Under the Feet of Jesus

by Helena María Viramontes

  —I don’t want her to see me. Alejo wanted to be left alone, but Estrella stood by anyway.

  Estrella watched the silver mercury pump up the barometer, and the metallic liquid was beautiful, like a moon riding on a geyser, like an upside down waterfall. The mercury jumped once, lowered, jumped again, a third time, then rushed down to a pool at the bottom. Pulsating. Metallic and fluid. Solid and diffused. The nurse removed the plugs of her stethoscope, jotted something on the paper.

  Petra did not like all this jotting and poking the nurse was doing. She had smelled the carnations even before the nurse appeared and the smell repulsed her and she fought against upchucking right there into the shiny trash barrel. The nurse should know better than to wear something so venomous to pregnant women as carnations. Even the many things on the nurse’s desk implied fakery; the pictures of her smiling boys (Who did they think they were, smiling so boldly at the camera?), the porcelain statue of a calico kitten with a little stethoscope, wearing a folded white cap with a red cross between its too cute perky little ears; a pile of manila folder files stacked in a strange way that seemed cluttered and disordered. She wore too much red lipstick, too much perfume and asked too many questions and seemed too clean, too white just like the imitation cotton. She may fool other people but certainly not her. Enough. Get the young man well enough so that he could return to Edinburg. As she saw Estrella touch Alejo’s cheek, she wondered for the first time about contagious ailments.

  —Don’t you worry, she’ll be behind this curtain, just keeping us company. Estrella heard the Velcro rip of the blood pressure wrap, the rattle of shower curtain rings when the nurse pulled the curtain between she and Alejo.

  —How much is all this gonna cost? asked Petra, spitting into the trash can, but no one answered.

  —I think the boy’s got dysentery. But I’m not a doctor, and I got no lab for sampling. You gonna have to get him to the main hospital in Corazón. He’s got all the signs of dehydration.

  —¿Qué dice del corazón? asked the mother.

  —Sweet Jesus, Estrella said. We gotta take him to the hospital in Corazón.

  —¿Esta loca la enfermera?

  —Amá, Alejo’s sicker then we thought.

  —He’s not our responsibility. This from Perfecto Flores.

  —Es la verdad. Su primo Gumecindo lo puede llevar al hospital. Vámonos, Perfecto.

  —You know he’s gone back. The mother shrugged her shoulders. I can’t believe you, Mama.

  —Piénsalo, hija. Does he have papers? What if the hospital reports him.

  —He was born in Texas. His grandma was born there too and her grandma. They belong here, Mama.

  —Does he have money? You got money? Whose gonna pay?

  —Perfecto Flores, what do we do?

  Perfecto rubbed the baldness of his head. Why wasn’t he wearing his hat? Damn if he couldn’t remember if he left it in the car or in the house.

  —Is Alejo gonna die? asked Perla.

  —Shut up!

  —Ricky, take the twins to the shade over there. Now.

  —But ...

  —You heard your mother, unless you want a nalgazo!

  —Why can’t Arnulfo take the twins?

  —Why don’t we ask Alejo what he wants. Estrella bit a hangnail.

  —I know what he wants.

  —You gave your word, Perfecto.

  —Puta madre. ¿Dónde está Corazón?

  The fan seemed feeble against the heat which was more intense inside the trailer. Alejo’s shirt was unbuttoned, and from his belly button, a straight, thin line of black hair sprouted to his chest. Estrella saw his nipples like two pennies and his body had colors that she had never noticed before. His belly was as white as hominy, veins of tarnished blue under his tongue, the gold of ears, the half moon of fingernails, his palms like the morning light. His hand, the one she held, was the color of sweet piloncillo. And Estrella couldn’t hold the wind of his life as easily as she held his clammy hand. The nurse went over to her desk and sat and wrote on the manila folder until she looked up to rearrange the picture frames of her smiling sons as if someone had disturbed their original position.

  —The clinic visit is fifteen dollars, but I’ll charge you only ten because ... she paused and glanced at Estrella, then added, because I know times are hard these days. She removed her black patent leather purse from the bottom drawer and placed it on the desk beside the phone. Estrella stared at the nurse an extra second. How easily she put herself in a position to judge.

