The Hummingbird's Daughter_ A Novel - Luis Alberto Urrea [32]
Her legs were still sore and shaky, so Huila carried her to bed. Teresita had never felt sheets. She ran her hands over them, slid her legs across the delightful coolness of their whiteness. Huila pulled her chamber pot out from under the bed and said, “If you have to pee, pee in here. If you have to make caca, then go outside. I don’t want to be smelling caca all night!” She blew out the candle. “What’s left of the night,” she grumbled.
Teresita thrilled to the weight of the old woman when she lay down beside her. The bed sank and squealed. Teresita waited to see if it would break, but it did not. Huila rolled on her side. Teresita rested against her back.
“Is the pillow all right?” Huila said.
“Yes,” Teresita answered. “It’s very soft.”
“I always like a good pillow,” said Huila. Immediately thereafter, she began to snore.
Teresita lay there as if resting in a cloud.
She thought she was awake, but she was not.
This time she dreamed of a great field of blue flowers. She was barefoot. Three old men watched her from a distance. They were of the People. She recognized their nut-brown skin and their white clothes, their straw hats. One old man raised a hand and waved to her once. His voice was small—she could barely hear him. He called out a mysterious word to her: “Huitziltepec.”
He pointed.
She turned and saw a hill covered in blossoms.
She walked up the hill. Her feet hurt from the pebbles in the ground, and the path turned to a clear stream of water, and the water cooled her feet and the rocks were yellow and purple and round as eggs. She thanked the ground for its mercy.
At the summit, she discovered a white rock.
She sat.
She heard a hum above her head. She looked up: a hummingbird made of sky came down from the heavens. It was too small to be seen, yet she could see it. Its blue breast reflected the world as it descended. Its wings were white, made of writing. Although she did not have words, she recognized them. The hummingbird’s wings had been written with a quill pen.
It landed on her knee. It had its back to her. It turned to the left. When it faced her, it had a small white feather in its mouth. She knew to reach out to it. The semalú dropped the feather into her hand.
Soon, the roosters were crowing.
Teresita opened her eyes.
Huila was kneeling in prayer before a low altar built against the wall. A picture of the Virgen de Guadalupe stood on the altar, and a tall wooden crucifix. Stones, shells, a few bundles of sage and incense grass, and a paper-wasps’ nest. Small figures of Huila’s saints stood on either side of the cross. Teresita recognized Saint Francis, because he had doves on his shoulders and head. To one side of the altar stood a lone glass of water.
“Huila?” she said.
The old one held up a finger.
Teresita waited.
When Huila was through praying, she braced herself on the altar and rose.
“Yes, child?”
“What is the water for?”
“It is the soul,” Huila said. “It is the soul, cleansed of sins.”
“Is it your soul?” Teresita asked.
“I wish it were, child.” Huila stretched. “I wish it were.”
She picked up Teresita’s mud-stained smock. It looked, in this morning light, terrible and ratty and filthy. Teresita was suddenly ashamed.
“This won’t do,” said Huila.
She went out into the house. Teresita slipped from bed and looked at Jesus on the cross. She shyly touched Guadalupe’s dress. She picked up the water glass and turned it, looking through it at the sun. There were little flecks of dirt in it, floating back and forth as she turned the glass.
When Huila came back, Teresita said, “I think you missed some sins.”
Huila had brought her a dress from Loreto’s daughter. She pulled it over Teresita’s head.
“Qué bonita,” she said.
Teresita posed.
Huila took up her brush, and in spite of many complaints, dragged the knots out of Teresita’s hair.
She then made Teresita put