by Meg Medina
As the girls finally reached the valley, they rushed to get the taxi drivers’ attention, negotiating for a proper price. Tía Neli surveyed the confusion calmly.
“You!” She snapped her fingers at the back of a young man with a bike taxi at the edge of the highway. He tossed away his drink, beamed a smile, and pedaled toward them.
To Sonia’s surprise, it was Pancho Muñoz, from school. She lowered her shawl to greet him, her heart already racing.
“What luck that it’s you,” she said politely over the squeaks of his rusty wheels. He had only recently begun his job, but already Pancho looked like the other taxi boys. He seemed taller in the pressed blue shirt of a taxi apprentice, much older than he did in his worn cotton shirts and bare feet during the week at school, when he was nothing more than Pancho the Orphan about whom the other girls snickered. He was too formal when he spoke, they said, too given to daydreams. But Sonia liked him for all of those qualities. Now, in the sunshine, he looked especially handsome.
Pancho tipped his cap, blushing. “We’ve missed you at school, Sonia. I hope you’re feeling better.”
Sonia went mute in his gaze. For one thing, he had sweet brown eyes. But there was also no explanation she could give for avoiding everyone. The wind gusted sharply again, and Tía Neli nudged her forward. “We’ll be late,” she announced.
Pancho offered Sonia his hand and cast an appreciative glance at her legs as she climbed onto the bench.
Tía Neli frowned at him and settled in beside her niece.
“To the plaza, por favor.” She leaned in to Sonia, who was already at work on her boots. “I’ll do the talking from here.”
The office was small and hot. Girls waiting for interviews filled every seat in the hallway. Sonia wiped the perspiration from her lip and peered over her aunt’s shoulder as they read the job listings provided.
Today Señor Arenas was hiring for several employers. A glass factory in the west was looking for steady-handed workers and a citrus farm to the south wanted workers who didn’t whine about red ants or scorching heat. A few nannies were needed to tend to the imperial children of dignitaries. But Tía Neli pointed at the last entry. It was only two words: Casa Masón. “That’s the one,” she whispered. “Wait here.”
She walked over to the young secretary toiling behind an old desk. “How many are needed at Casa Masón?” she asked.
The secretary stopped typing and looked up crossly over the top of her glasses. She opened a coffee-stained folder and glanced at the last page.
“Four in total for the widow,” she said primly. “But don’t get your hopes up, señora. We take only experienced girls for such a position.” She tossed Sonia a dubious glance. “Our client is very clear on that point.”
Tía Neli walked back to her seat and patted Sonía’s hand.
“Change that face, niña,” she said firmly. “You’ll be fine. It’s all in how you handle these silly men.”
“How do I know she’ll be any good?” Señor Arenas asked as he leaned back in his chair and folded his hands over his protruding belly. He scrutinized Sonia as a rancher might eye one of his herd. “She looks a bit scrawny. I’ve got fifty other girls to chose from who are meatier and experienced.” Sonia knew it was true. As always there were more girls than he could possibly hire — a tidy situation for a businessman with the only legal employment agency for a hundred miles.
Tía Neli smiled and waved her hand in the air as if shooing a pesky fly.
“You have fifty very ordinary girls, señor. What I’m offering you is an extraordinary one.”
Sonia nudged Tía Neli with her heel, hoping to silence her discretely. She longed to be ordinary, nothing more. Sonia tried her best to smile and ignore the perspiration running down her back.
Señor Arenas twirled a toothpick and shrugged. “She’s pretty enough,” he said. “I’ll give you that.”
“Of course she is. And she has a natural elegance, señor, She was born with it. If that’s not extraordinary, I don’t know what is!”
Señor Arenas clamped his gold-rimmed teeth down on a toothpick. “But can she work?”
Tía Neli gave him a pout and shook her head. “Really, Señor Arenas, it’s as though you’d never heard of the Ocampos. We are a most hardworking and revered family, as you know. This is the girl everyone has heard of: Sonia, the girl who silenced the winds of Tres Montes.” She laid Sonia’s shawl across his desk to show him the milagros as proof. “Ask your mother. She comes to Sonia for petitions from time to time.”
