Eartheater: A Novel

Part One

Walter was good, unlike Tía. He’d sit on my bed and listen, rarely talk. He wouldn’t get angry if I grabbed a pillow and slept on the floor from time to time, beneath his bed, the wood slats and his mattress the ceiling of a house all my body’s. He’d stay with me, for hours. Waiting.

I listened to the noises around the house. I grew.

Sometimes my brother would ask about Papá. The old man, he’d say. He wanted to know if he’d come by, if I’d bumped into him again.

I don’t know anything about him. Should I ask the earth?

No, Walter always said, it’ll hurt you.

One afternoon I waited for Tía to go buy some food and snuck out. I looked for Walter in the next room. They’d taken out the big bed.

I’m all on my own, I thought. What if Walter and Tía never come home?

I went to the kitchen and opened a can of peas. Not wanting to waste them, I emptied the can over the table. A slimy liquid oozed from the pea mound in the middle. I felt like eating them but didn’t. My tummy needed to be empty. I went looking for a knife and, opening the drawer, spotted my old man’s bottle opener.

I needed something of his so that I could ask the earth about him, but Walter and Tía had been busy rubbing him out of the house, and out of my life. They’d even got rid of his bed. I grabbed the bottle opener from the drawer and studied it. Then, as happy as if I’d found a treasure, I stuffed it in my shorts pocket.

I walked out of the house, barefoot, hair hanging loose, bottle opener in my pocket, empty can in one hand and knife in the other.

I sat on our land, ran my hand over the earth, rammed the knife in the ground and pulled it out. I liked it. I stabbed again. This time I didn’t pull out the knife but tried to shimmy it, to get the earth to crack open and loosen up a bit. Though the earth was strong, it still let me. Once it started to give, I put my hand down and closed it. Earth in fist. I set the soil on my shorts. I collected it there. Meanwhile, I used the knife and my hand to loosen the earth. Then, I took my old man’s bottle opener from my pocket and placed it in the hole. Upright, smack in the middle. Fistful by fistful, I covered it with earth until it was completely buried. I wiped my hands on my shorts and legs.

Seated, my hair reached the floor and was the color of the ground I lived on.

I wanted something to crawl out of there, even a critter would do, but I got nothing. Even so, I waited, staring down at my hands, my legs, the knife. Then, I gathered everything up—the earth, the bottle opener—and thought of the last time I’d seen my old man crack open a bottle of beer.

It hurt to think of. Miffed, I shoved everything in the can.

I stood up and walked inside. A bit of pea juice had dribbled onto the floor. I pulled up a chair and sat down. In one hand I held the can while the other lay open, palm up. I tried to pour a small amount of dirt into my open hand but everything came tumbling out, both earth and bottle opener. Dirt spilled on the floor. I brought the rest to my mouth and ate it, hungry to see Papá again. I coated my tongue, closed my mouth, tried to swallow. The earth felt like it had gone from being a thing in my hand to something alive. Loving earth inside me. I kept on eating. Once I ran out of dirt, I turned to the bottle opener. Licked it clean.

Belly heavy with earth, I shut my eyes.

Papá’s alive, I later said to Walter and Tía, when I saw them gawking at me. I thought they’d be happy, but I was wrong. They were quiet. Like, frozen still. I ran up to Walter and hugged him.

What the fuck have you done, you twerp? my tía said, grabbing my arm to pull me away from my brother.

Walter, Papá’s alive, I repeated as she yanked me back.

My brother came to me again and grabbed my hand. He took me to the bathroom and scrubbed my legs with a sponge, then left the faucet running. As he wiped my arms and hands, he made me swear I’d never eat earth again.

I swore and Walter stroked my head. With his hand on my head, I couldn’t tell if he was taller or if I had shrunk.

Now brush your teeth, he said, leaving me in the bathroom on my own.

I looked in the mirror, smiled: my teeth were mud-stained. I thought of Papá and his smokes, the scent and darkness of his mouth, of how they wanted to forget him and how that was probably for the best. I held my brush under the stream of water, squeezed on some toothpaste, got everything wet, started brushing.

I walked back to the kitchen and tried one last time:

Your brother’s alive.

Tía turned around and looked furiously at me. She pulled a pack of smokes from her jean pocket.

Filthy brat. I catch you eating dirt again and I’ll burn your tongue with a lighter.

For a while, I was so scared I couldn’t bring myself to even step on the earth, and avoided going outside without shoes on. Whenever I felt like eating dirt, I’d scarf down piping hot food, the second Tía took it off the stove. I wouldn’t wait. I’d stuff my mouth and feel it blister. Then, tongue scorched, I’d down one glass after another of water. Belly full, the urge to scarf earth went away. The next day, I could hardly eat, I could hardly talk.

In time, they stopped messing with us at school. No more earth in my backpack dirtying my notebooks followed by muffled sniggers. No more alfajor wrappers—sweets I wanted but couldn’t buy—filled with dirt sitting on my chair. Just the odd look, and a lot of silence.

And, without the earth, everything was perfect.

Until Señorita Ana stopped coming to school.

They looked for her, they said, behind the reedbed.

Not me.

I stared at the corner of the school courtyard where she’d stood watching Walter and the other kids play soccer. She didn’t want any of the brats climbing the tree in the back, in case they fell.

I waited.

Once the police stopped looking for her among the weeds and little houses, or by the arroyo, I looked for her on the edge of the courtyard, in the dirt where her lovely boots had once stood to watch us play.

The urge had passed; I didn’t know if I’d see anything. Still, I ran my hands through the earth and thought of how Señorita Ana wasn’t turning up. I didn’t want to lose her. I thought of Señorita Ana, alive. Of Señorita Ana, laughing. Then I made a fist and tried to make some part of her find its way into my palm, my mouth.

Even though everybody said those white smocks were pretty, I always thought they were crap. They got dirty. Mine had earth all over the cuffs. The front and neckline were fouled up.

On my way home, I thought of Tía smoking and of her lighters. When I got there, I pulled off my smock, balled it up, and hid it among the plants. I told Tía I’d left it at school, that I’d been made to take it off in gym class.

I’m getting sick of this, she said. I look after you all ’cause your old lady died and my brother up and left, but you don’t listen.

She carried on cooking in the kitchen. I couldn’t tell if she was talking to me or to herself:

Don’t like kids, never had any of my own.

I walked to the table hoping she’d snap out of it, and no longer heard her. A little later, Walter came and sat next to me. When Walter was tired, he always spread his legs real wide.

Tía carried a pot in from the kitchen.

Go grab the plates, she told Walter. And you, bring three glasses and three forks.

Just as we were getting up, Tía laid her hand on my wrist and said:

Brush me off one more time, and it’s over. Got it?

You, drawing by the window, get up, said the hall monitor sent to fetch me the next day. I didn’t breathe a word. I knew I was in for it. I grabbed my drawing with both hands and walked behind him to the principal’s office. Everybody stared.

Tía was there. She didn’t have a clue what was going on. She’d come in to complain about my missing smock.

What’s wrong? I asked. What’re you looking at me like that for?

That was the last time I remember her looking, ’cause as soon as they saw the drawing, she and the principal forgot all about me.

It was Señorita Ana, her face just the way I remembered it, except not how she looked at school. I’d drawn her as the earth had shown me: naked, her legs spread-eagle and kind of bent, so that she looked smaller, like a frog. Her hands were behind her, tied to the posts of an open warehouse with the words PANDA JUNKYARD painted on it.

What the fuck were you thinking, eating earth in front of the whole school? my tía asked me at home, before slapping me.

When they found Señorita Ana’s body on Panda Junkyard land the next day, Tía left. Neither Walter nor I ever heard from her again.

I wasn’t going to school.

It was just Walter, his buddies, who came and went, and me.

I spent half the day slumped between my bed and the sofa by the door. My brother had got a job at a body shop. Sometimes, when he left for work, I would be slouched on the sofa, and when he came back, I’d still be there, staring at my toes.

Thinking: Why me, earth?

Walter never said a word. At noon, he would bring something for us to eat then head back to the shop. He was worried ’cause I’d quit school, but worry was all he could do. Half the kids in our barrio were dropouts. Except I wasn’t working, and I wasn’t knocked up either. All I did was laze about and