Fruit of the Drunken Tree

by Ingrid Rojas Contreras

  “Don’t cry anymore, niña.” Petrona took the ice away and looked into my eyes. “The important thing is I’m here. Right? I wouldn’t leave you.” There were pretty gray speckles in the amber of Petrona’s eyes. She pressed me close and I nodded. I held the ice to my cheek.

  I wondered what possible reasons Mamá and Cassandra could have to betray me. Maybe it was something I said. To Cassandra I had said, “Face of a bat! Face of a bat!” To Mamá I had said, “No, Mamá, you can’t play Barbies, you don’t know how.” To Cassandra I had said, “See how Mamá always braids my hair better?” To Mamá I had said, “Mamá, don’t try. You can’t make hot chocolate like Petrona.”

  I started to feel better. Petrona was making flan just for me. She was burning sugar in a pan, making it dark and thick. The air smelled like vanilla. She put the concoction in the fridge and then I asked Petrona if she would watch the funeral procession with me on Mamá’s television. Yellow light from the fridge brightened her face until she closed the door. She hardened her jaw. She didn’t protest as I grabbed her hand and pulled her up the stairs.

  We sat together on Mamá’s bed. On the television, I saw how the flag-draped coffin made its way across Bogotá’s main plaza. It was topped with a beautiful flower arrangement. In some ways, it was better to see the funeral from home, because it was like you had many eyes—some swerving overhead, others close-up on the crowd, always following the action around the coffin. I started to think that the coffin was like a black hole, and the mouth of the black hole was Galán and down his throat was the great mystery: a heart stopped, a body decomposing. I wondered if Galán would become a Blessed Soul of Purgatory. He didn’t seem sinful, but you never knew. It was like that saying: faces we see, hearts we don’t know. Maybe he was already walking somewhere in our neighborhood in that endless procession of Blessed Souls.

  On the screen, the streets were filled with people waving things—white handkerchiefs, white shirts, Colombian flags, red plastic. Galán’s face was printed on posters, flyers, cloth. His face fluttered everywhere. His face also on Mamá’s bedroom window.

  Petrona didn’t know who the men carrying the coffin were, but they looked important. There were fancy soldiers marching at their sides. The soldiers had a rigid march. Their hats had a golden point. Police with guns held the crowd in place, but they allowed people to throw red and white carnations on the black limousine trailing behind the coffin. The flowers fell on the roof and hood. Petrona said that’s where Galán’s family probably was—sitting down while people struggled. I told Petrona I guessed it would have been nice for them to walk instead of being in a car, but they had just lost someone. “I wouldn’t want to walk if Mamá had just died.”

  “But you have a choice, niña,” Petrona said.

  I was looking on the television for Mamá and Cassandra, but there were so many little faces. There were thousands of people hanging from trees, from lampposts, out of windows, boiling in the crowd, men weeping, women chanting. “Who doesn’t have a choice?” I couldn’t take my eyes off the television. All throughout the crowd people were beating white handkerchiefs into the air. It was an ocean of beating white cloth. People were chanting, “Se vive, se siente, Galán está presente!” and the white-gloved hands of the fancy soldiers moved rigidly up and down by the coffin.

  Then the doorbell rang. “I’ll get it!” I pushed off the floor and sprinted down the hall and down the stairs. There was a young man at the door. He had short, afroed hair and sharp cheekbones. His eyes and ears were small, but his lips were large and brown. “Hello,” he said. “Is your mami home?” When I didn’t answer, he smiled and lifted his eyebrows. “I’m here to fix the carpet.” I cocked my head to the side and looked at him. His knees showed through frayed holes in his jeans. He was no carpet guy. I could tell. He was too young, didn’t have any tools, not even a duffel bag. I wasn’t about to let him in, but Petrona grabbed the door handle behind my back and said Mamá told her somebody was stopping by to measure the carpet. She beheld the carpet guy, pursing her lips to keep a smile from her face. Petrona welcomed him. I didn’t stand aside but he pressed in. I grabbed the tail of his flannel shirt and pulled him back, pointing to the welcome mat. “Are you going to wipe your boots? You’ll ruin the carpet.” His nostrils flared. He set his jaw and wiped his boots. He was grim. Then he smirked.

