PART 1
Before the sun would rise on this day, before
the rays of sun light danced across the waves of sea that would burst into a
thousand diamond like drops over volcanic rocks, one woman’s life would change
forever.
It was the turn of the 20th century and the world seemed to be moving at lightning speed except for on an island archipelago in the North Atlantic made up of 9 tiny islands of lush valleys cuddled by salty sea fog. One island in particular rose above them all crowned by dormant volcano that gave the island it's name: the black
island, an island of ash, the island of
Pico.
The harshness of the Pico's rocky shoreline
broke into soft land of chartreuse and pear greens and on especially rainy days deep hunter and emerald. The grey and purple majestic peak of the mountain stood high in the sky surrounded by miles of hydrangea lined vineyards as it looked down like a giant; like a king
on his throne over quaint whitewashed walls of the tiny village
homes with orange tiled roofs. All identically crafted of the same black volcanic rock with tiny visible pours, a reminder of the time they were once hot molten.
On this morning Aliceanna, a 26 year old native
of this village and of this island, fixated on the dark patch of sky hiding the
mountain from her kitchen window. Her sparkling hazel eyes gazed into the
distance of green and gray up at where the mountain should have been but had yet to appear in the
dawning sky.
She was often up with the gossiping chickens
before the sun every morning. Her curly auburn hair tied up in bun hid under a soft silk handkerchief to keep out of those eyes...those eyes her
husband Xavier adored so much.
Her small home made
of volcanic stone smelled of fresh sweat bread that she was baking in the oven.
Her husband's favorite to have for lunch. The aroma filled the little kitchen
decorated with hand crocheted pot holders with blue and red roosters and pots
and pans hanging above a small aluminum sink where she scrubbed a pot
that had been soaking over night to loosen the hold of the dinner it cooked the
night before.
She pushed up the crisp white blouse buttoned
at the sleeve with an embroidered collar and quickly glanced into the adjoining
room where a warm fire burning in wood stove warmed an 8 month old baby in his
cozy bassinet.
She could hear his soft breath like a kitten
purring after it's milky breakfast. It made her smile as the sea crashed
against the rocks in the distance creating a loud boom that frightened no one
but the fidgety chickens in the yard.
The sea gave this island, and the 8 others that
encircled it, its life. It brought with it the shining of
the sun, fresh salty air and below a deep blue world a plentiful bounty
of food.
On this sea is where Aliceanna's husband Xavier spent most of his
time with 5 other men from the village. They would spend hours and hours
throughout the day catching fish and bringing them to shore to sell. The money
they'd make would then go into their family coffers -- half of it at least, the
other half to the boat's owner -- in hopes of bringing some more prosperity to
their tiny growing families.
It had been 4 hours into the morning and Xavier
and the others had caught a boat full. Their second batch of the morning. Their
troughs and buckets were full and needed to be emptied to be refilled again
before mid-day.
"Alright, let's bring her about. I think
before 9 am, this isn't too bad." The small boat's captain said surveying
their second catch as the 5 other men, including Xavier, agreed and began to
bring in their lines.
The clean-up of the boat before they brought her
in was typical. Grab everything that is yours, place it in your carry-on's, tie
up and loose lines and snip anything that could possibly tangle up. It was a
slippery 6 to 8 man boat that needed to be tidy to function. The waves often
spilled into the boat, and anything that could cause a slip or a tangle could
spell disaster, especially so far out into the sea.
The fish lines were rolled up. The excess
snipped and tucked away. Xavier, a tall handsome man, got up from his seat and
began to slowly make his way across a small beam in the center of the boat to
toss his extra line into a bin. His light brown hair shined in the rising sun
as he tossed his extra line into the bin.
As Xavier balanced his way back over the center
beam, soaked with a splash from the ocean, his boot slipped causing his ankle
to snap. He instantly howled in pain and lost his balance. The others were
startled in their seats and watched Xavier fall into the dark blue water
below.
"Eh!!!!" One of the other men
exclaimed as the other's quickly got up from their seats when the splash from
Xavier's fall struck them.
"Eh? Xavier? Eh!" Another man
screamed, trying to search in the sloshing water for Xavier who had not come up
for air.
"Here, grab this, turn the boat, maybe he's
under." The captain said pulling an oar from each side of the boat and
handing them off to two men to use and steer the boat.
They quickly began to turn the boat. The current pushed it along in the opposite direction, it almost felt like the sea was
purposefully working against them, not an unusual sensation as any fisherman or sailor knew the sea had a
mind of it's own.
As the boat turned, a wave lifted the bow up
slightly and turned them to the left just as Xavier finally lifted his head to
breath. The boat, unknowing to the other fishermen, came down on Xavier's breaking his neck and pulling him under into the deep blue sea.
"I don't see him!" A fellow fisherman
said, looking over the boat into the water.
"Not here either!" A third man said
from the opposite side.
"This is crazy, how could he just
go...just...how could he just vanish?" The captain said not knowing his
little boat had cut down his friend and worker just under him.
"Antonio." a fourth fisherman said
lifting his oar in the air to the captain.
The sun was now peeking through the morning
fog.
"Do you see him?"
The fourth man noticed a strange color to the
water that had washed up on his oar. He then pooled it in his hands to show
Antonio. It was blood. He showed the captain, the sun now brightly shining in
the pooled crimson colored water.
They looked at each other then again quickly
looked all around their small boat, the buckets and troughs of fish jostled
back and forth and some even fell back into the ocean with the commotion of the search for Xavier.
The 4th fisherman reached down under the boat,
hoping Xavier was there. But there was nothing. Xavier was gone. Swallowed
into the sea after his neck was broken in an accident by the small boat he gave
so much time and energy to.
In her kitchen Aliceanna, prepared the meal for
lunch that in a few hours she expected to share with Xavier as they always did
when he came back to shore mid-day. A small block of cheese was cut into slices
with grapes from a tree in the grotto of their volcanic rock lines backyard adorned the circular kitchen table with is embroidered cover. Small cubes of beef and potatoes steaming in a pot that smelled of
garlic and tomatoes swirled in the kitchen just waiting for a hungry fisherman
to come home and devour it. Aliceanna hummed a little song that had no
name waiting. The baby was in his crib rubbing his eyes as the morning sun finally reached
his little face.
"Well, now you've finally gotten up,
haven't you little lazy bug. Were you very sleepy? You were, weren't you?"
the happy mother said, her eyes glowing in their own hazel brightness.
She picked up the baby and bounced him on her
hip. She sat down on a small chair in the corner of the main room where the
wood burning stove still warmed their golden skin, tanned from life on an
island.
She unbuttoned her blouse and removed her breast for her baby. The two connected in mother
nature's brilliant design. She continued to hum her song, as her feet covered
in wool socks pushed back to create a rocking motion as the baby she named
Nicolau blinked with the return of his sleep.
"Oh no, you can't sleep again. No, no."
She giggled as little Nico continued his slow blinks into another morning nap.
"Ok, only for a minute."
Aliceanna buttoned her blouse and brought him
back to his warm and safe crib just as a knock came from the door from the
outside staircase that lead to the cobblestone street below.
She looked up from the crib and then at her watch, her brow furrowed,
unsure of who might be there to visit at 8:45 in the morning. She dusted off
her hands on her apron and slowly walked over to the door. The glass from the
door frame sparkled and projected it’s geometric pattern on to her dark wool
skirt that matched the embroidery on her blouse.
She stood at the door for a second...something
told her not to open it. Something in her mind made her pause for a split
second before answering the door, it was like an alarm call and it told her she
would be safer if she never opened that door. Her hand gripped the door knob...another
knock.
She swallowed that feeling, shook it off as
absurd, and turned the door knob. Xavier's captain Antonio, with his hat
removed showing his bald head with wiry stray hairs stood there with his arms folded at his chest looking directly into her. Her hazel and perfect eyes.
He then said the words every fisherman's wife dreaded every day of their lives: "There was an accident."
Then, everything seemed to go white.
He then said the words every fisherman's wife dreaded every day of their lives: "There was an accident."
Then, everything seemed to go white.
PART 2
Aliceanna sat in dim room with a small love seat
alone. It had been hours and hours since Antonio broke the news of Xavier's
drowning. The flickering of a lantern by her side reflected in the tear-filled eyes
of a woman lost in the horror of her reality.
She felt numb. She felt cold. She felt like a
ghost in her own home. She could not make sense of anything. How could Xavier
be gone, how? How could God have let it happen? Her baby Nico--the son Xavier
would now never know, would forever be her final connection to the first man she
ever truly loved.
She was so numb, she wasn't even sure if she was
breathing. She looked down at her belly and saw it lifting up and down beneath
her shirt, proof she was a live. But barley.
"You have to eat." A voice said from a
darkened side doorway.
It was her neighbor and friend Luzia who had
come to take care of the baby as soon as the news spread around the village
that Xavier had drowned. She had made a small dinner for Aliceanna and taken
care of Nico. The whole village was in shock.
"Aliceanna? Did you hear me, love? You have
to eat." Luzia repeated.
Aliceanna turned to her shuttered window and
walked over to it and pushed open the shutters allowing the cool breeze from
the night to flow in from the sea. She could hear the shearwater birds calling
in the night.
"Listen to them." Aliceanna said of
the nocturnal sea birds. "They're crying for him." she said as tears
fell from her eyes.
"Querida, you need to eat something.
It's been hours. No one has seen you eat. I certainly haven't. You can't get
sick." Luzia replied, begging one more time from her shadowy doorway perch.
She dare not enter the room where her friend was sitting in mourning.
She dare not enter the room where her friend was sitting in mourning.
"Do you think they know he's gone? Animals
can tell. It almost feels like they're circling the house." Aliceanna said
not bothered by Luzia's insistence of eating.
"The Cagarros? They always
sound..." Luzia said of the bird calls before being interrupted.
"Like they're crying." Aliceanna
finishing the sentence, her voice now breaking in a gust of tears..
The Cargarros only flew at night. They circled
the Azores Islands like stealth bombers, constantly and were almost mythological.
On rare occasions natives would see a sick one in the day that did not make it
home, their eyes glazed over with the burning of the sun's rays. They were like
feathered vampires that flew in the dark in search of food; fish from the sea.
But the sound they made, the sound was like pain, like a lost baby in search of it's mother. Hurt. Wounded. Crying.
Luzia's heart broke. She fought back her own
tears and rushed over to the window where the breeze brushed passed her like a
winter's kiss on her cheek and hugged Aliceanna from behind. She buried her
face into the young widow's soft shoulder and cried with her.
"Maybe he'll come back. Maybe he didn't go
under." Aliceanna said in a tear-stained whisper as she turned around to
face Luzia. "It could happen, maybe he's out somewhere, maybe he swam to
shore and they never saw him!" Aliceanna continued grabbing her friend by
the shoulders and forcing her to look into her broken eyes.
"I don't know....I don't know." Luzia
could only repeat over and over.
"Of course not, no one knows. No one knows.
He could be out there. Maybe he's confused, he has to be confused if he hasn't
come home yet. I'm going out there! I'll find him." Aliceanna said
quickly releasing herself from Luzia's grasp and reaching for a black shawl
from the back of a chair.
"You can't go out there! It's
dark!" Luzia said, her hands wiping away tears.
"If he's out there, he may need help, no
one wants to help him, no one cares. No one wants to help! I have to
help!" Aliceanna said screaming as she quickly pulled open the door and
dashed down the rocky front steps and down into the village rushing towards the
stone filled docks like a banshee, her echoing howls of bouncing around the narrow village street.
Luzia's husband and Xavier's cousin, José, rushed up the steps to Aliceanna's door upon hearing the commotion from their adjoining house.
"What's happened? Where is she going?"
José asked alarmed by Aliceanna's screaming.
"She thinks he's waiting for her! She
thinks he's waiting for her!" Luzia said sobbing, now holding a crying
Nico in the dark doorway again.
Like a flash of light, José too took off down into
the village and after Aliceanna. He could see her running down the cobblestone
streets towards the boat ramp at the end of the docks. The little homes painted
in all different shades of white were like teeth grinning in the face of such
tragedy happening within the tiny village's walls.
Aliceanna, her hair blowing in the chill of the
Atlantic air, ran like a mad woman through the winding ancient streets
until she could feel the water from the sea seep through wool socks and chill
her toes.
José caught up to her quickly as she continued
down the boat ramp further into the icy cold Atlantic sea, her hands extended over
the surface of the quiet lapping water.
"Stop! Stop this!! He's gone!" José
said jumping in after her. "Listen to me, he's gone!" He continued, holding the sobbing young widow by her shoulders.
"I see him! I hear him! I see him! Let me
go! Let me go!!!" She screamed as she punched José in the arms to loosen
his grip on her.
"Stop! Aliceanna please, think of Nico.
think of your son!" he kept saying, and she kept screaming.
Aliceanna was now on her knees, sobbing into the
salty ocean as the water spilled into her mouth, screaming Xavier's name.
Lights began to flicker on in some of the widows of the village. Woman from the
village looked out into the dark night towards what looked like a black
violent sea and only heard the sobbing of Aliceanna mixing with crashing waves
and the calls of the shearwater birds circling her in their invisible flights
above the small village.
Four days later, the bells of the small village
church rang announcing the end of mass on that final Sunday of June. The tiny
cobblestone street was filled with onlookers and mourners alike. The bright sun
seemed to become even brighter as the light from the sky reflected on all the
tiny white homes with tiled orange roofs. It looked like the entire
island had come to pay respect to Xavier, his widow and their tiny baby.
Aliceanna carried the baby in her arms. He was
dressed in all white matching the little houses and the church, all painted
white over black volcanic rock that formed their walls. The baby's white clothes contrasted dramatically against the black of every single other person in
front of the church mere steps away from the boat ramps that lead to
the open sea that now was Xavier's grave.
