Stories for Lovers, page 65
“Thank you for that.” Arnulfo leaned into the touch, brushing a soft caress against Mitch’s palm with his lips. “I’ll think about it.”
Mitch wrapped his arms around Arnulfo from behind. Together they watched the world, enjoying their moment of calm.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come?” Mitch allowed Cassie to help him with his backpack. Once back in the States, he’d look her up. She’d proven herself to be good people.
“No, I can’t. There’s too few of us fluent in Spanish.” She knelt, kissed Lida’s forehead, and murmured soft words. “I told her Dr. Mitch would look after her until her papa comes.”
Her papa. Arnulfo.
A man hooked up a horse cart to carry the worst of the wounded. Lida appeared smaller than ever, huddled between two women.
Arnulfo strolled over. “Take care of my little angel.” He, like Cassie, spoke to Lida in Spanish and kissed her forehead. He met Mitch’s eyes.
Somewhere else they would have shared a kiss goodbye, parting with affection like the man hugging his wife before she left, with tears in both their eyes.
He did all he could: clapped a hand to Arnulfo’s shoulder. “Until we meet again, Dr. Oliva.”
“Safe travels, my friend.”
Cassie’s words came back to Mitch, “Take only what you can’t live without.” He slipped off his backpack. “Whatever’s in here I won’t need where I’m going. Use these things for someone else.”
Arnulfo nodded and took the offering.
Mitch hiked along beside the cart. He glanced over his shoulder every few yards, watching the distance grow between him and his lover until Arnulfo disappeared from sight.
“Dr. Mitch?” Lida reached for him.
Mitch held her hand as the cart jarred over a rutted path.
An odd assortment of vans and trucks met them in the clearing where he’d last seen his expensive suitcases. “Easy, now!” He helped a woman into one of the vans. What he wouldn’t give for a Medevac chopper or two.
He lifted Lida and her few belongings into the back of a truck, crawled in, and cradled the child in his lap. He’d learned a lot in the past two days, lessons years of medical school hadn’t taught, and now realized there was only one thing he couldn’t live without: Arnulfo.
The bone rattling trip to the capital city of San Salvador took an eternity. The sun had set before the convoy arrived at the airport.
Present passport, answer questions, stand by while local doctors explained the situation. Six hours of pure hell later, an official arrived with emergency medical visas. Finally, finally, Mitch and his charges boarded a plane.
He let Lida sit by the window, as he’d seen the view before. The plane circled, showing a volcano located far too close to the city for his comfort. Down there, somewhere in all those trees, Arnulfo gave of himself.
Mitch didn’t deserve Arnulfo, but damned if he wouldn’t spend the rest of his life trying to be a better man, and live up to the stellar example, if Arnulfo gave him half the chance.
January 27, 2001 – Atlanta, Georgia
Mitch poked his head through the door, checking on his favorite patient. Cassie held a finger to her lips, pointed at the sleeping, heavily bandaged child, and crept to the door, book pressed against her chest.
“Cassie!” What in God’s name possessed Mitch to hug the woman? “When did you get back?”
“Yesterday. I’m only back for a week before I leave again. I had to stop by and check on Lida.” And trust Cassie to be in the hospital, reading to children, on a brief furlough.
She presented the book. “This is her favorite.”
Spanish title, Spanish words. For being involved with a Spanish speaker for over a year, he’d learned only a handful of sentences. The front cover showed a cart-laden donkey stopped in the middle of the road, surrounded by people.
The song Arnulfo had sung.
Mitch should’ve taken more interest in Arnulfo’s culture: maybe then he’d have understood what made a man leave a comfortable life for a promise.
“I won’t wake her.” Mitched leaned in the doorway, the steady rise and fall of Lida’s chest somehow tugging the corner of his lips up.
The smile fell. Lida. So young, and all alone in the world except for an uncle. Parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins. Although an only child, Mitch never lacked relatives, spending summers with his uncle on Cape Cod, skiing in winter with his cousins while his family enjoyed their vacation home in Tahoe.
He’d never been alone. Not really. Not like Nulfo. Not like Lida.
