The Indigo Notebook Read online

  We cross old, weed-filled train tracks, and Wendell whips out his camera and snaps a picture. “Perspective shots turn out great.” He turns to me, clicks, and carefully tucks the camera back inside his shirt. I wonder what his sort-of-ex-girlfriend will say when she sees me in his pictures. I wonder what he’ll say about me. Oh, she’s just this girl I’ll never see again. Just my translator.

  I’ve had my flings with tourist boys. The first one was when I was thirteen, in Brazil, and spent a blissful week body-boarding and holding hands with adorable French Olivier. Last year, on Phi Phi Island, I met an Australian, Patrick, with ice-blue eyes and freckles. For two weeks, we surfed and snorkeled and swam and kissed and went on long walks. Both times, for months afterward, I wrote them e-mails and listened to our music and mooned over their pictures and reread their notebook pages. Then their e-mails stopped. After the Australian, I finally faced the truth. For them, I was nothing more than a vacation-girl hookup, an exciting break from real life.

  But this is my real life, this endless vacation.

  I glance at Wendell. His lips are tender and curved like a Buddha’s lotus-flower mouth, and purplish-blue in the cold. I will not be his fling. Especially knowing he’s in love with a sort-of-ex-girlfriend.

  Kids’ voices drift toward us, muffled through the damp air, squeals and laughter and shouts. Through the fog, I can just make out three girls running from a house to a pigpen and back again, playing chase. In their paths, chickens squawk as the kids barrel through.

  I stride up to the girls. They look about four, six, and nine years old. The oldest one’s wearing a white embroidered blouse, gold beads, a cardigan, and an anaco—a straight, wraparound skirt—while the littler ones have on jeans and Disney polar fleece sweatshirts with hoods. They have round, pretty faces, glistening eyes, cheeks pink with cold. At first they look about to run at the sight of us, but instead, on second thought, they giggle.

  “Buenos días,” I say.

  “Buenos días,” they reply shyly.

  “I’m Zeeta. And this is Wendell.”

  The oldest one says, “I’m Eva. This little one’s my ñaña Odelia, and she’s my other ñaña, Isabel.”

  “Well, chicas, we’re looking for Wendell’s birth parents. He was adopted by an American family as a baby. Want to be our guides? Introduce us to the people in your town?”

  The girls stare at Wendell and titter and confer in Quichua, and then Eva says, “Come with us. There aren’t that many houses. We’ll just take you to all of them.” The littlest, Odelia, takes one of my hands, and Isabel takes the other, and we set off down the road. They don’t seem to notice the drizzle, and soon they’re shooting off questions like fireworks. Where are you from? Do you have animals? Are you two married? I burst out laughing at the married one, but then remember that Gaby got married when she was fifteen. It isn’t so far-fetched to them.

  They chatter and tell stories that I translate in snatches to Wendell—a rich man on the hill who made a pact with the devil, a greedy man whose hacienda was magically drowned in a lake, a woman named Mamita Luz who sounds like everyone’s fairy godmother. Mother Luz. Mother Light. They particularly love talking about her. She’s the mother of all the children of the village, they say. She gives all children fresh-baked still-warm bread so that not a single child will ever go hungry. Her husband is Silvio, but everyone calls him Taita Silvio. Father Silvio. “We’ll go there after we finish,” Eva says, “to eat bread.”

  Timidly, Odelia takes Wendell’s hand. “If you don’t find your mother, Mamita Luz will be your mother.”

  After I translate, Wendell gives me a look full of questions.

  I shrug, mystified.

  The houses are spaced far apart, each with its pens of pigs, its slew of dogs, its cow or horse or donkey, and the occasional beat-up truck. Some buildings are cement, some adobe, some put together with an assortment of scrap wood. At the first house, three round, pretty women are working under a shelter that lets a little drizzle through. They’re taking hardened corn kernels off cobs, but they stop and smile when we approach. “Sit down, sit down,” they insist, pulling up extra plastic lawn chairs.

