A Blossom of Bright Light (5 page)

Chapter 6

“O
kay, Sophia. Let's try this again. Which number is smaller? Negative six or negative one?”

“I told you, Mommy! One! One is smaller than six.”

“No, Mija,” said Adele. “One
is
smaller than six. But
negative
one is larger than
negative
six.”

“But that makes no sense!” Sophia shoved the worksheet across the dining table and folded her arms across her chest. She was getting near the breaking point. They both were. Sophia was dog-tired from being up late at the sleepover—a misnomer if ever there was one. Adele felt beaten down by the events of this morning. How come Peter got to do all the fun stuff with their daughter, like taking her ice-skating and Adele ended up with fourth-grade math?

She retrieved the worksheet and laid it gently in front of her daughter. “What you need to remember is that negative numbers work in reverse. The bigger the negative, the smaller the amount. So negative six is
smaller
than negative one.”

“But six is bigger.”

“When it's a positive number.”

“But if you owed somebody six dollars, you'd owe
more
than if you only owed them one. So it's bigger.”

Ay caray!
Adele's head was pounding. Her nerves were shot. Every time the phone rang, it was someone else telling her about the dead newborn found behind La Casa—everyone but Jimmy. He had yet to call since he'd stormed out of the house at seven-thirty this morning.

She was in the process of drawing a number line for Sophia when the phone rang again. She checked the caller ID. It wasn't Jimmy. But it was a call she knew she had to take: Steve Schulman, the county supervisor, who, if the polls were correct, would soon become the next Democratic U.S. senator from New York.

“I have to answer this,” Adele told her daughter. “Fill in the numbers on the number line, and I'll check them when I get off the phone.”

The little girl groaned and rolled her eyes. She was nine going on thirteen. Rhinestone jeans. Sequined shirts. All sparkle and high drama. Adele took the phone upstairs. She hadn't told Sophia anything about Schulman's offer yet. She hadn't told anyone.

She walked into her bedroom and shut the door. “Hey, Steve.” She feigned a brightness she didn't feel.

“You're busier than I am, Adele, and that's saying something. I've been trying to reach you for two days.” He had no idea she'd been dodging his calls. And why would he? Most people would give their right arm for the opportunity Schulman was offering her. What was her problem?

“It's just been crazy at work lately,” said Adele. That was one way to describe a homicide investigation behind her community center.

“So—you're coming to the gala Saturday night, right?”

“I wouldn't miss it for the world.” Adele wondered again if Jimmy had gotten around to renting a tuxedo. She'd been asking him for a month to do it. He kept putting it off, like a lot of things in their relationship. Then again, the same could be said of her.

“You know,” said Schulman, “I would love to be able to introduce you on Saturday as my new Hispanic Affairs appointee.”

The words hung on the line a half beat too long. Adele knew she was supposed to say something.

“I'm flattered, Steve. More than flattered. Honored—”

“You
are
going to accept, aren't you?” He had an airline pilot's voice. Quietly confident under the most harrowing of circumstances. More than once Adele had relied on Schulman for his reassuring demeanor, not to mention his political savvy and sway with community leaders.

She'd first met Steve Schulman ten years ago when he was an up-and-coming state senator for the district and she was a former Wall Street lawyer who'd just won a class-action discrimination suit against the town of Lake Holly on behalf of a group of day laborers. As part of the settlement, she'd been granted the resources to start La Casa. It was not a politically popular decision. Overnight, picket lines formed across from the center. Adele was deluged with hate mail, even at her home, telling her to “Go back to Mexico”—despite the fact that she was born in the United States and her parents were from Ecuador.

Every week, there were angry letters in the local newspaper decrying the death of their bucolic little village at the hands of “alien invaders.” All the local politicians walked a fine line with Adele, on the one hand extolling the “American melting pot” and, on the other, reassuring their voters that they did not support “lawbreakers.”

