How I Learned to Walk

Calláte. Don’t say it out loud: the color of his hair, the sour odor of his skin, the way they say his stomach rose when he slept. I have done nothing, said nothing. I piss in the corner of the room, the outhouse is far, I think orange blossoms call me to eat them. I fling rocks at bats hanging midway up almond trees. I’ve skinned lizards. I’ve been bored. It’s like that time I told my friend Luz to rub her lice against my hair. I wanted to wear a plastic bag, to smell of gasoline, to shave my hair, to feel something like his hands on my head. When I clutch pillows, I think of him. If he sleeps facedown like I do. If he can tie strings to the backs of dragonflies. I’ve heard of how I used to run to him. His hair still smelling of fish, gasoline, and seaweed. It’s how I learned to walk they say. Calláte. If I step out this door, I want to know nothing will take me. Not the van he ran to. Not the man he paid to take him. Mamá Pati was asleep when he left. People say somehow I walked across our cornfield at dawn, a few steps behind. I must have seen him get in that van. I was two. I sat behind a ceiba tree, waiting. No one could find me.