  They’re pleased with the peaches I give them and amused that we offer to help them strip the corn kernels. We talk for a while, going over the same questions the girls asked us. Wendell’s from Colorado. I’m from nowhere. No, we’re not married. (I can’t help blushing at that one.) The only animals in the picture are Wendell’s corgi-Lab mix and his ancient goldfish. No, not a single pig or sheep.

  Soon our fingertips are growing sore from the kernel stripping. When we get to the part about Wendell’s birth parents, the women turn their palms faceup. “Only God knows.” The oldest woman gives us two eggs fresh from under her hen as a goodbye present.

  At the next house, a family invites us inside. They’re eating around a long table, about ten of them, ranging in age from three to seventy, with the TV blaring a singing talent show. They accept a bag of strawberries and make us have a bowl of potato soup with them as we shout over the TV about Wendell’s search.

  They speak among themselves in Quichua and, finally, shake their heads. “Sorry, we don’t know. Only God knows.”

  Wendell doesn’t seem too disappointed, probably because everyone’s nice and feeds us and acts concerned. They’re all amazed that Wendell doesn’t speak Quichua, much less Spanish. “But you have our face!” they exclaim. “And you even wear your hair long, like us!”

  All afternoon, we go from house to house. It’s the same with the next seven houses. People share food, talk, and ultimately claim that only God knows.

  And now it’s sunset and for the past hour, little Odelia’s been pleading, “Now can we go to Mamita Luz’s? Now? How much longer till Mamita Luz’s?”

  It’s almost dark, and we have to go back soon. “Okay, chica. Just for a few minutes.”

  She claps her hands and does a little dance.

  On the way there, I ask Eva, “What about your parents? They might know something.”

  A cloud passes over her face. “Our mamá is out,” she says, her voice suddenly quiet. “She works as a maid in Otavalo all day.”

  “What about your father?”

  The girls look at one another.

  “He’s sick,” Eva says.

  “Yes, sick,” Isabel says.

  Solemnly, Odelia adds, “Very sick.”

  Chapter 9

  The girls lead us through a misty maze of paths and corn rows. Odelia’s a little hummingbird of darting energy, chatting nearly nonstop, her eyes impossibly wide. Isabel walks and talks a little slower, but somehow manages to get a word in edgewise here and there. Eva’s observant and protective like a mother wolf, warning us to watch our step over holes and rocks, her eyes flicking around, always on the lookout for unseen dangers.

  We walk on a path by an irrigation ditch, a two-foot-wide channel of water with corn plants on either side reaching higher than our heads, making a tunnel over us, sheltering us from the drizzle. To our left, the cornfield ends in a backyard. From the wall of the house, a clay mound protrudes, a giant bump in the adobe.

  Odelia points and jumps up and down. “Mamita Luz’s bread oven!” And then she and Isabel are running, unable to contain their excitement, pulling me along, with Wendell and Eva right on our heels. And sure enough, as we come closer, the rich, warm smell of baking bread surrounds the house in a sweet cloud. Smoke’s rising from the chimney, swirling into the raindrops. In front, sprays of pink bougainvillea are climbing the walls, emerging from tangles of blackberry bushes heavy with shiny berries. A few chickens peck around in the mud among red and orange potted flowers in old tin cans. The house is a cheerful oasis in the rain.

  The girls knock on the heavy wooden door, Odelia bouncing in anticipation.

  As we wait, Wendell turns to me, shivering. It’s grown colder now that the sun’s setting. “Ever feel extra alive?”

  I think of how Layla felt more alive than ever the f
irst time she traveled. “When we move,” I say slowly. “The first month or two, there’s that time when I notice everything—all the colors and sounds and smells—they seem magnified.” I don’t mention that this in-between time is also the time my middle-of-the-night panics are worst.

  “Yeah,” he says. “That’s how I feel now. Freezing my butt off, but alive.”

  The door opens, and there stands a woman, middle-aged, round as a soft roll. The girls rush into her arms and she wraps all three of them up like a blanket. She reaches out for my hand and Wendell’s, and holds them for a moment, beaming. “Mis hijos!” My children!