Only Schulman was able to step above the fray and see the bigger picture. A real estate lawyer and small-time developer, he quickly rounded up local civic and business leaders and community activists and forced them to sit in the same room with one another. He charmed the Hispanic community with his stilted, gringo-accented Spanish and willingness to partake in their culture. And he rightly pointed out to business leaders that Latinos were reinvigorating a downtown that had been slowly dying as middle-class residents took their business to the malls.

He could not change everyone's heart, but he changed enough of them, and Lake Holly—unlike so many other towns faced with the same challenges—managed to emerge from the crisis stronger and, at least in Adele's mind, better than it had been before.

She admired him. She owed him. And so she stumbled about now for an answer. “I haven't spoken to my daughter about the position yet. Moving to D.C., leaving La Casa, those are big decisions—”

“As opposed to what, Adele? Organizing mitten drives and English classes? Figuring out how to squeeze another year's worth of life from your copier? God knows, I'm your biggest fan. And, God knows, I appreciate the work you've done at La Casa, the contributions it has made to the community. To the county. But it's time to move on. You're a Harvard-educated lawyer, a woman with the vision and courage to change the lives of a much broader group of Latinos than you could ever hope to staying in Lake Holly.”

“I know. It's just that—”

“I'm sure you could find someone else to take over the reins there.”

Yes, she could. She had several highly competent people working there now. They could keep the place running and take over the fund-raising. But who would handle all the little details? Who would remember to give the Serrano children extra snacks when they came for tutoring because their mom was dead and their dad was overwhelmed with the fact that he was facing deportation? Who would scavenge garage sales for old SAT prep books so that maybe—just maybe—Orestes Pilar had a shot at going to college? Who would buy a cake for Nataly Mejia, who was too proud to tell anyone her tenth birthday was coming up and her family couldn't afford a celebration?

But no. Even those weren't the biggest reasons. The biggest reason didn't
know
he was the biggest reason. She hadn't told him.

“I just need some more time, Steve. I mean, the election's still several weeks away. And you won't be taking office until January, and—”

“I recognize a stall when I hear one, Adele. What are you afraid of?”

“Nothing—”

“Because this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. It's not every day you get the chance to shape policy on a national level.”

Oh God
. What wouldn't she have given for a chance like this straight out of law school? Or even a couple of years ago, right after her divorce? And then
he
came along. And overnight, everything changed. No man had ever made her laugh harder or caused her body to tingle from head to toe when he entered a room. Was that what happened when you fell in love? Did you rearrange the evidence to suit the verdict like some small-town judge fixing speeding tickets?

They didn't belong together. Anyone could see that. He loved predictability. She craved excitement. He didn't like his opinions scrutinized. She relished a good debate. He was methodical and practical. She preferred to think big and fill in the gaps later.

He didn't understand her job or why it mattered so much to her. He'd deny that if she said it. But she knew it in the way he sometimes drifted off when she was sharing some dilemma about a client, the way he'd grow restless at functions, jiggling his legs, jangling his keys, playing with his phone or his Swiss Army knife. He viewed work—any work, even his own—through a blue-collar lens. It was something he did, not something he was. You gave it your best shot, and then you went home.

She'd tried to see things his way. She'd tried to compromise. And look what it had cost—a child's life.

“Look,” said Schulman, “if you don't want to be my Hispanic Affairs adviser, just say so.”

“I do want it.”

“Then you're accepting?”

“Probably. That is—look, Steve, a terrible thing happened this morning. A newborn was found dead behind La Casa. I'm having a hard time processing anything today.”

“Did they find the mother?”

“Not yet, as far as I know. I'm going to be asking around.”

“A word of advice? Stay out of any controversy right now. Let the police handle it. You need to be squeaky clean if you're going to work for me. Which brings us back to the big question.”

They were both silent for a moment. Adele didn't know what to say.

“Look, Adele, I really, really want you for this position. I know you'd be terrific at it. But I need
you
to want it.”

“I do. I just—I need a little more time to get things in order.”

“How about you give me your answer at the gala Saturday night? Deal?”

“Yes. Deal. Thank you, Steve.”

