Before We Were Free Read online

  “You mean, do I want you to show it to me?”

  I hang my head with embarrassment.

  “No big deal,” he adds. “I never do good in English and it’s my native language.”

  I like him instantly for not making fun of me.

  “Let me tell my mom,” he says before we set off. When he comes running back out, a tall, red-headed woman wearing a frilly apron stands at the door waving hello to me.

  We spend the rest of the afternoon exploring the compound— the lily pond with wishing coins we can’t see at the bottom because it’s gotten so slimy; the old Taino cemetery, where Mundín discovered a carved stone Chucha said would bring rain; the wild, overgrown plot where my maiden aunt Mimí will someday build a house if she ever gets married. Showing it off to somebody makes the place I’ve always known suddenly a lot more interesting. But I can’t show him everything because a little later, his mom calls him inside to get his room in order so he can sleep in it tonight.

  “See you later, alligator,” Sammy yells over his shoulder.

  “Tomorrow?” I ask.

  “Sure,” he calls back.

  Just thinking about tomorrow’s meeting, I feel so excited. I only wish Sammy had not called me an alligator. I know it’s just a stupid American saying, but I really don’t appreciate being called such an ugly animal. Even cotorrita is starting to get on my nerves. Honestly! People are always reminding me about my manners, but where are theirs?

  The next day, Sam and I are exploring down by Tía Mimí’s orchid shed, where the orchids have grown straggly since Porfirio left. Right next to the shed is the bachelor pad that Tío Toni built last year, a tiny casita like the ones in the country, with wooden shutters that latch up from the inside and a big padlock at the door. Tío Toni and his friends liked to sit around half the night talking in hushed voices. Now that I know what they were really up to, it feels creepy going near the place.

  As we come in view of the casita, I stop in my tracks as if I’ve seen a ghost. The door to Tío Toni’s casita is opened a crack!

  “What’s up?” Sammy wants to know.

  “It’s not supposed to be open,” I whisper. The casita has been shut up since late summer, when Tío Toni disappeared.

  “Maybe your maid left it that way when she cleaned?” Sammy suggests. By now he looks a little nervous himself and is talking in whispers.

  I shake my head. Chucha is the only one left working in the compound. She doesn’t have time to do extra cleaning.

  Slowly, we creep up to the door and glance in. Someone is moving around in the darkness inside!

  We run back so fast that I can feel my heart racing long after my legs have stopped. Later, bouncing together on Sammy’s trampoline, we promise not to tell our parents about our discovery just yet or they won’t let us explore the compound anymore. We jump up and down, trying to touch the lowest branches on the ceiba tree. When Mrs. Washburn comes out with lemonade, we climb off the trampoline.

  “How are you children doing?” she asks. She has big, blue, wide-open eyes and looks as if she is always surprised.

  “Fine and dandy,” Sam says quickly, raising a finger when his mother isn’t looking and crossing his lips.

  three

  Secret Santas

  Now that the SIM are gone and the Washburns are living next door, Mami and Papi decide we can go back to school.

  But first, Mami sits us down. “I don’t want you talking about what happened with your friends,” she warns.

  “Why not?” I want to know.

  Mami quotes one of Chucha’s sayings, “ ‘No flies fly into a closed mouth.’ ” The less said, the better. “And that includes talking to Susie and Sammy,” Mami adds, eyeing Lucinda and me.

  Lucinda has become friends with Sammy’s older sister, just as I have with Sammy. Poor Mundín is stuck without a new friend. But he says he doesn’t care. Papi is giving him extra responsibility, taking him to work the days we aren’t in school. Some nights after supper, Mundín gets to drive the car up and down all the driveways that connect the houses in the compound.

  “If anything happens to me,” Papi says from time to time, “you’re the man of the house.”

  “If he wants to be the man of the house, he’s going to have to stop biting his nails,” Mami says, breaking the tense silence that follows such remarks.