Three young boys walked from around the
glistening white church to the front where gatherers were sniffling and hugging
each other in silence. The boys were tugging a small boat on wheels behind them
filled to the edges with what looked like mountains of white hydrangeas. As the tiny
boat on wheels passed mourners, they added more roses and carnations into the boat.
Aliceanna, her face guarded from the brightness
all around her by a black veil, carried her baby in one arm and took the rope
attached to the small boat on wheels from one of the boys and walked slowly
towards the boat ramp.
The sea lapped up onto the ramp in frequent
splashes as Aliceanna, the baby and the boat on wheels approached, slowly going
down into the water as a woman's voice from the crowd of mourners could be
heard beginning the call of the rosary.
"Should we go over there...too..."
Luzia whispered to José unsure of just what Aliceanna would do.
"Let her be alone." José whispered
back as the mourners in the background prayed aloud.
Aliceanna dragged the boat filled with the
various white flowers into the sea on the ramp until the water was waist high.
She lifted her veil revealing a stoic solemn face tired from crying. Her baby
kept reaching for the golden necklace around her neck and without even looking
she grabbed the baby's hand and placed a white carnation into it.
"Throw it into the sea for daddy, my angel.
Go on throw it into the water." She whispered very softly.
The baby complied and she turned back to Luzia
who rushed over into the water herself and took the baby from Aliceanna.
"Thank you." the young widow said as
Luzia rushed back up the rap to rejoin the mourners.
Aliceanna then grabbed a hand full of flowers
and tossed them into the sea. She then lifted the small boat filled with the
remaining flowers and pushed it out on the surface of the water and watched the tiny
boat get dragged out to sea. It got smaller and smaller as the pulling current
of blue ocean took the flowers away from shore guided by the white seagulls
above.
Aliceanna shed another tear, just one. It crawled down her cheek sparkling like her eyes in the sunlight as the mourners
behind her continued to pray
"Santa Maria, Mãe de deus, rogai por
nós.... agora e na hora da nossa morte......Amen."
"Amen." Aliceanna said, finishing the
prayer with the voices behind her.
In the evening, Aliceanna and Nico had fallen
asleep. The baby had a full tummy, but Aliceanna, mourned on an empty stomach.
Luzia and José had been there the entire day watching over mother and son.
Aliceanna was an orphan herself, her mother and father had died when she was very young of pneumonia they both caught while picking bananas in a rain storm. With her parents death she and her her older sister were separated; her sister shipped off to live with family members in the Portuguese colony of Angola leaving Aliceanna alone on Pico with an elderly spinster aunt that died when Aliceanna was just 17. The two sisters never saw each other again and Aliceanna began to take care of herself from that point forward.
Aliceanna was an orphan herself, her mother and father had died when she was very young of pneumonia they both caught while picking bananas in a rain storm. With her parents death she and her her older sister were separated; her sister shipped off to live with family members in the Portuguese colony of Angola leaving Aliceanna alone on Pico with an elderly spinster aunt that died when Aliceanna was just 17. The two sisters never saw each other again and Aliceanna began to take care of herself from that point forward.
Xavier's extended family on the island of Pico,
José and Luzia, were the only people Aliceanna considered her own. And now they
were all she had aside from her little baby. José and Luzia knew these next few
weeks and months would be difficult. But they promised each other they would be
there for her. They needed to. Xavier's family back in Lisbon expected it.
In the kitchen while mother and baby slept,
Luzia and José discussed the future and their place in it.
"She'll stay here. Where else would she go?"
Luzia said, stirring a mug of tea while she took off her shoes exposing her
swollen feet from an entire day standing and prayer and walking and praying and
standing.
"My aunt wants to take them back to Lisbon
with her." José said of Xavier's mother.
"What do you mean she wants to take them
back? The whole reason they're here in this village is because of how Dona Gabriela
felt about their marriage, she disapproved, why would she want to take them to
Lisbon?" Luzia questioned.
"When I sent her the horrible news over a
telegraph she responded. She said so." José said, his voice timid and
whispery as if his domineering Aunt Gabriela were in the room with him.
"Did she say she would be sending money to
take them? Aliceanna doesn't have the kind of money to take her back to Lisbon,
not now and now for a while." Luzia said pouring her husband some tea.
"Well...." José said unsure of how to
say what he knew without Luzia spilling the tea.
"Well what?" She asked setting the
teakettle on a heat tile.
"She's coming here to take them
back..." José finished.
Luzia rolled her eyes. After all the years
Gabriela remained estranged from her son Xavier because he married outside of
his class she would now come to the islands, but only after his death. Luzia
had seen this behavior from the wealthy before. This was to show face around
the people of the little village and even more so the people of the island who
would no doubt hear that the wealthy widow from Lisbon had taken it upon
herself to come to the islands to be with her daughter-in-law...now also a
widow, all in an effort to sanctify herself with the those who she saw as below
her.
But the truth was not so buried in the past as
Gabriela would hope, she had never approved of her son, a young educated man of
a wealthy Lisbonite family, to marry a girl who had not a penny to her name.
But the baby, Gabriela's grandson, was all that she had left of Xavier, her
final link to the son she lost at sea. She had to be with him, even if
Aliceanna had to come along too.
"Aliceanna won't go. She won't." Luzia
said as a matter of fact.
"She may not have a choice, what is she
going to do here .. alone?" José questioned dipping a cinnamon cookie into
his tea, the two of them still dressed head to toe in black.
"She's not alone. She has us. Xavier was
your cousin. She's still family, and Nico, definitely family. Whatever
Aliceanna chooses, whatever she decides, we'll be happy for her and we'll pray
for her, but believe me when I tell you, she will never leave this island.
Never. Not if it's because Gabriela says so."
José only took a deep sigh and shook his head,
dipped the remainder of his cookie in the tea and chewed.
"Are you going to tell her about
Gabriela?" José said after a brief moment of silence between the two.
"Me? Why not you?" Luzia said frustrated, he only shrugged.
"Me? Why not you?" Luzia said frustrated, he only shrugged.
Luzia was now standing in Aliceanna's small
kitchen clearing dishes for the sleeping mother. She knew in her heart she had
to tell her that her mother-in-law would soon be on a boat headed for the
islands and that there was a possibility she wanted to take them back to
Lisbon, but the truth was, like José, she couldn't bring herself to tell her. Not now at least.
It could take at least two weeks for Gabriela's
arrival from Lisbon. Luzia wanted to give Aliceanna some time of peace before releasing
more news into the air.
"Tomorrow. Maybe the next day." Luzia
said as she looked out of the kitchen window that was bathed in the light of
the moon over a black sea that would bring with it a woman who's heart was just
as black.
PART 3
She was swimming, deeper and deeper into the
darkest blue she had ever seen. Her hair became mangled and twisted in the glob
like sea that surrounded her whole body. She kept pushing and reaching with her
hands, reaching for something in the dark deep of the ocean. Her skirt, a
flowered woolen mass, became heavy holding her down under the water.
She could see him. his eyes were closed. His
beautiful eyes were closed. She reached. She could not touch. The blue got
darker. She reached again. She saw him. She could see his face within the blue,
within the dark shadowy sea she was swimming in. If only she could touch him.
If only she could feel his skin one more time, even as cold as it must be under
all this water. If only she could see his eyes open .....then suddenly they
did.
His cold waterlogged stare woke her in her bed.
She could have touched him one more time. One last time.
It had been two weeks of readjusting and praying
for her heart to reach the even a glimmer of acceptance and peace of the loss of her
husband, but it did not come easy. Aliceanna saw days and nights go by without even
realizing it, it was the period she would refer to as "o borrão"--the
blur. She would sit and stare into Nico's dark eyes that reminded her so much
of Xavier. The smirk, the same dimple. It was all she could do to find
peace...she had to, for herself but mainly for the little boy that would grow
up without his father there in the flesh, only a memory that she would have
to build for him as he grew.
She didn't even have a clear picture of him.
Just a charcoal drawing. She needed to remind herself of his real face every
day. But Nico's eyes...Nico's dimple. Helped.
As Aliceanna hummed a happy song, that somehow
came from her while she took down her sheets and clothes that were drying in
the wind on the line, Luzia and José walked up Aliceanna's back steps into a
little grotto of a backyard made of carefully placed black volcanic rock born
from the Island's crust.
They had a serious expression plastered across
their faces.
The wind blew a white sheet between Aliceanna
and the couple like the white flag of surrender. In Jose's hand a tightly
crumpled telegraph from two weeks before--the night Gabriela was told of her
son's passing, it was her confirmation she would be coming to Pico Island.
Aliceanna's mind went through a thousand reasons
why her two closest friends were standing in her backyard staring at her so
seriously.
"What is it?" She questioned, lifting
the laundry basket to her hip with one arm.
"Querida, we wanted to tell you this
sooner, but we needed ---wanted--you ---to have sometime to be alone with
everything." Luzia said, struggling to get her words out.
"Please don't be angry with us." José
said in hushed voice that mixed with the crashing waves below them.
"What is it? What's happened?"
Aliceanna said rushing over to her friends.
José looked over at his wife who looked over at
him. Neither of them wanted to tell Aliceanna that her mother-in-law, a woman
who had only said two words to her in the 5 years that she knew her, was headed
to the island and would arrive, most likely, within the next two days.
José reached out his hand and showed Aliceanna
the telegraph from Gabriela. She took the small scrap of yellow paper and
unfolded it, read it quickly and folded it back again into its crushed up
shape. She took a breath and closed her eyes.
"When does she arrive exactly?"
Aliceanna asked without opening her eyes as if she were still taking it all in.
"That telegraph was from a few weeks ago,
she'll probably be here when the next ship arrives from Lisbon." Luzia
said.
"Please don't be angry with us." José
pleaded again.
"It doesn't matter. Whatever is going to
happen is going to happen no matter how hard I pray for it to just go away.
None of what I prayed for has made any difference. Xavier is still gone...I'm
still here. Its all just the same." Aliceanna said, collapsing onto a
giant painted white rock surrounded by blue hydrangeas in her grotto.
"You've prayed to go away?' Luzia said with
tears in her eyes, kneeling down next to her friend.
"This morning I woke up from a dream I had.
It was ...it was horrible, but at the same time it felt like I was having my
last moments with Xavier. I saw him...I was looking right at him and I wanted
him to open his eyes." Aliceanna recalled.
"He was sleeping?' Luzia asked.
"He was dead. We were underwater. And I was
alive, and he was dead." Aliceanna said, her tone stoic and calm as Luzia
quietly gasped.
"He...." Luzia began before choking
up.
"He told me he was dead. To let go. To
just....let him go." Aliceanna finished.
"You have to stay strong, Alice, you have
to stay strong for Nico, whatever happens next, Nico will need you now more
than ever." José added realizing the baby's grandmother would most
certainly stir things up in the small village.
Aliceanna smiled softly, she knew her son was
now the last thing on earth that connected her to the man she loved so much. To
give up, to let it all just dissipate into thin air like a morning fog burning
off in a mid afternoon sun was not an option. Her mind told her to never get
out of bed, to stay asleep and dream of Xavier in any incarnation that her
unconscious mind and imagination could muster, but her heart was stronger; it told
her to snap out of it as fast as she could to live, live for her son, live for
herself and mostly live in the place of Xavier for Nico's sake. The true
test of someone's power is in the face of adversity, and Gabriela was about to
throw a new hurtle in Aliceanna's way.
"It's...all so green." A woman said as a large white and black passenger ship docked in the small
harbor of the village Madalena. "I've never seen such greenery." She
smiled, her tightly corseted dress squeezing her voice into a high squeal laced
with a Lisbonite accent.
"Odette, don't be ridiculous, there are
things just as green in Lisbon. You just don't pay attention." A harsher
and deeper female voice said peeking from underneath a dark and well stitched parasol to match her equally as dark dress. "What I'm worried about is the smell."
She added with a snicker.
"Of the sea? Oh you won't be able to smell
it from the house we're staying in...I think." Odette responded unsure of
what she was even talking about.
"I'm not bothered by the smell of the
ocean. Look...cows. Everywhere. You know what cows smell like don't you
Odette?" The older woman said lifting her parasol away from her face
revealing a woman of about 65, her face perfectly smooth with dark green
eyes that seemed to slice right through the person she was speaking to. Her
hair, a lovely shade of chestnut, was tied up and pinned back with silver combs
allowing only the most fragile of curls to peek around her ears. This was Dona Gabriela Duarte.
"Well, I've never been around cows before
but I ---" Odette began before being interrupted by her mistress.
"Shit. That's what they smell like."
Gabriela said crudely to her maid. "I just want to get off this ship already."
"They're docking us now." Odette
replied turning her head uncomfortably away from Gabriela and her crude
language.
It only took a half an hour for the large ship
to finally begin unloading the passengers and their luggage. There weren't too
many people. A hand full of travelers who spent time on the continent visiting
family and returning home. Mostly the wealthy of the small island. Gabriela and
her maid Odette were the only new people visiting for
what may be an extended trip.
Standing near the end of the shipyard, nervously
twisting his hat, was José waiting for his aunt to make her appearance known,
something that no one would be able to miss especially with the amount of
luggage she carried.
"José ! José !" Gabriela said waving a
white handkerchief in the air. José quickly rushed over and kissed his aunt
once on each cheek.
"So good to see you tia. I wish
it were in better times." José said his hands firmly on Gabriela's.
She flashed a quick tight lipped smirk and
motioned for him to lift her luggage.
"Odette's too." She ordered.
"Oh, I can carry mine." the maid
replied to Gabriela swiftly brushing her hands away from the cases and
interlocking her arms with Odette's.
"He can do it. He's strong. We'll be out
side." Gabriela said, reopening her parasol and marching herself with
Odette out to the awaiting horse and buggy.
