The second week in November, Julie was at her desk when she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned to behold the face of Talbot’s assistant Doni.
“There’s a small, intimate dinner party at Talbot’s Sunday evening. The board president and his wife and two major donors. You’re invited.”
“Is it possible to reschedule? We leave for Guatemala Saturday.”
Doni raised her eyebrows. “Let me know by end of day today,” she said, withdrawing to return to the administrative offices.
Talbot, the board president, major donors. These important people wouldn’t be able to reschedule because the date was inconvenient. These important people were busy. Julie and Mark could go to Guatemala another time. Deal with it.
Pushing back her desk chair, she grabbed her yellow legal tablet and paper calendar and hurried to the conference room, carefully closing the door, not bothering to move to the table to sit down. She dialed Kate and explained her dilemma. “Are you out of your mind?” Kate asked.
“We’d fly first week of December,” Julie said. “Before the Christmas crush.”
“What’s to say they don’t jerk you around then? You reschedule and some other meeting comes up. You’ve worked there how long?”
“Twelve years.”
“And they don’t know what you can do by now?”
Julie didn’t answer. She wasn’t sure they did.
“If you want to risk losing Juan, be my guest,” Kate said.
Julie was dumbstruck. Of course, she didn’t want to risk losing Juan. How could Kate even say that? She didn’t want to sabotage the directorship, either.
“Listen, Julie. If the job is meant for you, you’ll get it.”
“Can’t the same be said for Juan? We’ll get him if we’re supposed to?”
Kate laughed cynically. “We’re talking about Guatemala. There are no guarantees.”
After hanging up, Julie paced the conference room floor for only a minute before dialing Mark’s number. In a rush, she told him about the invitation and Kate’s response. “We’re going,” he said without hesitation. “Screw the museum.”
“Really? Because I want to. Juan needs us.”
“The flights are booked. Period.”
The Saturday before Thanksgiving, they flew the red-eye to La Aurora Airport, Guatemala City as planned. Julie worried she hadn’t groveled enough in her apologetic email to the board president and his wife, but Mark waved away her fears. Tired from late nights over the microscope, he was fading as they boarded the aircraft and snoring before the end of the safety presentation.
Julie couldn’t sleep. In less than twelve hours, she’d meet her son. In less than twelve hours, she’d get to hold him in her arms and be his mother. They’d spent months pushing toward this moment, years if counting the fertility treatments. She could barely contain her excitement.
Mark, on the other hand? Julie almost laughed to see his head falling forward while he kept jerking it up, not waking. The poor man. She extricated one of the airline blankets from its plastic bag and placed it in a roll around his neck for support.
She opened the book she’d brought about Guatemalan politics. It focused on the history of an American corporate giant, United Fruit, in Guatemala, and the legacy of President Jacobo Arbenz in the 1950s. United Fruit exported bananas and seized acres of land to grow them. The socially progressive Arbenz planned to take back fallow land owned and unused by United Fruit and give it to landless Mayan peasants. Arbenz also threatened to raise United Fruit’s taxes, slashing company profits. The Eisenhower White House smelled communism. In 1954, Arbenz was deposed in a military coup orchestrated by Guatemalan conservatives and the CIA.
A period photo showed the disgraced former president stripped to white boxer shorts and presented to international photographers before being exiled from the country. A reign of dictators followed, with a policy called scorched earth. Civil war raged between the Guatemalan army and guerrillas for thirty-six years. Two hundred thousand people were killed: innocent farmers, women, children. Six hundred villages were destroyed. Peace Accords finally were signed in 1996.
There was so much to take in. Too much. Julie closed her book as a flight attendant moved down the aisle selling refreshments. Julie swiped her credit card and purchased tapas. Tearing open a bag of crackers, she dipped into a wedge of packaged cheese and munched on black olives. She couldn’t believe the power a private corporation was able to wield over Guatemala. United Fruit’s corporate greed led to political decisions by the United States that damaged Guatemala irrevocably. The civil war ended, but the country continued to struggle with its legacy. At that time, Guatemala had one of the highest murder rates in the world, consistently among the top five, and one of the highest rates of femicide, also among the top five, with women crushed into submission by abusive systems and partners. Drug traffickers and gangs ruled urban neighborhoods as well as remote areas, where they controlled roadways and airstrips. Impunity was the rule, not the exception. Crimes rarely were prosecuted.
Julie stuffed the snack packaging into the box and pushed up her window shade. They were getting closer. Below was a large lake, surrounded by mountains she knew were volcanoes. Guatemala had an impressive number of them. She’d seen numbers ranging from thirty to almost forty. The densest concentration of volcanoes in Central America.
The captain’s voice crackled over the speaker and announced they were beginning their descent into Guatemala City. Mark stretched and yawned. “Catch any sleep?”
She held up the book to show the cover. “Brushing up on my Guatemalan history.”
They’d passed over the lake and trees gave way to low buildings sprawling for miles, condensing into a core of high rises clustered in the city center. The capital was the largest urban area in Central America, home to some two million of Guatemala’s fifteen million inhabitants. Julie pointed her camera out the window, shaking off thoughts of the museum dinner party she was missing. She’d made her decision and needed to live with it.
They followed the crowd through the terminal toward passport control, and although Julie should have been worn out from no sleep, she felt energized. Nearly everyone around her was Guatemalan. Young, old, male, female: these were Juan’s countrymen, his people. She felt pulled toward them and wanted to proclaim their purpose: We’re meeting our son! Everyone! Today’s the day.
Occasionally Julie glimpsed other white faces, heads of light-colored hair—missionaries in scripture-bearing t-shirts, a high school girls’ soccer team—but they felt oddly separate, visitors to the country. Julie and Mark would forever have a connection.
La Aurora Airport was due for an upgrade, shabby and a little cramped, with kiosks to change money and buy phone cards. Julie had been expecting it, especially after spending the past few hours reading about the country’s bleak history. After passing through passport control, they went to the luggage carousel to claim their three enormous suitcases packed with diapers, formula, vitamins, and clothes. Kate had given them a long list of supplies to bring for Juan’s niñera or nanny to use while she cared for Juan. He’d stay with her until the adoption was final.
Outside, the terminal smelled like diesel fuel and gasoline, car exhaust without emission controls. Crowds of people pressed against barricades, with families calling out, private drivers holding signs, and children selling baskets of chewing gum and hacky sacks. Mark spotted the shuttle with the Marriott logo and the driver loaded them in.
“The book said seventy percent of Guatemalans live below