JENALYN A Novella Marianne Villanueva
Seventeen-year-old Jenalyn dreams of a better life. From the vantage point of her home island of Cebu, in the Philippines, America looks like a haven, a place where poverty and hardship can be left behind. When Jenalyn attracts the attention of a much older American man, she and her family assume the rest of her life will be happy. But Jenalyn is unaware of the secret he hides, and the unexpected fate that awaits her. JENALYN explores, with unflinching exactitude, the interplay of hope and delusion in the mind of a young woman who aches only to break free.
One During the trial, Jenalyn keeps her hair pulled back. She wears low-heeled black pumps and dark clothes. When she sits in the witness box, she sees a whole roomful of people looking at her. She keeps her gaze flat, still as the surface of a lake. No emotion behind her eyes at all. Look up, Jenalyn! Raise your face for the cameras! So many people, watching her! Who was Jenalyn? She was born in Cebu. She was the eldest of six children. Her family lived in a small apartment next to the lumberyard where her father worked as a security guard. Her mother ran a small food stand for the workers. As the eldest, she had to help her mother sell soft drinks, bottled water, snacks. She learned about men that way. “Mrs. Conners, we’ve been over this several times. There were search warrants.” “Do you mean —” “Signed consents to search. Did you see them?” “No. I don’t think so.” “They look like this, Mrs. Conners. If you would be so kind as to examine this. Your honor, may it please the Court . . .” “Please?” “It is the government’s representation that in the presence of Jenalyn Conners, a lawful search of the residence of George Conners in Herington, Kansas was conducted.” “When you looked into the windows of the garage, you saw something inside, is that correct, Mrs. Conners?” She wants to answer strongly, firmly, but she is nervous, this nervousness most apparent when she and the lawyer go over the tapes afterward: her head is bent down, and she can barely hear herself whisper: “Yes, sir.” “You are not, Mrs. Conners, to discuss your testimony with anyone. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir. All right, sir.” “If there’s a problem, you tell me at the recess.” “All right.” Now, she thinks, now they want to hear her story. Now it can be told. Jenalyn says: “They were talking and talking and talking. In the backyard, where I couldn’t hear them and all I could do was watch.” “What about?” “How do I know? What men talk about. Fishing, maybe.” “Fishing?” “Yes, fishing.” “It was cold,” she says. She didn’t like to go out there. She says, “You know that feeling? Like sandpaper on skin? I didn’t know wind could feel like that. That wind could hurt.” “Could it have been about something else? About that?” “No, how would I know — about that? Two men are talking, always talking. That’s all I know.” She isn’t pretty. Her face is blank, like a drawer that is shut tight. Her teeth, crooked. She should have had braces, but her family couldn’t afford them: She lived the first 17 years of her life on the island of Cebu. The “C” is soft. The “C” sounds like “sea.” It has wonderful beaches. So many tourists go there. That’s not what she misses. To return to a place where the wind stayed warm, all year long. To feel cradled in heat. That is her desire. On TV, she is so plain. Her accent is embarrassing. People say that she married George just for the money. All Filipinas are gold-diggers. But foreign men love Filipinas! They keep coming, these foreign men. They meet a Filipina and they settle down. You know there was Gloria Diaz, Miss Universe. And Au-Au Pijuan, Miss International.
