The Book of Lost Saints

by Daniel José Older

  She’s staring straight ahead at a spot just past Ramón. “Would you take off these restraints, please?”

  “Well, Catalina, before I do that, I need to be sure you’re not going to try to hurt yourself or anyone else, okay?”

  “I’m not. That was stupid, I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  “Catalina.”

  “Really.” She finally looks at him. It’s not a desperate face, not pleading or vulnerable. In fact, it’s almost like she borrowed it from Dr. Unimpressed; she even has the sleepy lids and one raised eyebrow. Like she has an uncanny ability to instantly reproduce other people’s facial expressions.

  I think that seals it. If she’d tried to go all simpery he might’ve held out some glint of professional skepticism, might’ve pushed her just a little further, but the confident, arrogant, even sneer that she just flashed? Finishes off any last resistance Dr. Concerned has. “Ramón?”

  Ramón gets up and crosses to Catalina’s stretcher. “Whatsup?”

  “You can go ahead and undo Ms. Ramirez’s restraints.” Ramón gets to work on the first one. “Wait.” He stops, looks at the doctor. “Catalina.”

  “Yes?”

  “I’m very serious about this. I’m doing you a favor here. I’m trusting you. And I’d appreciate it if you would respect that when we take these restraints off, okay?”

  Catalina nods, closes her eyes, and takes a deep breath. Nods again. “Okay, Doctor. I understand.”

  “Alright, Ramón.”

  Ramón unbuckles one strap, then the other, and then stands back. Catalina winds up and decks the doctor so hard across the face he’s actually lifted into the air and flies a few feet backward before sprawling out on the linoleum floor.

  “Gah! Bitch!” he yells through a broken nose. Ramón is supposed to tackle the girl, but she’s still on her stretcher. He’s supposed to get the restraints back on her, but she’s got her fists up, boxer style, ready for him. “What are you doing?” the doctor sputters. “Tie her back down, goddammit!”

  “Post three,” Ramón says into his radio. “I have a ten-six red, repeat ten-six red.”

  Catalina cackles, waving her arms around like she’s an airplane and screaming: “Ten-six, bitches! Ten-six! Come the fuck get me, you tawdry putos! You think I give a fuck? I don’t! Not one single fuck, you little cunt hairs!”

  “Listen,” Ramón says, one hand up, face straining to look reasonable. “There’s about to be like ten guys in here holding you down and they’re gonna medicate you and the more you fight, the more of a pain in the ass it’s gonna be.”

  “Go ahead, you fucking perverts! Watch me give a fuck. Watch.”

  “Catalina.” Ramón takes a step toward her and she chucks one of the restraints at him.

  “You back the fuck up off me, puto! I will destroy you, you hear me. I will fuck you up so bad, your dead grandparents will cry about it. Don’t fucking touch me.”

  Ramón steps back, both hands up don’t-shoot-me style. “Okay. Okay. Just wait, then.”

  Doctor Concerned has crawled out of the room, cursing and blowing wads of bloody snot out of his shattered nose. As he leaves, Derringer runs in followed by three other security guys and, of course, Aliceana.

  “What happened?” Aliceana asks. She already has the tranquilizer drawn up and ready to push.

  “Shut the fuck up, bitch! No one gives a fuck what you think!”

  “The doc told us to take off the restraints and she broke his nose,” Ramón says.

  Derringer looks at him. “How you wanna do this?”

  “We each grab an arm and then the doctor does what she does. Just watch out—she’s got some dried blood on her from cutting herself earlier.”

  “Fucking right I do. Come get me, bitch parade.”

  “Bitch … parade?” Derringer says.

  “The fuck you talking to, fuckboy? You talk when I say you can!”

  Ramón puts on some rubber gloves that Derringer passes him. “Alright, c’mon, guys.” They move in quickly, two to each one of Catalina’s waving arms.

  “Unhand me, bitches! Unfuckinghand me!” Catalina hollers. “Perverts! Asswipes! Fuck all your grandmothers!”

  Aliceana slides herself between the struggling security guards and pops the needle into Catalina’s arm.

  “You Chinese whore! Don’t fucking … Don’t!” They wait. She writhes, squirms, fusses.

