Sabrina & Corina: Stories

Ana, the protagonist of this story, sits in a college classroom. She is preoccupied as the lecturer, Samantha Brown—a young woman “with a Ph.D. from an East Coast school Ana has never heard of”—speaks to the class (194). Brown recounts the story of a man who, in 1875, struck silver while digging a grave for his brother in Leadville. The man immediately abandoned his brother’s body to a snowbank and claimed the mine: “What this story demonstrates is the absolute depravity of the West,” Brown says (194-195). A student named Colleen, who sits in the front row, raises her hand to inquire about the legality of what the man did: “Brown graciously answers Colleen’s question with a comment on lawlessness” (195).

Ana checks her phone for word from her boyfriend, Clifton, but only finds a text from her mother, whom the narrator refers to as “Mom”: “Haven’t heard from C. Had a job for him. Dinner tonight?” (195). Ana replies and continues to sit distractedly. Last Thursday, Clifton told her that he was going to visit his grandparents near Shiprock in New Mexico: “There’s no cell service in their corner of the reservation, a convenient excuse because Clifton often disappears. He has a problem with weariness, a tendency to binge. But that’s Clifton, slippery, like a fish” (195).

Later, Mom comes to Ana’s apartment, bearing “three bags of frozen tortillas, a rinsed-out lard bucket of beef stew, and six bananas” (195). She chastises Ana for being too skinny. She also asks where Clifton is. Ana lies and tells her that he is picking up extra shifts at the restaurant where he works: “I had a couple jobs for him around the house, sod to move, bathroom needs painting,” Mom says (196).

Ana intimates that her mother did not approve of her moving in with Clifton—even though she once loved Clifton more than Ana did. When Clifton was 11, he moved into the house next to Ana’s to live with his uncle Virgil “after his parents were killed on the reservation in a drunken brawl over seventeen dollars” (196). He was often at Ana’s home, and Mom, full of empathy, allowed him to trail her and ask her to tell him stories as she went about the house.

Ana tells her mother that she is having trouble with her History class, because she has trouble retaining important dates. Mom reminds her that she cannot fail another class: “Ana knows this. If she fails, she’ll lose her scholarship, the Displaced Fund, given to the grandchildren of Denver residents, mostly Hispano, who once occupied the Westside neighborhood before it was plowed to make way for an urban campus. Then she’ll lose her work-study job at the library. After that, Ana will be back home with Mom” (197).

Later that evening, after Mom has left, Ana receives a phone call from a blocked number. There’s nothing but static on the other end: “I know it’s you,” Ana says, as she knows it must be Clifton (197). She states that rent is due on Thursday, and then says, “Come home, baby. Please” (198).

The next day, Ana reports to the William H. Moffat Library for her shift. During her break, she walks to the Museum of Houses at the center of campus. It memorializes the neighborhood that once stood where the campus now is. Ana reflects on the stories about the neighborhood that she once heard from her grandparents—stories of bustling life, children, and families.

Ana returns to her shift, and sees that Colleen, from her History class, is on the second floor of the library, studying with another girl. She sees that “they are both blond with sharp features and lengthy, ivory necks” (198). Ana often thinks about students like this, who have come to Denver with trust fund money and live in loft apartments. While Clifton doesn’t mind their presence much, Ana feels that, the longer they stay, the more her own world recedes.

Colleen begins to speak to Ana, only she calls her “Hannah.” Ana corrects her, and then Colleen says “You always wear such neat turquoise jewelry. Are you from Colorado, like a Native American?” (199): “I don’t know, really. It’s complicated,” Ana answers (199). When Colleen tells her that she is from Vermont, Ana replies: “Whenever I picture those faraway states […] I think of white people and dead witches” (199). When Colleen expresses confusion, Ana says that she is kidding.

When Ana comes home, she finds the entirety of the rent payment on her nightstand. She initially thinks that Clifton must have left it, but when she calls his phone twice, and finds both times that his phone is dead, she figures that it must have been her mother who placed the money there. She then packs a bag and goes to her mother’s house, because she does not want to spend the night alone.

