But it was not Clyde. It was her aunt Karen, flanked by two escorts, their faces covered by black bandanas. The sight pulled the breath from Olga’s mouth. Before she could say a word, they had pushed past her and were, as Karen explained, doing a sweep for “bugs.” Her brother had told her wild things about her mother that Reggie only amplified and colored in, yet these stories failed to prepare her for the terrifying and surreal sensation of the Pa?uelos Negros invading her apartment. Of seeing that it was all true. Of knowing that if they were here it was only because her mother had sent them.
“Okay,” Aunt Karen declared when the place was deemed secure, “if we are all clear, you can wait downstairs now, okay?”
Karen had spent most of her life in front of a classroom, and her professorial delivery reared its head even in moments such as now. Her casual demeanor made Olga herself relax, take her aunt in. Olga had not seen her in nearly a decade, since shortly after her grandmother died. Karen had aged, but not nearly as much as Olga would have thought. She had always found her aunt beautiful, and she was still so now. Olga imagined that Karen and her mother must have been quite the pair when they were young.
“Olga,” her aunt offered with warmth, “you are glowing. Are you in love?”
Olga’s mother had never believed in witchcraft, but her grandmother had, and she had always felt—with some degree of fear and reservation—that La Karen, as she called her, had a bruja’s touch. Olga felt herself blushing but unable to speak.
“You reveal yourself, girl!” Karen sighed with a smile as she made her way to the sofa. Olga felt her eyeing the apartment. Judging. Taking in the accoutrements of bourgeoisie that Olga had, at one point, been so proud of having accrued, and now felt embarrassed of. Olga and Prieto had grown up with Karen in their lives, but the relationship belonged, first and foremost, to their mother, who had, according to their grandmother, worshiped at Karen’s altar when they were in high school. Karen: the first person their mother had ever connected with utterly independent of her siblings or her family or her neighborhood. Theirs had been a closeness that nothing rivaled—not their mother’s relationship with her children, and certainly not with their father. Olga’s mother had once said that in her life only Karen had never disappointed her; only Karen lived a life as big as she was. To Olga, this was as close to having her mother near as she might ever get.
“So, sit your butt down,” Karen commanded. How did she feel so comfortable bossing Olga around in her own house? Karen pulled a flip phone out of her tote bag. “Your mama’s gonna call us”—she checked her watch—“soon.”
Olga’s heart began racing, at a pace that scared her. Karen pulled her down to the sofa and patted her hand.
“I know,” she said, “it’s been a while, but it’s still just your mama. Time means nothing when it comes to our mothers.”
But Olga couldn’t breathe. The tears welled but wouldn’t come. She couldn’t remember her mother’s voice. She couldn’t even imagine it. And then, she didn’t need to. The phone rang and Karen answered.
* * *
“WE ARE HERE,” Karen said. “Both of us.” She put it on speaker.
“？Querida? ?Querida, mi Olga? Are you there?” her mother said.
“？Mami?” Olga asked, the word quivering in her mouth. She was thirteen, or younger, again, her mother’s voice rewinding time, and pain, and hurt, and bitterness. “？Mami! It’s you!”
“Sí, Olga. It’s me! Mija, someone showed me the clip of you on the news! I was so proud. Finally, you’ve found your voice.”
The tears had come now, but Olga smiled through them. Pride was a feeling her mother had always reserved for Prieto; she bathed in it now.
“Something just came over me, Mami,” she said.
“What came over you was the truth. There comes for each of us a moment when we can’t turn our backs to abuses of power, and this was your moment. It’s still your moment, Olga. Here in Puerto Rico we are on the cusp of the liberation that has evaded our people for over a hundred years, and I believe that you, mija, can help deliver us the key to unlock this door.”
“Me?” Olga said with disbelief.
“Claro, mija. Olga, you see the news; how the government has had us on our knees—before Maria, even—begging for power, like citizens of a third-world country? We have long known our need to get out from under the thumb of this corrupt government and PREPA. Slowly, we have been accumulating solar and wind energy sources, but we can no longer afford to move slowly.”