Lindsay Quintanilla

A lot changed after Abuela died in her sleep, for starters, our house reeks of fish. The scent lingers in our spice cabinet, our pillowcases, and even on our clothes. At school, I heard a classmate call me la hedionda. It’s not like we don’t shower. We just can’t help it because of all the fish my dad brings home. Every day at midnight, my dad goes fishing. He gathers his fishing gear and drives to Lake Mead where the drought has eaten the shoreline. 

When I think of a fisherman I don’t think of my dad, but instead, of an old White guy from those TV commercials who fishes from the inside of a wooden canoe and wears rubber overalls. My dad doesn’t have a canoe. He wades into the water with a pair of crusty jeans and a Fallas Paredes t-shirt covered in fish guts. His tackle box is burgundy. The corners are filled with dust. He doesn’t use the rubber bait. He cuts a Sardine into tiny pieces. Fishing is in my dad’s blood because he grew up in Los Cóbanos, a fishing village in El Salvador, where the water is the color of grey clouds and the sunsets are too vast to capture with the eye. At least that’s what my dad used to tell us before Abuela died. My mom said my dad’s head isn’t there anymore. 

We saw Abuela’s funeral via Facebook Live because my parents don’t have their papers so we can’t travel outside the United States. My parents met in Los Cóbanos. My dad was a fisherman who had his own lancha. He painted Valdez in blocky blue letters. Everyday he’d sell the catch of the day to nearby restaurants, but all that ended because the civil war ate the country up. My dad said seeing his cousin Frido’s body wash up on the shore, gutted like a fish, was the last straw for him. My parents had no choice but to abandon everything, including Abuela. He said death lurked in Doña’s Marleni’s corner store, the fishing port, the beach. When they arrived to Las Vegas, they still smelled of fish. 

 We are usually asleep when my dad comes home from Lake Mead. His jangling keys wake me. I’ll hear him slump into his green La-Z-Boy and doze off. I like to crawl out of bed to watch him sleep. I smell the Corona Beer he likes to drink now on his breath as he snores. I sit next to his feet watching his nostrils flare. When he is asleep, he looks at peace. The lake used to be a family activity. My dad would whistle to let us know it was Lake Mead Time. We’d usually stop at a bait shop in Boulder City where Santiago, Sandy and I roamed the aisles touching the fake rubber fish. I’d always take a free map even though my dad insisted it was a waste, but then, he always got lost on Route 95. I’d get lulled to sleep by the powdery dust and hot wind. Every time we’d pull up to the parking lot of the lake, he’d say it was the closest thing to the ocean while he stared out at what I thought looked like a bathtub ring. I wondered if boats or cars got stuck in the mud in Los Cóbanos like they do in Lake Mead. We wade in the shallow water until our hands resembled my mom’s burnt plantains. 

Abuela only visited us one time from El Salvador. The purpose of the trip was for Abuela to meet us, but she didn’t even bother asking for my name. She smelled of eucalyptus. She doused herself in eucalyptus because she was afraid of getting attacked by mosquitos, but I told her scorpions were her real problem. She spent the entire time complaining even when we took her to the lake. “Some lake this is,” is what she said when we finally arrived. The desert was just some wasteland in her eyes; our purple mountains were lifeless compared to the giant volcanoes in El Salvador. 

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Abuela’s death stopped my dad from cooking which was a shock to us since he loved being in the kitchen. His dream was to open a fish restaurant where he’d serve the catch of the day. My mom used to laugh at the idea because we live in the desert, que irónico es eso, she’d say. She hates cooking, but unfortunately, she said the show must go on. If a recipe book calls for corn starch, she’ll substitute it with corn masa or whatever she finds so her version comes out mushy and undercooked. With all the incoming fish, she’s desperately tried to keep up. Over the past months, we’ve eaten fish in every possible way—boiled, broiled and battered. We can’t complain because my mom will say, “Ah, estan locos. Back in El Salvador, we’ve would’ve killed for a meal like this.” To keep up with the fish supply, my mom mummifies them with the plastic bags we get from Cardenas Market. She stacks their bodies in the freezer, on top of the ones from last week, and the week before, and the week before that one. It’s not all bad. We use the stacks of fish to hide our favorite food from each other. The other day, I excavated a Neapolitan ice cream sandwich wedged behind two Catfish. 

