In the Time of the Butterflies

(Complications: 1938)

The story now switches to Minerva’s point of view. She wonders how she and her sisters ever succeeded in convincing Papá to send them away to school, as at home the sisters always had to ask his permission for everything. Minerva recalls watching the family’s rabbits in their pens once, and feeling that she was just like them. One day she tried to set one of the rabbits free, but it would not leave its cage. Minerva realized then that the rabbit was nothing like her after all.

The decision to send the girls away to school began with Patria’s desire to be a nun. She always seemed to have a religious vocation, but Papá thinks that her becoming a nun will be a “waste of a pretty girl” (11). Nonetheless, Mamá finally convinces him to send her to a convent school. Minerva then asks Papá if she can “chaperone” her older sister at the school by attending as well. Minerva mentions that everyone thinks that she is Papá’s favorite, though she is the one who argues with him the most. Papá does not want to let her go, and worries about what will happen when all his “little chickens go” (12).

It is revealed that Mamá cannot read, though she pretends that her eyesight is just bad, and she convinces Papá to let the girls go to school so that they might have a better education than their parents, and thus a better chance in life. Papá’s business has been making a lot of money lately, so they can actually afford a good school. Papá finally agrees, but as he always has to get his way somehow, he says that one of the sisters needs to stay at home and help with the store. It is clear that he wants Minerva to volunteer and stay behind, but she remains defiantly silent. Dedé, who is good at math, volunteers, and Papá finally relents and says that they can all go.

Minerva notes that this is how she finally got free. As it turns out, it was not just the freedom of leaving home for the capital, but a freedom inside her head when she realized she had “just left a small cage to go into a bigger one, the size of our whole country” (13).

When Minerva finally goes to school, she befriends a girl named Sinita. Sinita looks poorer than the other children, and is alone without a mother on her first day. She first arrives dressed in black, for mourning. Minerva notes that she looks as if she will attack the first person who says anything to her. Minerva offers her a button, which Sinita initially rejects as charity, but when Minerva calls it a friendship button, Sinita accepts it with such familiarity and warmth that it is as if they have been friends for a long time.

Minerva notices how few possessions Sinita has when the sisters begin taking account of their belongings. The other girls start to make fun of Sinita as a charity student, but Minerva defends her. When the girls are taken to their dormitory and assigned to their beds by Sor Milagros, one of the nuns, Minerva thinks that the mosquito nets around the beds make it look like “a room of little bridal veils” (14).

Though Sor Milagros arranges the bunks in alphabetical order, Minerva asks if she can bunk with Sinita, and Sor Milagros agrees. When other girls hear this, they want to choose as well. Minerva then says that Sor Milagros should not make an exception just for her, which surprises Sor Milagros. Minerva wonders how she can be so forward, possibly getting herself into trouble on the very first day, but Sor Milagros agrees to let all the girls choose their own bunks, and tells Minerva to look out for Sinita.

A few days later, Sor Milagros gives the girls a vague lesson about menstruation. Sinita is entirely confused by the talk and asks Minerva about it later that night. Minerva, who has already learned all about menstruation from Patria, explains everything. Sinita offers to trade Minerva the “secret of Trujillo” (17) in exchange.

However, Sinita waits a few weeks before revealing the secret to Minerva. During that time, Minerva and Sinita become close friends with two other girls, Lourdes and Elsa. One night, Minerva finds Sinita crying in bed. Minerva tries to comfort her, and Sinita tells Minerva that she is crying on account of her brother, who died not too long ago. In fact, he was the reason that Sinita was mourning when she first came to school. His death has to do with the secret, but she is afraid to tell Minerva about it because every one of them could be killed on account of it. Minerva asks Sinita to tell her the secret of Trujillo anyway, and she finally agrees.

Sinita says that her family used to be rich and important. Three of her uncles were friends with Trujillo, but when “they saw he was doing bad things” (17), they turned on him. Minerva is initially shocked at the suggestion that Trujillo could do bad things, and compares it to learning that “Jesus had slapped a baby” (17). She thinks about the portrait of Trujillo that hangs in her family’s house right next to a picture of Jesus and a flock of little lambs. Sinita then tells Minerva that someone informed on her uncles, and they were all shot.

Though she is shocked by Sinita’s story, Minerva asks what “bad things” Trujillo was doing, and Sinita goes on to explain his rise to power. She says that Trujillo was a soldier who played people’s jealousies against each other. People above him kept disappearing, and eventually he became head general. When a rebellion against the old president began, the president ordered Trujillo to quash it, but he refused to help the president. After that, Trujillo announced that he was the new president.

Minerva asks why someone didn’t challenge Trujillo and tell him that he could not just proclaim himself president, but Sinita says that people who criticized him did not live very long. First, her three uncles were killed, and then two more uncles, and then her father. Lastly, her brother was killed. Minerva suddenly feels nauseated and asks Sinita to stop talking about the secret, but Sinita says she cannot stop now.

