Malentendido (Misunderstood)

by Mara White

  But Jesus, I knew that voice. Recognized it like my native tongue, knew it and would follow it anywhere. Even into death if it bade me. Just the memory of the sound of it collapsed my whole reality.

  With two syllables, that familiar voice unwound every step I’d ever taken to recover from it.

  I reach blindly for the door, my hand slick with my own blood.

  “Help!” I scream. The sound of my own voice is shocking; it takes up too much room in the closet. I scream louder as adrenaline pours shots of lightning through my system. My senses are sharp and acute like an animal on the prowl; my mouth tastes like metal, and my teeth feel shocked from slamming them together in terror.

  I manage to pull the heavy door open and crawl into the absurdly bright hallway. I blink my eyes and look behind myself at the heavy door, which has now closed from its own weight. I grab my shoe, limp over to the fire alarm and pull the red lever down as hard as I can and pray to my neglected God that it works. I’m like Adela and Dr. Aziz in the Marabar caves in A Passage to India. I panicked, heard voices and completely lost my mind in a dark hospital storage closet.

  When security arrived, they drew their guns, opened the door and there was no one in the closet.

  “They’re sending someone in from the psychiatric department.”

  “Oh God, Adam. It’s bad enough that we’re here where I work. Where we both work. Holy crap, I fucked up! I could lose my job over this!”

  He takes my hand and massages the backs of my fingers. “Why, because you tripped and hurt your leg?”

  Adam’s eyes are so kind. It was the first thing that attracted me to him.

  “Because I lost it,” I say. Groaning into the pillow, I kick my feet a little. It’s weird to be a patient in the same place you work every day.

  “That would be discrimination, Belén. They can’t fire you over an isolated incident. Besides, there’s no way you should be going to a restricted floor to get supplies on your own. Fill out the request forms in advance of the labs and have transport bring it all down for you.”

  That’s the disadvantage of having a husband who used to work your same position—he can tell you how to do it and actually be right. I huff and cross my arms in frustration. Sure, I shouldn’t have been in there. But it doesn’t change the fact that I heard his voice like a clarion.

  I’m sitting all the way up in the bed in the ER, separated only by thin curtains from other patients who are stricken with emergencies way worse than mine. I run my hand over the gauze that covers my five stitches. Adam came immediately and my mom agreed to pick Luke up from school.

  “I just want to get discharged today. What if my boss gets wind of this? I can’t stand to have my co-workers look at me with pity. I was doing so well, Adam.”

  “I know, Belén. Post-traumatic stress can pop up at any time, it’s not your fault and there’s no way to even know what triggered it.”

  “Being alone in the dark.”

  “You’re not alone, love. You’ve got all of us. We can do this. We can be strong. It’s a process.”

  “I hate the dark. I want a pocket flashlight for Christmas.”

  “Done,” Adam says. He smiles at me lovingly.

  Adam rubs down the length of my arm; he lifts my hand to his mouth and kisses the backs of my fingers. I know that Adam struggles to stay strong too, that the loss he feels is just as agonizing and as raw as mine. I know he often suffers from often debilitating survivor’s guilt.

  He lost his twin Luke in Afghanistan and hasn’t been the same since. The two of us walk through life with giant parts of our identities missing. It’s almost like something has been amputated and you constantly feel the phantom presence, but instead of a limb, it’s your mirrored reflection you found in someone else. All of my memories are so tied up with Luciano. My whole childhood is saturated with things that we shared. When he’s removed from the equation, my life stops making sense; it’s a half-painted picture. Adam knows the feeling all too well. We try to help guide one another through the maze of life while missing at least half of our hearts.

  “I’m embarrassed, that’s all. I thought I was past the really crazy stuff. It’s been over a year since I’ve had an episode.”

  “Just make sure you tell the psychiatrist about hearing the voice. And you should probably be upfront about how you stopped taking the medication.”

  “No, Adam! Because then they’ll give me something else, and remember how awful I felt? I don’t want to go through that again.”

  “It’s not up to us, Belén.”