The Filipinos in the States try to raise money to help with Jenalyn’s legal expenses. Student groups set up fundraisers. They put her picture on fliers: SUPPORT JENALYN! FIGHT FOR JUSTICE FOR MAIL ORDER BRIDES! Newspapers publish articles about the way the Filipino American community is galvanized. Jenalyn is just a poor, young girl, trapped on a farm, expected to do all the work, like a slave. She gives exactly one interview. After that, she stops returning phone calls. People give up. No one can understand her. She tells her family it is because she hasn’t found a way to talk about it. Not now, not when everything is still so new. And the trouble is, now is the time when she needs the words most. Because people are always asking her questions — afterward. “Are you saying no, you didn’t know? But you were his wife.” “I don’t know. I never asked him.” “Where he went? You didn’t care?” She shrugs. Her gaze slides away. What is she looking at? Something in her mind no one else can see. She says, “We didn’t get the papers. My husband doesn’t like to read the news. He says it’s all lies.” Her mother almost went crazy. Did you know, did you know, did you know that she, that he, that they, that what happened, it was all her fault, who could blame the man, the shock, knowing your marriage was a sham, that your husband kept secrets, that you’d been tricked. They write songs about her. Ruby Rose turns one into a hit: Something happened To a girl from Cebu Jenalyn of the dark eyes What a sacrifice she made
For her country. Reporters track down childhood friends, anyone who used to know her. A former classmate says that Jenalyn always wanted a foreign boyfriend. “She liked clothes, make-up. You know? Nice things. The boys we knew didn’t have money.” She did have a boyfriend, Bernardo, but that was over quickly. Bernardo began cheating on her. Jenalyn was very hurt. The security guard at the Hotel Aureliano IV says, “I saw her come here several times, always with foreign men.” An uncle goes on GMA. You get Good Morning, America here? Not Good Morning, America! GMA! GMA, Channel 7! She used to dance in Hanky Panky. To survive. That was the important thing. She liked bright colors. She always wore red nail polish. She tugged the ends of her hair when she was nervous. She was 17 when George Conners started writing her through Cherry Blossoms. The lawyers ask about her life in Cebu. She didn’t expect that. She isn’t prepared. She blames her lawyer. “Did you finish high school, Mrs. Conners?” “Yes.” “What about college?” “No, but I started a course in nursing at University of the Visayas.” “Okay, could you repeat the name of the school?” “University of the Visayas.” “And how long were you there at the University?” “Two months.” “So you never graduated?” Jenalyn shakes her head.
“When did you arrive in the States, Mrs. Conners?” “Seven years ago.” “How old were you at the time?” “18.” “Your marriage to George Conners. How did that come about?” “Come about? About what?” “Were you married in Cebu?” “Yes.” “How did your parents react when you told them you were going to marry George?” “They were happy.” “Happy? So they were happy that you, their daughter, would marry a man more than twice her age.” “It was — how do you say? — a win-win.” “Sorry, could you repeat that?” “My parents thought it was a good idea.” Jenalyn’s mother tells a reporter, “My daughter was a good girl. Stop jumping to concussions!” Concussions! “I always told her,” Jenalyn’s mother says. “I always told her that what women need most is a house. Children. A good husband. The world can be cruel. But what can a mother do? If that is her daughter’s fate.” “You told your daughter… ?” “Make the man wait, I said. You don’t want to look desperate. Don’t have sex until he signs the wedding license! And now, Mr. Reporter, I have a question for you! Why don’t you guys just leave my daughter alone? And this is what I think!” She gestures down there and sticks out her right hand with the middle finger extended. “Puñeta!” she shouts and slams her door shut.
Jenalyn insists that she was a very loyal wife. She never looked at another man. She spent all her days at home, doing housework. Even now. Because she was a good wife. She will never go back. She hates snow. Right after the trial ends, she packs up to go home. Bad luck, she had to end up with a man like that. A man who was sira-ulo. Crazy. Went juramentado. Tried to blow up a building. For what? Because he didn’t like the U.S. government? He should try living in the Philippines! George thought Mr. Schlegel was having an affair with Jenalyn. But Mr. Schlegel only felt sorry for her. Because George, when he was home, spent most of his time sitting on the porch, drinking beer. George didn’t seem to care that Jenalyn or the kids were freezing: they didn’t have winter coats or scarves or gloves. They really lived like trash. One day Mr. Schlegel walked over and gave Jenalyn an old coat and an old pair of gloves that belonged to his dead wife.
About The Author
Marianne Villanueva is the author of the short story collections Ginseng and Other Tales From Manila, Mayor of the Roses, and The Lost Language. She is the recipient of fellowships from the Stanford University Creative Writing Program, the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, and the California Arts Council. Her work has been widely anthologized and has appeared in many literary journals, including The Threepenny Review, ZYZZYVA, The Asian American Literary Review, J Journal, Juked, the New Orleans Review, and Our Own Voice. "Jenalyn" is her first published novella.