Chapter 5
It didn’t seem real that she and André would be leaving for America the next morning, but here she was at their own going-away party. A live band played outside the café, which wasn’t André’s anymore. They’d sold it to buy plane tickets. They’d also sold her pig.
Despite the July heat, dancers filled the alley and music blasted from outside speakers. Celia found a shady spot near the wall of the restaurant and sat beside an old friend, Antonio, a tour guide who used to frequent her village.
He was a short, squat man in his fifties, one of the few men in town who owned a car. He had known Celia since the day she was born in one of his tourist vans. Business had died down after the eruption, so he and his wife had started a new business, selling cell phones and watches.
“I miss the old days,” he told Celia. “There was nothing like teaching those Germans to play mancala with you and Manny under the shade of your mother’s mango trees. Remember how I had to pay Manny to let them win?”
She laughed. “He made some good money that way. Then there was his sister. Remember when she was little and she wanted to win so badly, she swallowed the dried beans?”
“Or put them up her nose,” he said, leaning back to roar with laughter. “I wonder if some of those beans are still rattling around inside her.”
“Probably.” She sighed, wiping a happy tear from her cheek. “Life was so much simpler back then. I like to go back there in my dreams.” The caldera had been a paradise—full of figs, mangoes, grapes, and apples. She and Manny could spend every morning selling produce and crafts to tourists.
Manny. She hadn’t seen him since he’d walked out of the café, but she had thought about him nearly every hour afterward. How she wished she could turn back time and tell her past self what her present self knew—that she had been wrong about the girlfriend. But there was no turning back now. She and André were married and going to America. Everything was settled.
It wasn’t the type of cozy marriage she would have had with Manny, where they would chat over lunch and take walks together in the evenings. But everyone knew she was lucky to be married to André. Not only was he charming and athletic, he was a good businessman, and he respected her enough to marry her in the church. Still, she hadn’t expected to spend so many nights alone in her bed.
Nor had she expected this new ache of knowing Manny kept his promise. He hadn’t been unfaithful at all. She was the one who hadn’t trusted him enough.
“I see your mother down at the market sometimes,” Antonio said. “She seems better now.”
“Yes, she is.” Celia craned her head, trying to find her mother and Toon in the crowd of dancers. She was just about to point them out when André set his hand on her shoulder.
“I’ve got something to show you,” he said in that soft, sultry voice he had used when they first met.
She hoped he hadn’t misinterpreted her happy conversation with Antonio as flirtation, the way he had when Manny came to visit. “I’m sorry,” she said, turning to Antonio. “I’m afraid I have to get back to my preparations. It was nice seeing you again. May God be with you and your family.” She gave the man a kiss on each cheek before she turned to head back to their little house behind the café.
André led her all the way to their bedroom, where everything she owned was already packed in three brightly-colored, fabric tote bags lined up against the wall. Manny’s mother, Joana, had made the bags when they’d all lived together in the village.
André held up a big, black suitcase, the kind she’d seen the tourists carry. “This is for you. I want my wife to look high class on the airplane.” He had already packed his own possessions in a similar suitcase that lay on the bed. “I got one for myself too.”
She gasped in surprise, hefting the case, which was lighter than it looked, and unzipping it to reveal a large, clean space inside. “Thank you so much!” She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him.
“Be sure to have everything packed by sunrise. I have to take care of some business after the party, so I might not be home until late.”
She knew what type of business men generally conducted right before leaving the island—the type that involved partying with other women—and she couldn’t help letting a little sigh escape. “All right. I’ll miss you.”
He gave her another kiss, and then slipped out the door, leaving her alone to do her packing. She emptied the contents of the three tote bags into the gigantic suitcase. She took the opportunity to look through André’s things too, searching for that scrap of paper with Manny’s phone number on it. Maybe she was too suspicious, but she’d started to suspect André had slipped the paper into his pocket on the day they first met. Then he had let her believe that she had lost it. Of course, if he had taken the paper from her, he’d probably burned it long ago.
She folded each item of clothing tightly, but try as she might, she just couldn’t fit everything inside the suitcase. That meant she would have to leave something behind, probably the stack of photographs from her childhood. It was either those or the English dictionary André’s parents had given them.
