Book Cover  •  Table of Contents  •  < PREV Chapter  •  NEXT Chapter >

CHAPTER 14

A Red Rose

      THEY SAT around the kitchen table drinking coffee until noontime.

      By eleven it had stopped snowing, but it got no warmer, and the power did not come back on. Lucy made sandwiches, and more coffee, although no one was really hungry. As an excuse to keep the oven going, she stirred up a cake and as the afternoon grew grayer all the time, Uncle Bob went back to bed, where he lay dozing over yesterday's newspaper.

      Rosana Sanchez was good company. And what with the dreamy dimness outdoors, it seemed natural that, instead of going about their usual affairs, the three women should sit idle and talk together all through the soft, dark afternoon.

      They talked about cooking, and babies, and housekeeping, and what were the prettiest clothes. But as the shadows crept in around them, Lucy noticed that no matter what the subject was when they started, before long it was Normalade they were talking about.

      About dark, they began talking about daydreams. "I always wished I'd been born rich," Normalade said. "Think about it — diamond necklaces and gold bracelets and strings of pearls, and every day you could wear some new, beautiful dress. And when you want more, you could just go into a big store and buy anything you want. And there'd be parties all the time, and men begging me to dance . . ."

      She sighed, "Movie stars live like that. They get to wear a whole lot of glamorous make-up, and have people wait on them and do what you tell them. Wouldn't that be grand? To have the men all looking at you like you were something good to eat . . ."

      Those were not the kinds of things Lucy wished for, when she did any wishing, and listening to Normalade talk, and hearing the longing in her voice, even while Lucy was thinking, "How shallow she is," it made her feel sad and wistful. What a child Normalade was. What a child.

      By late afternoon, it was so dark that when Lucy got up to make them all a piece of cake and a cup of tea, she had to light a candle to see what she was doing. She took a nice piece to Uncle Bob, and he roused and ate it, and then nodded off again. She was tiptoeing when she crept back to the kitchen, and the candlelight cast spooky shadows around her, making the dark rooms seem even darker.

      While Lucy washed up, Normalade and Rosana stayed at the kitchen table finishing a third or fourth cup of tea, Normalade said suddenly, "Rosana — Gene told me one time that when he was a little boy, you used to be a witch. Is that right?"

      "That's an old family joke," Rosana answered, but her voice told Lucy there was nothing funny about it, and, standing there at the sink, Lucy turned around to look at her. But in the candlelight it was hard to see the older woman's expression clearly.

      "No, he meant it," Normalade said positively. "And I'm glad you are one, too — because I want some magic done."

      Rosana just looked at her a minute. Finally she said, "I can't do magic for you, little daughter." Again, the woman's voice had a odd tone, and hearing it, a cold feeling seemed to creep around Lucy and wrap her like a shawl.

      Normalade, however, rushed heedlessly on. "Oh come on, help me out. I'd even pay you, if you want me to."

      Rosana said firmly. "I am not a bruja and I have never been one. Long time ago, some people in Mexico did call me that, but Gene lived with his uncle and me for years, and he knows perfectly well that they were wrong."

      "Well, see." Normalade cried, looking pleased with herself. "So you been one a long time, ever since you lived in Mexico — I knew it."

      "Haven't you been listening at all?" The woman's voice had an edge to it, but then she stopped and went on more softly, "Well all right, I'll tell you how they got that idea — how Gene heard it — and you'll see why you're mistaken."

      She picked up the spoon from the saucer of her teacup and began to play with it as she talked. "Years ago, when I first married Eugene's uncle Tonio in El Paso, we took a trip to Hermosillo to see his people in Mexico. His sisters didn't much like his marrying anybody, and they didn't like hearing him call me his Rosa-Roja — his Red Rose — and they realized I was an Indio, they began to whisper about me . . ."

      "But why did they," Normalade demanded, very smug.

      "Because they said all Indios were too stupid ever to be able to learn to read except by magic. And they refused to believe that after I came into Los Estados Unidos and learned English, I'd gone to night school — and after many years of hard work I'd finished classes at the college and gotten my degree."

      The candlelight flashed from the polished bowl of the spoon as Rosana went on, "One of Tonio's sisters told me to my face that there was no way I could have gotten him marry me and done all the rest without the help of magic. And she taught the children, behind my back, to call me Tia' Bruja — Auntie Witch." She glanced up. "So that's what Gene remembers."

      Lucy had stopped putting away dishes to listen to all this, and now she looked at Rosana admiringly. Well. She had come here from Mexico and learned English and worked hard and then gone to college. To do all that took doing.

      But Normalade wouldn't give up. "Oh but please, won't you make me just one little charm? So Bobby will stop being so stubborn and start being nice to me again."

      Rosana shook her head at Normalade very patiently. "M'hija, if there's trouble between you and your husband, can't be cured with a magic trick. You two should sit down and talk about it. Or better yet, feed him well, and then coax him a little and try to tease him out of it — because you know, the best way to make a man be nice is to be a little nice to him yourself."

      Normalade rolled her eyes. "Give me a break! Don't you think I know how to manage men? Listen — I can make a man do anything for me I want. And Bobby especially."