In her mom’s guest bedroom, she reminisces about how she fell in love with Clifton, and about the intimacies they once shared in that very bed. In the morning, she has breakfast with her mother. She continues to lie about Clifton’s absence, saying that she came to spend the night for the air conditioning and because she’s out of groceries. Privately, she plans to scour all of Clifton’s favorite hiding places—including seedy motels and dark bars—to find him.

Ana’s mom also teases her about her reasons for being there: “‘Perhaps you’re stressed about some silly class. You must have inherited your memory from a white man.’ She laughs, and laughs again. ‘Oh, that’s right. You did’” (201-202). It is common for Mom to joke about Ana’s dad, a White man who disappeared before Ana was even born—but not before encouraging Mom to have an abortion.

Mom opens a cedar box, which reveals a beaded purse. She asks Ana if she remembers her great-grandfather Desiderio: “Ana remembers a few fragments of Great-Grandpa Desi. The funny way her face reflected in his glasses, his warm skin, waxy and cracked, the fragrance of his tobacco and Old Spice, the lullaby sounds of his languages, Spanish and something else,” the narrator intimates (202). However, Ana tells her mom that he died when she was so young: “It doesn’t have to be a story-memory […] It can be a picture, a feeling,” Mom says (202). She tells Ana that the purse belonged to him, and that it was used to carry ceremonial tobacco. Ana holds the purse in her hands, taking it its surprising heaviness: “You know […] Clifton once told me this purse depicts the emergence, the place where our people crawled out of the earth. It’s down south, near the San Juan Mountains,” Mom says (202). Ana looks at the purse and studies the four mountains—white, blue, yellow, and black—that it depicts: “You come from this land, jita. Remembering that might help with your little history class,” Mom says (202).

In another lecture, Brown describes what she terms a “culture-bound syndrome” called “ghost sickness.” She asserts that the sickness does not actually exist outside of its cultural context. Ana takes notes: “Imaginary illness […] comes after abrupt/violent death of loved one. Marked by loss of appetite, sense of fear, xtrme cases, hallucinations” (203). Brown sarcastically continues: “If one were to go to the doctor today with these symptoms, you’d have what’s known as anxiety or depression. Modern medicine handles it without all-night dances and prayer ceremonies” (203). Colleen asks if this material will appear on the final. Brown replies that it will not, but she also says that she often asks an extra credit question related to Native Americans on her final exams. Ana makes a special note about this. She then raises her hand. Brown calls on her, calling her Erica. Ana corrects her, and asks her if there was a drought during the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. Brown answers, “Ana, it’d be wise to follow along. I’m essentially giving you the answers, and right now we’re discussing the Land Act of 1820” (204).

Back in her apartment, Ana tries to study, with the television on in the background. She paces her apartment and calls Clifton several times, to no avail. The empty feeling inside of her grows cavernous.

Ana draws a bath for herself. She immerses her whole body, including her head, in the water. Then, she has a vision of Clifton. In it:

[H]e is driving the narrow mountain pass between Silverton and Ouray, the Million Dollar Highway, a road once thought impossible to build, the cliffs too steep, the land forsaken. It’s deep into the night. The pavement is bone dry as Clifton tilts left then right along the corkscrew path. He is going very fast […] the truck hugs several bends in the road. A black bear, dopey and confused, emerges from the shadowed tree line, Clifton swerves, the drop into the gulch immeasurable in real time (205).

In the vision, Clifton in his truck plunges thousands of feet, into darkness. Ana jerks out of the water and begins to cry. She knows, with utter certainty, that Clifton is dead. Later, Ana calls her mother and confesses that she is afraid, and that she thinks Clifton is dead.

The day of the History final exam arrives. Ana muddles through the exam, and when she finishes, she tabulates the number of multiple-choice questions that she knows are correct—which does not seem like enough to yield her a passing grade. She comes to the extra credit question: “For a full letter grade increase, in detail, describe the origin myth of the Navajo people” (207).

Ana recounts a tender, intimate time with Clifton from the past—one week after they moved in together. There was a tick embedded in the skin behind Ana’s ear, and she was very agitated. Clifton prepared a hot needle to remove the tick, and Ana requested that he tell her a story to distract her while he extracted it: “And so Clifton told Ana the story of First Man and First Woman, how they were born of stardust and earth, scrambled out of the underground land of darkness and traveled through many worlds, leaving behind the blackness of their beginnings for a life of sunlight and air” (209).