THE MIRACLE
By Ben Crisp and Rose Flores
The
coffee was still too hot, so I cradled the foam cup between my knees and lit my
last cigarette.
My last ever, I promised
myself, as I had done the day before.
The park was mostly
empty. The sun had not yet crept above
the horizon, to burn the dirty greyness from the dawn sky, and it would be at
least an hour before the rest of the city left the their homes to brave another
miserable taglamig day outside.
There had been reports of
another journalist shot in Manila. I had
long grown used to such news, acknowledging it with a kind of postured
indifference that my ex-girlfriend had found no comfort in. It didn’t matter to her that I was relegated
to the smallest sections of the sports pages; I was white, and besides, could
not an outraged sports fan be just as violent as a vengeful gangster or
deranged terrorist? She was probably
right. Still, I found comfort in my own
sense of insignificance. Speaking barely
a word of Filipino, and – some had argued – only just enough English to get by,
I would never rise to the ranks of martyrdom like my braver, more talented
brethren. I may have been white, but with
no money, no connections and no friends I was worth nothing to anyone.
A familiar figure
appeared from behind the trees that formed the arched entrance to the
park. She always wore yellow dresses, or
perhaps the same yellow dress, that danced beneath her knees. She was pretty, or at least she gave an
impression of prettiness from across a distance too far to know for sure. She meandered, indecisive, between the
benches scattered beneath pines that brushed the air in the morning breeze,
before choosing the one she always chose.
It faced the statue of
the Madonna that stood upon a plinth in the centre of a small pond. It was a simple carving, as they all were;
achieving no greatness in aesthetic or skill.
The virgin’s head tilted to one side, serenely, eyes opened wide and her
hands stretched out in blessing - not, as it had always appeared to me,
shrugging as if to say: what?
To the pinay in her
yellow dress she was captivating. She
sat before the statue, alternating between long, lingering stares and moments
with head bowed, eyes closed, I guessed, though I was too far away to know.
I sipped my coffee and
watched her watching the Madonna, killing time as I waited for my day to begin.
There
was no place to go, but here.
I was raging as always, to imperfections. As such, at
least, be perfect in front of this holy woman.
Something stirred into my memory, while I uttered
chants I couldn’t even understand. So, this holy woman people called
their mother, and the Catholics believed to be the mother of Christ, had always
stunned me. No, she did not stun me like ghosts scared, but her
benevolence scared my sins and inspired me to hope. At least, in this
way, I could re-organize my undecided life.
At least, I’d be prim in front of her, confident in
front of her; complete. Apart from my whoring affairs to get money, I
wished some guy would come back for me, as my yellow dress meant waiting.
In a few weeks, my boyfriend, a married man, would
decide whether to marry me and annul their marriage, or leave me for his
wife. Of all the men in my life, I just got into material quests so I
could sustain my falling business, but this married man was different because
he thrilled my every need, other than desire.
We’ve been on and off this love affair for two years
now, and I could see how he craved for my being, because of his maid wife. “My
wife compared to your diplomas is only good for a housekeeper,” he told me.
And so, I summoned him. “You must choose between
me and your wife.” In a few weeks, I hoped, he’d be back to cuddle me and
present me a diamond engagement ring.
A yellow dress would be good to wear all the
time! I’d go for this good luck hype.
“Oh, would you always come back for me,
Madonna?”
In my thoughts I chanted, “My boy friend would come
back for me; heaven might let the maid wife curse me, but what can I do?
I have to steal something to love me, or else I won’t stop whoring. Who
would come back for me? Maybe, a thousand other men, to prance on my neck
and mark it ‘Hey, I’ve got your ass, too.” Will I be punished for
ruining a sacred matrimony or stealing a father?
In this place, was something more real and
tender. “Love me tender, love me sweet… Oh, my love complete,” I
hummed. After my love affairs, here was the only concrete and beautiful
thing.
Across the benches, of this, which I called a
sanctuary, were a few others who breathed solace like me. Perhaps.
One could be on a fitness program, another read a newspaper, and still another
guy, sipped his brew. This guy, sipping his brew, could be thinking nuts
like me. Or could he be thanking the magnificence of another day, while
he looked up the sky, bowed low for his cup, and darted again, in front this
Madonna?
