An Untamed State (18 page)

And now, his youngest child was in the hands of animals—the little girl who always looked up at him, followed him everywhere, did as he asked. Sebastien never imagined this could happen. Things were getting so much better throughout the country—even CNN said so. He paid various thugs to allow his trucks into certain neighborhoods so his workers could build what needed building. Every hour of every day he paid armed guards to watch the concrete plant and keep people from stealing too much. He paid bonuses and holidays and when a project finished early or under budget. He paid the customs agents to finesse the import of supplies he needed. He paid the women who fed his family and cleaned his home and he paid for their children to go to school, made sure they had strong roofs over their heads.

Always, Sebastien was paying money, small ransoms here and there, the price of doing business in Haiti. But this was too much—a million dollars, such a breathtaking amount of money. It galled him that men who had not worked an honest day in their lives would be so bold as to ask for a lifetime’s fortune. But it wasn’t about the money. It was about so much more and there was nothing he could say to explain what he meant. Sebastien rubbed his forehead. He was doing the right thing. He finally met his wife’s stare and his stomach fell. They had spoken little since their daughter was taken. There was little to be said.

Fabienne stood and everyone hushed, watching as she crossed toward her husband. They wanted the spectacle to swell ever more garishly. When husband and wife were only inches apart, Sebastien smiled softly. He studied Fabienne’s hands, still smooth, the hands of a much younger woman. And oh how her hands felt in his, so much smaller than his calloused hands, what a network of delicate strength. Sebastien set his espresso on the small end table and reached for Fabienne’s hands but she swatted him away.

“No. You do not get to hold my hands, not until my daughter is safe, back in this house.”

Sebastien shifted from one foot to the other, terribly aware of the barbarians staring at him, judging him no matter what he said, no matter what he did. He tried to reach for his wife again but she was resolute, holding her body in a rigid line. “I am doing everything I can to bring our child back to us. You have to trust me.”

“No,” Fabienne said. “The time for trust is over. Too much trust I have given you. End this, now.” She could feel panic rising through her spine. “Now,” she repeated, her voice high and sharp. “Goddamn you, Sebastien Duval. Bring home my child.”

Sebastien was suddenly weary. All the stares had shifted from curious to accusing. He loosened his necktie. “Excuse me,” he said, stumbling forward, and out of the sitting room. He kept walking until he no longer heard voices and finally, when he was alone, he collapsed.

W
ith the Commander I surrendered defiantly but with TiPierre I fought viciously, like the caged animal I was. I clawed at him and beat his body with my hands. I refused to lie still, twisting my body every which way. He was always calm, patient, as if he knew he would win but also knew I needed to fight.

TiPierre had a son close in age to Christophe. He told me about his child as he lay next to me on the tenth night, his arm heavy across my chest, one of his legs draped over mine. Even though I kept trying to free myself, he would not be moved.

“I love my boy,” TiPierre said. “He lives with his mother. I live with her when she isn’t angry with me. She is often angry with me. You know how women can be.”

I was silent, my skin burning with the weight of his arm across my chest. I said nothing.

“You have a son. What do you want for your boy?”

“I do not have a child,” I whispered. “I do not have a child.” The constant ache in my breasts sharpened even though my milk was drying, I could feel myself losing this one last part of myself. I tried to figure out what I could say to make TiPierre stop talking, to make him finish what he had come to my cage to do so he could leave me alone to be no one and feel nothing.

He propped himself up on one elbow. “Why would you deny your own child?”

I turned away from the man, the boy really, next to me, the one who hoped that through the intimacy of confession he might bring about my desire. “I am not the mother of that child,” I said, pulling my knees to my chest, trying to find my way to some silent place inside myself.

TiPierre abandoned his line of questioning and began tracing my shoulder with his fingers. I bit down on my knuckles, as hard as I could. It was an interesting pain, dull but steady.

“I would like to raise my boy in America. I don’t want him to become like me, running the streets, living in all this,” TiPierre said.

Ti Pierre was from Gonaives, came to Port-au-Prince as a
restavek
, sold into indentured servitude when he was a small boy, sold by his mother who loved him for one thousand
gourdes
, twenty-five U.S. dollars. He was no stranger to the buying and selling of the human body. As a boy, he worked, indentured, to a wealthy family who lived up on Montagne Noire. All day and night he worked, cleaning for them, and when he got older, cooking. At night, the bones of his fingers were curled in pain from scrubbing marble floors and climbing ladders to polish a crystal chandelier and washing the beautiful German cars he would never sit in. The father of the family who owned him used to beat him each evening with a whittled tree branch to remind TiPierre of his place, fifteen strokes, more if he had somehow displeased his employer. TiPierre did not go to school, never learned to read or write, had no friends. He forgot his mother who loved him, his father, brothers and sister, his real name. He ran away when he was sixteen, ran to the slums because in the slums he would be safe. Someday, TiPierre said, he would make his way to Miami, where he would be a deejay in a fancy nightclub. He would meet famous football players and rap stars and beautiful women who wear bikinis at night. He would play Benny Benassi and David Guetta and Chemical Brothers and wear sunglasses in the dark and jump up and down to the beat. Maybe, he said, I would come see him spin. Maybe I would be his girl and look pretty for him. Of course he thought he could buy me.

I was desperate to keep his body from touching mine more than necessary. He kissed my shoulder and fondled my breasts affectionately. I pitied him, how carelessly he had been loved, how easily he had been discarded, how little he knew of love or true desire. I loathed myself for my compassion. I loathed him for making me feel anything toward him at all.

