Border Child

by Michel Stone

  Karolina nodded, scribbling notes on a pad of paper.

  “We found out later, years later, just recently, that the woman died in a car crash near here and that a baby was in the car with her. The baby survived. We suspected the baby had to be our Alejandra, and so our village priest phoned a few places, and you know the rest. Now I am here, and I want to take my daughter back home with me to Puerto Isadore, to her mama. Her mama misses her so much. You can’t…We just…” He faltered. “Please,” he added, feeling inadequate in his anguish and with a sudden shortness of breath.

  “Your daughter has been adopted by a wonderful couple,” Karolina said, at once regretting her words, as if she were implying the child’s birth parents were less than satisfactory, but the right words tripped over her tongue and would not come out.

  Héctor stood, his anger mounting. “Where is she? Where are these people?”

  “They are in Colorado, in the United States.”

  “In America? My baby is in America?” he said, easing back down into the chair as if his legs might fail him. “Americans have my baby?”

  “Alejandra was adopted by an American couple. But they are also Mexican. He is a respectable man, a doctor of letters, and he teaches at a university there. His wife is an artist, her work is sold for large sums of money in America, according to my files. But they are also Mexican. They are from our country, but they are United States citizens, too. They have dual citizenship. Your daughter is their only child,” she said, thumbing through the folder in her lap as if she were reading, though she’d memorized its contents already.

  “Will they give her back to me?” he said, his demeanor changing and his tone shifting so drastically she feared he might faint. She knew he felt weak and powerless at the thought of the adoptive Americans.

  Karolina opened her mouth to speak but at once realized she had no answer to offer.

  “Do they know,” he said, “that Alejandra has a real father and a real mother who love her very much?”

  Karolina shook her head. “No. I…I wanted to speak to you first. Now that we have spoken, I can contact them if you wish.”

  “Yes, I wish so, of course. This is my child, and I want her back with her family. Her real family. Do they have a telephone? Can you call them?”

  Karolina suspected all Americans, certainly these well-to-do Mexican Americans, had a telephone.

  “Surely if these are decent people they will bring her back to me, when they understand that Alejandra’s real parents have been located they will bring her. Otherwise they are evil people. They are people who would steal a child,” he said.

  “Señor, please. They went through legal channels. This couple, I assure you, are very decent and good folks. Remember, no one could locate anyone related to this child. When this couple requested to adopt her, their offer seemed to be the very best option in the world for your daughter. They’d wanted children for many years and were unable to conceive one. They did missionary work in Mexico through their church in America, and that’s how they met Esther. I mean, Alejandra. They were on a mission trip here, doing good things with their time and energy and financial resources. They wanted a Latina girl so that she would look like them. They could have adopted an American child, but Alejandra is the one they chose, the one they fell in love with. I promise they are providing everything this child needs to thrive.”

  “Call them. Call them now,” Héctor said.

  Karolina nodded. “Of course. As you wish.” She’d known in her gut since the test results had come in that he would request this, that he would push her and demand the child be returned to him. She would have done the same if she were in his situation. She rose.

  “Wait here,” she said. “I’ll see what I can do. I’m also going to contact legal counsel.”

  “What does that mean? Who is legal counsel?”

  A wave of empathy and tremendous sadness for Héctor washed over Karolina.

  “Someone knowledgeable about such situations,” she said, before retreating to the privacy of the back office to make the calls she dreaded.

  Chapter 36

  Rosa

  Lilia’s first contraction hit before she made her way back to the bed. As soon as Rosa saw her she knew without Lilia saying a word.

  “Lilia?” Rosa said, stepping toward her, helping Lilia ease onto the bed beside which she stood, one hand on the wall and the other pressed against her hardening belly.

  Lilia, unable to speak, pointed to her skirt, drenched in fluid from her womb.

  “Now that your bag of waters has opened we’ll change our methods, Lilia,” Rosa said. “No use trying to keep that little one in there anymore. This one is ready to see the world.”