It was no more than a 40 minute trip to the
small village where Aliceanna nervously awaited her estranged mother-in-law. As
the horse and buggy pulled along the long and treacherous roads beside the
towering cliffs of green, Odette's eyes bulged out of her head with wonder.
The lush surrounding them was like from a
fairy world to people from a city like Lisbon. The trees that made up the thick canopy were like buildings themselves filled with birds of every color of the rainbow. The sky, a cool blue, framed
the eponymous mountain like a painting,
mysterious and glorious all at the same time.
Gabriela patted the due like sweat surrounding
her neck with her handkerchief.
"How much further?" She questioned,
her voice frustrated with the bouncing of the buggy.
"Not too far." José said from the
horse.
Soon, they arrived above the small village of
white houses with orange tile roofs and cobble stone streets. The waves crashed
against the rocks as the buggy slowly made it's way down a winding trail that
lead to the main small road of the village that faced the boat ramp the lead to
the sea, the wild Atlantic sea where fisherman were now bringing in their
mid-day catch.
Gabriela pulled on José's coat requesting him to
stop. He did so.
Gabriela, bereaved but stoic, carefully got out of the buggy, snapped open her parasol and walked over to the water's edge and looked out into the sea...the sea that took her son, the sea that took her whole world without giving her a change to make things right or to say good bye. Her cold stare could have frozen the sea in front of her if not for the ringing of the mid-day bells from the Church that broke her gaze.
Gabriela, bereaved but stoic, carefully got out of the buggy, snapped open her parasol and walked over to the water's edge and looked out into the sea...the sea that took her son, the sea that took her whole world without giving her a change to make things right or to say good bye. Her cold stare could have frozen the sea in front of her if not for the ringing of the mid-day bells from the Church that broke her gaze.
"I'm ready." She said in a soft,
uncharacteristic voice.
José nodded, and motioned for the horse to
continue its way to Aliceanna's house.
Aliceanna rushed around her small, quaint home,
making sure everything was in perfect condition for her mother-in-law's
welcome. Fresh sheets, fresh towers, a pot of hot tea ready, fresh flowers in
almost every corner, baby Nico washed and dressed to perfection. A small
charcoal drawing of Xavier carefully placed on full view in the center of the
room.
Aliceanna could hear steps coming up the
staircase that lead to her front door. She quickly grabbed the baby and walked
over to the front door to greet her new visitors. The door opened and in walked
Gabriela, Odette, and José with the first of many bags.
Aliceanna gulped.
"Thank you for coming. Please come in, come
in!" She said bouncing the baby on her hip after a quick, icy kiss from Gabriela.
"My dear, it's been ....so long."
Gabriela smirked coldly, looking around the tiny front room as if she were an
inspector searching for a foul smell.
"I have tea, you both must be so hungry as
well." Aliceanna said suddenly noticing Odette. "Oh...I..."
"This is Maria Odette. She is my handmaid.
Don't worry she is no bother and will be paid by me, you won't have to worry
about anything when it comes to her. She can sleep in the loja."
Gabriela said mentioning the bottom store rooms called the loja in
Aliceanna's house.
"Pleasure." Odette said with a nervous
curtsy.
"I'll just place these downstairs and be on
my way." José said, rushing out of the room.
"Now let me look at this beautiful boy. My
goodness, his eyes. It's as if I've gone back in time and I'm seeing Xavier.
Odette, you never knew Xavier, look here, these are his eyes." Gabriela
said proudly.
"Oh how beautiful! You must be so
proud?" Odette replied.
"Yes." Both Gabriela and
Aliceanna answered smirking nervously at each other.
"Odette, Aliceanna said there was tea,
please fetch us the tea." Gabriela ordered to Odette's nod and rush off to
discover the kitchen.
"Oh she doesn't have to serve me, I can do
it, I should serve you both, I'm sure she's tired too." Aliceanna said.
"My dear, it's her job." Gabriela
quickly answered. "You'll get used to it. Now tell me, how have you been
since......since it happened?"
Aliceanna wasn't prepared to talk about Xavier's
death so quickly with a woman she hardly knew, especially knowing just how
harsh Gabriela had been when Xavier married her. She couldn't get the feeling
of discomfort out of her body, it was like a sickness in her stomach that
wasn't going away, it was like a rock, a rock that she had eaten sitting in the
pit of her stomach sitting there with this cold stranger of a woman who in all
her stoic and harsh tones still reminded her of Xavier too. A bitter/sweet trick of nature and genetics.
"I don't really know how to respond to
that. Its all happened so quickly, and I haven't really been able to come to
terms with being alone yet, well I'm not alone but...I am." Aliceanna said
cuddling the baby.
"You have to find something to do with your
time now, there is no way you can be a good mother if you're in this state. How
will you both eat? Who will clothe and give you the things you need? I refuse
to allow anyone with our last name to suffer this way. Xavier, my darling son,
would have wanted me to come here and take stock. I can already see that things
are not well Aliceanna. Not well at all." Gabriela said looking around the
modest room.
Aliceanna followed Gabriela’s eyes confused at her tone. "What do you mean?"
"You don't really believe you can stay here
alone on this island with a child to raise? I won't allow it. No, Aliceanna,
I'm here to take you back to Lisbon." Gabriela said as Odette entered the
room with the tea. "No honey." Gabriela added to Odette's chores sharply.
"I.... I don't know what to say."
Aliceanna said in shock.
"Most people reply courteously with a 'obrigada'."
Gabriela said with one eye brow lifted as Odette squeamishly stirred the tea
for her.
"Thank you but, no thank you."
Aliceanna said stunningly.
"Excuse me?" Gabriela shot back
quickly.
"Dona Gabriela, this is our
home. This is our son's home. I'm not leaving. We're not. How could I? I would
be abandoning everything Xavier lived and literally died for. This is the home
he worked for so that we could raise our family. I would never leave it not for
anything." Aliceanna said, as Odette quietly made her way out of the room
awaiting the storm from Gabriela's voice.
Gabriela perked up in her seat. Her corseted
body perfectly positioned in place. She flattened a crease in her dark dress
and picked up the small tea cup and sipped while nodding her head as Aliceanna
spoke.
"Very well, if this is what you wish, but I
can assure you, my dear, things will not be so easy. I can't force you to leave
Pico anytime soon, but in time, I guarantee you'll see it may way. And because
I am an understanding woman, I'll remain here to lift you and this beautiful
child up when you realize how difficult it will be." Gabriela sipped again
from her teacup and noticed a tiny chip on the cup's lip.
Aliceanna sipped from her cup too holding Nico
firmly on her lap.
"We'll get you new ones." Gabriela
said of the teacups as she placed it on the small side table and crossed her
hands perfectly on her lap.
Later that night, Aliceanna went out to pour out
a bucket of dishwater into a garden just off to the side of the street just
before it forked creating two additional roads that lead up through the small
village and into the green hills above. Luzia, from her window, saw this and
quickly made her way out to speak to Aliceanna privately before she went
back in.
"Psssst! Psssst! Hey!" Luzia called
from her front gate, she lit a cigarette motioned with her hand for Aliceanna.
Aliceanna giggled and walked over.
"Eager to hear the scandal? Did I rip her
head off? Did she slap me silly?" Aliceanna said pulling the cigarette
from Luzia's mouth.
"Stop! These are disgusting!" Luzia
replied pulling the cigarette from Aliceanna's hand. "And yes, tell me
everything Tia Gabriela said."
"Well there was no fighting. But she wants to replace my teacups."
Aliceanna answered in hest..
"I know, we live next door, I didn't hear
any screams." Luzia replied to Aliceanna's hearty laugh.
"I think it's going to be fine. She wanted
me to just pick up and leave everything for Lisbon. I told her it was
impossible, that this is where Xavier wanted to raise his family with me and
this is where the baby and I would remain. Nico's home is where his father
died. I won't leave." Aliceanna answered.
"Well done!" Luzia smiled.
Luzia winked at her friend and said good night
then rushed up the steps of her little home that was glowing with light from a
several little oil lanterns.
Aliceanna, turned slowly and faced her own
little house right next door that was glowing too. Things seemed different. She
felt...ok. She felt that the darkness in her heart was slowly slipping away;
putting her foot down with Gabriela earlier that afternoon showed her that in
the middle of a 3 week horrible and terrible mourning period she could still do
the right thing, her head was clear, her mind strong.
They were going to be ok.
As she walked back into the house with the empty
dishwater bucket, the night air chilled and the became filled with the cries
of the mysterious shearwater birds of the night. Aliceanna looked
up and was able to make out the swirling dark birds in the night sky above her
head.
But Despite all their attempts this time,
Aliceanna would not join them in crying, not this night and not for many nights
to come in the coming years.
PART 4
On a remarkable summer morning 2 years after Xavier's death, 2 years after Gabriela's arrival, a familiar aroma
filled Aliceanna's kitchen. It was an aroma that she never thought she'd never smell
again. With it came a memory that felt like a hug from the past. It was the smell of
freshly baked sweet bread in her kitchen, the same sweet bread she was baking
for her husband the day he died. It had been 2 years since she had baked, 2 years
of loss, mourning, pain and growing.
She paused as she kneaded more of the dough and
thought of him. She thought of how he left her alone with a baby that was now
almost 3. She thought of all the things that had happened in those two years
living with his mother and her maid that she wished had never happened: the
constant disagreements on how to raise Nico, the condescending manner of
Gabriela's entire way of speaking condescendingly, cruelly, and coldly, was in complete contrast to Aliceanna's whole
nature.
The last two years had truly been a test of
Aliceanna's faith and temperament.
Gabriela had virtually taken over the house since moving in. Invading the space like a an incurable plague from some god
forsaken jungle. It was a difficult and trying position to be, and Luzia would
often joke in whispers about how she would have already poisoned Gabriela's tea
for her own sanity.
"God would forgive you." Luzia would
say with a childish grin.
"That bread isnt going to make itself,
child." Gabriela's voice said from behind Aliceanna.
Her mother-in-laws voice broke Aliceanna's
day-dream and she was back to her reality again in her kitchen surrounded by the
gorgeous smell of baking sweet bread.
"Good afternoon." Aliceanna said in a quiet
voice seeming to shake the memories away from her mind.
"You were distracted." Gabriela noted,
sipping freshly brewed tea. "That's a sign of a bit of laziness. I won't
call you lazy, but that's a sign of laziness. Careful."
Aliceanna furrowed her brow and scoffed the
very idea and pointed over with her chin at the enormous basket of tiny little sweetbreads she had already made and was taking to the neighboring village to sell with Luzia for the
festival of Nossa Senhora de Lourdes.
"Don't be rude." The mother-in-law
hissed. "How long will you be out at this festa?"
"Luzia and I are hoping to sell all the
bread and once it's all gone, then I'll be home."
Gabriela snickered and put more sugar in her
tea. "That could be all day. Are you expecting Odette and myself to watch
your son the whole day?"
Aliceanna was confused at Gabriela doing anything but answered politely. "Well I could take
him, but you said you'd ---" then interrupted.
"It's never been a bother to me to watch my
grandson, Aliceanna, and I can already tell by the tone in your voice that this
is where this conversation is leading. He'll be fine here, I refuse to allow
him to be around all those drunkards at the festa anyway. Imagine, celebrating
Our Lady of Lourdes and drinking in front of her. The very idea!"
Aliceanna let Gabriela talk, mostly to herself,
and watched her get up from the small table and walk out of the room continuing
to complain about the festival goers.
"Is she gone?" A voice said peeking in
from the open kitchen window.
It was Luzia hiding out until Gabriela left the
room. Aliceanna giggled and nodded her head as Luzia made her way in through
the back door that connected Aliceanna's back grotto with Luzia's.
"I have here...oh! They did not come out
like yours at all. Should I even take them?" Luzia gasped comparing her
sweet bread buns with Aliceanna's.
Aliceanna replied with another giggle.
"Of course! The more we sell the better."
The Festival of Our Lady of Lourdes was one of
the biggest on the Island of Pico in the village of Lajes. People came from all
over the archipelago to pray, center themselves, and most of all celebrate life
in the beautiful world that surrounded them. It was one of the most anticipated
celebrations of August and culminated when sail boats from all over the
archipelago gathered together in the harbor in Lajes to accompany a smaller
boat carrying the statue of The Virgin Mary as she passed several villages on
her way to the Church of the Holy Trinity covered in a white veil and crowned
with a tiny imperial crown with small crystals that glistened in the sun like
tiny stars in the Azorean night sky.
"We should get going, the boats are
starting to circle and we don't want to be late." Luzia said rushing Aliceanna out the door.
When they arrived at the festival several
other village merchants had already set up their own places with their goods.
Some brought had crafted items, and other's their crops, some with little
trinkets to remember the day. Aliceanna and Luzia set up a small cart hitched
to borrowed donkey from a neighbor next the large Black and white painted
Church that towered over the villagers and merchants gathering around the
square awaiting the sail boat carrying the Virgin Mary's statue.
It was all timed to perfection, like a dance
coming in from the sea.
The larger sail boats circled the harbor, their
pristine white sails flapped in the ocean breeze like cloth clouds with an
accompanying gaggle of seagulls screeching away above as if they were
discussing the procession below.
As the larger sail boats parted, a small little
boat carrying 4 men, a priest and the statue emerged and slowly made it's way
up the small boat ramp where the men lifted the 2 and a half foot sacred
statue, hoisted her on a cart with their shoulders and began to march down the
main cobble stone street on top of a carpet of red rose and carnation petals
the went from the docks to the entrance of the church in a slow moving sometimes emotional procession.
On lookers reached for the flowers at the statues
feet, crossed themselves and curtsied as she passed them by allowing the music
from a local band to fill the empty sound around them.
Aliceanna crossed herself and curtsied as did
Luzia as the statue passed their little station of sweet bread buns.
"Do you know that man?" Luzia asked
noticing another merchant selling wool from across the path looking over at their cart.
