Tigers, Not Daughters - Samantha Mabry Page 0,33

a composition book. Hector volunteered to run over and put it in the tree.

We never saw Rosa retrieve the note, but a couple of days later, Hector’s mom called us from downstairs saying that a letter had been left in the mailbox addressed to “Hector & His Friends.” We ran downstairs, took the letter into the backyard, and crowded around as Hector unfolded it.

Rosa’s writing, in pencil on heart-shaped stationery, was so light. When the sun hit the paper, the words were nearly invisible.

Thank you for telling me about my sister, she’d written. I hope she comes back. If she doesn’t, I will go out and try to find her myself.

Rosa

(Wednesday, June 12th)

Rosa had to wait almost an hour before she could speak with Father Mendoza, so once she took her seat in front of his wide oak desk, she placed her hands into her lap, leaned forward, and got right to the meat of the thing.

“Good afternoon, Father,” she said. “I’d like to know what Catholic doctrine has to say about ghosts.”

Father Mendoza was a tall, thin man originally from the Rio Grande Valley. Rosa thought he looked like he was made of sticks, and he always smelled somewhat brittle, like dry kindling about to catch fire. It was true that, shortly after arriving at San Fernando, Father Mendoza, in his attempt to counsel Rafe when they’d come across each other in the grocery store, had gotten punched in the face. Father Mendoza had then promised Rafe he’d leave the Torres family alone, but Rosa wouldn’t have any of that. Nearly every week since Ana had died, Rosa had sat right there—at that oak desk, with her hands folded in her lap—and asked her priest questions about faith and kindness and doubt and death. The marks Ana had left on the wall hadn’t scared Rosa, hadn’t made her wild-eyed and twitchy like they’d made Iridian or pale and mute like they’d made Jessica. When she’d first seen them, and traced the blue ink lightly with the tips of her fingers, she’d smiled. Her heart had bloomed like the big white petals on the magnolia trees in the park. With one beat, it had tripled in size. Her sister had come back. Within seconds, though, that smile faded. Ana’s marks on the wall were so broken, and the lines were so wobbly. Ana may have been back, but something was wrong. If the lines were broken and wobbly, then Ana’s spirit was broken and wobbly, too. Rosa was worried.

“Well.” Father Mendoza put his hands in his lap and leaned forward in his chair just as Rosa had done. “Unfortunately, church doctrine isn’t completely clear. There’s a lot on demons, but less on ghosts. Basically, we view them as souls lost in purgatory, stuck between heaven and hell because they need to make amends or atone for something. Some of them are harmless wanderers. Others are angry and play tricks.” The priest sat quietly for a moment. “Why do you ask?”

Play tricks, Rosa repeated to herself. And then she said, out loud, “I think my sister Ana has come back.”

Father Mendoza didn’t smirk or snicker, which Rosa appreciated.

“Have you seen her?” he asked.

“No,” Rosa replied. “But others have. And she’s doing things.”

Rosa looked away from Father Mendoza’s light brown eyes and stared off into the corner of the room, thinking. She liked this room. She liked the walls, which were painted stark white—white like the blossoms on a magnolia tree. She liked the fact that nothing hung on the stark white walls except for a cross and a small ticking clock. The room was always clean. She could do a lot of good thinking in a room like this. The only thing that broke the perfection of the clean, white room was the row of sugar ants marching up the wall behind Father Mendoza’s chair.

Ants sought shelter indoors during the rain, when their home in the ground outside got too wet. That made sense. Living creatures want to be comfortable, dry, and safe in familiar territory. If Ana was a spirit trapped in purgatory, she must’ve been very uncomfortable.

“I can tell you this,” Father Mendoza went on. “If God has willed Ana’s spirit to return, and