Lucky Broken Girl

by Ruth Behar

  Dear Frida,

  You are a very special guardian angel to me. I am grateful to you for showing the world you can be a great artist even when you can’t get out of bed.

  Please make me well. Heal my legs. And I promise I’ll keep painting forever.

  And if you can’t heal me, I’ll still keep painting forever. I really love painting!

  But try to heal me. Okay, Frida? Not just for my sake, but so my pretty mami can go out and stroll around in her high heels and be admired by everybody.

  Thank you,

  Ruthie

  applause, applause

  Izzie is a pirate with a black patch over one eye for Halloween. Dennis has on a sailor suit. Lily is a gypsy, with big hoop earrings she’s borrowed from Aunt Sylvia and a wide multicolored skirt.

  I am so jealous! If only I could go. I don’t even have to dress up. I’m already in costume. I’m a mummy with a painted plaster cast!

  Just before they all leave, Izzie announces, “We’re going to trick-or-treat in all the buildings on our street. We’ll get so much candy it will last months! Maybe years!”

  “Yeah, that’s great, Izzie,” I say, trying not to sound too bitter.

  He looks at me guiltily. “Sorry, Roofie.” Then he brightens, the way he does when he gets an idea. “Wait, I know what I can do! I’ll trick-or-treat for you!”

  “How will you do that?” I ask.

  He dashes out of the room and bounces back with another brown bag.

  “Here, Ruthie, write your name on it and that will be for your candy.”

  I do as Izzie asks, but it makes me even sadder to think I am now a ghost, an absent girl, nothing but a brown bag with a name on it.

  Two hours later, Izzie comes back with his bag brimming with candy. But my bag is only half full.

  Izzie stomps his feet in fury. “People thought I was telling a lie to get more candy for myself! I told them, ‘You want to see my sister? She’s in a body cast in bed.’ But they just laughed and said, ‘Yeah, sure, take me over to see her.’”

  Poor Izzie. He’s trying to be good.

  I take one piece and tell him he can keep the rest of my candy since I know Mami won’t allow me to eat it anyway.

  “Really?” he asks. His eyes light up.

  I say, “Sure. It’s all yours.”

  He comes to the side of my bed and kisses my cheek. “Thanks, Roofie. You’re the best sister!” He rummages through the candy, enjoying being in charge of the extra bounty, but then he becomes downcast and says, “Roofie, if I take your candy, all those people who thought I was a liar, just pretending to be trick-or-treating for you, will be right. I don’t want to be a crook.”

  “But you were trick-or-treating for me, that’s no lie!” I tell him. “And now I’m giving the candy to you.”

  “Nah, Roofie. If I keep your candy, I’ll be the wicked boy they think I am.”

  “Why not give the candy away if you don’t want it?”

  “Okay! But who do I give it to?”

  “I know. Tomorrow, when you go to school, give the candy to the kids in the dumb class. And tell them I say hello.”

  “I will, Roofie. That’s a great idea. I bet they’ll be so happy.”

  I smile at him proudly. “Izzie, you really are a good boy.”

  “Sort of,” he mutters, looking unsure of himself. “I don’t know. Mami is always scolding me.”

  “Come on, you are.” I clap my hands for him. “Bravo, Izzie! Yay!”

  “Ssshhh, Roofie. I don’t deserve that.”

  His bangs are still crooked, but my little brother is growing up.

  I ate only one candy from the Halloween bag, but I can’t stop worrying about outgrowing my body cast. I try to figure out some exercises to do even though I’m squished into this silly thing.

  I can move my head left and right against my pillow.

  I can lift my shoulders up and down.

  I can punch the air with my fists.

  I can clap my hands.

  Mami hears me clapping my hands and comes running, thinking I want something.

  “Sorry, Mami, I wasn’t calling you. Just doing some exercise.”

  “Would you mind not clapping unless you need me?”

  “Sure, Mami, sure.”

  At night, when Papi is back and he and Mami and Izzie have finished eating dinner, I forget and start clapping my hands again.

