Frida Page 4

  “It must be a stomach virus,” he had said. That was in the afternoon.

  “I guess so,” answered Mami. She was cutting a mamey, and as she pierced the russet-colored rind, the sweet yellow juices ran over her hand. “But I think we should call the doctor just the same.”

  “Call him if you want.” Papá searched Mami’s face for a sign of serious concern. He thought that women were mysterious beings, like cats, and that they had secret ways of knowing things. Mami bit her lip and continued to slice the fruit with steady, even strokes. Maybe he thought her eyes looked apprehensive, maybe he wasn’t sure.

  “You don’t suppose it’s anything more than a stomach virus, do you?” he asked. I think his voice quivered, but it was so long ago, I can’t swear to it. You reinvent these things in your mind. You relive them so many times that after a while you aren’t sure whether they really happened the way you think they did or whether you’ve made the whole thing up, embellishing the scene just a tiny bit every time you conjure it—adding this detail or that—until your mental image is totally different from reality.

  Mami didn’t answer, but she didn’t send for the doctor, either. Money was tight, and doctors were expensive. I guess she thought it could wait one more day.

  That evening Frida went to bed at the regular time, but she had complained of stiffness in the neck and spine during the day. I still thought she was carrying on just to get attention, but there was something about the way Papi stroked her hair and tucked her in that made me anxious.

  “I don’t feel well, Papá,” she kept whining. She gasped, short of breath. Her voice was small and cracked. Papá looked at her pinched, frightened face and winced as though he had a gnarl of snakes in his stomach. “Oh God,” he whispered. “Even though I don’t believe in you, please make this be nothing more than a cold.” His eyes met Frida’s, and I felt—well, why not say it?—I felt jealous. Don’t forget that I was only five, after all, and to me it looked as though Frida might be playing one of her dying-orphan roles just to get Papá to sit with her.

  “I know, Friducha,” he said, “but tomorrow we’ll call the doctor for sure.”

  He turned out the light. He was so absorbed in his thoughts that he didn’t see me there, cowering in the shadows. No sooner was he out the door than Frida called again.

  “Papá,” she whimpered when he sat down beside her. Her eyes were glazed and feverish. “Cristi was horrible to me today.”

  I hated her. I have to admit it. At that moment I hated her.

  “No, I’m sure she wasn’t. Cristina’s just a baby. She does silly things, but she doesn’t really mean to bother you.”

  “Yes, she does! She’s nasty!”

  “I’ll tell Mami to talk to her.” Typical! He never sat me on his knee or stroked my hair and asked me if Frida’s stupid accusations were true. He just said dumb things like “I’ll tell Mami to talk to her.” He let Frida get away with everything just because she was the favorite.

  Frida started to wail. “She took my doll!” That was a lie! I hadn’t touched her doll. Sometimes I did take her toys, but not that day, because I hadn’t even been allowed in the room. But did Papá think to ask me if it was true?

  “All right. Tomorrow we’ll make her give it back,” he said.

  “I want it back now!”

  “Cristina’s sleeping now. We’ll have to wait until tomorrow.”

  Frida’s little fingers curled into a fist and her body trembled with rage. “I want it now!”

  I was dying to call out, “I don’t have your ugly doll!,” but I didn’t want them to know I was eavesdropping, so I kept quiet.

  Papá looked exhausted. With Frida’s illness, her crankiness had increased to the point that even he had to admit she was unbearable.

  “Go to bed now, Friducha.”

  “It’s not fair! I want it now!”

  For the second time, Papá turned out the light, then lumbered toward his study. “You know what I am?” he said to the invisible creatures that inhabit the night. He spoke in a voice so low it was almost inaudible. “I’m some sort of ancient reptile who should have died centuries ago.” I peeped through the keyhole—it was the old-fashioned kind, large enough for a wrought-iron house key—and watched him scan his record collection without registering the name of a single disk, then again, more carefully. He made a selection, turned on the Victrola, and slumped into a fat, comfortable chair. Moments later, strains of a Beethoven sonata filled the room and trickled out the keyhole. He closed his eyes and tried to listen, but Frida started moaning again. He sat up and leaned toward the door as if he had heard her, even though I knew he couldn’t have. Her voice wasn’t strong enough to carry over the music. And yet again, the wince as if he had snakes in his stomach. It’s true I was just a young child, but I sensed his anxiety. I know now that he was straining to suppress the questions that had been tormenting him just below the threshold of consciousness: What if Frida’s illness wasn’t just a cold? What if something was seriously wrong with her?

