God's Country

Miranda called the hospital to check on Lupe’s condition. Diagnosis: old age. She was doing all right for the moment, they were giving her fluids and making her comfortable, so Miranda gave the nurse on duty her pager number and said she’d be by after work.

She checked outside. It was a beautiful day, the morning mist clearing early, sky bright blue above. A bit of chill in the air, but in that nice, crisp way. She wandered the orchard in her beat-up outdoor slippers. She pulled down a small nectarine and bit it, wincing as the sour juice squirted against her gums, but then finding the pulp a bit sweeter. She finished it and threw the pit on the ground. The macadamia was showing one tiny green bud that she thought just might be a nut. She gathered a handful of oranges and went inside, making herself a glass of fresh-squeezed juice.

She saw Rick and all her other patients, performing her work with an efficiency and good humor that very nearly resembled the person she had been before her mother’s death. She felt strange, removed, but curiously light. She stopped into the office to wrap up her workday. Roberta called her in for a moment.

"Nice to see you getting back to normal, Mir," she said, a half-smile on her stern features.

Is that what this is? Miranda wondered, but she just nodded. "Work is the thing," she said.

She finished her paperwork, grabbed a slice of pizza and a Coke at Filippi’s, and then headed down to Grant Memorial, where Lupe was being held. That was how she thought of it – her grandma, imprisoned by the men in white.

Lupe was sleeping when Miranda arrived, so she pulled a book out of her bag and just sat by her bedside, reading. After awhile, a soft noise alerted her. She looked up to meet Lupe’s bird-bright eyes.

"Hi Grandma."

"You should call me abuela."

"A little late to make a good Mexican girl out of me now."

Lupe smiled. "You are a good girl, Miranda."

"I’m sorry about our fight last night, Grandma."

"You didn’t put me here, mija. God did."

"I thought he was helping you to stand."

"He was. Now he’s helping me to lie down."

"That’s convenient." Miranda turned away for a moment. "I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’m so touchy right now."

"You broke it off, didn’t you? With Bradley." Lupe never did miss much. A couple of tubes trailing out of her apparently didn’t change that.

"Yes, I did. He’s supposed to be picking his things up today."

Lupe frowned at her. "Stubborn, you."

Miranda leaned over to touch Lupe’s cheek gently. "Stubborn, you." Lupe smiled.

"Yes, it’s true. You get it from me. But learn, mija! Look at my life! A drunken husband, four kids, all died too young. Even your Ma, who did good and went to school, got knocked up by a sailor who hooked her on cigarettes before deserting the two of you." Lupe clutched at her, trying so hard to make her point. "Miranda, many men will not be good to you, or good for you. That Paquito, for instance. But you will end up with a man, regardless. It’s your nature. Bradley is a good man. You should give him a chance."

"Are you saying I just won’t have a complete life if there’s no man in it, Grandma? Isn’t that a little antiquated? This is the ‘80s."

Lupe made an exasperated noise. "You miss the point on purpose. You know me better than that. You are a loving person, Miranda. A sexual person. It would be wrong to deny that in yourself. It would kill you." Her sharp eyes narrowed. "But there are other things that will kill you faster, and one of them is a bad Indian."

"Grandma!" Miranda sat back in her chair. "Okay, I don’t want to start another fight with you. Let me just say that first of all, I am not in any sort of romantic relationship with Rick. He’s like 8 years too young for me, he’s got a girlfriend of his own, and he’s a paraplegic. I just…like him. For some reason, he’s the only person I talk to right now who doesn’t rub me the wrong way."

She saw relief showing in Lupe’s eyes and held up a hand to forestall her. "But, that said, if I were dating a Paquito, I just don’t understand why you would be so against it. Can you please explain it to me? Because when you just shout out random hateful and unjustified things, it pisses me off and I can’t hear you. Do you understand?"

Lupe relaxed and closed her eyes. Miranda thought she was sleeping, but her lids fluttered open and she stared at the ceiling.

"I don’t hate the Paquitos, mija. I feel sorry for them, and for other folk like them. But I worry about you going near them. They are trapped in the triangle of evils." She held up a tiny hand, enumerating the evils on her fingers. "Poverty, alcoholism, violence." Her hand dropped back to the bed. "It is not their fault they ended up there, or at least not wholly their fault. But that is where they are, and I don’t know if they can get out – not as a people, or even as individuals. Don’t tell me I don’t know what I’m talking about. I lived it in Guadalajara, mija, and I can recognize it from miles away. Your Uncle Juan died as a teenager because my husband beat him so badly as a child, it damaged his spine, and eventually killed him. Pina started drinking at 12, became a whore and was beaten to death. And Pedro died in jail, after pushing his pregnant wife down the stairs one night while he was drunk. Nadine was the only one to break out of it, and you are the only grandchild. She did a good job with you, raised you up. You’re a good girl, Miranda, a good American girl. But your mother still killed herself, for all that. And you no longer know who your real people are, or how to defend yourself from those who aren’t."