Aliceanna looked and saw the stranger who was looking over
at her. He smiled. She quickly turned away.
"No."
Luzia looked down and placed a sweet bread bun
into a little baggy for a customer and took her money, "Obrigada",
she said then looked back at Aliceanna who seemed a bit nervous.
"Is he still looking?" Aliceanna
asked.
"Maybe he just wants some bread. He's
selling wool---he's a shepherd. He's probably hungry." Luzia noted.
The shepherd waited for a the crowds to finally
begin filing into the church for the festival mass to leap across the flowered
path with a few coins in his hand. He bounded up to the two women and grinned a
large white toothed grin.
"Hi." He said, his voice pure and
kind.
"Bread?" Luzia asked handing him a
bun.
"Please, thank you." His eye never
leaving Aliceanna.
"Obrigada." Luzia replied taking his
money and Aliceanna, who never looked up from her cart handed him the bun in a
small bag.
"You're very brave standing so close to a
donkey all day. Even I couldn't handle the smell." The man said, trying to
make conversation.
"It's nothing I haven't been around
before." Aliceanna said with a gin.
"Oh is that so! You've been around many
donkeys, huh?" The shepherd giggled to Aliceanna's confused reaction.
Luzia's eyes narrowed. She made a sucking
sound with her tongue and front teeth.
"She can spot as ass from across the
path." Luzia said, quickly coming to Aliceanna's rescue with words.
"Oh...wait, I'm sorry, I didn't mean
anything by that. I....I ...I'm sorry." The man said, quickly realizing
how his words came off and blushing rushed back to his own stand with his tail between his legs.
"Ugh....you know, you'd think because
they're cute they'd be smart too, but a lot of times, they're worse. That's why
I'm happy with José. He may be tough to look at in the morning, but he's not an
idiot." Luiza smirked.
The festival continued after the mass with music
and danging. The evening brought with it a cold summer chill in the air, but
also more people from the surrounding villages came to see the streets all lit
up with colored lanterns glowing like giant fireflies twinkling and bouncing
with the breeze.
Over in the square, a large group of dancers
gathered. The men in their white button-up shirts, with carefully crocheted hats
that flopped from shoulder to shoulder, the women in their thick red and yellow
skirts embroidered with little flowers that twirled around like flowers opening
and closer as they all spun with their arms in their with tot the beat of
the music all around them. They'd stomp their feet, and clap, the spin and
switch dancing partners, then spin, and spin again all in a perfectly timed and choreographed circle. Over and
over the song about the sea rang from a singer's voice as the dangers danced away the night.
The sweet bread buns were almost gone and the
two women had decided to pack up and head back home before it got too late.
"I can't imagine us taking back all this
bread. We can't eat all this bread!" Aliceanna noticed.
"Here, give me those, I'll take them into
the church and give them to the priest. I'm sure he'll be happy to give them
away to some of the poor." Luzia said to Aliceanna's agreement.
Luzia quickly dashed into the church leaving
Aliceanna alone. She was packing up the reminder of their things, tying them
securely into bundles in the back of the cart hitched to the donkey when the
shepherd returned.
"Miss, I just want to say I'm sorry if I
made a stupid joke. I honestly did not mean to be rude. I'm Filipe."
Aliceanna looked up, the night sky was behind
him dark and perplexing. The wind was slowly blowing on his soft curls.
His face, chiseled and bearded seemed kind and warm.
"Don't worry, I wasn't offended, I guess it
just took me by surprise. Luzia can be a bit protective." Aliceanna
answered.
"The bread was delicious. I was so happy to
see someone had something here to eat. I was starving." He replied, making
small talk as the music played behind them in the square.
"Oh, thank you."
"What's your name?" He asked.
Aliceanna paused. She wasn't sure what was
happening. She wasn't sure why he was so interested in her. She bundled up some
of the bags and tied them with some brown string and turned away shyly.
"Aliceanna."
Filipe came around the donkey to face Aliceanna.
"That's a very beautiful name. Would you care to have a little ginjinha with
me before you leave?"
Aliceanna looked around, they were all packed up
and it wasn't too late in the evening. She thought about it and wondered what
Gabriela would say. But it didn't matter, she took a deep breath and smiled.
"Ok, just one." She said.
Over at a small cantina, Filipe ordered two
small glasses of the cherry liqueur Ginjinha. The smell
reminded Aliceanna instantly of her father and his friends when they'd all come
over and play cards to the wee-hours of the morning, laughing and joking and
smoking and drinking. It was the best of times for her, remembering all of those
she loved and that were gone. It also reminded her of Xavier who used to sip on
the cherry drink when he was feeling a cold coming on. "It'll kill
it all" he'd tease.
"Your name is so uncommon. Are you from
Lajes?" Filipe said as they both sat on large rocks across from the donkey
she borrowed.
"No." She answered again shyly sipping
her drink too.
"Oh. Me neither." he said. "I'm
not from here at all actually. I just came here to work for my grandfather. He
needed help, so I came as fast as I could."
"Where are you from?" Aliceanna asked,
finally looking at him in the eyes.
"Well if you ask my mother, no where
good." He joked, Aliceanna laughed. "You have such a beautiful smile.
Why haven't you smiled all evening?"
"You were watching me?"
"It's hard not to. You're very
beautiful." He answered. She blushed.
"I don't really how to even react to any of
this." She said truthfully, as the glass slipped from her hand. Filipe quickly
grabbed it, saving it from shattering all over the volcanic rock carved
sidewalk leaving the liquid to spill all over his shoe.
"Oh! I'm so sorry!"
"It's fine! It's fine! Don't worry."
Filipe laughed.
"You were saying where you were
from..." She continued embarrassed by her clumsiness.
"Right....I was born on the
continent. Lived in Evora all my life and when my grandfather sent me a letter
to come help him with his herd, I came right away."
"That was very sweet of you. I'm sure he is
grateful for the help"
"He died last year." Filipe replied
sadly. "I've been sort of alone, making sure everything runs smoothly on
his land."
"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that." She replied, a twinge of emotion from Xavier's death suddenly rushing back to her. It felt
that for a minute things were better that things were back to normal. But the
ghost returned. "My husband died two years ago. We have a son."
She said, putting her life front and center for him to see.
"Aliceanna I'm so sorry. It must be very
difficult for you to be managing it --life, baby, home--all alone." He
answered.
"His mother moved to be with us from
Lisbon. So..." She said before a long pause. He noticed her discomfort
with the topic of his mother.
"Well THAT must be fun!
Huh?" he joked, attempting to make her more comfortable.
She burst into laughter, a laughter so hard her
ribs hurt. She felt so happy again in that second, knowing that someone else
out there, besides her closest friends, understood what she was going through.
Filipe was bright, and handsome and kind. She hadn't felt how he was making her
feel in over 2 long years.
As the two continued to make small talk and got
to know each other, Odette made her way down from their village to the festival. Through the crowds in the square, she meandered around watching the
dancers and musicians wrapped in a dark black shawl. As she came down the main
pathway, she turned her head towards the church and saw Aliceanna and Filipe
laughing and talking and making jokes. Odette's face froze. Her heart felt as
if it slowed...the very idea of Aliceanna even remotely involved with a man
would infuriate Gabriela.
Odette waited, she waited and waited and it felt
like an eternity before Filipe went back across the path and gathered his own
things and waved goodbye to Aliceanna, and as soon as he did Odette began to
rush over but was suddenly stopped by Luzia.
"Leave her alone." Luzia said holding
firmly to Odette's arm.
"What is she doing? Who was that?"
Odette wondered.
"I'm probably the nosiest person on this
island, and I don't even care who he was. Aliceanna has been
through a lot and when I came out of that church and saw her smiling and
laughing like that I wasn't going to stop her or make her feel any way about
it. And neither are you. Odette, go home." Luzia ordered leaving Odette
standing in the middle of the cobble stone street with her jaw on the ground.
"What took you so long?" Aliceanna
asked Luzia who had been giving her some time alone when she saw the shepherd
Filipe making her laugh.
"You know how priests are, the minute they
get your attention all the do is talk talk talk." Luzia replied with a small fib.
The next morning, Aliceanna and Odette traveled
up the long winding road of their village and made their way though the
thickets and lush greens of the land with baskets on their heads on their way
to a corn mill for flour. While the two women filled their sacks of the
yellowish-white powder Filipe and a friend from the village of Santo Amaro
arrived.
Aliceanna lifted her head, and like a flicker of
a flame her face lit up, bright and glowing.
"Well, bom dia, fancy meeting
you here." She said dragging over her sack of flour to say hello.
"Bom dia! Aliceanna! How are you?
How was the rest of the festival?" He said, his voice sounding nervous.
"We didn't stay much longer after you left.
How are you?" She wondered as he handed his empty bag to his friend to
fill.
"I'm good. Just came to help carry the
bags. I have to confess, I thought about you all night and then all this
morning. It's a strange feeling seeing you here."
"Aliceanna...we should go." Odette
said in a dry tone.
"Oh, Ok. Well, it was nice seeing you again
Filipe." Aliceanna said lifting the large sack of flour and placing it
firmly on her head.
"Listen, if you ever have some time, or ...
I don't know.... if maybe you would like to go to a dance with me sometime
before the fall comes? This summer there are lots of dances coming, I think we'd
have some fun!" He answered as she slowly turned to look at him.
Before Aliceanna could began to speak, Odette
interrupted by grabbing her hand and pulling towards the front of the mill.
"Aliceanna, your son is waiting."
Odette announced as Aliceanna's face frowned with Odette's constant prodding.
"I have to go. I'll see you around
ok?" She answered leaving Filipe in the mill feeling a bit embarrassed by
her non answer.
As the two women carried the large sacks of
flour on their heads and made their way down the long stretch of road that
was surrounded by the canopy of trees filled with the chirping and singing of a thousand birds, they stopped for a
second to rest. The wild fresh breeze swirled itself into Aliceanna's hair,
cooling her head hot from the sun's cruel rays.
"I don't want to pry." Odette began to
say before being rebuffed by Aliceanna sitting on her sack resting.
"Then don't."
"Aliceanna, you know what this will do. You
know what Dona Gabriela would say. You're being reckless."
The maid insisted.
"What are you talking about? How am I being
reckless? Because I spoke to a man at a flour mill?" She wondered with
annoyance.
"Dona Gabriela would be furious
if the mother of her grandson was even entertaining the notion of....whatever
it is you're entertaining. That's all I'll say." Odette said, her body
language uncomfortable with the whole situation.
"Odette, I have done nothing but welcome
you and Dona Gabriela into my house with open arms and in the
last 2 years I've done absolutely nothing to make anyone believe anything out
of the ordinary. We came to get the flour, you and I, and that's all."
Aliceanna replied.
Odette turned and picked up the sack of flour
and balanced it on her head.
"Vamos." she hissed.
Aliceanna rolled her eyes and quickly picked up
her bag of flour and did the same. She hurried down the path following Odette.
"What is it about Gabriela that scares you
so much? Can't you see how she treats you? She pretends you're not even there
unless she needs something." Aliceanna noted, trying to get Odette to see
her mistress's cold ways. "You're a person too."
"She's done a lot for me. More than anyone
else I have ever met." The maid replied.
"She's your employer!" Aliceanna threw
back.
"She's more than that."
Aliceanna's eyes welled up in frustration. She
began to see that Odette was clinging to Gabriela for some reason. There was a
tension there but also the feeling that Odette would do anything, perhaps even
say anything, to please Gabriela.
"I don't understand why you can't see how
she treats you and even the way she speaks to me. I've done nothing wrong and
she reacts as though I have. I didn't kill her son, he died, but I didn't kill
him. I feel like she blames me for his death with her anger. I loved him too.
You can see that, can't you?"
"You can't understand." Odette
replied.
"What is it that I can't understand Odette?"
"The world is filled with people who are like Gabriela and Xavier and people like you and me. We have to keep things separate, and for you to be in her family and yet be like me and still not see how lucky you are...it's selfish." Odette explained, her ideology of on class made Aliceanna sick to her stomach.
"Xavier didn't care about any of that. He didn't care how much money he had or would have had if he had never married me. Gabriela only sees the bad in people and with you she sees no one at all. You're just a servant to her, why do you protect her?"
"Enough!! You're just irresponsible, Aliceanna, you've been given so much and now you'll throw it away because of some shepherd." Odette said with a hint of jealousy.
"What is it that I can't understand Odette?"
"The world is filled with people who are like Gabriela and Xavier and people like you and me. We have to keep things separate, and for you to be in her family and yet be like me and still not see how lucky you are...it's selfish." Odette explained, her ideology of on class made Aliceanna sick to her stomach.
"Xavier didn't care about any of that. He didn't care how much money he had or would have had if he had never married me. Gabriela only sees the bad in people and with you she sees no one at all. You're just a servant to her, why do you protect her?"
"Enough!! You're just irresponsible, Aliceanna, you've been given so much and now you'll throw it away because of some shepherd." Odette said with a hint of jealousy.
"Odette, stop!" Aliceanna said reaching for Odette's arm to turn her and keep the conversation going, but in doing so spun her too fast and dropping the sack of flour on the floor spilling some.
"Look what you made me do!" Odette screamed back.
"Look what you made me do!" Odette screamed back.
Aliceanna froze in place. Odette had broken her passive servant veneer but not in the way Aliceanna had hoped. Gabriela's hold
on Odette was stronger that she anticipated.
Aliceanna helped Odette pick up the sack of flour and and retie the opening. Odette replaced it back on her head and looked at Aliceanna now with suspicious eyes. Something in the maid told her that Aliceanna was much more of a threat than she had realized, Odette's place in her mistresses world needed to be constant and held on solid ground, no one, not even Aliceanna could try and shake her place in the pecking order of the household.
