Treasure of the World by Tara Sullivan (free ebook reader txt) 📕

And I might be wrong, but I think I see a tiny smile on Carmencita’s face before she turns away.

Two hours later, chapped to the elbows in a giant tub of washing, I’m reconsidering that smile.

I rub at a stubborn stain on the white tablecloth in the sudsy water in front of me, shoving it under the water and attacking it with the hard corner of the big brick of lye soap. Carmencita had given it to me when she set me up in this tiled room with a waist-high pile of dirty linens. How many people live here? The question was out of my mouth before I really had a chance to think about whether I wanted to say it or not. And that’s when Carmencita told me that Doña Arenal’s home was a posada—a place where travelers, like the Americans who were here right now, could come and stay. They paid for clean sheets every day and clean tablecloths and napkins every time they sat down at a table. She indicated the pile with her chin. So get to work, she had said.

I’m glad of the work, really, though my arms are killing me and I tire much more easily than I should. It puts my body into a pattern, which leaves my mind free for thinking. And so I wash. And think.

I think about Mami and Abuelita, far away, up the mountain. I think about Yenni’s kindness, and Carmencita’s prickliness, and Juana’s shyness. I think about little Santiago, off at school. I wonder about Doña Arenal, and the secret life of rich people.

But mostly, I think about Daniel. I think about the way he’d make fun of me for being too weak to wash napkins, and then plunge his hands in beside me to make the work go faster; the way his eyes would have sparkled if he’d been served a breakfast like I was this morning; the stories he would make up about the people who lived here. I think about the angel that presses into my thigh every time my pocket bumps the tub.

“Ana!”

I whip my head around. Yenni is standing behind me.

“You dreamer,” she says with a smile. “I called you three times.”

“Sorry,” I say, hauling the last tablecloth out of the water and wringing it between my hands. “I guess I was caught up in the work.”

Yenni makes a face.

“I hate laundry,” she says, but she rolls up her sleeves and grabs the other end of the cloth. Between us, we twist the water out of it much faster. Yenni helps me heave the damp, heavy fabric over a line. She raises an eyebrow at the eleven tablecloths and half a hundred napkins hung on the various lines crisscrossing the little washroom. “You, on the other hand, seem to like it?”

“Like is too strong a word for what I feel about this,” I say, making a face at her. Still, I swell with the praise. I had figured out how to get it done quickly and well. I’m pleased that I’ve impressed Yenni.

Yenni laughs.

“Well, okay, maybe you don’t like it,” she amends. “But you are good at it. It would have taken me all day to get this done, and you finished it in barely a morning. Come on.” She holds out a hand to me. “It’s time for lunch. Carmencita gives you extras when she’s pleased.”

I wipe my hands and raise an eyebrow at Yenni. She laughs again. I like how much she laughs. I don’t think I’ve ever known anyone to laugh as much as she and her brother do.

“You won’t be able to tell she’s pleased,” Yenni admits with a grin, “but she will be, all the same. Come on.”

Pushing my way through the forest of clean-smelling damp cloth, I follow Yenni to the kitchen.

When we get there, I can see that Carmencita and Juana have been working the whole time I’ve been in the laundry. The kitchen is a confusion of steam, smells, and loud clanging noises. I sit down at what I’m rapidly beginning to think of as “my” spot at the table and watch in awe as Carmencita sends plate after plate of steaming food out the door to be served in the restaurant. Gisele carries the trays; Juana is working away ferociously at the sink again. Yenni gives me a wink and slips into the chaos, emerging a few minutes later with two plates of food. Handing me one, heaped high with meat, rice, and potatoes, she folds her slender form onto the bench and sits beside me.

“So,” she says, digging in to her food, “how are you feeling?”

I’m staring at the food in front of me, struggling to believe that it’s real. I’ve only eaten this well at weddings, and I’m ashamed to feel tears prickling at the corners of my eyes. I hope Yenni doesn’t notice.

“Better,” I say, sounding only a little froggy. I pick up my knife and fork and clear my throat. “Thank you.”

“Good,” says Yenni, “because later, I’m taking you into town.”

I smile at her tentatively and wonder whether, despite the difference in our ages and despite the fact that she’s found a choice better than I can dream of, Yenni and I could be friends.

It’s midafternoon by the time the napkins have all been ironed and folded into the pretty shapes Doña Arenal likes, and then the tablecloths that I washed in the morning are dry enough that they can be ironed and folded too. Throughout the day, Yenni has flitted in and out of my working space like a friendly moth, smiling and offering words of encouragement.

When the laundry is done, I say goodbye to Juana and Carmencita. I ask the women to say my goodbyes to the rest of the staff I’ve gotten to know. Carmencita gives me a small wrapped bundle to take with me and puffs up like a bird that’s