Sinita goes on to explain how her brother was killed. He was the last male in the family, and had been talking about avenging his father and uncles, talk which must have been spread all over town. One day, he was stabbed in front of the entire family by the man who sold them lottery tickets. Sinita witnessed the entire thing. The head of the convent school knew Sinita’s family, and allowed Sinita to attend for free in the hope of keeping her safe. Sinita finally tells Minerva that Trujillo’s secret is that he is having everyone killed. Minerva is traumatized by this new information, which changes her view of both Trujillo and her country. She sleeps very little that night. When she wakes up the next morning, she is horrified to think that she has wet the bed, but then realizes that she has actually begun menstruating.

(Pobrecita!: 1941)

This section begins with Minerva’s account of how she is directly affected by Trujillo three years after hearing Sinita’s story. At school, she and her friends both befriend and admire an older girl named Lina Lovatón. The girl is very beautiful, and every girl in school wants to be her friend. They look up to her for everything. One day, the girls are playing volleyball. One of the nuns hurries outside and says that Lina has an important visitor. Lina goes inside and when she returns, she has a medal pinned to her uniform. She says that her visitor was Trujillo. He had seen her from an official’s house next door and had immediately sent for her. The nuns initially refused, but he insisted, and had taken a medal from his uniform and pinned it to Lina’s.

After that first encounter, whenever Trujillo comes to town, he stops by the school to visit Lina. He also starts sending her gifts. Though the nuns are worried, he eventually begins sending gifts for the school as well. Whenever Trujillo visits, all the classes are cancelled, and the talk of the day is Lina and Trujillo. Lina describes their meetings afterwards, which usually comprise of Trujillo reciting some poetry, and the two of them playing a game where she takes the medals off his uniform and then puts them back on. Though the girls all seem in awe, Sinita is disgusted. She asks Lina if she truly loves Trujillo, and Lina says yes.

As the girls hear more and more about Trujillo and how lovingly he treats Lina, they all start falling in love with him through Lina, except for Sinita. Even Minerva changes her mind about him, and keeps a picture of him under her pillow. When Lina turns seventeen, Trujillo throws her a party and takes her away from the school for a week. On her birthday, there is a poem devoted to Lina in the newspaper, supposedly written by Trujillo himself.

Time passes, however, and Lina does not return to the school. The nuns, who seem sad, eventually say that she will get her degree in absentia, but they cannot explain why. When Minerva is out of school that summer, she drives by a mansion with Papá, and he tells her that “one of Trujillo’s girlfriends” (23) lives there, a girl named Lina. Minerva is shocked, and asks how Trujillo can have girlfriends if he is married. Papá says that Trujillo has girlfriends set up all over the island. He says that the really sad thing about Lina is that she actually loves him.

When Minerva returns to school, she hears the rest of the story from the other girls. As it turns out, Trujillo got Lina pregnant, and Trujillo’s wife attacked her. Trujillo then placed Lina in one of his mansions. She waits for him there, but he has moved on to another pretty girl somewhere else. Minerva is shocked and saddened by Lina’s fate. She begins wearing bandages around her chest so her breasts will not grow, as she does not want to end up like Lina. Though Sinita reaffirms that “Trujillo is a devil” (24), Minerva is still convinced that he is a man who probably feels bad about what he has done.

(The Performance: 1944)

Three years later, it is the country’s centennial year, which means that there will be festivities and celebrations honoring Trujillo. The Mirabals do not want to celebrate, and get around this by celebrating Patria’s twentieth birthday while wearing red, white, and blue instead. Patria is now married and has a son; she has given up on being a nun.

Minerva says that, at this point, the whole country is “putting on a big loyalty performance” (24). At school, they get new textbooks with Trujillo’s picture on the front cover. The country’s history books have been rewritten to echo the plot of the Bible, all leading up to Trujillo’s birth, which they call “God’s glory made flesh in a miracle” (24).

There is also a new gymnasium at school built with money donated by Trujillo, which is called the Lina Lovatón Gymnasium. The school itself has a contest to celebrate the “Benefactor” (Trujillo), where the girls are supposed to put on performances related to him. Minerva, Sinita, Elsa, and Lourdes decide to do a play together, and make a symbolic play about Liberty and Glory freeing the enslaved Motherland. They really get into the play, and on the night of the contest, Minerva’s team wins by a landslide. They are told that the play will be performed for Trujillo himself, which angers the girls. They feel that they have been tricked somehow, and do not want to perform for Trujillo, but they also know they cannot say no, and so reluctantly agree. Strangely, when they are later sent to perform their skit for Trujillo on his birthday and Minerva tries to decline, Sinita says that she wants to go through with the performance. Sinita says that the play is like a hidden protest, because it is about a past when the country was free. Minerva agrees, but insists that they perform dressed as boys.

On the night of the performance, one of the nuns, Sor Asunción, escorts the girls to the capital and warns them to act like “jewels” and impress Trujillo. The girls are excited to be in the capital and, upon arriving, Minerva sees Trujillo for the first time. He looks small, and is sitting a big golden armchair, covered with medals. His handsome son Ramfis, who was made a general at age four, is sitting next to him.

