The Willow Tree: A Novel (8 page)

Yes. You look sad and worn—looking at her mother for a moment then smiling at her and kissing her on the top of her head—It is such a tiring day. You need rest and food. But first—broadening her smile—a cup of real coffee, not the machine.

The old woman almost smiled and bent over as much as possible and carefully lifted the cup to her lips and took a sip, licked her lips then took a small mouthful and closed her eyes as she swallowed, then took a larger mouthful and raised her head and leaned back in the chair and sighed, Ohhh, what a blessing—smiling up at her daughter, the sadness still clearly etched on her face, momentarily obscured by her smile. Isabella returned her mothers smile, Rest. Soon we will eat and then we will talk—smiling—when the children are sleeping.

The old woman nodded her head and finished her coffee and held out the cup to her daughter.

Good….Another cup…good.

Her mother leaned against the back of the chair and smiled up at her.

Maria lay quietly on the bed. Unmoving. A dull pain in her right hip slowly radiating out. Getting worse. Thinking move to stop the pain. Mommy gone. Grandmother gone. Bobby gone…somewhere. Still sounds…noises. From time to time opens eyes…lights. More pain. Eyes sting, leg hurts. Cant move. Cant will to move. Cant force movement away from pain. Crack in ceiling moving….Ceiling falling, eyes shut, body tense, waiting…waiting for impact…to be crushed…
the clock lost its hands
…mommy…mommy…alone alone alone O mommy mommy…

                                                  darkness sudden, safe from ceiling….It hurts. Really bad. Mommy it hurts. Mommy move me. Stop the pain. Terror freezes body, stiff, rigid, cracking and splintering and little pieces falling off and rolling from bed to hungry demon mouth devouring, grinding, laughing, moaning, moaning, moaning, MOANING, MOANING

                                   Maria. Maria. You in pain?

Tears soak bandage, body shatters in million pieces, a million demon shattered pieces, bones, flesh, the sunrise, all swallowed, swallowed and disappearing into whatever is beyond darkness

       mommy…. mommy

I have the nurse bring you somethin—o mommy—tears of terror soaking gauze and sheets—o mommy—a tiny plea from a small mouth and a huge pain, a tiny plea in an infinite threat, a thin, frail body pleading, reaching, reaching, reaching beyond itself to the unknown for something to touch, something to hold it, to comfort it, trying to force the darkness to give up a little glimmer of light as the darkness continues to consume and rend and torture and devour and torment and twist and grind and grind and spit the powdered bones of the tiny body into its crying eyes—mommy, mommy—the fires of fear and pain burning the tiny shell, the tears hot and red—o mommy, mommmmmmmy please…o please….

     The nurse gave her an injection, and left the room…and planes of soft gray slowly wrapped itself around the demon and absorbed its venom…and Maria was gently lowered into the peace of sleep where the handless clock of pain would begin once more to tick away godless hours and would, hopefully, keep its hands and their movement, until the night was once again turned away with the coming of light.

Isabella sat with her mother at the table. The children were in bed, the dishes washed, and they sat, with their coffee, a breeze coming in the kitchen window along with the sounds, noise and smells of the street.

You look very tired momma.

I am worried…I am tired—shrugging—I am sad. I do not know why we are here, why we—

Please momma. We have talked so many times. We are here. This is where we are. There was no place to go when Roberto died. We are here momma.

Yes, yes—nodding her head—We are here, in this land of noise and smoke—turning toward the window—it comes in, smell it? Listen—

Please momma. No more. My heart too is filled with pain. I too live in this same strange land as you with a language that is like mumblings to my ears. Everything sounds so bad so terrible, but we are here and—

But we should not be here. We should be where the sun does not have to fight with smoke to reach your face.

Isabella took a drink of coffee, looked at the light reflecting in the coffee and the sides of the cup for a moment, then looked at her mother, seeing the age in the lines on her face and the tiredness in her eyes, Perhaps you should stay home tomorrow momma. It is such a long trip, it tires you.

The trip is long. True—nodding her head—but to be here all the day with the children and the noise is also very tiring. Even more.

The children will not be here. They can go as today to the homes of friends. They are kind.

