The Doll
Raven: Narcisco was christened and his mother called him Sising. But when he took a fancy to his mother’s old rag dolls, his father decided to call him Boy. His father has a masculine body, from the low broad forehead and bushy brows to the wide cleft chest.
James: We’ll call him, Boy. He is my son, a male, the offspring of a male. A man is fashioned by heredity and environment. I’ve given him enough red for his blood, but a lot of good it will do him with the kind of environment you are giving him. That Doll you gave him-
Niqui: I didn’t give him that doll, he happened it upon my aparador when I was clearing it. He took pity on it and drew it out. He asked me to make a dress for it.
James: And you made him one, you encourage him to play with it!
Raven: Dona Enchay looked at her husband embarrassedly, brushing an imaginary wisp of hair from her forehead, she said:
Niqui: I had many cuttings, and I thought I’d make use of them.
James: You are such a child yourself, Enchay. You still want to play with dolls.That is why you refuse to cut your son’s hair short! You’ll make a sissy out of him and I will not allow it! Boy! Boy! Boy! (his eyes hardened and pulse ticked under his right ear.)
Raven: Don Endong laid his cane on the sill, Dona Enchay moved close to him and passed an arm around his waist.
Niqui: The curls will not harm him, Marido. They are so pretty. They make him look like the little boys in the story books. His hair does not make him a girl. He looks too much like you.
Raven: Don Endong’s mouth twitched at one corner.
James: All right mujer, but not the doll!
Raven: The boy was getting the doll ready for bed. The doll was a long, slender, rag bodied with a glossy head of porcelain. He heard his father shout. At whom was his father shouting?
James: Boy! Boy! Boy!
Raven: Narciso looked at his father and said without flinching:
Anthony: Were you calling me, father? My name is not boy!
James: It’s Boy from now on. That will help you to remember that you are a boy. A boy!
Anthony: I don’t understand, why papa?
James: Little boys don’t play with a doll, that’s why!
Raven: His father snatched the doll from him, and he flung it viciously to the floor. It was sprawled on the floor, naked, and broken, an arm twisted limp beneath it, another flung across its face, as if to hide the shame of its disaster. Narciso couldn’t speak nor move. He could only stare until his mother took him in her arms.
Raven: one day in May, his mother came home from meeting of the “ Marias” at the parish rectory full of excitement. The Lady of Fatima was going to town. The image was from the Portugal and tour around the Catholic world. Dona Enchay had been unanimously elected chairman of the reception committee.
Niqui: What shall I do? What shall I do?
James: To be sure, mujer, I don’t know, ask the lady herself. She’ll tell you. Maybe.
Niqui: Endong! You mustn’t speak to Our Lady of Fatima. Por Dios, por Santo, Por Maria, She’s milagrosa, have heard how did she appeared on the limb of a tree before the three little children-
James: Oh yes! Also the countless novenas you have said in my behalf.
Niqui: Ah, Endong, it is your lack of faith, I’m sure. If you would only believe! If you would at least keep your peace and allow Our Lady to help you in her own quiet way, maybe—(sigh)
Raven: He couldn’t argue with her when she was suppliant. There was something about feminine weakness which he couldn’t fight. He kept his peace.
Raven: Boy easily caught his mother’s enthusiasm about the great welcome. He comes with his mother every day. And one day they met a woman, and she said-
Leniel: The Lady of Fatima did you say? You mean some woman like you and me, or your little girl here with such pretty hair, who can talk, walk and cry?
Niqui: To be sure she can’t, but she stands as the symbol of one who can!
Raven: When they arrive home Boy told his mother he wanted his hair cut short.
Anthony: I don’t want the Lady to mistake me for a girl.
Niqui: But our lady knows you are a boy.
Anthony: I want my hair cut short! I want my hair cut short! (at the floor kicking and screaming)
Raven: The Lady came on a day that threatened rain. Boy saw lots of people. But when rain poured all the people scampered for shelter. All but a few old women and the priests and the bishop and Dona Enchay and Boy hung on to the Lady. The bishop laid a hand on Boy’s head and said-
John: You are a brave little boy, our Lady must be pleased with you.
Raven: Boy took a look at the Lady. She was smiling through tears of happiness. Her eyes spilled water of love; her lips dropped freshness of sweetness. And her cheeks-they were dew-filled. Suddenly, he was seized with a great thirst. He felt he should drink of the Lady’s eyes, of the Lady’s lips, of the Lady’s cheeks…
As he grew older his thirst intensified. But when he approached his Lady at various shrines, whether she had a serpent at her feet, a child in her arms, or beads in her hands, his cracking lips climbed no higher than her pink and white toes and his thirst was quenched.
When he was nineteen he told his mother he wanted to take Our Lady for a bride.
Niqui: Que dicha! To wed the Mother of God, to be a priest and sing her glorias forever. Que dicha!
James: A priest? Is that all you will amount to a sissy, a maricon, a half-man? I’d rather you died. I’d rather I died!
Raven: It was night, when the household was making ready to turn in. The feeble light of a single electric bulb lit the veranda where Boy stood facing his father in his wicker chair. The boy’s voice was a taut as the string of an instrument that is about to snap.
Anthony: The priesthood is the noblest profession on earth. Father, It is the most manly too. One who is master of himself, who can leash the lust of his loins to the eye of the spirit, is indeed the man! A man is not measured by the length of his limbs and the breadth of his chest or depth of his voice, but by the strength of his mind, the depth of his courage, the firmness of his will!
James: God gave you the body of a male to do the functions of a male not to hide under the skirt!
Anthony: He said to his mind: strike! Strike your father! Raise your hand against the man who was man enough to give you the figure of man!
Niqui: Boy! Boy! (her voice pierced to his clouding mind)
Raven: On the little deserted dock he fell asleep and had a dream.
Anthony: What do you want with me? he asked the woman without turning around. He had not sensed her coming.
Lady: You are a large man. You are very strong. And you are lonely.
Anthony: Yes I’m strong and lonely, and I’m a man, (he said angrily) am I not?
Lady: Oh but of course, I can see that and I can feel that!
Raven: a fragrant azucenas folded about him in the night. He opened his eyes in total darkness, he couldn’t see his hand before him and he had a feeling he was trapped in a narrow place. A mouth found his shoulder and sharp teeth sank into his flesh.
Raven: A sudden flood of light burst upon him. Lying at his feet was a woman, naked and broken. But a short while before, under the sheet of night, she was cradled in his arms, receiving kisses. Now, under the eye of the light, she was but a limp mass of woman flesh.
Raven: Two men grabbed him and dragged him out into the street. Angry cries and curses followed him. But as he felt the clean air of morning sweep against his face, his chest filled out, and his arms grew thick, and his sturdy legs stretched long like the giant’s of the seven-league boots.