  Papi comes in and says, “So I hear this is your new exercise routine! How about if I teach you how to clap out the beat to the cha-cha-cha?”

  “I sort of remember it. How does it go again?”

  “It’s a nice beat—one, two . . . s-l-o-w-l-y . . . and then cha-cha-cha real quick. Your mother and I used to dance the cha-cha-cha all the time in Cuba.”

  “Can you show me how you danced?” I ask.

  He looks at me with pity. “Let’s wait until you’re better.”

  “But I want to see you dance,” I say. “Please.”

  “Ven, Rebeca,” he calls to my mother. “Let’s show Ruti the cha-cha-cha.”

  She and Papi look so happy as they sing together, “Cha-cha-cha, qué rico cha-cha-cha,” and dance around. I like how they shuffle their feet.

  Finally they stop. They’re sweating and laughing.

  “That was so much fun,” Mami says to Papi.

  Papi takes Mami in his arms and lifts her into the air. Her wide skirt opens like a beach umbrella. “Mi cielo, you’re as good a dancer as you were in Cuba.”

  I clap for them. They’re so beautiful when Papi is not upset and Mami is not sad or bored.

  Applause, applause!

  birthday wish

  I keep willing myself to be happy, but there are days when the sadness arrives and sits on my head. It gets comfortable and stays there. Like a dark cloud that won’t go away,

  That’s what’s going on this cold November day that’s so rainy it feels like nighttime in the middle of the afternoon. And today isn’t just an ordinary day. Today is my birthday! That should make me happy. Lots of people are coming over and we’re going to have a big party. For me! For my birthday! I’m going to be eleven years old! A whole decade plus a year of being alive on Planet Earth!

  But that dark cloud is sitting on my head. Go away! Go away! Go away!

  Mami comes in and takes away the bedpan and then she comes back with clean water and soap and a basin. I wash my hands and say to her, “Why did you give birth to me in November? It’s such a gloomy time of year.”

  “In Cuba it’s good to be born in November,” Mami replies. “By that time of year, there are no hurricanes. The breezes are soft by then, like a gentle caress.”

  “Do you miss Cuba all the time, Mami?”

  “Not all the time,” she says. “And you, Ruti, do you miss it, or have you forgotten about our island?”

  “I miss Cuba, Mami. I think about Caro too. She was such a good nanny. I remember when she took me to her hometown in the countryside and I got to help gather the eggs the hens had just laid. And I remember she came to the airport to say good-bye to us when we left Cuba. Do you think she still remembers us?”

  “Don’t worry, mi niña, she remembers all of us very well. I’ve been writing to Caro ever since we got here.”

  “You have?”

  “Of course, mi niña. The letters take a long time going back and forth, but Caro knows all about your broken leg. She has gone to the shrine of San Lázaro to pray for you, so you’ll be able to walk again. He is a powerful saint. In Cuba, we also call him by the African name of Babalu-Ayé. He helps people who are suffering from illnesses and ailments of the legs.”

  “But, Mami, will that help me since we are Jewish?”

  “Mi niña, yes. I believe we should accept all actions that are carried out in good faith and with a lovin
g heart.”

  “Yes, Mami, I do too,” I tell her. I touch my dancing Shiva necklace and remember Ramu’s kindness.

  I choose one of my favorite pictures to send to Caro—a picture of Mami and Papi dancing the cha-cha-cha. On the back I write to her in Spanish: “Te quiero, Caro.”

  Then Mami addresses the envelope, and I see her write the words “Havana, Cuba” in big letters.

  As she puts down her pen, Mami looks sad again. Luckily, just then, there’s a knock on the door and it’s Chicho.

  “You’re early,” I hear her tell Chicho. “The party for Ruti isn’t until tonight.”

  “I came early to decorate Ruti’s room. This is Mark. He came to give me a hand.”

  “Come in, come in! Ruti will be so happy!” Mami says, cheering up. She loves a party and it’s been a long time since we’ve had one.

  Mark has a twinkle in his eye like Chicho, but he is twice as tall and used to be a football player when he was in college. Now he’s a nurse at a hospital.