Or would he look at me, too? His gaze was
flaming hot. For what thoughts, he could have sensed my urgent pleading
to this holy statue, sublime in simplicity and honesty. “Well, we’re
flesh and bones, but if for moments, we could be holy,” an old priest said that
during the mass I had attended when I was younger, so once in a lifetime I had been
serious in the temples; so once pure, I was, before I came into this
labyrinth. Would my pleadings echo around?
I caught him looking into nothingness, unconscious
maybe, when he glanced into my space and my confused efforts. That time,
when he raised his cup, swallowed and sipped again, I thought he was a handsome
bum.
It
must be nice, I thought, to have some sort of certainty in life.
To be able to look to a
faith to guide you when reality – that deluge of chaos that tears at the flesh
and soul – is inescapable. Or maybe she
just liked the statue.
More people began to
trickle into the park. The illusion that
this was my place began to fade, like it always did, as the sun drew long
shadows on the ground; soon it would be time for work. Once I had enjoyed the anonymity of living in
a big foreign city. Now, I feared,
solitude was decaying into loneliness and I felt myself disappearing into the
crowds that lined the streets each day.
She finished or paused
whatever thoughts had held her and stood up to leave, as though in a sudden
hurry.
Was this my life? Watching others from outside a window like a
child at a pet store?
It took a moment for me
to notice the sliver of yellow beneath the bench. Curious, I stood and walked slowly across the
park to the space in the front of the statue.
The impassive Madonna did not turn to look at me as I entered her periphery,
and when I stooped to inspect I saw it was a silk summer scarf that had fallen
from the bench; that same canary hue of the woman’s dress.
She was already at the
end of the park, turning left out of the gates without looking back. The scarf in one hand, my other reached into its
pocket to retrieve my phone.
come
dwn sick. mybe flu. srry. tlk
2morrow.
I had taken three sick
days in four years. Whatever else that
devotion to such a badly paying job might be called, I reasoned, it wasn’t the
symptom of a well man.
I quickened my pace not
quite to a jog and scanned the streets when I reached the gates. For a moment I thought I had lost her until I
spied a flash of yellow amidst a crowd of pedestrians moving across an
intersection two blocks down. The
traffic closed after them like parted waters and I waited, tense.
Overloaded trucks and
bikes whined past at high speed in the dangerous dance of weaving engines that only
the Filipinos can survive. A group of wiry
children aligned at the curb next to me, chattering like squirrels, watching
the road with unblinking eyes and gesturing to each other with their hands. They were preparing to cross. I watched them watching the cars, and when
they darted out I sucked in a breath and ran with them.
Horns blared all around
me, and I felt the thundering slabs of steel rush by close enough to feel the
heat from their choking and spluttering motors, but after a few terrifying
moments we were across safely – the children giggling and pointing at the
idiotic white man.
The woman had vanished
from sight, and I spent a few moments striding between street corners, standing
on the tips of my toes as I scanned the faceless crowds for her. Then the yellow dress peeked out through gaps
in the crowd ahead of me, and I moved again in her direction, pushing my way
past the suits and the sneakers and the cell phones and sunglasses.
I followed her to a
street lined with townhouses – the angular, rendered townhouses for people with
the money to pay others to choose their tastes for them. I had gained enough ground now to call out to
her from the other side of the street, but I caught myself when she stopped in
front of a high stone wall to push the button on an intercom panel.
She spoke for only a
moment and waited for a response, then the courtyard door must have been
unlatched from within because she pushed it open quickly and stepped inside.
I was alone, on that lush
and empty street, the scarf still wrapped in my hands.
THE MIRACLE
Final Round
The Miracle
by Ben Crisp and Rose Flores
“Yes,”
I said, gesturing pointlessly down the street as I crossed to her. “I…
you left it at the park.”
“Thank
you,” she said, reaching out a hand to take it. She brushed a loose
strand of hair back and squinted at me. “I have no money, sorry.
But thank you.”
“No,
you don’t… I didn’t want a reward. Are you alright? You look
upset.”
She
turned away, and I wondered how I could be so direct to this perfect stranger.
“I’m
sorry,” I said. “I’m inquisitive.”
