Excerpt
They would call my mother The Guilt.
Guilty, with love.
Everyone would show her affection. They would respect
her as a woman and a female. Square and straight. All at
once. She had gained it through her conduct. Her
brazenness would open eyes of the young and old. Dark.
Full. Without an age. Never bragged about a past, which
would leap over the rotten board fence, which made the
whorehouse an island. Island for the wrecked who would
even get dizzy in a bathtub, savage pail and incoherent
that spits words, childish drunks that would ignite their
wives at entering “Las Mariposas” to lighten up their
dreams. She would say (Carmen would pee in her pants
out of laughter) that she was weaned from milk and rum
the same day she lost the girl to be a real girl, short and
bothersome. At that time they would not call her The
Guilt, but blame her parents for raising her that way. She
stopped carrying dolls in a park after playing a game of
marbles. She started to rot before being conscious. Lose to
win, because she enjoyed life.
Since I was a child I was as spoilt as spoilt could
be. The only thing I wish to have had was the well which
we thought of putting in the center of the garden, covered
by glazed tiles. It remained in my head. Even that, the
same way. The Guilt wanted it because of the lack of
water, and I, because I flat out wished to live in the past.
The past had tagged me along like anything else, I once
said to The Guilt –we were at the cinema watching a
western movie- why we couldn’t walk straight into the
screen. The Guilt spat out the popcorn. She laughed and
kissed my forehead, eyes and lips. I confess, I still look for
that little time door which connects to the past. Cowboy
past, and conquerors. Marine conquerors. Like Columbus
and Magallanes. My favorite.
I would persuade the girls to find a
resemblance of
them with me, and if they would deny it, they knew that
something would happen to them and their belongings.
My name is Serafin. Serafin. I have
never been able to
bear it. Never been able to get used to my name. It seems
like someone else’s call. The Guilt loved it, so I never
wished to upset her by changing it. Maria would tell me
that it came from heaven. From an angel. My enthusiasm for nicknames would make
them
strange, passenger. Although I, my insides, would call
myself “ The Scruff”. The Scruff would emphasize my
character. That’s what I thought. I baptized myself with
that nickname the day I swung a knife at Pedro, because
he wanted to go without paying the wherewithal of the
drinks. I let him leave. I didn’t want to use my right to
attack him until he had grasped confidence and found
himself at enough distance, so they couldn’t throw it back
to my face. That was my habit. I would let them take
distance and then…without getting to kill them, only as a
warning. So they would respect The Guilt. I would do it
more for her than for the other girls, although I liked and
respected them, too. I followed him for two or three
blocks. Deep into the slums: the opportunity. That’s how I
saw it and it was o.k. I knew that Pedro was forced to
show his face to me when he crossed the road at the
market, so I rushed and beat him running through the
stands. I got close to the wall and pulled out my jackknife.
He was whistling without a… the grief would come later.
His and mine. His whistling gave me a lot of blood. Ire.
The anger arose and fell as he affirmed, that the ungrateful
came professing from the heart he had pulled a leg on us. I
felt it in my guts, the pride of the old geezer for his
swindle. Scoundrel, Coward. Although he denied it, I
could never erase that moment when he whistled with
such faith in front of himself. There was the deed.
Harmful. Undeniable. I watched his swollen face and his
eyes laughing with mean tricks, flinted and red from the
booze. Pedro was the owner of a grocery store at the edge
of the slums. I hadn’t noticed that before at “Las Mariposas”.
I had found out through Carolina
that his wife had bit the dust two months ago because of a brain
dispersion and for that reason, he spent most of the time sobbing
and asking death for forgiveness during working hours. The blade
only bit once his right cheek. The old man howled like a coyote
and scattered. He ran like demon.
-I have no money- he roared.
-Then why do you go to “Las Mariposas”? You
didn’t pay, you damned old fool.
-I did pay, I did pay. Ask Carolina.
-She was the one that told me you were running
off.
-She’s a liar, she got mad with me because I made
her pretend to be like my wife, I made her do it, that was
wrong, I know, but I paid her, I gave her more money than
she wanted.
I believed him. Believed in Pedro. He
was telling
the truth. He wasn’t an old liar. One could tell. It wasn’t
because he was frightened. I got a doctor to cure Pedro’s
wounds and promised to heal all what I had done. I had
fulfilled in Carolina’s body, trembling of the fierceness of
my anger. We became friends. From the first encounter, I
liked Pedro, mistaken encounter: putting my jackknife in
the hand.
The Guilt never sighed because of
being different.
She said it was lucky for her not having to take care of the
foul language. The little she had to lose, the infamous
skin which many would kill for or were so miserable, was
thrown away at an early age. I don’t know who my dad
was. She taught me not to hold things against him. I never
missed him nor miss him. Sometimes I imagined him as a
child. Mentally, I would do so to be told off first and later
send him to hell. Frigging kid, I would call him, and if he
kept on yelling I would slap him. He always ended up
being the punished one. I would send him to kneel down
at the center of the garden with his arms up high and leave
him there all morning with the sun shining right on his
forehead. I would strike him with a twig from quince tree
until his ass bled and leave him with no food. I needed 0him once when a bowlegged marine hit The Guilt. I was
eleven years old. I was ill willed. I know that I told my
mom when she came up to offer me a tea which would
take the bitter taste away: If Dad was here, he would have
killed him.
-If your dad was here, I would not be
able to do
whatever I felt like doing –she answered- One of those
things would be spoil you just as I do.
From that time on, I
had this urge to grow up and become strong. I often fantasized that I would turn twenty and buy a horse to go
far away with The Guilt. To strange lands. She and I
alone. At gallop we would get to a real island. Of flowers
and birds. Of mysteries and miracles. Like talking to water
and animals and plants. With the rocks and the huts. Order
the hut to take off its roof to see the stars, and it would
grant our wish. Ask the water in the pitcher to sing us a
song to fall asleep and another to wake up. And especially,
what I most liked, the river to freeze, to be able to play on
it as a slide. I also dreamt that I had set an eye on the
bowlegged one and could hit him hard in the stomach. I
tend to forget the face of my enemy, but never the one of
that cockroach. Of all my dreams, the one that has lasted
the most got me in the mood to enroll on a ship and seek
worlds. Ride the waves, run the risks, which come with
luck. The Guilt always went on with me when I wandered
off into my imagination. She would put an innocent face.
Turn into a little girl. A real little girl. That’s when I could
tell her what I thought, what I felt, we were the same, just
as silly and full of dreams. I was lucky to have a little
sister who didn’t like to play with dolls or a toy kitchen.
It was easy to see that I wasn’t going
to leave her
side. I believe those kind of bonds are like the root and a
plant. What one could do would benefit or kill the other.
