Let Their Spirits Dance (25 page)

We're in a time warp traveling to D.C. We've entered an orb that's propelling us to the Wall like a boomerang. We'll come back, but we won't be the same. When we get to the Wall, will that be the beginning or the end? Are there really parallel universes as Michael describes, whole images reverberating in the universe, defying our concept of space, location, and substance? And last of all, are we moving closer to Aztlán, or did we already pass it by?

C
hris's socks are hanging on the back of a chair in his room. They look like white Christmas stockings. He says he always gets his socks and shoes ready. You never know when you'll have to run out somewhere.

“It's from my old war days. It stayed with me. We never took off our shoes when we were out in the field no matter how bad the jungle rot got on our feet. To take off your shoes meant you were half dead and they were taking them off so you could die in peace.”

I position Chris's socks on the nightstand and sit back on the chair. He's sitting on the bed wearing corduroy walking shorts, a T-shirt, and no shoes. I've never seen his legs before. They're hairy, pale, thinner than I expected. The bed is a king-size with a glossy, orange comforter. It's bigger than the queen-size I shared with Ray at our house on Canterbury Street. It makes me wonder if people really need all that room.

“I hope someday you won't have to put them out at all,” I tell him.

“Someday.” Chris looks closely at me. “Relax. We're adults, not kids.”

“I don't think anybody saw me come in here.”

“And what if they did?”

“You know how people are.”

“Yeah, I can imagine Manuel, busting in here to rescue you.”

“He's always had a crush on me.”

“He better get over it.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“The vato's gotta learn to take ‘no' for an answer. You'd think he would have learned after all these years. But I can see how he could fall in love with you.”

I'm watching every move Chris makes, slow, deliberate moves. He walks a few paces to lock the door. His bare feet pound softly on the carpet. With my eyes I measure what his body might mean over mine. He's taller than Ray, with more angles, and firm muscles. He sits on the edge of the bed and leans close to me. It's strange how faces change, but eyes never do. Chris's eyes are the same. I see myself reflected in them, the high school girl he said good-bye to at the airport and the look in his eyes, mournful, afraid. The appetite I felt earlier in the day is filling up the space between us. It makes me shiver.

“Are you cold?”

“No, not cold.” I want to smile, but can't.

“Don't be so nervous,” he says. The middle of my chest starts to ache the minute he says the words, as if somebody ignited a match inside me. He kneels at my feet, switching off the lamp. Now we're encased in inky darkness.

“Leave the light on, I can't see you.”

“That's the way it was in Nam, Teresa. So dark I swear I could see black atoms floating in the air.”

“You must have been afraid.” I notice numbers glowing, bright red, from the digital clock on the TV, 12:31
A.M.
I watch the numbers change…12:32
A.M.

“After a while that went away,” Chris says. “Then you became part of the darkness, like a tree or a rock—you just stayed there and tried not to move. The night didn't care what side we were on, it covered us all, except Charlie knew the place with his eyes closed, and we didn't. We were in his backyard. Imagine being in somebody else's backyard at night.”

I feel Chris's forehead and he's sweating, cool drops of sweat on my hand.

“You're sweating, Chris—are you all right?”

“It happens sometimes. I guess my body's got the nights in Nam recorded like a history lesson. I wish it didn't, but never mind about that, take off your shoes, Teresa, and I'll rub your feet.”

“I'm here to give you a neck rub, remember?” My voice sounds like an echo in my ears. I feel like I'm talking in a cave.

“Forget it. I want to do this for you,” he says. The flame in my chest reaches my stomach and groin. It makes me sit up straight in the chair.

Chris starts taking off one of my sandals and can't undo the strap. His fingers feel icy cold against my flesh. He's fumbling, trying again. It's comical somehow, like we're two kids in the back seat of a car.

“Chris, turn the light back on.”

“I can see in the dark. I learned how to do that in Vietnam.”

“This isn't Vietnam.”

“Are these shoes glued to your feet?”

“Maybe you're nervous. Let me do it.”

“No, I can do this.” He tries the other shoe.

“Chris, you're making the straps tighter…you're hurting my ankle.” I feel for his face in the dark, and it's wet with tears.

I kneel on the floor with him. He puts his arms around me, and I lay my head on his shoulder.

“You smell like you did when I left for Nam, Teresa. You were so beautiful, so beautiful, still are. I swear I carried your smell with me all the way to Nam. I guess I want to do for you what I didn't do for your brother—take off your shoes, give you peace. All I did was cover Jesse's face with my shirt. God, I regret not riding with him in the chopper!” I hold Chris tight in my arms. He's crying on my shoulder, into my hair. Our tears get mixed up in the dark. We stand up together, holding tight.

“Lie down, Chris.” I lead him by the hand, like a drowsy child, gently, slowly to bed. His teeth start chattering. I cover him over with a blanket. His body twitches. He groans. I take off my shoes, thinking of El Santo Niño's sandals and how worn out they would be if He walked all the way to Vietnam. I lie next to Chris, encircling him in my arms, resting his head in the middle of my chest where the match ignited an ache in me. I stroke his hair.

“Jesse told me he wasn't coming back, Chris.” I whisper the words and swallow back the sound that wants to erupt from my throat.

“He knew more than I did. Jesse was like that. His mind moved through space, like he could figure out things we didn't know anything about. Me? I thought I would die, and Jesse would come back.”

“Is that why you went back…to see if you would die?”

“Maybe. There were so many Chicanos over there, and even more when troops were being pulled out and only certain companies were left. We had front row seats. You know no Chicano is gonna do the rear when his buddies are up front. Maybe I wanted to join them. It was worse staying alive—all the nightmares, the whole mess here. People
accusing us of killing babies. I let my hair grow long, I hated anything that made me remember the war. I didn't even tell people I had been there, it got so bad. I started to march with the protesters for a while, then I couldn't stand it, because I thought they were a bunch of cowards, going the gabacho way and burning their draft cards. Sorry m'fer's, I thought. Then I'd feel bad cause I really didn't want them to go to Nam. I knew the war was sick—so sick, and we still kept fighting. Your nana gave me that little prayer, remember? I kept it with me next to my mom's picture, and it was the only thing I didn't lose. We were like that, los Chicanos, holding on to crucifixes and prayers, pictures of La Virgen de Guadalupe, and our moms. We were in a man's world, but we hung on to our women. I never told Margie any of this. I came back to Albuquerque and married her, and I didn't know why.”

“Ray never told me anything about Vietnam either, and he wasn't even fighting in the front. He was a mechanic.”

“It's like we were chained up together, Teresa, like all of us went to Hell and nobody else would understand. I had my two daughters with Margie. She finally divorced me, and I don't blame her. I still love her. Margie could have had anybody she wanted. I don't know why she waited for me. After Margie, I went two more rounds with other women, and they did the same thing. I didn't really care, because I didn't love them. I looked at myself in the mirror one day, and I couldn't stand what I saw. I was disgusted with myself, because I couldn't get Nam out of my system. That was the day I almost turned a gun on myself. If it hadn't been for thinking about my two daughters, I probably would have done it, but I remembered all the kids I saw in the war with no parents, crying, sleeping on the streets, some of them raped, or made into prostitutes and drug dealers. I saw their faces in my head, so small. They were these tiny people and I was a giant, ‘number ten GI' they used to call me cause they knew I wasn't into torture and all that shit. I was ashamed of myself, watching what other guys did to them. And they still called me ‘number ten GI'!”

I hold Chris tight until the pain is a pinpoint in my chest. Chris is still mumbling about the kids in Vietnam, a baby who was paralyzed by a bullet in his spine, a young girl raped by one of the ARVNs, an old woman beaten by an American with the butt of his gun, running—wanting to find Salt and Pepper, the fabled Black and White soldiers who deserted the American forces and joined up with the VC.

My throat is aching. There are questions I want to ask Chris. What did Jesse say before he died? And the woman he wrote to me about, the
one who taught him Vietnamese—who was she? It won't make any sense to Chris, not now. He finally falls asleep, and I sleep, too.

I wake up with a jump. Chris is bundled in a blanket next to me. We're curled up in the middle of the bed. The room is ice cold from the air conditioner running all night. It makes me wonder if there's winter in Vietnam. I want to get up before everybody else does.

I slide quietly to the edge of the bed. Chris rolls over and puts his hand on my thigh. It's warm. Deep in my pelvis, I sense an ache. I want to rush back to the middle of the bed and let his hands find the rest of me, but the room is already bathed in early morning light. The light illuminates the truth. I'm not the high school girl Chris said good-bye to at Sky Harbor Airport, and he's not the young soldier who walked backwards alongside my brother to get to the plane that would fly them away to Vietnam and change them forever.

He strokes my hair gently, and lets his hand run smoothly over my shoulder. “Don't leave, Teresa.”

“I have to.” I put my sandals back on. “You don't have to help me with my shoes. I'll be all right.”

“I'm sorry,” he says.

“For what?” I ask him. I lean over him, arrange the blanket under his chin, and kiss his forehead.