God Loves Haiti (9780062348142) Read online

  Stabilize? Stabilize us from what imbalance? How exactly are they stabilizing us?

  Only they know. Do you know how many soldiers work for me in the Haitian army currently?

  Zero?

  Zero. You know how many soldiers with blue helmets the special envoy has working for him currently in his army in your beloved pearl of the Caribbean?

  No.

  Twelve thousand.

  No way! Twelve thousand! Correct me if I’m wrong, but that’s a greater armed force—

  —than the national police force. I know. We have seven thousand police officers. They are poorly trained, underfinanced, and short fifteen thousand men—

  —and women.

  And women. Yes. A country this size should have three times more cops than it does, according to the Swedes. They tell me these stats without giving me the resources to change the situation, knowing full well we can’t generate the resources on our own. For example, the international community took our army away from us years ago.

  Why can’t we have a new one?

  The President got irritated.

  We can’t, OK? We can’t.

  Natasha grew irritated too. The car had rumbled off Boulevard Toussaint Louverture and into the Carrefour Trois Mains roundabout. She stared at the tips of the fingers on the golden statue of big hands holding a globe in the wan morning sun. The fingers were rotten with rust.

  The President continued his lament.

  Meanwhile, the special envoy back there has an army, a good one too. With all their small Asians, skinny Africans, and bronzing Brazilians, these blue helmets may look like a ragtag outfit. But do not underestimate them. They benefit from state-of-the-art facilities and weapons. Stuff Haitian soldiers couldn’t dream of. Most of them have seen action in some of the worst wars around the world, Sudan, Iraq, Afghanistan, Congo.

  So now they’re in big bad Haiti? Doing what? Defending us against a potential invasion of transforming warrior robot cars? Natasha sucked her teeth. You’re too impressed by these foreigners and their guns and money, she said. You’re not scared of them, are you?

  Lower your voice, he said.

  You are scared!

  Let it go.

  Lord have mercy, why are you scared of these people?

  You don’t know what you’re talking, Natasha. You don’t know these people.

  What’s to know? They spend more money on weapons than food and medicine. That says all I need to know about them. After that, what makes them special? They put their pants on one leg at a time like us. They bleed like us. Get hungry like us. One thing you have that they don’t is that you are Haitian and they are not. You were democratically elected to lead this country. Twice!

  You don’t know what they can do, the President whispered. You don’t know what they have done. You just don’t know.

  What don’t I know?

  You just don’t know.

  Well, tell me then.

  You just don’t know, he said.

  Then the President began weeping. Oh Lord, Natasha thought. He had his back turned to her. The limo was dark. She noticed the smell of vanilla for the first time. Nice move, driver’s wife, she thought. The President was looking at his hands. His head hung low. For once, Natasha didn’t judge the old man or calibrate how she should react to him. She did what felt natural. She slid across the seat in the back of the limo and she hugged him. He embraced her with the grip of a drowning man, tearing her blouse a little. The President sobbed like a child on her shoulders. Fat tears streamed from his eyes and down her back. They gave her chills.

  Sweetheart, she said, if I agree to marry you, can we leave for Italy, like we’ve talked about, as quickly as possible?

  Yes, he said, after a pause. Thus, the rescued became the savior.

  Are you sure you can walk away from the presidency?

  Yes, he said. It’s just a job. It’s not like it was a vocation, like you and your art. This country took every ounce of everything I have for sixty years. It’s past time I left it to the young turks who want to run it so badly. Like that Destiné boy.

  Natasha closed her eyes. She held on to her husband with both hands. Dug her nails into his back. Her heart palpitated like a leaf in a hurricane. Alain, she thought. She bit into the President’s shoulder. What will I tell Alain?

  Less than two weeks later, the apocalypse landed on Haiti. Alain Destiné, at first, was the furthest thing from Natasha’s mind. No man ever held Natasha as firmly as the President held her on the tarmac after the earthquake. Natasha had never before found herself needing to be held so much in her life. She stood in a white fog under a sad sun on a shattered airport’s tarmac on a dog of an evening. She couldn’t see. She couldn’t hear. She couldn’t understand what had happened, why everyone around her was dead or broken or bleeding. Or where her future went. She felt as though God had swept down and withdrawn all love from around her. She felt cold, man. Freezing. But here was this man, her husband, the weakest man she’d ever met. He was keeping her upright because her legs were failing her. He seemed the picture of good health. His arms felt firm, like bent steel, around her waist. The man she believed was a big baby with a job that was way too big for him was, in her most freaked-out hour, strong and confident and capable of holding her up, nursing her toward feeling confident she would actually live to find out what happened to the world.