Should he ask about Arnulfo? Dare he? “How’s—”
Cassie placed a hand on Mitch’s arm, a familiarity he rarely allowed among the staff. But somehow hugging her broke down barriers. Funny how their brief shared time in El Salvador gave them kinship. “He’s tired. He pushes himself too hard. But… but we all do. We have no choice.”
Not Mitch, safely ensconced in a hospital, eating three warm meals a day and resting in a bed at night, not the ground, or sitting up by a tree.
The hospital’s most dedicated nurse stepped passed Mitch into the hall.
Mitch held out his hand. “Um… Mind if I borrow the book?”
Cassie smiled. “Dr. Rollins, you surprise me more and more every day. So, you’re learning Spanish?”
“Not yet.” For Lida’s—and Nulfo’s sake—he’d learn.
Cassie winked. “If you ever need help, just look me up.”
He took the elevator from pediatrics to intensive care. “Hola, Dr. Mitch,” a bright, but wrinkled-faced woman exclaimed from a wheelchair. She might never walk again, yet she smiled, and held vigil at her husband’s bedside.
Mitch checked the husband’s chart. Still no real progress. He’d have to speak to the man’s attending physician. If only they could have gotten him medical care immediately, and hadn’t had to wait for evacuation to the US—and all the accompanying paperwork.
He forced a reassuring smile for the worried wife and trudged down the hall, weary beyond belief.
Two teenaged boys chatted in Spanish in the next room on his rounds, one with his arm in a sling. “Hola, Dr. Mitch,” they both said, although the younger of the two boys more quietly than the older.
Ah, improvements! They might not be able to return to their village for some weeks, but a mother, father, brothers and sisters awaited their return.
But coffee fields lay in their futures, lives much like their father’s and their grandfather’s. And low life expectancy. What hopes did they have for a better life? What had Arnulfo thought growing up? Would the ruptured appendix at age twenty have resulted in his death?
Best not to imagine a world without Arnulfo Oliva.
Room by room Mitch checked his charges, whether he’d been assigned as their doctor or not.
Graham Logan stepped into the elevator behind Mitch, engrossed in the contents of a clipboard. “Second floor, please!”
Mitch pushed the button for the second floor and the parking level. “Good evening, Graham.”
Graham glanced up, a furrow between his eyebrows. The furrow disappeared. “Mitch! I’m surprised to see you here so late, and on a Saturday, no less. Checking on the Salvadoran patients?”
“Yes, sir.” How’d he know?
“I must say, you shocked me at first with your volunteering, but the more I ponder the matter, the more I connect the dots.” Dr. Logan patted Mitch’s arm. “I’ve always considered you an excellent doctor, but wondered if you put your heart into your job.
“I can’t tell you how pleased I am to see this compassionate side of you. You’re destined for great things.” The door opened. “This is my floor. Go home, Mitch. Get some rest.” Graham stepped off the elevator.
Mitch’s mentor, staying even later than Mitch, and working weekends. With his rank he didn’t have to. Compassion, he’d said. Had Mitch lacked compassion?
Probably.
Emptiness ate at his insides on his journey from the elevator to a status symbol rapidly losing its luster. The drive through town, all the lights, didn’t give him the sense of accomplishment to cruise through the poorer sections to the better part of town, where he’d earned his place.
Being a sought-after doctor, valued for his opinions, living an extravagant lifestyle—one he believed he deserved—lost its shiny.
For a few brief hours, in a foreign land, he’d been a part of something larger than himself, helping others for no other reason than they needed him.
“Though I can’t be out, I am needed,” Nulfo had said of his home country.
Mitch could be out, and used to think the hospital couldn’t run without him. It ran just fine during his brief absence, and if he left permanently, the doors wouldn’t close.
But Arnulfo had been wrong. He was needed. Both in El Salvador and the US: by Mitch and Lida here, but whole villages of people there.
Mitch pulled into his reserved parking space beneath his building, and took yet another elevator. He slogged to a lonely condo that would have easily held all the remaining buildings in Arnulfo’s village.
