“Are you feeling a little better?” I ask tentatively, because it is and it isn’t the question I want to ask.
“A lot better, especially after that supper.”
Any further inroads into trying to mend fences feels premature. And so, not knowing what to say, I say too much: “Would you marry me again if you had it to do over?”
Bill turns to me, his face in a scowl, as if I’ve asked the most ridiculous question in the world. “What do you mean? You’re my life.”
I’m almost in tears with gratitude to him for being able to see me clearly, and still love me—another critical survival skill I’m struggling to learn. “But it gets so rough some times!”
“No it doesn’t,” Bill pronounces. And this time I am so glad for his sturdy certitude, I keep my mouth shut. On this rock I have built my marriage.
Back in his own room, Piti is strumming his guitar. I wonder if he is missing Eseline and Ludy on this, his first night away from Haiti.
He has no way of knowing that within a month, they will be back, having crossed over with Wilson. Eseline will be feeling fine, happy to be coming home to her husband and little house. Meanwhile, Ludy will be walking, reaching for everything, putting it in her mouth. (Oh dear, how to babyproof a humble casita?) She will also be talking a blue streak, saying ma-ma, pa-pa, making those nonsense syllables that sound eerily like goudou, goudou, but refer only to the wonders she is seeing and learning to name in this world.
A Shannon Ravenel Book
Published by
Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill
Post Office Box 2225
Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27515-2225
a division of
Workman Publishing
225 Varick Street
New York, New York 10014
© 2012 by Julia Alvarez. All rights reserved.
Some names have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.
The photographs in this book are credited as follows: Isaías Orozco Lang, page 3; Nicole Sánchez, page 10; Bill Eichner, pages 38, 39, 74, 82, 83, 100, 200, 216, 219; Homero, pages 54, 55, 66, 67, 69, 104, 123; Carlos Barria (Reuters), page 143; Mikaela, pages 199, 207, 210, 235; Ana Alvarez, page 173; Thony Belizaire (AFP/Getty Images), page 242. All others by the author, except for page 25, from the author’s collection.
ISBN 978-1-61620-151-7
Julia Alvarez, A Wedding in Haiti
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