Chapter 9

Alejandra, 1936

Whatever was wrong with Fausto now? He’d been acting very strange around Alejandra, and she couldn’t stand it. Sure, he’d paid her attention while they were having their picture taken, but ever since her sisters had left, he’d run off with the neighborhood kids and left her alone on the swings. If only she didn’t have a stupid dress on, she could have run behind them. But her mother had warned her to take care of her only outing dress, passed down from one of her older sisters.

She fixed her long hair into a thick braid. She hated her hair. It was yet another source of controversy with her mother. Alejandra wanted it short, but Mamá Blanca insisted that a girl her age should look feminine. The word alone made her cringe. Even worse, Mamá Blanca had warned her that soon she would have to wear one of those brassieres her sisters always talked about—as if underwear was the most interesting subject in the world. Alejandra eyed the two protuberances growing from her chest. She couldn’t deny it anymore, those things were growing, and according to her ghastly cousin, they were larger than Abigail’s. Oh, God. How could that be when Abigail was two years older than her? It must be some sort of punishment for skipping mass.

Well, she wasn’t about to waste an afternoon in the park feeling sorry for herself, dress or no dress. She jumped off the swing and followed the trail her cousin had taken with his friends. His friends. Not long ago, they used to be her friends too, her jorga, as they liked to call themselves. But lately all they did was mock or ignore her.

“Fausto!” she yelled. “Come here, idiota!”

The idiot was probably hiding behind one of the dense trees or maybe on top. Shit! Nothing was more embarrassing than looking for someone who might be watching you. She glanced at the summit of the capuli tree, the one Fausto had taught her to climb when they were small—before he decided she wasn’t fun anymore.

Well, she was still fun, and she didn’t need a boy to have a good time. With both hands she grasped the trunk of the tree and stepped on the nearest branch. Her skirt swished, and not in a good way, in a torn fabric sort of way. She examined the skirt as best as she could but it didn’t look like there was any damage. She continued her climb as quickly as her dress allowed her. See? This was fun. She didn’t need him. If only it weren’t so hot here, her joy would be complete. Her hands were sweating, and so was her back. Come to think of it, she was sweating all over. Oh well, she was almost on top. From there, she would spot those damn boys.

“Señorita?”

A voice called from the bottom of the tree. She looked down, beneath the branches and leaves, at a young man watching her.

“Who are you?” she said. “What do you want?”

“I’m Edgar Carrasco, the new barber’s son. We just moved here.”

Alejandra had seen the new barber shop across the street and had been curious about her new neighbors, but this was a strange time for introductions.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Of course. I’ve climbed this tree a hundred times before.”

“It’s just that you’re bleeding … so I thought …”

“Bleeding?”

Alejandra checked her bare arms and legs. This kid must be crazy. She wasn’t bleeding; nothing hurt.

She laughed. “All right. Thank you.”

“I’m serious. You might want to come down and take care of … your problem.”

“What on earth are you talking about?”

The boy brought a handkerchief to his forehead and dried it. “Just come down. I’ll explain everything here.”

Alejandra sighed. Had she cut herself and not noticed? She descended carefully. At only a couple of meters from the ground, she jumped down, landing painfully on her feet.

She stood in front of this Edgar person. He looked about her age, maybe already fourteen, but he was shorter than her.

“So what is this about? Did you just want an excuse to talk to me?”

“No.”

“Then?”

“Look, I don’t want to embarrass you, but—”

“Alejandra!” Fausto yelled behind her. “What are you doing here? I thought you’d be home already, and what in God’s name happened to you?”

He was looking at something on her back. She looked behind her shoulder but couldn’t tell what the source of all this uproar was.

“And who are you?” Fausto asked the new kid.

“This is Edgar Carrasco. Our new neighbor,” Alejandra said.

“Well, don’t you see you’re making my cousin uncomfortable?” Fausto said. “Get out of here!”

Edgar took a step back and headed for the pond.

“You shouldn’t be talking to strangers,” Fausto said.

“He’s just a kid.”

“I don’t care. You don’t talk to young men if you haven’t been properly introduced.”

“Well, if you hadn’t left me alone, I would have been properly introduced.”