  She’d brought her birthing stool to Lilia’s house days ago. Rosa fetched it, a bowl, towels, and some cocoa beans for Lilia to chew to get the contractions going in case this one was false or in case the second one stalled in coming, but in a short span Lilia’s contractions became regular and mighty.

  Rosa placed her hand across Lilia’s belly. It felt knotted as a tree root. She hummed a tune and in between verses prayed to Mary, the mother of Jesus, that the child had working lungs and a steady heartbeat. She called, too, upon Saint Raymond Nonnatus, the patron saint of expectant mothers, newborn babies, and midwives, and asked for his guidance, for him to be her heavenly advocate, to intercede here.

  Lilia gripped the back of the birthing stool and grunted, calling out the indecipherable but familiar sounds of labor. Rosa moved behind her, massaging Lilia’s back to relieve the pain of her contractions. Lilia cried out and squatted in her need to birth this baby, and Rosa shifted around to face her. In less than twenty minutes the crown of the baby’s head, matted and slick with thick, curly hair, just as Alejandra had looked, peeked between Lilia’s legs.

  “This will be quick, Lilia. Usually the third child comes faster than the first and second, though Fernando didn’t have to pass into the world the normal way,” Rosa said, recalling the boy’s perfect, round head at birth, so different from the more pointed heads of babies who’d labored through the birth canal.

  Fernando sat in his little chair in the corner of Lilia’s room. What a good child he’d become during Lilia’s bed confinement. Rosa glanced at him, all the while holding a clean folded cloth to Lilia’s bottom, dabbing at the fluids seeping out there around the tip of the baby’s head.

  “Your mama’s going to be fine, little one,” she said to Fernando. “She just has to work a bit to give you a new baby. She’ll be able to rest after a while.”

  “I want to see my baby, Roro. I want to see my baby,” he said, standing up from his chair and darting toward the women where together they labored at the stool.

  “In a little while, my boy. Now I need you to do something for me, to bring good luck to this baby and to your mama. Can you do a job for me, my love?”

  “What to do, Roro?” he said, his eyes wide.

  “Slip into the courtyard, but you must be very quiet. Very quiet. I want you to listen for birdsong, to see if you can understand what they’re saying, what message the birds send to your mama and to your baby. Listen closely to their tunes for me. Can you do that?” Rosa whispered, all the while keeping a hand on Lilia.

  “I can do that,” the boy said softly, nodding.

  “That’s good, Fernando,” Rosa said. “Your mama needs to work. You go on, now. You have to be the big boy your papa expects you to be while he’s away. Go spy on those birds for us, so you can tell us their meaning.”

  The boy grinned, then padded on silent toes toward the door.

  “He’s a good child,” Rosa said to Lilia. “And very soon, God willing, he will have a baby to love and help you care for.”

  A hen darted into the room, and Rosa swatted her out.

  “This one has a lot of hair like her sister did,” Rosa said, carefully placing the folded blanket on the floor beneath Lilia.

  Lilia did not speak but crouched, pushing and groaning
, and Rosa hummed and dabbed around the top of the baby’s head that had eased out almost to its ears before sinking back into its mama.

  “No, this won’t take long, Lilia. Take a good breath and get ready. One more good strong effort from you and the hard part of this will be over,” Rosa said.

  She massaged with oil the tight circle of Lilia’s skin through which the little head would soon pass. She knew doing so would ease not only the birthing but also Lilia’s healing afterward, and oftentimes she found doing so prevented the flesh from tearing.

  She could not tell from the crown of the baby’s head if the child was too small to survive or how its lungs would be or if it could suckle or any of those mysteries only time and God knew.

  And then, out popped the little head, small but perfect. Lilia felt it and exhaled a huge sigh. Then with the last bit of strength in her quivering, thick thighs, Lilia pushed again.

  “Yes, yes, here we go now,” Rosa said, easing the rest of the little girl’s body from her mother’s and into the world. She placed the tiny child on the folded cloth, and at the same time scooped another clean rag from the pile beside her and placed it over the opening from which the child had just come. Lilia slumped, leaning hard against the back of the birthing stool.

