Drifting, p.2
Drifting, page 2
All around us, the dwellings continued to fall. There was thick dust in my eyes, dust in my mouth. There was a dust storm in the spot where Freda’s clinic had been only moments before.
I screamed for my sister. Lidia screamed for Dieudonne. I realized then that I had never learned the other two children’s names. Ti Papa held his mother’s skirt and shook violently. The parched terrain underneath us shook even more violently.
“Dear God,” Serge shrieked as he made his way to the mound of concrete blocks that had been Freda’s clinic. “Dear God,” he repeated as he began to remove cement blocks and toss them aside. He would not stop until he rescued Freda and the babies she had meant to have—if only there’d been time.
BEREAVEMENT PAY
Come on in, dear. Sit down. Would you like some coffee? Hey, how often does the boss ask if you’d like something to drink? Times are changing, aren’t they? Some say the world is coming to an end. I hope they’re wrong. By the way, has everyone in your family been accounted for? Never mind that question. You must be getting sick of hearing it. People must ask you that all the time. Has everyone in your family been accounted for? That is an odd question. After all, it’s been weeks since the quake struck. I hope you don’t hold it against me for asking you this now. I’ve been busy with life. You know how it is.
I hear communication is still pretty bad between here and there; hear it’s tough getting through. Have you been able to reach your people? From what I understand communication was pretty below standard even before this thing happened. I’m guessing you don’t know much of anything. Who would? Come to think of it, you may never know if all your family is accounted for. Dear God!
Listen, dear, I understand. I really do. I’ve even had a nightmare or two. If I were in your shoes, I don’t know what I would do. I can’t even begin to wrap my brain around some of the images I’ve seen on CNN. I can’t imagine what your people must be going through. The scope of this mess is like nothing the world has ever seen. Dead bodies in wheelbarrows. Dead bodies being shoveled into mass graves. Blood everywhere. Dust and blood. No one has a name. No one is accounted for, right?
This sort of thing must never happen on US soil. I’ve got kids, you know: a boy and a girl, plus one on the way. Can you imagine? I don’t know what I would do if something like that happened here.
Even our military guys down in your country are having a difficult time. And some of those guys have done tours in Iraq, Afghanistan. They say your country has the desert beat by a thousand miles. I read somewhere that the soldiers now have trouble sleeping. They can’t keep food down. They’re going to need serious assistance after this quake thing blows over. War, you know, is different. You expect to see certain things on the battlefield. You expect to hear certain noises, cries. You expect to smell certain smells. You expect to see death. A lot of it, in fact. But this is not war.
My heart goes out to you, dear. And to your family. Believe me when I tell you that. My heart goes out to your country too. I’d never heard so much about that place in my entire life before the quake hit.
You know, I became so interested and curious that I started to do a little research myself. I had no idea you guys were the first black republic. 1804, right? That’s pretty impressive. I saw something about the maroon people: slaves so clever no one could catch them. It was cool the way they hid in those hills. I’ll have to go back and read a little more about them. I like to know about that sort of thing.
I found out your country used to be gorgeous too. Imagine that! It was the place to be once upon a time, am I right? They called it the Pearl, or something like that. That sounds so resort-like, you know: Come on down to the Pearl. Lose your shoes and your troubles. Have a cocktail with one of those little umbrellas in them. Somebody told me Elizabeth Taylor and other movie stars used to vacation down there. I hear Bill and Hillary Clinton honeymooned down there. Who knew Haiti was a place to have a honeymoon?
Hey, can you believe your country is next to the Dominican Republic? It’s like one of those masks you see in the theater: comedy and tragedy, right? I’ve taken my family to the DR several times. Nice place. Amazing beaches. Good food! You’d never know your country was right next door.
Yes . . . of course . . . forgive me . . . Here I am going on and on, telling you what you probably already know. Believe me when I tell you I really, truly do feel your pain. I can almost put myself in your shoes. So, let’s get back to your question about bereavement pay.
Yes. If you consult the employee manual, you’ll see how bereavement is broken down according to proximity. Your mind might be all jumbled up right now with all that you must be going through. Mine would be too. So let me help you find the information you need:
If you lose a mother or a father, that’s an automatic five days off. With pay. If you lose a sister or a brother, three days, also with pay. Grandparents: two days (but you only get paid for one). First cousins: one day, without pay. An uncle or an aunt—depending on how close you were to them, half a day (and we’ll need proof, of course . . . you know . . . something to show you were actually at a memorial service . . . you understand . . . oh . . . wait . . . in your case . . . given the circumstances . . . well, how do I put this? . . . given what we’ve all seen on TV . . . you won’t be required to provide that sort of proof).
Back to the list. Yes . . . second cousins. Let’s see. No . . . they’re not on the list. You would not be allowed time off per se, but there’s always your lunch hour. At any rate, you can see, second cousins are not on the list. Your mother-in-law’s brother on her father’s side . . . no, also not on the list . . . Your cousin’s sister on his mother’s side . . . nope, sorry . . . The lady who took care of you for ten years while your parents immigrated to another country to work and send money so you could eat and go to school . . . sorry, not on the list either . . . The lady’s children? Come on, are you kidding me?