Aliceanna helped Odette pick up the sack of flour and and retie the opening. Odette replaced it back on her head and looked at Aliceanna now with suspicious eyes. Something in the maid told her that Aliceanna was much more of a threat than she had realized, Odette's place in her mistresses world needed to be constant and held on solid ground, no one, not even Aliceanna could try and shake her place in the pecking order of the household.
The two quickly made their way back to the
village below, and never spoke another word about the argument or about Filipe the whole way.
That evening, as the sun turned the blue sky
into a purple wonderland of twinkling stars reflecting the dark blue sea below,
Filipe made his way down to Aliceanna's village and with word of mouth found
her little house.
He quietly walked up perfectly painted white
steps of stone and adjusted his suspenders and hat and knocked on the front
door. He could see a light from a lantern in through the glass, and then
someone coming through the house to answer the door.
It was Odette.
"Boa tarde, is Aliceanna in?"
He asked.
Odette stood there unsure of what to do. She
could easily send him on his way and keep Aliceanna from getting into any
trouble with Gabriela who would surly overreact to a strange man coming to call
on her widowed daughter-in-law. She could save Aliceanna all the trouble that
it would bring, she could easily keep the temperature of the already simmering house
at a stand-still by making sure Filipe's presence was never known.
But then the conversation she had with Aliceanna
on their way back from the mill floated back into her mind. She remembered how
Aliceanna spoke to her and how she made her feel: inadequate and dumb even if it were in a way challenging how Gabriela really made her feel. She sensed that fervor of that conversation well up returning and
it almost made her want to vomit. She composed herself without even the hint of discomfort to Filipe and smiled, a perfect maid hiding her truth.
"I'll go get her." She said softly.
But Odette did not call on Aliceanna who was next
door at José and Luzia's house with Nico. She went into the bedroom
and called on Gabriela who hurriedly came to the front door to a confused
Filipe.
They stared at each other, he in his dark
trousers, white shirt and suspenders unsure who the woman in the dark dress
with puffy full length sleeves was starting at him from across the small living
room in the doorway.
"Uhh..." he muttered in confusion.
"Uhh..." he muttered in confusion.
She clutched her a rosary beads as he smiled nervously and
began to speak again just before a strange feeling in his stomach appeared that quieted
any more words from escaping his mouth.
Gabriela walked slowly into the room, the light
of the sunset forming a glow of orange around her face, she reached for the
door knob, her lips tightly pursed and thin and closed the door in Filipe's
face, never uttering a single word to him.
It was around 7:30 that evening. Aliceanna and
Nico were making their way over from José and Luzia's house next door. The sun had now set, and she
carefully stepped up the stone steps to her own house with the baby in her
arms, a lantern lit by oil illuminated the summer night just outside her front
door. She pushed open the door and standing in the dim front room speaking in
lowered voices were Gabriela and Odette.
They both turned to the door quickly ending
their conversation, Aliceanna instantly noticing the change in their demeanor
and the felt the energy in the room turn cold, like an icy wind had blown in
from the north frosting everything it touched.
"What's the matter, what's happened?"
Aliceanna said, stepping into the small square shaped living with two large oil
lamps across from each other creating a moody shade to the room.
"Odette, you may go." Gabriela said
fully turning to face Aliceanna as Odette slowly snuck away back down to her
lower level room.
"What's the matter?" Aliceanna asked
again, her baby still in her arms grabbing at her necklace.
"Where were you you all this time?"
"Next door. Why?"
"For the last two hours? You were next door
for all this time?" Gabriela, her voice forceful in tone.
"Yes, why? Gabriela tell me what's
happened. I can sense that there's clearly something wrong." the
daughter-in-law said sitting down on a small love seat.
"I came to this ...island, this remote
almost desolate place after my son died to be here with you and to show you
that I was willing to work on any kind of relationship for the good of my
grandson and what do you do what that gift? You throw it all away to
...to...to...harlot yourself around the villages with some man. You should be
ashamed of yourself." Gabriela bristled.
Aliceanna sat there still, shocked and clueless
at what her mother-in-law was even talking about. Baby Nico still grabbing at
her necklace, she pulled his hand down and took a breath to respond.
"Dona Gabriela, I assure you I
have no idea what you're talking about. What did Odette tell you?"
"And how do you know that this is something
that Odette would have said to me? Is that your guilty conscious? What would
Xavier even think to know what you are doing!?" Gabriela shot back in a veiled
accusation.
"What am I doing? What have I done?"
Aliceanna questioned, her voice raising.
"Don't you dare. Don't you even dare try
and pretend that you're so innocent in all of this. I saw him. He came to this
door and came for you. You would allow him to come here, to the home you shared
with my son, and your child like a common....I can't even say the word."
Gabriela accused through Odette's coercion.
"Who!? Who Came here!" Aliceanna
demanded to know, her mind finally starting to break at the idea of what
Gabriela was attempting to accuse her of.
Gabriela, her long black dress clinging to a
throw rug on the floor, stood up and faced Aliceanna who was now standing as
well. The two women who had lived together for two years had often times bumped
heads, like two goats fighting over the same territory, locking horns and
pushing and shoving until one finally gave in. But this battle was based on a
lie, based on a twist of the truth that Odette had created to place her in
Gabriela's better graces, so that she would see her as more of a friend and a
companion rather than just a maid.
"I knew it from the day my son told me he
was marrying you that you were this type of woman. God only knows what my poor son
knew before the he was taken from us, God only knows what he had
suffered because of your disgusting behavior. Give me my grandson!"
Gabriela shouted, grabbing at the baby and pulling at him from Aliceanna's arms.
"What are you doing? Stop it! Stop
it!" Aliceanna struggled.
And in a split second everything changed as
Aliceanna's free hand went into the air and slapped Gabriela across the face
with such a stinging jolt one of Gabriel's ear-rings fell out of her ear.
Gabriela's hand covered her red cheek. She could
feel her heart beat in her ears. Her body felt like it was shaking, her rage so
filled her body that it had to be expelled one way or another.
"Dona Gabriela... my god, I'm sorry."
Aliceanna said, shocked at her own reaction, but her motherly instincts were
stronger than anything else. Surely Gabriela would understand.
The dowager's rage was too hot to be rational.
Gabriela stared at Aliceanna now with the eyes of a snake hungry and ready to
release it's venom on it's next meal and with all the force she had in her,
without a single word uttered, swung back and slapped Aliceanna across her face with the back of her hand.
The baby was crying. Aliceanna was crying,
Gabriela stood there stone faced and cold, ready for the next slap but her
daughter-in-law only shook her head and cuddled the baby in her arms and rushed
out of the room leaving Gabriela standing alone in the orange glow of the oil
lamps furious and unable to see the darkness slowly seeping into her own
behavior that would soon damage everything it touched.
PART 5
Two days had passed and nothing felt the same, but
in reality the atmosphere in the small little house in the seaside village was
worse than it had ever been. The awkward walking on egg shells feeling seemed
to now be as if they were all walking red hot coals. Avoiding the burning looks
each of them would shoot at first glance.
In the small village church of St. Isabel,
Aliceanna knelt in prayer, her hair covered in a white handkerchief with a few
soft curls peeking through the side.
Nico, sat strangely quiet in one of the pews surrounded by the gold leafed banisters and rococo moldings and statues of saints from all over the world looking down with eyes of hope and love. The baby, full of energy, flipped through a bible while his mother prayed.
She prayed for guidance and hoped for a sign, something that would tell her she was making the right decisions and that somehow by some miracle she would get a signal, a message on what she should do next or at least how she should handle the horrible situation with Gabriela.
She prayed for guidance and hoped for a sign, something that would tell her she was making the right decisions and that somehow by some miracle she would get a signal, a message on what she should do next or at least how she should handle the horrible situation with Gabriela.
As she left the church, her forehead still wet
from a touch of holy water, she noticed just around the corner walking down the
long rocky path that lead into the village from a larger street above, Filipe. He noticed her too. He stopped, grinned ear to ear and
rushed down the small path.
"Aliceanna!" He shouted.
She waved back, unsure of what she was feeling.
Happiness? Relief? The strangest feeling of all was a sense that she had a new
ally in this difficult time in her life. Someone that she could confide in and
not feel as if she were hurting anyone's feelings; José and Luzia were
often there for her too but Gabriela was José 's aunt, how could she tell
them what she had done? How could she admit to not only yelling at the older
woman, but slapping her.
"I'm so glad I've found you. You're a very
difficult lady to connect with!" He joked.
Her face flashed concern. "What is it? Are
you ok?" He asked.
"I don't even know where to begin. I don't
know how to even say what I've done without you hating me."
Aliceanna answered as she walked over to a large sea-wall blocking the crashing
waves from the sidewalk just in front of the church.
"Is everything alright? What happened? I
went to your house a few days ago and...well I guess you weren't home. A woman
closed the door on me." Filipe said as he pinched the baby's cheek.
"It was my mother-in-law. She.... I don't
know what to say."
"What is it?" He began to feel a pain
in stomach again. Something inside him was telling him something was wrong, something very wrong.
Aliceanna felt as if it was the end of the
world, and in way, for her it truly was. She had lost control in a moment of
frustration and slapped the woman she was supposed to respect no matter how
cruel she was. The feeling of disappointing Xavier's memory was killing her
inside.
"I've done something terrible to my
mother-in-law. She ....she accused me of awful things and in the spur of the
moment she tried to grab the baby and I snapped, Filipe, I slapped her across the face." Aliceanna
confessed.
He didn't know what to say. He didn't know how
to react. He just nodded his head and listened. He listened to her whole story:
how she married Xavier only 4 years ago and how his family in Lisbon
disapproved because of her social status and lack of dowry. She told him how he
was disinherited from his family's money and how they refused to accept her
even when she became a mother. She spoke of the countless times Xavier tried to
get his mother to come visit the islands so she could meet her new grandson and
how Gabriela never even replied to the letters or the telegrams. She spoke
about how on the outside Xavier pretended it didn't hurt him but how she could
see it was destroying him inside not to be with his family, his whole family.
"I feel responsible for everything. I feel
like it's my fault they distanced themselves, it's my fault they disowned him.
If it weren't for me he would have never lived on this island, he would have
never been on that boat and he never would have died on that boat!" She
cried.
The story broke Filipe's heart, but it got
worse.
"Now she think's I've turned into this
village whore, this ...thing that I'm not! She think's you and are I .... don't
even want to say it." Aliceanna continued.
Filipe put his hands on her shoulders, she
turned her face up from the ground and looked at him. His eyes, those deep
brown eyes. She could see what looked like specs of gold in them. He looked
like he had two sets of thick black eye lashes that protected those golden
brown eyes. He gave her a small smile and kissed her on the cheek.
"You have done nothing wrong. You are not
what they say you are. You are a wonderful, caring woman who has done
everything she possible could to raise this little baby in a storm of tragedy.
Don't ever think twice about that."
As the two spoke just outside the church, clouds
began to form just above them. It was typical of that time of the year, the
grayness of a summer storm would come at the drop of a hat and wash away the
warmth and soak up the ash like ground of the Portuguese volcanic island.
Parishioners from inside the church, ladies of a
certain again with small lace veils quickly departed the church rushing home
away from the rain. Aliceanna covered baby Nico's head with her own scarf and
Filipe gathered them together and quickly rushed them off to a place away from the coming rain storm, a place where they could break away from the day's worries: his grandfather's beautiful land in the hills.
From the steps of the main entrance of the
church, Father Silva stood taking in all that he saw of Aliceanna and Filipe. It wasn't just a summer
rainstorm washing all over the island, it was a man and a woman glowing when
they were in each other's presence. For him, this relationship seemed off. It
seemed as though they were gloating and gallivanting around the village in a
some kind of obscene way. She a widow of a wealthy family, he a shepherd no one had heard of. She was a mother to a young boy, an heir, and he was some
outsider that was sneaking into money.
Father Silva squeezed the wooden crucifix around
his neck tied to a long rope. This would not do. Not in his parish.
The summer shower dissipated into history as quickly as it came and up in the hills, as green as anything on the
earth, Filipe, Aliceanna, and baby Nico, decompressed among the 80 or so sheep
Filipe was charged in keeping track of. They were so high up on the side of the
green and grey volcanic island's mountain that they felt as if they could touch
the clouds that rushed passed them in a stream of a cool breeze that smelled of
the sea.
The baby had never seen such fluffy animals
before. He was fascinated by the sheep and Aliceanna, for a moment was taken
away from all her grief and worry. She could see that something inside of her
was changing, her world, as dark as the mountain Pico itself, was finally
turning to color like the rainbow the shower had left.
As for Filipe, he was the spring that had come and warned her hardened heart after a 2 year long winter.
As for Filipe, he was the spring that had come and warned her hardened heart after a 2 year long winter.
The sheep danced around them like the white
clouds of fluff they were. The baby giggled and grabbed at their wool and
played in the grass with a baby lamb just before picking up dirt to eat like
the lamb was. Filipe and Aliceanna gasped and laughed and caught him just
before he finalized his imaginative feed.
The three walked together down a hill as the
sheep cascaded down with them. They talked about the past, their hopes for the future,
the different worlds the came from and what it meant for them to be where they
were today.
Aliceanna seemed to be falling in love. It was as if the
island, this rural island, one of nine in the center of the Atlantic ocean, had
given her a new gift, a rejuvenation that she had never believed could happen again. A person that understood her, cared for her and wanted to protect her.
Filipe grabbed her hand, the breeze of ocean air
high above all the villages released the scarf tied in her hair. Then they kissed,
erasing all of her worries and troubles with Gabriela away just for a moment.
All of this brightness under the gathering of more rain clouds that soon began to
form above their heads.
"I knew it." Filipe said about the
coming rain. He gathered up Nico from his patch of grass with the lamb "Here it comes again!"
"Quickly!" Aliceanna said as she began
to help herd the sheep into a pen.
As the fickle rain storm came and went it left
blustery wind that pounded the Gray and purple island of Pico with it's lush pastures of sheep and dairy cows like boxer thrusting his arms into a
punching a bag.
