The Butterfly’s Daughter (23 page)

Margaret tsked and crossed her arms over her stomach. “I'm just calling it as I see it. Your car is ancient and it's a long trip. My car has got to be safer. And honestly, Luz, no offense, but it's pretty darn ghetto. I mean, look at the rust and dents. It's not safe.”

This had been Luz's own reaction when she'd first seen the VW. She remembered Abuela's face when she handed Luz the keys, so excited, so full of promise. It may not have been the best car in the world, but it was the best that Abuela could afford. And that was good enough for Luz.

Luz teased back, “Nah, the ol' boy has a lot of character. Besides, Abuela bought me this car. It might sound crazy, but I feel her presence in it. Taking your car would be like leaving Abuela behind.”

“We'd take her ashes, of course.”

“Nope,” Luz said, standing firm. This was
her
odyssey. Hers and Abuela's. “Look, Margaret, if you want to take your car, go ahead. You can follow me. But I'm driving El Toro.”

Margaret scrunched her face. “El Toro?”

“Yes,” Luz replied defiantly, eyes lit. “That's its name. Every car should have a name.”

“Mine doesn't.”

“And it's all the sorrier for it. This car might be little but it has the heart of a bull.”

Margaret's mouth turned in derision. “It looks more like an ox.”

“Ox, steer, bull—they're all the same.”

“FYI, an ox is a neutered bull, fit for pulling carts. I think that applies here.”

Luz patted the hood affectionately. “Don't you listen to her, Señor Toro. She's just jealous.”

Margaret laughed, rolled her eyes at the tiny car, and threw up her hands. “Fine, you hideous beast. El Toro it is!”

Luz watched Margaret's efficient packing with awe. Abuela had called Luz practical and careful, but she was a piker compared to Margaret. “You're like a Girl Scout with all of this stuff,” she told Margaret. “What's that motto? ‘Always prepared'?”

Margaret stuck her head out from the backseat, where she was arranging the pillow and box of ashes. “As a matter of fact, I was an Ambassador.”

Luz could picture it, her sash ablaze with patches. “I'll just bet you had tons of merit badges.”

Margaret climbed out from the car and reached up to tighten the loose hairs in her ponytail. “Sure did. But these are just your everyday, practical measures for safety,” she said with precision. “No offense, El Toro, but we're heading through some pretty remote areas where there won't be a handy tow truck to save us. If the car breaks down, we could be stuck for hours. Or more, God forbid.”

Luz stood a moment to survey the car. She kicked her tires. She checked her watch. Reaching up, she slammed down the trunk. Then, digging into her jeans, she pulled out the keys. “Well, I think we're ready now. I don't think we can squeeze another thing in, and all this put us back. It's already two o'clock. Time's a wasting! Hop in, girlfriend. I want to get some miles under my belt while there's still daylight.”

“Wait! I just have to grab some glue and markers.”

Luz cursed under her breath. “What for?”

“For Abuela!”

Aerial photos and topographical maps that Margaret had pulled up on the computer before they left showed the Kansas landscape as a beautiful patchwork quilt of color and texture. “Very Van Gogh,” as Margaret put it. And it was true. There were moments of breathtaking beauty. The Midwest was the land of rivers.

Luz regretted being on a strict timetable. There wasn't time to take an exit and see what was beyond the monotonous highway. Someday, she'd like to slow down and see more of the sights she was passing by—the rivers, universities, churches, small, friendly towns and bucolic farms with grazing animals. But Luz knew that, like the plucky monarch, she had to be in Mexico in two weeks.

The landscape was classic midwestern farmland, not unlike what she was used to seeing in Wisconsin. Here and there the tedium of open fields was broken by enormous grain silos, a picturesque, bright red barn, and modest frame houses, most of them white with green roofs.

An armada of steel-colored clouds gathered over the land, heralded by the growl of thunder. Luz turned on her headlights in anticipation of the storm. While she drove, she wondered what it would be like living in one of those farmhouses, married to a man not unlike Sully, with a few kids, a dog in the yard, a cat. She smiled, enjoying the scene in her mind. She tried to imagine herself milking cows, collecting eggs from chickens, waking up early to the call of a rooster. She chuckled. That was more of a stretch.

“What's so funny?” asked Margaret, turning her head from the window. She'd been silent for miles, taking in the blur of scenery.

“Oh, I was just wondering what it would be like to live in one of those houses out there. On a farm.” They passed another
house. This one was a pretty Cape Cod surrounded by stately pecan trees. It was an island in the middle of acres of fields. “They're miles away from their nearest neighbor. I wonder if they get lonely.”

“They're pretty isolated,” Margaret answered. “But I've found that neighbors in a rural community are more in touch with each other than neighbors who live next door in a city. There are lots of groups to join in a farming community. It's a small town. Everyone knows everyone's business. Everyone knows your name. In the city, there are so many people it's easier to get lost. Besides, is anyone really isolated anymore? Everyone is connected by phones and the Internet. Social networking. Online, I have people I hardly know commenting on my mundane daily activities. It's kind of like having a neighbor calling out from the window, ‘Hi! Sunny day today, isn't it? Think I'll hang some laundry.'”

“But it's not the same as a real face smiling at you, or the touch of a hand,” Luz argued. It struck her how she'd made two new, completely different friends on this odyssey across the country—without a phone or WiFi. She'd done it the old-fashioned way—meeting them face-to-face. Margaret, with her discipline and intelligence, and Ofelia, with her teasing humor and blunt honesty, were not people she might ordinarily have connected with. They were different ages, and had different lifestyles and different goals. But she was finding out she had more in common with them than not.

Thunder cracked loud and fierce and lightning lit up the sky. Margaret startled and jerked her head to peer through the window. “We're about to get drenched.”