  “Any time now,” Ramón mutters.

  “You see? You can’t just, motherfuckers, you can’t just! See? Hahahaha!”

  “Might take a second,” Aliceana admits.

  “Might?”

  “Bitches!”

  “Maybe hit her with another one?” Derringer suggests.

  Aliceana scowls at him. “You a doctor now, Gary?”

  “I’m just sayin’…”

  “Fuck … bitches…” Catalina is slowing down. Her eyes glaze over and she looks back and forth at the security guys around her. Smiles. “Bitches,” she says, and lays her head back down on the stretcher, eyes closed.

  “Restraints,” Ramón orders. “Now.”

  They re-restrain her arms and step back, panting and patting each other’s shoulders. “Well done, Doc.” Derringer grins at Aliceana.

  “It’s what I do,” she says with a smile that almost melts Ramón. “But thanks for your helpful advice on dosage.” And then she glances at Ramón, or his chest really, she won’t meet his eyes, nods with a confused smile, and saunters off.

  “Wow,” Derringer says. “So you—”

  “Not now, Gary,” Ramón growls, taking off after her. His mind fills with words that might bring her back to him, with images, possibilities, grand gestures. None of them make much sense, really, but he’s finally going to try. He walks into the corridor and finds her talking to a group of residents, freezes.

  For a brief moment amidst the bodies bustling through the corridor, their eyes meet. I catch my breath. Her gaze is indecipherable. I realize: Against my will, I have become invested. She would be a good partner in crime for my nephew. He would step up his game to match her, and she would develop a stronger foundation for her creative side with him, become more spontaneous. I can see it.

  Ramón turns around and walks away.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  I’m getting better at this. I am. This time I wasn’t caught off guard, of course, so that helps, but still: The rage rises in me as I round the corner out of the corridor.

  Nilda is in the kitchen, filling it with thick, delicious aroma clouds. I watch the back of her head as she busies herself with chopping vegetables. She’s been dyeing away the gray, that much is clear. Her shoulders are relaxed and she’s hunched over slightly, head bobbing in time with each cut. Chop-chop-chop and then toss the little pieces into a bowl for later. Chop-chop-chop. Her fingers tremble and her brow is furrowed in concentration, her lips pursed into a frown, eyebrows arched. Ignoring things is hard work and a lifetime of it is showing in the lines on her face.

  I can see myself sliding this untenable amorphia over her face, closing down arteries and vessels until the blood simply clots and then the sudden emptiness within me as her body slides to the kitchen floor.

  But no.

  I won’t.

  If nothing else, it would throw Ramón’s whole world to pieces if his mom suddenly dropped dead, and I need him to keep it together right now. I need him focused and moving forward. And that’s hard enough as it is.

  And anyway, somewhere in that shambling carapace, whatever is left of the little girl I once knew and was annoyed by must linger still. Somewhere there is the girl who is a whole orchestra unto herself, whose slender fingers danced across the piano keys. I try to merge this sagging tragedy with the bright child, lips pursed in that know-it-all pout, eyebrows creased. The jawline is the same, that’s about it.

  And what I see more than anything is the obstinate, fierce girl of seventeen who glares at me across our kitchen table in Las Colinas, barely breathing, bare
ly blinking.

  “What do you mean, you’re going to see—?” Nilda asked me a hundred thousand years ago, and I shushed her before she could finish.

  “No need to tell the entire block,” I scolded. “I found her! I’ve … I’ve been before.” This was information I’d been terrified to reveal. I thought she’d be mad that I’d been keeping it, keeping Isabel, to myself all this time. Thought Nilda might even become self-reflective for at least a moment about why, and realize, perhaps, that her own sisters don’t fully trust her.

  Silly me.

  “What is wrong with you, Mari?” Nilda hissed.

  “I—”

  “You’re an idiot if you think—” She stopped, didn’t bother, was it even worth it? Clearly no. Sighed instead, a long, irritated release.

  “She’s our sister,” I whispered.

  “She’s going to get us all killed. Or haven’t you noticed?”

  I stood, shook my head. “You don’t understand anything.”