Father Silva, clad in a dark robe and a black
umbrella made his way up the side steps to the front door of Aliceanna's little
house. Small droplets of water from the orange tile roof fell to his collar, he
dusted them off and knocked on the door.
Odette opened it.
"Senhor Padre, what can I do for
you?"
"Good afternoon, I'd like to speak to
Aliceanna. Is she home by chance?"
"Not at the moment, no, she went to church
earlier and was to go by Senhor Antonio's dairy to bring home
milk. Is there anything I can do?" Odette questioned not knowing
Aliceanna's actual whereabouts.
"Well, I should..." The priest began
before Gabriela walked into the room.
"Padre Silva. Come in! Come in!
Odette, please you should never keep a priest waiting at the door."
"I'm sorry." Odette replied, her eyes
searching the floor for her confidence.
"Dona Gabriela, would it be possible for
you and I to speak alone?" Father Silva asked, to Gabriela's quick
confirmation.
Odette scurried out of the room but kept her ear
to the door, she didn't want to miss a word.
"What is it?" Gabriela said, showing
Father Silva to a soft chair near a warm fire.
"I'm afraid there is something I have seen
down by the church that does not sit well with me at all. And knowing the kind
of woman and family you are from I know that you will agree with me." He
said, an eye brow lifted above his bony sunken eyes.
"You're making me nervous, what is it that
you saw?" She wondered.
"Your daughter-in-law, with her baby, with
a man. That man--that--whom ever he is from where ever he is from. Filipe. In
front of my church, Dona Gabriela, they were in a way that I don't see becoming
for a woman with a child who not 2 years ago lost her husband. Your son."
Gabriela's face twisted in discomfort and embarrassment.
She knew just how quickly news in the village traveled and gossip like this ran
like roaring river. Her daughter-in-law, and grandson in a peculiar position,
even though it was truly innocent would be turned into something scandalous,
perverted into a sultry story of something it was not only to breath life in
those who wanted no one to be happy, those ill souls who wished horrible things
on good people. People like Garbriela herself, which is why she was all too sure of what could happen if the story got into the wrong mind. Aliceanna's reputation would be tarnished and with it Gabriela's son's good name.
Gabriela, who came to the village and all but
beatified her son Xavier, would see that image crumble in front of her on
baseless rumors and innuendo. It was her worst nightmare.
"I warned her. I warned her this would
happen. I knew that what she was doing and how she was behaving would come back
to haunt her. I just knew it!" Gabriela exclaimed.
"I'm very sorry that I had to be the one to
tell you." Father Silver replied.
"No, absolutely not, I am very grateful for
you coming here to confront her, but I'm afraid it would have fallen on def
ears, Father. She's....she's turned. I just can't explain what or how she's
ever going to come back from this. Imagine if my son in heaven would see her
running around this island with ---him---another man! I can't even begin to imagine
it. He must be so horrified by her illness." Gabriela said, crocodile
tears in her eyes glistened as she grabbed her son's charcoal portrait.
"Illness? What do you mean?" The
priest wondered.
"Her mind father, it's ...something is
wrong with it. She's starting to show signs of strain. Perhaps it was bound to
happen. All I can do is think about the abuse I've suffered, and my poor
grandchild, what things he may have already seen in his young age."
Gabriela confessed with an ere of decide laced within her voice.
"Abuse? What abuse have you suffered my
child?" The priest said, startled to his feet.
"She assaulted me just the other day.
Slapped across the face--her anger was like a thunder bolt shocking my whole
body. It was awful." Gabriela replied showing her marked cheek and leaving out the reason for the slap in the first place.
Father Silva gasped at the notion that this fine
woman with a good name, with such a powerful stance in front of him could have
been abused in such a manner by a woman who was turning her life upside down by
doing who knows what with a shepherd with no name, no history and nothing to
offer. It was a terrible reality.
"Something has to be done." Silva
conceded.
"Something...yes... but what? I fear for my
grandson's safety. Isn't there anything you can do?"
"What would you have me do?" Silva
questioned.
"Her illness, it can take over her whole
life. The illness of madness is so strong that, not I, not even you
can control it. I've seen how it can manifest into the physical. Can't you
somehow use the power of your stature to have her taken to a safe place? Taken
somewhere that a person in the medical field could possibility watch over her
while her son--Xavier's son--could be safe away from it?" Gabriela
plotted.
"Yes, yes, I could. Dr. Francisco here on
the island could take her. I know of a woman many years ago that went into a
dark madness after she lost a child and he was able to keep her in a hospital.
This is what I can do." The priest said.
"Yes...yes, this would work. But it has to
be tonight. She has to be taken away tonight to save my sweet grandson any more
pain."
"Tonight then." The priest replied.
He gathered his things, and quickly dashed off
to see Dr. Francisco while Odette walked back into the room. The two women stood
in there pleased with themselves for two different reasons. Odette could now
move into a more important and lucrative position in Gabriela's life; no more a
simple maid but perhaps a governess to the child, and Gabriela would be
rid of the one woman who brought a tarnish to her family's name, something she
had detested all the years of her son's involvement with her.
"Tonight, I finally let go of my grief,
Odette. Tonight, Xavier finally finds peace."
PART 6
Aliceanna's escape from her reality that after
noon changed her. She, for so long, felt as if fate had turned against her.
That her destiny would forever be the woman who lost her fisherman husband to
the depths of the ocean below. That's what she would be to the village: the sad
widow of the sea.
But now that she had Filipe in her life, the sun
seemed to shine warmer, the breeze cooler and colors seemed brighter. Even in
the very short time they had gotten to know each other, she seemed to feel
safer, it was a security that he brought with him through his kindness
and friendship.
Aliceanna and Nico had spent all day with Filipe at his pasture after they ran into each other at the church. It was close to
dusk now, and the village was beginning to show signs of dozing off into the
night with the small little windows of the little homes with orange tile roofs
beginning to glow of the light from their oil lamps.
As the three descended the long winding road that lead from the main street above from the hills and turned on to the main road that lead into the village by the
docks a large carriage was blocking the entrance. Several large men got off the carriage blocked
Aliceanna, Filipe and the baby from going up the street to her home.
Suddenly, from behind the carriage Father Silva and Gabriela with her stone like face that showed no signs of joy came into view.
Suddenly, from behind the carriage Father Silva and Gabriela with her stone like face that showed no signs of joy came into view.
"We've been waiting for you. Where have you
been?" Father Silva asked coldly.
"What is this?" Filipe asked slightly
stepping in front of Aliceanna and the baby.
"Mind your business boy, this does not
concern you. Aliceanna, hand the child over to his grandmother." Father
Silva demanded.
"I won't. I won't do it." Aliceanna
said, holding the baby tight.
"Young lady, you hand the child over to his
grandmother on your own, or I have these men take him forcefully, I will allow
you to decide for yourself what you want to do, but either way, you will hand
him over." Silva shot back angrily.
"I want to know what's going on? Why are
you asking for Nicolau?" Filipe again questioned.
"This woman is ill. She's slowly losing her
mind running around this village and the island as if she hadn't care in the
world, obviously you cannot see the dangers of this profound irresponsible and ill behavior will have on a child of Nicolau's age. We have all seen things in
Aliceanna that are concerning and it's best she be evaluated by a
doctor." Father Silva said.
"What? Evaluated? I'm not sick!"
Aliceanna exclaimed.
"This is ridiculous!" Filipe said,
holding his arm out barricading Aliceanna and the baby behind it.
"I've seen it with my own eyes, boy, do my
eyes deceive me? Not to mention the abuse she's inflicted on Dona Gabriela.
That sort of vial attitude is surly proof that she is an unfit mother. The baby
belongs in safer hands." Silva replied.
Aliceanna's heart dropped. She felt suddenly
sick at the notion that she was out of hand especially when describing what she had done in such a split second reaction to Gabriela who was grabbing at
Nico. "Abuse? She.... this is a lie, I apologized and she...she hit me
back!"
"Oh Aliceanna. ....these are just lies,
your grace. Doctor, please take her, and help her find peace." Gabriela
said moving aside for Doctor Francisco and the men to reach over and attempt to separate Aliceanna
and Nico from Filipe.
Aliceanna began to scream, the baby began to cry,
the men scuffled with Filipe, there was noise and grunts amidst the crashing of
the waves against the small port where boats bobbled and bounced and knocked
against each other with every wild wave mimicking the scuffle just feet from shore and the Church's door.
"Give me the boy, pass me my
grandson!" Gabriela shouted as people began to look of their white lace
curtained windows.
One of the men from the hospital punched Filipe
in the face knocking him out. Aliceanna screamed and as she was distracted the
other man grabbed the baby and handed him to Gabriela.
"Let's go." The first man said pulling
a screaming Aliceanna into the carriage with the confused doctor who had not
understood what exactly was happening, only that Father Silva said a mentally
unstable woman was in the village, and to the doctor's eyes something else was really going on.
Inside the carriage, Aliceanna was inconsolable
and attempted to free herself, but was held down by one of the men.
"Clam down, calm down, please calm
down." The doctor said.
"Please, there's been a mistake!"
Aliceanna continued to repeat.
"It's going to be ok, please, miss. As soon
as I can diagnose what is happening to you, you'll be able to come home. Just
please calm down. We're just going up to the clinic and we'll be back in no
time." The doctor said, his eyes a cool ice blue seemed to calm Aliceanna
who could only turn her head out of the small circular window in the carriage
to see Filipe out cold on the wet cold cobble stone street.
Gabriela watched as the carriage rushed off into
the darkening horizon. She cuddled the sniffling baby and smiled to herself, finally rid
of the woman who had brought so much frustration and tarnish to her family's
name.
The next afternoon was just as brilliant as the
day before, Filipe woke up with a headache and in a bed and in a room he did
not recognize. He sat up in a jolt at the strange place and quickly regretted
it as sharp pain began to tear at his temple where he had fallen the night before
after the punch to the face
"I thought you'd sleep for two more
days." Luzia said bringing into the room a porcelain dish with water and
towel. "Here," she continued handing him the towel. "to wash
your face."
"Am I in your house?" he asked looking
around the wood paneled room with it's virgin Mary statue in the corner.
"You are. And you have to get up, I'm
making you something to eat to take with you." Luzia said standing over
him while he washed his face.
"What? Take with me?" he asked still in
a daze from his sleep and bruised face.
"Filipe, get up! You don't have time.
You've already missed on too much since you've been asleep. Aliceanna needs
you."
"Aliceanna!" Filipe said, suddenly remembering
everything that happened in a sudden burst as if her name was a key that
unlocked a long held amnesia. "Where is she??"
"She's been at Dr. Francisco's clinic all
night and what everyone that lives down by the dock is saying is that she went
insane and tried to kill Gabriela. They're saying Father Silva was witness to this and
that Dr. Francisco is ordering her into an institution because she's gone mad
with grief over Xavier's death--which we all know is a pile of cow shit fresh
in the morning!" Luzia said in a rush of words.
"How did I get here?" Filipe asked.
"We got word of what happened from neighbors and went down and got you. Anyway, No one can trust what these gossips say around here, so we had to check for ourselves. And there you were, out cold on the street. Now get up, take this and get to the clinic because we don't have much time!" Luzia ordered handing Filipe a roll of bread with a large piece of fragrant yellow cheese from the neighboring island of São Jorge.
Filipe's head was spinning. The story of Aliceanna trying to kill Gabriela, the gossip the lies, the smell of the cheese, everything was all confusing, but one thing Luzia said was clear, he had to get to Aliceanna.
"How did I get here?" Filipe asked.
"We got word of what happened from neighbors and went down and got you. Anyway, No one can trust what these gossips say around here, so we had to check for ourselves. And there you were, out cold on the street. Now get up, take this and get to the clinic because we don't have much time!" Luzia ordered handing Filipe a roll of bread with a large piece of fragrant yellow cheese from the neighboring island of São Jorge.
Filipe's head was spinning. The story of Aliceanna trying to kill Gabriela, the gossip the lies, the smell of the cheese, everything was all confusing, but one thing Luzia said was clear, he had to get to Aliceanna.
"Ok ok ok! I'm going but you're practically throwing me out of the door, why are you rushing
me?" Filipe questioned, sensing things were much more urgent that she was leading on.
Luzia stomped her foot and placed her fists
folded inward on her hips, rolled her eyes, she wasn't used to men questioning
her, not in her own home but Filipe had a right to know what was else happened as he slept.
"Look, come here," She said pulling
him to the window. "That's my husband over there, coming from next
door at Aliceanna's house. Do you see what he's doing?"
"He's....he's packing away a horse and
buggy."
"That's right, do you know who left
that house and who he buggied over to Madalena just a few
hours ago?" Luzia questioned in an annoyed tone to Filipe's slow to reacting body.
"No."
"Gabriela and Odette somehow managed to
purchase tickets back to Lisbon today---TODAY! Their ship leaves from Madalena's port
in just two hours--do you understand now? You only have two hours to get to
Aliceanna, bring her to Madalena and make sure Gabriela, that
witch, doesn't take Nico away to the continent. That's what she's wanted all
along."
Filipe finally started to understand, his
mind pushing through the fog the knot on his forehead was causing. He
dropped the bread and cheese and dashed out of the back door of Luzia and
José's house to find Aliceanna and get her to the island's main port in village of Madalena before
Gabriela could escape with the baby.
In a small locked room, Aliceanna lay in a ball,
her body sore from banging on the walls and doors all night begging to be
freed. Her mother in law, cruelly creating a falsehood about her that put her
in a place that was dark, frightening and most of all void of any interaction
with anyone from her family. She had no idea what was happening 20 miles away
in her own home, in her own village.
She could only imagine.