“You come to D.C., I'll be the one thanking you.”

Adele hung up the phone. She'd just bought herself six more days before she had to come up with a decision. So why didn't she feel any better?

Because I still have to tell Jimmy.
Every bad thing Adele had faced in her life she'd handled by avoiding the issue and bottling it inside: her childhood traumas growing up with undocumented parents, her financial struggles at Harvard, her failing marriage. Adele had dealt with each by not dealing with it. She could do that largely because she was the recipient of the pain, not the instigator. But here finally was a problem she couldn't pretend away. She was going to have to face him squarely when she delivered the news. Six days, six weeks—it didn't matter.

What mattered was—this time she was the one inflicting the pain.

Chapter 7

A
dele needed to clear her head. So did Sophia. They'd been working on math problems long enough. Outside, the late-afternoon sun had settled like butterscotch over the landscape, and the air carried the scent of cinnamon and fresh-cut wood. The days were getting shorter. Autumn was slipping through their fingers.

Adele hauled Sophia's bike out of the garage and pumped some air into the tires. Just a few blocks from their house was a small bodega that sold Good Humor ice cream. Adele and Sophia were both suckers for their Candy Center Crunch Bars.

Walking into Claudia's bodega was like stepping into another country. Light filtered through the stalks of green and yellow plantains that dangled from ropes on the ceiling. The air smelled like ripe fruit and strong coffee. There was a sense of treasure and mystery on every shelf, from the colorful peppers shriveled like old lady's fingers to the rows of strange herbs that traditional healers—
curanderos—
used to treat a variety of ailments from diabetes to colic.

There were items one could only find here: cartons of the cinnamon-rice drink
horchata
. Jars of cashew apple jam. Bins of squash seeds that the Guatemalan women ground up to make a nutty-tasting stew. And there were things one could find elsewhere but that had more meaning in a place like this: dried and salted codfish. Votive candles with the Virgin of Guadalupe etched across them. Beans in every shape and variety. Burlap sacks of rice. Cans of Café Bustelo, the old Cuban-style espresso. Jars of Vicks VapoRub, a staple in every Latin American's medicine chest. Claudia Aguilar's store was more than a bodega; it was a safe harbor for people who might never see their home port again.

Adele tried to imagine herself shopping in a place like this in Washington, D.C. Would she even
find
such a store? Every time she traveled there, she was struck by the cookie-cutter sprawl of the surrounding suburbs. All the town houses and shopping malls looked the same. Bland. Brick-veneered. Soulless. People always seemed in flux and on the move. Oh sure, there were plenty of immigrants in D.C. But how could she form real relationships if her fortunes were tied to an electoral calendar? In Lake Holly, she knew everyone. Leaving would feel like a betrayal. And yet—

“Doña Adele!
Que bueno verte!
” Claudia called out from behind the counter. Claudia was a short, energetic Salvadoran with a body like a Russian nesting doll and hair the color of a used chalkboard eraser. She worked seven days a week and carried herself like she was everyone's mother—something the young men in the area, so far from home, really appreciated. Like a lot of the immigrants in Lake Holly, Claudia still used “Don” and “Doña” as signs of respect.

Adele lifted her hand in greeting. Usually Claudia's daughter, Inés, was behind the counter helping her. But today there were only two people in the store besides Claudia: a customer at the front counter and Claudia's mildly retarded grandson, Neto, who was unloading crates of guavas and habañero peppers while his miniature dachshund, Chicha, danced around his legs.

Chicha rolled over for a belly rub the moment she spotted Sophia. While the girl was scratching the dog, Neto grabbed a habañero pepper from the crate he'd just unloaded and held it out to Sophia between his stubby fingers.

“This? Don't eat,” he said in Spanish, then laughed in his thick, nasal way. “You eat this?” He fanned his mouth. “Ay, it's hot!”

“Don't be silly, Neto!” Claudia chided from behind the counter. “She doesn't want that.” Claudia reached behind the register and held out a tamarind-flavored Mexican candy to Sophia. The child hesitated.

