Infinite Devotion (14 page)

In the morning, the keys jingle, and I’m relieved he didn’t die overnight. Bella gets up and wags her tail at his approach. His wife opens up the back door and croaks out, “Bella,” but the dog stays right by my feet.

The old man laughs. “I think she likes you. She never passes up sausage in the morning.”

I help him move his cart to market, and Bella runs beside me the whole way. He reaches for the usual apple but puts his finger up for me to wait, and my mouth waters as he withdraws a greasy parcel from his pocket and hands it to me. I can smell what it is‌—‌sausages! I take them quickly, and I’m so happy I hug him and nearly knock him over. He smiles and coughs as he regains his balance. I run off as Bella follows.

“Don’t forget to help me at sunset!” he calls out between cupped hands. “And take care of Bella!”

I’m so happy to have a friend that I share my sausages with her. She is the whitest white and has a look to her eyes that makes her different from any dog I’ve known: a spark of human understanding. She follows me to the docks and even snatches a fish from a basket left by some fishermen. The look on their faces as she pulls a herring out of the basket that is half the size of her and runs back to me is priceless. As soon as I see what she did, I start running, trying to find a good place for us to escape to.

When she drops the fish for me, I say, “You can eat it like that, but I can’t.”

I try to think about how I can find a fire to cook it on. I pick up the fish and walk along the dirt road until I catch the smell of an open fire. I follow it around some houses and see a small lean-to made out of sailcloth and a small fire with an empty spit over it. I approach slowly, but Bella runs right into the tent.

“Bella!” I whisper, but nothing seems to happen, and I peer in and see Bella sitting down on someone’s tattered quilt.

With no one in sight, I risk using the fire for a few minutes and take my shirt off to take the skewer off and pierce the already gutted fish. My mouth waters as the smell emerges from the fish, but it seems to draw the attention of someone else.

“Get out of my house!”

I hear a voice behind me and turn to see a boy who is either slightly older than me or simply taller. He is dirty, unkempt, and carries a large stick in his hands that he holds over me threateningly. Bella barks and grabs on to his pant leg and begins thrashing.

“Get him off!”

“Bella!” I shout, and she runs back over to me.

“Look, I was just using your fire for a minute. If you let me finish cooking this fish, I’ll give you some.”

He thinks about it for a moment and gives a stiff nod. He sits across from me with his thumbnail between the small space in his teeth and watches the fish turn in the fire.

“I think it’s done,” he says only a minute after waiting.

“You must be starving.”

He holds his stomach. “I couldn’t find anything all day.”

I take the fish off the spit as he pulls out a knife. I straighten away from him, but he reaches for the fish and fillets it, giving me the bigger half. He gives the skin to Bella.

It’s the best fish I’ve ever had, and after it’s gone, I get up to leave and say, “Thanks for the fire.”

“Where are you going?”

“Don’t you want me to leave?’

“Well,” he says as he dribbles his stick, making an eight on its side over and over again in the dirt, “there’s nothing else to do.”

I sit again, and Bella crawls into my lap and lies down.

“My name’s Pepe. What’s yours?”

“Luis.”

“Do you live in a house?”

“No.”

“Do you have parents?”

“Not anymore.”

He looks happy about this.

“I live here and can move whenever I want to. If I feel like being by the water, I move. If I feel like being in the woods, I go.”

“That sounds really good.”

I envy his little lean-to, studying it to see if I can find material to do the same.

“All I need, I have right here.” He pats his pocket proudly and slowly pulls out each item. “This here’s my knife. Used to be my father’s before he died fighting the Dutch. Here’s Auradona; she’s my flint rock. If I lost her, I’d be done for. Last, I have my sewing kit.”

He unwraps a piece of cloth with a needle made of bone and one spool of black thread.

“It was my mother’s. I use it to fix all of the holes in my clothes and the quilt I found.” He carefully wraps everything back up. “She gave it to me before she dumped me at Saint Mary’s.” He points back up the hill.