      "Well then — "

      "Only . . . he's changed. And now I can't do anything with him at all. He won't bring me presents any more. He never tells me I look pretty, or takes me places, or gives me money to spend — it's almost like he was saying, 'All right, you got what you wanted — I married you. And that's all you get from me.'" A whiny note crept into her voice. "And now I'm stuck out here with nothing to do. And with a baby. And half the time I can't hardly even watch what I want on TV!" The TV was an especially sore point with her.

      "And this is in spite of Hero getting born, and me suffering all that pain," Normalade gave a slanting look at Lucy as if for her corroboration on that point, "Even after all that — I hate to say it, but he actually started being mean to me. And now he'd run off and left me. All alone with a tiny baby. He deserted me. Flat!"

      What a story, Lucy thought. She hardly knew where to start contradicting her.

      But Rosana said, "But what it is you really want?"

      Normalade looked indignant. "What do I want? I just told you — I want Bobby to take me places and buy me presents and be nice. Like he was before!"

      "Act as he did before you were married?"

      "Of course!"

      Rosana shook her head. "Then you're doomed to disappointment. Your husband can't be your boyfriend all the time."

      Normalade looked shocked. "Well why not!"

      Rosana said gently, "Because you share a different life now. A different love."

      The candle flickered in the dark kitchen. Nomalade's eyes seemed to get bigger in her little white face, until she looked almost like a wild creature. Until even Lucy, although she was irritated with her, couldn't help but pity her. Normalade said in a tiny baby voice. "But — I don't want it to be different."

      Rosana shrugged, as Normalade sat staring at her calm face beyond the candle flame. When she spoke again, her voice sounded as if she wanted to cry. "I want him to take me places. Take me dancing and buy me things. That's what I want."

      When Rosana shook her head silently, Normalade simply picked up the sleeping baby, and without saying anything more, turned and carried him upstairs.

      Rosana murmured, "Poor little girl."

      "Don't feel too sorry for her," Lucy said tartly. "The argument they had was as much her fault just as much as it was his."

      "Even so." Rosana shook her head. "Here is a pretty young woman, who wants the kind of life she sees on the TV screen. She thinks that marriage is the gold prize and that being married will give her all she wants, but she has had no inkling of what marriage is about, and so now she is facing a whole future that she can't cope with. Sad for her."

      But Lucy didn't want to feel sorry for Normalade. She got up, emptied the teapot and both cups, and turned on the kettle again.

      Watching her, Rosana continued, "Yes, you're thinking it's sad for your brother, too. He liked her well enough to marry her, and he had his hopes, too. But it's always sad to get what you want and discover that it is not what you thought — not what you should have wanted at all. I know. It has happened to me as well."

      When Lucy didn't answer, Rosana persisted, "Hasn't that happened to you — that you struggled to get something, and then found you didn't like it?"

      Lucy brought the tea things back to the table and made more tea. "I guess I've always been too busy for that kind of scheming."

      Then, realizing how sour that sounded, she added. "Ever since I was sixteen, I've always had to work for what other people wanted. When Mama was dying, she made me promise I'd take care of Uncle Bob and Bobby as long as they needed me. I swore on her death bed that I would, so what I want doesn't count."

      "I see. And a promise like that takes such a long time to keep that it's also like a marriage; you can't go back on it when you get tired of it."

      She reached for the clean teacup. "But after all, now that your brother has married, he can't take much looking after."

      "There's Uncle Bob."

      "That's true," Rosana nodded. "Still . . . you're a young woman. What will you do with yourself later?"

      She was right, of course, Lucy thought. The day would come, someday, when Uncle Bob would be gone. But it hardly seemed right to think about that. It would be like wishing it, and that would be wrong.

      She stirred the tea, her spoon making a bell-like sound against the cup. But when that did happen, this would be Bobby's and Normalade's house. With their family growing up here, there would be no room for her. Really, there was hardly room for her now. What would she do? Stay on as Bobby's old-maid sister, keeping the house and running the bar for him? Sleeping on the screened-in porch? Worrying every week about how to pay the beer man? It didn't seem like much of a life.

      And yet she had a hard time picturing anything else for herself. After all, even if she was foolish enough to daydream about the far future . . . what was there? Some man? Babies? Some other job?

      After a long pause, she said slowly, "A long time ago, I thought I'd go to college and teach school." Then she pushed away her untasted cup and added crossly, "But I'm grown up now, and I never actually finished high school. They just sent me a certificate in the mail."

      Rosana looked interested. "But you could still go to college. It happens all the time, even for students who don't have a regular diploma. All you have to do is pass one little test — questions anybody could answer." She added offhandedly, "I only went to school two or three years in Mexico, so that's the way I did it."

      "But — I wouldn't know anything. I couldn't do that."

      Rosana shrugged. "Well, if you say so." She drank up her tea. "It's getting late; I better get on home."

      Lucy saw her to the door and watched her drive away. Then she went and looked in on Uncle Bob, who looked like he was down for the night. And then she returned to the silent kitchen to wash the dishes one more time before she went to bed.

Cover  •  Contents  •  < PREV Chapter  •  NEXT Chapter >  •  Page Top