Summary

In "Angelita Unearthed," the narrator's grandmother hated the rain. When the narrator asked her why, her grandmother "dodged [her] questions" (3). The narrator loved the rain, because it "softened the dry earth" for her digging (4). She loved to dig, and see what she could find buried in the yard. One day, the narrator found bones. When she showed them to her father, he said "they were chicken bones," "beef bones," or the remains of someone's pet (5). When Grandma saw the bones, she started screaming "Angelita!" and pulling at her hair (5).

That night, Grandma told the narrator that the bones belonged to one of her dead siblings. She had died when she was only a few months old. Because she was so little, and thus still innocent, she was "an angelita" (5, Enriquez's italics). They had performed a ceremony for the baby, too...