  “Mari,” Nilda said, but I was already out the door.

  Chop-chop-chop. It seems to grow faster, more intense, as I watch. Maybe she knows I’m here, can feel me somehow. Maybe the weight of that memory has reached her. Nilda was the last member of the family I would expect to have any spiritual powers. If she did she’d ignore them so hard it would rupture her, file them away with all those repressed memories and feelings, another rusted cabinet, sealed shut.

  I wonder if she ever plays piano these days, and the thought fills me with an unexpected warmth. I did love her once. And she did watch over me once, whatever else happened. And she did send those notes simmering through the living room while Isabel and I failed miserably at dancing across the linoleum kitchen tiles. I’m moving backward, watching Nilda toss peppers into the sizzling pan. I’m feeling alright. I didn’t kill my sister, for what it’s worth. The bar is low for my good mood these days. Then I inadvertently pass over Javier Peña.

  Javier Peña is that most skittish of Cuban daemons: a Chihuahua. Technically, he’s Javier Peña IV, not by any blood relation to the other three eponymous creatures, but simply by virtue of being the fourth four-pound bulgy-eyed, off-yellow canine that the Rodriguez family has owned. Ramón’s grandfather Juan José María Rodriguez gave the first Javier Peña to his dear wife, Angela Cecilia, on Three Kings’ Day. Angela Cecilia loved dogs but hated insects and was unimpressed by the tiny keening beast that appeared to be the product of an unholy union between the two. They were about to turn Javier Peña out into the cruel custody of the Las Colinas avenues when little Juan-Carlo, Ramón’s father, aged four, got a look at him and fell in love.

  After that there were numerous attempts to dispatch the salvaged beast, each one foiled by the ever-vigilant Juan-Carlo. When they dropped him off in the Parque Central all the way in the middle of La Habana one morning while Juan-Carlo was at school, they figured they’d just weather the temper tantrum and eventually the boy would forget the dog and get on with his little life. But Juan-Carlo didn’t cry, he startled everyone by locking himself in his room and not speaking or eating for three days straight. On the third day, a humbled Angela Cecilia stepped outside to wait for Dr. Arturo to show up and there, looking slightly worse for wear but still bulgy eyed and concerned as ever, was Javier Peña.

  Young Juan-Carlo gave him a thorough inspection, suspicious of the tricks he would later play on himself, and then contented himself that it was in fact the real Javier Peña and life returned more or less to normal in la casa Rodriguez. Javier Peña survived the revolution, the subsequent period of terror, and made it all the way to Miami, smuggled on an international flight inside Juan-Carlo’s wide jacket, bought several sizes too big for the purpose of dog storage.

  No one knew if it was the culture shock or some change in the atmosphere or perhaps the trauma of leaving, but Javier Peña was never the same again. He became despondent, moped around the house, his little head drooping, barely touched his food, peed wherever and whenever he felt like it. Perhaps, one of Juan-Carlo’s cousins suggested before being exiled from the house for six months, Javier Peña was a communist. Nilda, then a newlywed and still stunned from all that had just transpired, probably had it right when she said, The dog is heartbroken. He misses Cuba just like the rest of us. And a few weeks later he was simply gone: No body to bury, no mess to clean up. Vanished. Just like me.

  So they bought another Javier Peña and he was quickly claimed by Miami traffic and immediately replaced by Javier Peña III, who didn’t survive the flight to Jersey and thus came Javier Peña IV—a sniveling, skittish little beast that I just passed over in all my glowing glory. It’s an odd feeling, that tiny heart thump-thumping away a thousand times a minute and all those tense little muscles, paws scrambling for purchase against the smooth linoleum floor. Javier Peña lets out a howl and scatters down the hallway. I follow, past smiling graduates, quinceañeras and brides, ignore them, past a hideous painting of a flower rendered all pink and vulvic in the scattered Catholic hyper-sexed imagination of some Boca Raton Marielita and into the heart of Juan-Carlo’s household realm: el den.

  Javier Peña has forgotten what the fuss was about by the time he arrives, panting and agitated, so he lets out a few desultory yelps on general principle and then settles onto the couch between Juan-Carlo and Ramón.