I shook, silently, my hand over my mouth until my bitterness welled. “With you as his father, your son has a very good chance of turning out exactly like you.”

TiPierre grabbed me by my neck, the V of his thumb and forefinger locked just below my chin. I tried to swat his arm away but he squeezed until my eyes bulged and I gasped hungrily for air. I was on the edge of something, a quiet blackness. I found comfort there.

“You are an animal just like the man you work for,” I said hoarsely, relaxing into his hand, hoping TiPierre would kill me. I longed for him to squeeze just a little harder, to show no mercy. I was no one. My death would not matter.

He finally released his grip. I touched my neck, could still feel the pressure of his hand against my fingertips. He kissed my collarbone, and the new bruises blooming around my throat. “I am sorry,” he said, “but what you said was not nice.”

“We are not friends. We are not lovers. I do not choose this. I do not want you. My God, surely you can see that.”

He was seemingly oblivious. TiPierre brought his mouth to my breast and began to suckle softly. I panicked, shoved him away, but he refused to stop, refused to hold any part of me as sacred. The ache began to lessen as he stole the milk from my body. The relief was so startling I could not bear it. I dug my fingernails into his shoulders and scratched so hard, I hoped I might find bone. He cursed and pulled away. I covered my chest with my arms, shaking again.

“You cannot do that. You cannot.”

For once, TiPierre heard me. He shrugged, resumed talking about his son, and I let myself breathe. The son’s name was Innocent Sylvain; he was nine months old. “I’ll bring you a picture of my boy,” he said.

I grunted. I did not want to see any evidence of the man in this animal.

“In a different world, our sons could be playmates but in this world, my son will someday end up working for yours.”

“I have no son. Please stop saying I do.”

TiPierre slid on top of my body again, pinning my wrists above my head.

My body could not take any more. I knew that. I knew his intentions. “No,” I said. “No more tonight, I cannot.”

He ignored me.

After hours of labor, when it finally came time to push, the doctor had to reach inside me to turn the boy around. The pain was so intense it rendered me silent. All I could focus on was the pain and then the doctor told me to push and I had so little energy left but I held on to my thighs and Michael held me, his sweaty forehead pressed against mine. As the baby began to emerge, my body felt like it was coming apart, like my pelvic bones were separating then fracturing. It was only after the baby was all the way out that I groaned, a loose and ugly sound. That is the pain I remembered on the tenth night, when so much had been done to my body. It was my only frame of reference for a pain more profound than the body should survive.

There was a time when I did not want a child.

My husband and I were young and successful in Miami. The life we were living was all I wanted for us. We were not careful but I thought my disinterest in motherhood would reinforce our irresponsible approach to birth control, which mostly involved hope and, once in a while, Michael pulling out.

I did not want a child.

A year and a half before I had Christophe, I had a miscarriage. Michael never knew.

I didn’t even realize I was pregnant until everything had gone wrong. I was at the beach, running, when a tight fist twisted everything inside me and forced it out. I drove home, bleeding, thinking, “At least my car seats are leather,” and when Michael wasn’t home I was relieved. I sat on the toilet staring at my blood, drying in streaks almost to my knee.

I waited until I had a better idea of what to do. I waited for Michael to come home but he didn’t so I undressed, stuffed my clothes in the trash and took a hot shower. I did not cry. It was for the best, that’s what I told myself.

When I was pregnant with Christophe, I was feeling tired and irritable all the time. I thought it was work stress. There’s always a steady stream of clients for an immigration attorney in Miami—so many people desperate to stay, desperate to bring the ones they love to the Promised Land even if they haven’t found any promise yet. My caseload was insane after my leave of absence. If Michael didn’t call me most nights to remind me to come home at a decent hour, I worked well into the night. I was nauseous anytime I smelled something citrusy or flowery or salty. I spent an entire day in my private bathroom, my forehead pressed to the toilet seat, my chest and back muscles sore from the heaving. I ignored the incessant ringing of my office phone and my cell phone and the chime of new e-mails pouring in every few minutes. After work, I stopped at Walgreens and bought a double-pack pregnancy test. I went to a gas station and peed on a stick and peed on another stick. The tests had those digital readouts that blink Yes or No so any idiot can determine if they are in the family way. I did not want a child. I got so angry I started crying because I don’t love easy and loving a child or the idea of a child felt like it was too, too much.

I stayed in that gas station bathroom for a long time, until the smell of antiseptic cleaning products and stale piss and the cheap air freshener being sprayed into the bathroom at five-minute intervals with a soft puff made me sick. I wrapped the pregnancy tests in toilet paper and carefully placed them in my purse like they needed to be handled with care. When I got home, Michael was in the kitchen cooking dinner because he’s the one who cooks most of the time. He smiled, his face pink and sweaty from slaving over a hot stove. He asked about my day and I sat at the kitchen table and told him how I was sick all day. He came over and held the back of his hand to my forehead, clucking, brushing my hair out of my face, and then he went back to cooking, smiling at me every few minutes, pretending not to worry.

When I miscarried, Michael was in Key West with friends for the weekend. I waited for him to come home because I forgot he would not be coming home. I did not cry. I ached and cramped all night but I scrubbed the bathroom clean, I scrubbed the bathroom and watched the red run pink and then disappear and I scrubbed the seat in my car and I took the trash to a Dumpster behind the 7-Eleven just outside our neighborhood. I bought a pack of cigarettes and drove home slowly. I smoked. When I pulled into my driveway, I got out and lay on our lawn, Bermuda grass, not at all comfortable. I stared up at the palm trees, which always look beautiful at night, and I smoked the whole pack. I held my hands over my stomach, tender and rotten, strange fruit.