“Stop being fresh with me. Have you forgotten I’m older than you?”

“By six months.”

Fausto removed his jacket and covered her derriere with it.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Just walk home. You’ll thank me later.”

“What is it? What’s wrong with me?”

“Don’t ask me. Ask your mother or one of your sisters.”

Hesitantly, she took a step forward. Fausto never called Mamá Blanca “your mother.” The fact that he was being so formal meant this must be serious.

Alejandra locked herself in her room, too flustered to face the world again. Her linen pink skirt had a round blood stain on it. Blood, of all things! And not exactly from a cut. This was her period, according to Mamá Blanca. And from now on, her life would change. She couldn’t climb trees anymore, or play fútbol with the neighborhood kids, or eat avocado during “those days.” And of course, she could never mention this to anyone from the opposite sex, including Fausto. No wonder he’d been so awkward about it. He probably knew all along what the damn stain meant! As if things weren’t bad enough with her so-called friends already, now she had to put up with this nonsense, the disgrace of becoming “officially” a woman—capable of making babies at age thirteen! She’d never heard of anything more ridiculous or disgusting. She prayed Fausto wouldn’t tell them. But what about Edgar? He owed her no loyalty, especially after the rude way Fausto had treated him back at the park.

She threw one of her brushes across the room, then another. Her box of watercolors followed and then her pencils. Once her wooden desk was empty, she crashed on her bed, pounding her fists on the mattress until she’d exhausted her arms.

She must have slept a long time for it was already dark when she woke up. And now her mother was knocking on her door and calling her name. Alejandra told her she wasn’t hungry. She couldn’t go downstairs and face her family. She could already picture Fausto’s smirk across the table. No, it would be too humiliating.

Her mother brought her a bowl of lentil soup and a glass of avena that first evening. For breakfast, she left a tray with bread and cheese, and a cup of café con leche, but by lunchtime she wasn’t so understanding anymore. She forced Alejandra out of the room and made her sit across from Fausto at the dining room table.

Alejandra avoided the sight of her cousin during most of the meal, but once or twice, her gaze wandered in his direction. He didn’t look at her once. He talked to everyone at the table, except for her.

After lunch, she followed him to the courtyard.

“You want to play fútbol?” she said.

His eyes narrowed. “With you?”

“Sure.”

“I don’t think you can.”

“Of course I can.”

“Not according to Mamá Blanca.” With both hands, he seized the branch of one of the lemon trees.

“Things don’t have to change. I can still do the things I did before.”

He didn’t need to say anything. Alejandra knew things had changed between them, maybe forever. Unless she could prove otherwise.

“Do you know the circus is coming next week?” she asked.

“Yes.”

Holding on to the branch, Fausto kicked his legs up and folded them over it. He let go of his hands and hung upside down.

“I can probably get us tickets,” she said.

“You?” He chuckled. “How?”

“I can ask my father.”

Fausto laughed. Still upside down, his face had turned red and his straight hair pointed down.

“Good luck with that.”

“I have my methods.” Although she’d managed to sound confident, she didn’t have the faintest idea of how to convince the stingiest man in town to give her money for something as irrelevant as a circus performance.

“The only method that would work would be to take the money from his drawer.”

“What drawer?”

“You know that desk in the workshop that’s shoved against the wall?”

She nodded.

“Top drawer.” Fausto grasped the branch again and jumped down in one swift move. “But of course, you would never dare.”

She kicked a rock. Only Fausto had the power to make her this angry.

“Yes I would.”

That hateful smirk appeared on his face. “We’ll have to see about that.”

Without another word, he headed for the kitchen door. She grabbed a handful of soil and threw it at him with such bad aim that it landed on one of the concrete columns in the courtyard instead of his back. He laughed louder.

“You wait and see,” she muttered. “Just wait.”

How hard could it be to take a few coins from her father’s drawer? As immersed as he was in his jewelry work, it would be as easy as taking a piece of candy from a baby. He would never notice. She dragged her feet down the hall and opened the workshop’s door.