  Estrella spread open both her hands and held them up for Perfecto to see. Petra saw her do this, and it made her think of when people surrender to the police or La Migra and how they put their hands up when they see the pistols pointed at the bull’s-eye of their bellies. Petra was outraged.

  —¡Diez dólares! ¿Y por qué diez? No más para decir que está enfermo el joven. Por gratis yo le digo la misma cosa. ¡Qué racketa!

  Perfecto slipped his battered leather wallet from out of his back pocket. The wallet was shaped like the contours of his hip, round corners, thin, and contained an expired driver’s license, his green card, a photo of a child of an acquaintance he no longer remembered, and strips of paper, receipts for reimbursements or reminders of money owed. He slipped out a five, then one dollar, two, three. And that was that. A deep darkened mouth gaped between the lips of the wallet. He checked a second time, looked up at Estrella. He dug into his pockets deep for coins, counted the assorted change. Altogether, change and bills, the total came to $9.07. Perfecto asked Estrella to ask the nurse if the toilet needed fixing. He would do this, and sand and paint this wall, for services rendered.

  —He wants to know, Estrella said, flipping her thumb over her shoulder at Perfecto. He wants to know if he could maybe fix your toilet. He’s very good, she added, His name’s Perfecto because ...

  —Not to worry. The nurse waved her off, unlocked a tin money box, and removed a receipt book from inside. Listen, a few pennies short don’t mean much.

  —This is all we have, I think ...

  —The toilet don’t need fixing. It’s the heat is all.

  —Tell her.

  —He says ...

  —The poles.

  —The poles outside ...

  —Need to be recemented.

  —The poles outside need new cement. Maybe can he do that instead of the money?

  —I only work here. I’m real sorry, the nurse replied, I couldn’t say.

  Estrella explained to Perfecto who was still hesitant about giving up the money. In the end, he gave it to her, placing the coins on top as if the thinly worn bills were a raft. She handed it to the nurse and the nurse placed a purple carbon between two sheets of the receipt book and pressed hard, misspelling the name. When she was done, she separated the pennies from the dimes and nickels, counted the money and slid it into her palm and placed the bills and coins in the appropriate slots of the tin box and the coins dropping sounded like uncooked pinto beans dropping into a steel pot. The nurse closed the box, locked it, placed it in the top drawer, and handed the receipt to Estrella who handed it to Perfecto who stared at it, then placed it in his wallet where the money had once been and the mother folded her arms above her bosom.

  —You’re gonna get sicker if you don’t get to a hospital. It’s your call, Estrella whispered, helping Alejo do up his shirt like a mother buttoning a child against the cold.

  —Take me home, Alejo replied faintly. His tongue was caked white and swollen and his hot breath on her face smelled sour.

  —Where?

  —Back home. Alejo closed his eyes.

  —Come on, Alejo, don’t do this to me. What do you mean?

  —Hon, you gotta understand. I gotta pick up my kids in Daisyfield by six. The nurse checked her watch a third time, a pile of keys in her hand.

  —How far is the hospital?

  —A stone’s throw away. About twenty miles, 281 East. Corazón turnoff. The nurse pointed.

  —P
erfecto can clear the high weeds around the door, maybe plant some seedlings. What do you say? Estrella remembered the pictures of boys in framed smiles. Maybe I can baby-sit? Come on ...

  —I’m gonna have to lock up real soon.

  —We’re gonna have to go.... Estrella glanced around the room. She knew that they couldn’t leave, but knew, too, the nurse was being stubborn. She would do anything at this point, Perfecto as well, the mother too. But they couldn’t leave, they couldn’t go. They had no money except for what Perfecto relinquished to pay for what the mother said they already knew, which seemed to her unfair.

  Estrella thought for a moment as the heat condensed into sweat which trickled between her breasts in the trailer room when the nurse clicked off the fan. She tried to make her mind work, tried to imagine them back on the road with an empty gas tank and wallet and Alejo too sick to talk. She stared at Perfecto’s tired face. The wrinkles on his face etched deeper with the sweat and soil and jagged sun. Was this the same panic the mother went through? There was no bartering this time. If only the nurse would consent. Estrella knew she couldn’t get him home, but the hospital was only twenty miles. A simple nod, a break. If only God could help.

