Let Their Spirits Dance (31 page)

One of the flickering candles is scented, and makes the motel room smell like a miniature church. The two heavenly figures look back at the old ladies, unblinking, silent. “They've brought us this far, they won't fail us now,” Mom says. “Dios obra en todo, God works through all things.”

Later, Priscilla and I come back from the laundromat with the clothes folded and ready to be put away. We find the Guadalupanas kneeling before their makeshift altar reciting a litany of praise, a chant that moves in circles around their heads, breathing over the flickering candle flames. Bendito sea Dios, bendito sea su santo nombre, bendito sea Dios en sus angeles y en sus santos, Blessed be God, blessed be His holy name, blessed be God in his angels and in his saints. Blessed be this, blessed be that—the chanting goes on for fifteen minutes at least. It reminds me of the song my mother never finished the day we found out Jesse had been killed. Bendito, Bendito, Bendito sea Dios, los angeles cantan y alaban a Dios. Blessed, blessed, blessed is God, angels are singing and praising God, angels are singing and praising God. A deep nostalgia for Mom's voice goes through me like an electric shock that makes me drop the clothes I'm putting away. The Guadalupanas are so caught up in their prayers they don't even look my way. I want to shout at Mom—SING THE SONG—SING “BENDITO”! It's been so long, too long. I don't say anything. I just freeze in position behind them and listen to their chanting, mesmerized by the weariness of the journey and the feeling that la manda between Mom and Heaven will be finished before another day goes by.

Jesse looks like he's smiling at all of us from his position between the heavenly figures. I know Jesse. He'd probably say “Get me out of here” if he really found himself caught between the two old women. He wouldn't say anything about La Virgen and El Santo Niño, he had too much respect for that.

Priscilla is out the door before I am. “Mom shouldn't be kneeling like that, it'll put pressure on her knees.”

“Forget it,” I tell her. “She's got more strength than the two of us when it comes to praying and believing.”

“That won't help her in D.C.,” Priscilla says. “Have you thought about what's really gonna happen there? Do you think Mom can handle all this? We'll see his name on the Wall.” Priscilla says the last words like she's whispering a prayer.
We'll see his name
…

“And we'll touch it,” I tell her.

“God, why did all this happen to us? Did we do something wrong?” Priscilla asks. “Maybe we didn't love God enough, or each other. Maybe God got mad at us and took Jesse. He was the best our family had to offer. Do you think God's like that?”

“He's not the Aztec god! What are you talking about? Christ sacrificed Himself, what does that tell you?”

“I still miss Annette, Teresa!” Priscilla says suddenly. “God, this trip is killing me! I'll never touch my baby again! Mom gets to touch Jesse's name, and all I have is Annette's headstone.” Priscilla is crying, wiping her tears with the end of her T-shirt. I haven't seen her cry in years and forgot what it was like to smooth her hair back and blot out her tears with my fingers. “Maybe I'm being punished for all the wild years. You remember…the times I wouldn't listen to anybody.”

“I told you, God's not like that. He's not standing around wondering how he's gonna hurt us. He doesn't think like a human being. He knows we're hurting, but there's some hurt He can't take away from us just as we can't take our kids' pain. Those two old ladies in there, they know what it means to suffer and still believe that God is good. Just because we go through pain, doesn't mean God isn't close by—that He doesn't love us anymore. All these years I've known how much you hurt for Annette. I've always known, maybe that's why I'm glad you're close to Lilly. I thought maybe one of my own girls would give you comfort.”

“She does. Lilly's part of the reason I've survived all these years. She's given me the chance to see what it means to have a daughter.”

“Think about it this way, Priscilla, we were with Mom all the way. She has to do this, she has to finish la manda.” We hold hands as we did when we were kids and get ready to walk downstairs. Before we take a step, we hear Michael and Angelo racing up the stairs, out of breath. They tell us that Yellowhair and his mother, Sarah, have started a bonfire behind a garbage bin and are chanting and moving around in a circle.

“It's some kind of Zuñi ritual,” Michael says. “A cleansing ceremony from their tribe.”

“Can I put on feathers like Yellowhair?” Angelo asks.

We hurry down the stairs before the motel manager calls the fire department on Yellowhair and his mother. By the time we get there, Yellowhair is smoking a peace pipe and sitting before a fire smoldering in a tin tub that looks like the old-fashioned kind we used to bathe ourselves in when we were kids. He's wearing red and white feathers as a headdress. I'm glad there's high oleander bushes all around, blocking
Yellowhair and his mother from the parking lot behind us. Sarah is sitting next to her son, dressed in a black and white jumper, flowered scarf, and white leggings, holding a white eagle feather in her hand. The fragrant smell of sage reaches me and instantly my body relaxes. I remember Don Florencío and pretend he's the one who lit the fire.

“Jesse would love this!” I tell Yellowhair.

“My ancestors wouldn't like us to approach a place like the Wall without a ceremony cleansing us and getting us ready for what the invisible world is preparing.”

“And what is it preparing?” Priscilla asks.

“Who knows?” Yellowhair answers. “It's best not to ask too many questions. The answers will come by themselves. My ancestors hid for years from the white man, in kivas to worship in secret. So much of what is revealed is in secret. My mother, here, knows so much, she's wise, but she doesn't say much because she knows the gods will do what they want anyway.”

“Gods?” I ask him.

“Gods, like beings who guard us, but there is only one Great Spirit. We have Shalako who dance, six of them with huge masks. They tell the story of how the Zuñis came from the center of the earth to a resting place on a river. Later the white man swallowed up the river with a dam, and now we live in villages.”

Yellowhair sprinkles sacred meal on the fire and it turns the fire to tiny sparks.

“Jesse and I knew an old man named Don Florencío, a descendant of the Aztecs. He used to sprinkle sacred cornmeal in fire to cleanse the air of evil spirits. He believed our ancestors came from seven caves, somewhere in a land called Aztlán, which was north of Mexico.”

“The Zuñis believe they are at the center of the earth,” Yellowhair says. “I think all people believe themselves to be located in sacred places. My brother, Strong Horse, now lives in a sacred place, maybe in the center of the earth, who knows?”

Michael and Angelo adorn themselves with feathers and start dancing around the smoky tin tub. They attract attention from other motel residents and pretty soon a maintenance man comes by with a hose to spray the fire down. He splashes water into the tub, and the fire turns to gray smoke.

“This is against city code!” he says in a loud voice. “What are you people trying to do, close the place down?”

Manuel, Chris, and the others come down to see what's going on,
and the maintenance man tells us if we're going to do a war dance to go to another motel. Pretty soon we've got an audience of motel guests.

“We're not doing a war dance,” Manuel says. “We're against war! We're the family traveling to the Vietnam Wall. Haven't you heard about us?”

“Oh yeah,” the man says. “Yeah, I heard about you, and frankly I don't care where you're going as long as you don't burn this place down.”

“It doesn't matter what happens now,” Yellowhair says. “The ceremony is over. Great Spirit protected us.” The man dumps the water from the tub into the oleanders as we walk away, then hoists the tub into the garbage bin.

“Buncha crazies,” he says. “The whole goddamn world is going to hell.”

I think about the Guadalupanas in their room with the flickering candles, the silent images and the prayers spinning circles over their heads, and decide I don't believe the world is going to hell anymore. I did once, after Jesse was killed. I smile at the man, and it surprises me. He's so unhappy, his whole body is an angry fist.

 

• I
'M GLAD
C
HRIS
is sharing a room with the boys tonight. I'm tempted to crawl into bed with him. There's also a part of me that wants to call Ray on the phone just to hear his voice. The Wall is bigger than life in my mind, an immense structure, bigger than the Wall of China Willy talked about the other day. He said the Great Wall of China was one thousand miles long. “Is it a wailing wall like the Vietnam Wall?” I asked him. “No, of course not, except thousands died to build it, so that makes it a wailing wall of sorts.”

About one o'clock in the morning Irene knocks on my door to tell me Mom is upset and crying. I walk into their room and Mom is sitting up in bed, her hair like a wispy halo on the pillow. My first thought is that she's heard the voices again. I sit next to her hoping it's not the voices. A chill goes through my body.

“Did I do right, mija?” she asks as she catches her breath between sobs.

“About what, Mom?” I sit next to her, smoothing the sheet around her, arranging her hair on the pillow.