She stopped at the sight of her father leaning against his teak desk, his back arched, his black-frame glasses on the tip of his nose, his calloused hands polishing a silver ring with a piece of sandpaper. Francisco Platas worked ten hours a day in this moldy room—with minimum help from an occasional apprentice—to support his large family. All that sacrifice and hard work so that one day his youngest daughter would sneak into his workshop and rob him. She glanced at the desk in the corner of the room where Fausto said her father kept his spare change.

Papá Pancho, as they lovingly called him, looked up at her.

“Hija, what a surprise. Come in.” He nodded at a chair beside him, still holding the ring mandrel with one hand and the sandpaper with the other. “It’s been so long since you’ve come to visit me. When you were little you used to spend all morning here until your mother dragged you back into the house. Remember?”

“Yes.” She loved it here more than anywhere else in the house, despite the mess and the smell of wax used to mold the pieces. She could watch her father work for hours.

“You’re the only one who ever remembers this viejo. Unlike your sisters who only come here asking for money.”

At least they ask. Alejandra pressed her cold hand against her burning cheek. There was no way she could ask him now. But she needed the money. There was simply no other way.

“People are so obsessed with money nowadays,” he said. “Look at all the assistants I’ve had. Almost all of them robbed me. Either that, or they were too lazy.”

“But you like Toño, don’t you?”

Papá Pancho shrugged. “He’s all right, but he’s not family. It’s not the same. An employee is transient. Just watch, once he finds a better paying job he’ll leave. He has no ties here.” He blew the dust off the ring. “I can’t wait until Fausto grows up so he can run the store, or until one of you girls gets married so your husband comes to work here.”

“Don’t look at me,” she said. “I’m never getting married.”

Francisco Platas seldom smiled, but apparently what she’d said was pretty funny; his smile was so wide that his oversized front teeth, as bright as the keys in an organ, stood out in full contrast with his tan skin.

“That’s what you say now. Wait a couple of years and we’ll talk.”

Alejandra doubted time would change her mind. She already knew she didn’t want her mother’s life. She despised housework or having to slave around at a husband’s every whim. Having children didn’t appeal to her either. The way those stomachs grew when they had babies inside! Not to mention the peculiar method of getting pregnant, which Abigail had told her about two years ago. Alejandra couldn’t imagine kissing a boy, much less having his thing inside of her. She’d seen firsthand how dirty boys could be, always farting and burping, allowing lint to lurk between their toes for days. Sure, they were more fun than girls, but they could also be infinitely gross. No, her father would have to look elsewhere for a son-in-law. They could call her a solterona all they wanted.

Toño entered the workshop.

“Don Francisco.” He stood by the doorway, a pencil stuck over his ear. “Don Pascual needs to speak to you.”

“Can’t he talk to you? That’s why I pay you.” He pushed his glasses up with his index finger. “Excessively,” he added to himself, or maybe not just to himself.

“I know, S-S-Señor, but he says he has a s-s-special request for you.” Oh, Christ. The stutter had begun. It appeared whenever Toño was nervous, which happened to be every time he spoke to Alejandra’s father.

“Special request?” The lines on her father’s forehead deepened. He hated talking to clients as much as Alejandra hated the idea of robbing her own father. “What does that mean?”

“He insisted, p-p-patrón.”

With a loud sigh, Papá Pancho left his tools on the surface of his desk and dusted his hands on his apron. He stood up and removed his apron in slow motion—his entire body rejecting the idea of talking to a customer. Without the apron, his thin frame stood out. He didn’t have an ounce of fat in his body, in spite of how much he ate, which was more than any other person in the family. He pulled out a handkerchief from his back pocket and blew his nose vociferously. Alejandra giggled.

Papá Pancho walked past Toño, leaving the door ajar and his employee tiptoeing behind him.

Alejandra stood up right away. This was it, her only chance. She approached the desk in the corner of the room and opened the top drawer. The money was there. Enough money for all her jorga and Fausto to go to the circus, but she had to be smart. She would only take enough for Fausto and her so her father wouldn’t notice. Glancing over her shoulder, she grabbed a handful of coins and inserted them in a tiny purse Mamá Blanca had crocheted for her in pink wool.

After making sure nobody was in the hallway, she snuck out of the workshop. Papá Pancho’s voice arguing with the customer echoed in her ears. If only he knew what his perfect child had done, he would never look at her the same way again. Shoving her thoughts away, she entered the house and ran upstairs, two steps at a time.

