When I Knew You

by Desireé Prosapio

  I took the envelope, the label on the outside had Antonia's name on it written in blue ink.

  He pointed to the envelope. "That has much of Susan's work on the case. I tried to reach her, but she's working in Argentina." He shrugged. "Probably for the best that she's too far to reach."

  "I don't understand. Why would anyone care about this?" I drummed my fingers on the envelope.

  Calderon's eyes softened. "Do you not know your Texas politics, Katarina? Javier Bonita's son, Trent, is running for governor of our fine state. Trent is the odds-on favorite, thanks to his father's land and fracking on Eagle Ford Shale. It took Bonita from being one of 500 big ranchers in the state to one of the ten wealthiest men in the state. So when your mother thought Javier Bonita wasn't really who he said he was, that was a dangerous thing to pursue."

  "Did I have proof?" Antonia asked.

  "You thought so," said Calderon. "Something about family in Chicago and some documents at UTEP. You wanted to get DNA samples, test them against an old sample. But men like Bonita don't just spit in a cup for some researcher in El Paso."

  "Why not take this to the police?" I asked. "I mean, if there's a crime that's been committed, then shouldn't they be involved?"

  Calderon looked grim, his jaw tightening. "The police here are not interested in challenging Bonita. The Chief and the DA have their jobs thanks to Javier Bonita's campaign contributions. The Bonita's diversified from land a couple decades ago, and they run a dozen businesses in El Paso. Javier Bonita is on the board for the biggest bank in town. Antonia suspected they were mixed up in it somehow." He glanced back at Antonia. "I learned to trust her instincts. I'd keep away from the Bonita's if I were you."

  "I'm not exactly the one doing the pursuing, Mr. Calderon," I pointed out.

  "Please, Katarina, call me Gustav," he said. "Just try to keep your distance."

  "One last thing," I said. "Do you know anything about a second account at the credit union?"

  He paused in thought, then pulled out a card from his shirt pocket along with a slender gold pen. "No, I don't." He wrote on the back of the card and handed it to me. "Ask for Harriet Nash, she's the president. Give them this card. She'll help you."

  As we rose to leave, Calderon grabbed a suit coat from the hook by the door. "Leaving?" I asked him as we walked out.

  "For a while. I couldn't leave until I saw you again. I promised." He smiled warmly at Antonia.

  "Thank you for keeping that promise, Gustav," she said, her southern accent as soft as velvet.

  "Por nada, Antonia." He walked us to the truck and I watched Antonia wave to him as he got into his car.

  "He loved her, didn't he?" she said quietly, her eyes filled with tears.

  "Looks like it," I said, climbing in the truck. "I'd never met him before."

  We drove in silence back to El Paso.

  Chapter 16

  I opted for a La Quinta off Mesa Drive. The parking lot was nearly empty but clean of tumbleweeds that were scattered over the rest of the street. Antonia grabbed the tape player and tapes along with her bag, I gathered the rest, along with my backpack from the back of the truck. I hesitated, then reached back into the glove box, pulling out Pilar's .38. She always said it was for snakes. We both knew she didn't mean the slithering kind.

  Antonia stared at the gun. "Kati?" she said, "Is that yours?"

  "It belongs to a friend," I said. "It's just in case. Like an insurance policy."

  "It's okay with me," she said brightly. "I like guns."

  "Really?" I said, more than a little taken aback. "Since when?"

  She knitted her brows. "It's in my notes. Maybe it's like the typing thing. Where I can type those long words I don't know. Part of me never forgets. Make sure you flip the safety when you need it."

  "More advice from the Lady?" I asked.

  She just smiled.

  We paid with Antonia's cash and checked in under the name Rosie Torres, my third-grade teacher. Hopefully, she wasn't wanted in three states for destroying hotel rooms.

  Light filled the room and the beds looked like an oasis to my exhausted body. I'd been up for so long even walking felt strange as if I was really sleep walking. We tossed our things on the beds and I headed for the shower. I hung my head and let the water pound my neck, trying to wake up. Instead, I almost fell asleep on my feet.