  “Will you sit in the living room?” Petrona asked, but the young man didn’t answer and walked into the house in a self-important gait. I didn’t know what part of the carpet he was fixing, but once inside, he wandered through the living and dining room and let his small eyes roam over everything—the lights, the paintings, the furniture, the little plates in display easels—everything in fact, except the carpet. He made his way into the kitchen, the indoor patio, Petrona’s room, and turned back. He seemed impressed but in a moment his tone changed. “It’s cramped like a tuna can in here.”

  “If you’ll have a seat—” Petrona insisted, but the young man paused, suddenly absorbed in studying the stairs. He knelt. When he saw that over the carpeted steps there was a runner, he laughed. “A carpet over another carpet.” Petrona giggled shortly into her hand. The carpet guy knelt at the third step and ran his finger along the golden rod holding the runner in place. His finger was slow along the length of the rod—then he gripped and pulled it with force. He held it in his fist and showed it to us, smiling. He sat on the steps and took out a knife from his pocket and, bending over his work, he scraped the metal. After a while he seemed satisfied and rose to his feet to show me. “It’s garbage, look.” He scraped the rod with the blade and I saw how gold powder stripped away. He sneered as he placed the crooked rod back in place. Then he bounded up the steps. Petrona and I looked at one another and started behind him. He was lifting a painting that hung on the hall at the top of the stairs, peering behind it like he was expecting a safe to be there. I scoffed and he bowed and swept his hand in front of him like this was his house he was welcoming us to. Petrona frowned and cleared her throat and passed in front of him. As she did, his hand came up and caressed her behind, absentmindedly, like Papá sometimes did with Mamá. Petrona didn’t even notice. I was so confused I stood in place, thinking about what I had seen: the knees through the frayed jeans, the rod, his palm caressing Petrona. When I lifted my eyes there were noises in Mamá’s room and I raced to see what it was—I passed Petrona, oddly standing halfway up the attic stairs, and then I sprang into Mamá’s room, where the carpet guy was crouching and looking under Mamá’s bed.

  I crossed my arms. “Who are you really?”

  His voice came muffled. “I told you, little girl. I’m the carpet guy.”

  “How are you measuring the carpet without measuring tools?”

  “I don’t need measuring tools on account of my lifelong experience in measuring.”

  “Then why would you grab our maid’s behind if you are really just a carpet guy?”

  He cackled, laughing into the darkness under Mamá’s bed. He shot up. “I didn’t touch your maid’s behind.” He spoke close to my face: “Eh? Are you threatening me? Little girl?”

  Petrona ran into the room, getting between the carpet guy and me, keeping him back with one arm. “You must have not seen right, niña! We were just walking by each other like normal. You think I would let a stranger grab me?” She turned to the carpet guy, waving the air with her hand, tittering. “Can you imagine?” The carpet guy was instantly appeased and then Petrona said, “Listen, I think it’s time for you to leave.” He shrugged and said he was done measuring anyway.

  His dark caramel eyes bored into me.

  Petrona told me she was going to tell Mamá about the carpet guy and that he was surely going to get fired, so I should forget about the whole thing. I nodded. When Mamá and Cassandra got home, I refused to talk to either of them. Cassandra wanted to tell me about the funeral procession, but I didn’t want to know. I sat on my bed and
sulked and hugged my bandaged arm. I could hear Mamá tearing her Galán posters down.

  * * *

  At night, Mamá knelt by our beds and told us we weren’t allowed outside the neighborhood. Which meant Cassandra and I were no longer allowed to pass Elisario’s gate and cross the street and go to the stores that sold candy and milkshakes. Mamá said you could never know where there would be a car bomb or men on motorcycles. Men on motorcycles is how Pablo Escobar killed his targets. Bystanders died every day. Mamá seemed sad but I was upset, and I refused to feel sorry for her.

  “For how long?” Cassandra asked. Her voice hung in the dark. The moonlight fell on the end of her bed and I saw her feet shift under her blankets.