As she lay there, her cold legs tucked under her flowery dress, she wondered how she would
ever be able to look her son in the eyes when he was older to explain how she
was never really insane and how the lies that his grandmother spread about her
only made her look that way; she loved his father
but could also find it in her heart to love again. That Love was not the
enemy, only the hate and jealousy and all the things that embodied Gabriela's
dark side was.
She could only imagine.
She had been locked away in that room since night fall, and it was well into the late afternoon now. She had seen no one, she had
heard nothing. Only the screams of the other people in this tiny little clinic
for the mentally ill. It was a small 8 room building all white that lifted
above the village of São Roque on a hill top on the road that also housed a large convent with bells that sang at every hour. It was the only way Aliceanna could tell how long she had been there, she counted the tolls.
Two distinctly different places of two distinctly different frames of mind; One of peace the other of madness.
Two distinctly different places of two distinctly different frames of mind; One of peace the other of madness.
She could only imagine what was being said about her, the lies being told over and over. But Then the door
opened, and it wasn't her imagination.
"Aliceanna. How are you?" Doctor Francisco said,
handing her some food.
She didn't know what to say.
"I'm sorry its taken me so long to bring
you something to eat, you'll have to understand, or maybe you wont, but Father
Silva controls a lot of what goes on here being that he's only just down the way at the Convent most of the time. I had to sneak this in for
you." The doctor confessed.
"I want to go home, please can I go home to
my son?"
"Aliceanna, listen to me, there are people
saying things about you, that you've been running around with a man. The things
that those people describe you doing with this man, they aren't true are
they?" The doctor asked.
"I've done nothing wrong." She said.
"In your mind you've done nothing wrong, I
completely agree with that, but can you tell me if other people wouldn't agree?
Aliceanna, the things I'm going to ask you may seem a bit off color and
personal, but I have to ask, and you must tell me the truth." The
doctor said.
"My mother in law, she will stop at nothing
to tare me down, won't she. She hates me this much, to take parent away
from her grandson, just like that, like I don't even matter. I just want to go
home to my son, doctor, I'll say whatever I need to do go home to him."
"No, no, I don't want you to say what you think
i want you to say, I need you to be very honest, The rumors about you and Filipe,
the shepherd, are very salacious."
"We're friends. Filipe has been very kind
to me, we're only friends."
"And you've never....you've never been with
him?" The doctor asked bashfully.
Aliceanna's eyes almost popped out of her head.
She couldn't believe what she was hearing. She couldn't understand how people
would have assumed such a thing about someone whom she had just met. The
friendship was nothing to that extent, other than a small kiss, but that was
just yesterday. Nothing else.
Aliceanna's face told her story even before her
words. Doctor Francisco shook his head and told her to forget what he asked
her.
"I'm not a fool Aliceanna, I know what's
being done here. I know that someone in a place of power has decided that they
would like to be some sort of hero for hypocrites and gossips who have nothing
better to do than use their influence to make me keep you here. I can't tell
you that I can make it all go away, but I know you're not ill Aliceanna, not like the ill people who are staying here. Please, eat a little, gain some
strength and go. I've already allowed this to go on too long."
Aliceanna jumped up, she dropped the small
packaged meal to the ground and hugged the doctor who was a bit stiff.
"Go." He said pushing her through the
door.
Aliceanna rushed through the white stone halls of the
clinic and thrust open the door alowing the fresh island air to surround her and wash over her like heavily embrace. Standing there, as if by chance, ready to rush her to Madalena was Filipe. She gasped and he opened his arms ready to
for her to jump into them.
"We have to go, we can't waist any time, we
only have 40 minutes." Filipe said.
"40 minutes for what?"
"Gabriela is probably already in Madalena,
she and Odette bought tickets back to Lisbon somehow over night and are
attempting to take Nico, we have to hurry!"
Aliceanna gasped again and they both jumped onto a horse that Luzia had arranged for him to take. The two galloped
down the steep hill in the village of São Roque passed the
convent where a group of nuns were just descending from a carriage just returning from Madalena themselves.
PART 7
The ship yard in the village of Madalena was
crowded with people arranging their baggage and others arriving on horse back,
this wasn't the sort of giant crowd you'd see in a big city, but for the
village of Madalena and it's healthy population, the crowds seemed to overwhelm
the ship yard.
Sitting on two benches awaiting their turn to
board the steam ship headed back to Lisbon was Gabriela, Odette, and baby Nico;
with them a man who helped them buy their first class tickets in such a short
amount of time....Father Silva who had just been dropped off by the nuns at the convent.
"I appreciate again how much you've done
for me, Senhor Padre. Getting us back to Lisbon on such short
notice is truly a miracle." Gabriela grinned.
"By the will of God this ship will find itself in the capital as if it flew there. I'm sure of it." The priest said
squeezing the baby's cheek.
"FIRST CLASS! ALL ABOARD!" A ship
ensign shouted, scratching off names on a clip-board.
"Well this is it, thank you again."
Gabriela said standing up and handing the baby to Odette as two men quickly
began to grab their suitcases.
They began to make their way over to the loading
area, step by step, closer and closer to returning to the capital city, free
from all connection to the islands, and just as they began to ascend the large
staircase connecting shore to ship, Aliceanna and Filipe arrived shocking
Father Silva so much that he gasped and seated himself back on the bench.
"WAIT! GABRIELA WAIT!!!" Aliceanna
said leaping from the horse.
Gabriela turned back to the crowd below in shock at what she was seeing, like a spirit rising from the dead, Aliceanna had been freed. told Odette as
they began to make their way up the stairs.
"Go, quickly!" The older woman said to Odette who was carrying the baby.
"Go, quickly!" The older woman said to Odette who was carrying the baby.
"You have to stop them, they're taking her
child without her consent." Filipe said to the ensign.
"What do you mean? It says here this is a
grandmother, her daughter and grandson." He read.
"It's not true, she's taking my child from
me, please you have to stop them." Aliceanna plead.
The ensign looked confused. He was watching a drama unfold in front of him that he didn't want to escalate.
"Madam, please come back down here....." the sailor requested to Gabriela's discomfort, but she reluctantly complied.
"Madam, please come back down here....." the sailor requested to Gabriela's discomfort, but she reluctantly complied.
"This woman is out of her mind, she's been
recently institutionalized and has no connection to this child
what-so-ever." Gabriela bristled in a lie.
He could tell Gabriela was uneasy, her speech seemed shaky and labored. It was a lie.
"The child, whom does he really belong to?" The man asked now growing frustrated.
"The child, whom does he really belong to?" The man asked now growing frustrated.
"Me." Gabriela and Aliceanna both
replied.
"She is the grandmother, but I am the
mother. Please sir, you have to believe me. This is all some sort of attempt
for her to punish me for doing absolutely nothing wrong." Aliceanna said.
"Nothing wrong? You don't think
gallivanting around this island with this shepherd is so innocent? You've taken
my son's good name and dragged it through the muck of this island. I won't have
my grandson around to see anymore of it." Gabriela replied as she turned
and began to push Odette back up the staircase.
"So the boy is hers then?" The man
asked refusing to deal with any more of the drama and only requiring the truth.
Gabriela turned back to him, lifted an eye brown
and nodded a slight yes.
"Very well hand him over." The man
said.
"What? I will not!" Gabriela
insisted.
"Madam, hand him over right now and then
you can board the ship back home. You cannot take the boy."
"We've already paid his fair." Odette
stupidly spoke.
"We'll refund the money, hand him over
--now!" the man from the ship instructed.
"OI! LET'S GO! YOU'RE HOLDING US
BACK!" A man in the line screamed.
"GO ON!" another frustrated passenger
shouted.
Odette looked at Gabriela unsure of what to do
next. She was holding on to the baby tightly, as Father Silva stood up and
walked over. He began to speak on the side of Gabriela but Filipe put his hand
up in the priests face.
"It's because of you this is happening, and
if you want all your teeth to remain in your mouth father, I would keep it shut."
Filipe said in a whisper--the Priest backed away and sat back on the bench.
Gabriela felt trapped. She could feel the eyes of everyone below her on the dock searing her with anger. She could already foresee everyone back in Lisbon talking about her in hushed tones about what had happened on the island, she could see people laughing at her, pointing at her, calling her a kidnapper. She could feel the embarrassment fervor up in her body like an over boiled teakettle.
Gabriela felt trapped. She could feel the eyes of everyone below her on the dock searing her with anger. She could already foresee everyone back in Lisbon talking about her in hushed tones about what had happened on the island, she could see people laughing at her, pointing at her, calling her a kidnapper. She could feel the embarrassment fervor up in her body like an over boiled teakettle.
"Go on." Gabriela instructed Odette in
a hushed voice to conceal her defeat. "Make it quick."
Odette reached down from above on the last step of the staircase
and handed the baby back to his mother who screeched with delight. Nico, too,
seemed to be much happier and in the right place. They kissed and hugged and
Aliceanna couldn't help but cry. Her tears were of joy and of sadness. How it
got to this point she could not understand but now, hopefully, things would
get better.
She, Filipe and the baby turned and quickly
walked off leaving Gabriela and Odette on the staircase ready to take their
place on the ship's first class cafe to leave the island they'd lived on for
two years and never look back, but look back they did. Gabriela could not keep
her eyes off of Aliceanna and her grandson as they got smaller and smaller in
the distance, up the road and passed the main church of Madalena and then disappeared in the
grays and greens of the island's scenery.
The serene setting of the waves crashing up
against the rocks behind Aliceanna's small home, sent a soothing and calm
energy into the house. The smell of the fresh sea air spilled into the open
windows and cooled off the warm kitchen. Aliceanna, Filipe, José and
Luzia had a celebratory meal now that the anxiety and stressful last two years
of their lives were behind them.
Aliceanna blew out a candle in the baby's room
where he was fast asleep. In the dim light she smiled at him and watched as his
chest rose and fell with every soft breath. She had flashes in her mind of her
husband, his smile, his warm heart. How he would have loved to see their son
now, growing fast, adorable and free of his mother Gabriela's overbearing eye.
"Are you ok?" Luzia asked, tapping
Aliceanna on the shoulder.
"He's just perfect isn't he?"
"When they're asleep they're always
perfect." Luzia joked as Aliceanna playfully slapped her on the shoulder.
"Well Nico always is! He's the perfect
baby." The young mother replied. "I can't believe how close I came to
losing him. She was really going to take him away from me. How could a woman, a
mother herself, do that to another mother?"
"Honey, she is an angry woman who had no
place raising children, and the mistakes she made with Xavier and his siblings
were just the surface of the kind of woman she was. She was probably trying to
make up for it all and start fresh with Nico. Forget about her, she's gone, and
God has given you a new life with your baby and a new..." Luzia paused
unsure of how to title Filipe...."A new friend." She gulped.
Aliceanna smirked and looked into the kitchen
from the shadowy doorway of the baby's tiny room. She could
see José and Filipe sitting in the kitchen drinking small glasses of
wine from José's personal cellar shaking their heads at what an
atrocious last two days they all just had.
"The worst is
over." José said lifting his cup of ruby colored wine.
"Vamos la! Um brinde!" Luzia
said, ordering a toast to their new found freedom from Gabriela. She handed
Aliceanna a small glass, filled it to the top "You need this more than
us!"
"To Aliceanna, and the baby, and
...." José paused.
"And what?" Luzia asked frustrated
with her husband's confusion on something so simple.
"And...." he didn't know what else to
say.
Luzia sighed and rolled her eyes. "And new
friends!"
The four clinked their little glasses of wine,
drank and in celebration.
Luzia brought over from the small stove a large
pot of pork-meat and tomato broth stew with shrimp and clams. The dipped
healthy slices of thick white-corn mean corn bread in the broth then savored
all of the fruits the sea had given them. It was a meal fit for royalty but
made it into their own stomachs, fulfilling and loving, and perfect.
After a few hours of talking and eating and
laughing and drinking and card playing and eating some more, Luzia
and José decided it was time to leave and Filipe too needed to head
back in the hills to heard the sheep. He had been away for almost 3 days.
"The sheep must think I abandoned them". He joked.
"The sheep must think I abandoned them". He joked.
"It's late, you could just rest here."
Aliceanna said.
"Are you sure?" He asked.
"You can have the bed, I'll stay in the
room Odette was in. Its fine. You need a good night's sleep if you're going to
be up in the hills tomorrow." Aliceanna said already
grabbing fresh linens from the cabinet.
Filipe smiled and thanked her. They looked at
each other for a second and walked closer. They stood in the small entry way to the
room where he'd sleep, the fresh sheets between them folded perfectly into a
square.
He reached down, his hand gripped her chin and
lifted her face to his. Her eyes closed and their lips touched just as a giant
wave crashed against the rocks outside sending a shock wave into the house.
They laughed and quickly regrouped, like two
teenagers kissing for the first time.
"I'll make up your bed." she said.
"I can help."
The hours went by and they both lay on the made
bed talking and giggling. They had known each other for such a short time, a
month and some weeks. They went over his favorite foods,
her favorite color, his favorite part of the day, her favorite song, all of the
conversation and talking soon lulled them away to a place only their dreams
understood. They fell asleep, together and let the waves outside talk for them
as the oil lamp burning on the bureau in front of them continued to glow its
orange glimmer of light watching over like a lighthouse guiding them to sleep.
It was late, three in the morning. The
clocks ticked away inside Aliceanna's house. The oil lamp still burned in the
room. Out of the shadowy star filled night, beneath the gloss of a full
moon, a cloaked figure appeared at the back door of Aliceanna's home. The
person turned the small door knob and entered the house. They passed the room
where Nico was sleeping and gazed in, then passed down into the room where
Filipe and Aliceanna had fallen asleep.
The hood of the cloak quickly dropped revealing an angry cold stare at the
site of two on the bed, innocently, together
The angry cold face face of Gabriela Duarte.