"Jesus, Grandma. How come I never knew that? I thought Uncle Juan and Uncle Pedro died in Vietnam, and Auntie Pina in childbirth. That’s what Ma always said."

"We agreed to protect you, mija, but now I am dying and you have to protect yourself."

"Grandma," said Miranda thoughtfully. "How did Granddad die?"

A stark look came into her grandmother’s eyes. "That, mija, will die with me." Her tone was utterly final. "Now go home and sleep. I’ll be fine." She closed her eyes, clearly exhausted from her long speech. Miranda kissed her on the forehead.

"I’ll be back tomorrow," she whispered.

Visiting hours were over, and the sterile halls were nearly deserted. She walked quickly, squeaking a little on the smooth tile in her rubber-soled shoes. She had worked here for a couple of years right out of nursing school, but found the patient loads stressful and the changeable hours difficult. It had been hard to feel that she was doing the best possible job with each patient, so when the agency job came up, she had jumped at it. She liked the independence it gave her. She still had to consult with doctors, of course, but she didn’t spend most of her shift being talked down to anymore.

When she first saw him striding towards her, long black hair swinging loose, she thought she was having another apparition, like that day in the creek. But as he walked up and stopped, she realized he was wearing blue jeans, and that he wasn’t a spirit warrior, or even Rick, but just Michael, in a place she didn’t expect to see him.

"Michael, what are you doing here?" she said, at the same time he said, "You got my message." They stared at
each other in confusion a moment.

"I’m here to see my grandmother," she said.

"Rick developed a really high fever, so they brought him in this afternoon."

"Oh my God. He was fine this morning. Where is he? Why didn’t someone page me?" Michael caught at her arm as she was about to go running down the hall.

"He’s in the ICU, they won’t let you in. I don’t have your pager number."

"Show me where he is," she demanded. He led her back down the hall. A guard stood outside the doors.

"I need to see Rick Fuentes," she said. He shook his head.

"Sorry, lady, visiting hours are over."

"He’s my patient," she said, pulling out her agency ID. He squinted at it, but nodded reluctantly. Miranda walked past him and Michael followed, but the guard stopped him.

"Not you." Miranda turned, but Michael shrugged and gestured her on.

"I’ll wait out here," he said, and collapsed into one of the hard plastic chairs in the hall. She hurried inside.
She found him quickly, completely unconscious. She introduced herself at the nurse’s station. They waved her in and left her alone. She took a quick look at his chart and then sat down beside him. She stared and stared at his face, in a way she never could while he was awake. Was Lupe right? Was he so trapped in the Triangle of Evils, as Lupe had so melodramatically put it, that he would never escape? A wave of tiredness overtook her suddenly and she leaned down, putting her forehead on the edge of the bed.

"Why do you have a fever, Rick? You shouldn’t have a fever. I take good care of you." She raised her head and looked at him. "You make me crazy, you know. You’re smart, I know you are. You have a good heart. You care about your family, even though they barely care about you. You’re a talented artist. And you have enough money to make a life for yourself. So why, Rick? Why do you live in a hovel, and keep a gun in your bedside table and play dangerous games of ‘who’s more macho’ with drunken assholes who would kill you if you gave them half a chance? Why do you let Sandy torment you like that? She’s bad. Bad for you."

She took his hand, twining her fingers through his. His legs looked smaller than usual, tucked tight into a hospital bed. Various machines made pinging noises on all sides through the thin curtains screening his bed from the others that shared his room. Footsteps passed up and down the hall right outside. It was never really quiet in the ICU.

"I want you to be saved. I don’t want you to end up like the rest of them. I want you to get out. I want you to move to town, take some art classes. I’ll help you. I’ll come see you, wherever you move, I promise. Please." She was whispering so as not to bother anyone else, but she hoped, she prayed that her words were reaching him. These were things she couldn’t say to him while he was awake. He was so proud. He’d never hear her.
He never stirred. She stood up, finally, and kissed him, stroking her hand over the long hair, so black against the crisp white pillow. She left her pager number with the nurse’s station and went out to see Michael. He looked exhausted, his tall form bent up in the small chair.

"How about some coffee?" she said. "Denny’s is open all night." He unwound himself and stretched.

"Yeah, I’ll need it to get home," he said. They left the hospital together.

Denny’s was just down the street, easy walking distance. A good location for a 24-hour diner, right next to a hospital. Lots of late night visitors, needing coffee, a hot meal, an hour away from disease, injury, death. Like what Hemingway said, something about a cold, bright place. Sometimes, it was just what you needed.