Ana Maria Reyes Does Not Live in a Castle

by Hilda Eunice Burgos

  I opened my eyes when I finished playing. Soft clapping began behind me, which got louder and louder. I turned around and saw Mami, Abuelita, my aunts, and Gracie and Muñeca standing in the doorway to the living room. “Bravo!” Tía Nona said.

  “That was beautiful, mamita,” Mami said.

  Abuelita wiped her eyes, and Tía Chea, Gracie, and Muñeca nodded as they continued to clap.

  I wasn’t sure what I had done to deserve this. Was this what Doña Dulce meant when she told me to play from the heart? If it was, then I didn’t like it. My heart hurt with sadness.

  Chapter 30

  The wedding was at the Catholic church in the nearby town of Salcedo. Pepito took the van to Tía Nona’s house to pick up the rest of my family while Gracie, Muñeca, Juancito, and I rode in the back of Tío Pepe’s pickup truck. We girls had to hold down our matching yellow skirts in the wind, and the road was so bumpy our butts hurt by the time we got there.

  The church was loud with chatter and laughter. Mami and Tía Chea led Muñeca and my sisters to the front pew. Papi, Tío Pepe, and the boys sat behind them. I took my sheet music to the front of the church and sat at the piano. There were a lot of familiar faces there, but I couldn’t remember many names. It was so hot I could hardly breathe. My sweaty dress clung to me, and beads of moisture rolled down my arm like they would on a glass of ice water on a summer day. Three long candles on the altar drooped to the side.

  I looked at the music in front of me and hoped I didn’t mess anything up. I listened to the hum of a hundred voices talking at the same time and the rustle of paper as people fanned themselves with prayer books and wedding programs and whatever else they could find. Finally, the organist played a few notes to quiet everybody down. Juan Miguel stood by the altar dripping with sweat. Then the priest looked at me and nodded. I started to play Prelude in C Major. Tía Nona entered the church with a beaming Abuelita by her side. My grandmother seemed to be okay with walking Tía Nona down the aisle after all.

  Tía Nona came down the aisle and joined Juan Miguel at the front. I finished the Prelude without any mistakes, and when the priest started to speak, I snuck over to sit with my family. Mami cried as Tía Nona and Juan Miguel read the marriage vows they had written themselves. They talked about making each other better people and blah, blah, blah. Tía Chea probably didn’t agree with that. After all, she said Juan Miguel and his family were making Tía Nona a snob. Maybe I agreed with her. Or maybe Tía Nona had been a snob all along. After the way she treated Clarisa, I was sure my aunt was not becoming a better person, Juan Miguel or no Juan Miguel.

  Finally Tía Nona and Juan Miguel kissed, and then everybody clapped and cheered. The priest told us to go in peace, and the organ played while the happy couple walked toward the door. I peeled myself off my seat and followed my family outside. We stood in a line outside the church and hugged a bunch of sticky people. A few of them asked Abuelita the same question: “Where is your son?”

  Abuelita waved her arm each time, and said, “Oh, he’s around here somewhere.”

  But he wasn’t. Tío Lalo never showed up.

  ***

  We got back in the pickup truck to go to the reception at Juan Miguel’s parents’ country house. The party was outside, with food served on tables under a bunch of white tents. The band played a Juan Luis Guerra song while Tía Nona and Juan Miguel danced. Then the band’s singer announced that it was time for the bride to dance with her father and the groom with his mother. “Unfortunately,” he said, “the bride’s father is watching us from up above, so her older brother will dance with her in their father’s place.”

  Tía Nona had said she didn’t care if Tío Lalo never showed up, but now she was looking all around for him, and her eyes were getting shiny. Mami nudged Papi with her elbow, and he walked over to my aunt and held out his hand. She smiled and took it. Abuelita cried as we watched Papi and Tía Nona, and Juan Miguel and his mother, on the dance floor. I couldn’t tell if she was sad that Tío Lalo wasn’t there, or happy that Papi had saved the day.

