Because It Is My Blood (12 page)

VII

I BEGIN A NEW CHAPTER; AT GRANJA MAÑANA

A
N ENDLESS TEN DAYS LATER,
we arrived in Oaxaca, where, along with a sailor named Pip, I was transferred into a small dinghy.

As we approached the shoreline, my seasickness began to resolve itself only to be replaced by a homesickness such as I had never known before. It was not that the coast of Oaxaca lacked charms. The rooftops were dotted in promising shades of orange, pink, turquoise, and yellow, and the ocean was bluer and better-smelling than any water you’d find in my hometown. In the distance, I could make out mountains and forests, green, so green, with icy swirls of white. Were these swirls clouds or mists? I did not know—the icy swirl was not a meteorological phenomenon that we city girls were familiar with. The temperature was 67°, warm enough that the chill I had experienced since swimming to Ellis Island ten days ago at last began to fade. Still, this was not my home. It was not the place where my sister lived or where my grandmother and parents had died. It was not the place where I had fallen in love with the planet’s most inappropriate boy. It was not the land of Trinity and of buses with my boyfriend’s father’s picture on the side. It was not the land of chocolate dealers and drained swimming pools. No one knew me here and I knew no one—i.e., Mr. Kipling and Simon Green’s plan had worked! Maybe the plan had worked too well. I could die in this boat, and no one would care. I would be a mysterious body with a bad haircut. Maybe, at some point, a local cop would get the idea to use that tattoo on my ankle to identify me. But that was the only thing that identified me, this body, as Anya Balanchine. That regrettable tattoo was the only thing separating me from oblivion.

I wanted to cry, but I feared appearing unmanly to the sailor. Though I had not yet seen myself in a mirror, I could sense how awful I looked. I could see (and smell) the flecks of vomit on my one suit of clothes. My hair I did not wish to consider. I did feel my much abused mustache slipping off my face. I would discard it as soon as the sailor and I parted company. If I were to pass as a boy—I didn’t yet know what story had been told Sophia’s relations—it would have to be one without facial hair.

We were nearly to the shore when the sailor said to me, “They say the oldest tree in the world’s here.”

“Oh,” I said. “That’s … interesting.”

“I mention it because Captain said you were a student botanist.”

Right. That whole lie. “Yeah, I’m going to try to see it.”

The sailor studied me curiously, then nodded. We had reached the beach of Puerto Escondido, and I was glad to be quit of that boat and of boats in general.

“You got someone meeting you?” the sailor asked.

I nodded. I was supposed to meet Sophia’s cousin, a woman named Theobroma Marquez, in the Hotel Camino, which was supposedly in a shopping area called El Adoquin. I was unsure of how to pronounce any of this, of course.

I thanked him for the ride.

“You’re very welcome. Word of advice?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Keep your hands in your pockets,” the sailor said.

“Why?”

“Boys’ hands don’t look like that.”

Well, this boy’s do,
I wanted to say. I mean, what if I really had been a boy? What business was it of his? I felt outraged on slightly effeminate student botanist Adam Barnum’s behalf. “Which way to El Adoquin?” I asked in my most imperious voice.

“You’re almost there. El Adoquin runs parallel to Playa Principal.” He pointed me in a direction, then rowed away. As soon as he was gone, I ripped off my mustache and stuffed my incriminatingly girly hands into my pockets.

I walked toward the town square. My clothes were heavy, appropriate for autumn in New York, and I began to feel light-headed from the humidity. The fact that I hadn’t eaten anything aside from a past-prime apple in several days may also have contributed to my light-headedness. My stomach was acidic and hollow, and my head throbbed.

It was Wednesday morning, and despite my disheveled appearance, no one much noticed me.

A funeral procession traveled down the street. The coffin was covered in red roses, and a puppet skeleton controlled by sticks was held in the air. The women wore black lace dresses to their ankles. An accordion was wailing, and everyone sang a discordant song that sounded like musical weeping.

I crossed myself and kept walking. I passed, of all things, a chocolate store! I had never seen one out in the open like that. In the window were stacks of small, puck-like disks of chocolate wrapped in waxy papers. The exterior was paneled in rich mahogany, and inside were red stools and a bar. Of course, it made sense. Chocolate was legal here. As I was looking in the window, I caught sight of my own reflection in the glass. I pulled my hat farther down over my head and resumed looking for the hotel.