“St. Mary’s?”

“The orphanage.” He begins making his eights again incessantly. “You don’t ever want to end up there.” His eyes light up. “That place was so full of kids, the nuns would try to control them, but they were so wild, one of the nuns went crazy. She started running up and down the hall with her hands up by her head saying ‘Baah-dah-da-da-da-da-da-da-da!’”

I start laughing, and he gets up to show me.

“Baah-dah-da-da-da-da-da-da-da!” he screams and runs around the fire.

I keep laughing until Bella begins barking, and as I look up, I see dark clouds moving in.

“Pepe, I have to go. A storm is coming.”

“Where do you sleep?”

“I have to go!” I start running. “Come, Bella!”

“I might have room for you if you need a place to stay!” he screams out over the distance, but I only wave him off, trying to get to the market before the sky opens up.

The old man’s already put the burlap cover on and is trying to move the cart but is having trouble. I run right up and start helping him push. He releases the cart and pats his head with his handkerchief as he sighs. “Thank the Lord.”

I push as fast as I can without toppling the apples, but the rain begins pouring down as we round the corner to his house.

We’re getting soaked as he stands with the lock and once he opens it, he gives me an apple. He asks as I turn to go, “Where are you going?”

“I thought you didn’t want me to stay another night?”

“It’s pouring. God would strike me dead if I sent you out in this rain after helping me. Now get in quick.”

He smiles and leaves but comes back ten minutes later with a few things under his arms. He hands them to me. “Bella will be happy to have you again. She hates storms.”

After pulling the door closed, he locks the shed. There’s no light in the shed, but I can feel he gave me a whole loaf of bread with a pat of butter and what feels like an old nightshirt. It smells a little of him, but I’m soaked to the bone and start to get a chill. It feels wonderful to put on the soft, old shirt, and I make my bed of burlap and share my dinner. When the cracking thunder rattles the shed, Bella won’t stop shaking. I try to fold her ears over so she can’t hear it, but she doesn’t relax until it’s passed. I think of Pepe and wonder how it must be sleeping on the ground tonight.

Chapter 3

The morning routine is the same, and Bella and I run off with our sausages. I decide to save one, even though my stomach wants it, and run off to find Pepe. His camp is empty. I wander back in the brushy area above the large rocks by the water and hear a strange call.

“Chick-a-bow!”

I look up and see Pepe standing on a huge rock, calling to me. I run up quickly and see he was smart in making his lean-to under a boulder that sticks out like a ledge.

“Were you dry last night?”

“As a biscuit,” he says proudly. “What about you? Where’d you go?”

“I know a good place.” Not wanting to admit someone has to help me.

“I smell something good.” He puts his nose up to the air, and his light green eyes sparkle as I bring out the sausage I saved for him.

“You owe me,” I say as he throws the sausage into his mouth and smiles after. Why does that space in his teeth always draw my eyes so?

“I’m still starving.” He rubs his bony ribs. “Let’s go and see what we can find at the docks.”

“Bella got that fish yesterday.” I laugh.

“Maybe she’ll do it again.”

We hide behind some crates by a pier as the fishermen are bringing in their baskets. Once Bella sees them put one on the dock, she runs for it, but this time, the fishermen shouts at her as she nears. She tries to bite their ankles, and once they shake her loose, she runs in circles as they try to kick her. One of the fishermen knocks into the basket, spilling the fish in the whole chaotic scene. Bella quickly grabs a large fish and takes off with two fishermen after her. Pepe looks at me, and we both know she’s heading right for us. We run off back into the street, and Pepe just misses getting hit by a carriage. He’s much faster than me, but I see a small woodshed by a house and whistle. Pepe comes running back, and we hide, along with Bella and her huge fish.

We hear the men come running by, panting. One curses, and then it sounds like they left. After waiting a little longer, we look at each other and start laughing. We laugh so hard that we realized they must not be around, and we start pulling ourselves out, when we hear crying. It’s coming from under the wood. As we pull a few pieces away, we see a younger, smaller boy curled up in a space between the wood stack and the shed wall.