  You’re alive, Natasha babbled. You’re alive!

  Yes, the President said, and not the worst for wear either, all things considered. Come on. You’re hurt. We have to get your injuries checked out.

  With alert eyes, a becalmed Natasha sat on a stretcher and drank slowly from a bottle of water. A cheery blond medic worked on her bleeding knee and twisted ankle. Is this OK? he said very politely each time before he touched her knee. She barely spoke or understood English, but she could get his drift and nodded. A scene developed around her as a pink dusk fell on Port-au-Prince. Americans. They were everywhere. They were blond, or of African descent; some of them even were women. In her short time in the art world in Port-au-Prince, she’d already learned to tell the difference between Americans and Europeans, no matter their ethnic origin. They walked into rooms differently and made eye contact differently when they spoke, especially to locals like her. These were definitely Americans, and they were fluttering down from the sky, like dollar bills in her dreams of massive wealth. The soldiers, and these were definitely military personnel, wore airplanes on their uniforms and jumpsuits. They surrounded the President, making presentations, explaining action plans. There was a group hunched over laptops. They spoke to the heavens. They guided airplanes, helping them find landing patches on the ruined tarmac. There seemed to be a backlog of airplanes trying to land in Haiti. This scared her. She bit her lower lip.

  Did, did I hurt you, ma’am?

  It was the medic. So cheerful.

  Why, she said, Why are all these planes coming here? What happened? Natasha pointed to the sky. A smoky black curtain of night had fallen. You could hear the drone of the planes’ engines. You could see the blinking red lights as some of them weaved between clouds. You couldn’t see them, though. You felt them. You felt them in your bones.

  That’s help, cheerful medic said.

  Seeing the alarm in her eyes, happy medic softened his voice. There was an earthquake, he said. He was about her age, but he tried to speak to her like one would speak to a child. She didn’t like him.

  We estimate the earthquake may have destroyed over seventy percent of the buildings in Port-au-Prince, he said. The epicenter was near Carrefour and Léogâne, which are now completely destroyed. The earthquake measured seven point zero on the Richter scale. The force was unheard of for the capital city of a country, particularly a country as small and densely populated as Haiti. We’re afraid thousands of people may have died. Most buildings were flattened or damaged. Even the National Palace and the cathedral. I’m so sorry. We only have aerial and satellite shots of the city so far. In the c
oming days, hopefully things will reveal themselves to be better than we fear.

  The National Palace? she thought, feeling a sharp pinprick in her heart. Alain! She had bid her ex-lover a final farewell in her room in the National Palace that morning, leaving him trapped and helpless. At once, Natasha felt every ounce of energy leave her body. Dante was wrong, she thought. This is what hell is like. In hell, you’re alive but everyone and everything that you love is dead and destroyed, and you don’t know what to do or say. Dante didn’t get it. You had to die or receive this kind of news to truly glimpse hell. Hell to the exiled Florentine was mere homesickness. Hell, Dante, is the physical destruction of your entire hometown, and the death of your lover by your own hands. Natasha, who fancied herself a capable artist in the best traditions of Florence, suddenly could not imagine how art or poetry could come from people who even once in their lives felt the blackness of death so completely envelop them. It’s like being buried alive. Thousands dead. Alain! She wiggled some toes to make sure she was still alive.

  She was,

  Merde.

  On the bright side, the medic continued, taking a break from dressing her wounded legs, we’re here.

  The bright side!

  He waved his hand to show off the buzzing activity around them. An army base had spontaneously developed near the debris of the national airport. On the horizon of the black sky, a swarm of helicopters, airplanes, and parachutists choked off views of the emerging silver moon. On the ground, things felt lively, even chipper. Soldiers built tents of various sizes, including a large cafeteria, which reminded Natasha how hungry she was. There were civilians in cargo pants and, oddly, hiking boots and even sandals. Their pale faces ranged from middle-aged to impossibly young. They looked scruffy, bespectacled, and keen. Humanitarian aid workers. Had to be. The rest of the foreigners seemed to be mostly military. The military men and women were unlike the soldiers Natasha was accustomed to seeing around town. For one, they sometimes wore non-combat uniforms and carried small guns. They were bright-eyed, open, and friendly while going about their work. This operation seemed to involve a lot of talking into headsets and cell phones and staring at bright laptop screens. Energetic medics fanned out to help the bleeding Haitians who walked on hands, bellies, and feet toward them like believers to John the Baptist on the river Jordan.

