Señora Rosario returned to my room with me to make sure I hurriedly gathered my things. I put everything back into my little suitcase while she stood there looking very sorry. My tears flowed even more freely.
“I don’t want to go with Señor Baker,” I told her. “I don’t like him.”
She bit down on her lower lip as if she was stopping herself from saying something she would regret and then shook her head.
“I’m sorry,” she told me. “Do the best you can. It’s what we all do. Come along.”
I followed her to the front of the house, where Señor Baker waited in his car. He was all smiles, eager to help me with my suitcase. Then he opened the car door for me.
“Adentro. Get in,” he said.
I got into his car, and he closed the door and got in behind the wheel.
“I’ll start your lessons by identifying every part of the inside of the car,” he told me, and then, as he touched something, he pronounced the English word for it. He asked me to repeat what he said and then touched the part again without speaking and asked me to identify it in English.
Despite my nervousness and fear, I was able to do it easily.
“S
ee how easy it can be when we work like this?” he said loudly enough for Señora Rosario to hear. He nodded and smiled at her, but she just stared at us. “That was so simple. You liked that, didn’t you?” he asked me.
“Sí.”
“Yes.”
“Yes.”
“Okay,” he said, starting the engine. “We’ll have a little tour of the desert. We’ll stop and get groceries, and I’ll teach you words all along the way. It will be good. You’ll see. I’ve gotten you out of slave labor here, too,” he said loudly, and nodded at the house and Señora Rosario, who continued to stand there on the steps watching us. She grimaced and shook her head slightly.
“The housework you will have with me will be nothing in comparison with what they made you do here,” he said, leaning over to whisper, “and you won’t have to put up with that spoiled brat, Sophia. I’m the only spoiled brat in your life now.” He laughed.
“Now, here’s another good idea,” he said. “I’ll teach you a song that will teach you numbers in English. Ready? It starts like this: One hundred bottles of beer on the wall, one hundred bottles of beer. If one of the bottles should happen to fall, ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall. See? Sing along. Come on,” he said as he drove away from the house.
I looked back at Señora Rosario and saw her shake her head again and turn to go back inside. Despite what Señor Baker said and how I had been treated, I was not happy about leaving with him. We continued down the long driveway, past the beautiful flowers and hedges, the statues and fountains.
“Sing what I sing,” he ordered.
I did.
“Louder. Be happy, energetic. You’re off to begin a new life. Ninety-seven bottles of beer on the wall…”
The gate opened for us, and I looked back one more time as Señor Baker continued to sing and forced me to sing along with him.
Now I don’t even have a phantom family, I thought.
Why should I care what awaited me when we reached zero bottles of beer on the wall?
7
Newlyweds
As he had promised, along the way, we stopped at a supermarket at the center of a big shopping mall. Señor Baker explained that we had to get basic necessities and enough food to keep us for at least a week or so. He said my aunt told him that all of the kitchen utensils were there, dishes and glassware, too. A vacuum cleaner, pails and mops, brooms and rags for cleaning were in the pantry. As she had said, it was a house she usually rented out. From the way Señor Baker spoke, it sounded as if mi tía Isabela owned many properties. Señor Baker told me mi tía Isabela’s husband had been very smart about his real estate investments.
“You should be very grateful,” he said. “Your aunt is making a big investment in you. She’s paying me a lot of money to teach you English quickly.”
He looked at me to see if I appreciated what mi tía was doing for me, but it didn’t feel as if she was helping me. It felt more as if she was looking for a way to get rid of me.
“Your aunt is paying for everything we need and buy, so choose whatever you like to eat,” he said. When we entered the supermarket, he said, “Go on. Get anything you want, just like a kid turned loose in a candy store.”