  Ramón is about to ask his father another vague family history question when Juan-Carlo sighs, still staring at the TV, and says: “Ramón, do you know who the greatest actor of all time is?”

  “Dad…”

  “Do you?”

  “Will Smith.”

  “Right. Willsmeeth. Do you know why?”

  “Dad.”

  “Name one Willsmeeth movie. One. That is terrible.”

  “Dad.”

  “I’ll wait.”

  “Dad, this isn’t even a conversation, it’s like a … a church sermon.”

  “Estill, I wait.”

  Ramón sighs, sits back on the couch. “Bagger Vance.”

  “Ah, well, Bagger Vance doesn’t count.”

  “What? Why not?”

  “Two thousand was a difficult year for everybody. And golf movies, really, they should’ve known better. But that’s beside the point.”

  “What’s the point?”

  “The point is, son, the reason that Willsmeeth is such a good actor, the thing that makes him above all the others, is that he can play any character he wants, and he is still true to himself.”

  “What does that even mean, Dad?”

  “Men in Black II.”

  “What about it?”

  “Probably the greatest movie of all time, no?”

  “Dad…”

  “Wil’ Wil’ West.”

  “Probably one of the most terrible movies in the history of ever.”

  “Coño, m’ijo, how can you say such things when there are movies like Snake Eyes out? Espeaking of which, take Nicolas Cage, for example.”

  “Okay.”

  “Never made a single good movie, not once ever in the entire…” Juan-Carlo makes a wide arc with his hands to signify the breadth of Nicolas Cage’s career. “… time. Not one.”

  “Dad, Face/Off’s a great movie. You loved that movie.”

  “But Snake Eyes was so bad, it cancels out any of the good of his other movies.”

  “But, Dad…”

  “Even Face/Off.”

  “That doesn’t even make sense. Anyway, what’s your point?”

  Juan-Carlo shrugs, turns the volume back up on the game. “Pick your battles, m’ijo. That’s all I’m saying.”

  “Dad, what does…?”

  “¡A comer!” Nilda calls from the kitchen. Javier Peña, who after eight years hasn’t learned that he’s not a person and doesn’t eat with the people, drops gingerly down from the couch and then flitters off amidst a clickity skittering of his nails against the tile.

  Juan-Carlo sighs and says, “Bueno, pues,” and heaves himself up, scratches his back, and then saunte
rs into the kitchen. Ramón watches his dad walk away, trying not to notice the slowness of the older man’s gait, the back that seems to hunch farther forward with each passing day. Then he thinks of me, the mystery of me, the impossibility: to think of someone you’ve never met, barely understand. By now, he knows more about me than anyone else; he’s closer to me; I’m burrowed inside him; we’re damn near one. And one day he’ll understand.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Gómez.

  Again.

  But this time he’s tiny, a hundred miles away, smudge of gray, black, and white, a messy collection of squares overlapping each other that only make up Gómez when I squint. But still: It is him.

  The first time we recognized someone on the wall it was Mami’s cousin Agustín. I think everyone knew it would come eventually; he’d been a minister of something or other in the Batista government and at family dinners he would rail against the bearded rebels like they’d done something to him personally by cutting the army’s supply routes and blowing up the police station at the far side of Las Colinas. I guess in a way they had, considering how everything transpired. When they brought him in he went without a fight, Mami said, and then came the updates: He wasn’t eating. He was, but now he was sick. He’d caught a fungal infection, they were petitioning to get him medical treatment. Then he was missing. No one knew where he’d gone. He’d been tortured, broken, put back together again. Tortured.

  One of those words that says so much and nothing at all. I had tried not to imagine Tío Agustín tied to a chair or hanging shirtless from a dungeon wall like in the cartoons. Tried not to imagine them punishing his proud face, that smile so big it looked like it was trying to escape the confines of his head. I never liked Tío Agustín much; he didn’t look you in the eyes when he spoke and there was something uneven about his manic fits of excitement and rage, but the thought of him bruised and shattered, helpless at the hands of these men that we once called heroes. It haunts me. Haunts us all, I think, and the house takes on an even heavier shadow as the weeks go on and the news gets worse.