Like the character of Daniel, I wanted to understand. I wanted to reciprocate the affection, comprehension, and compassion that the people in Spain had shown toward me and the history within my books. As my research progressed, I realized that the refrains were accurate. Not only is it difficult for an outsider to understand, I often found myself asking, “What right do we have to history other than our own?
Can it really be so hard to die?
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be taken by anybody else, these pages must be shown.
But we escaped into a stillness within ourselves. We found strenght there.
I looked back to the hole. What if we were digging our own grave?
Doll. Dame. Kitten. Baby. American men have many terms for women. Just when Ana thinks she has learned them all, a new one appears. In her English class at the hotel, these words are called terms of endearment.
My throat tightened. I swallowed, reminding myself she wasn’t really gone. I felt Mama among the trees. I could feel her touch and hear her laughter in the leaves. So I talked to the trees as I walked, hoping their branches would carry messages up to Mama and let her know what I had done, and most of all, that I would try to be brave.
Daniel looks at a photo of Ben, alone on the dance floor. He moves to a beat entirely his own, life pouring in and out of him. He lived hard and played harder. He did the work.
Stalin has stolen more than lands. Hannelore, he has stolen human dignity. I see it in their forlorn eyes and broken posture. It’s all the fault of the Communists.
You know I don’t like to read, Yankee girl. Don’t think anyone likes to read as much as you do. What you got under your arm this time?” “E. M. Forster.
My mother’s a prostitute. Not the filthy, streetwalking kind. She’s actually quite pretty, fairly well spoken, and has lovely clothes. But she sleeps with men for money or gifts, and according to the dictionary, that makes her a prostitute. She started working in 1940 when I was seven, the year we moved from Detroit to New Orleans.
Some friendships are born of commonality. Others of proximity. And some friendships, often the unlikely ones, are born of survival. Rafa and his friend are comrades of hardship. They refuse to speak of the boys’ home in Barcelona. It was not a “home.” It was a hellhole, a slaughterhouse of souls. The “brothers” and “matrons” who ran the institution took pleasure in the humiliation of children. The mere memory is poison.
The platform is clogged with passengers, but orderly. With such well-ordered society, are so many police and guards on the street really necessary?
This is your time, Dan. Grab it and run. Do the stuff you see in the movies. It’s the stuff no one gets to do. But you can do it, Matheson. I don’t want you calling me in ten years whining that you should have done this and should have done that. As the saying goes, it’s later than you think.
Miguel clears his throat. “You’re very talented. But remember, Spain is not your country. Be careful, amigo.” The Guardia Civil delivered a similar message. Daniel knows the words of caution are meant to dissuade him. They should.
Valencia. City by the sea, birthplace of her favorite painter, Sorolla. Hotel guests speak of Valencia’s tranquil beauty, fragrant orange trees, and rolling blue waters. What does a large body of water sound and smell like? Ana wonders. Landlocked, fenced by circumstance, she has never seen the sea. She sees Spain only through images on postcards that guests collect in their rooms. If she transfers to the hotel business office, perhaps one day she too will walk along the beach in Valencia.
We brought her into the house. My stomach pushed up into my throat. The Polish girl was my sister’s age. What had human beings become? Did war make us evil or just activate an evil already lurking within us?
They were happy to help someone, to succeed at something, even if they weren’t to benefit. We’d been trying to touch the sky from the bottom of the ocean. I realized that if we boosted one another, maybe we’d get a little closer.
Each day when the train stopped, we’d lean out of the car and try to count the number of bodies thrown. It grew every day. I noticed Jonas kept track of the children, making marks with a stone on the floor board of the car. I looked at his marks and imagined drawing little heads atop each one – hair, eyes, a nose, and a mouth.
How would she know the truths from the untruths?