  I saw him doze in his chair, wake suddenly, then doze again. He resisted going to bed. I guess he felt that somehow, as long as he sat upright in that chair, he was less vulnerable to the demons that pursued him. His financial worries had already left him drained, and this new fear was gnawing him to bits. Finally, barely able to stand the oppressive weight of his eyelids, he forced his head erect and lugged himself to the door. I darted for a decorative table that stood outside the study and hid under it, and from there watched him trudge back to his bedroom.

  The windows that opened to the patio were covered with heavy curtains. One curtain had been pushed aside and the pane left slightly ajar, perhaps to let in some fresh air. Standing on top of a watering can, I could see in just slightly, and I could hear, with difficulty, my parents’ muffled words.

  Mami was lying with her head propped up, reading the Bible.

  “Does it help?” asked Papá. I don’t think he intended to sound sarcastic, but Mami didn’t answer. She closed the book and rolled over on her side. He got into bed next to her, kissed her on the ear, then put out the light.

  I peered into the black room. They were done talking. I was getting sleepy and it was senseless to stand there in the dark, so I made my way back to my sisters’ room and crawled under the covers next to Adriana. But I couldn’t drift off. I kept thinking of Papá in his bed, twisting and turning like a cat with nettles. I imagined him staring into the asphyxiating blackness, straining his ears to detect a cry or a moan or any other indication that Frida’s state was worsening.

  I sank into a terrifying nightmare in which Papá was having an even more terrifying nightmare. Then, suddenly, both our nightmares were aborted by a terrifying reality: Frida’s scream. It lacerated the night and sent pains shooting through my head. But I didn’t move. Instead, I lay there, imagining Papá’s gargantuan efforts to pull his hand up to the edge of the blanket and to push it away with unwieldy, leaden fingers. Another cry, this one shriller and closer than the first, yet a million miles away.

  I didn’t actually see Matilde and Adriana sit up in bed, but I sensed their movements, quick and automatic, as though Frida’s voice had activated springs in their hips. But I was out the door before them, racing barefoot to Frida’s bed.

  “You should have brought the doctor,” Papá was saying. “It was a mistake to wait.”

  Mami shot him a ferocious look.

  “My leg!” wailed Frida. “My leg hurts! It’s awful!”

  “Which leg?” Mami pulled back the blankets with disturbing efficiency.

  “This one, the right one. All this part here.” Frida pointed to her calf.

  Papá watched Mami lift Frida’s nightgown to the knee and massage the leg. She looked somber, but she wasn’t crying and she wasn’t hysterical. She didn’t act as though we were in the midst of a crisis.

  “Here?” Mami asked, massaging more vigorously.

  “It hurts!” screamed Frida. “I can’t stand it! It
hurts, Mami! It hurts so bad I want to cut it off!”

  Papá shuddered and squeezed his eyelids shut. “I’ll send for Dr. Costa,” he stammered.

  “Send for him at once,” commanded Mami. She turned to my sister Matilde. “Tell Inocencia to come, and you,” she said to Adriana, “go boil water.”

  “I don’t think it’s necessary to wake the servants,” whispered Papá.

  “Just Inocencia and Manuel. Manuel will have to go for the doctor.”

  Before Matilde could call her, Inocencia appeared at the door with a rosary in her hand. She looked like a fleecy, spectral sheep in her crumpled white nightgown. Her braids crossed the top of her head and flopped over on either side, like ears. Frida almost smiled. “Inocencia looks funny,” she simpered through the sobs.

  “Holy Child of the Holy Father,” whispered Inocencia. “What is wrong with little Frida?”

  “Bring some liniment. The child is in terrible pain.”

  Mami massaged with determined hands. When she got tired, Inocencia took over. But Frida continued to wail.

