Going to the Davilas’ house was difficult, not only because of the distance and the arrangements I had to make to get there but because my aunt disapproved. The first time she learned I had visited the Davilas, she summoned me to her office. Señora Rosario informed me that I was to appear immediately. It was as if she was bringing me a court subpoena. Edward was already away at college, but that didn’t matter. I hadn’t told either him or Jesse about my visits with the Davila family. I did not know how my aunt had found out. It gave me pause to think she might be having me watched, even followed, perhaps for other reasons. After all, I had been shoved down her throat, so to speak, and mi tía Isabela was never one to be told what to do. That I knew from what my family back in Mexico had told me of her.
She made me stand in front of her in her office for a good thirty seconds while she shuffled papers.
“First,” she began, lifting her eyes toward me and focusing sharply, like a sniper taking sight of his target, “I would have thought you would want to widen your relationships and take advantage of the opportunity to know young people from substantial families.”
“Substantial?”
“Rich, well-off, people with status, authority, people who could do you some good,” she rattled off. “Don’t pretend not to understand me, Delia Yebarra. I know you better than anyone else knows you, even Edward, and I know you’re not stupid, so don’t pretend.”
“I’m not pretending anything. I just wanted to be sure I understood,” I said softly.
She glared at me a moment and then took a deep breath before continuing.
Forgive me, Grandmother, I thought, but I do enjoy frustrating her.
“Second, this boy you knew from this family was a felon and would have gone to prison. He was selfish and foolish to take you along on a very dangerous desert crossing, and yet now I learn you still remain friendly with his family. Why?”
“They have suffered.”
“So has Rod Whitfield. And so has your cousin!” she added, widening her eyes.
I knew that Tía Isabela would blame me for Edward’s loss of his eye forever, even if Edward did not. On more than one occasion, she had suggested that I should have kept what Bradley had done to me to myself, swallowed it back and forgotten about it, just like that, like snapping your fingers, and poof, it never happened. She could do that with unhappy events, disappointments. She had steel skin and an iron heart. She told me that if I had kept what Bradley had done to me locked away, Edward would have both eyes, and the Mexican boys would not be in prison.
“And one wouldn’t be dead and food for buzzards,” she added, believing, as did everyone else, that Ignacio was dead. Maybe she was right. I did feel some responsibility for it all, even though I was a classic victim.
“Continuing any relationship with these Mexicans, especially now, can come to no good. I forbid it!” she told me.
I just stared at her.
“Did you hear me?”
I turned away and looked out the window at the clouds, which seemed to be reaching for each other. It was as if the sky were in sympathy with me, with my longing to reach out to Ignacio and feel his hand in mine.
“Do you understand me?” she demanded.
I did not respond. I went to that wall of silence so familiar in this house, that wall that fell so often between everyone in it. In this hacienda, it was safer to be deaf and dumb and even blind.
“I’m warning you. I won’t stand for it,” she threatened. “Don’t you ever even think about bringing any of those people here!”
I smiled.
“What are you laughing at?”
“Would you even know if one of them came, Tía Isabela? In your eyes now, all Mexicans look the same.”
For a moment, she looked as if her face would bu
rst.
“You insolent…get out of here. You’ll make your own disasters, I know. You won’t need me to help,” she said, nodding. Suddenly, she waved her right forefinger at me, her entire demeanor changing. “El pez que busca anzuelo busca su duelo,” she recited. I was certain it had been recited at her so many times when she was younger that it was embedded in her brain. A fish that looks for the hook is halfway cooked, a lesson her father had tried desperately to teach her.
Her returning to her Mexican roots, even for a split second in anger, brought a gleeful smile to my face. Perhaps she hated me most because I reminded her of who she had been and who she still was. The moment the Spanish words came from her lips, she slammed them shut and turned away, angry at me but shocked at herself as well.
“Thank you for worrying about me,” I said and left.
She never spoke of the Davilas again, but I had no doubt that she would be infuriated if she knew I continued to defy her and visited them many times after her lecture. She did complain to Edward.
“If you feel comfortable with the Davilas and feel you should visit them, that’s fine,” he said. “But it’s better my mother does not know. I have made her swallow as much as I can, but always be careful. She’ll always be looking for something she can use against you, Delia. Try not to give her any other opportunities. She’ll pounce on you.”