After the Hurricane(59)
And so a century passes, like grains of sugar through the hourglass. Spain, the creator of the conquistador, the terrorizer of the New World, the bringer of pox and taker of silver, the hungry wolf at the door, has softened, weakened, it is an old dog now, its teeth rotted away in its mouth, fat and flatulent, grey at the muzzle and weak at the joints. It barks like a champion, still, and refuses to admit that times have changed, refuses to see that the 20th century fast approaches, refuses to accept that four centuries is more than enough, it won’t just let it go.
But of course it must. And Rincon, its position making it easily attacked over and over again, by English ships and in pirate battles, eventually finds itself invaded by something else entirely, groovy gringos eager to hang ten. A less violent invasion, to be sure, and a more lasting one. Now this area, so vulnerable to hurricane rains and the punishments of the sea, is also a prime tourist spot. Once missing on many maps, it is the only place some tourists to the island have really seen. A corner of the world where you can see the sea rushing up to pull you under, a place where people look at that every day and somehow imagine that they will be safe, on the crumbling land weakened by the sweetener in their coffee.
Question, what kind of person lives in a place like this, knowing what it is? Answer, the kind who is waiting for the sea to swallow him whole.
They have passed Quebradillas, and Fernando takes the exit for Isabela. Instantly the highway drops away, and they are on a much smaller road, twisting through the countryside. The empty countryside. There is no one around, few other cars, and several roadside shacks they pass advertising aguacates frescas y maduras and pinchos and bacalaitos are empty. It all seems abandoned. Elena’s heart aches at all the emptiness, for the coffee plants, the people living in towns that never see a cent of tourist money, ugly little places that will stay in darkness long after most of the island is electrified again, people who will suffer for the sin of not being born somewhere else. For the way this paradise is also a prison, a pretty place with no jobs and no escape, beaten down by the rain and the sea.
“Should be twenty minutes, maybe less,” Fernando says.
“I thought you hadn’t been?” Elena asks. Fernando points to his phone, which is attached to the dashboard and navigating for him. Of course. And he is right, for twenty minutes later they are driving through the town of Isabela, right through a square with a large church on one side.
It looks like most other Puerto Rican towns she’s been to, with one striking exception. It’s completely empty. Fernando slows the car down, then stops, and there are no cars behind him to beep at him in anger. He turns off the car suddenly and gets out, and Elena follows him.
“Jesus,” he says. Elena nods, looking up at the church, which has a sign declaring that it is the parish of San Antonio de Padua, and another, paper sign declaring that it is closed. It’s eerie how quiet it is, with only the coos of pigeons audible. A cat wanders through the square, displacing the birds, and stops, looking at the two of them and meowing, plaintively. Elena wishes she had something to give it, but doubts that it wants anything from their car.
“You wanted to see the beach, right?” Elena says, softly, unsure what else to say. Fernando nods, looking dazed, and gets back in the car. Elena follows, and watches him warily. She feels like perhaps he shouldn’t be driving but she doesn’t want to offend him by offering, and she can’t just make him let her, it’s his car. The engine starts and Fernando follows the road down a hill and past a large apartment building that is clearly devoid of inhabitants, and past a group of little huts, shut up, and a basketball court, and parks under a tree. Elena smiles, that’s something her father would do, to keep the car cool. She looks out and it is true, the beach is beautiful.
“This all flooded.” Fernando breathes out, still sitting in the car. He points to a hut, and Elena can just make out watermarks, halfway up the side of the wall. “I saw it on the news. They evacuated the town. I guess a lot of people just never came back.”
“Fuck,” Elena says. She has no more eloquent thought to offer. There is a shrine on the beach, with an image of a woman holding a child. Her face is blank, as is the face of the child, and the lettering around the woman identifies her as La Virgen de los Pescadores. It looks like a cartoon person. Elena shakes her head, wondering who this woman is, who her child is. She isn’t Mary, and that isn’t Jesus. There are icons of women with children in their arms in bright robes all over Latin America, and Elena, whenever she sees them, wonders what local goddess has tried on Christianity so she doesn’t have to die out. “I will never understand the Catholic Church’s obsession with virgins.”
“Original sin,” Fernando says. “But it is a funny thing. When the Europeans came here, the Spanish, they folded all these local goddesses into the church so they could convert the natives, who wouldn’t let go of their gods. And all these poor women had to become virgins again.”
“Apparently there is a surgery you can do to restore your hymen,” Elena tells him, then blushes. This is a strange conversation to have, and it calls sex to mind but it is also entirely unsexy. The look on Fernando’s face confirms it, and he laughs.
“If you are trying to distract me from how insane this is, it’s working,” he tells her. She smiles. Perhaps she was. She gets out of the car, and Fernando follows her. She takes off her shoes, and walks out onto the sand. The beach makes a natural curve, and at one end there are rock formations, probably a part of a fort or defensive wall, long abandoned and decaying prettily. So much of the decay on the island is mistaken for beauty, Elena thinks, and not what it really is, death. Fernando is beside her, and they make a silent mutual decision to walk along the beach, their feet cooled by the tide. It is a large crescent of yellow sand, which is probably not geometrically perfect, but it looks that way to Elena. The sea is deep teal and, farther out, clear navy today. A few houses peek through the palm trees and plants and vines, but most of the curving shoreline looks empty of human life. A palm tree has grown almost horizontally, and Elena imagines sitting on it and gazing out at the pristine ocean waves. Looking at it, Elena cannot picture hurricane waves and flooding. It looks like every cartoon of a perfect tropical paradise, like a place nothing bad can ever touch. She can almost hear the “Kokomo” lyrics as the sun turns the water ever bluer, and a breeze ripples through the palms. How does such a beautiful place turn so deadly year after year? Maria was not the only storm to ever hit the Caribbean, nor will it be the last. How does the island continue to look so deceptively placid and calm when it has just been lashed by the angry sea and vicious rains? The beauty of the Caribbean is a lie, a lure, an act of lunacy.