“Go take the candy and say thank you to Doña Claudia,” Adele instructed her daughter in Spanish.

Sophia gave her mother a smoldering look, then took the candy and sputtered out a shy
gracias
. The child understood Spanish, but getting her to speak it was another matter. Adele hoped that that would change as Sophia got older, but with a last name like Kessler, her ties to her Latin roots already seemed like a thing of the past. Sophia didn't even like tamarind.

“We were just talking about you,” said Claudia. She nodded to the woman whose order she was ringing up.

“Me?” Adele stepped closer. The woman at the counter was dressed in a tailored black wool jacket with a poufy, furlike collar. Her nails sported a French manicure, and her handbag looked expensive. Claudia had only one customer Adele knew of who could afford such things.

“Doña Esme,
cómo está?
”

Esmeralda Gonzalez ran a hand through her high, tight ponytail and mumbled a shy greeting in return. For some reason Adele could never fathom, she made Charlie Gonzalez's wife nervous—which struck her as odd since she and Gonzalez got along well. Carlos “Charlie” Gonzalez was something of a legend in Lake Holly, a man who crossed the border from Mexico thirty years ago with nothing but the clothes on his back and rose to become the owner of a multimillion-dollar string of car washes as well as a political force in the state Democratic Party. He was a big supporter of La Casa and one of Schulman's chief campaign advisers. Yet for all the years Adele had known Gonzalez, she could count on one hand the number of times she'd said more than hello to his wife.

“We were talking about that terrible situation,” said Claudia.

Adele thought for a moment that Claudia was referring to the infant behind La Casa. But it was too soon for anyone in the community to know about that.

“I was just telling Doña Esme that I saw him in church this morning. With his two little ones. And the older girl, the one you like so much. Such a beauty.”

Manuel Serrano.
Claudia was talking about the cook who used to work at La Bella Vita. His situation concerned all the Latinos in Lake Holly—even the ones who had green cards and the ones born here—because all of them had relatives who didn't and weren't.

Serrano had become the biblical Job of Lake Holly. Eighteen months ago, his wife died suddenly of meningitis. Then a fire in a neighbor's apartment caused Serrano and his three children to have to relocate. Then the local police kicked down the door of his new apartment, ransacked his belongings, and arrested him in a case of mistaken identity. And finally, instead of apologizing and letting Serrano go, they discovered a fourteen-year-old deportation order against him from a labor raid at a California garment factory when he was twenty-two.

For four months now, Adele had been helping Serrano fight deportation. He had a final hearing coming up a week from Monday. If his lawyer couldn't convince a federal immigration judge to stay the order on the grounds that he was the sole support of his children—two of whom were American-born citizens—he'd be deported back to Mexico, separated from his kids for the rest of their childhood, if not forever.

“Do you have any news on the situation?” Claudia asked Adele.

“I think Doña Esme probably knows more than I do at this point,” said Adele, “seeing as her husband arranged for Manuel's lawyer.”

“I don't know anything,” said Esme. “My husband does not talk to me about such things.”

“Really?” The word came out sharper than Adele had intended. She had to remind herself that Esme had married Gonzalez when she was a teenager and he was in his thirties. Gonzalez liked to tell the story of returning back to his village, where he fell hopelessly in love with his wife on the eve of her taking her vows as a nun and begged her on bended knee to marry him. Adele couldn't picture Vega or her ex doing something so corny—or so romantic, for that matter. Then again, there wasn't a man on earth she'd have let slip a ring on her finger in her teens.

“I'm sure Don Charlie and Steve Schulman's old law partner are doing all they can for Manuel,” said Adele.

“So he'll be free soon?” asked Claudia.

“That's hard to predict.” Adele didn't have a magic wand she could wave and stay Serrano's order of deportation. People always attributed to her more power than she possessed—and then got annoyed when she couldn't come through.

Take Serrano's ankle monitor. When he first got arrested, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the federal agency that handles deportations, wanted to ship him off to a detention center in some distant part of the country and expedite his removal. Adele worked an all-nighter to convince a judge to release him on humanitarian grounds and monitor him at home while he fought deportation.

