I slowly pull my hand away from his.
“But I live in your neighborhood. I haven’t thrown anything or anyone away.”
I close my eyes for a moment and inhale. “Do you see that rent is going up all over the place and people are not getting paid more? Schools are shitty because teachers think we’re a lost cause. I’m trying to get into college, but I need financial aid and scholarships ’cause I have three more sisters who want to go to college too, and my parents have always been broke. That’s why I had a wall up with you. You were moving into my hood from what seemed like a whole different world.”
We’re both quiet for a long minute before he says, “I understand. But it’s not like I have it easy, either.”
“Darius, if my family had your kind of money and this kind of house, my whole life would’ve been different.”
After what feels like forever, he says, “I never told you this, but we left our old apartment on the Upper East Side because the neighbors had concerns about me and Ainsley. We had lived there since we were toddlers. Everybody thought we were cute when we were in the third grade. But once we got taller and got some bass in our voices, they decided that they didn’t recognize us anymore. So we decided to move. But I dunno, sometimes I still feel like I don’t belong in Bushwick, either. I don’t fit in anywhere.”
“But I don’t want you to, Darius. I just want you to be you and me to be me.” I wrap my fingers through his.
He smiles, just a little bit. “If you say so,” he says.
“What do we do now, then?” I ask.
“I have an idea,” he says. He’s closer to me now. Our legs are touching.
And finally he leans in and kisses me. He eases his fingers across my cheek, up around my neck, toward the back of my head, and through the tight coils of my hair. He cradles my head in his hand as he kisses me deep, deep. I am honey again.
It all feels like the end of a game that we didn’t even know we were playing. And we’ve both had the ball stolen and thrown back, played defense and offense. And from the way he kisses me—easing his bruised hand around my body and pulling me in close, almost swallowing me with his whole self—I know that I’ve won this game. And he’s won too.
I almost fall asleep in Darius’s arms, on this roof, across the street from my own building. The nearby sirens will put me into an even a deeper sleep if I let them, but it’s the flashing lights behind my closed eyelids that make me pull away from Darius’s warmth and slow-beating heart.
He’s awake too, squinting. “I think there’s an ambulance in front of your building,” he says.
“Oh, shit!” I say, and I’m on my feet and ready to rush down from the roof. But he quickly gets in front of me to open the door.
“Darius? Is that you?” his mother calls out from a nearby room when we reach the second floor.
“Yeah, Mom,” he says. “Was just hanging out on the roof for a bit. Going to bed.”
His mother says good night, and we tiptoe back down to the basement, where Layla is just starting to toss about.
“Layla, we gotta go,” I say, nudging her.
She gets up groggy and confused, but Darius helps us up the stairs and out the door. We have to decide in a split second whether or not he’ll walk me across the street.
“I’m coming with you,” he says.
I nod and swallow hard.
Just as we come around his house, I spot Mama and Papi in our open doorway as two EMT workers bring a stretcher down the front stoop. There’s a body on that stretcher. I look at Mama and Papi, and it takes me a second to make sure that they’re both standing there and not on that stretcher.
My heart sinks, and I’m frozen where I stand, with Layla leaning her head on my shoulder.
“What’s going on?” she asks, slowly pulling away from me. Then it hits her. “Oh my god, no!”
She rushes across the street, and it takes me a while to follow her, because my legs feel like tree trunks. I can’t move them.
Marisol, Kayla, and Janae come out of the building. Janae is the first to spot me across the street, and she motions for me to hurry up.
I once asked Madrina how she knows so much about the strangers who come down to the basement for her love consultations. She told me that thoughts and feelings are vibrations. They move the air like a light breeze, and if I pay close enough attention, I can feel those thoughts in my own body. So even with the white sheet covering her whole body and her face, I already know. And I’m the first to fall to my knees and start crying.
Never in my life have I wanted to disappear into thin air as I do now. But not because Papi’s eyes have disappointment written all over them. Not because Mama’s eyes are red and teary and she doesn’t even look at me or Darius. Not because my sisters try to console me and even Janae comes down to the ground with me and hugs me tight.
I was on the roof with Darius when Madrina’s spirit left the world. Our bodies were glued together and I was happy for a little while, but I didn’t know that this deep sadness was waiting for me like an open door.
And then I think that it was maybe Madrina, priestess of the love goddess Ochún, who made it so. She gave me that little bit of happiness.
Twenty-Seven
Elegy for Paola Esperanza Negrón
or
?Ay Madrina! ?Mi madrina!
?Ay Madrina! ?Mi madrina!
The very last drumbeat has left its mark.
Its pulsing rhythm leaves no sound,
like blown-out candles in the dark.
The singing voices muted,
the quiet prayers unheard,
the orishas have retreated,
your shining light now blurred.
?Pero mi corazón! ?Mi corazón!
The only music left against the melody of my own song, to my sweet Ochún, of love, bereft.
?Ay Madrina! ?Mi madrina!
Who will clear these lovers’ paths
to walk these noisy streets
where toppled buildings unearth our wrath?
Newcomers fill these spaces
with shiny jewels and polished stone.
We blacks and browns have surrendered,
while our memory stands alone.
?Ahora, Madrina! ?Querida abuela!
This is the greatest theft.
Los antepasados have stolen you
from my sweet Ochún, of love, bereft.
I get applause after reading my poem, the loudest from Colin, who gives a whistle. Every word rolled out of my mouth heavy and hard like the round red-and-white mint candies Madrina used to give me. I take my seat in the front-row pew.
There’s standing room only at St. Martin of Tours Roman Catholic church on Hancock Street, and it’s a sea of all shades of brown people wearing either black or white. The ones who wear black are just following the Catholic tradition. The ones who wear white are following the Santería tradition. But everyone’s here to celebrate Madrina in their own special way.
I too am dressed in all white from head to toe, and Madrina would’ve liked that. My hair is wrapped beneath one of her head scarves. And even though I’m not supposed to wear them because a santera or santero hasn’t blessed them and I haven’t made ocha, her colorful elekes hang long around my neck. Every single one of them. And I’ll cut my eyes at any santero who questions me.
I know almost everybody who’s come to her funeral, including Darius, who walked in while I was reciting my poem. I had to pause for a long second, almost forgetting the words that were right there on the page.
Afterward, Mama opens up our apartment and the whole building for the repast. She’s been cooking for three days, and my sisters and I have been helping her. And when the church doors open so everyone can make their way to our building, I hear the congas. My heart leaps. Bobbito, Manny, and Wayne have gathered about a dozen drummers to play outside the church.
I take Darius’s hand so everyone around can see that we’re together, and we walk toward the drums. The santeras do a little two-step as they lead the procession from the church to our building. They smile at me and Darius as we walk hand in hand.