Where is Laura?

Where is Laura?

When my older sister, Laura, left home to go to university, Mom had to adjust to her absence. I saw her often viewing our old picture album. Maybe she needed it to reminisce about my sister’s life. Mom told Laura the day she left, “You don’t need me anymore, darling. You are all grown up now.”

My sister cried and hugged Mom. When Laura found her words, she said, “I will always need you, Mama.”

The first few days after my sister left were the hardest for us. From an early age, she was my idol. I imitated her behaviour, how she talked, and even wore her clothes when I could. For Mom, it was even more difficult. She cried often and spent long hours alone in her room. Sometimes, I lay in her bed and curled up by her side without talking. I didn’t know how to help her.

My father had died three years ago, leaving us a little family of three incomplete without my sister. But as my grandmother used to say, “Todas las heridas las cura el tiempo.” Time heals all wounds.

After a couple of months, seeing Mom return to her old self gave me hope that she could cope with my sister’s absence. But a worry gnawed at my mind. Being two years younger than my sister, my time to leave home and attend college was approaching soon. How was Mom going to manage without us?

One afternoon, I sat by Mom’s side while she knitted a sweater for Laura. Winter was approaching, but the weather was still warm enough to sit on the porch. The bougainvillea Dad planted long ago still showed its stunning red flowers. The gentle rain from the day before made the wet soil smell fragrant.

“How are you feeling, Mama?”

“I’m fine, amor,” she said and kept knitting without looking at me.

I knew it wasn’t true.

“Last night, I couldn’t sleep well.” She put down the sweater on her lap.

“Yeah, me too.”

We didn’t have to go over the details. Fear grabbed our hearts because the noise in the streets always indicated danger. We often heard the sound of bullet shots, people's screams and sirens.

“I want you to be careful when you go to the supermarket. You know it’s dangerous out in the street.”

“Si, Mama.” I touched her arm in reassurance. "But I worry about you when I go to college in a few months.”

“You have to go. You need your education. That’s the only thing I’ll leave you.”

If we lived normally, I wouldn’t worry about Mom so much. But our world turned upside down when our country faced a coup. We were going through a tremendous period of political turmoil. People faced the terrible situation of living under a dictatorship, deprived of civil liberties, citizen rights and freedom of expression. Political prosecution abounded. Life was hellish, except for those who held power.

The military roamed the streets, displaying heavy weapons as if we were in a war situation. Where was the enemy? For those in power, the war was waged against anyone who dared to demand a return to democracy, social liberties, and free elections.

***

Uncertainty about the future reigned in our minds. Fear, apprehension and trepidation loomed over the heads of ordinary people. When the secret police showed up at someone’s door and forcibly took a family member, accusing them of conspiracy against the military, you knew your chances of finding where your loved ones were taken were slim.

As always, life must go on. We had no choice but to keep going, pretending things would be bearable. But they weren’t.

Laura came back home every time she had a break from her classes. She said she was doing well at school and dreamed about becoming a lawyer one day to help people find justice. I admired her.

After a while, Mom got used to having my sister back home for a few days. Laura said she couldn’t stay any longer. Curiosity gnawed at my mind.

“Hi, sis. You have a minute?” I stuck my head at her bedroom door.

“Sure,” she said while preparing her bags for the following day.

I sat on her bed, twirling one of my curls with my index finger. “Laura, why are you always in a hurry to leave?”

“What kind of question is that?” She frowned.

“A simple one,” I answered.

“I have to study hard to keep my scholarship, you know. And I have other commitments that are important to me.”

“I see. What are those?”

Laura avoided my gaze. “Sorry, Clara, but I can’t tell you.”

“Why not? What’s your secret?”

“Listen, I said I couldn’t tell you. You shouldn’t know.”

I did insist, but she wouldn’t tell me. She kissed me and left the room.

***

I’ll never forget that ominous morning. Rain splattered the windows. The storm unleashed its fury, and lightning bolts streaked across the sky. Through the kitchen window, I gazed at the branches of our bougainvillea bending like twigs.

After Mom and I had finished breakfast, I cleared the table. A loud bang at our door alarmed us. I notice Mom’s pallid face. We didn’t have the chance to say a word when they kicked open the door. Two military men stared at us in disgust. They held machine guns and painted their faces as in a war movie. I rubbed my eyes, thinking I was having a nightmare, but no. Reality hit me hard.

“Where is Laura Perez?” they shouted.

I had never seen Mom so scared; her whole body was trembling. She opened her mouth but couldn’t speak. So I did.

“My sister isn’t home. She is at her college. Why are you looking for her?” My dry tongue got stuck on my palate.

“Shut up, stupid woman!” the older officer barked at me. “Don’t you dare to ask questions!” He slapped my face with such violence that I fell to the floor.

Mom ran to help me up. “Please, don’t hurt her, please don’t hurt her,” she pleaded.

Without an explanation, the men destroyed our place. Our kitchen was a pile of rubble. They broke glasses, ripped out mattresses, and destroyed furniture. What were they looking for? Guns? Political propaganda? In our house?

When they left our home, it looked like a tornado had passed through.

It took Mom and me a few minutes to understand the dimension of our dilemma. My sister was in deep trouble. The military police were looking for her, and we didn't know why. Most importantly, where was she? Mom was now becoming frantic about Laura’s whereabouts and safety.