  She ushers us inside, to a room on the left—a kitchen—where three other children, two boys and a toddler girl, are sitting by the fire, pulling apart pieces of steaming bread and munching with delight.

  They stare at us, curious, until finally a brave boy says, “Buenas tardes.”

  As we introduce ourselves, the girls put their hands in mine and Wendell’s, firmly, claiming first dibs on their new friends.

  For a moment, Wendell and I stand, savoring the heat, gazing around the room. The ceiling is high, with exposed beams, and covered in straw. There’s hardly any furniture in here, just two large wood pillars with spoons and pans and ladles hanging from nails. The walls are rough, pink clay with bits of straw and old corncobs poking out. Small benches and stools line the walls, ready and waiting for more kids to come. An old guitar leans in the corner, with reed flutes of different sizes on a stool beside it.

  In the center of the room, a hearth fire pit holds hot coals beneath a bubbling pot of tea, something lemony. The woman dips a steaming cupful for each of us, and motions for us to sit on a bench. In one sweeping motion, without a fuss, she takes a blue wool poncho from a nail on the wall and drapes it over Wendell’s shivering shoulders.

  Then she floats over to a hole in the wall that’s hiding an orange fire glow and an iron rack. Inside, on a giant metal pan, are little balls of dough, just beginning to turn golden. And farther back, I glimpse the blackened wall of the inside of the bump we’d seen from the outside. She feeds more wood into the oven and then plucks some rolls from a pan beside it. Smiling, she drops one in each of our hands, and sits down with us. After we’ve eaten our rolls—which are so otherworldly delicious I’m sure we’ve stumbled straight into a fairy tale—she drops second rolls into our hands and announces, “I am Mamita Luz.”

  She’s staring at Wendell, maybe sensing he doesn’t speak Spanish or come from here.

  “Nice to meet you,” I say, sipping my tea. Lemon balm, it tastes like. With tons of sugar. “Thank you for the bread. I’m Zeeta and this is Wendell. He’s American.”

  Wendell pipes in with “Gracias, gracias,” in his rough accent.

  She smiles appreciatively, and stares at him, curious.

  Wendell says, “Zeeta, thank her. Tell her that this is the best bread I’ve ever eaten. Ever.”

  What he really means: Please, please, be my birth mother.

  When I translate the bread compliment, she laughs and crinkles her eyes. “How could I not share bread with you? You are my son.”

  I blink. It can’t possibly be this easy.

  But then Mamita Luz motions to me. “And she is my daughter.” And to the girls. “And they are my daughters.” And to the boys. “And they are my sons.”

  Once I translate, Wendell’s quiet for a moment, then says, “Zeeta, can you ask her if she’s had any kids by birth?”

  Mamita Luz shakes her head slowly in response. “My breasts have never fed milk to a baby.” She pats her great bosom with no self-consciousness. “Instead, I am blessed with all these children, the children of the village, and more, like you two. And instead of mother’s milk, I feed my children bread.”

  Wendell’s face falls.

  I want to reach out and hold his hand. Instead, I open my indigo notebook. “When is the moment you felt most alive, Mamita Luz?”

  She looks around the room, at the children eating, stuffing their cheeks like chipmunks and talking and laughing with their mouths full. “I wanted children with all my heart. But God did not give me any. For years I felt half dead. Then, my husband built me this oven, just like the one my grandmother had. I started baking bread. And children started coming. Soon, every day my kitchen was full of children, happy and full. One day I looked around and realized I was no longer half dead. No, I was more alive than ever.” From the huge, steaming pot, she ladles more tea into our cups. “Now,” she says, “what brings you two all the way out here?”

  I’m speechless. It’s true, this woman has stepped straight out of a fairy tale. Finally, I say, “Mamita Luz, Wendell was adopted sixteen years ago. Do you know who his birth parents might be?”

  She smiles wistfully. “Who are the people who nourish you and love you?”

  After I translate, he says, without hesitation, “Mi mamá y papá.”

