Breadfruit (31 page)

She’s still got those bathroom tiles sitting around—the ones that Lily offered to give away to the first person who went and
got them when she retiled her bathroom.

Materena gets a piece of paper and a pen and sits at the kitchen table to draw her swimming pool. It’s square. One yard by
one yard, and twenty inches deep. Materena studies her plan for a while and concludes that her swimming pool is more a pond
than a swimming pool.

Well, a pond is better than a washtub, Materena thinks.

The pond is going to be out the back, next to the frangipani tree, and Materena gets the shovel. Pito, who’s practicing on
his ukulele outside, shakes his head as Materena walks past him, the shovel on her shoulder.

“What are you doing with that shovel?” he asks.

She explains the situation and Pito laughs.

“So, you’re a pond expert now?”

“I never said I was a pond expert.” Materena wishes Pito would just concentrate on his ukulele.

“But you know what you’re doing?”

“Oh
oui!
” And to prove to Pito that indeed she knows what she is doing, Materena begins to dig furiously.

Pito calls out to the kids to come and look at their mother, who is building a pond, and within minutes the three kids are
at the scene.

“You’re building a pond?” Moana asks.

Materena nods.

Moana’s eyes widen with excitement, and he starts taking his clothes off. “When is it going to be finished?”

“Soon.” Materena is very confident.

Pito snorts, prompting Tamatoa to snort too. Circumcision or no circumcision, Materena has been noticing some changes in Tamatoa
lately. Eh, it’s the age. But it makes her feel just a bit sad.

“I better not see your behind in Mamie’s pond, Tamatoa,” Leilani warns him.

“And the pond is going to be big?” Moana asks.

“Big enough for you, Leilani, and me,” Materena replies, looking straight into Tamatoa’s eyes.

She keeps on digging. There’s sweat on her forehead, sweat under her armpits, sweat between her legs. She’d never known digging
a pool would be so difficult. She keeps on digging and hums a happy tune to give herself energy. Materena can visualize the
pond when complete. In her opinion, if you believe in yourself, you can’t fail. And she believes in herself. She wants that
pond very much.

She’s got the hole, and now it is time to place the tiles in it. She goes and gets the tiles, stacked at the back of the house.
Leilani and Moana follow her. There are over one hundred tiles—plenty. Moana and Leilani immediately propose to help, and
the three of them carry the tiles back to the hole.

Materena places the first tile and pats it good into the soil.

“You think the water is going to stay in?” Pito asks.

“Of course.”

“You are sure about that?”

“
Oui,
I’m sure. I’m positive.”

“You don’t think the water is going to leak?”

Pito’s questions are starting to get on Materena’s nerves.

“
Non,
” she says, “I don’t think the water is going to leak, I think the water is going to fill my pond.”

“The way you talk about that pond, it’s like it’s already a reality,” Pito says. “Well, I’m telling you, woman, what you’re
doing now, it’s a waste of time. You need concrete.”

Materena shrugs. Pito’s words—in one ear and out the other. “You can’t build a pond with tiles, Papi?” Tamatoa just wants
to confirm the situation.

“You need concrete,” Pito says. Tamatoa looks at his mother and shakes his head.

Materena spends quite some time neatly laying the tiles into the dirt. And now it is time to get the hose. Moana rushes to
the outside tap, turns it on, and runs back with the hose, grinning.

Materena fills the pond with water. The water escapes through the tiles, into the dirt. Pito and Tamatoa glance at each other
and smirk. Materena readjusts the tiles but the water keeps escaping. Plus, it’s mud in there.

She’s getting very upset, but, looking at her face, you wouldn’t know she feels like crying. Looking at her face, you would
think she doesn’t care if her pond is going to be a reality or not.

“Oh well,” she says casually. “It’s not for today.”

“You need —,” Tamatoa begins.

But with one look Pito commands his son to be quiet.

Materena wants to smash the tiles with the shovel, but there’s no need to overreact. It’s best to walk away and deal with
the tiles later on. She’s going to go and have a long, cool shower. She marches away with dignity as Pito and the kids look
on.

Moana puts his clothes back on. “Poor Mamie.”

