Auntie Bernadette talks the entire way to Talofofo, and in the afternoon she picks us up and talks the entire way back to Auntie Minerva’s house.

Olivia likes Auntie’s talk because she gets to hear about how Mrs. Cruz’s daughter is going to have a baby, but no husband, how Mrs. Santos spent her entire paycheck at bingo, how Roman’s mom poured a pitcher of water on Roman’s hungover dad and he just rolled over and peed on the couch. Olivia knows more gossip than any seven-year-old at St. Cletus.

One day I tried to remember what my mother said during our daily trips to and from school, but I couldn’t remember a single word. My mother lived in a world of her own—a world filled with sadness that I couldn’t see.

Sh-sh

My school friends, Delia and Tonya, are back to their normal selves, gossiping about Lola, passing notes in class, sneaking bites of dried squid. But, after my mother died, whenever I approached, one of them would quit talking and say, “Sh-sh.”

Even the nuns stopped whispering to each other when I walked by. Sister Agnes nudged Sister Rachel and their bodies straightened. “Hafa adai, Isabel.”

Sh-sh. So many secrets. Don’t they know there’s nothing they can tell me about my mother’s death?

Unless they know why she left.

Evaporate

Whenever I think of my mother, something fills up inside me, like water filling a bucket. It fills me up so much, I’m afraid my feelings will spill over for everyone to see. So I close my eyes and picture the water in the bucket evaporating until nothing is left, not one single drop.

Monday’s List

1. Get up

2. Draw Olivia’s bathwater and wake Olivia

3. Hide Olivia’s nightgown and wet towels

4. Make sofa bed

5. Get ready for school

6. Remind Frank to comb his hair

7. School

8. Clean bathroom and vacuum

9. Homework

10. Eat dinner

11. Finish homework

12. Read until lights-out

Techa

Auntie Minerva is a techa. To be chosen a techa, you must know the rosary in Chamorro. Most people my age understand a few Chamorro words like Hafa adai, but English is our main language. Even though she lives in Tamuning, Auntie Minerva grew up in Malesso, so she leads the rosary for most of our village’s dead. She said the rosary, each of the nine evenings, for my mother.

“I knew the rosary by heart since I was eight,” she tells us for the millionth time.

Of course, Auntie Minerva doesn’t perform the rosary every day, but she finds reasons to go to church. Usually to light a candle and pray for someone. Tonight she lifts her muumuu and shows me the bruises on her knobby knees. “This afternoon I prayed for six hours straight,” she says. “But my suffering is nothing like our Savior’s.”

When Auntie Minerva isn’t fasting, she barely eats. Twice I caught her spitting food into a napkin; she’s afraid to put some meat on those bones. I’ve seen the way she shakes her head, studying Auntie Bernadette’s full hips.