“Tía —” Sonia began in protest.
But Señor Arenas had already pushed the garment away in disgust. “Please! Enough with old superstitions! This is the capital we’re talking about. Nobody there cares about that. In fact, my girls are on strict orders not to talk such nonsense at their jobs! It makes us sound like lunatics. I don’t need girls who think they’re angels. What I need, señora, are girls who know their place, girls who can work like brutes without anyone knowing they’re in the room.”
Tía Neli’s face reddened. “Well, in any case, it doesn’t matter,” she said, taking her niece’s hands. “Show Señor Arenas your hands, Sonia. You’ll notice, señor, that her hands are slender but strong — perfect for doing the meticulous work you need in a fine household. They seem to me the same hands of a future pastry chef. If you ask me, she’d make a marvelous kitchen apprentice.”
Sonia glanced down and almost gasped. Her aunt had given her three large bills, wrapped in a rubber band. It was enough to buy food for a month. Tía Neli nodded sweetly in Señor Arenas’s direction.
Sonia drew her hands from her lap and extended them, palms down for inspection, though she couldn’t think of where to look in her embarrassment. She turned her gaze to the waiting area, where the remaining girls waited hopefully for their chance at work contracts.
Immediately, she felt Señor Arenas’s hands caress her wrists. When he withdrew, the bills were tucked between his own stubby fingers. He slipped them inside his shirt pocket casually.
“Pastry chef.” He chuckled.
He opened a file folder and slid on his dirty glasses. After a few moments, he made a whistling sound to summon the secretary.
“Send the rest home.”
The secretary cast an insulted look at Sonia as she turned to go inform the others. Sonia tried to look innocent, but she knew she had cheated. What kind of girl bribed her way ahead of friends and neighbors?
It’s your only chance, she told herself. It’s your only escape.
Señor Arenas offered her a form for her signature. “You do know how to write, don’t you?”
Sonia nodded and studied the paperwork. Her name had been added to a list of three others under a column marked CASA MASÓN.
Señor Arenas reached into his drawer and pulled out a pretty spice bottle. He placed it before her on his desk. The foil label read ESPECIAS MASÓN.
“So you know where you’re going,” he said, tapping the lid. “Casa Masón spices are known the world over. It’s the old widow Katarina Masón who runs the business now, of course. She’s rich beyond all your dreams since her husband died. Take care to please her, niña. Opportunities like this don’t come often, understand? A hundred other girls would die to have your spot.” He pointed at the shawl in her lap. “And make sure you leave that thing behind.”
“Gladly, señor!” Sonia answered, and signed her name.
“Congratulations,” a jobless girl called to Sonia as they left the building.
“Good luck comes to those who are worthy,” cried another.
Sonia looked back and nodded silently, her mouth glued with shame.
Tía Neli patted her back as they climbed into a taxi to take them all the way home in celebration. She held the jar under her nose to sniff the faded scent of all corners of the world.
“We did it! My very own niece working with one of the richest families in the whole country! Imagine it! Inside Casa Masón! I know you won’t forget wh
at I’ve done for you, Sonia.” Her eyes were already dreamy with ideas.
SONIA EXPECTED TO find Abuela’s spirit waiting at the edge of her bed to scold her for brazen lies and bribery. When her grandmother was cross, she pulled off people’s covers or rattled at their windows to keep them awake. Once she’d flattened all of Rafael’s tires for forgetting to bring her daisies on the anniversary of her death.
But the house had stayed calm all night.
“Looks like you’re safe, hermanita,” Rafael told her across the kitchen table at breakfast. “Abuela always had good sense. Even she knows you made the right decision.”
Sonia stared into her porridge guiltily. “Well, I might have exaggerated a little.”
Rafael’s eyebrows shot up in proud surprise. His mouth dropped open as he laughed in disbelief. “And they say I’m reckless!”