Materena cries under the shower. She punches herself too—she’s so angry about the situation. What got into me, wanting to
build a pond? A pond, eh! Silly
andouille.
She grinds her teeth. You stupid woman. Why didn’t you just get into the family-size washing tub, like you usually do? Why
create complications? The washing tub is perfect!

Materena is not sure if she’s crying because her pond didn’t become a reality or because she thought about her wedding last
night, the wedding that will never happen, meaning she will die without a ring on her finger and a framed certificate on the
wall. Materena doesn’t understand why the wedding came into her head last night. She really believed she was completely over
all that—cured. Well, maybe she’s not crying about that at all. Maybe she’s crying now because she just feels like it. Because
crying feels good sometimes.

A clap of thunder breaks, shortly followed by another. Fat drops of rain begin to splatter on the tin roof and within minutes
it is pouring. There’s excitement outside.

“Mamie!” Leilani calls out. “Come and see!”

Materena, thinking that Pito has done some magic with her pond, wraps a towel around herself and runs to the back door to
investigate.

The rain has filled up the pond.

Leilani and Moana are squeezed into the pond, laughing and splashing each other with the muddy water and pushing Tamatoa out
of the pond every time he tries to get in.

Materena stops feeling sorry for herself.

Who needs concrete when there’s rain?

I
t is still raining, and just listening to the rain spattering on the tin roof is making Materena melancholic. And when Materena
feels melancholic, she cries. This week she finds that tears are coming easily to her and sometimes there’s no particular
reason. She’ll be sweeping, for instance, and then, just like that, she’ll start feeling sad.

But today she’s crying for her cousin Tepua.

Tepua’s nickname is
po’o neva-neva,
head-in-the-clouds. Her cousin James said to her one day, “Tepua, the Pope is in Tahiti and he’s celebrating Mass at the
cathedral in Papeete this Sunday morning.” Sunday came and Tepua scrubbed and dressed her kids all nice and they caught the
truck to Papeete to see the Pope at the cathedral.

But since her tragedy, nobody calls Tepua head-in-the-clouds anymore. It happened almost a year ago to this day.

It was a Sunday after Mass when Tepua came in contact with the
popa’a
woman for the first time. The
popa’a
woman gave Tepua compliments about her kids looking adorable in their white Sunday clothes. Tepua didn’t mind that woman
saying nice things about her family, and they got talking more right next to the church about the weather, the priest’s sermon,
Tepua’s sixth child, due in four months… the
popa’a
woman’s inability to have children.

The
popa’a
woman, Jacqueline was her name, had known about her sad condition for years and said she’d accepted it until her man got
transferred to Tahiti. But here, everywhere Jacqueline went she saw children. Children came into her dreams too.

Tepua felt sorry for Jacqueline and she invited her to visit her house for a little more talk sometime. She gave her all the
necessary directions: behind the snack, fourth house, green and yellow, and there’s a washing machine out the front. Tepua
explained how it didn’t work anymore.

Tepua cleaned her house from top to bottom, which was good, because Jacqueline came the next morning. They talked some more
and when Jacqueline left, Tepua said to herself, “I like that woman—poor her, eh.”

Jacqueline came back two days later, then two days later again, then it’s a brand-new family-size washing machine that came.
Tepua told the delivery people that they better check the address, because she sure didn’t order a brand-new family-size washing
machine. But her name was on the delivery docket, along with the name of her
popa’a
friend—Madame Jacqueline Pietre.

Tepua got a bit mad at Madame Jacqueline Pietre because not once had she complained to her about not having a washing machine,
and you don’t give people you don’t know well a brand-new family-size washing machine. Tepua was going to give that washing
machine back, but she was tired of washing by hand, and since her new friend (her sister, almost, now) had plenty of money
in the bank . . .

Tepua asked her
popa’a
sister to be the godmother of the baby, and that lady, Jacqueline, accepted in a second. In fact, she fell to her knees and
blessed Tepua.

It was after this that the weirdness began. Jacqueline, she started to talk strange—pain in her lower back, swollen breasts,
nausea, cravings for strawberries and pumpkin. She started to act strange too, always wanting to caress Tepua’s belly and
reading poetry to the baby like it could hear. Tepua was concerned her
popa’a
sister was going mad on her.