“OK,Yankee
Steve. I have to go now,” she said, and started to walk.A stupid, mad
chuckle escaped my mouth and I caught it quickly in my hand as I chased after
her.
“No,
not… it means I’m nosy. I’m curious, sorry. Like a cat, you know.”
She
stopped and squinted at me again, as though wondering whether to smile at this
insane white man or not. Then she pointed at my nose. “Curiosity
kills the cats.”
“Yes
it does,” I said, nodding. “Do you want a coffee?”
She
turned and started walking again. “If I had money I would give it to you,
but thank you for bringing my scarf.”
I
chased after her. “No! No, it’s nothing to do with… I want nothing
from you. I just thought you looked like you could use a coffee.”
Her
squinting tortured me. I had no clue what was going on behind those stern
brown eyes, and not knowing this little thing was vanishing all that I did
know; every instinct was fading from me.
“I’m
a journalist, I’m not…” I said helplessly, and shrugged. Not what?
She
shrugged back.
“Your
boyfriend’s house?” I asked as we sat at a table beneath a red canvas umbrella.
“Why
do you think that?”
“The
locket.” I pointed at the little golden heart turning restlessly between
her thumb and forefinger. She snapped it into her palm defiantly.
“The
scarf is from my boyfriend,” she said, pulling it from her neck and resting it
on the table as our coffees arrived.
I
tore open a sugar packet and tapped it into my cup. “I’ll bet you chose
it. It matches your dress.”
She
checked her phone and did not answer me. I was right.
“You
drink too much coffee,” she said at last, after she had sighed and tucked her
phone away again. “Caffeine is bad for the heart.”
I
shrugged again. “Everything is bad for the heart these days.”
We
sipped from our cups and ventured into the silence that filled the air around us.
Empty, silent air; it choked me more than smoke. Was that why my fingers
reached for last cigarette after last cigarette after last cigarette?
“May
I see?” I said, and held out my palm.
She
stared at me through steam rising from her coffee, a cradle of warmth between
her two soft hands; then lowered the cup, unfolding her fingers to proffer the
locket.
It
was of the yellow gold I had never admired, adorned with rubies that might have
been real, or might have not; and not knowing made them seem worthless. A
tiny clasp unhinged its two halves, splitting the fragile little heart in two,
revealing a miniature biscuit-tin print of the veiled Madonna.
“Lucky
charm?” I asked.
“She
is pure. Perfect. Everything else is dirty in the morning.”
“Nothing’s
quite as pretty as Mary in the morning,” I sang in my best Elvis voice, but she
did not smile. A digital chirrup sounded beneath the table, and she withdrew
her phone swiftly, reading the message with that same familiar squint.
“Boyfriend?”
I asked.
She
reached out and took the locket back, standing as she did so.
“I
have to go. Now.”
Her
voice had a tiny tinge of urgency to it. I stood too.
“Thank
you for the coffee,” she said as she started to walk away.
I
was about to remind her that I hadn’t actually offered to pay for her drink,
but changed my mind and dropped a handful of coins on the table instead,
following her.
“Your
scarf,” I said, offering it to her. She snatched it from me with a little
noise of annoyance – at herself or at me I was not sure. “It’s Michael,
by the way.”
“Violeta,”
she said.
She
began to murmur underneath her breath as she quickened her pace. I was
almost jogging just to keep up with her, my hands in my pockets as though we
were just two friends in a mutual hurry. She was praying, I realised;
every other word of the rosary filtered from her lips through the noise of the
traffic – into which she suddenly stepped, waving her hand at a Corolla with
barely readable taxicab printing that skidded to a halt beside her.
“Where
are you going?” I asked.
She
glanced at me like an impatient schoolteacher as she grabbed at the door.
“Hospital,”
she said.
“Then Michael hop
in! Or would you leave now?” So we boarded the Corolla.
I didn’t know what this
guy wanted from me, but I didn’t care less because my thoughts were
horrible. I knew something would happen, and whatever fate again would
present to me – as to my friend Hannibal’s wisdom was to be happy and
free. I assured myself that what could happen to my boyfriend was
reality, like the shifting of clouds – we just couldn’t stop their movements,
only God can. The next thing I felt our hands were tightly locked, and
Michael’s gaze trying to seize my brokenness.