“Staying with your dad. He was so mean to all of us—to Jesse—then Jesse left. I know it was to get away from your father. But I still stayed
with him! Ay, can Jesse ever forgive me? Maybe he hasn't—maybe I came all this way, and Jesse doesn't want to see me!”

“Mom, his name is on the Wall. There are no eyes on the Wall.”

“You don't understand, mija. Spirits see without eyes.”

“Jesse's not mad at you, Mom. You know how he loved you and Dad. He couldn't stay home when other guys were paying with their lives in Vietnam. But let me ask you this. Are
you
mad at him?”

“Ay! For leaving me, yes, for leaving me! Why did he do that to me? I told him stay in school—but no, you see he didn't do what I asked.”

“What about me, Mom, are you mad at me?”

“Mad at you? For what, mija?”

“For not telling you that Jesse told me he'd never come back. I knew even before he left.”

“Your nana told me. I knew, but I didn't let myself believe it. You should never blame yourself. I hid everything inside me, and I didn't want to see it.”

“Mom—remember when you lost Inez, because I almost drowned in the Salt River and gave you el susto?”

“El susto?”

“Yeah, the fear. Doña Carolina said fear could freeze you in place, even kill you. I'm sorry I made you lose Inez. It was all my fault!”

My mother looks at me, her eyes opening in surprise. “Mija, you didn't make me lose Inez! I was sick from the moment I got pregnant with her. There was something wrong in the womb, that's why Inez didn't hang on. You blamed yourself all these years? My poor mija! Nothing has been your fault—ever!”

I bend down and kiss her forehead. We're both crying. I don't let go until she stops crying, and Irene starts talking to her, promising her that Jesse will be happy to see her. “He's over there smiling with Faustino and Gustavo,” Irene says, pointing to Jesse's picture. “Our sons know we're here.”

I sense Jesse standing by watching us, the atoms of who he is merging with us, not floating aimlessly, but in a distinct spot. I put out my hand to touch him and grasp only empty space.

 

• T
HAT NIGHT IN
F
REDERICK
I dream I'm stepping on bodies in a river in Vietnam. The jungle is like pictures of Vietnam I've seen in books and on TV, except the trees are huge shade trees with birds' nests
in the trunks. I'm calling out for El Ganso to come get me across El Río Salado, and he doesn't come. I see bodies floating all around. I keep pushing them down with my feet trying to sink them. The water is bloodred. Then, I try to step on the bodies to get across the river. The shore looks so far away, and I'm so tired. I can feel my feet sinking, but I keep walking on the bodies like they're solid ground and make it to shore with no one helping me. I'm on the shore, waving my hands in ecstasy. I made it! The worst is over. I wake up and remember what my mother said, “Nothing has been your fault—ever,” and I smile in the dark, because I'm not drowning in El Río Salado anymore.

F
riday morning, June 6, we're still in Frederick. It's as if we don't want to leave. The sun is shining, and the day is incredibly clear. We have breakfast at a diner that looks like a train. It's got all kinds of artifacts related to the era of trains and trolley cars. Mom looks strong, and her energy spreads to all of us. We've been traveling, hypnotized by the sun rising and setting in a country so beautiful it makes your heart long to hold it all in your arms. We've seen so many landscapes they've blurred into one. Deserts look like forests with fewer trees, and the pattern of stars at night is the same over Denver as it is over Pittsburgh. American families look alike whether they eat in a McDonald's in Raton, New Mexico, or Topeka, Kansas. It's the same tradition of moms, dads, grandparents, single parents with kids.

I've never seen the bloodied fields of Vietnam. Jesse did. I've been protected, spied on by Heaven, seduced by the winds over the flatlands and mountains of America, seduced to believe that the American way of life is the only reality. We're foreigners, still, the remnant of Aztlán, issuing from caves, blinking in white sunlight, rounding the detours of America to get to its wailing wall, clearing the underbrush to find a straight path to D.C., the city of pain, straight to the warrior's heart that charmed the sun into moving across the sky in the splendid empire of the Aztecs.

 

• W
E FINISH BREAKFAST
and head back to the motel. By the time we get there, the motel parking lot is crowded with cars and vans from local news stations. There are reporters with cameras and microphones standing in the motel office.

“Oh, man, take a look at this! Are we celebrities, or what?”