***

A couple of days later, someone came to talk to us. Her name was Rosa, one of Laura’s classmates. She said my sister was involved with a group of students planning a protest at the university. Someone alerted the military police, and they barged into the meeting and arrested the students. No one knew where they took them.

After my sister’s classmate left, I focused my attention on Mom. She appeared calm, took my hand and said, “We are not going to despair. We’ll look for Laura, and we will find her.” Her voice sounded resolute, but her eyes deceived her.

“Si, Mama. We’ll find her,” I promised.

Mom and I looked for my sister everywhere: at the local police station, every hospital in the city, and even the morgue. Laura was nowhere to be found.

A few months later, Mom got sick. The doctor said she had developed a heart problem. But I believe sadness consumed her. My mother died with my sister’s name on her lips.

***

Sitting in the back of a taxi, going to the same place I’ve been so many times, I looked through the window as the images ran in front of my eyes like the pictures in an old album, similar to the one Mom used to have on the bookshelf in her bedroom.

After I left the place where I got the DNA testing, I felt exhausted. I wasn’t sure if my tiredness was due to waiting in line for over an hour or to my mental state.

It was so discouraging to go from place to place looking for some kind of information to locate my sister or what was left of her. I thought these words were terrible, but I was realistic. After two years of looking for Laura, the chances of finding her alive were almost nonexistent. But I had to keep going because of my promise to Mom. Sometimes, while walking along a random street, I thought I saw Laura, but it was just an illusion.

Outside the building, the world kept going, oblivious to my pain. The children were released from school. They played and laughed, teasing each other. It was late autumn, and crisp, yellow leaves carpeted the ground.

By the side of the road, I came across a little coffee shop, and I went in. It felt great to sit for a while. A young girl approached my table and asked for my order. She had enormous brown eyes and wore her beautiful black hair in the same style as Laura.

I returned from my reverie as the girl stood by my table.

“What can I get you, Miss?”

“I’ll have a cappuccino, please.”

As I waited for my order, I noticed a person staring at me, trying to be discreet but to no avail. She was a young girl, maybe in her twenties. Twirling her fingers and blinking rapidly, she kept staring at me.

To my surprise, she stood and came over to my table.

“Sorry to disturb you.” Heat rose in her face. “Are you Clara Perez?”

“Yes. Who are you?” My curiosity made my voice increase a few decibels.

“I’m Rosa. Your sister Laura and I were classmates at university. I was the person who went to your home to tell you about Laura’s disappearance.”

As I remembered Rosa’s face, I felt my pulse pounding against my temples. My words came tumbling out of my mouth.“Have you seen my sister? Do you know where she is?”

“No, I don’t. I’m sorry.”

My shoulders sank.

“May I sit?” she asked timidly.

“Sure,” I gave her a crooked smile.

My cappuccino arrived as she went to get the coffee she had left at her table. She returned and sat opposite to me.

“Please, tell me about my sister,” I pleaded.

“What I’m going to share with you is devastating.” Her voice shook.

“I’m ready to learn what happened to my sister. No matter how horrific it might be,” I said. My mouth was dry as I waited to hear what she had to say.

Rosa took a deep breath to steel herself. “Laura and I, plus a group of students, were in a meeting to plan how to deliver the pamphlets we wrote against the military. We were asking for free elections, for the return to democracy and peace.” She paused and looked straight at me. “We had to do something.”

“Tell me about Laura,” I begged.

“Somehow, the secret police found out about our meeting. We were about ten students. They burst into the room, screaming and hitting us. They had us all against

the wall with our hands over our heads. Next, they proceeded to blindfold us.”

At this point in the story, tears pooled in Rosa’s eyes.

Across the table, I touched her hand and squeezed it gently. “Please, go on,” I said.

She continued: “I don’t know where they took us. When we arrived at that place, they pushed us into a room and covered our eyes. They took the male students out of that room, leaving us four girls in there.”

She blinked back tears and continued. “In that place, they tortured people. We could hear the screams of our male classmates. It was heartbreaking.” I thought Rosa might break down, but she didn’t.

She sipped her drink and then kept going. “Laura was our leader, organizing meetings and encouraging students to go to the streets to protest. She was well known to the police.”

“I’m so proud of my sister,” I said out loud.

“Yes, you should.” She replied. “We were at that awful place for a few days, but it felt like an eternity. They took each of us out of that room, one at a time and did things to us…” She pressed the heel of her hands against her eyes.

I was speechless.

She continued, “I won’t get into details, Clara. They are macabre. Suffice it to say that none of us was the same after the hell we went through. But Laura didn’t come back to our room. I never saw her again.” By this point, the colour had faded from Rosa’s face.

As she said those words, a sharp pain stabbed inside my chest. Darkness surrounded me. A sob caught in my throat.

Rosa stood and hugged me tightly. I stayed in her arms for a minute, thinking that Laura hugged her friend while they fought for survival.

Out in the street, we departed. I turned around and observed Rosa’s fragile figure getting lost in the crowd.

Three years later, I’m still looking for my sister. Whenever a new marked grave is discovered, I stand in line with hundreds like myself to give a DNA sample, hoping to find her remains. I promised that to Mom.

THE END