Emilio's
Son
Fiction
by Gwendolyn Joyce Mintz • Art by Zenon Toczek
Like the shadow she cast, the woman emerged dark and obscure in the
bright sunlight. Her steps, slow and deliberate, were uneven and often
took her into the path of oncoming cars. With her protruding belly, it
was clear she was near giving birth, and people passing her — some
swerving to avoid hitting her — shook their heads in amazement. She
surprised only visitors to the area; residents had long before become
accustomed to the swollen Mexican women flowing in and out of the town,
just like the river they crossed to get there.
The woman sighed as she viewed what lay before her; it was not what she
had expected. Rosa, a friend who crossed almost every day to clean
houses, had told her of the parteras,
midwives, who delivered babies
for women coming across the border.
"Hay muchas," Rosa had assured
her, but still the woman saw no houses designated as such, nothing in
sight to suggest that she would find someone to deliver her child. She
feared that her plan would not work, and she sighed again in
frustration. Then she thought of Emilio. She pushed the
fearful thoughts from her mind, and regaining her determination, she
stood a bit straighter and continued on.
The 1979 Regal jerked to a stop in front of the house. Frances snatched
her purse from the seat as she quickly got out of the car and raced up
the steps, fumbling through her key ring, for the one she needed.
She hoped she hadn't missed Wilson. Once in the house, Frances flicked
on the light, tossed her purse onto the couch and locked the door.
Going behind the desk, she knelt before the safe and opened it.
She began counting the money, and when she heard the sharp screech of
brakes outside, she slipped two bills from the stack, put the rest back
into the safe, pushing the door closed. She rose as the knock she
was hoping for came at the door. She calmed herself before
unlocking the door and opening it.
Wilson stood on the porch, his coal-black hair cut above his ears, his
somber eyes hidden behind the black frame and lenses. Frances thought
how immaculate he always looked in his white shirt, sleeves rolled just
to the elbow, his name embroidered in red just above the chest pocket,
his dark pants neatly pressed.
"G'morning," she said, standing in the open doorway.
He smiled, rolling a toothpick in his mouth to either side. "Delivery,
ma'am."
Frances stepped aside and he entered. He tossed the toothpick
into the small wastepaper basket by the desk, and then, in one motion,
brought her to him. With his hand at the small of her back, he
pressed her body against his, their lips meeting. When he released her,
Frances unaffectedly went to the desk, picked up the two one-hundred
dollar bills and held them out to him.
"Is that all?" he asked, smiling. He ran his hands across her
shoulders, down her arms, around her waist. As he began to pull her to
him again, she said, "You don't get something for nothing, you know."
Wilson laughed. Nodding, he went outside and returned with three
cardboard boxes, which he sat on the floor. "Clinic in Galveston didn't
want part of their order."
Kneeling, Frances opened the boxes and counted the IV units in each.
"Well then," she said, looking up at him.
"Well, then," he repeated.
Frances stood on the sidewalk, tucking her shirt back into her jeans.
She watched Wilson's truck roll down the street until the words Abbott
Laboratories were no longer in sight. She smiled, satisfied, and went
inside. She acted quickly to unpack the IV units and destroy the boxes
before Ernest arrived.
The units contained a saline solution, but Ernest didn't now that. He,
like the women she gave them to, believed it was some drug to help
lessen the pain of labor. Stupid, Frances thought. Or, maybe not. In a
holistic health class she'd taken, she'd read that people generally
expected doctors to give them something whenever they visited their
offices, complaining of pain. Sometimes the doctors issued a placebo.
Frances did the same thing. Maybe the pain was psychological. Maybe
some women did have an easier time because they thought they were
really getting something medicinal. Frances didn't know. She didn't
care.
Using a box cutter, she slit the boxes into flat pieces and then carted
them out to her car. She had just put them into the trunk and was
shutting it, when she saw Ernest coming up the road. She waited
for him.
"Good morning, Ernest," she said as he reached the walk leading to the
front door. "Ready for work?"