PART II
FLORA
THE HUNTERS
Her black curls glistened in the sunlight streaming through a hole in the corrugated tin roof. Take away those layers of dust and the spider webs crisscrossed on her lace-trimmed bib; take away that three-inch long crack in her right leg; anyone would have mistaken her for a real baby—a good, well-behaved baby, waiting patiently for her bottle of warm milk with a spoonful of powdered rice thrown in.
Nine years later and I still wonder what happened to that doll. She did not fall out of the high chair and drag her fractured limb out of the house. I searched everywhere for days. For years I entertained the fantasy that a street child had crept upstairs and taken the doll. But no one had broken into our house. The landlord must have lied. Nothing mysterious about that. Grown-ups lied all the time, to one another and to kids. Especially to kids: Be a good girl, sweetie, and take this balloon to the latrine for me. Don’t untie the knot. Don’t try to blow it up either. It’s a special kind of balloon. It’s no good once it’s been used. And it’s been used. Heh! Heh!
Of course the landlord lied. I can still hear him talking to Manman as if she were a child: “See that door at the top of the stairs? Don’t ever open it. You won’t pay rent for the room behind it. So pretend it’s not there . . . Oh, you see a doll through the keyhole? Just ignore it. My last tenant had kids too. Three girls, like you. The doll must have belonged to them. Look, madame, if you don’t want to rent the house, hurry up and say so. I’ve got fifteen other people lined up.”
“Mister, please.” Manman had been nervous. She needed that house for two reasons: the rent was the cheapest she had found anywhere, and the school which my sisters and I would attend was so close we could see our classrooms from the front porch.
Manman dared not look into the landlord’s eyes. “How many months do you want in advance, mister?”
“Two will do.” The man kept his own eyes on the sweetsop tree behind Manman.
“Two?” Usually, landlords were not so kind. Manman had expected him to ask for at least four months in advance.
“Yes, two.”
“God bless you.” Manman thumbed through the spectrum of Haitian currency in her hands: blue, brown, orange. A couple of green US dollars sat on the stack like icing on a cake.
The landlord took the money from Manman and counted it. When he was done, he said: “Welcome to your new home, madame.” A friendly smile played on his lips. He knew all along that Manman would take the house.
“Thank you, mister. Bon Dye va beni w. God will bless you.”
* * *
The landlord had his reasons for keeping us out of the doll room. Nine years later and I still wonder what those reasons were. Flora Desormeau, I tell myself, forget the doll. But I can’t forget—just as I cannot forget the day Manman came home late and as a routine peeped through that keyhole. “Where is she?” Manman was so distraught that the doll was gone she said it was time for us to leave the house too. She fished out her dog-eared Bible and the long list of highly recommended psalms that she carried in her purse for protection—like a switchblade or a loaded gun. She gestured for me to start reading while she crossed herself hurriedly.
“Dans ma détresse, c’est à l’Éternel que je crie,” I began. “In my distress I cried unto the Lord . . .”
Of all the chores I was expected to do in our house, reading the psalms with Manman was the most tedious. She repeated each word in that exaggerated lilt of the illiterate. Her stubborn tongue refused to contort itself around the French vowels. Her mouth had never been trained to make those strange sounds. She parted her lips when puckering and stretching them was necessary. The pointed “u” came out like “ee.” The unnatural “e” sounded like the English “a.”
I was tired and justifiably unnerved about the missing doll myself. Manman, on the other hand, was alert, vigilant. Each time I skipped a line or two to try and make the reading go faster, she made me start from the beginning. She had memorized the Bible in its entirety—or so it seemed—and was now reciting the psalms verbatim. She was not simply echoing me. She paused for the punctuation marks, even before I saw them: one second for commas, two for periods. She stopped between verses like a child looking both ways before crossing the street. Manman did not need me.
“Do we have to read all of these tonight?” I protested.
Manman did not appreciate the question nor did she care for my tone of voice. Her hand shot up to slap me. Since we were praying, she decided against it. I continued to read while Manman followed along from her impeccable memory: “Lève-toi, Éternel! Sauve-moi . . . Tu brises les dents des méchants . . . Arise, O Lord! Save me . . . You break the teeth of the wicked . . .”
“This will take hours,” I said.
“Quit whining!” Manman shouted in Creole.
The kerosene lamp on the floor next to me filled my throat with so much smoke that it itched. My mouth was dry.
“Keep reading.”
I read until a rooster crowed and the sun rolled out of bed and the streets buzzed with the protests of children fetching water from distant streams.
“Amen,” I said after the last word of the last psalm on Manman’s endless list.
“Amen.” Manman sounded like she’d been haggling with a vendor at the marketplace over a can of tomato paste. She closed the Bible, keeping her eyes on the worn leather. She did not blink. It was the book’s turn to agree to or counter whatever secret offer she’d made. After a few minutes of silent bargaining, she put the Bible away, saying, “If that doesn’t do it, nothing will.”