I quickly identified the Hotel Camino, as it was the only hotel in the area, and went inside. At this point, I could tell that if I didn’t sit down, I was going to pass out. I went into the hotel bar and scanned the room for Theobroma Marquez. I looked for a girl who resembled Sophia, though aside from her height, I found I could barely remember anything about her. The bartender had not yet come on duty. The only one there was a boy around my age.

“Buenos días,”
he said to me.

I really was on the verge of fainting—rather Victorian of me, I know—and so I sat down at one of the tables. I took off my hat and ran my fingers through my hair.

I became aware that the boy was staring at me. It made me self-conscious so I put my hat back on.

The boy came over to my table. He was grinning, and I felt as if I were the punch line to some great joke. “Anya Barnum?” That settled it. I was relieved to know that I was a girl, but not a Balanchine. This seemed a fine compromise. He offered me his hand. “Theobroma Marquez, but everyone calls me Theo.” The name was pronounced
Tay-oh.
I was also relieved that Theo spoke English.

“Theo,” I repeated. Though he was short, Theo looked sturdy and strong. He had eyes so brown they were almost black, and dark eyelashes like a horse’s. He had stubble that indicated the beginnings of a beard and mustache. It was sacrilegious to say it, but he looked a bit like a Spanish Jesus to me.

“
Lo siento
,
lo siento
. I did not recognize you at first,” he said. “They said you would be pretty.” He laughed as he said this, not in a mean way, and I didn’t feel all that offended that I’d just been called ugly.

“They told me you were going to be a girl,” I replied.

Theo laughed at that, too. “It’s this
estúpido
name of mine. A family name, though, so what can I do? Are you hungry? It’s a long drive to Chiapas.”

“Chiapas? I thought I was staying at a cacao farm in Oaxaca.”

“You cannot grow cacao in the state of Oaxaca, Anya Barnum.” He said this in a patient voice that indicated he was dealing with someone impossibly ignorant. “Granja Mañana is in Ixtapa, Chiapas. My family supplies to and has chocolate factories in Oaxaca, which is why I am the one who has to get you today.”

Oaxaca or Chiapas. It didn’t matter either way, I supposed.

“So, are you hungry or not?” Theo asked.

I shook my head. I was hungry but I was also eager to get to my destination. I told him I needed to use the bathroom, and then we could be on our way.

In the bathroom, I took a moment to consider myself in the mirror. Theo was right. I wasn’t pretty anymore, but luckily, I wasn’t all that vain either. Besides, I had a boyfriend, sort of, and I wasn’t in the mood for seducing boys anyhow. I washed my face, paying special attention to the sticky residue that the mustache adhesive had left on my upper lip, and slicked back my hair. (
Readers, how I did miss that mane of mine!
) I threw the necktie into the trash, rolled up the sleeves of my shirt, and went back out to join Theo.

Theo studied me. “You are less hideous already.”

“Thanks. That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”

“Come, the car’s over here.” I followed him out of the bar. “Where are your things?”

I told the same lie about them being shipped.

“No matter. My sister will lend you whatever you need.”

Theo’s “car” was a green pickup truck. On the side,
GRANJA MAÑANA
was painted in gold, and beneath that was a grouping of what I thought at the time were leaves in fall colors.

As it was a big step up to the truck, Theo offered me his hand. “Anya,” he said with a furrowed brow, “don’t tell my sister I said you weren’t pretty. She thinks I have no manners already. I probably don’t, but…” He smiled at me. I suspected that smile got him out of (and into) all sorts of trouble.

We drove out of the town of Puerto Escondido and onto a strip of road that had a wall of green mountains and rain forest on one side and ocean on the other. “So, you’re friends with Cousin Sophia?” asked Theo.

I nodded.

“And you’re here to study cacao farming?”

I nodded again.

“You have a lot to learn.” He was probably thinking of the apparently hugely embarrassing gaffe I had made in thinking that cacao was grown in Oaxaca.

Theo gave me a sidelong glance. “You’re from the United States. Is your family in chocolate?”

I paused. “Not really,” I lied.