He showered and shaved, scrubbing and scrubbing, until he finally felt clean again. Arnulfo spoke truths Mitch never saw: the flashy car and expensive condo just weren’t him. He’d gladly trade all worldly possessions for a tiny hut in El Salvador, if giving up everything meant he’d be with the man he loved.
With a bright-eyed little girl completing their family.
February 2, 2001—Atlanta, Georgia
Mitch sat at Lida’s bedside in the children’s ward, book in hand. “El burro—”
“Burro!” the world’s youngest Spanish teacher cried, rolling the r’s. “El burro.”
“El burro,” he tried again, earning a smile. With her help they made their way through the book. He stood from the chair.
The corners of Lida’s mouth turned down. “Papa?” she asked.
“Soon.” Far too much time passed with no phone calls. But technology wasn’t the same in El Salvador as the US. At least Mitch stopped feeling phantom earthquakes.
But now Arnulfo wasn’t the only Spanish speaker with claims to Mitch’s heart. He pulled a slip of paper from his pocket and sounded out the words he’d gotten from Cassie: “I’ll see you later.”
He retreated to his office and placed the book on his desk. What would he do when Lida grew well enough to return home? What would happen to a girl with no home to return to, just an uncle, and no house?
His phone rang. “Doctor Rollins.”
A long pause, and then, “Hello, Mitch. How are you? How is Lida?”
“I’m fine, she’s doing well.” Mitch relaxed into his chair, picturing Nulfo in his mind. He tried to sound casual, keeping the worry from his voice, all the while tapping a ragged beat on the desk with an ink pen. It wasn’t his choice to make and pleading would do no good. He’d made his case, their future, or lack thereof, rested on Nulfo’s shoulders.
“She’s responding well to treatment,” Mitch said. “The scars on her face should be hardly noticeable once properly healed.” They filled the next few minutes with details of Lida’s surgeries, her progress, and treatment plan. Once they’d exhausted the topic, silence hung heavy between them. Mitch held his breath, waiting for the words that would either make or break him, for if Nulfo chose to stay in Central America, Mitch stood to lose more than a lover and partner—he’d lose Lida too.
He’d made a few covert inquiries and Arnulfo had spoken the truth. In the mountainous areas of El Salvador, a gay couple would find no acceptance, let alone be allowed to raise a daughter together.
Not to mention the suspicion locals would have for an American man seen with a Salvadoran child.
Agonizing moments passed before Arnulfo broke the silence. “I’ve given some thought to what you said.”
“And?” Mitch kept a tight rein on his hopes. He’d never wanted anything as desperately as he did a life with Arnulfo and Lida.
“You’re right. What’s really needed here is money, and a champion for their cause.” Arnulfo paused for a moment. His voice grew hesitant, and Mitch could easily visualize the man’s typical nervous gestures of lip biting and hair pulling. Had he slicked his hair back into a tail, or did dark waves flow over his shoulders? How Mitch missed combing his fingers through his lover’s hair. “If I return to the United States I’ll insist on spending at least a few weeks every year down here, helping out however I can, and I intend to be heavily involved in improving life for my people.”
If I return? Mitch’s heart pounded double-time. When faced with a choice between sharing Nulfo with a faraway village and not having him at all, the decision became a no-brainer. “I can live with that.”
“Can you? Can you also live with, how did you put it, ‘half my pay going to family back home?’ Only, now, it’s not even family, just people who need money worse than I do.”
Two doctors? Together? They’d make more than enough to share. And once Mitch included his parents and their wealthy friends in a fund-raiser, they’d see to constructing more earthquake-proof houses. “Actually, having had time to consider the matter, I think it’s a pretty admirable trait.”
“Will you grumble and complain if I cook pupusas for lunch?”
Pupusas? “Never! Um, that is some kind of food, right?”
A strained chuckled reached his ears. “You really should ask more questions, you know. The flat bread, filled with meat and cheese. You said you liked them.”
“Oh!” Yes, they had been rather tasty. “I guess eating a few papoose... or...”
“Pupusas.”