Marguerite leaned against a post. Her feet hurt, the thin soles of the
loafers a worthless barrier against the odd-sized rocks on the road.
She had stopped not only because of her feet, but due to the dull ache
of a contraction as well. When it passed, she stood unsteadily and
began walking again.
The contractions were increasing, growing stronger; the time between
them, shorter. She hoped that she had not timed her trip wrong.
With Irene, Maria, and Teresa, her deliveries had been quick, easy. She
did not expect it to be so with this pregnancy. Everything about this
child would be different. It was a boy. A son. Emilio's son. He was
going to be an American citizen, the first in the family. This child,
the promise Emilio had made . . .
Marguerite stood at the edge of the river, her arms crossed at her
breast. Rosa and some other women chatted, but Marguerite's attention
kept returning to her husband.
Emilio stood with the group of men talking about their adventures
across the border, joking about la
migra. She looked at him, his jeans
almost white and torn in places, his brown plaid western shirt hanging
loosely on his frame. One hand was shoved deeply in his front jeans
pocket, the other held a cigarette and moved about in the air when he
spoke. His movements were animated and she watched him with concerned
interest until he turned and caught her eyes. She then turned away.
Emilio watched as she left the group of women and walked alone along
the riverbank. She held her head down, the dark curls covering her
face. He wanted to go to her, but his feet acted as though they had
rooted in the ground. Anyway, he would not ever say the right thing, he
knew, to ease her mind. Every day he chose to cross into the United
States brought more silence from his wife.
Emilio thought that she didn't understand that he did it so that he
could give her more. Little in Mexico was getting better. He had tried
to find work, but it seemed impossible. When his cousin Manuel
suggested looking for work across the border, he couldn't
refuse. He had a wife. Children. So he painted
houses, picked onions and chile, did any work he could find. It was not
without reward.
In a jar, about three inches wide, they kept his earnings. The American
dollars were rolled together, and each day there was less space in the
glass container. He didn't count the money each day — progress was slow
and he didn't want to be discouraged — still he knew the amount was
increasing. Whenever his wife became unreasonable about his travels, he
simply took the jar and set it before her.
"Time to go." Manuel tapped Emilio on his arm.
Emilio took one last drag from the cigarette and then flicked it into
the river. He called out to his wife, beckoned for her to come to him.
In his arms, she was stiff, said nothing. Emilio kissed the side of
Marguerite's head and said, "I'll be home this evening." In the
beginning, he would sometimes stay in the United States for days at a
time (it was easier, and in some ways, a bit safer) but Marguerite
worried, so Emilio tried now to make it home every night.
When he released his wife, she stood with her back to him. Minutes
later Marguerite turned, watched the horde of people wading through the
water. Though she couldn't make Emilio out in the crowd, she felt
it was just as well.
"Here." Frances handed the baby to Ernest. "Tell her it's a boy."
She scooped up the towels she had used to wipe the blood and body
fluids and to catch the afterbirth and dropped them into a plastic bag,
knotting it closed. She took it to the huge covered wastebasket
at the end of the hallway and dumped it along with the plastic gloves
she was wearing.
In the bathroom, washing her hands, she caught her reflection in the
mirror. She looked — haggard? No. She shook the word from her
mind. Still she knew two years of this had begun to take its toll.
She was tired of these Mexican women and their babies, tired of
worrying about getting caught. What she wanted now was to take her
money and spend it. Maybe she'd get a facelift, she thought, pulling
the skin on her face back with her wet hands. She looked better without
the heavy lines cutting across her forehead, running down the sides of
her mouth. She dried her hands and opened the door. Ernest was there,
poised to knock.
"She wants to know when she can leave," he said.
"Whenever she wants," Frances replied, walking past him. They always
wanted to know when they could go. It was risky for them to be up so
soon, but many left shortly after giving birth. They took their
babies — and the American citizenship— and went.