  Antonia had pulled the covers down on one bed, closed the curtains and sat at the tiny desk with both envelopes. She was using a pair of drug store cheaters, a pair she used when she did embroidery. She was studying the locket from the Father Henry envelope.

  "The locket has an engraving on it."

  "I know," I said, stifling a yawn. "It's in Spanish."

  She shook her head. "No, behind the photo. It's engraved there too. It says 'mi amor 1951.' And this hair, it's not a cutting. See?" She held up the hair in the lamp light. "Some of it has roots on it. Isn't that strange?" She looked at me over her glasses. "You need to sleep, Kati. We'll look at the rest when you wake up." Antonia patted the envelope Calderon had handed over.

  I nodded, then crawled under the covers. I didn't remember falling asleep.

  I could hear my mother talking to me, her voice was indistinct, but I could hear her. I'm working on my paper mache project, the one that's supposed to be a piggy bank, and my hands are covered in newspaper print and thin glue.

  "Katarina, you need to put that away and find Pilot. He jumped the fence when you weren't watching him. I told you not to let him out." She was angry, impatient.

  "Pilot's dead, Mom," I said, dipping another strip of newspaper in the bowl of glue. "Abuela ran him over with her van."

  Her steps were heavy, and I heard the door slide open. "I'm almost done," I called over my shoulder. "I just need a minute."

  "I told you—you can't trust anyone, Katarina." I felt her standing behind me, but when I looked back, she faded away as if she'd been made of smoke all along.

  "Mom?" I tried to rise, but I was held fast to my chair. Strips of newspaper wrapped around my arms and legs. The glue had hardened and every limb felt as though it was wrapped in a cast. "Mom!" I needed her to help me, where was she?

  "I'm right here, Kati. Kati! It's just a dream."

  I briefly woke, saw Antonia through heavily lidded eyes, then turned over. I could feel her hand on my forehead, her gentle rubbing calming me, sending me to a deeper sleep.

  The click of a tape player threaded through my mind. I could hear the murmur of my mother's voice from the recording.

  I'm losing words for things. The writing is on the wall, Katarina. It looks like I won't be able to warn you, at least not in person. I won't be here to protect you. Again.

  There was a click and I opened my eyes. Antonia was sitting at the desk, her hand on the tape player. Her back was rod straight, and she jotted something down on a piece of paper. Then she popped out the tape, swap another with it, and hit play. Her voice, with a southern accent, floated in the air.

  Antonia. Here are the things you need to remember and that this tape will remind you. You are a mother. Your daughter is Kati, and she is amazing. So smart and beautiful. Kati moved to San Antonio to help people. She visits every now and then and her favorite food is Chico's Tacos. Her birthday is in July, so check the calendar. You circled the date so you can get her a present.

  Antonia, you were in an accident 12 years ago and it means you have trouble remembering things. You know almost all of this, but keep playing the tape because some things you don't.

  All right. Mother takes care of you, and sometimes she doesn't do what you want her to do. Her name is Diane, Kati calls her Abuela.

  Be sure to set aside part of your money every day in the lining of your purse by the bed. That way you'll get to decide when you want to spend money. Margie is a friend and helps you learn things. There are pictures of everyone in your purse, with their names. You also have your address, in case you get lost.

  Add to this tape every time you need to. Make
a new tape if there are 30 marks on your paper, there are blank tapes in the night stand. Remember that you are a good person and that you still know how to do many, many things.

  There was a clicking sound, but the tape continued.

  You came back for a little while – you remembered everything. Your mother made you leave Kati and the man took the box of tapes. I don't know why. Be careful. Look out for Kati. I think she's in danger.

  There was another click, then a hiss of blank tape. I watched as she rewound the tape a few seconds, then pressed the buttons and began speaking.

  You are with Kati, and you are running from a very bad man. He is very tall and his name is Eliah. Trust Kati. And don't worry about the things on the other tape. The things the lady says. She was just sad because she misses Kati.

  There was another click and I closed my eyes. I could hear her sigh and set down the tape player. I waited a few minutes, her words repeating in my head. She was just sad because she misses Kati.

