Paloma

On the eve of my fifteenth birthday my parents' struggling marriage reached a boiling point. Their constant threats to divorce began to actualize when my father threw a pair of freshly pressed button downs into his weathered black suitcase and grabbed his keys. My mother's insults rattled against picture frames that displayed photos of a family I no longer recognized and my dad's compulsory need to reply to each and every one of them prolonged his departure. 

In the morning, having allowed the guilt of their actions to settle, they shifted me off to the Dominican Republic to spend that summer with my cousin Palomita while they sorted themselves out. I arrived in the small town of Los Pinos del Eden only to realize that this side of my family was quite well off. The house my cousin was growing up in was a lavish two story, apricot colored hacienda with eight rooms and five bathrooms, not counting the servant quarters. The fields behind the home housed cows and donkeys, chickens and goats, and the largest concentration of pigeons I had ever seen. 

My tio, Don Dolio, had made a name for himself by incorporating city-life ideas into a rural town. He also engaged in cockfighting and carrier pigeon competitions which always seemed to render him the winner. The rest of my mother's family didn't engage much with Tio Dolio, especially after his wife had passed away. Whispers had always surrounded his substantial wealth and his departure from their hometown never quite settled well with the rest of his kin. However, he had always been particularly fond of my mother who was the only sibling he still spoke to out of the twelve he had. Hence my parents' decision to send me off to a relative whose familial disconnection would keep their own disfunction well under wraps.

Night after night my cousin and I conducted mini investigations of the sprawling mansion, exploring rooms she typically stayed out of having no siblings to encourage such boldness. Our bravery led us beyond the walls of the house to the fields where the animals slept, beyond that to the servant quarters that rested on the edge of the woods and finally into the woods. 

It was there that one night we saw my Tio Dolio carrying a cage with a white pigeon cooing inside. Immediately a silence fell between the two of us that far surpassed our fear of getting caught. Without exchanging a single word we both knew that what we were seeing was not supposed to be witnessed. My cousin pulled my arm in the direction of the distant house but I was a whole year older than her and as a fifteen year old without a proper quinceañera I was going to get my way. So I pressed forward, following my uncle deep into the darkness with my cousin in tow. 

He approached a clearing where a trio of nearly naked people awaited him. One man sat upon a tree stump with two bare chested women next to him. One of the women took the still caged pigeon and placed it atop a flat rock. My uncle bowed before the man, cupping his feet in his hands and kissing the tops of them. The man asked my tio the reason for his visit, and my uncle mentioned an upcoming sale of several of his cows. He explained what he deemed to be a significant profit while the seated man explained what he expected in return though none of it made much sense to me back then. 

Then the man gestured towards the woman on his right. My uncle approached the woman and began to suck from one of her breasts. My cousin gasped loudly enough for me to claw my nails into her arm. Only the man looked in our direction, and I swore he could see us despite the trees that shielded us from view. My uncle continued sucking on the woman's dried out breast as black liquid poured out the side of his mouth in a manner so grotesque I nearly vomited where I stood. As he sucked the white pigeon began to flutter wildly within its cage. It threw itself violently against the bars until its fluttering slowed down. Soon it began to wither right before our eyes as if someone was sucking out its blood through an unseen straw. My cousin, unable to take the scene any longer, clawed at my hand in the direction of the no longer visible house. 

That night, unlike the rest, we crept back into our bed in total silence. She faced her wall, and I faced mine, shame and horror resting between us until we drifted off to sleep. Ghastly nightmares awaited our slumber causing one to wake the other in endless intervals until morning light finally found us. At breakfast, Tio Dolio greeted us with an array of exotic fruits the servant boy had picked out just for us. Tio was in a particularly cheerful mood, his smile lighting up his face though his eyes seemed tired with dark hoods encircling their frame. He began to speak about my cousin's upcoming fifteenth birthday, asking me if I would fly back out in few months to be a part of it. I nodded and went along with all his suggestions though the image of the black liquid remained pressed in my mind.

My cousin sat silently throughout the whole meal despite how much my tio tried to engage her. Assuming we had stayed up too late goofing around, he kissed us both and went out on business. Upon his exit a flood of questions poured out of me in the direction of my cousin who could not or desired not to answer a single one. We remained this way for several days, my uncle urging us to forgive each other for whatever we had done, and to return to the friendship that had brought him so much joy to see. 

