Party for Flor Pequeña
by Lauren Culley
The mothers sit in plastic lawn chairs clinking together brown bottles of beer with limes
squeezed into the tops, periodically pulling light green pieces of pulp from their lips. One
of them turns on the radio that is lying in the grass next to a stack of magazines and a clay
ashtray. The mothers start to tap their feet, and Luciá, who is sitting beside me, reaches
her hand over and pats my arm in time with the music. Her hand is heavy and hot, and
physically links me to the line of Mexican women beside me. Sixteen and pale, wearing a
t-shirt from the Ohio State Fair and jelly bracelets on my left wrist, I am sure that I look
like something recently added, remembered, and tacked on at the last minute: a name on
an assignment, a date on a photo, a card on a gift. From behind a baby pool filled with ice
and beer and Coca-Cola bottles, the mothers form a line of extended legs and flashing
hand-held fans.
Near the door to the house, the men are standing beside a long table of food dipping their
hands into bowls. The table is filled with Mexican dishes of the Pacific—skinned shrimp,
salmon cooked on cedar planks, baked grouper wrapped in cornhusks and presented with
Cascabel chilies. One of the mothers has sprinkled the tablecloth with confetti and small
chocolate coins that are losing their shape in the sun. The men lean against the house with
their elbows resting on windowsills. They fan flies away from the food and curse the
dogs that stand on hind legs to smell the chicken. One of them looks at me and tips the
brim of an imaginary hat. “Goodbye, flor pequeña,” he says. I nod back, “Little flower
must go home.” I say.
I am leaving tomorrow after a summer with these families—migrant workers living in the
Yakima Valley of Washington. Tomorrow I’ll be, “Up then away!” one of the children
says, and throws her arms into the air. The others mimic her and begin flying around the
yard. I watch all of my students turn into airplanes in front of me.
“I’ll be the one that takes you home,” Rachel says. She is my youngest student, beautiful
and quick to cry. “But they need you here,” I tell her. “Maybe you should fly to the ocean
instead. Just for the afternoon.” Her eyes become wide at the thought of it. “Arriba y
lejos! Up and away! Arriba y lejos!” She shouts.
One of the men puts his drink down and starts to dance, calling over to his wife to join
him. “Come here, my love.” He motions for her as he dances across the lawn. “Come on
and dance.” He holds out his hand and moves his hips. “You want to, huh? Dance with a
lonely old man?”
The mothers laugh as the wife hits him on the arm with her fan, “You are too old for me,”
she says.
“Too bad a dancer,” calls out another. They all laugh and look away, look back again to
see what he will do.
The man pretends to be struck in the heart by their words and stumbles backwards. The
mothers call out to him to stop pretending. He is not hurt, they say. No, they are more in
pain than he—they had to see him dance. “Stop!” they say, covering their eyes from his
dancing, laughing behind their hands. “Stop before we split a side!” I lean forward to
watch all of the women, rocking back and forth as they laugh, dropping their fans in their
laps to wipe their eyes. The children look up from their game and watch their parents
play, watch the man hold his heart and the wife wink back. She blow him a kiss from her
chair, publicly flattered, blushing. “He’s all yours!” Luciá calls out, and looks over at me,
laughing.
The men beside the table lightly punch the husband on the arm, “She’s your piece of ice,”
they say.
One mother turns up the radio. “This is how you dance,” she says, standing up. Flipping
her fan open, she covers all of her face but her eyes. She stomps her foot and throws her
head back.
Luciá reaches over to take my hand. She brings it to her mouth and kisses my wrist. “This
was a good party for you, yes? This was a good time? This was a good time.”