You spoke quickly, naming all the items you needed to order from the vendors: toilet paper, apples, eggs, milk, potatoes, Chee-tos, and Spam … “Damn Spam,” you said, laughing like it was funny. Repeating the words, saying them so fast that I prayed the groceries would fall down straight from heaven. Then maybe you’d slow down.

Remember when you did slow down, Mom? Remember the days you made our breakfast, then crawled back into bed and Auntie had to drive us to school?

Remember when Frank almost drowned and you didn’t come out of your room, not even when Auntie told you what happened? You acted like Frank had died.

Remember how you let me hold Olivia when she was a very tiny baby because you said her crying gave you a headache?

Remember how I had to stand on my tippy toes to get her diapers? And you told me to go ahead and change her? “Just this time,” you said. But then it was the next time, too.

Say His Name

Say His Name

Frank has been in the hospital for three weeks. Still no one mentions him at school. Not Sister Agnes or Sister Rachel. Not Delia, Tonya, or Mary Kelly. It reminds me of the days after my mother died. I want to shout, My brother is alive. Say his name. If someone would just say “Frank” once, then maybe I could start to believe that he was going to be okay.

A True Love Story

A True Love Story

On the way to the hospital, I tell Auntie, “Did you know that Tata visits Frank every day?”

“Yes,” Auntie says.

“But why won’t he meet with Ed?”

“Pride. A lot of Chamorro men think it’s a sign of weakness to admit they need help. That’s why most of my customers are women. A little pride is okay, but some Chamorro men have too much. Not Fernando. That’s why I married him.”

I must have been right about my uncle marrying my auntie because she was a suruhana. So even though I know, I ask, “He lets you help him?”

“Yes, exactly. And he helped me, too.”

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“I was twenty-five when I met Fernando. It was at the fiesta in Umatac. My cousin Celia and I went together. Celia was beautiful and when the music played, men raced over to ask her to dance. The one that reached Celia first won her as a partner. The others asked the remaining girls. Except for me. I hadn’t danced since school, when I would cha-cha with my girlhood friends on the playground.”

I can’t picture Auntie dancing at all, but now I ache at the thought of her sitting against the wall while everyone else danced.