  “Frida, Fridita,” murmured the cook. “Come on, little one. You’re always so brave. Don’t cry now.”

  Papi and I accompanied Manuel as far as the sidewalk. A phosphorescent moon hung inert in a heavy black sky. I strained to see if there was a face in it. There wasn’t. It was dead matter.

  Dr. Costa took his time in coming. Manuel told us that he had had to bang on the gate forever before a servant appeared with a light in his hand.

  “The doctor is asleep,” the servant said.

  “Of course he’s asleep,” Manuel answered. “It is the middle of the night. Everyone is asleep. But this is an emergency. Wake him.”

  The domestic resisted, but Manuel stuck to his guns.

  “Little Frida Kahlo is sick. The child of Don Guillermo and Doña Matilde, on the corner of Londres and Allende.”

  When the doctor finally appeared in our doorway, he was rumpled and groggy, but he hadn’t forgotten to bring his black bag. About forty-five minutes later, Manuel arrived. Costa had come in his chauffeur-driven automobile, leaving Manuel to walk. He was a bastard, all right. But Frida always loved doctors. I think she loved anyone who spent time looking at her, examining her, hanging on to her every word. As for me, I hate them. Well, not all of them. Not you.

  The doctor examined her carefully but reached no conclusions. All he said was that she would have to go to the hospital in the morning for some tests.

  “She can’t be moved,” Mami said. “She’s in too much pain.” But both she and Papá knew that they had no choice.

  Matilde and Adriana stayed home. For some reason that I don’t understand even now, my parents insisted that I go with them. Maybe they thought that my presence would calm Frida during the long ride from Coyoacán to Mexico City. Maybe they brought me along to help keep her amused. I remember that the hospital air was bitter with pestilence and formaldehyde. Everything was green. Green walls, green floors, green chairs. I was growing nauseous. At least the wimples and habits of the nurses were white.

  Papi looked dazed. Who knows what he was thinking. Back then, people were afraid to articulate, even mentally, the name of the dreaded childhood disease for which there was no cure. He was pallid, overcome, I suppose, by a kind of larval terror. I knew just from looking at him that his mouth tasted like ashes.

  “I am truly one of the Chosen People,” Papá said out loud. “Everything in my life is putrefying.”

  Mami was reciting the rosary. “Hail Mary, full of grace …” Her voice rasped like a wooden stick against a grate.

  “Stop it!” Papi said in a loud whisper that made people turn around to look.

  “Stop it? I’m praying to the Blessed Virgin for the health of our daughter!”

  “Have faith in the doctors.”

  “I have faith in God.”

  “I don’t,” said Papi under his breath. He looked woozy. He sank onto a wooden hospital chair. I thought he had forgotten about me, but all of a sudden he said, “You know what I’m thinking about, Cristina?”

  “What, Papi?”

  “I’m making noisy pictures in my head: waves bashing rocks, biblical tempests, traffic accidents, erupting volcanoes, snarling tigers. That sort of thing. Can you guess why, Cristi?”

  “Why, Papi?” I asked him.

  “To drown out Mami’s praying.”

  “But Mami’s praying for Fridita.”

  He didn’t answer. Mami’s voice droned on: “Dios te salve, María, llena eres de gracia; el Señor es contigo; bendita tú eres entre todas las mujeres … Dios te salve, María … salve María … salve María …”

  “Do I love this woman?” Papi said.

  “What?” I asked.

  A man, a total stranger, was standing in front of us, looking dour.

  Papi was suddenly hyperalert. I noticed a ginger-colored stain on the man’s white jacket, a black hair that extended about a quarter of a centimeter from the inside of his left nostril, and several flecks of yellowish dandruff on his collar. I realized he was a doctor. Some where, a baby wailed and birds screamed raucously. Something metal fell to the ground with what would have been a brain-shattering clatter if the object had been nearer. A nurse walked by carrying foul-smelling flowers. A rachitic old man hobbled past on the arm of an adolescent boy. Papi looked at his fingernails.

  “We have examined Frida and arrived at a diagnosis,” said the doctor.

  “Holy Virgin,” whispered Mami. Papi and I said nothing.

  “I am sorry to have to tell you that the child has infantile paralysis.”