  “Well, I’m not leaving it up to them. I’d rather my pain than the drugs.”

  Antes

  We smoked two joints of some trippy weed off of a Colombian dealer in the Heights. The stuff must be laced, ’cause my head feels like a balloon drifting up into the clouds while my feet aren’t even touching the ground anymore. Every stupid thing my boys say has me laughing ’til tears squeeze out the corner of my eyes. I can’t stop coughing either, a deep, phlegmy sound that barrels out of my chest and feels like a freight train charging through my lungs; lungs so heavy they labor to breathe. I’ve been smoking so much that this body will be ruined before I ever see eighteen. Even though I’m laughing hard, I feel strung out and anxious as fuck. I take off my baseball cap and run my fingers over my head. Applying pressure, I squeeze tight, trying to kick out the crazy thoughts, pull my brain back down to earth.

  Then I see Yari and Bey coming down the block. They’re holding hands and swinging their arms between them. My girl and my girl. The sinner and the saint. The slut and the virgin, who are always whispering and sharing secrets like it’s just them two in the universe. They’ve got a bag of snacks from the deli. Belén’s hair wags back and forth in a high ponytail. I want to pull her hair. I want to bite her and spank her until she cries and then console her with my tongue.

  Oh fuck.

  I stuff my hands in my pockets and swallow, crack my neck and tell myself to quit acting fucked up. They both look beautiful and they seem to come at me in slow motion. Time stretches to a soft blur and it feels like they’ll never reach me. Their tits are bouncing in rhythm with their steps; their lips are red, parted and wet. Bey’s got a sucker that she swirls her tongue around seductively. She pops it out, licks her lips and hands it to, Yari who then sticks it in her mouth.

  Double fuck.

  My dick is rock hard and I pull my hands closer to my zipper inside my pockets to try to hide the embarrassing bulge. My boys start right in saying shit to them about the sucker. Yari pulls it in and out of her mouth suggestively just to egg them on. Bey smiles and her tongue is bright pink from the candy. So are her full lips, and I want them so bad I can taste their cherry sweetness already.

  “S’up, Bey? Yari?” I try to act cool but it sounds hollow even to myself.

  “I’m teaching Bey how to give head, even if she’ll only ever do it to a lollipop.”

  “Fuck off, Yari. Just because you give it away like Halloween candy doesn’t mean that Belén should too. Knock it off. Maybe you should let her teach you how to do homework.”

  My boys laugh and tease Yari some more. Eddie starts to undo his fly and thrusts his hips toward B. I hit him fucking hard in the arm. None of this shit is funny.

  “We’re just having fun,” Bey says. But her eyes are kind of sad. She doesn’t want to be like Yari. Belén was made to move mountains, to put that superstar brain to work. I don’t like to see her made fun of. I can’t stand to see her hurt.

  “It’s not funny. Yari, stay away from Belén.”

  Fucking God, Yari is a bitch to Bey. I don’t know why she puts up with it. I think Yari is way off track to call Belén a prude. Bey has always been open about sex, she’s just a little choosier than Yari. She got time, she can wait if she wants.

  On the other hand, everything about Yari screams hot sex. She hands it out to the whole hood like the Jehovah’s Witnesses hand out Watchtowers. Yari straight up laying down her scent on ever
y single mattress in West Harlem. Well, maybe that’s exaggerating. I bet if I asked Yari to be my girl she’d go all out and even drop all of the others. But I don’t want Yari for my girl any more than anybody else do. Yari’s like a fix. You want it, you get it and then you swear off it the minute it hits you. You’re finished—until you want it again.

  There’s only one girl I really want that way and I can barely admit it to myself.

  Sunlight shines in her eyes in the late afternoon and she squints and blinks her lashes. Her brown eyes light up; they look like caramel and I get lost in them. Bey looks at me expectantly, sort of like she always does—like she’s waiting for me to make a move and trying to figure me out all at once. She licks her lips. Sucks the corner in and bites it.

  “What?” I say to her and shrug. Her staring has me feeling self-conscious. She can tell how fucked up I am. Bey’s like Sherlock Holmes when it comes to high Lucky.