“Go away!” he yells as he feels the wood pulled off his back.

“We’re not going to hurt you. We were only hiding in here.”

“I found this place first,” he snaps.

“Whoa, easy there, tough guy,” Pepe says.

“We’re leaving with our fish.” I start to move out.

At the mention of fish, his brown-haired head pops up, he searches our hands, and upon seeing the big fish, he suddenly sits up.

“How old are you?” Pepe asks.

“Twelve.”

“Yeah, right!” Pepe says.

“Okay, I’m ten.”

Even that seems old for his small stature.

“How did you get that?” I ask, seeing a large wound on his forehead, not yet healed.

“A group of boys around the block beat me with sticks, telling me this was their street.”

I suddenly feel bad for him.

“Why don’t you come with us and share our fish?” Pepe says as he pulls Auradona out of his pocket. “I can start a fire to cook it.”

The small boy’s eyes flash at the mention of a cooked dinner. We help him out and run off with Bella in front spinning this way and that to figure out which direction we are headed.

After we eat our fish, I pull out my apple, and the new boy and Pepe both cheer. I feel like a hero. I put my hand out, and Pepe realizes I want his knife. I cut the apple into equal pieces. We lay back after our bellies are full. Full is such an unfamiliar feeling to us all.

“What’s your name?” I ask.

“Andres.”

“This is Pepe, and I’m Luis.”

“We make a pretty good team,” Pepe says to me.

“I can help too!” Andres tries. “I can run really fast, you know.”

“What’s your story?”

Andres looks down. “My mother died, and no one came for me.”

We both nod and feel sad for ourselves for a moment.

“It doesn’t matter, though. We can take care of ourselves,” Pepe says.

“I can’t go back to my woodshed, because if those boys find me again, they said they’d shove their sticks up my ass.” His eyes widen like plates as he says this.

Pepe and I can’t help laughing.

“Really, they are! I can’t go back there. I want to stay with you guys. I’ll help you.”

Pepe cocks his head. “Fine, you can stay with me. I think you’ll fit. Just don’t stink it up.” He goes back under the rock but starts throwing leaves in the air, saying, “I left it here! Someone stole it!”

“Stole what?” Andres asks me.

“His tent.”

“Oh, that’s not good.” Andres frowns.

“Of course it’s not good! Where am I going to find a piece of canvas like that? I had to sneak on a galleon to get it!”

I squint up at the sky. “It looks like it’s going to rain again tonight too.”

“Great!” Pepe throws a large pebble.

“Well, you can come sleep with me, maybe?” I venture, thinking the old man probably won’t allow it.

“Where do you sleep?”

“In an old man’s shed, where he keeps his apple cart. I bring his cart back and forth from market for him, and he gives me some food and lets me sleep in his shed. Bella’s his dog.”

“You let me sleep in the rain when you had a nice warm shed to sleep in?” Pepe says half-jokingly.

“Well, let’s go help the old man!” Andres starts for the market.

The old man is leaning back on the wall having a coughing fit when his eyes widen as he sees who I brought with me.

“Oh, no. Oh, no! What do you think I am, St. Mary’s?”

Andres tries to look as cute as he can while Pepe avoids making eye contact.

“They don’t have anywhere to sleep either and”—he’s shaking his head back and forth, still coughing as I speak—“you don’t have to give me more food. I’ve been sharing mine.”

He takes a deep breath once his fit is over and looks up to the sky. “Anna Maria will skin me alive if she finds out.”

Andres cleverly says with a sad face, “We understand. Don’t worry about us; we’ll find a rock we can sleep under.”

He starts walking away, and Bella barks at him.

“Oh, I’m going to die soon anyway. What do I care?” He pulls his old body from the wall. “Come help me put this cover on and get my cart back for me.”