  The night before going back to school, I spend a long time picking out my outfit, as if I’m getting ready for the first day of classes. Finally, I settle on the parrot skirt Mami made me in imitation of the poodle skirt all the American girls are wearing. But even after everything is laid out, I feel apprehensive about going back. Everyone will be asking me why I’ve been absent for over two weeks. I myself don’t understand why we weren’t able to go to school just because the SIM were on our doorstep. After all, Papi still went to work every day. But Mami has refused to even discuss it.

  I go next door to Lucinda’s room. My sister is setting her hair in rollers. Talk about torture! How can she sleep with those rods in her hair? For her outfit, she also picked out her skirt just like my parrot skirt, but she insisted on a poodle when Mami made hers.

  “Linda Lucinda,” I butter her up. “What are we going to tell everyone at school? You know they’re going to be asking us where we were.”

  Lucinda sighs and rolls her eyes at herself in the mirror. She motions for me to come closer. “Don’t talk in here,” she whispers.

  “Why?” I say out loud.

  She gives me a disgusted look.

  “Why?” I whisper in her ear.

  “Very funny,” she says.

  I sit around until she’s done with her rollers. Then she jerks her head for me to go out on the patio, where we can talk.

  “If people ask, just tell them we had the chicken pox,” Lucinda says.

  “But we didn’t.”

  Lucinda closes her eyes until she regains her patience with me. “I know we didn’t have the chicken pox, Anita. It’s just a story, okay?”

  I nod. “But why didn’t we really go to school?”

  Lucinda explains that after our cousins’ departure, too many upsetting things have been happening and that’s why Mami hasn’t wanted us out of her sight. Raids by the SIM, like the one we had; arrests; accidents.

  “I heard Papi talking about some accident with butterflies or something,” I tell her.

  “The Butterflies,” Lucinda corrects me, nodding. “They were friends of Papi. He’s really upset. Everyone is. Even the Americans are protesting.”

  “Protesting what? Wasn’t it a car accident?”

  Lucinda rolls her eyes again at how little I know. “ ‘Car accident,’ ” she says, making quote marks in the air with her fingers, as if she doesn’t really mean what she’s saying.

  “You mean, they were—”

  “Shhh!” Lucinda hushes me.

  Suddenly, I understand. These women were murdered in a pretend accident! I shiver, imagining myself on the way to school, tumbling down a cliff, my parrot skirt flying up around me. Now I feel scared of leaving the compound. “So why send us to school at all?”

  “The Americans are our friends,” Lucinda reminds me. “So for now, we’re safe.”

  I don’t like the sound of “for now,” or how Lucinda makes those quote marks in the air again when she says “we’re safe.”

  Mami is actually a lot calmer now that the Washburns have moved in. Not only is it nice to have the special protection of the consul next door, but the extra rent money is coming in handy. Construcciones de la Torre isn’t doing well. Everything is at a standstill because of the embargo, whatever that is. We’re having to cut corners and sell off our uncles’ cars and the furniture from my grandparents’ house from when Papito was making money. I offer to let Mami sell my brown oxfords and old-fashioned jumpers I don’t like. But she smiles and says that won’t be necessary just yet.

  Lucinda and I aren’t the only ones to make friends with our neighbors. Mami starts a cana
sta group to introduce Mrs. Washburn to other Dominican ladies and help her practice her Spanish. Two or three tables are set up on the back patio. The ladies chat in lowered voices. Every once in a while, the new maid, Lorena, comes around with a tray of lemonades or clean ashtrays. Although Mami is trying to save money, there’s too much work keeping up with all the houses in the compound for just Chucha. So Mami has hired the young girl to help out. But we have to be extra careful what we say around her.

  “Why?” I ask. “Because she’s new?”

  Mami gives me a look that has “Cotorrita!” written all over it. After I told Mami that her nickname for me was really getting on my nerves, she promised to stop using it. But she still lets me know with her eyes when I’m speaking up too much. “Just be careful what you say,” Mami repeats.

  I guess you can’t trust a maid who hasn’t changed anyone’s diaper in the family!

  Actually, I can’t really complain about being asked to keep secrets. Sammy and I haven’t said a word about our discovery. Twice we’ve gone back to Tío Toni’s casita only to find the door closed and the padlock in place. But there have been fresh footprints leading to and from the casita and a pile of cigarette butts, as if someone without an ashtray has thrown them out the window.