  When the rest of the guests were invited to join in, my whole family stepped forward. Gracie and Muñeca danced with those twin neighbor boys, my parents twirled Rosie and Connie around, and Pepito led Abuelita onto the dance floor. Juancito asked if I wanted to dance, but I didn’t feel like it. Especially not when I heard the Johnny Ventura song that Clarisa had said was her favorite. I watched kids take glasses of lemonade from the servers, only to spill half of them right away, and I saw chunks of cheese and nibbled-on empanadas all mashed up on the ground. How much food and drink was being wasted at this one party? How many people were going to bed hungry tonight just a few miles away? I served myself a small plate and sat at a table feeling guilty as I nibbled at my meal and looked around. When I saw Tía Nona laughing away, I got kind of mad. How dare she be so happy after what she had done to Clarisa! She had no right.

  ***

  After Tía Nona left for her honeymoon, my whole family stayed at Tía Chea’s house. I shared my bed with Connie, and Rosie slept with Gracie.

  “This is so much fun,” Muñeca said when we were all tucked into bed. She pointed her flashlight to the ceiling. She had promised to keep it on until Connie fell asleep. “It’s like a slumber party. You guys are so lucky to have each other. I wish I had sisters.”

  “I wonder if Clarisa has any sisters,” I said.

  “Who’s Clarisa?” Rosie asked.

  “Tía Nona’s maid. Well, she’s not her maid anymore since Tía Nona fired her.”

  “Hmm, I think she has a sister,” Muñeca said. “I’ve seen a little girl running around outside her house, but I guess she could be a neighbor or a cousin.”

  “Wait!” I sat up in bed. “You know where Clarisa lives?”

  “Yeah, she’s not too far.”

  “Can you take me there tomorrow?”

  “Oh, it’s not close enough to walk,” Muñeca said. “But my dad could drive you.”

  “Would he do that?”

  “Sure, why not? We’ll ask him in the morning.”

  ***

  Tío Pepe said he would be happy to take me to see Clarisa. Muñeca and my sisters wanted to come too, but my parents said no. “We don’t want Clarisa and her family to think you’re going over to gawk at them like they’re animals at the zoo,” Papi said.

  So it was just me and Tío Pepe in the pickup truck. “What will you say to her?” he asked.

  I opened my mouth, then closed it again. I realized I had no idea what I would say. “Well, I guess I’ll apologize for making her lose her job.”

  “That’s a good start.” Tío Pepe made a sharp right turn onto a narrow dirt road. There were no street signs anywhere.

  “Also, Papi told me to give her this.” I showed him the crumpled twenty-dollar bill in my hand.

  “That’s even better.”

  Tío Pepe swerved to avoid a cat licking her kittens in the middle of the road. He made another turn and slowed down to a crawl when we got to an area with houses crowded together on both sides of the road. This was so different from Tía Nona’s neighborhood, where the houses were huge and far apart, and from where Tía Chea lived, with smaller, neat and colorful houses surrounded by fruit trees. Some houses here had thatched roofs, and others had rusty metal ones. Wet towels, shirts, and socks hung on bushes and clotheslines and in the gaps between the wooden slats of the house frames. Toothless women laughed and shouted out to one another from yard to yard. The muscles on their wiry arms flexed as they wrung out clothes, holding them at arm’s length until the water dripping from the cloth slowed to a trickle. Diapered toddlers ran between the women’s scarred legs, shrieking with laughter as they chased one another. Everyone stopped what they were doing to stare at us when we pulled up in front of a faded blue house. “This is it,” Tío Pepe said.

  I got out and took a deep breath, trying to sl
ow the thumping of my heart. I hoped this visit would actually help, but I wasn’t sure that it would. I followed the sound of voices coming from behind the house and found the naked boy tossing a dirty tennis ball to a little girl in a ripped-up dress.

  “Hi,” I said.

  The boy waved at me. He whispered in the girl’s ear, and she waved too. Then she ran inside and immediately came back out dragging her father by the hand.

  “Señorita!” Clarisa’s father said. “Welcome, welcome. Please, come inside.”

  “Oh, no, that’s okay,” I said. “My uncle’s waiting for me in the truck, but my dad told me to give you this.” I wanted to ask to see Clarisa, but I wasn’t sure if I should. Maybe she was busy. Or still mad. I remembered how she had looked at me when I got her fired, and I didn’t want to see that look again.