  “Until they find that damned Escobar,” Mamá said.

  I bit my lip, unable to remain upset after all. “Are we telling Papá?”

  She ironed our sheets with her hands and sat cross-legged on the floor between our beds. “He’s coming home. We’ve decided that what you girls need is a little vacation. Won’t that be nice? We’re going to visit your abuela and spend the holidays there!” Mamá placed each of her hands on our chests. “I heard Abuela has baby rabbits now.”

  “What are you talking about, Mamá?” Cassandra said. “Final quarter just started.”

  Mamá laughed. “I talked to the Principal. She’s giving us permission to skip it. You’ll have make-up work to do when you return, but. You can go.”

  “But what about my friends, Mamá? You want me to just leave? I’ll miss everything!”

  “Grow up, Cassandra. Not everything is about you. We’re a family. We have to take care of one another.”

  “That’s so typical, every time something happens you run to Abuela.”

  “What about Petrona?” I asked. “What is she going to do?”

  “She’s going to her own home, Chula. She has a family of her own, you know. Now go to sleep. I want you to get some rest.”

  My lids felt heavy. I tried to imagine Petrona’s family, but the best I could do was picture a row of little children standing in front of a father and mother, all of them with a Petrona face. Mamá said Petrona’s family was twelve total, so I imagined Petrona splintered in eleven. I imagined eleven Petronas mopping the floors, eleven Petronas stirring a pot with a long wooden spoon, nothing in the house because there was nothing for them to lose.

  The weight of Mamá’s hand on my chest was comforting. Her green veins pulsed under the light of the moon. I felt my mind growing dizzy and heavy. I didn’t want to be dead. All it took was a little bad luck. Mamá’s veins and their outlines rose in the air and floated there like green branches, and then turned into the waves of a green sea where a lost ship sat bobbing, and where sharks shot up at all sides, their white bellies glistening in the sun. They stayed suspended in the air, their gray tails dripping seawater. Their lips curved down in sadness and parted to mutter incomprehensible things.

  Petrona

  I was upset about how Gorrión had behaved at the Santiagos’ but the nearness of his body took the air out of mine. Don’t hate me, cielito, I get protective sometimes. I wanted to make sure they’re treating you right. I couldn’t stay angry. I didn’t tell him in a few days it’d be my birthday, but Gorrión took my hand and brought it to his lips like he knew. Petrona, how can you stand to be so pretty?

  I stared at my tennis shoes climbing the Hills with Gorrión. These are the shoes of the girl that could have kept little Ramón alive but did not. I was not a good person and after thinking about Ramón, I thought about Gorrión and the soft way his lids fell over his eyes. Lids like night, the white of his eyes moonlight. I saw Gorrión clearly in my imagination. I could not remember how Ramón’s lids fell over his eyes.

  Gorrión wanted justice. Why do you think some bodies are worth more than others? He wanted me to see all the ways I was taken advantage of. He liked to list the things the Santiagos had as opposed to what I had. I listened to him.

  We avoided the playground at the top of the Hills where little Ramón was found. Gorrión took me down the path and around to the north end where there were a few trees, and there we sat on a stone. Birds sang and Gorrión stared at my lips. Gorrión had the power to make everything disappear. When I tasted him the only two things in the world were the grit of sand on his lips and his muscular hand at my waist.

  Little Aurora covered for me. She sat by the well a few paces away. She did not hear what we did. Gorrión made me tremble and I came back flushed full of the possibility of a future.

  Later, Little Aurora cried for her brother. I consoled my girl. I told her what la Señora Alma said to her girls. When it is time it is time, though it wasn’t true, not for us. I could have kept Ramón safe, had I earned more, had I been able to buy us anything other than pan and gaseosa. I carried the water on the yoke and as we went back to our hut, I wondered if it was an injustice that Ramón had died, and if it was, then who was to blame.

  I could not keep a secret in the Hills. Somebody told Mami I had been with Gorrión, and when I entered our hut Mami threw our pots and plastic dishes and plastic plates at me. How dare you, Petrona, did you forget your brother is dead? He’s dead! Your brother is dead! I don’t want to see you, go away, I can’t even look at you.

