“Is better. You go to nice place, have a good dinner.”
Even Martia wants us away on this day. She doesn’t like the way the house feels any more than we do.
The shiny blue air-conditioned taxi arrives on time. Crisply dressed, the driver holds the door for Mother, something Jinco never does. The car is solid, expensive, with leather seats. Kammi scoots into the middle between Mother and me. She smoothes out her linen skirt and tucks her flowerprint purse on the seat between us.
The driver smiles into the rearview mirror at Mother. His eyes never stray to look at Kammi or me. He knows who has the money. “Where are you going?”
“Otrobanda. Café Azul.”
“Ah, yes, Azul, very good fish, shrimps, there.” The man eases the car out of the driveway smoothly, not the way Jinco does, leaving a trail of dust everywhere.
“You are new here?” the driver asks.
“No, we come every summer,” Mother says. She doesn’t explain that this is Kammi’s first visit.
“Oh, that is very good. You know where you are going. No need to point out the tourist sites.”
“Thank you.” Mother turns her head to look out the passenger-side window.
Kammi nudges me, points at the colors of the sky to the west.
I nod. The colors mean it will soon be dark. That night, Dad didn’t return. Mother finally stopped pacing along the widow’s walk and called the police to report him missing. I told her to tell them to check the airport. Maybe he’d taken the boat to Willemstad and then taken a plane back to Maine or Italy. Mother just told them Dad had gone out to fish and he hadn’t come back. I sat outside on the deck growing colder and colder despite the tropical air until Martia wrapped me in a shawl and made me hot chocolate, the kind my grandmother used to make, with the miniature marsh -mallows on top. The locals—I don’t know how they knew; maybe Martia summoned them like spirits—set bonfires on the beach, to provide a light should Dad be lost and unsure of the shoreline.
The trip to town takes forever with the traffic. Lights begin to twinkle on as the taxi driver winds down narrow streets, eases past slower cars, avoids pedestrians. Despite the crush, he never jerks the steering wheel. He’ll charge Mother more than Jinco does, but she won’t mind paying.
“Kammi, look over here,” Mother says, pointing to the floating market.
“Remember? That’s where the boats go, the ones that come from Venezuela for trade,” I say. “The fishing boats.” The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them.
Mother sucks in her breath.
Kammi unzips her purse, takes out a small map, and quickly unfolds it. I recognize it’s a cruise-ship map, one we picked up in Willemstad on our previous trip. The map posts all the important tourist spots, or at least the shops that pay to have their names printed on the map. “The pottery place. May we go there? My mom—my mom likes pottery.”
“Perhaps after dinner. I think there’s a shoe shop in Otrobanda, too. You need hiking shoes.”
Kammi says, “I’m sorry. I should have brought some.”
“Nonsense, how would you have known? But I can’t send you home with blisters on your feet.”
I wriggle my toes in my flip-flops. I don’t have hiking shoes, not even sturdy sports sandals. I left them in Maine.
Mother pays the taxi driver a partial fare, and he agrees to wait for us.
Café Azul looks out over the water. The waiter gives us a table right by the window. Mother motions Kammi into a chair close to the window and then sits opposite her. Leaving me to sit to the side, like an extra chair leg.
The air smells fresh, despite the grills going full blast in the kitchen.
Mother orders a Blue Bay for herself, sodas for us—mine a diet—not even asking what we want.
“Do you like spicy?” Mother asks Kammi.
“How spicy?”
“Pepper and lime, almost like a curry. Just a hint of hot. I recommend the mango fish platter. If it’s as good as last year.”
Mother dares to speak of last year.
“They have fish and chips,” I say, pointing to the children’s menu. Dad liked to go to fancy restaurants and order fried food. It was something he and Mother argued about.
“Fried food should be outlawed.” Mother slips off her reading glasses, the rectangular ones, and folds them next to her plate.
After the waiter returns with our drinks, paper umbrellas propped against the glass rims for show, he takes our order. Mother and Kammi choose the mango fish. I ask for grilled fish with lemon, but with French fries.
Mother’s smile stays tight, but she doesn’t change my order for me.
While we wait for the food to arrive, I stare at the candelabras on the bar across the room. They are huge, ornate, as if someone stole them out of a cathedral. They look out of place here, in a restaurant with simple pale blue walls, cobalt trim, and white curtains.