The performance begins, and Minerva is so nervous that she is shaking. The skit goes smoothly, but Minerva is annoyed to see that both Trujillo and his son are barely paying attention to them. Eventually, as the girls go on about Liberty and the Motherland, Trujillo takes notice. When the part where Sinita (dressed as Liberty) is supposed to free Minerva (the Fatherland), Sinita instead draws her bow and points an imaginary arrow straight at Trujillo. Ramfis leaps up and grabs Sinita’s bow, breaking it over his knee.

Minerva tries to make things right and cover for Sinita, saying that what she did was part of the play, but Ramfis warns them not to play in that manner. He then makes Sinita untie Minerva with her teeth, and calls her a “bitch” (28). When Minerva is free, she is clearly scared, but starts a chant of “Viva Trujillo!” to defuse the situation. On the way home, Sor Asunción is disappointed in the girls and their actions.

The narrative now switches to María Teresa’s diary entries. When it begins, she is preparing for her First Communion, and is excited about her new shoes. María Teresa thinks about souls, and how to cultivate the soul, and also muses about how her friends Daysi and Lidia have been mean to her. She often asks Minerva for advice, now that they are both at the same school. María Teresa says that she is advanced for her age because of her older sisters, but in an effort not to make the other girls jealous; she purposefully does not win the handwriting prize at school every week.

María Teresa returns home for the holidays and is excited to see all of her family. Her nickname at home is “Mate.” She writes that Minerva has a talk with Daysi and Lidia about being nicer to her, and they are. She also writes about Minerva telling her about menstruation and sex. One day, a young man who has taken a liking to Minerva follows them, complimenting Minerva effusively. Minerva ignores him but lets the man buy María Teresa some ice cream. The man immediately sits next to them, and to María Teresa’s embarrassment, a diagram of the male anatomy is lying open beside them.

María Teresa then describes Patria’s children, Nelson and Noris, both of whom she finds adorable. For Three Kings day, the family goes shopping in Santiago, and María Teresa gets new shoes. Minerva manages to get a new bathing suit and justifies it, even though she promised to give up swimming for a while. María Teresa compliments Minerva for being so smart and good at arguing. María Teresa then talks about her cousin Berto, who she likes, and who brought Mamá some flowers.

María Teresa describes a “funny little moment” (37), when an uncle mentioned Benefactor’s Day. In response, Minerva said they should all go celebrate at the cemetery. The room went silent, but María Teresa does not understand why or what had happened. Later, María Teresa talks more about the shoes she wears for Benefactor’s Day, and how happy she is to have El Jefe (Trujillo) as her president. She feels special because her birthday is in the same month as his.

One day María Teresa is shocked to hear that Minerva has been sneaking out of school. María Teresa is called before a nun, confused. Seeing a knowing look on Minerva’s face, María Teresa affirms Minerva’s lie that they have a sick uncle that she was visiting. Later María Teresa forces Minerva to explain, and Minerva says that she has been going to secret meetings at Don Horacio’s house. He is Elsa’s grandfather, and is in trouble with the police for refusing to hang a picture of Trujillo in his house.

María Teresa asks why Minerva would do such a thing, and Minerva admits that she wants María Teresa to grow up in a free country. Again, María Teresa is confused, as she thinks the country is already free. She becomes upset and starts having an asthma attack; Minerva holds her hands until she finally calms down.

Given Minerva’s actions and talk about the country, María Teresa becomes more suspicious of the police and Trujillo. Everything seems different to her now. She had thought of Trujillo as “like God, watching over everything I did” (39), but now when she sees a portrait of him, she thinks that he is trying to catch her doing something bad. María Teresa affirms that she still loves the president, but that she is disappointed in him.

María Teresa writes excitedly about letters she gets from her cousin Berto. She then describes Minerva’s new friend, Hilda, who is rude, and who now often hangs around the school. Hilda also goes to the secret meetings at Don Horacio’s house and wears a beret and trousers. She openly questions God’s existence, and though the nuns humor her for a while because she is an orphan, they eventually grow tired of her dangerous politics and tell her to leave the school.

Two months later, guards visit the school, asking for Hilda. Minerva tells María Teresa that Hilda had appeared suddenly asking for a place to hide, and Sor Asunción agreed to hide her. The police keep coming, but the nuns say nothing about Hilda. María Teresa thinks how it is ironic that this girl who defies God must turn to God’s house for help.

After Minerva graduates, she and María Teresa go home for the summer. Patria has been pregnant, but she gives birth to a stillborn boy. She cries all the time now. In the last entry, María Teresa explains that she has to bury her diary as Hilda has been caught and everyone in Don Horacio’s group now has to destroy anything and everything that might seem suspicious or implicate any of them. Minerva has seen the diary and knows that María Teresa has mentioned Hilda, so she has to dispose of the diary too, for their safety. María Teresa agrees, reluctantly, and buries it.