The Lemon Orchard Read online

  His grandmother would try to soothe him but nothing worked. The cerveza had power over him and eventually the old man would nod off at the table and the family would carry him off to bed. After everyone cleaned up, the aunts would go home. His grandmother would say good night and go to her room, and Roberto and his father would sit on the couch.

  Always, there was his father’s strong arm around him, and his voice telling Roberto about the better life, and asking him about school, and work in the orchard and cornfields, and what was happening in the family. And he would tell Roberto other things, too.

  “You have strength inside,” his father would say. “No one can make you do anything.”

  “No one?” Roberto asked one time. There were many things people tried to make him do. His oldest cousin, Hernandez, was lazy, and when they were in the fields he told Roberto to do extra work while he lay in the sun or went climbing in the hills to look for hidden gold. Carlos, a boy at school, had weed and agave and was always saying he’d tell everyone Roberto was a flaco pussy if he didn’t smoke and drink with him. These pressures were hard to resist.

  “Not one person in this world,” his father said. He seemed to sense the stresses Roberto was under but didn’t ask for names or stories. “You have power, son. And you are the only one. Even I cannot tell you what to do.”

  Roberto wanted to say that wasn’t true. His father could tell him anything and he would do it. His father was darker than Roberto, and stocky. He had thick black hair and a moustache, and sometimes a beard. His eyes were black, while Roberto’s were brown, but there was no mistaking the fact they were father and son.

  When his father was home, he worked in the field and orchard like before. Roberto wanted to skip school to be with him, but his father made him go. He never told his father about Señor Tedoro, the teacher who would rip up his papers and make fun of him in front of the class because he never got his homework right. Roberto knew it was because he worked so many hours it didn’t leave enough time for study—and besides, he had no one to help him with schoolwork.

  Other kids had mothers. Even if their fathers had gone to the United States, their mothers stayed home and cared for them. Roberto couldn’t even remember his mother’s smile, or the touch of her hand, or the sound of her voice—she had died when he was born. His grandmother had never finished sixth grade; his grandfather couldn’t even write his own name, but made an “X” to sign papers.

  So they would sit there on the couch, his father telling Roberto lessons about life, with one arm around his shoulder. Then, as Roberto grew sleepy, his father would pat his chest the way he had when he was a baby, and made the sound ssh, ssh, ssh. Over and over again: ssh, ssh, ssh, until Roberto couldn’t tell the difference between his father’s voice and the sound of blood coursing through his own veins, and he would fall asleep.

  When he was twelve, and Geraldo, an older boy at school, started shoving him around, his father told him he needed to learn to fight. On that trip home, his father taught him to do push-ups, a hundred at a time, to run fast, and to climb trees. He told him the most important thing was to keep his eyes on his opponent, never look away. Move in fast, strike hard, use his speed. Never fake, never think it’s a game—if you fight, you fight to win. After a few matches, Geraldo and his friends left Roberto alone.

  Roberto didn’t like to fight, but he would if he had to. His father had taught him there were many things in life a person would rather not do. But you had to survive, and one of the ways to do that was to maintain your honor.

  Now, in the living room with La Reina del Sur filling the TV screen, Roberto looked up at Rosa’s picture and wondered, as he did every time he looked at it, why he hadn’t taken the biggest lesson from his father: leave his child in Mexico and go to America to work. Send home money, and visit when he could. Crossing the border had become much more dangerous during the years since his father had first left, and getting a green card, as his father had, was now almost impossible.

  But Roberto hadn’t been able to bear the idea of being apart from Rosa. And as beautiful as the reunions with his father had been, the long stretches of months and years in between had been unbearable. Each year his father had come home to the village wearing Polo cologne, and one time when he’d left to go back to L.A., he’d forgotten the bottle in the bathroom. Every night Roberto would open the bottle and stand there with his nose in it, just to bring back the sense of his father.

  He had wanted Rosa to have more than just a few visits, a remembered scent to help her hold on to her father. He wanted her to have him, for them to be together. In his family, for some cursed reason, all the women in his family, except for his grandmother, left.

  Adriana had run off to Mexico City, too young and wild to give up her life to be a mother to Rosa and a wife to Roberto. And Roberto’s mother had died. When his grandmother was most angry at Rosa’s mother for leaving, she blamed it on a curse put on the family by a bruja who lived in the hills high above the village.

  Nearly every day, Roberto thought he should give up life here in the States and go home. When they were kids, he and his cousins went to school and worked hard in the fields, but when they had a moment of spare time they would run into the hills and look for more gold. Sitting in his father’s dark living room, Roberto dreamed of being there now, with Rosa, finding the gold and building a good house and taking care of everyone.

  “Hey, hijo,” his father said, coming into the living room. He wore an undershirt and baggy jeans, and his face was wrinkled from the pillow. He never hugged Roberto anymore, hadn’t since he became a man. But being called “son” felt good, and Roberto stood to greet him.

  “Bien, bien, y tú, Papá?” Roberto asked.

  “Good. You’re not at work?”

  “I’m going back soon,” Roberto said. “Just came home to eat and get some things.”