She couldn’t face another loss right then, so instead of deciding what to leave behind, she snatched up the white plastic bucket in the corner. Going to fetch water was just the excuse she needed, and André likely wouldn’t notice that she was going to take longer than normal.
With the bucket swinging from her hand, she ran out of the house, across the alley, and down the steep cobblestone road that plunged toward historic São Filipe. She didn’t stop running until she’d reached the edge of the city. Resting her bucket on the stone wall beside the abandoned prison, she gazed down at the ancient cemetery with its tall, stone crosses and monuments. A couple of goats grazed on the sparse shrubbery just outside the cemetery. Below there, the black cliffs dropped to the ocean.
This was where she had stood a year and a half ago when she realized she had lost Manny’s number. Sometimes late at night, when she lay in bed waiting for André to come home, her mind taunted her with imaginations that not only had he stolen Manny’s phone number from her, he had also gotten someone to pretend to be Manny’s girlfriend on the phone.
Like the song said, life was filled with regrets. It was no use aching for what could have been, for the possibility of marrying a man she adored, a man who was her best friend. She wrapped her arms around herself and let the pain swell inside for a moment, burning and throbbing. When she didn’t think she could tolerate any more, she wiped her eyes, squaring her shoulders. What was done was done, and she was going to America. Everything would be better there. She and André would be on their own, he would get a job playing soccer, and he would come to appreciate her.
Manny would find someone new. For all she knew, he was already seeing one of the pretty girls at the university. He was probably holding her in his arms this very moment. Perhaps they were already married and she slept beside him every night, secure in the knowledge that he would stay faithful. Manny would be the best kind of husband, the kind that never lost his temper.
Taking hold of her water bucket again, Celia turned down the dirt path that led to the beach below. She sang an old song to herself as she walked: “I have to depart for a land far away. I’ll leave my mother. I’ll leave my father.” Of course, she had lost her father long ago, but that didn’t diminish her sense of longing. How she wished they could all be together in their little village, sitting around the same table. How she wished that nothing had ever changed. That her father hadn’t ever left for Portugal. That Manny had never gone to the university. That her mother hadn’t gone sick in the head.
But everything had changed. Her only choice was to create a new future, where any children she and André had together would have the kind of stability she craved. They were waiting to have children until they got to America. That way, their children could be American citizens, and maybe at least they could be happy.
With the party going on, André had probably forgotten she’d gone for water, so she continued down the path, singing the songs of her childhood. Now was her time to say goodbye to her island, her home.
A group of young men played soccer on the beach below, and the waves swooshed gently toward the black sands. Tomorrow she would take a boat across that ocean and then an airplane across that sky. All the way to America.
She hated to leave her mother, but Toon had promised to care for her, and she trusted he would do his best. Mama was back to normal now, but there was always the risk that the stress of a move could bring back her illness. Celia couldn’t ask her to go with her, but she also couldn’t stay for her mother’s sake. Mama wanted her to go to America. It was what every Cape Verdean mother wanted for her daughter.
As she walked along the shore, she sang every song she could remember—both sad songs and happy ones. She sang childhood songs—the one about a doll named Pim and others about the perfume of the flowers. She sang songs of freedom, love, sunshine, and the brightness of life.
She had heard that on other beaches, the sand was white, so this might be the last time she ever walked on black sands. Taking off her flip-flops, she ran right up to the water and let the waves lap at her feet.
Right then, she just wanted to be a child, carefree and happy. Oh, to sit once more with Manny in the mango tree.
She danced on the damp edge of sand just above where the waves broke. She sang songs of the sand and sea, promising herself never to forget the words. Along with her clothes and her memories, these words would be the only possessions she could take with her across the ocean. She sang the songs again and again as the sun sank to the edge of the water.
When her voice finally grew hoarse, she collapsed into a soft pile of sand, letting it mold itself against her body. The stars were beginning to peek out of the indigo sky, and André would still be partying, so she lay, watching as each star flickered into existence.
Everything would be different for her tomorrow. Everything would be better . . . she hoped.