Mia Alvar - In the Country - Stories

Come March, Baby had stopped going to work.

“Her time card’s missing from the rack,” said Girlie. A new Bangladeshi girl took over Baby’s floors. We stopped seeing her in the Suq or at Jawad’s. At most we’d find her in traffic, driving her black Saab behind dark glasses, like a film star who wished to elude the public.

“Where did we go wrong?” said Flor Bautista, as if she’d lost control of her own child. And we did feel that responsible for Baby. Back when we lived in Manila, our own country cousins had come to work for us as maids or yaya, supporting their children while they helped raise ours, hoping to climb into the middle class within a generation or two. If our rising tide lifted all boats, what did Baby’s descent mean for us? If she could fall so fast from “maintenance” work to “hospitality,” just how far up did we live from the slop sink and the soil?

—

By spring Bongbong the gardener had proposed to Dolly the janitress, the happy coda to a match we’d orchestrated in September. We saw our chance to rescue Baby, if we acted fast. We bought barong Tagalog s for Bongbong and his groomsmen, a stiff piña gown for Dolly, bouquets and lavender dresses for the bridesmaids. Dolly chose her flatmates for attendants: Girlie, Tiny, Missy, Pinkie, and, at our urging, the woman who’d briefly lived and worked with them — Baby. What better showcase than a wedding, of the life that honest, decent work created? Didn’t every girl, no matter how loose or eccentric, want the gown and cake in the end? We defied Baby to hear Mendelssohn’s march or see the gold rings on their satin pillow and continue on her wayward path.

Of course, Baby said “Thanks-no” to the lavender dress. She didn’t respond as a regular guest either. But we refused to give up. The next time Lourdes Ocampo saw the black Saab in traffic, she followed Baby home. As it turned out, “home” for Baby was not some run-down workers’ village, but a small white bungalow near our own compound. Not far from the Evoras and deLumens — no former katulong we knew lived there.

“She got out wearing a black abaya, ” said Lourdes, who’d idled her engine nearby. “Of all things.”

To see her new Muslim garb for ourselves — and really just to get poor Dolly her RSVP, we swore — we started following Baby too. Rosario Ledesma saw the abaya, but noted that Baby stopped short of covering her orange hair. “When she gathered up the hem to walk,” said Rosario, “I could still see the high heels underneath.” Dulce deLumen went so far as to knock on Baby’s door, but the shades were drawn, and Baby didn’t answer.

“She’s found favor with an Arab,” Lourdes concluded.

No one had a better theory. Baby had receded from us, a hidden harem of one. What Rita Espiritu called her “family business” didn’t explain the abaya, after all. It was true we’d never seen anyone, least of all an Arab, with her, but Lourdes countered that a man who could afford such a mistress could afford to keep her in a second home. “If you were his wife,” she said, “could you stand to have Baby around?”

This new hypothesis troubled us more than the first. If losing Baby to her mother’s profession made us nervous, as if one of our children had joined a bad crowd, losing Baby to a world of mosques and abaya s and possible polygamy set off a more desperate alarm, as if one of our children had woken with a fever and was speaking in tongues. Without friends or her job at the Gulf Bank, what defense would Baby have against her new local benefactor? A few of our husbands’ embassy ties could help, if only she’d let them.

But Dolly’s wedding day arrived without any word from Baby. As Luz Salonga played the organ, we listened for high heels along the nave. As Father Almeida swung incense around the altar, we waited for the smell of Opium to pierce the smoke. As Dolly and Bongbong knelt, accepting a silk cord and pouch of coins from their sponsors, we still saw no sign of Baby. Soon the priest was blessing man and wife. Dolly turned, giggling at her new last name. “What a shame she isn’t seeing this,” said Rowena Cruz.

We turned to watch Dolly and Bongbong recess past the pews. Before them, the church doors swung open, and the afternoon sun brightened the dim narthex, as if God Himself were easing and illuminating their path.

But it wasn’t God at all. It was Baby who’d opened the doors and entered, wearing the black abaya we’d all seen or heard about by now. She turned sideways to nod at the newlyweds as they exited. And that was how she showed us.

Her shape had changed. The once slim, flat waistline had “popped,” as they say, tenting the black crepe out in front of her.

We looked to the altar, but Father Almeida had gone into the sacristy. We turned to our husbands, who only dropped their heads. Some of our teenagers trained the video cameras on her. We covered our babies’ eyes. “Take them to the car now,” we said, and the men complied.

We filed out of the pews and circled her shyly, as if we were the maids and she the bride. Lourdes Ocampo guessed her to be six months along. But who could say for sure? Her proportions had never matched ours.

“I think she is farther gone than that,” said Luz Salonga.

Lourdes addressed her first. “We had no idea, Baby.” An admission of failure, from a woman we’d always relied on for the scoop.

“I suppose congratulations are in order,” said Dulce deLumen.

“If we can help in any way…” Rowena Cruz began.

That word help did relax us. We knew how to help an expectant mother. “Come to the reception, Baby,” said Paz Evora. “We’ve cooked enough at my place to feed an army! And we love to do it. Anytime we can feed you or the little one, just say the word.”

“Don’t dream of buying any toys or clothes,” said Fe Zaldivar. “We’ve got more in boxes than our babies can use. Brand-new.”

“The teens would love to babysit,” said Vilma Bustamante, whether or not she believed this.

In the dim church, our words seemed to get through to Baby, or at least spook her. A hint of fear, like a trapped animal’s, flashed in her eyes. This encouraged us. We gathered up the nerve to start offering the kind of help she truly needed.

“We’ll throw another party,” Luz Salonga said, stepping forward, “when the child is baptized. The child will be baptized, Baby? Here in our church?”

“And attend Sunday school with our babies?” said Lourdes Ocampo.

“Of course you’ll be her first teacher,” said Fe Zaldivar. “Children look to their mothers above all. My first pregnancy, I took the opportunity to…examine my life. It wasn’t just my life anymore — do you know what I mean, Baby?”

“Cars and jewelry are one thing, Baby,” said Rosario Ledesma. “But a child needs a family, a—”

“Father?” Baby interrupted.

Rosario was going to say community. “Sure,” she said. “A father, while we’re on the subject.”

“She has that.”

“Oh, Baby,” said Luz Salonga gently. “Of course she does, strictly speaking. But that’s not all we mean by father. Who will teach the child and raise her? Who’ll provide for her?”

“Who provided my house?” said Baby. “Who provided my car?”

Lourdes Ocampo decided to level with her. “Baby, we worry about you.” She grasped a fold of Baby’s cloak between her thumb and finger, like the edge of a curtain. “Do you know what you’re getting into? One day you wear their clothes, the next you’re a slave to a stranger’s way of life. Are you prepared to convert? To raise your child as one of them? To lose your child, if things don’t work out?”