Emilio stood at the window of the dress shop, staring at the dress as
he'd done on many occasions before. It was a strapless gown,
tea-length, made of sea-blue silk. A white lace petticoat underneath
increased the fullness of the skirt. Each time he stood outside the
window, he imagined his wife pulling the dress on. Saw himself zipping
it up from behind, then turning her to face him. He'd push her thick
curls away from her face with the bone combs he'd once impulsively
bought. Everyone would be able to see the beauty in her face, the
smooth brown skin, the high cheekbones, her deep brown eyes. Emilio,
for the first time in months, would not be afraid to look into those
eyes because they would be free of fear and worry. He smiled to himself
at the image.
So tempted was he to buy the dress that one time he took the jar of
money and counted out the four-hundred and sixty-five dollars. The
dress was five-hundred dollars, and the shopkeeper had suggested he put
it on layaway, but Emilio shook his head. When he gave his money for
the dress, he wanted to take it with him. It would wait, he'd thought
as he exited the store. There would be time — and money — to fill
Marguerite's life with beautiful dresses and more.
Marguerite stood in the kitchen, running her husband's shirt over the
washboard in the sink. Emilio sat at the table. He curled the
corn tortilla up and taking a bite, he said, "¿ Quiere trabajar en casa de gente
blanca?"
She didn't reply.
"Rosa says there is a woman who wants someone to watch her children,
just in the day. She'll pay every night."
"I have my own children to watch."
Emilio momentarily froze at the sharpness in her voice. Then angrily,
he threw the tortilla down on the plate of his half-eaten meal.
He stood, pushing his chair back noisily, and slammed out the door.
Marguerite continued to push the shirt against the board until her
knuckles ached. Tears swelled up in her eyes. How could she make him
understand that with all they were gaining, there was still so much to
lose?
Later that night as they lay in bed, he said, "This cannot be all that
you want." When she didn't respond, he asked, "¿ No necesita nada para los ninos?"
"Of course I do," she quickly answered. She could no longer bear
the curious expressions on her children's faces as she counted pesos
each time she took an item off the grocery shelf. Her heart ached with
each no she had to offer in response to a request por un dolce, por un
resfresco, para una muñeca . . .
"But —"
"No buts. There is so much more we could have, Marguerite. There
is no other way for us to have it, but I promise you, one day we will."
Standing in the doorway, Marguerite could see a dark lone figure coming
up the road. She closed the door and went to the kitchen to
finish preparing her husband's meal. As she was reaching for a
plate, she was surprised at the knock on the door.
"Emilio?"
Another knock.
Opening the door, she found Manuel standing on the steps, his clothes
wet and clinging to his thin body, his hair matted to his head.
"¿ Donde esta Emilio?"
she asked immediately.
"Marguerite," he murmured.
"¿ Donde esta Emilio?"
she shrieked.
Manuel opened the screen door and entered. Marguerite felt her
chest begin to tighten.
"He fell . . . en el rio . . . le
quisimos dar ayuda pero el rio. . ." He shook his
head. "El moviemento de agua
muy rapido."
Marguerite's eyes filled with tears as she imagined her husband being
overtaken by the river currents.
"I'm sorry," Manuel offered.
She nodded, believing he was. Moments later, Manuel collapsed in
her arms and Marguerite found herself rocking him slowly, listening to
him apologize again and again.
Her monthly flow had ceased due to her grief, she believed. But
one morning, Marguerite woke to a fluttering sensation in her belly.
She was confused, then understanding, she smiled. She thought that
Manuel had been wrong. Emilio had not died; he was not really gone.
Frances, at 28, decided she wanted to be a nurse. After a few misguided
attempts at careers in fast food chains and cosmetic sales, she
enrolled in a nursing program. Nurses were always needed and they did
make good money. She hadn't expected it to be so tough. She
entered college with high hopes, but her optimism quickly diminished
when she received her first quarter grades. She learned no matter how
determined she was, it couldn't assure she'd pass Biology 101.
When she was placed on probation, she promised her grades would be
brought up —A's and B's. Again she started the next semester with
high hopes and plans for discipline and hard work. For all her efforts,
she received a C and three Ds.