  Clarisa’s father took the twenty-dollar bill. “God bless you. Thank you, thank you.”

  Clarisa came out of the house carrying a bucket of wet clothes.

  “Clarisa! Look at this!” Her father held up the bill.

  Clarisa looked at me with cold eyes. “We don’t need your charity,” she said. “My family and I work for everything we have.”

  “But you earned this,” I said. “It’s your last pay from my aunt.”

  Clarisa knew I was lying. Her father surely knew that too. She looked at her family one by one. They smiled at her, showing their small brown teeth. She did not smile back. Finally, she turned to me. “Thank you for bringing the money.” She walked to the clothesline.

  “Okay, well, goodbye,” I said.

  “Goodbye, señorita, and thank you.” Clarisa’s father took the two little ones and went back inside.

  I looked at Clarisa. “Do you need any help with the laundry?”

  “No!”

  I kicked a pebble back and forth from one foot to the other. “Look,” I said. “I’m really sorry about what happened the other day. I had no idea my aunt would fire you. I was just trying to help.”

  Clarisa kept her eyes on her work. “Yes, of course. You rich people never have any idea about anything.”

  I gasped. “I’m not rich!”

  Clarisa reached into her bucket and plucked out a shirt. “Oh really? Have you ever gone to bed hungry?”

  I paused, but I didn’t need to think about my answer. “No.”

  “Do you have shoes?”

  I looked at her bare feet. My voice was soft when I spoke. “Yes.”

  Clarisa turned to me with her hands on her hips. “You think you know everything, but you don’t! When my family needed me to work, everyone said I was too small and useless, but your aunt gave me a chance. Then you came and ruined it!”

  She reached down and grabbed another shirt, then another one. She jammed the clothespins fiercely into the laundry on the wire. The lines leaned toward the ground, then bounced back up, over and over again.

  I tried to think of something to say. Nothing came to mind. I walked back to the truck and told Tío Pepe I was ready to leave.

  Chapter 31

  We still had a few more days left in the Dominican Republic, and we spent all of them visiting relatives. Tía Chea was happy to drive us around and hang out drinking a cafecito at each house. Mami wouldn’t have any because she said the caffeine wasn’t good for the baby. There was a lot of talk about the baby. Everybody had a theory about whether it was a boy or a girl. Tío Rogelio’s wife said it was definitely a boy and that she was never wrong. But Tío Marcos reminded her that she was wrong about his last child, and that started a whole argument that ended in laughter and more cafecitos — except for Mami, of course, who had lemonade like us kids.

  My cousins — I think they were all cousins — were pretty nice, but not that interesting. Rosie and Connie had fun running around and playing stickball with the younger boys, while Gracie and Muñeca got makeup tips from the older girls. I was glad to go to Tía Nona’s house each day and practice piano. I even decided on my recital piece: “Meine Freuden” by Chopin and Liszt like Doña Dulce had suggested. It was super tough, and I would have to practice a lot after we got back home, but I thought I could handle it if I worked hard. And it would definitely impress Eleanor’s head of school — I hoped.

  Whenever I thought about going to Eleanor, I got excited. But then I’d think of Clarisa, working all day in her bare feet, struggling to make sure her family had enough to eat, and I’d feel kind of silly. How could I think about new textbooks and Latin classes when kids like Clarisa were going to bed hungry every night? But what could I do to help those kids? I didn’t have any idea, so I just concentrated on my music. At least that was something I could control.

  ***

  There was a lot of crying and hugging at the airport the day we left the Dominican Republic, just like on the day we arrived. But the tears were not happy this time. And the adults weren’t the only ones crying now. Gracie and Muñeca vowed to write to each other every day, and Connie and Rosie begged my parents to let us stay longer.

  I wished we could stay longer too. I had finally gotten the knack of using just the right amount of bath water, and the sunburn I got the first week didn’t hurt anymore. Plus, Tía Nona wasn’t back from her honeymoon yet. I was sure I could get her to hire Clarisa again if I only had a chance to talk to her one more time. Now that the wedding was behind her and she was relaxed, she would surely see that she had overreacted. I would have loved to tell Clarisa she had her job back. But I was out of time.