As though on cue, the sky opened up and a thunderous downpour hammered their car like tom-toms. Rain came down in sheets, and even though her windshield wipers were going full
speed, Luz could barely see the road ahead. She slowed to a crawl while the wind pushed and rattled the small car.

Margaret and Serena sat tense and wide-eyed in the passenger seat. Margaret's hands were clenched but she remained silent. Lightning seemed to surround them and the road looked like a lake. Luz was terrified of hydroplaning. She leaned forward over the wheel and squinted. Up ahead she saw an overpass.

“I'm pulling over,” she told Margaret. “I think we should sit this one out.”

“Good idea.” Margaret's relief was evident in the long sigh she released when Luz pulled off the road and turned off the engine.

Once they were nestled under the overpass, the percussive pounding ceased. They sat in a relatively blissful silence. Beyond the protective lair, the storm raged, spitting pellets of rain and renting the sky with lightning and thunder.

“Good ol' El Toro did a good job keeping us dry,” Luz said.

“I don't think it will be a long wait. It's a fast-moving storm.”

They opened bottles of water, ate candy bars, and sat for a while in silence as the storm blew around them. Serena daintily hopped to the backseat and curled up against the pillow. Luz closed her eyes and leaned back, listening to the increasingly muted thunder as the clouds rolled farther away.

“I was thinking of what we were saying,” Margaret said finally.

Luz opened her eyes and turned her head to face Margaret. “About the Internet?”

Margaret nodded. “And being isolated. Truth is, most nights I sit in my room alone and troll through the social networking sites, just seeing if anyone commented or sent pictures. Or even just said hello.” She sighed again, a sad sound that whistled through the small space. “It can get pretty lonely, no matter where you live.”

Luz looked at the woman beside her in the passenger seat in skinny black jeans and thin layers of black Capilene. In her lap she carried two books: one on wildflowers, the other on butterflies and moths. She'd spent a great deal of time writing notes in the observation notebook that her father had designed for her years earlier. Yet even with all her scientific prowess, she didn't exude the personal confidence or sparkle that could make a plain girl pretty.

“Margaret,” Luz ventured cautiously. She didn't want Margaret's protective shield to pop up again. “What made you change your mind about coming on this trip? Really.”

Margaret put a piece of paper in her book to mark her place, then closed it and rested her hand on the cover. “It wasn't just one thing. It was more a buildup of things over time. There was a time I had such ambition. I wanted to be top of my class so I could get a scholarship. My father used to tell me to look on my left, then my right. I had to work harder than both those people to succeed. So I did. I worked, worked, worked. I won my scholarship, then a fellowship, and after that I got an internship at the university. When the job for Hidden Ponds came up, I knew I was younger than what Mrs. Penfold advertised for, but I went after it and”—she shrugged with a short laugh—“I got it.”

“That's amazing,” Luz said, feeling admiration. To think she achieved all that on her own. “Look at all you've accomplished. You have a great job, your own condo, a car.”

“Right.” Margaret's voice was flat. “And when I go home to that condo, I bring my work home—all my files and notes. Only now I don't really want to work on them. Most nights I don't even open my briefcase. I don't read my journals. I seem to have lost my spark and fallen into a rut. Lately, it's begun to hit me that I've
worked so hard and with such focus, I didn't notice that the phone stopped ringing.”

Luz licked her lips. She understood that loneliness. “You must have friends?”

“Oh, sure,” she said quickly, heading off any pity. “Friends from college, mostly. But they're all married now and have children so, well, you know. They don't have a lot of free time, and frankly, my life is so different from theirs it's like we're living in separate worlds. More and more I find I'm going out by myself, and sometimes, I just can't bear to eat out alone so I take carryout home and watch TV. I watch a lot of TV . . . Sometimes, while I'm watching, I feel this panic well up inside of me, like I'm frozen and can't move. I just keep watching and it doesn't even matter what's on.”

She turned and asked with genuine concern, “Do you think I'm addicted?”

“No,” Luz answered quickly. “Maybe a little depressed.”

“Hmm . . .” Margaret's face was troubled as she reached for her bottle of water. She took a long sip, staring at some fixed point in the distance.

Lightning lit up the clouds. Their mottled purple and yellow coloring reminded Luz of Ofelia's bruises. Luz recalled the intimate conversations they'd shared in this car and here she was again, now privy to Margaret's confession. She recognized this as one of those rare moments of intimacy between friends that demanded honesty. She adjusted her seat to lean against the door and face Margaret fully.

“I get a little depressed sometimes, too,” Luz confessed.

Margaret tilted her head.

Luz took a breath. “I work in a foundry in Milwaukee.”

“Uh-huh,” Margaret said.

“I hate my job but we needed the money. So I quit school and got the job that paid the most money.”

“You quit school?” Margaret asked. That bit of information elicited more indignation than shock. “Didn't you have any choices?”

“Not really. Abuela was let go from her job and she was too old to find another. I couldn't leave her to fend for herself. She spent her life savings taking care of me and there was no one else. Besides, I loved her.” She shook her head. “There was no question of my responsibilities. So I quit school and got a job. I kept telling myself it was only temporary. That I was going to save my money and go back to school. But the days just flew by and the next thing you know, a year goes by. I feel stuck in a rut, too.”

“How can you be stuck in a rut? You're twenty, right?”

“Twenty-one.”

Margaret shook her head. “What was your major?”

“Well, it was a technical college,” Luz explained. “I was in a Human Services Associate program for a degree as a social service worker. I'd like to work in a community outreach program, to do sort of what Abuela did with neighborhood kids. She made a difference. I'd like that, you know? To know my life had meaning.” She laughed with derision. “I ended up working with machines.”