Her advisor couldn't have been kinder. She explained that the nursing
program was highly selective in its students and although she was
trying, she might be better off considering another career choice.
When dismissed, Frances sat in the nurses' locker room, cleaning out
the one she shared with Cindy Hughes, a student and practicing nurse.
She thought how she hated Cindy for being successful and, in one angry
sweep, she deposited everything in the locker into her bag.
Several days later she moved to Odessa. As she sorted through the
things in the backpack, she separated hers from Cindy's. She wondered
how her former locker mate had felt, finding all of her belongings
gone. She smiled as she imagined Cindy's Florence Nightingale smile
wilting. Laughing to herself, she went through Cindy's pile. Two
nursing books, a first aid pamphlet, and a nursing newsletter. As
Frances picked the newsletter up, a thin wallet fell out. Opening it,
she realized she had all of Cindy's identification. There was a
driver's license, two credit cards, a social security card, a health
club membership card and her nursing license.
Frances took the nursing license out. Tapping it lightly against her
chin, she thought of all the opportunities awaiting her.
Frances shook the woman's hand briefly before sitting down. She
smoothed her skirt over her legs and said, "I'm so glad you're giving
me this opportunity."
"Well, Cindy, I'm glad you decided to apply here at Memorial. From the
recommendations you've received, I can say I'd be pleased to have you
working for us."
"Thank you," Frances replied.
The nurse supervisor shuffled some papers around on her desk. "Right
now we're a little short-handed. I've been doing more nursing lately
than supervising . . . things have gotten a little behind." Finding the
forms she was searching for, she handed them to Frances. "If you'll
fill these out completely and then return it to the personnel office,
where you first applied, you'll be on staff. You can pick up your
first schedule at the third floor nurses' station this afternoon."
Francis smiled. "Great." She took out Cindy's social security card.
"You'll have to forgive me," she said. "I've yet to learn this."
The supervisor smiled. "I'm the same way."
I'll show them, Frances thought the next day as she tucked her hair
into the cloth nursing cap. I'll be as good a nurse as Cindy. Maybe
even better.
Marguerite finished drinking the water, and handed the glass back to
the man who'd responded to her request for a drink. She smiled as
he gestured toward her belly, then made motions as if he were driving,
this followed by his arms cradling an imaginary baby. Marguerite
understood the word 'hospital' from what he was saying, but she shook
her head. "Gracias. No,"
she told him. Rosa had advised she seek a midwife to help her.
As Marguerite headed down the walk, the man picked up his hose again,
hoping she knew where she was going.
Marguerite wasn't sure, but she was trusting her heart to get her there.
The nurse supervisor sat at her desk, trying to make sense of the piles
of paperwork on her desk. She'd been so busy lately, finding nurses to
fill the open positions. Then there was supervising them. Cindy came to
mind. Despite the glowing recommendations she'd received, she didn't
seem to quite know what she was doing. Maybe she wasn't used to living
in a new town yet. New environments had a way of throwing people off.
She decided to go through the newsletters first. She'd been too busy to
read the last three issues. Now she sat turning the pages, looking for
items of interest. Routinely, she checked the notice of lost licenses.
Her mouth fell open as her eyes came to rest on the name Cindy Hughes.
The supervisor checked the calendar and finding Cindy scheduled to
work, she immediately went looking for her. She found Frances prepping
a woman for delivery. Taking her aside, the supervisor said, her voice
low and angry, "I don't know who you are or what you're trying to pull,
but I want you in my office now or I will call the police!" She turned
sharply on her heel.
Frances trembled. Her first impulse was to follow, but then she took a
deep breath and instead rushed to her locker. Grabbing her regular
clothes and purse, she exited through the hospital kitchen.
Another move. This time to Brownsville. Bored, angry and running out of
money, she spent her days wondering what to do. One night, watching the
news, she heard a story about some women illegally presenting
themselves as midwives along the border. The fact that they were making
a fortune interested her.