While the streets filled with vendors, their wares in large baskets on their heads, the sun and the moon engaged in a hostile battle: one defied the other to try and rise before or linger beyond its allotted time. The few stars that lagged behind to watch the scuffle gave up their good seats, taking their light elsewhere. The outcome was too predictable: the sun would prevail. It always did in Haiti. From the moment it rose each morning until it went down, it spread its scorching power over everything that stood between the mountains and the sea, raging like a sugarcane field set on fire at harvest time.
Manman sectioned my hair into three parts and braided them. Two of the braids stopped just above my ears. The third, at the top of my head, stuck up in the air like a tiny stump in freshly raked black soil. Manman then ordered me to wear my green dress for good luck, in case the psalms failed. She wore a coat-dress with large buttons that ran from her neck to her ankles. It had been sent to her by someone in the States who forgot the definition of tropical. Our roses did not wither in December. Bougainvillea blossoms did not succumb to wintry nights. Hibiscus blooms did not steal away to some subterranean retreat—like peonies and irises had a habit of doing in the States. Our flowers did not hibernate in unmarked graves for seasons at a time. They showed themselves unabashedly, January through December, never losing their vibrancy. The breadfruit, the mango, the avocado, the palm—none of our trees found it necessary to expel every last one of their leaves in autumn. Temperatures never dipped to freezing. No one expected snow to fall on Christmas Day or New Year’s Eve. Women did not need to cover themselves with dresses such as the one Manman was now wearing. It was the color that attracted her: hunter green was perfect for the task at hand.
Armed with sandwiches and a thermos of lemonade, we marched out of the house and headed north toward Port-au-Prince. When we reached our destination, Manman was not surprised by the multitude already in line. “The enemy’s camp is crowded, as usual,” she sighed.
The people there generated a stifling heat that was exacerbated by the rising sun. A sea of bobbing heads glistened with sweat. Damp clothing stuck to faceless bodies that jostled for space, pushing and shoving, squeezing one behind the other, like the pods inside a pomegranate. Everyone wanted a chance to see the Angel of Mercy in person.
“I want you to form two groups,” a disembodied voice boomed through a megaphone. “If you have a letter that says your appointment is today, stand on my right. If you do not have a letter with your appointment date, stand on my left.”
From our position in the crowd, Manman could not discern where the speaker’s right or left was. She did what she’d always done: joined the line with fewer people in it, the line where no one was hurling curses at the sky and spitting angrily on the pavement.
“Get out of my way! Move! Padon kò-w!” The crowd scattered, as if shots had been fired. Men and women shoved and elbowed one another roughly, as if they were fighting for their lives. “Make way! Make way!”
Like flour in a sieve, the bulk of the crowd sifted through one side and a few lumps remained on the other. Manman secured my hand in hers, pulling me toward the lumps that remained in the sieve. Someone from the opposite side yelled something about having an appointment but not the letter to prove it.
“Then you do not have an appointment,” the voice in the megaphone replied in Creole. “And if you do not have one, I suggest you go home and wait for it to arrive in the mail.”
“The mail!” a man howled. An explosion of laughter ensued. “We have mail in Haiti now?” Everyone, even Manman, laughed.
When the voice in the megaphone said, “Or you can all go home and use your passports as kindling,” a heavy silence fell on the crowd. The sea of bobbing heads had been parted by the powerful gatekeeper. Only a select few would have the chance to hope and plead and cry today.
Just as the moon had made way for the sun earlier, the gatekeeper stepped aside and let us in. Manman, in her hunter-green battle gear, did not get a chance to wield any of the weapons she brought along: a wedding picture with my father in that too-big suit, a snapshot of my sisters with tear-stained faces, another picture of my father looking particularly lonely in the faraway country where heavy woolen clothing was too often necessary.
The gargantuan being I expected to see was a bespectacled little man in charcoal-colored slacks, starched white shirt, suspenders that made an X on his back, and flip-flops that slapped the marble floor with each seemingly directionless step. His skin was the color of a dried corn husk—not quite yellow, not quite beige. He was not white like a page in my composition notebook, but everyone called him “Blan” just the same. His eyes were the blue of waters too deep to swim in. Deep like that place in the ocean from which people seldom returned. But his bottomless-blue eyes were not interested in drowning us today.
With a sweeping motion of his arms, the consul invited us into his office. Perhaps he had met his secret quota of humiliation for the day. Perhaps his hands ached from crushing family after family with his Application Denied stamp. Perhaps he had grown tired of telling mothers and children to try again in six months or a year. Perhaps my green dress brought us good luck. “It was those psalms,” Manman later declared. “They worked like magic!”
The consul signed Manman’s papers hastily, as if some unseen hand were guiding his, forcing him to write his full name here, put his initials there, stamp that coveted seal of miracles in all the necessary places. Manman could not snatch the documents out of his hands fast enough. Within days we would be in an airplane, flying toward the unknown. I would see my father again for the first time in a decade. I had forgotten everything I was supposed to remember about him; everything except the name by which I would never be allowed to call him: Frisner Desormeau.