  “And now you have another mother, me, Mamita Luz. And you have Pachamama, Mother Earth, always below your feet. So many mothers. If you don’t find what you think you’re looking for, don’t be sad. There are ties stronger than blood, hijo.”

  And then, as though an internal alarm clock has buzzed, triggered by a certain golden bread smell, she whisks over to the oven. With a long wooden paddle like a flat oar, she pulls out the next batch of bread as the kids gather around her, eagerly watching.

  I note that she’s evaded our question, but there’s no time to push her for more information. It will be dark soon and Layla will be wondering where I am. We down the last drops of tea and say goodbye to the kids. Mamita Luz ushers us to the door, where it’s dusky blue outside, just the faintest light silhouetting the mountains.

  “Come back tomorrow when my husband is here. He will want to meet you.” Wendell starts taking off the poncho, but she firmly pats it back on his shoulders. “Wear it home and bring it back tomorrow, hijo.”

  Mamita Luz walks us to the end of the path, to the road, a shawl draped over her head. She holds Wendell’s hand for a moment and tilts his face, studying it from all angles. Rain droplets lace her eyelashes, like tiny crystals in the streetlamp’s glow. She wipes the water from her cheeks. “Go now, children.”

  …

  Wendell and the girls and I walk down the path through the corn, over the irrigation ditch, to the main street. A few streetlamps spot the darkness with flickering pools of light. Odelia clings fiercely to her sisters’ hands, telling us about a monster who lives in the shadows. As we near the inter section with the road that leads downhill to the bus stop, I notice someone at the edge of the road in a weedy ditch. A man, talking and singing to himself and clutching a nearly empty bottle.

  Odelia stops in her tracks, refuses to budge.

  Eva and Isabel have stopped too. The girls whisper in Quichua. Odelia starts crying.

  In a slurred voice, the man calls out, “Is that you, daughters?”

  Isabel bites her lip.

  “Come here,” he yells. “Who are you with?”

  Holding hands, the girls move closer to him the way you might approach a vicious dog.

  “What are you doing with my daughters?” Spit flies from his mouth. “You trying to steal them?”

  I take a step back. “They’re helping us look for my friend’s birth parents. He was adopted from this town.”

  He nods, squints at Wendell. “How old are you, boy?”

  “Sixteen.”

  He grunts. “There was a woman.” He takes a swig. “She had a baby. No one ever knew what happened to the boy.”

  “And the woman?” I ask.

  He coughs and spits out a shiny clump of mucus. “After a while, she disappeared too.”

  As I translate for Wendell, I resist the overwhelming urge to hold his hand or touch his shoulder.

  “What’s the woman’s name?” I ask the man.

  “Who knows. She wasn’t from here.”

  I translate for Wendell. He says nothing, only licks the rain from his lip
s.

  “What about his father?” I ask.

  Suddenly, the man stands up and waves his fists in the air. “You’re trying to steal my daughters, aren’t you?”

  The girls back up. Isabel’s crying now too. Their father’s moving toward them, staggering, punching the air.

  Wendell steps between him and the girls.

  Eva whispers to me, “I’m taking my ñañas to spend the night with Mamita Luz. Come back tomorrow.” The girls run down the street, their father shouting after them.

  Wendell and I stay still for a moment, hearts pounding, unsure what to do.

  Meanwhile, the man is stumbling after the girls, but they have a big head start that keeps widening. Finally, the man falls down at the roadside and sucks the remaining liquor from his bottle.

  Wendell takes my hand and we walk quickly to the intersection and turn right. Once we reach the hill, we run.

  Chapter 10

  We sit, not talking, as the bus moves down the dark highway, following its headlights. Romantic ballads blast from the speakers.

  Finally, Wendell says, “Think the girls are okay?”

  His breath is warm. It still smells like sweet, lemony tea.

  “They’ll be safe at Mamita Luz’s,” I say.

  “I was sure she was my birth mom. From the second she opened the door.” He presses his lips together. “Like I’d seen her before.”

  The blaring music forces our heads close, so that my eyes are just inches from his. “Maybe you just want her to be your birth mother.”