  “Eat with us,” Esperanza said, putting down her knitting and going into the kitchen.

  Roberto waited for his father to sit, then followed suit. His father’s eyes were still heavy from sleep; he blinked as he used the clicker to change the channel and find something else to watch on TV. He stopped on a program about tigers on Discovery en Español. They watched the male lying in jungle shadows, his stripes making him invisible to the gazelle. Roberto glanced at his father. He would wait for the commercial before speaking.

  He looked up at Rosa’s picture. Seeing it here on the wall with the rest of the family comforted him. He saw the sparkle of her smile, her sheer exuberance bursting out of the frame, and it made him believe she was out there somewhere, just waiting for him to find her.

  What was easier, knowing or not knowing, finality or crazy hope? He thought of Julia, of what she knew about Jenny, and he realized he wouldn’t trade places with her.

  Weeks later he remembered their talk. They had sat on the front step until fog rolled in from the ocean and stars went behind the mountain. She was gringa, Americana, and Roberto’s English wasn’t perfect. But they had both lost daughters, and they understood each other. What she had for Jenny, he had for Rosa.

  He pictured her blue eyes. He had never been close to anyone with eyes that color, and he thought they were strange and perfect. He wondered what color Jenny’s eyes had been.

  He wondered if Julia had looked into his brown eyes, or glanced down at their arms, entwined around each other, and noticed how pale her skin had looked next to his. He had lived in this country for five years, and he had worked for the Rileys part of that time, but most of his time had been spent with other Mexicans, living here in Boyle Heights, working for Americans but not hanging out with them and definitely not holding them and feeling as if their hearts were speaking, as if his knew every single thing in hers. They hadn’t kissed; it wasn’t like that. After a long time they’d said good night. He’d watched until she was safe inside and waited for the porch light to go
out before he’d walked back to his cabin.

  They had kept away from each other since. For him, it was because his feelings were too strong. For her, it might have been that she felt embarrassed for opening her heart to the man who worked in her uncle’s orchard.

  The commercial came on, loud music and a woman saying Popeye’s chicken was the best. His father yawned. Roberto wanted to ask his father something. His mind was racing, but when he imagined putting the thoughts into words, he could hear his father giving him advice. Don’t make a mistake, don’t jeopardize your good job, don’t imagine that she could ever feel anything real for you.

  “What is it, son?” his father asked.

  “There is a lady staying at Casa Riley,” he said.

  “While the Rileys are in Irlanda?”

  “Sí. Their niece.”

  “What is she like?”

  “She’s very nice.”

  “Remember she probably talks to her aunt and uncle. So make sure everything in the orchard is better than ever.”

  “I will.”

  “It is a very good job,” his father said, as he always did, reminding Roberto how important it was to work—not just for him, but for the family back home. He wasn’t criticizing, just reminding.

  “The best,” Roberto said.

  “Is the niece good-looking?”

  “Beautiful,” Roberto said.

  “And rich,” his father said. “Be careful and behave yourself.”

  Roberto nodded. He knew his father was trying to protect him and his job. He would never understand what had happened between them, and Roberto wouldn’t even try to explain.

  After a while Esperanza called them into the kitchen for lunch, chicken and rice.

  They ate without saying much. At one point Roberto glanced at his father and saw him watching him. It made Roberto feel uncomfortable; his father was trying to figure out what was going on. Then they both went back to their food, while in the other room the voice on TV talked about how one single tiger killed seven gazelles in a matter of minutes.

  chapter four

  Julia

  Another week passed. It was fall, and the orchard needed a lot of tending. Julia saw Roberto working with his crew—eliminating fire hazards, cutting back brush on the hillsides, pruning low branches in the orchard, raking dry leaves and fallen bougainvillea blossoms.

  The men—Roberto, Serapio, and anywhere from two to five others—worked hard each morning, then stopped for lunch in the shade of the barn at noon. Roberto was always the first to stand, brush himself off, and walk back into the orchard. He directed the guys, but did the same hard work himself. When Julia walked Bonnie, she waved and called hello, and Roberto always waved back. But he was busy, and she didn’t want to bother him.

  Besides, her plan was evolving. She approached it the way she had her thesis: gather information from as many sources as possible, make an outline, and seek support. In this case, her support came from Jenny. Jenny had sometimes given her a hard time about going back to school, dragging her to the middle of nowhere for fieldwork one summer, but inside she had been proud, and she’d let Julia know.

  Now, sitting at her uncle’s desk, Julia pored over maps of the Sonoran Desert, remembering the hot months she and Jenny had spent there with Dr. Christopher Barton and his team. Julia could almost feel Jenny perched on the desk, urging her to find Chris online. He was still on staff at Yale, but spent most of his time in the field and was currently working on a project in Honduras. Julia emailed him, but she knew how carefully he guarded his work, how reclusive he could be, and knew not to expect a reply any day soon.

  The third week of October, Julia saw Serapio in charge of the men, so she knew Roberto had left the property. He returned early two days later, his dusty black truck pulling up to the barn, headlights soft in the predawn fog. As she watched from the kitchen window, her heart was racing. She hadn’t said a word to him about what she’d been doing, but today she felt ready.