  Estrella stared at the mother’s resentfulness, at whom, what, she didn’t know. They were not asking for charity, not begging for money. She stared at Alejo’s forehead. All that was left of his fall was a darkened scar. They would all work, including the boys if they had to, to pay for the visit, to pay for gas. Alejo was sick and the nine dollars was gas money.

  She remembered the tar pits. Energy money, the fossilized bones of energy matter. How bones made oil and oil made gasoline. The oil was made from their bones, and it was their bones that kept the nurse’s car from not halting on some highway, kept her on her way to Daisyfield to pick up her boys at six. It was their bones that kept the air conditioning in the cars humming, that kept them moving on the long dotted line on the map. Their bones. Why couldn’t the nurse see that? Estrella had figured it out: the nurse owed them as much as they owed her.

  —Maybe, Estrella asked again, but this time the nurse didn’t even look up as she filed the folder away.

  Estrella walked out the door and out to the car. She didn’t know what she was about to do, but had to do something to get the money for the gas for the hospital for Alejo. The doors of the wagon were unlocked and the twins, and Ricky and Arnulfo were playing under the shade of the oak tree, making circles with pebbles they had collected. They looked up only for a moment as Estrella opened the back door, pulled open the hidden trunk door, grabbed the crowbar which laid next to the red jack, heavy, iron cold, and walked back to the clinic. Perfecto was already walking out with Alejo, the mother behind them, but they froze as she approached. They moved aside to let Estrella pass, then U-turned and followed her. Perfecto laid Alejo on the vacant chairs.

  When she reentered the clinic, the fan was off and the air was still and as thick as muck against her body. There was no turning back. But Estrella moved forward to the desk, the crowbar locked in her two fists.

  —Give us back our money. Her heart dripped sweat. She felt the sweat puddle and dampen the soles of her feet. When the nurse looked up, it was only then that Estrella noticed how perfect her lipstick was.

  —What are you talking about? The nurse, who now held her black patent leather purse, clutched it tighter to her breasts.

  —Give us back our money.

  —Excuse me?

  Perfecto moved forward to grab the crowbar, but Petra held him back.

  —I’ll smash these windows first, then all these glass jars if you don’t give us back our money.

  —You listen here!

  Estrella slammed the crowbar down on the desk, shattering the school pictures of the nurse’s children, sending the pencils flying to the floor, and breaking the porcelain cat with a nurse’s cap into pieces. The nurse dropped her purse, shielded her face with her hands. Estrella waited. The nurse began to cry but still had not moved. Estrella knocked the folders which spread like cards on the floor. A lid fell and circled on the floor until it rounded to a complete stop. Estrella held out her hand, palm up.

  The nurse stepped forward gingerly and removed the tin box from the top drawer of the desk. She tried three different keys before one slipped into the small lock and unlocked the box and spilled the coins and dollars on the desk and backed away. Estrella counted nine dollars and seven cents. She lowered the crowbar, unable to catch a breath and showed the nurse what she had taken. She did not feel like herself holding the money. She felt like two Estrellas. One was a silent phantom who obediently marked a circle with a stick around the bungalow as the mother had requested, while the other held the crowbar and the money. The money felt wet and ugly and sweaty like the swamp between her legs.

  —You should have let Perfecto fix the toilet, she whispered. But it was then that Estrella realized the nurse was sobbing into her hands, her lipstick smeared as if she tried wiping her mouth away. She saw the nurse trembling before her.

  Perfecto pumped the gas, then unhooked the dispenser and replaced it on the tank. He gave the old man with a lazy stomach a balled-up five-dollar bill. When he returned behind the wheel, he tapped the gauge with his fingernail and the indicator sluggishly moved to a quarter of a tank. They drove out of the station. The twins looked through the window at the orange Union 76 ball shrinking along with the sun.