“Is there something I can do?” he asked.
“Nothing. Thank you.”
Lane upon lane, track upon track; my mind whizzed the clouds, the nothingness,
the coldness of my fright, the fallen hopes, the waiting, my single life of
faith. At this time, the locket...
“Don’t
worry. We’ll get there.” Michael asserted.
And then, in my bag the phone buzzed again. I grasped the phone firmly,
but my hands were weak so the phone dropped down the cab floor. Michael
got it and read the message.
I did not mind his resolve. The driver was silent with only the twist of
his wheels. The air was cold and my heart pounded heavily like rocks on
my chest breaking for mercy. “Oh, Maria!”
Silence in the cab, in the air, near the afternoon... Michael didn’t say
any word, but searched the locket for me and put them in my hands. He
held me close and I did not resist the comfort of his arms around my bereft
shoulders that needed warmth and flesh.
“We’d
go to the back office of the hospital, Violeta. The staff will give us
instructions...”
I
paid the driver as she sprang from the taxi.
My only thought during the ride was that I could not remember the last time I
had hugged someone out of the simple instinct to comfort; when had the act of
touch become so foreign?
Please hurry.
That’s all the second text had said.So
whatever disaster had befallen him had not restricted his use of a phone.
I hated myself for the unkind thought. Had my ex looked as Violeta
looked, whenever I had told her I was ill?
The nurse at the back office desk glanced at the clipboard hanging by her
side. Emergency. Bay 212. Violeta hurried ahead and I followed,
helplessly, at a distance. I thrust my hands into my pockets and peered
through the gridded windows on the doors as we walked the length of the
corridor, my lungs filling with the smell of disinfectant. The figures in
the beds looked so small and vulnerable. As Violeta stopped ahead of me I
realised they were children. The realisation shook in me, and my fingers
closed around something in my pocket. The familiar scratch of a paper
curl on skin. A forgotten cigarette.
I stood behind her. Through the window in front of us I saw a dimly lit
room. A woman leaned forward in a chair, her back to us. Her hands
were clasped around the hand of a boy who lay motionless in the hospital
bed. From where I stood I could see his eyes were not quite closed, fine
red lines crossing his face around them. Machines surrounded him, their
cables disappearing under his sheet, electric green and blue lights winking and
flickering softly.
Across the bed from the woman stood her husband. I recognised him.
I had seen his face in newspapers; a politician, maybe. He was short,
dressed in a dark business suit. His hands were deep in his pockets and
he stood, slumped, staring at the boy with a strange look on his face. It
was the look of a man for whom the curtain of life had been pulled aside, and
he saw nothing behind it.
His glassy eyes drifted from the boy across the room to the door. He saw
Violeta. He saw me. I glanced at Violeta, her eyes now
welling. Across the space, through the glass, the two of them were
sharing a look filled with all the sadness, the sweetness, the tenderness and
heartache that I had ever known love to be about. It was then I felt
alone, as the lonely will do, rain soaked neighbour to the world of the
loved. A world for those who felt the warmth of others even when parted,
and who felt another’s pain.
I felt pain. I felt Violeta’s, as she felt her lover’s, as she felt and
he felt the pain of his son, and the mother did too, and I; all of us there in
the chapel of pain, Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Hospital.
He looked to his wife, and Violeta turned from the window, her hands to her
mouth, eyes searching for some solace in mine. I curled an arm around her
shoulder and walked her to the stairwell at the end of the ward. As we
rose, step by step, I heard the rooftop doorway humming a mellow chant between
the cold conditioned inside air and the free and humid day outside.
On the roof we stood and stared, listening together as the yellow scarf
fluttered in morning eddies, and I saw… I saw, across the avenue, beyond the
cries and howls and mirth of the city streets, through a border of bricks and
bolts and steel, perched on a plinth in the centre of a pond, the concrete
Madonna.
Perhaps love was not pure, but stained. Perhaps love was not harmony, but
discord. Perhaps love came in all the shades of earth and grime, and in
the moist and dirty breath of the taglamig air that brushed our faces on
mornings such as this.
Violeta prayed in silence beside me, and I lit my last cigarette.
My last ever, I promised myself, as I had done the day before.
posted
by rosevoc2
Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest
