Pipíche
The sun rose and set one more time in a wordless sky as the fragrance of chicken soup
stirred the silence inside. Violeta was finally sitting up. For three days there were only muted
whispers, the lonely half swing of the screen door and the occasional shuffling of feet. Time
stood still and waited until it could exhale and begin again. Violeta made her way into the
kitchen and sat down into a world of secrets.
“You’re up, hermanita! Are you hungry? What can I make for you? Do you want to take a bath?” Elena asked solicitously.
“Stop talking like that Elena. What has happened? What happened to my baby? I
remember hearing the crying. Was it a boy or a girl? Where’s the baby? Where’s Mamita?”
“You had a boy, Violeta, but the baby was very sick. Mamita did everything she could to
save him” Elena broke down in sobs. “He lived for two days. We named him Pipíché.”
“Pipíche. Pipíche. Pi-pí-che” She liked the way it sounded. "Where is he? Where is
Pipíche?”
“Mamita took him away. She wrapped him up in a blanket and took him. I don’t know
where….” Her voice trailed as she looked away. Violeta looked down at her empty hands; hands that needed to hold a baby. Her breasts, rock hard and heavy with milk, pushed her thin cotton dress out in front of her. As tears spilled hotly from her eyes, her breasts leaked milk soaking her shirt and flabby belly. She was going under again but this time into a visceral, hormonal, maternal mundo [1], soaked in a shroud of secrets. She would never know more than that. The family shame of her pregnancy built a wall of lies that stashed bits of true love’s reality into its crevices, as well as bits of Violeta herself, lost in the name of Shame.
The arduous routine of daily life slowly returned. Pipíche was never mentioned again. Príamo and Violeta’s relationship cooled, tempered by their parents’ unspoken but clear humiliation and disappointment in them. Somehow, their very personal act of true love was processed through an arbitrary value system that did not deal in reality. Violeta’s teenage heart was broken. She was left mystified and confused as to the direction of her life. She had been so sure and secure in who she was and where life was leading. She loved her hometown of Quisqueya, her sisters, her tribe of friends and most of all, her beautiful brown-skinned Prìamo. Their certainty together and their status in their little world had defined Violeta but now she did not know who she was or where she fit in. Young Violeta was imperceptibly redefined into a state of quiet depression, insecurity and anxiety. Something very important was stolen from her - her trust and faith in life’s natural beat. Doña Emilia and Príamo’s mother, Doña Josefina, were now transacting in cash. Life had changed fundamentally and there was nothing to do but to change with it. Violeta’s transformation happened inside. She held her head a little higher and her shoulders pulled back and a little wider pronouncing her chest as the shield it would harden into for the rest of her life. Meanwhile, the sun continued to rise and set in hot wavy lines, roosters crowed the morning up and the crickets continued to lull everyone to sleep. Life mercilessly marched on, leaving the shattered pieces of the brilliant vitality of love behind. Violeta helped Mamita with Sylvina and the housework, Emilia sat at her sewing machine and read coffee cups, Sylvina ran after butterflies while Elena fell in love with Carlton Edward Smith. She was soon pregnant.
[1] mundo - world
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