  Antonia greeted me with a warm smile when I rose. "Kati! Don't worry, everything is okay. We are in a hotel room. We came here together and now we are here." Antonia pulled a note from her pocket. It was the same note she had shown me earlier, the one she used to remind herself to listen to her tape. At the bottom, she had added two sentences.

  You and Kati are solving a mystery. It is very dangerous.

  You must keep track of the two envelopes and two tapes now. Still listen to the one marked Antonia.

  "So I'll remember." She folded the note carefully and put it back in her pocket. "It helps me remember."

  "It's scary to remember sometimes," I said, getting up. Light filtered into the room through the drapes, it was late afternoon.

  We spend the next hour pouring over the envelope from Calderon. Susan Miller's writing was long and flowing, there were pages of yellow legal pad notes with dates and names, some crossed out, and a few circled. We poured over baptism documents, single pages from census records, a copy of a promissory note and deed, and names and phone numbers of Father Henry, Calderon, and someone at the University of Texas at El Paso.

  "If I'm reading this right," I said, "Susan found that Javier Bonita was the illegitimate son of Roger Davis," I said.

  "Maybe that's why there are copies of the census records from 1920 and 1930." Antonia pulled a sheet out from a pile. "See? She circled something on these."

  I leaned over to read it. The writing was small and jagged and I could only decipher a large M for a first name and what could be Bonita. On the second sheet the writing was a little clearer. "It's hard to read—maybe it's Margaret or Magalina?" I flipped through the yellow legal pad pages. "She wrote down Magdalina. Magdalina Bonita, born 1925."

  "Probably Javier's mother." Antonia dug through her pile of papers. She pulled out a baptism record. "She's listed on here, no father, though."

  We kept at it until nightfall. We pieced together an outline from Susan's notes. At the turn of the century, Roger Davis married Penny Vincent, a much older woman from Pennsylvania. She came from money, old money. Her family had bought the happy couple fifty sections in La Salle county—what amounted to fifty square miles of scrub—in Texas to get them started.

  Somewhere along the way Davis got involved with Magdalina Bonita who was a cook at the ranch, and Javier was born. When Davis' wife, Penny, died in the '40s, Davis married Magdalina, but by then Javier had moved to Chicago. Javier met Estella, Lupe's mother. Javier Bonita came back to Texas in 1963 and Davis deeded his land, his holdings had grown to cover a good bit of the county, to Javier.

  "So Javier came back and left Estella and Lupe in Chicago." I leaned back in the desk chair. "He abandoned his family. Just like William Travis at the Alamo. It's a fine Texas tradition to skip out on your family."

  I looked over to Antonia, who had stretched, and gotten up from the bed, slipping on her shoes.

  "What I don't understand," I continued, "is why would that matter now? I can't believe it's a factor in the Governor's race. And it certainly didn't matter twelve years ago."

  Antonia walked over to the window, pulling the curtain aside. "And who is the tall man?"

  "Eliah?" My stomach knotted up. "I don't know. There's nothing about him in Susan's notes."

  Antonia frowned. "Mother knew him."

  "What?" I said, startled. "Abuela?"

  She nodded. "He called her Diane."

  "Are you sure?"

  Antonia let the curtain fall back into place. "That's how I knew he was trouble. She acted like she didn't know him, but I heard him call her Diane before I came in the room. Then they pretended not to know each other." She turned to me. "I'm forgetful, but I'm not an idiot." Her jaw tightened. "I'm not an idiot."

  It was getting late so we ordered pizza and ate. We turned on the TV, letting an old movie fill the room with different drama for a while. The blue glow of the screen lit the fine lines of Antonia's face and I thought of her pulling me out of the house, of us hiding in the camper of Pilar's truck.

  I knew Antonia was right; she wasn't an idiot. But she was much more than forgetful.

  How was I going to keep her safe, how were we going to survive all of this? And Abuela? Was she all right? Eliah knew her, did that mean she knew something about all of this?

  My mother had hidden all of this from Abuela and even now Antonia made it clear she didn't trust her own mother. What if something happened to Abuela? What if she had been hurt and we were here eating pizza? I felt sick.