Ernest sat at the desk, flipping a deck of cards. Occasionally he
glanced over at Frances, slouched on the couch, reading. He hated days
like this when few women came and the two of them sat waiting. They
weren't interested in each other's lives, but still he wished there was
something in common the two of them could discuss.
He didn't like Frances. Didn't like working for her, still he was paid
well. It had happened by chance. Looking for some type of work, he had
knocked on her door and found her frantic. She couldn't speak Spanish
and she couldn't understand what a Mexican woman was saying. Delivering
the baby, Frances told him, depended on her knowing what was happening.
He'd translated and the next day when he came back, she offered him a
job. What she expected him to do wasn't always pleasant, but still he
was able to send money home to his family in Mexico.
Looking at her again, he thought how odd she was at times. How uncaring
she could be. Like the time she refused to give a woman her child's
birth certificate because the woman had not had full payment when the
child was born. It was only when the child was at least four months old
that Frances issued the form for the certificate, and only then when
the woman had paid an additional two-hundred dollars.
There was a knock on the door. Ernest turned in the swivel chair.
Frances looked over the edge of her book. "Be my guest,"
she told him.
Ernest rose and cracked the door open.
"Busco una partera," the woman
said. "Your sign. . ."
Ernest let his eyes dart about the streets before he fully opened the
door. Taking the woman by the elbow, he led her inside and sat her on
the couch.
Frances tossed the book aside and stood. "Does she have the
money?"
Ernest hesitated, then turned to the woman and asked.
"Si." Marguerite pulled the
jar from her dress pocket and started to hand it to him.
Frances intercepted it. "Take her in the other room and get her ready,"
she said, walking down the hall.
Ernest sat at the woman's side as she drifted in and out of
consciousness. Frances had given her something she said would help her
rest through the contractions, and now he sat with Marguerite, timing
them.
She told him the child would be a son. "My husband," she said,
"is dead now. He did not know about his son."
She told him how Emilio had crossed the border many times to work so
they could have more. How, for two years, they made plans to leave
Mexico, to arrive in the United States and live. She told him how,
standing at the stove one evening, steaming the sopa for her husband's
meal, she'd heard the knock at the door and she feared her husband had
not come back, that he was not coming back.
Frances entered the room. "Are her contractions any stronger?"
" ¿Tiena los dolores fuerte?"
"Si," the woman sighed.
Frances pulled on a pair of plastic gloves and checked the
circumference of the woman's cervix. "She's only dilated six
centimeters. Four to go." She tossed the gloves into a wastebasket.
"We'll have to wait it out."
Frances watched the red hand on the clock make a full sweep as she ran
the back of her hand across her forehead. She sighed heavily. God, she
wished this kid would be born.
The woman was clinging desperately to Ernest, speaking so fast that
Frances could understand nothing.
He turned to her. "She wants to know if you can give her something else
for the pain."
"Tell her it'll hurt the baby."
As he spoke comfortingly to the woman, Frances thought that this was
the worst.
The woman's howl brought Frances' attention back to the child's
delivery. Maybe now, Frances thought, this baby was ready to come into
the world.
"Tell her to push," she told Ernest.
The woman yelled again, bore down, her feet curving over the metal
stirrups. Frances thought she could see the baby crowning.
"Tell her again!" she ordered.
Frances' eyes widened as a small foot emerged. "DAMN!" she
exploded, jumping back and snapping the gloves from her hands. "Damn!
Damn! Damn!"
Ernest patted the grave lightly with the shovel. He sighed as he leaned
against it and looked out across the yard. How many women, he
thought. And children.
He had, at one time, wanted to place rocks or crosses on the graves,
but Frances protested.
You don't advertise bad business, she'd said.
He lowered his head for a moment. Touched his forehead, his chest, one
shoulder and then the other. He sighed again, lifted the tool and
walked toward the house. He leaned the shovel against the wall and went
inside.
There were some forms Frances wanted him to fill out on the Rodriguez
baby born earlier that day. They had to be sent to a government office,
but he thought it could wait. No one would come by asking why they'd
missed a deadline.
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