“I only ask because many of Sophia’s friends are in chocolate.”

I didn’t know if Theo or the Marquezes could be trusted. Before I’d left New York, Simon Green had told me that he thought it would be best if I kept my history to myself as much as possible. Luckily, Theo did not pry any further on this point. “How old are you?” he asked. “You look like a little baby.”

It was the hair. I lied again, “I’m nineteen.” I had decided that it would be better for me not to be seventeen, and saying eighteen sounded more fake to me somehow.

“We’re the same age,” Theo informed me. “I’ll be twenty in January. I’m the baby of the family, and that’s why I’m so spoiled. Circumstance has turned me into a petted, silly lapdog.”

“Who else is there?”

“My sister Luna. She is twenty-three and very nosy. Like with me, you can say, ‘Oh, Theo, my family, they are
not really
in chocolate,’ and I won’t press. Your business is your business. But with her, you should have a better answer, so you know. And then there’s my brother, Castillo. He is twenty-nine. He is at home through the weekend but usually he is off studying to be a priest. He is very serious, and you won’t like him at all.”

I laughed. “I like serious people.”

“No, I am kidding. Everyone falls in love with Castillo. He is very handsome and everyone’s favorite. But you shouldn’t like him better than me, just because I am not serious.”

“I’ll probably like him better than you if he manages not to call me ugly in the first minute of my knowing him,” I told him.

“I thought we were over all of that. I explained! I apologized!”

“You did?”

“In my head,
sí, sí
. My English is not that good.
Lo siento!
”

His English seemed fine to me. I decided then and there that Theo was lovable and awful and that most of what he said was going to be nonsense. Theo turned the truck onto a different road that led uphill and away from the ocean. He continued, “I have another sister, Isabelle, who is a married lady and lives in Mexico City. And then there is Mama, Abuela, and Nana. Mama runs the business. Abuela and Nana know all the secret recipes and they do the cooking. They will think you are too skinny.”

I felt sad at the mention of the name Nana. “Abuela is your grandmother, right? So, who is your nana?”

“My
bisabuela
,” he replied. “Great-grandmother. She is ninety-five years old and as healthy as can be. She was born in the 1980s!”

“People live a long time in your family,” I commented.

“The women,
sí
. They are strong. The men, not so much. We have weak hearts.” An old woman was pushing a cart filled with a yellow fruit that looked like an overgrown apple down the side of the road. Theo pulled the truck over. “Excuse me, Anya. Her house is not far, but I know her back bothers her when it rains. I will return in less than ten minutes. Don’t drive off without me.” Theo got out of the truck and ran over to the woman. She kissed him on both cheeks, and he began pushing the cart down the road and then disappeared with the woman into an opening in the forest.

Theo returned to the truck with a piece of the fruit in each hand. “For you,” he said, placing one of the large fruits in my hand. “
Maracuyá
. Passion fruit.”

“Thank you,” I said. I hadn’t ever had or even seen one before.

Theo restarted the truck. “Do you have a great love, Anya Barnum?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“A great love! A grand passion!”

“Do you mean a boyfriend?” I asked.

“
Sí
, a boyfriend, if you favor such a boring word. Is there someone who you’ll weep for and who weeps for you back at home?”

I considered this. “Does it count if it’s hopeless?”

He smiled at me. “It especially counts if it is hopeless. The woman I was helping. She is the
abuela
of the girl I love. Sadly, the girl has told me she can never love me back. Yet still I am pulling over to help her grandmother. Can you explain this?”

I could not.

“Can you imagine the kind of girl who is so heartless as to resist someone so lovable as me?”

I laughed at him. “I’m sure there is a story.”

“Oh yes, it is very tragic. Why does everyone always like love stories? What about absence-of-love stories? Aren’t they much more common?”

Out my window, there was a large stacked-stone structure. “What’s that?”

“Mayan ruins. There are even better ones in Chiapas on the Guatemalan border. My ancestors are Mayan, you know.”

“
Theobroma
? Is that a Mayan name then?”

Theo laughed at me. “You do have a lot to learn, Señorita Barnum.”

The road was bumpy, and I was starting to feel carsick. I leaned my head on the window and closed my eyes and soon I fell asleep.