We no longer need an alarm clock because the thick smoke of fried fish wakes us for breakfast. My mom says cooking fish in the morning is a better way to air out the house. My older sister, Sandy, leads the way to the kitchen. We have to walk through the hallway where the walls are the color of olives and lined with pictures when we were little. Sandy is in high school and ever since she started ninth grade, she blows out her bangs, elongates her sentences, and corrects our English. I just started sixth grade. Santiago in fourth grade so we have the unfortunate chore of babysitting him. There are always two buckets of fish in the middle of kitchen. They are speckled with dry paint and filled to the rim, but some of the fish are half-alive, gills flapping, their stomachs sliced like an old cardboard box. We make pretend vomit sounds while pinching our noses. After we do so, my mom likes to slap us with her spatula so that we can show some respect for our food.

I’ll never forget the day we got the call about Abuela’s death. We had just gotten home from school to find my mom singing a Juan Gabriel song. She twirled around pretending to hold a microphone while my father chopped onions for the rice. His glasses fogged up from the boiling water. It was his day off from cooking at the MGM, so he wore his chancletas instead of steel-toed boots. We watched Nickelodeon and ate hot Cheetos sprinkled with pickles. My dad’s phone rang and after a minute, his voice reminded me of one of the Spanish songs my mom hears while cleaning; a voice so full of agony. My dad gets his languages confused especially when he is full of all the emotions, so his words came out choppy. “I talk with her last week. Como puede?” He took his hat off. His hair stuck out in various spots. The balding spots he tried to cover so diligently were visible. His knuckles turned white. He dropped the phone. He never finished any of his sentences because he was shaking too much.

Abuela died in her sleep. Her best friend, Marleni, who lives down the street found her because Abuela missed their morning cafecito. Marleni said there was a mosquito repellant tent on her bed so she looked like she was an Egyptian queen. Steam spurred onto her scallop lamp shade from her lemon water. The fan whirred above. 

My mom placed her hand on my dad’s shoulder. “Ay, Dios mío, but how could this happen?”

“Why are you asking me?” He threw his hands up in the air. It was the first time I’ve ever seen my dad’s anger rush in like a tidal wave taking everything out in its sight. Whenever he’d used to get mad at us for something, he’d never throw or break anything. He threw the bowl of green peppers across the kitchen table and slammed the pan of rice in the sink. Pieces of it landed on my arm and some splattered in Santiago’s hair like an abstract painting in those fancy museums I saw on YouTube. We all went quiet, only our breathing made noise. Spongebob’s laugh pierced the silence. “Why does no one listen to me in this house? I told you to turn the volume down.” He lifted the TV with the cord and all over his head. 

“Stop.” My mom shouted, but it was as if something had possessed his body. 

He let the TV go. It crashed against the white marble floor he installed last year. Sunrays sliced through the window and the shattered glass looked like hundreds of tiny diamonds.  

“What the hell has gotten into you!” My mother cried.

“I can’t do this.” Was all he managed to say. He held a piece of glass inside the palm of his hand and squeezed so hard blood dribbled down his wrist. I was paralyzed, not knowing how to act. I could feel the swishing sound of my heartbeat in my ears. My mother’s cries came out in hiccups as she trembled. 

“Get behind the door.” Sandy pulled us. I held Santiago in my arms as he sobbed into my chest. Santiago covered his ears. Tears stained his I love Las Vegas t-shirt we bought at the thrift store. My father dropped the glass when he saw us behind the door. He fell against the doorframe and crawled to his room like a baby where he made wounded noises. Santiago’s pee ran down my leg. I know I was supposed to cry for Abuela, but I couldn’t find the tears anywhere inside of me. 

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We started going to church after the incident. We only pray to Jesus Christ now and we can no longer sign the cross or pray to La Virgin Guadalupe. My mom found Iglesia de Nueva Vida because a woman at her job told her she received a miracle from God after she became an Apostolic Christian. The woman said her husband stopped drinking cold turkey. Just like that. He was cured from his alcoholism. At the church, there is a Salvadorian flag on the stage, but also many other country’s flags like Guatemala, Costa Rica, and Nicaragua. The carpet is forest green with pink flowers. There is a wooden pulpit on the stage with a purple and gold mantle over it. Next to the mantle, there is a bottle of Olive Oil that the pastor uses to touch people’s foreheads when he prays. Most of the time, I can’t think of anything to say to this Jesus guy because my brain is filled with pictures of my dad fishing by himself at the lake. My dad doesn’t go to church with us. He said there is no saving him now. He keeps saying we all die eventually. My mom wears a white veil over her head at church, and she cries at the altar every single service, but at home, she takes it off and goes on with the cooking. The women’s hair at church is so long it goes past their waist. They all have some huge mustaches since they are not allowed to shave. Women in the church can’t wear makeup either or jeans. The pastor told my mom this is because the Bible states women must not wear a man’s garments. I wondered why Jesus wanted the women in the church to look like brujas.