Yes, yes, I know, I thank God for the kindness of our friends. But what would you have me do, sit under a palm tree? Should I walk to the beach and stick my feet in the wet sand and listen to the water. Should I collect shells from the beach?—
Isabella stared at her coffee cup wishing she could wish all this away…all the pain all the unhappiness, but what could she do? Can she wake up in the morning and find a pot of gold on the table and take the family home? Is this a childs fairy tale where she can rub something and angels bring pieces of heaven on velvet pillows?
—Should I wade out into the water and smell the fresh breeze that moves over the water and through the tree tops? Should I bake a chicken? Sh—

Momma—Isabellas eyes and voice heavy with sadness—no more momma. It is enough. I am filled with the same sadness. Maria is my flesh…my blood—And mine—Yes momma, and yours, and we will do whatever we need to do to make her better. I too worry. I too try to understand the mysteries of what they say to us and leave in fear and ignorance. I hear words…sounds…and see my babys face wrapped in bandages, only little slits to look into to see her eyes, a little slit to feed food to her body. All the pain and sadness is the same for me momma.

The old woman stared at her folded hands on her lap for many silent moments, then nodded her head, Yes….Yes….she sighed and lifted her head and looked with great sadness at her daughter, Tomorrow we will go and see her and we will bring the soup and we will sit endlessly at the side of her bed and we will struggle with her pain and their language and feed her the soup, and milk, and hold her and pray to the Blessed Virgin to protect her and send her safe to her home with us—she sighed again and turned over her hands—We know we will do this…what else can we do?

Nothing else momma. God will see us through. And we will again ride the bus and find our way through all those hallways to her bed. She will be safe as long as we can see her…touch her—she looked at her mother and almost smiled—and feed her soup.

Isabella continued to look at her mother, her smile slowly absorbed by her feeling of concern, hearing the voices of children playing on the street, running up and down the stairs of their building, the sudden screeching after a ball, the yelling of arguments, the sudden burst of laughing, from time to time all the sounds blending into a vague and familiar noise that filled the background of her life that was so familiar it offered a degree of comfort, and she toyed with her coffee cup and looked out the window at the buildings across the street, the clothes lines stretched across the alley, the fire escapes—heavily loaded with plants, rugs, boxes, crates, children, adults, cats, dogs and god only knows how many unidentifiable objects, sipping her now cool coffee and continuing to hold the cup with both hands after replacing it on the table, unable to avoid acknowledging the worm of fear crawling around within her and she blinked her eyes several times until she was able to turn her eyes from the window back to her mother and look at the lines of age etched in her face but seeing years of sadness rather than simply years of living as her mother rubbed her fingertips around the edge of her cup, feeling it as she would her beads, hearing the painful screeching of brakes, the grinding of motors, the crunch of wheels, frowning as she tasted the smoke and fumes, her coffee no longer able to penetrate the foulness they created in her mouth, foulness that burned her throat and chewed her tongue, one that she wanted to spit out, to spit into the dirt of the streets to be free of its venom but even if she did, actually, spit the poison into the streets the foulness remained always in her mouth, as the monsters screaming never left her ears, and they too ached from the smoke and shadows of this terrible place, and everyday she tried to think of some way to shut out the noises that attacked her, but even hiding her ears behind cupped hands was useless and futile, so she sat rubbing the edge of her coffee cup with her fingertips, wondering how she ever ended up living so high off the ground, and if she would ever sit in clear sunshine again

                                                                       and mother and daughter sat in the midst of each others fear and grief as time did not stand still but moved with such agonizing slowness they felt crushed by the hands embrace, and the mother continued rubbing her cup and looking at the edge of the window, And what happens if Maria does not get well?

Isabella remained immobile, her hands around the coffee cup unmoving, her glance steady as a breeze waved a shirt on a line…. She must get better…shes my baby….

Yes, yes….But if she doesnt????

Isabella was rigid, seemingly not breathing.

These operations they will give her skin…from other parts of the body to hide scars….What is it our Maria looks like???? I see only bandages. How is it she needs operations? How is it we know the doctors are true? What is it we know about them? Are they any different than everyone else…here…in this…
place
????