  I didn’t know what “infantile paralysis” meant, but I flinched at the word sorry.

  “Otherwise known as poliomyelitis, or polio.”

  I looked from my mother to my father. Everyone knew what polio was—a horrible disease that made children so weak they couldn’t walk, couldn’t ride a bicycle or throw a ball or even play jacks. A dreadful thought crossed my mind: Ha! Now she won’t always be best at everything! No, wait. It wasn’t a real thought. I mean, it wasn’t something I sat and meditated on. It was just … sort of a flash. Then it was gone, but I felt miserable—guilty and treacherous. But you can’t blame me, really. After all, I was just a baby. I didn’t understand things, and Frida was always taunting me. It didn’t last, I didn’t dwell on it, it was just a streak of consciousness that vanished in an instant.

  I didn’t know what to do. What sort of reaction was expected? Should I cry? Should I hang on to Mami or stage a temper tantrum? My parents weren’t offering much guidance. Mami was clutching her rosary, but her eyes were dry. I was surprised, astounded, at her reserve, although I suspected the dam would break once the doctor was out of the room.

  “Your daughter has paralytic polio,” the doctor continued. “This is a viral disease, and there is no cure. During the active stages of the malady, Frida will have to stay in bed to avoid straining her limbs. Hot packs may help relieve the pain.”

  “Is she going to die?” I whispered. My voice sounded tiny, even to my own ears. My words shivered in the air like robins in the snow.

  “We’re all going to die,” said the doctor matter-of-factly.

  At that moment I wished Papá were a sturdy, muscular man who knew how to punch. I wished he spoke Spanish without an accent.

  Mami opened her mouth, but it took her a moment to force out the words. “How long … how long will the active stages last?”

  “Impossible to tell. You will have to be very careful about her fluid intake. Plenty of liquids, do you understand?”

  He said “do you understand?” as though he were talking to a two-year-old. Papi looked at the doctor as though the man were an imbecile.

  “You must maintain her intake of liquids in order to prevent dehydration. That means loss of water. Dehydration could result in fecal impaction. That means the bowels are blocked by dry, hard material, and the patient cannot eliminate waste.”

  “This man is used
to talking to Indians,” said Papi under his breath.

  “And afterward?” asked Mami. “I mean, after … the active stages?”

  I held my breath. What if the doctor did not foresee an afterward?

  “Please answer the question,” said Papi. I think he meant to sound commanding, but his voice trembled. He was pinned, you see, between his urgency about Frida’s condition and his resentment of the doctor’s stupefying arrogance. On the one hand, he wanted to draw as much information as possible out of the man, but on the other, he wanted to bloody his lip.

  “Afterward,” (and I think he added “if there is an afterward,” but I can’t remember for sure), “Frida will have to exercise as much as possible in order to limit her paralysis. Dance. Jump rope. That sort of thing.”

  His voice droned on, but I was no longer really listening. My mind was stuck on the words if there is an afterward … Yes, I’m certain he said that. Well, pretty certain. How can I tell you what I felt at that moment? Frida had always been victorious in all our rivalries, and yes, I had been jealous. There were moments when I despised her. But at that age, it’s natural for sisters to hate each other. What I mean is, I never wished she were … dead. I swear to you. I didn’t want her to die!

  “I would like to speak with our regular doctor,” Papi was saying. His accent was thicker than usual.

  “Of course. He’s with Frida. You can go in to see her now.”

  Frida was sitting on a chair, her legs crossed demurely at the ankle. Her face was still contracted with pain, but she had clearly charmed Dr. Costa’s young assistant, Dr. San Pedro. He was sitting across from her, engaged in conversation, as enthralled as if he were talking with a fascinating and worldly woman. Dr. Costa paid no attention to them. He stood looking out the window, smoking and passing gas.

  What more can I tell you? At school Frida had always protected me. Now, Frida could no longer go to school, and I found I didn’t need a protector. I could manage on my own. I stayed out of trouble. I made friends. I fascinated my classmates with stories of Frida’s awful disease and of our family’s heroic struggle to keep death from the door. Now sometimes I was the star of the show. Not often, but once in a while.