  “I didn’t know men could be nurses,” I say.

  “There’s not too many of us,” Mark replies. “But here I am.”

  “Would you like pink and red balloons?” Chicho asks.

  “Yes, yes!”

  Chicho and Mark string the balloons together and Mark hangs them from the ceiling.

  “How about pink and red carnations?”

  “Yes, yes!”

  Around my bed, they tuck the pink and red carnations.

  Then Chicho places a tiara on my head, my first ever, with sparkly crystals.

  “We officially proclaim you the birthday queen!” Chicho says.

  “The queen of Queens!” Mark says.

  I’m happy again. The tiara has sent the dark cloud away.

  By the time all the guests arrive, Mami has prepared a feast. She makes Cuban croquetas out of chicken rather than pork since we don’t eat pork. She also prepares her famous enrolladitos, swirls of bread filled with a blend of tuna fish, ketchup, and cream cheese, with an olive in the center. She bakes her pastelitos de guayaba, the guava filling so gooey and sticky and sweet. And last but not least, she makes my favorite chocolate cake, decorated with M&M’s.

  The bedroom fills with people eating, talking, and laughing. What a crowd!

  Baba and Zeide, Uncle Bill and Aunt Sylvia, and Dennis and Lily all come, of course.

  Abuelo and Abuela, my other grandparents, who are Papi’s parents, make the long trip from Canarsie in a taxi. They live close to old friends from Cuba, and don’t speak English and don’t speak Yiddish like Baba and Zeide. They are Turkish and speak an old beautiful Spanish from Spain, because that’s where Papi’s family came from long ago. We don’t see Abuelo and Abuela very much because they haven’t found their way in America and are afraid to get lost if they wander too far from Canarsie. But today they came for my birthday—and to cheer me up, they bring along their two yellow songbirds in their cage, Coqueta and El Flaquito, so they’ll sing for everyone at the party.

  “Para alegrar la caza,” Abuela says in her merry voice, pronouncing casa with a z instead of an s.

  “Gracias, Abuela!” I say.

  And she replies, “Rutica, Rutica, Rutica,” which is how she calls me in that Spanish that is so old and so beautiful.

  Gladys and Oscar and baby Rosa, who’s now walking, have come from Staten Island. I wish Gladys wouldn’t look at me so pityingly. She feels guilty the accident happened after we went to visit them.

  Mami and Papi’s closest friends from El Grupo also come, arriving all at once and shouting “Hola” to each other and smacking kisses on each other’s cheeks so loudly I can hear them from my room. Like us, they are Cuban and Jewish—they dance the cha-cha-cha, and eat matzo on Passover. There’s pretty, petite Mimi and her much older husband, Bernardo, and their children, Amaryllis and Abie, who go to yeshiva and know all the Hebrew prayers. Dorita, in an elegant white pantsuit, and Natan, who’s very smart and an architect, are with their children, Beby and Freddy, the four of them suntanned from a weekend in Miami Beach. And there’s Hilda, who is always worried Imre will be robbed because he sells diamond rings on Forty-Seventh Street, and their children, Eva and Ezra, who are too shy to talk.

  The kids play card games on the floor and eat potato chips until they get bored. Then they start running around the apartment, pulling down the balloons and competing to see who can pop more of them. In five minutes, they’ve burst every single balloon.

  Then it’s time for me to blow out the candles on my birthday cake. Everyone sings “Happy Birthday,” in Spanish and English. Abuelo and Abuela’s songbirds, Coqueta and El Flaquito, sing too, happy to be together in their cage.

  Finally they all yell, “Make a wish!”

  But what should I wish for? I wish, I wish, I wish . . . I could stand on my own two feet and walk again?

  Izzie screams, “Hurry, Roofie! Blow out the candles before the cake melts!”

  I take a deep breath, and an image flashes before my eyes of the five young men who died in the accident. The muchachitos, as Papi called them. They’ll never celebrate another birthday. They’re dead.

  I am filled with sadness for them.

  At the last minute I change my wish: All I want is to be alive next year.

