By Kate Lynch, April 2014
The paper's headline stared at Blanca. It screamed, Windiest City’s New Trend: Collecting Corpses On White Sand Beaches. She acknowledged what had, until this moment, been an unnoticeable lyric in the days' song. The wind. Yes. At seven years-old, she had never distinguished the whip of it enveloping her from her own breath. The constant whir in her ears, squinting to avoid particles landing in her eyes was what it meant to walk down the street, to play on the playground, to be a participant in this denizen known to kite surfers around the globe: Tarifa.
Looking at the words again she swallowed a bite of her Nutella sandwich. Corpse? She would ask her mother what it was. She took her plate from the table and put it in the sink with a clang. And headed off to the day ahead at Saint Augustine School for Girls.
On her way down the building's stairs, Blanca heard her mother and the resident busybody, Señora Prieto, conspiring in hushed voices down the hallway. Blanca slowed down.
“They’re coming in droves. Dead and alive. Washing up like fish. I can’t look out at the sea and not imagine another dinghy filled to the brim.”
“Tragic.” She heard her mother say. “The first time I saw an African man up close, it took my breath away. There was a group of men selling trinkets in the metro, hand-made necklaces and things. I came around a corner and froze at the sight of a man whose gaze locked with mine. He was blue, not black. I felt a fool staring, but couldn’t move. What skin, what height, the whites of his eyes glowed, he towered over our vitamin deficient generation; beautiful, statuesque, peaceful.”
“These cabrones in the capital today are at least open to granting political asylum,” ranted Señora Prieto. “The poor illegals living in shanty towns and working the metros to make a pittance, can’t feed their families. And they have to pack up and git when the Civil Guard comes calling. Think about that the next time you complain about Eduardo.”
“At least the dictator bastard is done and gone and these poor souls have a chance.” Blanca heard a foreign, almost violent tone in her mother's voice. And then it snapped to its usual tenor with: “I wonder when you’re going to get on your way, Blanca, stop dawdling and head on over to your colegio. We’ll see you at two for lunch, don’t be late!”
“Ciao, Mama!” Blanca picked up the pace. Her antennas had piped useful information into her pliable young mind. Stored until needed.
She met with Carla at the corner and they strolled the five blocks together that led them to school. They took their time. “Look at this little dog, this is the one that can climb the side of the wall, watch it, watch it!”
The two girls stood on the sidewalk, wind whistling over their giggles and shrieks as they pointed and laughed, witnessing the strange feat. Sure enough, the dirty mutt scaled the side of the blazing white stucco building and sat on the ledge of the first floor window sniffing for food. The wrought iron bars prevented the ground floor apartment from predators. Tarifa had no use for screens on the windows, no bugs, or dogs, were expected to enter this way. The little devil sat on the ledge, his beady eyes following them as they made their way to school, a contemptible snarl on his lips served as have-a-good-day send off.
Entering the school building the chaotic whistle and hair-whipped cheeks was replaced by the hum of two hundred girls filing through the hallway to their respective classrooms. Blanca saw a flow of dark hair, navy uniforms, navy socks, all blended together. It reminded her of the sea when she searched across it looking for Africa’s coast in the distance; a long stretch of different hues making one color.
Forty minutes later, all of the girls sat demurely in the auditorium as their headmaster, Sister Asuncion, briefed them on a dire matter. “Children, may God forgive me, but politics and politicians are harrowing. The most important thing we can do in our lives is open our hearts and arms to help those in need. Not far from our shore is a chaotic and perhaps cruel land that some of our beloved neighbors are choosing to flee from, risking their lives greatly to accomplish this journey. The result has proved tragic in many cases. Let us pray.”
All heads stared down in unison with a rustle, praying dutifully, for what, many were not quite sure.
“Carla, this sounds familiar. I think Señora Prieto was talking to my mother this morning about it," Blanca whispered. "They used the word dinghy and talked about blue men and poor souls. I think we need to cut out of here after morning mass and meet at the palm tree by the side entrance. We can run for it and head down San Miguel, straight to the beach.”
“You’re serious? We’ll have to run so fast! If Señor Ignacio at the market sees us, he’ll call our mothers. But, okay! Before mass, at the tree!” Anticipating castigation by Sister Asuncion made Carla sweat, beads gathering on her forehead preemptively.
The young Catholics filed out of the auditorium back into their morning of academics. Two demanding hours passed before it was time to walk single-file back into the chapel for mass. Blanca and Carla, separately, made stealth escapes through the side door, instead.
The friends found themselves face to face at the palm tree, and gave one another a quick embrace. Blanca grabbed Carla’s hand and off they ran, trying to outdo their companion, the wind, racing down to the beach.
“More kite surfers than ever today!! The colors of those kites are beautiful! When we get bigger we'll do it, too.”
“Stronger is the word, if we got on one now, we’d fly right across the Straits and land on African soil, it doesn’t look so far away,” said Carla.
“It’s eight miles! We couldn't swim that far. Let’s watch these guys fly across the waves with their colored kites. I wonder what countries they’re from? Maybe we can learn Deutsch swear words!!” squealed Blanca.
The two were sitting in the sand, hands shielding their faces, knee socks down around their ankles. The glare dancing off the green water and white beach was an assault on their eyes but the worst of it was the wild air forcing them to swallow the tips of their long hair, and pelting their bare skin with minuscule rocks.
Carla jumped up. “I’ll race you to the front of the Mar Abierto Hotel. Go!!”
They ran, they frolicked, they tripped and fell, laughed and got back up. Now underneath a pier, at the water’s edge, they laughed harder. “If you fall in, your mother is going to kill you, she’ll know you skipped school, even if the wind dries your skirt it’ll still smell like the saltwater!” screamed Blanca.
“I’ll tell her I wet myself, I couldn’t get out of Sister Maria’s class fast enough to get……..”
A force grabbed Carla’s ankles and pulled her down. Too surprised to make a noise, her panic level approaching shock, she was paralyzed with fear.
Blanca looked back with a quick reflex not sure why her friend didn’t finish the sentence.
A flash of confusion stabbed at her. She saw a man who was three times the size of her father. Bigger than her uncles. The biggest man she had seen. He wasn’t familiar to her, his skin, his eyes, his mouth. He was disfigured, engorged flesh on his face, swollen, maybe bitten.
She screeched a wail with all of her strength and sound. It was so high pitched it was carried into the wind and answered by the birds flying nearby.