  The sight that soon riveted Natasha was that of her husband, the President, leading. Of all things. In the middle of a circle of the most grizzled members of the international rescuers, the diminutive fat man seemed to be in charge. Under the yellow lights of military trucks and ambulances, he was absorbing information from engineers and air force commanders and firemen with brand-new tool belts. He kept a thoughtful hand on his chin. He fired questions back at them with orders, directions, and times for follow-up meetings. When he was done talking, the men—and they were all men, a fact that saddened Natasha—dispersed briskly, checking their watches. They seemed keen on doing a good job for Haiti after a disaster whose proportions Natasha found hard to grasp and difficult to even imagine without going glassy-eyed to the point of feeling faint and sleepy.

  Are you OK? the medic at her feet said.

  She’d forgotten he was there.

  That’s my husband, she said, pointing to the President, a bit surprised at how easy it was for her to utter those words for the first time. Was that pride in your voice, Nat? she thought. Is it because the President looked and behaved like he had grown a foot taller since disaster struck? Like he was the president of a nation, a leader of free men and women and children in need of wise leadership? She remembered stories of girlfriends who were actually annoyed after a boyfriend acquired a shot of self-confidence from a success or an event unrelated to being with them. Pity had been Natasha’s default mode for men and their delusions of control . . . until today.

  I know, the medic said.

  You know what? she said.

  I knew he was your husband.

  Stop, she said.

  What, did I say something wrong?

  No, no, you’ve done a good job. I feel fine. Why don’t you go help that lady over there with the baby? I need to go talk to my husband, if you don’t mind.

  D’accord, he said in French to please her.

  It worked.

  The President stood alone in a spotlight from trucks and ambulances, lights that had been turned into makeshift streetlights. He was on a new phone. The deep creases in his furrowed brow suggested he was receiving bad news. In the past, during these moments, he would stand with his back bent and a pleading look on his face, a cue for Natasha or Reginald, his assistant, to have at the ready a soft chair for him to sit on and a stiff glass of rum for fortification as soon as he got off the phone. They were meant to help refill his spirit, since the effort of not having answers in the face of the enormous problems around him taxed his intellectual and emotional capabilities. Oh, ce peuple, he would say afterward, Ils me laissent à bout de force.

  Tonight, he stood erect while wearing a broken watch, one suede loafer, and a ruined suit jacket with only one sleeve left. Not to mention having what looked like a broken jaw. He stood erect but his face and spirit radiated empathy. Compassion. Generosity. Why now? Finding the courage gene at the one moment in his life when he would be forgiven for not having any. Who was this man? Natasha thought, while limping toward him.

  His lined yet newly youthful brown face broke out in a wide smile when he turned to her. Mon amour, he said, before wrapping her warmly in his arms. He was calm and steady, and he hugged her exactly how she needed to be hugged. She let herself go like a basket case again.

  What are we going to do? she asked him once her sobbing had slowed to a stream. For the first time in her driven and imaginative young life, she really had no idea what to do next. We sleep, he said. Tomorrow will be a better day. It has no choice.

  He led her by hand to their new home, a tent on the tarmac. It was military green, about two by four square meters. It featured a cot, a foldable chair, and a table with a small lamp. I’ll sleep on the floor, the President said. The pre-earthquake President would have tried to sleep on the cot with her or have made a lame joke about having to give up the cot. This new President sat her down on the cot gently. When he tried to pull away from her, she tugged at him, and, instead, he sat close to her. Natasha held on to the arm he had around her.

  Reginald is dead, he said.

  Natasha stared at the floor of their tent. It was made of the same plastic material as the walls. The tent’s lamp worked. How’d that happen? Her eyes trailed all the cables running through the tent. There were quite a few.

  Marcel, Marie-José, François, Philippe, Jean-Yves, Yves-Antoine, Elias, all dead. Dozens of party members, dead. For Jean-Francois, it was almost worse. The twins died with their mother. The school walls crushed their car as they prepared to drive away. My house is gone. No one can find mother.

