Remedios met Mrs Richview at the doorway and took from her a small brown parcel. Even before she saw the address, she knew it was from home. The oily dark paper, and the hemp cord holding it together. The parcel had gone through two postal systems, and was damaged.
"Thank you," she said, and waited until Mrs Richview was halfway up the stairs before returning to the kitchen table.
She opened the package. First she found a piece of newspaper, el Comercio , with an article about the les Chupa-cabras . Now there were sightings in Ecuador! She read the article about the vampire-like creature, the "sheep sucker" that attacked not only sheep, but horses, cows, even dogs and cats, biting into them, draining their blood. The article said eye-witnesses had seen el Chupa-cabra , and described it as four or five feet tall, having the body of a bat, with large wings, and scales along the back of the neck, a cat's face, and the teeth! Remedios shivered just reading about it.
Next, she found a note, from her grandmother. Or, from Uncle Antonio, the only one in the family besides herself who could write in Spanish. Her grandmother had told him what to say, of course.
"Remedios, my dearest one. You are blessed by the Holy Virginsita, and God has seen to it that you were born strong, and must help your family. You are the one we rely on."
The letter went on with news of the family. Grandmother suffered pains in her arms and legs, and felt very tired. The twins had both been sick, coughing a lot, but were now well again. Dolores, who had been born with a club foot, was having difficulty walking. The neighbour examined the foot and said it was turning more inward; was it possible there could be money for a doctor? Esperanza was pregnant. This did not surprise Remedios — her sister had always been pretty, and always liked to flirt with the boys. But it meant one more mouth to feed! News of Juan was the most troubling. He had begun to go out at nights, and Grandmother suspected he was using cocaine and travelling with the packs of boys that murdered.
Remedios lowered the piece of paper, shaken. Tears sprang from her eyes. What could she do? She was not there. If she went home to try to make Juan behave, they would have no food. And he was now thirteen. Even before she had left home, he had been nearly impossible to control. Esperanza had never listened to her, and that would not change. Could she find money for a doctor? Already she sent everything home but for ten dollars a month, and that was only for little things she might need for herself; the Richviews gave her food, clothing, bus fare she did not need much. Perhaps she could send half of that home every month and then in three or four months there would be enough for a doctor, and Dolores could be taken to one But half of the ten dollars would go to the government, and Uncle Antonio. Home. If she were there, Grandmother would not have to look after everyone. But then who would earn the money? There was no work in de Quito. Or in most of Ecuador. All her thoughts seemed to end in impossibilities, and she could do nothing but cry silent tears.
Eventually, the ringing telephone forced her to pull herself together. She wiped her eyes with her sleeve and wrote down the message for Mr Richview, then returned to the kitchen. Her plate of food looked very unappetizing; she scraped the uneaten meal into the garbage disposal.
With all the troublesome news she had forgotten about the parcel itself. Perhaps she should have opened it before reading the letter, before becoming upset.
Inside she found a small cardboard box, and inside that a little black leather pouch, very worn, tied shut with a black leather thong, a pouch she had never seen before. She opened it to find a rosary. There, the gold crucifix at the end. And the Virginsita . And Diosito! Mio Diosito ! What was this? There were no beads that formed this rosary, but los dientes! Small teeth. She picked it up to examine it in the light, and at the same time reached for the letter.
At the bottom, her grandmother had added, "This belonged to my mother. The rosary is made from a baby tooth from each of her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, including you. I gave it to your mother, and she wanted you to have it, when it was time. You are to give it to your eldest daughter. Maybe you will now see how special you are, Remedios. Your family needs you."
Remedios looked closely at the rosary. All these baby teeth! It was true, her mother had sisters and brothers, and her grandmother too. So many teeth, all coated to keep them from turning too brown. There were back teeth, and front, from every area of the mouth. Some had come from her sisters and brothers, a tooth from her mother was here, her grandmother, but she did not know which belonged to whom. She looked at the familiar pattern of the rosary: one, three, one from the crucifix to the connector. Then: one, ten, one, ten, one, ten, one, ten, one, ten. Sixty altogether. And all similar. All but one. One she now noticed, and how had she missed it before?
A tooth like no other on this chain. Longer than the rest. One of the two they call the eye teeth. Pointed, sharp, not like a human tooth at all, more like the fang of an animal. Like the tooth of a vampire.
Remedios gasped, and the rosary slipped between her hands and hit the tile floor below.
Stupid girl! she chided herself, bending instantly to retrieve this precious gift from her mother. Thank the saints, may none of the teeth have broken.
She examined them all, one by one. Yes, none had broken or chipped. Oh, how lucky! And then she stared in horror at the long incisor. Gingerly she touched her fingertip to the point. Sharp! Like a knife.
Unnerved by this gift, by the letter, Remedios returned the rosary to the pouch. She stacked the dishwasher quickly, cleaned up the kitchen, then took the parcel to her room. She found the rosary and the letter so upsetting she placed the entire package in the bottom dresser drawer, under her T-shirts. Suddenly, she felt exhausted. Without undressing, just removing her shoes, she lay on the bed and closed her eyes with the lights still on.
Remedios awoke with a start from a deep and disturbing dream she could not remember. Her bedroom at the Richviews' looked strange, unfamiliar, with shadows moving in the corners, concealing what? El Chupa-cabra !
She bolted upright and stared hard at the shadows, examining them from the safety of her bed, listening; the house seemed unnaturally quiet, as if she were the only living, breathing soul under the roof. Outside her partially opened window there were no sounds in the dark night air, not even crickets. As if pulled by an invisible force, her eyes became focused on the dresser, and what she knew lay in the bottom drawer, hidden, but not. The awareness caused her heart to race, and her lungs felt compressed, as if there was no room for air, or not enough air to fill them. Her stomach cramped.
She got up from the bed and wandered into the hallway, listening. No sounds came from the upstairs. She padded barefoot to the kitchen, the familiar place where she spent so much time. She plugged in the electric kettle, and that simple, everyday act calmed her.
The undercurrent of terror she felt began to dissipate and she was left with a gnawing in her stomach she understood to be hunger. She opened the refrigerator, took out the plate with the roast, and reached for a carving knife from the rack. Hardly aware of what she was doing, Remedios cut deep into the flesh, to the bloodiest part, pulling out the reddest bits with her hands and stuffing them into her mouth, licking the blood from her fingers.
She looked at her hands, stained crimson with the meat juice, the blood, and suddenly remembered this: in the days between seasons, when the weather begins to turn even cooler at night, when she had been a child, very young — had Esperanza been born yet? — she had tasted blood!
Her mother, her father — he looked tired always — her grandmother before her hair had turned all white She stood with them, her mother's hands on her shoulders, in the square of the village. The square, with the church at one end, was crowded with friends and neighbours, other relatives. "It is a feast day," her grandmother said that morning, "el Dia de los Muertos, the day when the people pray to all the saints for all the dead." How can you pray to all the saints, Remedios wondered, because there are so many? Her grandmother said the day would be filled with prayers. The mass had been long, with all the names of the dead read out by the padre, many together for the poor families, and individual masses for the families that could pay more. The procession from the church where they had just attended the tiring masses was under way, moving around and around the square, the prayers chant-like, led by the padre, with the people echoing and responding to his words. The pungent scent of burning incienso filled the air, and the altar boys rang bells as they followed slowly behind the priest, while others sprinkled dark purple flower petals before the procession.