  Being alive is the best gift of all.

  Thank you, life.

  please take care of these muchachitos in the next world

  Every night I lie in bed and think about the dead muchachitos. The days pass, the weeks pass, and it is December. I imagine them in their cold graves, calling out to their mothers and fathers, “Don’t forget our birthdays! Celebrate for us. Eat cake for us.” The boy who caused the accident doesn’t ask to be remembered. He bows his head and says, “Forget me, forget me.”

  I make lots of pictures of the five boys. I use brown and gray paint. They are the gloomiest pictures I’ve ever made, the faces of the boys all blurry and ghostly.

  Chicho looks worried when he sees my pictures.

  “Are you feeling okay, Ruti?” he asks, looking straight into my eyes.

  “I’m fine,” I whisper.

  But he doesn’t believe me.

  “I know what you need—a new perspective. Let’s turn your bed around, so you can see what’s on the other side.”

  When he tells Mami what he’s going to do, she gets upset and tells him that the doctor told her and Papi not to move me. Chicho says he isn’t going to move me, just the bed. “But the bed is heavy,” Mami says, looking worried. Chicho tells her Mark is strong and between the two of them they can move the bed.

  Mark comes over, and he and Chicho pick up the bed and turn it around.

  Suddenly I can look out the window! See the snow falling! See the sun shining! See the night coming!

  My spirit rises, light as a feather, to the wide sky.

  Chicho checks in on me the next day. My bed is a huge mess of paints, sheets of paper, and brushes.

  I show Chicho my new paintings, ablaze with bright colors. A field of green grass dotted with yellow dandelions. A sailboat floating on the bright blue sea. A huge butterfly flapping its pink and purple wings.

  His eyes twinkle. “Do you feel better?” he asks.

  “Much better.”

  “You see, life is about putting things in perspective,” he tells me.

  Before, I didn’t know about perspective. Now I know it can change how you see the whole world.

  I am also learning that I can feel two very different feelings at the same time. I am still sad about the dead muchachitos, very sad. But I am happy, very happy, that I can look out my window and see all the beauty that’s still there, waiting for me.

  The next morning, when Mami brings me the bedpan, I tell her, “I want to see the newspaper that Uncle Bill kept, where they wrote about the accident.”

>   “But why, mi niña? Let’s put that in the past.”

  “I need it, Mami. I need to learn the names of the boys who died.”

  “All right, I will show it to you. But I don’t want you to be sad again.”

  “It won’t make me sad, Mami. I think the stone in my heart is dissolving.”

  In the newspaper, the boys’ names are listed: Jack, Johnny, Andy, Stuart, and the boy who was driving and caused the accident, his name was Eddy.

  “Mami, tell me, did Uncle Bill end up getting us a lawyer so we could sue the families of the boys who caused the accident?”

  “How do you know about that, mi niña?”

  “Papi told me.”

  “Well, if Papi told you, then I can tell you the rest of the story. Yes, your uncle Bill called a lawyer for us and the lawyer said we had a very strong case. But Papi decided not to do anything. We feel bad because all those boys are dead. Their families are suffering. Why punish them even more? Papi said he preferred to just work hard and pay the bills.”

  “Oh, Mami, I’m so glad! That’s how I feel too.”

  “That’s good, mi niña, that’s good.”

  Dear God, Dear Shiva, and Dear Frida,

  As you can tell, I’m not very good at praying. I haven’t prayed in a long time. But today I want to pray to all three of you.

  I want to say I am sorry for hating the boys who caused the accident. Their names are Jack, Johnny, Andy, Stuart, and Eddy. I hated them for too long. They were boys who made a mistake that cost them their lives and that is so sad.

  Please take care of these muchachitos in the next world. Especially Eddy needs to feel some love. He’s the one who was driving the car when he wasn’t supposed to. He’s the one who caused the accident. He thinks he doesn’t deserve any kindness. He wants to be lost and never found again. But I forgive him. So please, if you can, help him.

  Help Eddy to rest in peace.

  Thank you,

  Ruthie

  a white rose in July or January