Page 4 of My Heart Still Beats
…
Eighteen years earlier…
Nana has an altar in her room. I love Nana’s room because it has pretty gold wallpaper, and it always smells good. Kind of like smoke and perfume. Mommy and Da are Catholic, and so is Nana, but she’s a different kind of Catholic. She goes to Mass with us, but she also prays to the Virgin Mary at home, at her altar. She calls her “Our Lady of Guadaloop.”
The smoky and perfumy smell is from the incense she burns.
Mommy and Da don’t do things like that.
I stand at her door and wait until she opens her eyes and puts down her rosary.
“Come in, little one,” she says without turning toward me.
I rush in and scramble into her lap.
She kisses my forehead. “I always know when you’re there,” she says. “You and I have a special bond because you’re named after me.”
“I am? But your name is Nana.”
Nana smiles and strokes my hair. “But my given name is Teresa Maria, just like yours.”
A warm feeling, kind of like a hug, spreads over me. I love sitting with her at her little altar.
So many candles and incense. It smells kind of like cinnamon but also like something else. “It’s called frankincense,” she once told me when I asked about the woodsy aroma.
“Like what the wise men gave to baby Jesus?” I asked.
“Yes. The smoke helps carry my prayers up to Mary in Heaven.”
I love hearing Nana tell me about Mary and the other saints she prays to.
“Tell me about one of the saints, Nana,” I say to her now.
“All right.” She smiles. “I’ll tell you about one of my favorite saints.”
“Santa Maria?” I ask. “The Blessed Virgin? Our Lady of Guadaloop?”
“It’s Guadalupay,” she corrects me, “and you know all about her, little one.”
“Saint Michael, then. The Archangel.”
“You know all about him as well.”
I squint as I try to remember some of the other saints. “Saint Peter, Saint Paul.”
“No, little one. I want to tell you about Saint Rita.”
My eyes pop into circles. “I didn’t know there was a Saint Rita.”
“Oh, yes.” Nana stares at her altar. “Saint Rita holds a special place in my heart. She is the saint of impossible or desperate causes.”
“What does that mean, Nana?”
“It’s when people lose all hope.”
“Why would people lose all hope?”
Nana sighs and smooths out my dark hair. “Sometimes, little one, life takes a turn. A bad turn. But that’s not going to happen to you. Not while I’m alive.”