  I glance once over my shoulder and yank my hands out of my pockets to discreetly pull my pants up. I look quickly over the other shoulder and then back at Bey. I’m paranoid. She needs to be off the corner, in the house, the fuck away from Yari.

  “I don’t know, you tell me. Your eyes look red, like you’ve got a cold or allergies or something.”

  “Yeah?” I sniff and wipe my nose with the back of my hand. I pull my Yankees cap down lower, trying to obscure my eyes.

  “Are you sick?”

  “Something like that, Bey. Why don’t you go inside? You got homework you can do or something?”

  Why am I such an ass to her? I fucking hate the way I treat her, but at the same time I can’t do it any differently. We play these roles and we can’t ever seem to shake them. Her face looks upset and I want to pull her into my arms. I want to hold onto her innocence and shelter her from badass storms, like Yari and all of my boys hanging around the corner.

  Bey and I could stand here for a million years and still not be able to get enough of one another.

  “Do you ever think, Lucky, that maybe you could share? I’m only a year younger than you and maybe I’d like to try stuff sometime too,” she says and puts her little fists on her hips.

  I bite the back of my knuckle to keep from laughing at her tough stance. Over my fucking dead body Belén starts messing around with drugs. Not happening. Nope. Never. Not as long as I’m alive.

  “Hell yeah, let’s get your cousin high,” some douche says and reaches into his jeans pocket to produce a bag full of buds.

  “What the fuck, are you stupid?” I shout and grab Belén by the elbow. If I have to hide her I will. If I have to tell Tía Betty that Bey is in danger out here, I will. I march her toward our stoop without even glancing back at the corner.

  “God, Luciano! I swear you are so mean. I’m not good enough for your dumb friends? You’re too cool to be seen out on the corner with me?”

  “The opposite is true, Len. You are way too good for any of that. All that is trash. You mind your own fucking business and stay the hell away from that shit.”

  My grip is hard and I know it’s got to be hurting her. But I can’t back down or let go and I’m literally shoving her ass up the stairs of our building while she’s pushing against me trying to go back out. She’s walking backwards and starts to fall. I grab onto her shirt and she almost brings me down.

  Now our faces are too close together for comfort and Bey is locked against my chest. My heart screams for her; my arms shake with her slender little weight. I wish she knew how high I was. I wish she could understand that I’d do anything to keep her safe.

  “Let me go hang with Yari. I’ll leave you guys alone, I promise!”

  I want to kiss her. I’d tear her clothes off and screw her right in the stairwell. On the roof. In the backseat of car. The kitchen counter. I want her so fucking bad I can’t see straight.

  Jesus fucking Christ, Bey, you tear me up.

  “Walk!” I bellow. She turns and begins to concede.

  I’ve got my hands splayed across her back and I’m pushing her up the stairs. She turns around again on the first landing and suddenly she’s in my arms.

  She’s quick like a bird and I stutter to catch her.

  Everything changes with Bey this close to me. The universe opens up a little and I feel relief from the drugs. I get wound up so tight and she spins me back around the right way. The storm clouds part and my mind’s clear again. I can understand the world better when she’s in my arms.

  Stay like this, Bey. Close to my heart forever.

  The paint is peeling in here. Smells like dinner cooking, a thousand scents from families living too close together. A siren wails on the street and from inside an apartment a dog barks. Then a bird starts to squawk and someone’s pans clank onto the stove or into the sink. The sounds are muffled by a closed door, two sheets of drywall and a layer of bricks.

  She’s up against my chest again and I can smell her hair and feel her sweet breath on my neck. She’s giggling and her smile automatically makes mine appear. What do I do? I’m so confused and light-headed. I’ve got sixty different impulses banging up against each other like pots and pans in my head. Kiss her, protect her, lock her in the apartment, keep her away from everyone, fuck her, don’t touch her, tear her clothes off, kiss her, kiss her, make love to her.

  Love her.

  Lover.

  “You make me fucking crazy, huh? You know that, Len? Is that why you smile? ’Cause it’s fun to make me lose my shit—to see me get hot in the head?”