  Outside, all the other tents around them had yet to go dark. The Americans were too busy to sleep yet. There was a buzz worthy of the Marché de Fer on a Saturday morning—construction machines drilling, orders being given, yes-sirs being answered. The President continued: You can almost hear all the wailing going on in the country, can’t you? Everyone, absolutely everyone, on the island lost something today. I bet the diasporas are going mad with worry.

  You believe they know already? Natasha said.

  For sure, the President said. In the first hour, it felt like I spoke to more journalists than I did military rescue personnel. It felt like the country now has more foreign journalists and aid workers alive and kicking in it than healthy Haitians.

  Healthy Haitians? What the hell are those? I’ve been looking for that breed for over twenty years. I thought they were extinct. Didn’t the Duvaliers kill them all off?

  No, I think it was the Americans.

  Yes, the Americans. During the occupation, right? Fucking Americans. What else can we blame them for?

  The earthquake?

&n
bsp; Yes, the fucking earthquake. How do you think they caused it? The testing of new nuclear bombs by American submarines operating in the bottom of the Caribbean Sea

  Good one. In fact, it wasn’t even an earthquake. It was some new-style nuclear bomb experiment. They were aiming for Venezuela and the missile landed here.

  Can’t get nothing right, those Americans.

  Yeah. But they’re great at racking up civilian casualties, though. You gotta give them that.

  We mustn’t make light.

  You’re right. It’s too early.

  Yes, too early. Think about all those people out there who lost their homes. They don’t have tents.

  Is it too early to think about sex?

  Sex?

  You know, sex. Birds and bees. Sweat. Screaming at the end. I heard sex could be useful during national emergencies.

  Emergency sex?

  Yes. The idea came in the president’s manual. I think it may actually be a clause in the constitution.

  It’s one of the Ten Commandments too.

  Could be. You’re my connection to the divine. If you say it is, then it must be so.

  It’s the eleventh commandment. It was in the small fine print that no one bothers to read. God slid that in there past us.

  No pun intended?

  No pun intended!

  All Haitians are dead, and there’s only us left. What to do?

  Commence repopulating?

  Commence repopulating. Immediately.

  Hey, be careful with the legs. Fragile merchandise. Handle with care.

  Be careful with my head. Very tender.

  Which one?

  They giggled. They embraced. They fell asleep. The President and his wife did not make love that evening.

  WELCOME TO PLACE PIGEON

  The morning after the earthquake, to the surprise of most folks in Haiti and around the world, the sun rose over Haiti, as it had since the dawn of time. Pulsing, brilliant, and warm, it shone over the land like glorious yellow candlelight with a special affection for Caribbean islands. The sun over Haiti the day after the earthquake lodged in a clear sky so blue the Caribbean Sea seemed to reach up and merge with it. The air, too, retained its customary light fragrance. The freshness of the air inspired roosters to sing their hearts out, and sing they did that morning, determinedly, robustly, and with pride. The island was still above water, and palm trees felt cool enough about this state of affairs to cock their long, leafy crowns just so. The morning brought rising heat. And the warming of the ground beneath his buttocks spurred Alain Destiné into another attempt at holding on to his consciousness. Squinting and rubbing his eyes, Alain briefly ignored the sharp pain spreading throughout his body to take in his surprising location: one of the parks across the street from the National Palace. Alain saw his car. To his astonishment, the car hung about ten meters in the air, impaled on the statue of a woman holding a pair of pigeons. The statue gave the park its name, Place Pigeon. Pigeons liked the homage and congregated there regularly en masse. Before the park became the site of his seemingly impending doom, Alain had liked Place Pigeon too. Back when he dated unmarried women, the young bachelor took dates on strolls through this park after an evening at the movies at Le Capitol, the nearby theater. The couple would be wearing their Sunday best and talking breathlessly about the baroque drama of the kung fu films they’d seen. Young lovers in Port-au-Prince had been doing so since his father’s and his grandfather’s eras. Following tradition always made Alain happy. He had a lifelong thing for Haitian society’s old-world notions of honor and gallantry. You’re so old-fashioned for a boy, the women of various ages he courted often told him. He knew he had them once they said that. For women, he’d learned at a precocious age, liked to be wicked with boys their parents and the rest of the world found nonthreatening.