  There was only one person I could think of to call, one person who couldn't be involved in all of this. It was too late to call, but in the morning I'd call Father Vincent. Maybe he could check on Abuela.

  Chapter 17

  La Quinta's free breakfast consisted of watery orange juice and a "make your own waffle station" next to an assortment of bagels and mini cereal boxes. Antonia seemed a little off to me. Breaking routines was tough on her, as if the scaffolding of her memory wasn't made of metal, but was thin as a spider silk, and the slightest movement ripped it to pieces. She played her tape and read through her notes, but I wondered how long she could hold on to understanding what we were doing. I almost suggested she listen to the tape she'd made as her lucid self, as Mom, but I didn't want to force her through the pain of those stinging words. A sweet, dim, idiot.

  Father Vincent agreed to drop by the house to check on Abuela with the help of the baseball-bat-wielding Fernando. "Just in case," he'd said with a grim laugh. He promised to call when he could verify that the coast was clear.

  We headed to the headquarters of the credit union near the airport. It was a huge modern building that looked like an ocean liner had somehow landed in the desert, its prow reaching up for the pale El Paso sky. Built for thousands of government employees from the military bases like White Sands Missile Range and Ft. Bliss, it was one of the largest credit unions in the state and had even developed affordable housing loan programs and small business lending. My mother hated banks and loved the credit union. I'd had an account there since I was born.

  When I asked for Harriet Nash, the receptionist tried to pawn us off on a teller. When Antonia showed Calderon's business card and insisted her attorney told her to speak with Mrs. Nash personally, the receptionist acquiesced.

  Her gray hair was spiked in a modern cut, a match for her stylish red suit and the fierce intelligence in her eyes. The effect was somewhat moderated by her wide smile.

  "So Gus sent you straight to the top?" she extended her hand to Antonia, then me.

  "Our situation is a little complicated, Mrs. Nash," I said.

  "No doubt, if Gus told you to talk to me. Let's head upstairs." She turned on her heel and we scurried to keep up. "And call me Harriet, please."

  Her office was on the fifth floor and had a view of the mountains. There was a large mahogany desk, but she gestured to us to sit around a small round table with leather chairs the color of caramel.

  "Usually I'd be on the second floor today," she said
. "We have an appreciation brunch in the cafeteria on the 15th of the month. But since Gustav sent you, I figured I could use this to get out of waffle duty."

  The walls of her office were covered with photos of ribbon cuttings, family groups, and a watercolor of a Catholic church.

  "Is that the San Elizario mission?" I asked.

  Nash nodded. "Father Vincent sent me that after we finished working on a project together. He said I had a missionary zeal." She smiled patiently. "Tell me what I can help you with."

  Antonia pulled out her wallet and extracted a small white card along with her ID. "I have an account here, but Mr. Calderon said there's another account in my name. A hidden account."

  Nash took the card and walked over to the computer on her desk. Her fingers flew over the keyboard. She scrolled for a moment, frowned, then picked up the phone while continuing to type on the keyboard.

  "Someone tried to access your account yesterday," she said, arching an eyebrow.

  "Probably Diane Perez," Antonia said. "She's my mother."

  Nash stared at the screen and tapped a few more keys. "It's not your mother. It was a man, an Eliah Trevino. We told him he needed a power of attorney on your account."

  Nash straightened up and hung up the phone. "Your account had been flagged ten years ago, even with a power of attorney he wouldn't have been able to access it short of a death certificate. Still, Becky is new. But fortunately, it looks like our training classes are working." Nash walked back to the table. "What exactly is going on Ms. Perez?"

  "I don't know," Antonia and I both answered at the same time.

  "It's something that happened before my accident," Antonia continued. "Something I was trying to protect."

  "Well, we almost lost it yesterday." She rose from her desk. "But all is well. Let's check the safe deposit box."

  "Safe deposit box?" I asked.

  Nash nodded. "That's what the other account is. The hidden one. It's a safe deposit box. Paid in full for twenty years. According to the record, no one has tried to access it before yesterday."