Jacqueline dedicated a whole bedroom of her house to her godchild. She bought a brand-new cot with a mosquito net, mobiles
to hang from the ceiling, toys, toys, and more toys. The layette too was under control, made of expensive embroidered fabric.

Two months before her baby was due, Tepua visited her
popa’a
sister’s house for the very first time. Jacqueline showed Tepua around; then, speaking softly and holding Tepua’s hands,
she mentioned the word
adoption.

Tepua snatched her hands away. “I’m not the kind of mother who gives her children away.”

Jacqueline insisted that
adoption
didn’t mean “give away.” The child, she insisted, would be Tepua’s still. But the food, the clothes, the education, she would
pay. Jacqueline insisted that she was only trying to be a perfect godmother.

For nights, Tepua considered the proposal, wanting and not wanting—thinking about the washing machine, thinking about the
bedroom, her life, her difficult life, all the other children coming her way, six, maybe seven. Tepua asked God for a little
sign, and the next day she went to see the priest about getting an operation to stop children coming her way, but the priest
wouldn’t give Tepua the authorization because she was in good health.

So Tepua agreed that Jacqueline would get the baby and Tepua would get unlimited access to the baby—at Jacqueline’s house,
secured behind an electric gate.

“My house is your house,” Jacqueline swore.

And to prove this, Jacqueline revealed to Tepua the code of her electric gate.

Some papers had to be signed—just a formality for the inheritance—and Monsieur Pietre took Tepua’s husband to the bar and
paid his fare home.

Madame Pietre’s adoptive daughter was born on a Saturday morning. Madame Pietre felt the contractions and pushed her baby
into the world. And when the doctor gave her the dark-haired and brown-skinned newborn, she cried out, “Oh, she looks just
like me!”

It was two weeks after the birth that Tepua paid Madame Pietre a visit, her second. She entered the code and the electric
gate opened. Then she heard her baby wail and ran to her rescue.

Jacqueline didn’t kiss Tepua, she just looked at her up and down, all the while holding the baby tight. Jacqueline wouldn’t
let Tepua hold the baby. “It is for the best that you don’t come to my house again,” she said.

Tepua went home. She felt a bit lost. She didn’t understand Jacqueline speaking to her like she was a stranger. They were
friends. They were sisters. Maybe my sister is tired from lack of sleep, she thought. It can make you aggressive—not sleeping
and a crying baby.

Tepua went back to Jacqueline’s house two days later. She entered the code but the electric gate didn’t open. Maybe it was
broken. So Tepua climbed over the electric gate and called out, “Jacqueline! Jacqueline, girlfriend!”

Jacqueline immediately came out of the house. “Get off my property!” she shouted like a woman gone mad. She hurried back inside
the house to telephone the gendarmerie and a gendarme came to throw Tepua off Madame Pietre’s property.

“Do you know it is against the law to trespass on private property?” the gendarme said, violently grabbing Tepua by the arm.

“I’ve been robbed too many times, monsieur,” Madame Pietre complained. “This must stop.”

The gendarme agreed that stealing was a serious problem in Tahiti. He said, “The problem with those people is that they mistake
the verb
stealing
for the verb
borrowing.
”

Tepua smashed the brand-new washing machine with a hammer. Then she got an ax and destroyed the washing machine, all the while
crying her heart out.

None of her relatives said to her: “You, head-in-the-clouds. Why did you sign the papers?”

Mori picked up the destroyed washing machine and took it to the dump. He also picked up the other broken washing machine,
like he was supposed to do months before.

There was a prayer meeting the night before at Loana’s house to beg the Virgin Mary, Understanding Woman, to help Tepua overcome
her loss. Lily slapped Loma across the face because Loma said, “I can’t believe Tepua gave her child away.” And Materena cried
out loud as if she were the mother who’d lost her child.

Materena is still sobbing, but the children are back from school; she can hear Tamatoa and Leilani arguing on the path. Materena
gets to her feet and hurries to the bathroom to wash her face.