  10.

  Safe Routes

  To visit Abuela María we had to get our driving directions from the newspaper. The headline had read “Safe Routes for the Holiday Break” in boldface and capitals, but when Papá tore out the map, all that was left was a string of illegible half letters. The letters spread ornamentally atop the birdlike map of Colombia. In the car Papá said the reason there were safe routes was because of Pablo Escobar and his men, or as they called themselves, los Extraditables. I didn’t know Pablo Escobar had a group. I asked Papá if they played instruments, but Papá said they were not that kind of group: rather, they wrote letters to the press, left missives on the radio, and took credit for car bombs and kidnappings. Papá said the only thing los Extraditables feared was going to prison in the United States, where nobody spoke their language and they would let them die like dogs. Papá said they had a motto: We prefer a tomb in Colombia to a jail in the United States.

  Cassandra had one earphone in, the other she was holding in her hand, rock music quietly buzzing from it. She explained that Pablo Escobar was the president of the narco-paramilitary—to me—as if I didn’t already know.

  “Yes, but did you know he’s a baron?” I asked.

  “Yes, but did you know he’s a judge killer?” I didn’t have a comeback and was forced to remain quiet as Cassandra nodded with her eyebrows raised long after she had spoken.

  The road out of Bogotá climbed between buildings with bay windows and marble surfaces, then snaked through the cold moor of Suba, where rainwater puddled in the grasslands and mirrored the sky. There were cows and horses eating the valleys.

  Papá said, “In all the history of this country, there hasn’t been one newspaper that has printed a map with safe routes before now. Not one.” I could see him in the rearview mirror. Earlier that morning, Papá told Mamá he wasn’t sure if he was fired, having left the oil site in such a hurry, but he had paid vacation days and would find a job in the meantime if need be. Now, he seemed at ease. He ran his fingers over the wiry, thick fur of his mustache. I felt anxious not knowing if Papá had a job; then I remembered Petrona wearing Mamá’s slippers. I leaned forward to the middle between the front seats to ask if anyone had noticed. I opened my mouth, but then I realized I could get Petrona fired. Everyone stared. “Did we buy Petrona a Christmas present?”

  Papá glanced at Mamá.

  “Oh, no, we forgot!” Mamá said. “Let’s get her nice perfume though. I’ll bet she’ll like it.”

  I sat back thinking I was right in not sharing what I had seen Petrona do. It was possible after all that Petrona slipped on Mamá’s house shoes at the last minu
te to go out to the garden to see why the car’s headlights were on and nobody was coming into the house. But why had she been in our house?

  Papá said, “What in the world would a girl like Petrona do with perfume?”

  Mamá rolled her eyes. “You never understand anything, Antonio.”

  Either way Petrona had fixed my arm and stayed with me during Galán’s funeral when Mamá and Cassandra left. Telling my family about Petrona would only cause them to judge her unfairly.

  * * *

  All in all I liked the attention I got from my sprained arm. I liked the way everyone talked to me now: softly, like I could break. I got a lot of attention at school too over what had happened in Soacha. I had two versions. The one I told teachers blurred over important details and ended with what I thought they wanted to hear—“And it was at that moment, when I realized how fragile life really is.” It was the kind of rubbish teachers pointed out in the stories we read, and, if we were asked to write a reading response it was that same rubbish that, if quoted, got you the highest grade.

  The other version I told was hushed and energetic, and delivered with every other word emphasized: “Right up until the gunshots the band played merengue.” That one I told to my classmates, who surrounded me under the trees by the playground. “The news didn’t say this—but Pablo Escobar was there, in flesh and blood. I saw his face lit up by the fire of his own machine gun.” Kids from the higher grades came to listen. Girls I didn’t know bought me candy, and different classmates volunteered to take notes for me because of my bandaged arm. On the last day before Cassandra and I left, the Principal singled us out at the general assembly and gave us a diploma. Bravery, it said, and underneath there was her squiggly signature in blue ink. Everybody sang the national anthem, but I sang it loudest of all.