She had gotten off the ship in a humiliated and
rage filled rant. She had berated Father Silva for allowing Aliceanna to have
left the Doctor's care, she had refused to leave the island of Pico without her
grandson who she saw was in immanent danger living with his mother that Gabriela
saw as unfit.
Father Silva, embarrassed himself at how it all had transpired, agreed to lodge Gabriela in the convent in São Roque until the next ship left for Lisbon and until she was able to take Nico with her.
Father Silva, embarrassed himself at how it all had transpired, agreed to lodge Gabriela in the convent in São Roque until the next ship left for Lisbon and until she was able to take Nico with her.
Her eyes looked red as fire, her lips were thin
and angry. Her heart was racing her mind was about to explode. She wanted
Aliceanna to vanish from her life, she wanted this man, this Filipe the
shepherd to vanish her. She wanted nothing but hell on earth for the woman she
blamed for taking her son and leaving him here on the island she saw as retched
and poor.
Gabriela quietly paced back and forth in the bedroom. She wanted to take Nico in the night
but leaving Aliceanna unscathed and unpunished for what she had done was unthinkable.
Gabriela quietly paced back and forth in the bedroom. She wanted to take Nico in the night
but leaving Aliceanna unscathed and unpunished for what she had done was unthinkable.
Then, as Gabriela turned to pace one more time,
she saw the glowing oil lamp sitting on the oak bureau. She went over to it and
picked it up, she turned it over and poured the oil all over the wooden floor
placed the lamp down with it's wick quickly catching flame.
A fire quickly lit and began to burn. The flames
latched on to everything that was wooden and cloth like leaches to skin. In
seconds, the entire room was on fire and Gabriela was no where to be seen
leaving Aliceanna and Filipe do die in a fire like hellscape of her own
making.
PART 8
The flames and smoke were filling the room
quickly. Within minutes Filipe awoke gasping for air. He instantly saw the
flames and shook Aliceanna awake. She jolted awake and screamed. He grabbed her
hand and pulled her over the bed that that caught flame just as she jumped off
of it.
"Nico! WE HAVE TO GET NICO!" She
screamed.
"Go outside! Go! I'll get the baby! GO OUT
SIDE!" Filipe screamed at Aliceanna who refused to leave the home without
her baby.
"I won't leave him!" She screamed, the
fire began to intensify and part of the ceiling began to cave.
Filipe quickly grabbed her hand and
forcefully pulled her towards the front door where José was already
trying to break the door down as Luzia was screaming in a panic on the street
below.
"Take her!" Filipe said shoving
Aliceanna into José's arms.
"Nico! Please! NICO!" Aliceanna said,
her voice echoing in the street like a wounded animal as Luzia
attempted to comfort her as best she could.
As Aliceanna's screams and the smell of the
burning house awoke neighbors, they quickly came from their houses and began to
pour as much water from buckets as they could attempting to quench the fire's
rage. But the fire, was as strong as Gabriela's hate and angry.
Inside, a thick black blanket of engulfed every
corner of the house. Filipe snatched a blanket from one of the chairs in the
living room and covered his face. He kept pushing through the heat and smoke
until he reached the baby's room. He came in, the smoke filling the room only
to find the baby's bed empty.
In a panic, and confusion he quickly lunged for
the door. The front entrance and main bedroom were now blocked by a fallen beam
from the roof that was on fire. He dashed over to the back entrance where
Gabriela was standing with the baby. Their eyes met. She looked panicked.
Her cloak had caught fire in the rush to escape,
Filipe had caught her trying to leave at the same time as she was trying to put
the fire on her coat out.
"STOP!" He screamed.
She continued to pull at her coat with the baby
screaming on her hip. The smoke was coming now fast, the house was getting
hotter and the wooden frame was about to collapse. There was creaking
and groaning in the ceiling from the wooden panels ready to give
up their long stay above, the wood floors were beginning to give way and fall
into the first floor store rooms below.
Filipe had no time left, he lunged forward and
pulled the baby out of Gabriela's arms with such force he knocked her to the
floor. He grabbed the burning hot door knob of the back door and bounced out
like one of his sheep leaping over a down wooden fence up in the lush hills he
loved so much.
As the house began to collapse from the
ceiling down, Filipe and Nico came from around the back of the house,
three of Aliceanna's chicken's following right behind and rushing around the
street in their own panic.
Aliceanna grabbed her son and kissed his smoke
singed face, he was unharmed, Filipe had small burns on his hands. As the
neighbors and José attempted to put the fire, the entire roof caved in and
fell inward smashing the entire house with only the stone outer
structure remaining.The volcanic stones of the house's outer frame now
returning to their molten nativity of hot embers and red hot fire.
"Santa Maria...she's still
inside." Filipe said softly, his face blackened with smoke.
"Who?" Luzia
asked wiping his face while Aliceanna cleaned the baby's.
Filipe didn't know what to say. It was all so
surreal for him to have even caught her in the act. Would it better for
Aliceanna to never know her mother-in-law quiet possibly set the fire to kill
her and take her baby? Would it bring Aliceanna any more peace knowing that
Gabriela had perished in the flames.
"Never-mind, nothing, I didn't say anything."
Filipe said, his mind going blank as he stared into the fire.
Luzia, her mind sharp as
a tack knew there was something much more going on than meets the eye. She
looked at Filipe with a look of suspicion, but allowed him to keep his small
secret. Whatever it might have been.
As dawn broke, the house
smoldered in a black and purple heap of ash. Filipe had gone up to the hills to
take care of his sheep, leaving Aliceanna to stare down onto the house she had
loved from the atop the staircase that once lead to her front door. Now it was just a stone framed building, it's wooden innards
eaten away by hungry flames. The home she had built with her late husband
was gone in a matter of moments. All she could do was cry, and hope for
some kind of sign from god that it was all his doing, that somehow this was all
part of his plan for her.
"Toma."
Luzia said, handing Aliceanna a mug of coffee.
"It's all gone.
Everything. I can't believe how it's all gone, so quickly. What am I going to
do? What are Nico and I going to do now?" She said, her eyes filled with
grief.
"You and the baby
are our family, you can stay with us for as long as you need, Aliceanna, you
know that." Luzia said.
"But not
forever."
"For as long as you
need." Luzia reiterated.
Aliceanna looked down at
her former home. To her, still ignorant of the true source of the fire, it felt like a full circle feeling. The end of one part of her life
and the beginning of another. The volcanic island
that gave these villages life had forcibly taken back something it wanted without mercy and the only way it knew how, in a fiery heap
As Aliceanna went into a
small side room where Luzia and José had set up a bed for her and the baby, José took Luzia aside in the
kitchen as she prepared a small lunch before he went out fishing.
"I have to tell you
something, but I don't know how you're going to take it." José said in a whisper.
"What is
it?"
His wife's louder tone in voice caused him to squint in discomfort as he was attempting to be discrete. "Keep your voice
down, I don't want Aliceanna to hear!"
She shrugged and egged him on to tell her more.
"It's about the fire. Before Filipe left to watch his flock, he told me what happened. When the fire woke him up and he got Aliceanna out he went back in for the baby." José recounted.
She shrugged and egged him on to tell her more.
"It's about the fire. Before Filipe left to watch his flock, he told me what happened. When the fire woke him up and he got Aliceanna out he went back in for the baby." José recounted.
"Yes, I
know."
"What he found was
Gabriela in the house trying to escape with Nico." José continued.
Luzia gasped. "But
she never came out, and Nico did."
José nodded his head as his wife put two-and-two together. The
horror of the cruel woman's death was no consolation. It was a horrible way to
die no matter how awful the person may have been.
Luzia covered her mouth
in shock, forcing herself to keep the shock of the news from making her make
any sound. She grabbed a small dish rag and dabbed her eyes as José held her close.
"We have to tell
her. I can't keep this from her, I won't be able to look her in the face if I
know how Gabriela died and she doesn't. She can't hear this from anyone
else." Luzia said as José agreed.
"They're coming for
her body soon, we should tell her now and make sure she stays inside when they
come." he added.
Luzia slowly made her
way into the room where Aliceanna was with Nico. She sat down on the small bed,
the crunch of the corn husk mattress filling the silent room. Aliceanna could
see Luzia had been crying.
Luzia slowly and calmly
broke the news and told her what Filipe had told José . It was as if someone
was holding Aliceanna's head underwater and the sounds that came out of Luzia's
mouth were just muffled and hard to hear. But Aliceanna did not cry, not
because she didn't mourn Gabriela's life but because it was as if her eyes had
no tears left.
She sat there and held
Luzia's hand tightly, she didn't want to let go. She couldn't let go. She just
held on and hoped that that in any moment everything would change and it would
all go away and that the sun would come and thaw the hard cold truth of her own
reality.
And then it did.
"Are you ok?"
Filipe said from the door way.
Aliceanna smirked and
saw his warm tan face, his big brown eyes with specs of gold, that to her made
her feel safe, and most of all, made her feel at home again.
Luzia smiled and left
them alone in the room with the baby.
The two just held each
other for what seemed like forever.
PART
9
The sound of laughter
and accordions and trumpets blared through the sky at the final festival summer
on the island of Pico wound down. Children ran up and down the busy streets as
the music filled the windows of every house of the village. There were dancers
in the center of the town with their thick woolen socks and black shoes tapping
away the to the beat of a woman's voice; the female dancers in their colorful
red and green dresses swirled and turned with their arms up in the air spinning
like the little tops a group of boys were playing with on the limestone mosaic
side walk in the shape of a pirate ship and anchor.
It was now 4 months
after a fire that tore through the lives of Filipe, Aliceanna and Nico. Fall
would soon began and with this change in season, another big change was to
come. Aliceanna and Filipe were now married. A neighboring Priest who had heard
their story and wanted them to live the best life they could and took it upon
himself and married the two.
They were happy.
They were happy.
But what made them even
more happy was their little family's new adventure. This festival was not just
a festival for the whole town and island but also it was a way for Luzia
and José to say goodbye.
Aliceanna and Filipe
were taking their boy Nico and immigrating to the new world: America.
"I've heard so much
about that place. They say the streets are made of gold!" José said sipping on a mug at
the local tavern in the village as the music from the street filled the bar.
"Oh please! Don't
tell such lies! The streets cannot be made of gold, I had a cousin who
immigrated there and she said the streets were as dirt as ours, but there's
more room to grow things. She and her family have a large dairy somewhere in
this place call New Hampshire. I don't know what its all about but the streets
are not made of gold." Luzia explained.
"Does your cousin
like it there?" Filipe asked.
Luzia couldn't bare to
tell them the truth about what her cousin had told her in a letter. About how difficult
life was there, how harsh the winters in that part of America were and how
people around them, the Americans, at times were cruel and insulting to
foreigners. In her mind, Aliceanna And Filipe could stand to live in a small
happy fantasy even if it were for a little while.
"They love
it." She said with a forced grin. "But...." She continued, knowing she
could never lead a person off a cliff "they work very hard.
Sometimes harder than here. Life isn't always what we dream it to be."
"Well I can't wait
to start over. I can't wait to get away from here and have a new
beginning." Filipe said.
"What about you Alice? Are you excited too? It's literally a whole new life for you." Luzia asked sipping her drink, her voice loud to compensate for the noise in the bar.
Aliceanna smiled and
thought of everything that she had been through. She thought of losing her
husband, and the terrible life her Mother-in-law would have given her had she
lived and had she never met Filipe. She thought of the fire, and almost losing
Nico--twice, she thought of the night she spent in the mental hospital where
she could have been locked away for any amount of time.
"I don't think I have even been ready and more excited and scared of anything in my whole entire life!" She laughed, her smile big and bright.
Luzia laughed, the two of
them both feeling the small glasses of wine they had earlier and began to sing
a song together. A song about a bird trapped in a tree because of a
powerful wind storm. Then José jumped in to sing the chorus about
how the bird, finally strong enough and brave enough, jumped from the safety of
the three and flew on to find a world of beauty and majesty above the island of
Pico along with the other birds.
Pico Island. Its a place
so green, so beautiful and serene you'd never beleive it were a real place if you hadn't seen it with your own eyes. Beneath it's hardened
shell of volcanic stone lies the soft lush greenery, the magic, that your eyes
cannot escape. Aliceanna was a lot like the island herself; through their rough exteriors and everything they had been through in their own lifetimes.
From the ash new life always blooms.
From the ash new life always blooms.
In the island's case, new life is its green grass and white and blue hydrangeas, miles and miles of grape vines
and passion fruit and orange tree orchards. In Aliceanna's case, a new adventure; a
new world and freedom from the ghosts that kept her in what she now saw as
safety from the powerful windstorms of life.
The ship that Aliceanna,
Nico and Filipe boarded to take them on this new journey was ironically
named O Destino-- The Destiny. Leaving the island she had always
known as home was Aliceanna's destiny, along with so many other immigrants who were on this journey to American from the islands.
This new little family,
stood on the deck of the ship waving to their loved ones below. Waving
furiously, so hard that their arms felt sore afterwords. They wanted to make
sure everyone that saw them on that deck knew they would miss them and that
they loved them. There were tears.
There were sobs. There were painful thoughts that this was the last time they'd
all see their beloved homeland and families again. In Truth, they were probably right.
Aliceanna watched with watery eyes as the
Island got smaller and smaller in the distance. The mountain peak that gave the
island it's name stood tall in the distance above all the clouds as if it
wanted to reach the top of the globe and see the ship safely to America. She wished for so many things on that last glimpse of her island home, but the
truth was she was already so much luckier than she had even known. She had her
son, and a man that wanted to protect and love her all the days of his life.
Inside, unique feeling crept up into her heart...the feeling of Saudade. Every Portuguese feels in their lifetime when they say goodbye to someone or
something they love and keep so dear in their hearts. In Aliceanna's case José, Luzia and her little island that meant so much to her.
The island that gave
life and took life away.
The island that from a distance was the color of ash.
The island that from a distance was the color of ash.
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