Clap When You Land(33)
Mami refuses to talk about the body.
After she goes to bed, I begin doing research on what I would need to travel.
It is funny how money has no regard for time.
How it eases past minutes to get you what you want.
Thankfully, I have a passport. Papi had me get one years ago when it became clear I might qualify for tournaments abroad.
For a ticket, I used Mami’s credit card.
Mami does not remove any passwords from our computer, & I log on to her bank account & ensure we have enough.
I still don’t know if I have the courage to do what I want to do, & I know I can’t plan this trip alone but somehow, some way, I know I need to be there the day that Papi gets buried. I need to meet this sister.
I don’t know how much of
my desire
to meet Camino is because
all of a sudden I have a sister, & that’s very What the fuck?
But also, maybe, a part of me feels that she is a piece of Papi.
That in her body there will be answers for all the questions he left behind.
How could she have existed
this whole time without me?
Me without her?
Nothing has been logical since the morning Mami came to school, but in my heart of hearts I know whatever I need to find I’ll need to go.
Thirty-Seven Days After
Mami has not asked me again about the online message.
& I have not given
her any updates.
I told Dre because holding it in was killing me.
She shook her head & pushed a loud whistle through her teeth.
“Damn, who would have thought Poppa Rios had it in him?”
After a moment she said, “Maybe it’s better you didn’t know?”
How can you lose
an entire person,
only to gain a part of them back in someone entirely new?
“I think I need to go meet her, with Papi’s body, I mean.”
Dre nods without hesitation.
“Yes. It’s the right thing to do.”
& although her words should be a comfort,
a twinge of annoyance twists my mouth. How could she possibly know the right thing to do? In a situation like this, how would anyone know
so easily right from wrong when it all seems like we are pivoting left, spinning in circles.
Camino Yahaira
I think I hate this sister.
She messages me
that she has acquired a plane ticket.
& how easy she says it.
Because it wasn’t endless paperwork, because no one wondered if she would want to overstay her visa.
The years my father tried
to get me to the States,
& that girl over there fills out a short form, is granted permission, given a blue book— shit, an entire welcome mat to the world.
I squeeze my tablet so hard
I’m surprised I don’t crack the screen.
Her mother will not let her come, & she is planning to do so behind her back.
That takes strength. I know if it were me, Tía would kill me dead,
then have the spirits bring me back to life so she could murder me all over again.
As much as I want to hate this girl, I also have to admire what she will do to get here.
& I hope that she will admire all I will do to get there, too.
Forty Days After
It’s been three weeks since Carline gave birth.
I visit her every few days. Today carrying vitamins & cloth diapers on top of my head, I let my arms swing freely.
When I was little, my mother told me
she used to carry bundles of mangoes to the market this way.
On mornings like this I pretend I’m her: a girl who can carry water on her crown, who can walk barefoot without being scorched.
Although, I’m wearing a pair of Jordans that I now think were probably my sister’s first;
they were not new when Papi
brought them to me, & I think back to all the hand-me-downs I didn’t know were that other girl’s castoffs.
When I get to the house, Carline is there alone.
She chews on a thumbnail while little Luciano sleeps quietly in a crib. In another country, this baby would still be in the intensive care unit, but these are Kreyòl-speaking folk who cannot afford either the bill or the legalities that would come with hospitals.
Although Carline will not utter the words, I know she still expects the baby to die.
He is just so, so small.
Carline takes the bundle from me slowly & unwraps it like it might contain precious gems.
I ask her if I can wake the baby to check if he’s doing all right.
Tía has taught me how to listen to the babies’ hearts & swab their throats for mucus. She has taught me how to feel the neck for fever, to look for infection where the cord was cut.
Carline nods but gives me a long look. & I know her eyes are telling me to be careful. We are friends, but she is a mother now, & she is wary of anyone hurting her child.
She tells me Nelson is working himself to the bone trying to save enough to move them out
& is also considering dropping out of school.
I want to offer her platitudes & murmurs
that it will all be all right. But thing is,