                     Isabella still rigid, her breathing inaudible and unnoticeable, eyes widening, knuckles getting whiter and whiter

             Why dont we see whats behind the bandage? What is it they hide from us? Why do they not talk to us? Why is it they look at us as if we do not exist and walk away? Why is it they look at us as if we are going to steal from them? We are not animals…nor are we thieves yet they always run from us when all it is we ask is how is our Maria??? what is going to happen to our Maria??? Why do—MOMMA—suddenly grasping her head with her hands and squeezing as hard as possible, squeezing her eyes painfully shut against the hot tears pounding in her head, feeling the pain of her toes pushing against the bottoms of her shoes, her knotted calves, her burning throat—No more momma…please…please…so many questions—shaking her head—I cannot find the answers either. I look in their faces and try to see…to ask…to know…but I dont know what their eyes or words say—You know what their eyes say—looking Isabella in the eyes, her stare unwavering—it is what their eyes always say to us. O momma…momma—tears slowly seeping from her eyes—I dont care what their eyes say, I care only about my baby—But their eyes speak about Maria too, they say they do not care, that she is of no importance to them, she is only a pile of bandages in a bed….

                                                                       Isabellas chin almost rested on her chest. She watched the tears dropping on her lap, there seeming to be so few falling compared to those she felt rolling from her eyes…Where do they all go??? where do they all come from???? She felt her breath on her wrists as she spoke, I pray they will think she is one of theirs and will make her better, as she was the morning she left here and walked down the stairs with her school books in her hand.

I pray too—shrugs—what else is there…for us?

I pray…I pray and pray but there is only silence from the Blessed Virgin…I pray and pray and hear only the beating of my heart—Isabella slowly raised her head a few inches—I am frightened momma—raising her head a little more and staring into her mothers face, clasping her hands and squeezing hard—I am frightened for my little girl. Her mother looked back at her daughter, her expression stern, hard, unrelenting, watching the tears slowly roll down her daughters cheeks, her expression softening with each tear, in time a feeling of reassurance in her eyes as she reached over and put her hands on her daughters, My prayers, too, are spoken to deaf ears…perhaps it is that God cannot hear our tiny voices here…perhaps it is that the monsters in the streets…and the demons in the hearts of these crazy people, chew up the prayers before she hears them….

                                   they looked in each others eyes with as much love as possible, frightened of their fear, each hoping to see, or hear, in the other the answer to their own personal fears and the threat to Maria, Isabellas eyes eventually closing, too heavily burdened with grief to remain open, Perhaps you are right momma. It is possible it is as you say. But we will light a candle anyway…what else can we do?

                    their hands as one between them, slowly leaning toward each other, the air coming through the open window still alive with noise and fumes.

Moishe cautioned Bobby about moving around too much, You are needing to rest already…get strong.

Hey Mush, I dont be a ol man like you—throwing his shoulders back, but stopping in mid motion as the pain shot through him, but continuing to smile at Moshie.

Moishe smiled, and nodded his head, Its since a long time Im your age. Now, I find any excuse to rest.

Bobby looked around and frowned, How you get all this shit down here? You got some big shit here Mush.

Thats happening a long time ago. A long time I spent doing this—looking around—but I had lots of time.

Bobby started walking around the apartment and Moishe reached out to steady him from time to time, but held back and let Bobby find his own sense of balance. They went into a room that was filled with carts, wagons, hand trucks, dollies, a couple of work benches, and tools hanging on all the walls, My workshop—Moishe looking around proudly.

Damn, where you get all this stuff?

Long, long time—smiling at Bobby—so much older than you.

Bobby looked at Moishe, Thats for damn sure.

Moishe smiled and shrugged as they continued their tour. Bobby was amazed by what he saw, never having imagined anyone actually living in such luxury…all this space to move around, and lights everywhere but they didnt hurt your eyes, you could just see everything so clearly. And the food, a big freezer stuffed with food, huge refrigerator filled with food and more ice cream than he had ever seen in one place. At least that was how it seemed. Bobby kept looking at Moishe and shaking his head as he looked around then started walking toward the front door, This the door we be comin in, the pretty muthafucka? Moishe nodded and followed Bobby to the door who tried to open it and Moishe stepped in front of him and unlocked it, You want it should be opened? Yeah. Moishe opened the door and Bobby looked out, then shook his head and closed the door, Moishe looking at him quizzically, I was so fucked up I thought it might not be real like I remembered, but it be real—shaking his head—Damn, I still dont believe all this shit Mush.