the first time. At that moment, it felt like her intestines had tied themselves to the bedpost to keep her from lifting off the mattress and bursting out through the roof of the house. She’d also felt it gather fiercely within her when she’d finally accepted that she’d never go to school, and that the most she could hope to receive from the villagers was stiff regard, born of pity in the best of circumstances and restrained loathing in the worst. She’d learned, having had more than ample opportunity to study the phenomena, that people didn’t merely enjoy their fear, they savored it as steady and reliable entertainment. When she went to the market, or ventured down the street on an errand, she reminded them that they were lucky no matter what their circumstances were, for at the end of the day, when they washed in the river or the well, whether they had the benefit of soap or just friction and water, they’d be clean from head to toe, front and back.

  “Her mother is dying and she doesn’t shed a tear,” the villagers said. “Her face is perfect, like a statue. Not a tear.”

  “Does that surprise you?” they whispered. “She has the heart of the devil, and the devil is not saddened by death.”

  “There is rumor that she will leave for the north after her mother dies.”

  “I’ve been praying for years that she would. Ever since she was born, my fields have yielded much less, and hers seem to flourish. She’s cursed us all.”

  “Yes, she has. My baby died three weeks after Jamilet was born, and I have no doubt that Jamilet should have died instead.”

  As her mother’s illness progressed, Jamilet’s stories evolved beyond the imaginings that had served her as a child and into deeper longings that had the power to soothe her soul. She passed the hours away with eyes semiclosed and fluttering as her mother slept. Gabriela instructed Jamilet to pray whenever she felt that her heart would wither with pain, but her fantasies, as impossible as she knew them to be, eased her pain better than anything else.

  “Wake up, Mama. It’s time for breakfast and you’ve been sleeping too long. Do you expect me to do all the work around here?”

  Lorena’s eyes open and she smiles. “How long have I been sleeping?”

  “Too long,” Jamilet says, pulling the covers off. “Come and see what I’ve made for you.” Lorena gets out of bed and wraps a shawl around her shoulders as she’s led into the kitchen. The table is set with a breakfast of tortillas, chorizo, and eggs, with fresh chili sauce and two steaming cups of hot chocolate.

  They watch each other from across the table as they eat, incredulous with joy.

  “You seem so happy, Jamilet. I’ve never seen my little girl so happy.”

  “I have a surprise for you, Mama.”

  Lorena claps her hands like a child. “Another surprise? What is it?”

  “We’re going north, Mama. We’re leaving today. We’re going to make a new life in the place where the shiny buildings touch the sky. I talked with Mr. and Mrs. Miller and they already have jobs for us there. And there’s an extra room in their mansion that they don’t use. They say we can have it until we find our own house, and we can take all the time we need to find just the right one.”

  “What about your grandmother? She’s too old to live alone.”

  “She doesn’t want to go, Mama. I’ve already asked her and she’s very sure she would be miserable there and very happy here with the chili patch and chickens to look after. The doctor told me today that she’s as strong as a horse, and that having a little extra room would do her good.”

  Lorena accepts this without question. “Well then, I suppose we have some packing to do.”

  “I packed while you were sleeping, Mama. All we have to do now is go.”

  “And what about the mark, Jamilet? I can’t bear to think that we’ll have to explain it to a whole new group of people…people who won’t understand.”

  Jamilet places an envelope on the table.

  “What is this?”

  “I received it yesterday, Mama.”

  “Should we find someone to read it for us? Maybe if we call Rolando’s son Pepe, down the road…”

  Jamilet takes up the envelope, unfolds the letter, and begins to read in a loud, clear voice. She reads about an appointment next week with a well-known doctor in the north who is certain he can remove the mark in a matter of hours, or three days at the most. The procedure will be painless and the cost can be paid off over time.

  Tears are streaming down Lorena’s face. “Jamilet, I have never heard such wonderful news. And when did you learn to read? I had no idea.”

  “I just figured it out one day while I was waiting for you to wake up. I had that little book in my lap and I prayed like Abuela told me, and suddenly all the lines on the pages began to speak to me with their own voices. They came together like pictures and it all made sense to me, just like that.”

  “It’s a miracle.”

  “The world is full of miracles, Mama. All we have to do is find the ones that belong to us.”

  Jamilet was awakened by the sound of weeping, and her beautiful vision vanished all at once. Gabriela was on her knees by Lorena’s bed, her hands clasping a rosary and her forehead pressed against them. “Keep her near you always, sweet merciful Father. Grant her the rest and peace she never knew here on Earth. She was beautiful and not meant for such suffering.” Sensing that Jamilet had awakened, she turned and scowled through her tears. “Get on your knees and pray, child. Your mother is dead.”

  3

  JAMILET DECIDED it would be best to cut her hair to just above the ears. She performed this task with little ceremony, as she did when trimming the stems from the tomatoes when they were ripe and ready for the table. Next, she flattened her breasts by wrapping her torso with the fine white fabric she found under her mother’s bed. Gabriela told her it was sacrilegious to use fabric intended for her mother’s wedding dress in such a manner. But Jamilet paid no attention, and noted that although it was uncomfortable, she could still breathe, and the layers under her shirt would provide her with additional warmth during the night. She appraised herself critically, using the only mirror in the house. Wearing a pair of loose slacks and a broad-rimmed hat low on her brow, she appeared to be an underfed adolescent boy with weak shoulders and smallish feet. And if she lowered the pitch of her voice a bit when she spoke, the transformation was complete.

  Gabriela tried to discourage Jamilet from leaving as she swept up thick tendrils of black hair from the kitchen floor, but she chose a different argument from the one she’d
employed with Carmen years earlier. “Who’s going to look after my garden?” she wailed into her hands, careful to leave enough space between her fingers to peek through. “Relying on charity is a slow death in these parts.”

  Jamilet’s expression remained smooth and unyielding. “Tía Carmen sends you money every month and I will too. Everybody knows that money is easy to earn in the north. And remember, I speak English.”

  Gabriela lowered her hands and stared at her granddaughter through eyes weakened by cataracts. Even with her hair chopped off above the ears, she was lovely. “Life isn’t like one of your stories you can twist around in your head so the endings are always happy. There’s no cure for your mark, not even in the north. I’ve known this is true since the day I walked on my knees to God’s holy altar after you were born. I never told your mother about it because I knew she would only suffer more, but if I can prevent you from making this horrible mistake, I’ll tell you now.” She leaned on her broom, and her face softened with the memory. “I was praying for a miracle, looking up at our Lord as He hung on the cross, when a beam of light entered through the window above and illuminated His crown. At first I didn’t know what it meant, but then He spoke to me.” She closed her milky eyes, and swayed a bit on her feet. “He told me that you must bear your mark bravely and give your suffering to the Lord. It is your very own crown of thorns, and one day it will bring you glory.” She opened her eyes, as clear as the desert night. “So you see, if you go north you’ll be disappointed as always and this time you’ll be alone…”

  “I’ll be with Tía Carmen,”

  “That’s even worse!” Gabriela began sweeping again with such a fury that dust clouds rose up all around them. “God alone knows what kind of life that girl’s made for herself. She tells me she goes to church every Sunday, but I don’t believe her, and I’m sure she’s drinking more than ever. It’s a miracle she’s able to send any money at all.”