  “I love your smile. I love you, Lucky!” she says and her arms wrap around my neck. She pulls me to her so tightly. She’s giggling. Happy. Belén is a flower. And I’m a fucking loser, a deadbeat nobody who doesn’t even deserve her attention.

  I suck a deep breath in and give up; what good does it do to fight it? I’ll break down in tears in front of the boys. I’ll sob into her arms and tell her how sorry I am.

  My arms are out to my sides, suspended, mid-expression. I slowly wrap them around her and pull her snug into my chest. The world stops being wicked and unworthy. What was dulled, blooms bright again. Everything rights itself.

  Belén in my arms.

  Perfection.

  Total fucking bliss.

  Después

  The psychologist closes my file as soon as I walk in. A warm smile plays on her face, but underneath it’s clinical, critical. We’re nearly the same age so the air is already uncomfortable. The office is smaller than I expected it to be. No couch, just a huge desk, two chairs and a stunning fifteenth-floor view that looks out over the George Washington Bridge and the Hudson. The space would be claustrophobic but the view makes it different. It’s like we’re flying up here, me and this judgmental therapist.

  She gestures for me to sit and I pull my chair up to the desk. What I won’t tell her is that I’m not convinced that I can be or even want to be cured of this sickness. I carry this burden because it’s all I have left of him.

  My heart is a giant vase of blooming red flowers. But if she could see the bottom through the murky water and fallen decayed leaves, there’s an inch of black sludge, that’s rotten underneath.

  After all the formalities and going through my health history she gets to the real reason we’re here and asks me how long I’ve suffered from waking nightmares.

  “They started after Lucky died.”

  “When was this?”

  “In 2012.”

  “These auditory hallucinations, what’s the very first one you remember having?”

  “I always associate them with dreaming. I hear his voice in my dreams. But I really hear it, almost as if it were outside of the dream, not part of it in any other way. I don’t know how to explain it. Then I wake up. He’s not there and I feel like I’m losing my mind.”

  She scribbles a few notes in her notebook. Clicks the end of her pen relentlessly with her thumb.

  “Has his voice always been associated with dreams? Is this the first time you’ve heard it when you belie
ved yourself to be awake?”

  “Always in the dreams. But he doesn’t have to be in the dream. I can be dreaming about, I don’t know, running through a maze by myself and then the voice is there, but he isn’t.”

  “Do you feel like you’re running through a maze, Ms. Heredia?” she asks, glancing at my name to make sure that she’s saying it right.

  “No, not at all. That was just an example. It could be Thanksgiving dinner, Florence, Italy, a sunset over the ocean. Luciano is everywhere, he’s inside everything, even if he doesn’t have a face or a body.”

  I want to tell her how much I hate that there’s no body. How the lack of remains makes me hold onto an unhealthy hope that slowly eats away at what’s normal and real. I live for the fantasies and dreams of my cousin. Maybe he’ll come back, maybe he’s still out there under the same sun and moon. Lucky’s love was the strongest reality I ever knew, and no matter how hard I try, I can’t undo it. Love won’t walk away and give up—it’s steadfast and stubborn.

  “Have you ever walked in your sleep, Miss Heredia?”

  I want to tell her yes, that most of the time I am sleepwalking. Trying to do the right thing, put one foot in front of the other. I’m terrified of waking up, of truly getting in touch with my pain. My sense of loss is gargantuan, what lies outside the door is a black hole—it’s the whole world, my whole life—a huge looming future without Lucky by my side.

  “Not that I know of, no.”

  I have my son Luke. I have Adam, but sometimes I’m afraid that what they have is a shadow of the former Belén. A dissipating smoky mirage that gets scattered by even the softest wind. Somnambulant, watered down, muted by grief and fuzzy from popping too many pills for anxiety. I don’t know who I am. I don’t know what I want. Life was in focus with Lucky here; without him, it’s simply not.

  “When you went to the supply floor, did you have any ideations about perhaps harming yourself or hurting others, Miss Heredia?”