  “Here, Lilia,” Rosa said, as the blue baby started to cry, her little body turning pink. “Let’s get you to the bed while I tend to your beautiful daughter.”

  Lilia’s breath came in heaves of exhaustion and tears rolled down her cheeks, but she did not speak. Instead she nodded with closed eyes and shuffled to the bed as Rosa walked beside her, cradling the newborn in her arms as the baby was still connected by umbilical cord to her mother.

  Until now Rosa had not noticed Fernando back at her side, quietly watching his new sister.

  “Look at this, eh, Fernando! What do you think of this girl?” Rosa said, smiling at him.

  “What’s on my baby, Roro?” he said, clamping one arm tight around Rosa’s knee and pointing with his free hand at the slick gray mucus and blood-coated infant making soft bleating sounds not unlike those of a baby goat. “That’s a dirty baby,” Fernando said.

  “Then go hug your mama while I get your baby cleaned up,” Rosa said, shooing Fernando to the head of the bed and into Lilia’s limp arms, weakly reaching for him. Rosa’s skilled hands moved with efficiency and urgency. She needed to get the baby cleaned, dried, and warmed, and she needed to move fast, in preparation for the arrival of the placenta. She pulled open the front of Lilia’s blouse and placed the infant on her mama’s bare skin to warm her as blood continued to pulse through the cord, nurturing the newborn. When the blood flow ceased, Rosa tied off the cord and cut it. She grabbed the bowl from where she’d placed it on the floor.

  “Here we go, Lilia. Let’s finish this work now. The afterbirth’s coming,” she said, gently pumping her fingers across Lilia’s abdomen to ensure the womb contracted and Lilia’s bleeding slowed. Rosa caught the placenta neatly in the bowl, easing out the remainder of the umbilical cord.

  “How is she, Rosa?” Lilia said, straining to raise her head and shoulders from the pillow to study the tiny, living, breathing pink bundle now squirming on her chest.

  “She’s small but whole. I’m guessing she is forty-three, maybe forty-four centimeters long. And,” she said, lifting the infant in one hand to clean her a bit more before wrapping her in a soft blanket, “she feels over two kilos. Maybe two and a quarter. A respectable size for a baby this early.”

  Lilia stared at the child with that unmistakable expression of wonder, curiosity, love, and relief that Rosa had observed a hundred times in mothers within moments of their babies’ births.

  “I’ll call her Elizabeth,” Lilia said, sniffling. “Can you say your sister’s name, Fernando? Can you say Elizabeth?”

  Fernando stretched on the tips of his toes to see his sister. “Leed—ah—bet!” he said, grinning and proud that he could say his sister’s name.

  Rosa cupped Elizabeth in her palm. She had delivered smaller babies, but she’d also delivered bigger babies who hadn’t survived. This girl’s ankles were the size of Rosa’s little finger, but her coloring wasn’t bad, and, though raggedy and rapid, her breathing was continuing. Her lungs were functioning.

  “I know what the birds sang, Roro,” Fernando said.

  “What, my love?”

  “They said, ‘We hope baby Leed-ah-bet doesn’t cry.’ ”

  “That’s a good message, my son,” Lilia said. “Let’s call your sister Elizabeth Esperanza, Elizabeth Hope, in honor of the birds’ song.”

  “Okay, Mama,” he said, gently patting Lilia’s arm with dirty fingers.

  “We need to keep her warm,” Rosa said, opening the blanket to replace the baby, skin to skin, across Lilia’s chest. “And we’ll need to get her suckling to be sure she can do it. These early ones struggle with that. Later, when you’re ready, I’ll sit out in the courtyard with her, Lilia. Sunshine will get that yellow from her skin.”

  Rosa tucked the edges of the cottony fabric of a larger blanket over them both, then went to work tidying the room from Elizabeth Esperanza’s arrival.

  Chapter 37

  Héctor

  Héctor sat at a small table in the back corner of a café sipping a Coca-Cola, waiting.