Fausto’s mouth fell open after she dumped the money on his bedspread. He touched the coins, as if he couldn’t believe they were real.

“I told you I would do it,” she said, filled with a strange sense of pride. For the first time in her life, Fausto looked at her with admiration—not the other way around.

Alejandra couldn’t believe she was really here, in this magical world under the white tent. This place was well worth her betrayal. It almost made her forget the guilt she felt every time she was near her father after the Unmentionable Act.

Fausto sat beside her. Things were getting back to normal already. He’d even agreed to play cards with her this morning. He’d taught her a game called Cuarenta; except he’d gotten furious when she beat him.

“Beginner’s luck,” he’d said, sweeping the cards to the floor with his arm.

Alejandra smiled just thinking about it. She loved beating her cousin at anything. And so far, she had the upper hand. They were at the circus, weren’t they?

After the acrobat show, Fausto leaned over her shoulder and said, “That’s what I want to do for the rest of my life.”

She laughed. Fausto, an acrobat? Not according to Papá Pancho’s plans.

When the show was over, her cousin made her wait until everyone in the audience had gone before standing up. She followed him down the bleachers to the center of the stage, where three men were already sweeping the floor.

“What are you doing?” she asked Fausto.

“Just follow me, and keep your mouth shut.”

He approached one of the cleaning men and asked where the circus administrator was. The man pointed at the shiny red curtains where the performers had come from and told him to ask for Simón. Alejandra followed Fausto through the curtains, only to see the magic fade before them.

The smell of manure was strong here and the ground was sandy; the enchanting elastic woman, now in a blue robe and her hair down, didn’t seem so enchanting anymore; the clowns walked around without makeup and the tigers rested in small cages, looking sad. Other performers she’d seen earlier walked past her, oblivious to her presence. One of the acrobats even bumped into her.

“I’m looking for Mr. Simón,” Fausto asked again and again, until finally a young man in a sweater-vest and gray knickers stopped in front of them.

“Who are you?” he asked with a coastal accent.

Fausto extended his hand. “My name is Fausto Guerrero, and this is my cousin Alejandra Platas.”

The man shook Fausto’s hand, surveying the area the entire time. There was an eagerness in his gaze that was very appealing; it was the look of someone who never did things halfway.

“And your name is?” Fausto asked.

He withdrew his hand. “Enrique Hidalgo. What are you doing here?”

“I want to talk to Mr. Simón.”

“What for?”

“I want to work here.”

Enrique Hidalgo looked younger when he smiled, and he didn’t have a lot of facial hair either. He couldn’t have been older than seventeen or eighteen. “Doing what?”

“I want to be an acrobat.”

He laughed.

Fausto scowled. “What’s so funny?”

“It takes a lot to become an acrobat. These fellows start training when they’re four years old. What training do you have?”

All of Fausto’s training consisted of hanging upside down from trees, and he wasn’t even that good at it, in Alejandra’s opinion.

“Look,” Enrique said, “my padrino is a busy man. Don’t waste your time.” He patted Fausto’s back, dismissively, his attention still on the action around them. “Benito, add more chairs to the front row!” he told a man in a blue jumpsuit. “And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a lot of work to do here.”

“Fine. But I’ll be back tomorrow to talk to Mr. Simón.”

Enrique sighed, all amusement wiped from his face. He looked at Alejandra for the first time, sending a wave of electricity throughout her body.

“Alejandra, right? You look like a reasonable young lady. Would you put some sense into your cousin?”

He remembered her name? She nodded; she would nod to whatever he said.

“Look, you both seem like nice kids, but unfortunately I have to go.” He patted Fausto’s arm. “Good luck to you.” Enrique walked past Alejandra and the scent of his cologne masked, for a few seconds, the offensive smells in the area. Alejandra stared after him, mesmerized. She was starting to reconsider the idea of kissing a boy.

“Come on,” Fausto said, his fists clenched against his sides.

Alejandra followed her cousin in a haze, deaf to his complaints the entire way back. By the time she arrived home, she had reconsidered her stance on a lot of things.