“Ay, por favor, Rafael. You spend your whole life telling white lies to Papi.”
“True enough,” he admitted. “Just watch your step, though. Abuela was never one to let things slide.”
Felix blared the horn, calling Rafael to work.
Sonia left for school, whistling replies to the birds along the way and trying to feel happy. It was bad enough to have lied, but there was one regret she hadn’t confessed to anyone.
Pancho.
How would she tell him?
She’d found herself thinking of him since the taxi ride. They had suffered together for years inside the one-room building, listening to the monotony of Irina Gomez’s voice. Both were basically friendless — Sonia, because the other girls were afraid she already knew their secrets, and besides, she was too important to befriend, and Pancho because he was not important enough. He had no parents to protect him, no last name that mattered. He was simply an orphan who had found a roof over his head thanks to the kind help of Señor Pasqual, whose wife had a soft heart for abandoned cats and boys.
She thought of all the times he’d regaled her with stories composed during lonely nights lying on the floor of his employer’s kitchen. She liked that he had dreams in his head, beyond stealing kisses or getting drunk. She liked how his stories left her hopeful when they were finished.
“You’ll be a poet one day,” she’d told him. “You can recite them for the president. I bet he’ll give you a medal.”
Pancho had only smiled in his typical close-lipped way.
“I’d rather recite them for you,” he’d said.
It made her secretly love him on the spot, though neither of them had ever spoken such things. What was the point? Rafael could dally with any girl he pleased, but Felix placed a whole other set of limitations on his virtuous daughter. No blouses that might hint at her curves. No modern hairdos or lipstick, however pale. No boys, period. Still, Sonia found herself thinking of Pancho often.
She glanced nervously around the school grounds, trying to decide if she felt more relieved or disappointed to find Pancho missing. A tangle of girls her age under the acacia tree caught her attention. They were gossiping as always, and if she wasn’t imagining things, glancing in her direction.
She was about to join them when, as if materializing from her thoughts, Pancho stepped out of the shadows. “Is it true what people are saying?” he asked.
Sonia jumped in surprise. “Por Dios, Pancho! You frightened me.” He was wearing his old clothes again, his pants patched at the knees. Still, his legs were muscular, and he’d grown almost as tall as Rafael. His voice was low and even.
“Forgive me.”
“You shouldn’t stalk like a panther!”
He bowed his head and took a step closer than he had ever dared before. Standing this close, she noticed his long eyelashes, the green specks in his eyes, and how the corners of his mouth were turned down the way they did when Irina Gomez ignored his raised hand. His expression looked darker than she ever remembered.
“You haven’t answered me, though. Are you leaving with Ramona’s girls?” he asked. “To the capital?”
Sonia chewed her lip, already feeling the sting of his hurt. “I was going to tell you, Pancho.”
“Oh.” He studied his dusty feet.
She shifted uneasily. His closeness made her stomach lurch in a way that was thrilling and terrifying all at once.
“It’s just that I can’t stay here, Pancho,” she said at last.
Pancho’s fingertips brushed against hers. “Why not? Your family is here, your friends.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “The people who love you.”
Sonia did not dare move an inch as he raised his eyes to hers. Pancho had no idea she was a fraud, she thought. A boy like this deserved more than lies.
“Please don’t ask me to explain why I’m leaving, Pancho.”
“But, Sonia —” He reached for her hand and pulled her closer still.
Suddenly, the school bell rang out. Irina Gomez frowned in their direction.
“Let’s go,” Sonia said quickly, pulling free. “We’ll be late.”
It was a well-known fact that Irina Gomez despised her students. In her opinion, the younger ones were unruly and talkative, and the older ones disappeared for distant jobs whenever the opportunity presented itself. As a result, no one knew much of anything that she, “the most promising student of pedagogy at the university,” tried to teach them.
When she announced their failing grades from her record book, she was fond of saying, “With scores like these, you will be laborers. Nothing more. We all have a place in life.”