  When he’d left the orphanage the previous afternoon, Karolina had managed to arrange a meeting between him and the people who had Alejandra, and she’d promised to have a man there who understood such complicated situations. She’d explained they would meet not in person but on the computer, and she’d assured him this way of discussing the matter was the next best scenario. Héctor couldn’t understand, and he felt as if a thousand insects had hatched within his body and were scraping at his skin from the inside, their tiny legs scratching and poking, their antennae searching for a way out of him.

  Héctor had paced the streets of Matamoros until dark then retreated to the confines of his room at the inn, but he had not slept, and this morning he hit the streets again wandering without direction, thinking too many thoughts to organize in his head. How could someone have his child and not return her? What kind of evil lurked here? And why was legal counsel necessary? Wasn’t this situation as clear as still water?

  And poor Alejandra. What must she think, living with strange people in a foreign place, a distant state in an unfamiliar country with a family that wasn’t her own. How could her little mind make sense of these things? He wondered if at night Alejandra dreamed of the smell of Lilia and the sounds of their village, smells and sounds she had missed for more than three years: the clip-clopping of the goats that pulled trash carts, the voice of the orange and melon vendor peddling his fruit through his tattered white megaphone each afternoon, the cooing of the mourning doves each evening, the pat-pat-pat of Lilia slapping out tortillas, the scent of Lilia’s incense lingering on the salty Pacific breeze, of her lavender oils, of the bright flowers she grew. Héctor had been to America, and, though he had planned to stay there many years more than he had, these were the sounds and smells from Puerto Isadore that he’d longed for late at night in the quiet stillness on the tree farm where he’d lived and worked before his deportation.

  He gulped the last swig from his bottle of Coke. The time had come for him to make his way to Casa de Esperanza, to Karolina and the legal man. He’d do whatever they requested in order to prove his determination to get Alejandra back home. He’d played this day out in his mind too many times, yet somehow nothing was developing as he’d envisioned it. Once he’d located her, the getting-her-home part of the plan should have unfolded with no seams, no hitches.

  When he reached the door of the orphanage he offered a quick prayer then pushed the button that sounded the buzzer. Karolina opened the door for him, only this time she led him through her office to a corridor and down a hallway he’d never entered.

  “Señor Castillo is waiting on us,” she said.

  When he didn’t respond, she added, “He’s the
attorney who’ll help us through this. He represents Casa de Esperanza. To make sure we do everything properly, you see?”

  Héctor had dealt with an attorney only once before, and that had been during his and Lilia’s retention by the police in South Carolina. Everything had unfolded in quick and unexpected ways then, though in hindsight he realized he should have been more wary, more cautious. He and Lilia had stopped at the scene of a friend’s accident. That was all, but that was enough. Because of his concern for his co-worker who’d wrecked a farm truck, Héctor had let his guard down and a lawman had noticed him there.

  The American attorney the farmer had found for them had been kind, a smart and gentle man. Yet that attorney had proved useless in his ability to secure Héctor and Lilia’s stay in America.

  Héctor wondered how the attorney here would be.

  Karolina stopped in front of a doorway to Héctor’s left and motioned for him to enter the room before her. Inside, a gray-haired man in a dress shirt and trousers stood to greet him.

  “Eloy Castillo,” he said, extending his hand to Héctor. Héctor shook the man’s hand, which, like the hand of the innkeeper, was the smooth hand of one who knew no manual labor in hot, dry fields.

  “I’m Héctor,” he said. “Héctor Santos.”

  “Here, sit, won’t you?” Eloy Castillo said, motioning to one of two chairs beside him.

  Karolina began typing on her computer, though Héctor could not begin to understand what she aimed to accomplish there.

  Eloy was speaking, but Héctor was too distracted, worried that neither this legal man nor Karolina understood the urgency of this situation, and he had to bite the inside of his cheek not to scream at these people with their computer and fancy office and soft hands.

  “The situation is delicate and, no doubt, shocking for you,” Eloy was saying. “We want what’s best for the child, of course.”