  The rosary dangled from the rearview mirror. Estrella looked out of the windshield from the backseat of the station wagon. Over the puckering hood, the fluorescent dashes led into the valley and the rows of grapes reamed past them like a spreading paper fan. A few piscadores slowly walked along the belt of the road, their shoulders stooped from carrying the dusk, and they soon became specks of color left behind.

  —Did you hurt her? Alejo muttered, repeating it because Estrella couldn’t hear the question the first time. He tried to lift his head and licked his flaking lips to lubricate his mouth. His bottom lip bled. The clamor of the muffler scraped the pavement when they hit a speed bump, and his head resonated with powerful blows behind his eyes. It took moments before the pain eased. He cleared his throat. Estrella gently rubbed his feverish forehead with the handkerchief. I need to know.

  —They make you that way, she sighed with resignation. She tried to understand what happened herself. You talk and talk and talk to them and they ignore you. But you pick up a crowbar and break the pictures of their children, and all of a sudden they listen real fast.

  —Did you hurt her?

  —Sweet Jesus, what do you think? Her anger flared. Does it matter now?

  —For what? he whispered.

  —For what? Estrella asked. For what? For nine dollars and seven cents! Alejo did not understand her sarcasm. He seemed not to understand anything.

  —Don’t make it so easy for them. The fevers had drained him. He couldn’t keep warm enough, and he trembled. Estrella continued to wipe his forehead with the handkerchief, but he grabbed her hand slightly and held it. His eyes welled and became glassy. I’m not worth it, Star. Not me.

  —What a thing to say, she replied, forcing her hand away from between his cold fingers.

  Estrella looked out again at the valleys and peaks of the mountains they were heading for. She thought of bell peppers. It was odd that this thought came to her. A brisk wind came through the window, and when she inhaled, it awakened her.

  She remembered a ranch store. She couldn’t remember the town, or the owner of the ranch, or even the particulars of the store, but remembered how the brilliant red and green and yellow bell peppers were stacked like layers of granite stone into small and solid pyramids. The colors became something so completely breathtaking that one had to stop and ask why, why would anyone want to create an incandescent mosaic out of something as nondescript as bell peppers? Estrella wanted to tell the mother, to say, Mama, take a look at that, but a woman walked in the store and toppled the peak by removing the top single red one, shiny as new
love, and it was as easy to dismantle all that work as it was to kick a can on the road.

  —That’s a stupid thing to say, Estrella replied, not able to disguise the tone of disappointment. She forgave him because he was sick. You don’t make it so easy for them.

  -No. No. No. And he drifted off, his eyes deeply shut. Can’t you see, they want us to act like that? Nothing he said could undo what was already done. Nothing could remove the image of Estrella swinging the crowbar and sparks of chipped silver like shrapnel flying in his head.

  —Can’t you see they want to take your heart? she whispered.

  The wagon hummed towards the city of Corazón. Not even Elvis’s glitter or the heavenly look of La Virgen held more beauty to Estrella than the red bell pepper.

  —She better not call the police, Petra threatened. If she knows what’s good for her. She rubbed her forehead and closed her eyes, as if to halt the pounding in her head. She just better not make trouble for us.

  —We’ll tear down the barn starting tomorrow, right, Perfecto? Estrella asked. She covered Alejo.

  —Yes, Perfecto replied. The telephone poles blurred as they travelled the long stretch of paved highway. He could feel the vibration of the engine clear through the stiff leather soles of his shoes, and he felt the heat and the struggle of a car that made no promise. He looked in the rearview mirror and saw night falling and then he saw Estrella speaking to Alejo. She leaned an elbow over the backseat and spoke with him. Perfecto saw her lips pantomiming words, her forehead wrinkling, but couldn’t make out what they were saying to one another because Petra had been talking to him.

  —The barn? Petra raised her voice at Perfecto.

  —We need the money.

  —Maybe we can stay in one place, Ricky added, and he sloped on the mother’s arm in drowsiness. She raked his sweaty hair.

  —Maybe, mi’jo. What do you think, Perfecto? Petra asked.

  —Whatever you say. He lied and hated himself for doing it.