“Ignore her,” Rafael said whenever Sonia complained about the teacher’s dreariness. He’d left the teacher and her pronouncements behind forever two years earlier. “Irina Gomez has never known passion in her heart, mind, or loins. How can she fan a flame of hope in anyone else?”
Sonia found her seat and looked around for what she knew would be the last time. Then someone slipped in beside her and tapped her on the shoulder.
Eva Catá had round blue eyes and glossy lips. She was the ambassador of the older girls and a regular employee of Casa Masón. A pleasant scent of rosewater and talcum powder lingered all around her.
“Ay, dear Sonia. Is it true? Are you coming with us this year?” Eva, whose mother arranged successful marriages all over the mountainside, prided herself on keeping current on everyone’s personal affairs.
The village, it seemed, was shocked by the news of her upcoming departure. She was as much a part of the mountain as the metals that formed in its belly. Everyone was buzzing with the news.
“Yes,” Sonia said, motioning toward the girl with a bandaged hand. “Cuca was hurt by her horse.”
Eva clapped.
“Sonia Ocampo coming with us! I can scarcely believe it! What a blessing — although we’ll miss Cuca, naturally!”
“I hope I’ll be a help,” Sonia said cautiously. She noticed other girls watching and listening to their conversation.
“I have no doubt at all. And just wait until you see the estate; it’s a mansion. And, in case you don’t know, the city is full of handsome workers.”
Sonia’s eyes flitted to Pancho; she hoped he had not heard. He had found his seat and was at least pretending not to listen from his spot ahead of Sonia.
Eva followed the look in an instant. She reached over and blew on Pancho’s neck.
“Then again, I suspect some handsome boys here will miss you, too.”
She walked back to her seat at the rear, unconcerned by Pancho’s shame burning through the air.
Irina Gomez took her place beneath the crooked portrait of the president and opened her lesson book.
“Wait for me after school,” Pancho whispered over his shoulder. “I have something important to tell you.”
Sonia looked over the top of her book curiously. “What is it?”
He did not reply. Sonia nudged his back with the tip of her eraser. “Tell me.”
He turned his head slowly and lifted his grave eyes. “I wanted to tell you myself,” he said a little pointedly. “I, too, am
leaving school. This is my final day.”
Sonia’s eyes widened, and she leaned forward. “What are you saying?”
He turned completely in his chair. “Señor Pasqual thinks I would make a fine taxi boy. I’ve got strong legs, and I’ve apprenticed long enough on weekends to make a good salary. Who knows? One day I might take over his business. There’s nothing here for me anymore. I’ve learned as much as Irina Gomez will ever be able to teach me.”
Sonia felt her teacher’s icy stare. The room had fallen silent all around them.
“Is that so?” Irina Gomez said, eyeing Pancho critically. “Well, I certainly haven’t been able to teach you to be quiet, have I? Get to work.”
Giggles erupted from the back row. Pancho’s whole face burned brightly as he bowed his head in apology and turned back to his lessons.
Sonia bent over her book, but soon she was daydreaming while gazing at the portrait above her teacher’s head. No more schooling, Pancho? What about your dream of becoming a poet for el presidente? she wanted to ask him. She knew he liked to read and learn as much as she did. What about the poems you long to write?
But she never got the chance. In the afternoon Irina Gomez gave her a long lecture about venturing on as a decent young woman among city vipers. When she dismissed Sonia at last, Eva was waiting outside. She grabbed Sonia by the arm for the first time in her life, chattering excitedly about their plans for the trip and the farewell party that would be held in her honor that evening. Sonia listened as if in a happy dream. She forgot all about Pancho, who waited for her loyally in the deep shade of their favorite reading tree.
It was when she was putting away her tattered schoolbooks later that she realized her thoughtlessness. She tried not to think of his serious eyes, the formal way he held back his shoulders when they spoke, and the funny stories he had always invented simply to amuse her. Their friendship would never have blossomed into anything more — thanks to the watchful eye of her father, she reasoned. Besides, as much as she wanted to apologize, she knew it would be wrong to lie about why she was leaving.