“So, this is what Holly meant by ‘Get ready for Frederick,'” Chris says.

“Is this a press conference, Mom?” Lilly asks.

“I guess that's what it is.”

“Is something wrong?” Mom asks.

“Just people, lots of people, who want to talk to us. Don't get nervous, Mom.”

“I don't think she's nervous at all,” Chris says. “What about you, Teresa?” He eases our van into the parking lot, takes his sunglasses off and looks closely at me. “Well? Are you OK?”

“I don't know. All this delay. We need to keep moving.”

“These reporters will be hard to shake. They've been waiting for us. We're probably their six o'clock news report.”

A man approaches our van as Chris comes to a stop. I put my window down and he leans into the open space. “How do you do? My name is Diego Mendoza.” The man's Spanish name surprises me. He's light-skinned, someone who could pass for white.

“I'm from News Channel Ten, and we'd like to do a story on your mom.” Behind him are at least ten more reporters with cameras rolling.

“The question is, does she want to do a story with you? We're pretty much in a hurry to get to the Vietnam Wall. As a matter of fact, we're running late.”

“I realize that, and it won't take long, I promise!” He puts his hand over his heart, briefly, as if he's making a pledge. “The nation is caught up with your family's journey, Teresa. You are Teresa, right?”

I nod. “Your mother's faith, and the love for her son that's caused her to risk her life to come this far is what's keeping the nation on your trail.” He smiles broadly. “You understand?” Then he looks over at Mom. “Señora Ramirez, will you talk to me?”

“Are you a mejicano?”

“Yes. My family's from Guadalajara.”

“Do you know any Mendozas from Phoenix? There was a Mendoza
family who helped us when we had no money for food. Do you remember them, Teresa?”

“No, Mom. I don't.”

“I do,” Irene says. “It was a big family. Fifteen kids!”

“Your dad was so proud, Teresa, even though he had nothing to be proud about. He wouldn't let us get on welfare when he was out of work. The Mendozas helped us by giving us government food. Era comida, it was food, and I sneaked it into the house so your dad wouldn't see it. Si, of course, I'll talk to you!”

Diego Mendoza helps Mom and Irene off the van. “Were you named after Juan Diego—the one who saw La Virgen at Tepeyac?”

“The very same one.”

“La Virgen must be sending us a message. What do you think, Irene?”

“She is miraculous,” Irene says. “She must be telling us we'll be at the Wall very soon.”

We walk with Mom to the motel lobby. We're followed by the reporters and cameramen. Everyone else catches up to us. “Are you gonna let Mom do this?” Paul asks.

“She wants to do it. Ask her yourself.”

Paul walks up to Mom and the reporter. “Excuse me,” he tells Diego Mendoza. “I need to know if my mother wants to do this press conference.”

“She gave me the OK.”

“Mom, is that true? You want to talk to all these people?”

“Si, mijo. Don't worry. This man's name is Diego Mendoza. There was a Mendoza family who helped us when we were starving.”

“He's not related to them!”

“We're all related. Somos familia.”

I look over at Paul. “Told you.”

Questions start, as all of us settle into the lobby. Mom and Irene sit together on a flowered couch. I sit next to Mom. Paul stands behind her, and Priscilla sits on the armrest next to me. The kids sit on the carpet. Everybody else locates a space on a chair or couch, and in most cases, just stand wherever room can be found. The bright camera lights make me feel as if we're on stage.

Diego Mendoza starts the questions. “You're almost in D.C.,” he says, looking directly at me. “What thoughts do you have to share with us about your trip, Teresa?”

“It's been hard traveling, and there were times none of us thought
we'd ever get to the end. But it's all been worth it, such a beautiful country we have, and all the people we've met along the way have made it all worth it.”

“And to think it all started with you, Mrs. Ramirez.” He looks at Mom. “You heard voices?” I scan the faces around the room to see what reaction his words have made. Nobody flinches. It's business as usual.

“Voices? Yes, but I didn't know what they were saying. I never heard them before.”

“How do you know it was your son?”

“Do you have children?”

“Yes.”

“And you know their voices?”

“Yes.”

Diego Mendoza smiles.

One of the women reporters asks, “How do you feel now, Mrs. Ramirez? Now that you're almost there?”