With time we did just that, unable to act as though what we had witnessed did not demand a deeper analysis. We resumed our investigation of the house, reexamining objects we once deemed ordinary but that now seemed sinister, dangerous even. My parents' problems drifted away from me like feathers in the wind. I could not wait to get back to them to tell them all that I had seen. I was determined to use this disturbing story to unite us. Proving my uncle engaged in dark practices would allow my parents to have a common enemy, a certified blemish that would allow them to shine a bit brighter; finally measuring up as normal, and sane, and good. This singular story, along with any other dirt I could dig up would save my parents' marriage, my insignificant life and so I convinced my cousin that we needed to follow my uncle one last time. 

The campaign to get her to say yes took several days but after many promises that I would indeed return for her quinceañera she conceded. It took several more days before my uncle returned to the woods but the moment we saw him send the errand boy to place a white pigeon in the carrying cage we knew we should get ready. The first time had caught us off guard but that night we would be prepared. We hid my cousin’s pale skin under black sweaters and wore our hair in perfect ponytails to prevent all the snagging we experienced rushing back through the woods. 

Just as what we had witnessed before, my uncle bowed to the seated man, made his request, and awaited the reply. This time, tio asked for the type of business that would keep him from having to return to the woods. A deal so lucrative, so financially beneficial he could stop worrying about not being able to provide a life of luxury for his daughter. 

The seated man chuckled. 

“That is more than what you are willing to pay.” I recall him telling my uncle. 

The fact that the man did not outrightly deny the request caused my uncle to fall to his knees begging the man to grant him this final plea.

The man replied, “This old bird will not do. I will need a baby pigeon.” 

My uncle vowed to return with one of his recently hatched squabs. My cousin, no longer willing to see her father sucking the life out of a pigeon through the breast of an unknown woman demanded that we leave. Fearing she would make a scene I obliged, heading back towards the house careful not to be seen by my tio who now struggled to capture one of the chicks in a coop filled with frightened birds. 

My cousin crept back in her bed, rocking back and forth perhaps hoping the movement would lull her to sleep. I remained by the bedroom window that faced the woods. 

“Get in bed and go to sleep.” She urged; but I wanted to see something, anything. 

I lingered there a few minutes more when suddenly a peculiar movement began to take place. The tops of the trees that led back towards the clearing began to rustle and then shake violently as though a heavy breeze coursed through them all though none of the other trees exhibited the same behavior. I beckoned my cousin to come see but she refused to get out of the bed. Tucking herself beneath her blanket, nearly weeping loud enough to draw attention. 

The wind like movement moved through the field, disturbing the resting animals, then up towards the house with a frightening speed. I began to panic, begging my cousin to verify what I was seeing but she only cried out louder. No longer able to withstand such a fright I jumped in the bed with her. Tucking myself under the blankets alongside her as a creeping noise emerged from the window where I had stood. Suddenly my cousin began to convulse violently. Her body flung up and down on the bed as if tossed around by an invisible hand.

For years I have tried to rationalize what I saw next. A spirit-like version of my cousin arose from her body and flew out in the direction of the woods, her eyes and mouth agape, staring back at me in a scream I could not hear. Then, just as with the pigeon, her body began to shrink within itself. Emptying out as though all the blood had been drained out of her.

I folded myself into a corner, unable to scream, to speak, unable to move. My uncle burst through the doors of our room just a few moments later. Finding the remains of his daughter in such a state he ripped his shirt off his body, clawing at his chest and neck, drawing blood as the ripped slivers of his skin began to clump underneath his nails. He cursed heaven and earth, dragged me out of the corner begging me to answer questions I could not even begin to comprehend. With words no longer available to me all I pointed in the direction of the woods.

He dragged us both back out there. Awakening every servant within earshot of his animal like wails. We returned to the clearing to find no one there. The baby pigeon cooed inside the cage, looking all around with innocent eyes.

"You fooled me!" My uncle yelled over and over again. "Reason with me! Forgive my foolish request! Return my daughter to me!" He implored, to an audience of cedar and mahogany. Collapsing to his knees, he cried onto the earth, hugging my bare feet as he had once done to the man on the wooden stump.

With bulging eyes he looked up at me, "why?" he sobbed, "why has this happened to her?"

The only reply, the only logic my distressed fifteen year old mind could conjure was: "palomita is a baby pigeon".