“Pupusas, then. Eating pupusas won’t hurt me.” Although they might add to Mitch’s waistline.
“And if I attend an opera with you, will you go kayaking with me?”
Oh, to see Arnulfo in a tux. Of course, shorts and a T-shirt worked too. “I’ve heard kayaking is great exercise.” Plenty of local rivers to kayak in. Might be fun. Didn’t kayakers wear skin-tight suits? Lycra, stretched over Nulfo’s trim frame. Yep. Kayaking. Mitch’s new favorite sport.
The phone went quiet. “Arnulfo? Are you still there?” Please let them not have gotten disconnected. Lines into the country were still kind of iffy.
“Yeah, I’m here. I should warn you that I’m not an easy man.” Something unspoken hid within those words. Something Mitch couldn’t quite decipher—almost a question.
“I never thought you were easy.”
A heavy sigh, then, “No, I mean I’m not easy. I wasn’t raised to think like an American. Just moving in with you isn’t something I can do.”
The tiny hoped that flared to life when the phone rang quivered and died. “If that’s how you feel, then I have no choice but to accept that and...”
“Hush, you crazy gringo, I’m trying to propose!”
May 3, 2003—Atlanta, Georgia
“Her burns healed nicely. She’s a beautiful child.” The gray-haired pediatrician ruffled Lida’s dark curls.
“Yes, she is.” Particularly with her strong familial resemblance to Arnulfo. “Smart as a whip, too. Her English is improving every day.” Oh, damn. There Mitch went, sounding like a proud papa again. Aw, who the hell cared? He was a proud papa.
“Gonna stay with Gamma,” Lida announced, chubby cheeks flushed pink.
Her trip to “Camp Rollins” would likely be quite the adventure. Mitch laughed. “She’s going to be staying with my parents for a few weeks.”
The doctor was well-familiar with Mitch’s family. “I saw them last week. Seems they’re quite smitten with their granddaughter.”
“Smitten doesn’t even begin to cover it.” Mitch grinned. “C’mon, munchkin.” He lifted Lida from the exam table. She wrapped one arm around his neck, waving the other one.
“Bye,” she said to anyone who’d listen on their way out of the pediatrician’s office.
“Where would you like to go for lunch?” Mitch managed in broken Spanish while strapping his daughter into a late model minivan. A minivan! My, how the mighty Mitchell Rollins has fallen. A top of the line minivan, but a minivan nonetheless. Smiling to himself, he corrected, No, how the mighty Mitchell Rollins has risen.
“Daddy!” Lida wailed. “I haf ‘Mercan. Speak Inglés! ’Mercan, Daddy. Haf ‘Mercan!”
He laughed and patted her cheek. “Yes, since one of your fathers is American, I guess that does make you half American. But Daddy needs to practica Español. Tell you what. We’ll speak English in the afternoon and Spanish in the morning.”
“Sí, Daddy.”
She was attempting to feed French fries to her doll by the time they pulled up to the house in the suburbs Mitch never thought he’d own. With the touch a button the garage door opened, revealing an older model compact car and a bicycle with training wheels.
Mitch pulled in and helped Lida out. She shouted, “Papa!” and barreled into the house, chattering wildly in a mix of English and Spanish.
Toys littered the living room, leading the way to a bedroom decorated with a canopy bed and fairy tale princesses. Mitch rested against the doorway to watch his partner hugging and kissing their own little princess. On the bed lay a half-filled suitcase packed with tiny, frilly clothes.
The house was a far cry from the glass and chrome condominium Mitch used to own, and a whole lot more homey. The doorbell sounded.
Lida raced to the living room. “Abuel—Gamma!”
Taking advantage of the distraction, Mitch pulled Arnulfo into a quick hug. The tears forming in his husband’s eyes might break his heart. “It’s part of our compromise, remember?”
Arnulfo nodded. “I remember. Still, it hurts to leave her like this.”
“It’s only for six weeks, and she had such fun with my parents spoiling her rotten last time that she hardly even missed us. All children stay with their grandparents.” Mitch would never tell of the tears he himself had shed on the way home.