It was a huge victory. And although Serrano was forbidden to work under the conditions of his release, he was extremely grateful for the chance to remain with his children. But as far as the rest of the community was concerned, Adele had slapped an electronic ball and chain on an innocent man and gotten him kicked off his job.

She couldn't even begin to explain to Esme and Claudia what Serrano was up against now: federal policy, judicial expedience, the whims of Washington on any given day. Steve Schulman might—
might
—have the influence to get a judge to issue Serrano a stay of deportation. Not legal residency, mind you. Just a promise not to deport him
right now.
But it would be political suicide for a candidate not yet in office to intercede publicly or try to call in those sorts of favors right before an election. Also, it could backfire. A judge could decide to spite a politician who tried to exert that sort of pressure. People got deported for a variety of reasons, not all of them logical.

Adele couldn't give Esme and Claudia the news they wanted, so she tried to change the subject. She gestured to the huge pile of food Claudia was ringing up and sorting into various bags and boxes. Esme appeared to be buying for an army.

“I'll bet three growing boys must eat you out of house and home,” said Adele.

“These things aren't for me.”

“Doña Esme buys groceries for many people in town,” said Claudia. “Especially the ones who are too proud or too sick to visit the food pantry.”

“How wonderful,” said Adele. “I had no idea.” The Gonzalezes already gave generously to La Casa as well as to the medical clinic, the town's food pantry, and a scholarship program at Lake Holly High School.

Adele noticed packages of hand warmers among the items Esme was buying. “Are you taking these to Mano Amiga?” Adele knew that, in addition to all their other charities, Esme ran Mano Amiga—Helping Hand—at her church. It was an outreach program for the homeless.

Esme nodded. “Winter is coming.”

“When are you going again?”

“Tomorrow. Why?”

“Zambo came to see me last night at La Casa,” said Adele. “I wasn't there. I know he goes to Mano Amiga a lot, especially when it gets cold outside. If you see him, can you tell him to come by La Casa as soon as he can? I really need to talk to him.”

Esme took out her checkbook and began writing a check for the groceries. Claudia didn't take credit cards—the overhead was too steep. And besides, her customers mostly paid in cash.

“I don't think I'll be seeing him again,” said Esme.

“Why?”

Esme tore off her check and handed it to Claudia. “The last time I spoke to him, he told me he was going back to Guatemala.”

“He always says that. Every time the weather gets cold and the Lake Holly police dump him in Wickford.”

“He was serious this time, I believe.” Esme stuffed her checkbook back into her handbag. She looked down as she spoke. She often looked down when she spoke. Adele suspected it had something to do with her teeth. They were straight and white, but according to Gonzalez, when he first married her they were very crooked. The dental implants came later—late enough, Adele suspected, that Esme never got used to looking people straight in the eye when she was talking.

“Does he understand that if he leaves, he might not be able to come back?”

“I only know what he told me,” said Esme. “He seemed very certain. Maybe he wanted to see you to say good-bye.”

“Huh.” Adele felt like she'd just had the wind knocked out of her. Here was Manuel Serrano doing everything he could do
not
to get deported. And here was Zambo, heading back by choice. People were nothing if not surprising.

“Mom! Can we go?” asked Sophia in English. Her ice cream was beginning to melt. Chicha the dachshund was looking up hopefully in case any of it dropped. Neto was reciting his favorite flavors, but he couldn't get much beyond chocolate and vanilla.

“One minute, Mija.” Adele turned to Esme. “If it turns out Zambo was just bluffing and you
do
run into him, can you tell him to come see me at La Casa?”

“Of course,” said Esme. She kept her head slightly bent and didn't meet Adele's gaze. “I send everybody to you, Doña Adele. I'm sure you always try your best to help people.”

There was something in the way Esme spoke the words, the way Claudia kept her own gaze on the scuffed counter, that made Adele feel the weight of their expectations and the sense that already, she'd failed.