Last Saturday, I knew things would never go back to our old life. Sandy, Santiago and I were outside. Sandy swung lazily on the hammock tied on the porch with the Salvadorian flag crocheted on it. She scrolled through her phone, probably on Instagram. The air was so hot it burned our necks. Santiago and I played kickball with a plastic beach ball we found at the lake. The ball was wobbly and had letters that said, “Good vibes only” on it. Santiago stood in front of the lemon tree which we marked as first base. Sandy marched to us. Her hair was still really frizzy from the time I accidently lit it on fire with a candle. 

“Mom said we are going to the lake today with my dad, no matter what.” Sandy pulled Santiago’s hand. I felt like throwing up. We hadn’t been to the lake since before Abuela died. The inside of the house was humid from the fish soup my mom boiled on the stove. 

My dad sat on the couch organizing his fishing poles, and as he put on his shoes my mom said, “Misael, you never take us out anymore.” 

“Don’t start.” My dad continued lacing his shoes. 

“Jesus didn’t put us on this Earth to stay in this house all day.” She pointed to our yellowing lawn.

My dad took his cap off and massaged his temples. His eyes were lifeless. “Que tanto joden, pues? There is nothing left at that miserable lake. Nothing but dried up mud and death everywhere. Is that what you want to see?”  

My mom looked out the window. “I don’t know where your head is these days.” 

“You want to go so bad then I need you packed in twenty minutes.” My dad walked outside. We rushed to pack our bags in silence. My dad pulled the screwdriver from the visor of the driver’s seat to start the engine of our 1985 Toyota van. We prepared as if we were going away for a month. We packed chips, salsa, a giant green thermos with hot water for instant coffee, our second-hand sleeping bags in case we slept in the car, flashlights and my mom even packed some left-over fish soup in a deli-meat container. 

 “So, embarrassing.” Sandy scoffed as she entered the van. She enunciated every syllable. 

“Ah la Sandy.” My mom tsked. “Que embarrassing dice, and then she’s going to be the first to eat.” She placed the deli-meat container with fish soup under my feet. I sat next to Santiago who was eating the imitation Oreos we snuck in the cart at King Ranch Market when my mom wasn’t looking. We drove away from the city towards the purple mountains. Life dwindled as we drove further away from the city. Prickly bushes and dark orange rocks lined the bumpy road. Since the van had no A/C, we rolled down the windows letting hot air fill the car. The warm wind lulled me to sleep. I dreamt about showing up to school in new clothes, smelling of Downey and not fish. In the dream, my dad picked me up in his line cook jacket. He hugged me when I reached the car. 

We all must’ve fallen asleep because I was awakened when Santiago’s kickball hit me in the face. Our van swerved onto the other lane. My dad’s head was curved into his chest while my mom tried to desperately wake him up by shaking his shoulder. He was in such a deep sleep that he looked dead. I closed my eyes to beg the Jesus man to help us. My mom opened a beer can threw it on his face. Once he realized what was happening, he tried to steer the van. The van stayed on two wheels for a couple of seconds, and then with a loud thud, fell back on all fours. Since there are no seatbelts in the van, all of us slid to the left side. Stuff flew everywhere. Santiago was asleep next to me, but the sudden movement woke him. Sandy bumped her head against the roof. I landed on the other side of the van. My leg fell on top of the deli meat container full of fish soup. The liquid seeped through my jean shorts. 

“You almost killed us.” My mom screamed. She pulled Santiago into her lap. She held him against her chest. My mom pressed her face against Santiago’s back and closed her eyes. My dad turned the van into the correct lane. We were the only car on the road. The sky boiled with the color of bricks. My mom was full on crying like Santiago does sometimes. “We can’t do this anymore.” My mom pulled Sandy and I against her. It was like no words were left inside my dad because he didn’t speak. He only wiped his forehead while he stared at us and back to the road. We drove 15 miles per hour until the lake appeared in front of us. My dad parked the car in the dirt. The birds chirped outside. I wanted to scream at them to shut up. 

My dad got out of the car without a word. He walked towards the water and further and further away from us until he was a shadow. He waded in the water with his clothes on. He arranged his fishing poles near a rock. The water was still around his feet. He looked out into the sunset as a boat passed by. He didn’t sit on his painter’s bucket like he usually did and instead, sat directly in the water. The water was a pale green against the desert mountains. He covered his mouth with his hand and looked up at the sky and I knew, he probably tasted the Sardines he cut for bait. He rocked himself back and forth. Inside the van, havoc was reaped, containers were left wide open, the blankets left askew, and the sour scent of fish lingered.