“My mijo, that's Jesse. He didn't call me here for nothing. I feel strong. I could walk the rest of the way!” Everyone laughs along with Mom. “It's la manda, my promise that's making me strong. I made a promise to get there, and I'm going to keep it. God is leading the way, and La Virgen.” She lifts up the medallion. We will get there. My friend, here, Irene, has a son on the Wall, too.”

Irene leans into a microphone. “My son's name is Faustino Lara,” she says. Irene says her son's name slowly, as if she wants everyone to hear it correctly.

One reporter wants to know how many messages we've received on our web site. Cameras turn to Michael. “Over two thousand,” Michael says. “Some people send two or more messages, but there's always somebody sending us a message.”

“And you are how old, Michael?”

“I'm twelve. There's my dad over there.” He points to Paul.

One reporter asks Paul, “How does it feel to be the father of such a bright boy?”

“It feels good. My whole family is smart. I'm proud of my son.”

“Your brother, Jesse, did he win the Congressional Medal of Honor?”

“No. He won a Purple Heart, a Bronze Medal, a Silver Star, and other medals. It's not the medals that make a soldier, it's the kind of person he is. You can't forget somebody like Jesse because of who he was.
He was my only brother, but he was more than that. He was like a dad to me, a friend I could always count on. He was my hero.”

Priscilla whispers in my ear, “Wow.”

One woman stands up and asks, “These voices, has your mother ever had this experience before? Could this phenomenon be related to medication or to her health?”

Priscilla answers quickly, “If you think Mom needs Prozac, you're wrong! She's the sanest person I've ever known.” There is a pause, as the newspeople talk among themselves.

“I'm sorry, I meant no offense,” the woman says.

One man addresses the vets. “You men who served. Have any of you visited the Wall before?”

They all respond that they haven't. I notice Pepe, Gonzalo, and Fritz standing just outside the front door. I signal them to come in, and they shake their heads—no.

“I didn't even want to come on this trip,” Gates says.

“Why was that?” the man asks.

“I didn't think I was good enough. My life has taken some detours, you might say.” Gates smiles. “But things have changed. I'd like to thank the Ramirez family, and especially Mrs. Ramirez, for inviting me to come. Being here is making me realize how lucky I was to have friends like Jesse.”

“We're connected to the guys on the Wall,” Chris says, “whether we know it or not. When we were out on those hills, I can tell you we fought for each other. We couldn't depend on the government. None of it made any sense.” I look at Chris and nod my head.

“I'm hoping to meet other Chinese Americans at the Wall who served in Vietnam,” Willy says. “The Vietnamese thought I was one of them when I wasn't in my uniform.”

“Any comments from you? I'm sorry, your name?” One reporter is looking at Yellowhair.

“I'm Yellowhair. This is my mother, Sarah.” He puts his arm around his mother. “My brother Strong Horse was killed in Vietnam. We've always sent warriors to battle. It's no new thing for us.”

“Or for any of us,” Manuel says. “Chicanos are another group who have been drafted left and right, along with the Blacks, and other minorities.”

“So, it's the government's mistake that made all this possible?” one woman asks.

“Yes,” I tell her. “Money, long overdue. They sent Jesse to the wrong address, that was a nightmare for us.”

Diego Mendoza looks at me and says, “I understand President Clinton is sending some White House aides to meet you at the Wall.”

“This is the first I've heard of that,” I tell him.

Our press conference ends with some comments from the kids. The kids wave to their friends back home, and I wave to Elsa, and my granddaughter, Marisol. I sigh out loud in relief. “I never want to do this again,” Priscilla tells me. My mother and Irene sit like two queens, totally poised, waiting for someone to lead them to their royal coach. “They probably wouldn't mind it,” I tell Priscilla. “Did you ever think Mom could do all this?”

“Surprises come in small packages, I guess,” Priscilla says.

 

• B
EFORE WE LEAVE
the motel, I get a call from Lieutenant Major William Prescott, who tells me the Army would like to have a ceremony for us at the Wall on Saturday morning. He tells me the president would like to pay tribute to the men who served in Vietnam, and especially Hispanic soldiers. I tell Mom the news, and she looks at me, her face weary. “Era hora,” she says. It's about time.