  Once she heard the sprinklers start and saw him walking through the grove, she stepped outside and waved. Bonnie met him halfway down the path, her tail wagging.

  “Good morning,” she said.

  “Good morning. You and Bonnie are up early,” he said. It was still mostly dark, the day’s first light penetrating the fog.

  “We like early mornings,” she said. “It must have been good to be home last night.”

  “Sí,” he said.

  “Are you married?” she asked.

  “No,” he said. “I live in my father’s house. Well, in my own apartment.”

  She smiled, surprisingly happy. “Do you have time for coffee?”

  “Sí, gracias,” he said. “But . . .” He glanced at his boots, well worn and flaked with dirt and grass.

  “Oh, don’t worry,” she said. “Bonnie and I track in the whole outdoors.”

  He hesitated on the threshold for a moment; she wondered if it felt strange to him. Then he came through the door. She gestured at the kitchen table, and he took a seat as she poured coffee into blue mugs. She drank hers black, but put out cream and sugar for him.

  “You’ve seemed so busy,” she said.

  “Yes, this time of year there’s a lot to do.”

  He looked around the kitchen, seeming to take in the pictures, beams, books, and copper pans in a more leisurely way than before.

  “Don’t you come in here often?” she asked.

  “No,” he said. “Señor Riley and I usually talk in the orchard. There’s no reason for me to be in the house.”

  “I see,” she said.

  He spooned three sugars into his coffee, added cream, sipped. “Delicious,” he said, beaming. He had beautiful white teeth, but was missing one toward the back on the right side.

  “This was very nice of you,” he said. “You didn’t have to invite me.”

  “I wanted to.”

  “You’re my boss while the Rileys are gone,” he said. “You don’t have to do this.” Maybe he saw her expression change, her face fall, because he spoke quickly: “But I’m glad you did. Gracias, Julia.”

  She looked down, aware of how tenuous her plan felt. So far it had all been in her head—a way of keeping Jenny close. Madwomen behaved this way, talking to their dead children, holding them near.

  “Julia, what’s wrong?” he asked.

  “There’s something I wanted to speak to you about,” she said.

  “Okay,” he said.

  She met his gaze. Was this rude, intrusive? She’d lost perspective. “Roberto, would you tell me everything you can about Rosa and your crossing?”

  He squinted—pain and confusion in his eyes. “I told you,” he said.

  “I know,” she said. “But I want to know more.”

  “I thought . . . ,” he began.

  “Thought what?”

  “That I had upset you with what I already said. That you must have decided what kind of man I am, who would lose his daughter in the desert.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” she said.

  “How do you know?” he asked angrily.

  Julia stayed silent. She thought of Jenny and Rosa, their two lost girls, and of the study she had begun, slowly and methodically and inspired by Jenny, to search for Rosa.

  “I just know,” she said.

  “You want to hear what really happened?” he asked. “Okay. But it’s—it’s the worst thing.”

  “Roberto, I’ve already lived through the worst thing.”

  He nodded, touched her hand as if remembering Jenny.

  And then he started telling the story.

  Roberto

  MAY 2007

  Roberto and Rosa had traveled by bus from Puebla to Mexico City to Hermosillo and finally to Altar, just south
of the U.S. border from Nogales. The buses were hot and crowded and Rosa was carsick. She held her doll, Maria. Roberto’s grandmother had made it for her, sewn on angel wings, and said Maria had magical powers to protect her and her father.

  While Rosa held Maria, Roberto held Rosa on his lap, hand on her forehead, telling her stories about when he was little and he and his cousins would go searching for treasure in the hills.

  “And you found it,” she said, because this was a favorite story.

  “Well, there were a few gold coins,” he said. “We imagined that the stones were gold, too. Once we did find an old statue, small and round, an old man. My grandfather said he was a thousand years old.”

  “Why didn’t you take me looking?”

  “Always working, preciosa, and not enough time,” he said, holding her tighter. Working nearly round the clock for nothing, barely enough to feed himself and his daughter, or support his grandmother’s medical care.

  “Will it be different where we’re going?” she asked.

  “El Norte,” he said.

  He could only dream how different it would be. He’d grown up working in the fields from dawn until eight, when he went to school, then after school until dark, never enough time for homework. He was smart, and so was Rosa, but he didn’t want her to endure the same shame, never being prepared for class, falling asleep on her desk because she was so exhausted from work.

  His family and everyone in their small pueblo tended a rich man’s orchard and cornfields. As a child, Roberto and his cousins planted the seeds—his grandfather was already training Rosa to do the same thing. When they got older, they used the plow, learned to harvest, prepared shipments for market. Staring at Rosa, he knew he’d do anything to keep her from working that hard, dropping out of school at sixteen, the way he had.

  The bus chugged along, spewing carbon monoxide through the cabin. People had windows open but there was no getting away from the smells of sweat, beer, chickens, and dirty feet.

  “Papá, I feel sick,” she said.