  “Very fishy,” Sammy observes, an expression which he says means that something strange is going on.

  Our compound is crawling with fish, all right.

  At school, any interest in my disappearance for two weeks is upstaged by two much more exciting developments: Christmas is coming and Sammy has joined our class.

  “Samuel Adams Washburn,” Mrs. Brown introduces him.

  “Sam,” Sammy corrects her.

  Mrs. Brown asks “Samuel” to come to the front of the room and say a little something about himself. Mostly, Sam shrugs as Mrs. Brown introduces him herself.

  Then Mrs. Brown goes down each row, and we have to introduce ourselves. When my turn comes, Sam pipes up, “I know Anita already.” My face burns with pleasure.

  Behind me, Nancy Weaver and Amy Cartwright giggle their flirty hellos. I feel a pang of jealousy! Being Americans, they’ll have so much more to share with Sam than I do.

  I knew him first! I want to shout. He’s living in my cousins’ house next door!

  Not that I think of Sam as a boyfriend, which I’m not allowed to have anyway. Mami doesn’t approve of my being around any boys who aren’t related to me. But since my cousins moved away, the rules have both tightened and loosened in odd ways. I can’t talk about the SIM’s visit or my cousins’ leaving for New York City, but I can have Sam for a best friend even if he is a boy.

  After we all introduce ourselves, Mrs. Brown says she has an announcement to make. “Class, we are going to play a special game for Christmas!” Everyone cheers. Mrs. Brown holds a finger to her lips to hush us. When we quiet down, she continues. “You will each pick a name out of a hat, and you’ll be that classmate’s Secret Santa—”

  Oscar’s hand is in the air before Mrs. Brown is done explaining, which is something we’re not supposed to do.

  Mrs. Brown ignores him. “As a Secret Santa, you’ll be leaving hidden notes for the person whose name you’ve picked. Little gifts and surprises. Things like that. Then, at our Christmas party, you’ll each find out who your Secret Santa has been.” Mrs. Brown claps her hands at the fun this is going to be.

  “Any questions?” Mrs. Brown adds, looking over at Oscar, who waves his hand eagerly. The class groans.

  “What if you pick your own name?” Oscar wants to know.

  Mrs. Brown thinks for a moment. “That is a good question. I suppose the best thing would be to put the name back in the hat and try again.”

  I look over at Oscar. Sometimes he is sort of smart. He’s about Sammy’s height but with a permanent suntan, as the American kids sometimes describe our color of skin. Oscar is actually only half Dominican, on his mother’s side. His father, who’s originally from Italy, works at the Italian embassy, which is why Carla and I have always thought Mrs. Brown is more patient with Oscar than with the rest of us “natives.”

  It sounds like this Secret Santa game could be fun, although now that Carla is gone, there’s only one other person whose Secret Santa I want to be. I lift my chain out from inside my blouse and put the little cross in my mouth. Somehow it makes me feel closer to God. “Por favor, please, please, let it be Sammy,” I plead.

  But when I unfold my piece of paper, the name on it is Oscar Mancini! I consider folding the paper back up and pretending I picked my own name. But it seems like a mean thing to do, especially at Christmas.

  The Secret Santa idea is short-lived. The next day in class, Mrs. Brown announces that due to some parental complaints, she is going to have to cancel the game. The class groans. “I know, class,” Mrs. Brown says, pulling herself up as if someone has hurt her feelings, but she can’t say who. “I’m disappointed, too.”

  At recess, we all find out from Amy and Nancy what has happened. Some Dominican parents complained to the principal about having Secret Santas.

  I’m not surprised the complaints have come from Dominican parents, many of whom don’t like the idea of Santa Claus’s replacing the three wise kings. But it turns out that the objections aren’t religious. Instead, some parents feel that there’s enough tension in the air. Kids sneaking around and leaving secret messages might be taken the wrong way.

  “Oh, come on!” Amy says, rolling her eyes. “What are they talking about?”

