over how sweet the summer air smells, or a memory of making love, or the knowledge that I want to have more children. I want to tell Louis Leary that I can barely take what is going on inside of me. I do not have any room left to hold on to his feelings about the loss of my husband. I think at some point my stony face convinces Louis, at least for this afternoon, and he leaves.
LOUIS REMINDS me of Eddie, but the rest of the McLaughlins pull my heart in an unexpected direction. It is their eyes, which, except in Lila, are blue or green down to the last person. In their eyes, I am reminded of my own family. My own parents, and my own brothers and sisters. I am reminded that I look more like these strangers than I do my brown-skinned children. And even if I had been able to ignore the McLaughlins’ pale skin and light eyes filing past me every day, I would have been unable to avoid making the connection between my heritage and theirs because Mrs. McLaughlin won’t let me. As she says regularly to Kelly and Louis, she allowed me to be hired only because I am Irish.
“I wouldn’t let any other kind of person sit in my bedroom while I sleep, I can tell you that.”
“Mother, keep your voice down. That’s a racist thing to say.”
“No, it’s not. I like every other race perfectly well. But I want my own with me while I’m sick in bed.”
This appraisal of my value is startling because I never think of myself as Irish anymore. My own children have beautiful brown eyes, just like their father. I look at their dark skin and never think of my own pallor. Fifteen years ago I gave myself over to my husband, and to our family. I am one with them, and I am nothing apart from them. I made that choice when I fell in love with Eddie. I was nineteen years old at the time, and in my first year on full scholarship at Bergen County Nursing College. I was working two part-time jobs after classes, so I didn’t have many friends. Eddie was a few years older than I was. He had moved to New Jersey from Mexico with a cousin the year before and they were part of the construction team working on the building where most of my classes were held. I noticed him the first day of the semester. He was sitting on the school steps during a break, reading a book.
I had never had a real boyfriend before, and despite the influence of all my loud brothers and sisters, I was very shy. But something crazy came over me when I saw this young man. He seemed to be clearly outlined in a sea of blurry white nursing students. I walked up to him as bold as day and offered him the cold can of soda I had just gotten out of the soda machine. He looked at me as if I was crazy, which I was, and said, “No thank you.” But the next afternoon I did the same thing, and wasn’t discouraged when he said “No thank you” again. I figured out his work schedule, so that I was always there when he was getting off work for the day or just for a break. He was terribly polite, and I gave him no choice but to talk to me. I made him laugh, even though I had never thought of myself as even remotely funny. I heard bright, witty remarks come out of my mouth that I couldn’t believe were my own. The craziness stayed with me, and it didn’t take me long to realize it was love.
When I told my mother the wonderful news, she went hard and cold. I was the last of her thirteen children. She was exhausted, and no longer open to new ideas. “If you marry a spic,” she said, “you won’t be welcome in this house anymore.”
Of course I married him, and my heart narrowed and grew at the same time, and I stopped thinking of myself as Irish. I kept my maiden name professionally, but everywhere else I was Noreen Ortiz. I cut all ties with my mother and my brothers and sisters. When Eddie died and the pain seemed too great to bear alone, I thought of reaching out to my family. But my mother was dead