  “Don’t wait another sixteen years before you return,” Tía Chea said to Mami. “I want to meet my new niece or nephew soon.” She rubbed Mami’s belly and sniffled.

  “We’ll be back.” Mami put her arms around Tía Chea’s neck, and the two of them cried and cried.

  “Come on, Mecho,” Papi said. “We don’t want to miss our flight.”

  Mami let go of Tía Chea and took a step back. Abuelita was sobbing on Pepito’s shoulder. She looked up and threw herself at Tía Chea. The two of them clung to each other like suction cups on glass. Papi looked at his watch, and Mami saw that. “Mamá, come on,” she said. “The plane might leave us.”

  Tía Chea peeled herself off of Abuelita, then turned to say goodbye to the rest of us. When it was my turn, I felt her warm tears drip onto my neck. “Take good care of your mother and your sisters,” she said. To Gracie she said, “Be good.”

  When we were on the plane, I looked over at Mami and saw that she was still crying. What would it be like to go sixteen years without seeing one of my sisters? Even though they sometimes got on my nerves, I couldn’t imagine being apart from them for more than a few days. My parents lived so far from most of their relatives. How could they stand it? Maybe this was why they treated everyone in our neighborhood like family. A substitute family is better than no family at all.

  Chapter 32

  After we got home, it was like we had never left. Papi went to work every day. Mami cooked, cleaned, and did laundry. Gracie sewed with Mami and hung out with her friends. Rosie helped Mami cook and talked about the start of her new year of ballet classes in September. Connie got her hands dirty helping Mami with the plants. And I practiced piano and worked on my scholarship application by myself. On Sundays after church Ruben and I made flash cards with questions that might be on the scholarship exam.

  “Thanks for helping me,” I said to him, “especially since you don’t even want me to go to that school.”

  Ruben grinned. “This will help both of us with the Science test too — just in case you decide you don’t like Eleanor.”

  “True,” I said. I couldn’t imagine not liking Eleanor, but I could imagine not getting a scholarship, and I had to prepare for that possibility. So Ruben and I made more flash cards each week.

  Soon it was time to get ready for school. Gracie grumped about being required to wear a uniform to Little Bethlehem, and about the fact t
hat all her friends got to stay in public school for high school. I thought about Clarisa when we shopped for school supplies and for new first-day-of-school outfits for Rosie and me. How well did she know how to read and write? Wasn’t it against the law for her to stay home from school?

  Claudia came over for a sleepover at my house. I had told her everything. “If Tía Nona won’t help Clarisa, then I will,” I said.

  “Really? How?”

  “I’ll raise money and send it to her.”

  “Can I help?”

  We thought and thought about how to make some money. “We could go door to door and tell people about Clarisa,” Claudia said. “Or we could set up a GoFundMe page.”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “My parents would never let me go to people’s houses begging for money. And GoFundMe seems too much like begging for money too.”

  “At my school — well, our school next year — we sell stuff sometimes, like gift wrap, to raise money,” Claudia said.

  “Yeah, we could sell stuff!” I said. “But what? We’ll have to make something.”

  We decided to sell cookies and lemonade outside Claudia’s house. “That’s a wonderful idea!” Mami said. She and Rosie made a huge batch of Mami’s famous honey almond cookies. Claudia and I made chocolate chip. Gracie painted a sign for our stand. Connie helped her color in the letters.

  The next morning Claudia’s mom drove us to her house, and we made a giant pitcher of lemonade. As soon as we set up the stand, a kid on a bike came by. When he tasted one of Mami’s cookies, he ran off to get more money and to tell his friends. In no time, we sold $128 worth of lemonade and cookies. I called Tía Nona when I got back home.

  “Anamay, mi amor! It’s so good to hear your voice. Your mother tells me you’ve been busy with the piano.”

  “Yeah, the recital is in December, and ‘Meine Freuden’ is really challenging,” I said. “There are a few tricky parts I need to work on, and then I have to memorize it, but at least there’s plenty of time.”