  “It’s the embargo,” Oscar explains. Everyone looks over at him. None of us are really sure what an embargo is.

  “Many countries will not have anything to do with us anymore,” Oscar continues. “Including the United Estates,” he adds, nodding at Amy as if she ordered the embargo herself.

  “That’s ridiculous,” Nancy says. “If we didn’t want anything to do with you, why would we be here?” She rolls her eyes at Amy, who rolls her eyes back at her.

  Oscar considers this for a moment. “I don’t know,” he finally admits. “But my parents are preoccupied and that is why they do not wish anything sneaky to go on.”

  “So, it was your parents who complained!” Nancy says, hooking her arm into Amy’s. The two girls stalk off toward where Sammy is bouncing a basketball with some of his new friends.

  “Secret Santas are not sneaky!” Amy calls over her shoulder.

  Whatever Secret Santas are or are not, I sincerely hope that my parents aren’t among the complainers. But at supper that night, when I mention that the Secret Santa game has been canceled, the relieved look on their faces makes me suspect they also spoke to the principal.

  “There are enough secrets”—Mami stops while Lorena brings in the flan dessert and clears the dinner plates—“enough secrets in the world already,” Mami says as if she herself isn’t always asking us to add to that amount!

  In class, Mrs. Brown tries explaining how an embargo works. Sometimes a group of countries disapproves of what another country is doing, and they refuse to trade or do business with that country until the situation improves.

  “As you know,” Mrs. Brown is saying, “the United States has now joined the embargo.”

  Oscar turns and gives Nancy and Amy an I-told-you-so nod.

  A dozen hands go up. Lots of the American students have questions. Is it okay for them to be in a country that is being embargoed? Are they behind enemy lines? Will they be taken prisoner?

  Mrs. Brown shakes her head and laughs. “Heavens, no!” she reassures them. “It’s not like that at all. Countries can disagree but life goes on. The United States wants to be friends with this country. How many of you have a teenage brother or sister?”

  Lots of hands go up.

  “You know how your parents will sometimes ground your brother or sister? It’s not because they don’t love him or her, now, is it? It’s because they’re concerned and want to make him or her a better person.”

  The more I think about it, an embargo soun
ds an awful lot like the punishment chair at home whenever we misbehave.

  “So how has the Dominican Republic misbehaved?” one of the Dominican students wants to know.

  But that is a question Mrs. Brown won’t answer. “Enough about politics, class! We have our own politics to take care of. We’re going to have to have an election today.”

  It turns out that Joey Farland, our current president, will be leaving over Christmas vacation. His dad, Ambassador Farland, has been recalled to Washington, D.C., because of the embargo. Sam’s dad, Mr. Washburn, is in charge of the embassy that’s now only a consulate. Something like that.

  When Mrs. Brown asks for nominations, Nancy raises her hand. “Sam Washburn,” she announces. The whole class breaks out clapping, as if Sammy has already won.

  At school, I’m too shy to fight my way into the inner circle of Sam’s fans. But back at the compound, we’re still good pals. I draw him a map of the whole place and tell him some of the stories Tío Toni has told me about Sir Francis Drake and his pirates burying treasure on the property when they raided the island back in the 1500s, or about the Taino Indians having once had a burial yard behind Tío Fran’s house that is full of spirits now—stories that are exciting to tell even if I don’t really believe them anymore.

  “Wow!” Sam keeps saying. “Pirates and ghosts right here where we’re standing?”

  I nod. I just love impressing the most popular boy in our class! We might not have the greatest country on earth, but we certainly have an interesting one!

  One afternoon, while Chucha and Mami are out shopping, we sneak into Chucha’s room and I show Sammy her coffin.

  “Wow!” he says, glancing around at Chucha’s purple towel hanging from a peg, her purple mosquito net strung between two nails, her purple dresses draped over a chair. “Does everything she wear have to be purple?”

  I nod. “Even her panties and stuff have to be dyed.” My face burns as I realize I’m talking about underwear to a boy.

  But Sammy is too busy peering into the coffin to notice. “Why’s the inside all ripped up?”