Laura Restrepo - Delirium

It’s been one of our rules for living, Aunt Sofi says to me, that way of taking refuge in silence when the truth is about to surface, We’re paying a high price for that strategy, I say, I know, says Sofi, you’re talking about the tangles in Agustina’s head, That’s right, Aunt Sofi, that’s exactly what I’m talking about. Anyway, the day was still glorious and the rest of the way home Eugenia and I laughed, and that was even more unusual, hearing my sister laugh, the two of us laughing because the broken strap was making her limp, and then during lunch Eugenia sat at the head of the table, beautiful, silent, and remote as always, while I served the ajiaco , running in and out of the kitchen to make sure that everything was ready, the trays of chicken and the ears of corn, the cream, the capers, and the avocados in their respective bowls, and the ajiaco with the green herb guascas piping hot in the big earthenware tureen, because on Sundays the food was served with a wooden spoon from black clay Ráquira dishes, just as it had been all our lives in my mother’s house, despite the fact that the local cuisine was never to my father’s taste, since he was Colombian when it came to composing traditional dance tunes but still German when it came time to eat, but as I was saying, Aguilar, in Carlos Vicente’s presence my sister, Eugenia, fell silent.

And Agustina? I ask, Agustina, too, she was so entranced by her father that she couldn’t utter a word. After lunch everybody went off on their own, Carlos Vicente and Eugenia shut themselves in their bedroom, Joaco left in the car, and what Agustina was up to I don’t know, Try to remember, Aunt Sofi, I’d like to know what Agustina did after lunch, I don’t know, Aguilar, anything I told you would be a lie, and yet I remember perfectly that I went out into the front garden to prune the roses, and that Bichi put on a sweater and socks and boots over his pajamas and said that he was going to ride his bike around the neighborhood, although he really only rode around the block, over and over again, always clockwise, I saw him pass the house at least seven or eight times, so tall that the bike looked comically small and the cuffs of his pajama bottoms riding up over his ankles, with those black curls still uncombed, that beautiful face, those eyes that already had such depths, and an almost feminine delicacy of features, and I remember asking myself, When will that boy change, he’s such a solitary child, it must be fear of his father that keeps him from growing up and making friends, I remember all that with horrible clarity, Aunt Sofi says, I’ve read that when the atomic bomb fell on Hiroshima, shadows were etched on the walls where they were cast, and everything that happened during our family atomic bomb has been chiseled into my memory, too, my pupils even retain the image of the long-stemmed yellow roses that I cut that afternoon for the dining-room vases.

Around five thirty in the afternoon the maids brought hot chocolate with cheese buns and yucca rolls to the television room and one by one we all gathered there, even Joaco, who on Sundays didn’t usually come home until late at night, and, odder still, Carlos Vicente Senior was there, which really was strange because except at mealtimes he was either out or shut up in his study, not being a man who devoted much time to family life, but I tell you Aguilar, we were all there as if we’d been summoned, as if someone directing the scene had made sure that no one was missing, by which I mean to say that it was written that everyone be in attendance that Sunday. We’d probably all been drawn into the television room by the scent of the fresh-baked yucca rolls but that would be an easy explanation; the only real answer is to acknowledge that the scene had been scripted by fate long ago. Aunt Sofi was serving the hot chocolate, the two younger children were in an argument over which channel to watch, Carlos Vicente and Joaco had started a game of chess, and Eugenia was knitting a lilac-colored shawl, You may ask what the significance of these minor details is and I tell you again that they mean everything, because this was the last time for us.

Though no one was expecting her, Aminta came to visit; she was a maid who’d worked in the house for years, since she was very young, in fact, until the day, some eleven months before that Sunday, when she told us that she was pregnant; this is what’s terrible about Eugenia, her dark side, when she heard that Aminta was expecting a baby she fired her, the children cried, I tried to intercede, but Eugenia stood firm, maybe it was the same horror she’s always had of other people’s sexuality surging up in her again, a horror that’s probably also loathing of her own sexuality, I wouldn’t be surprised, but most important, this compulsion to censure and regulate the sex life of others was something she shared with Carlos Vicente, the two were united by the joyless pursuit, they coincided in it, they were accomplices in it, and it was the pillar of their authority, maybe even the mainstay of the family honor, as if by hereditary training they knew that whoever controls the sexuality of the rest of the tribe is in command, I don’t know whether you understand what I’m talking about, Aguilar, Of course I do, I say, if I didn’t, how could I ever understand this country of ours.

But Aunt Sofi continues to overflow with explanations as if she’s addressing them to herself, It’s a kind of force more powerful than anything else, something in the blood, a pitiless and indignant condemnation of sexuality in any form as something repugnant, Eugenia was insulted by couples who kissed in the park, to the extent that she complained because the police wouldn’t prevent them from doing that in public, that being anything having to do with sexuality, with sensuality, two things that she always refused to name, reducing them to a that uttered with a grimace as if merely mentioning them soiled her mouth. I don’t know where she got the phobia because neither my mother nor my father were like that, they had other fixations but not that one, nor did anyone else in Sasaima, in such matters Eugenia is more like Carlos Vicente, and I’d say that she learned the phobia from him and then developed her own extreme version; viewing people’s sex lives as a personal affront must be a hereditary trait of the families of Bogotá, or maybe it’s the very quality that gives them their stamp of distinction, I couldn’t tell you, Aguilar, but what I do know is that it’s there that the heart of the suffering lies, suffering that’s inherited, that spreads and is transmitted, suffering that people inflict on one another; in Eugenia’s case I suspect she’s just as hard on herself privately, but in the case of Carlos Vicente I know for a fact that it was only a front.

Let’s go back to that Sunday with Bichi riding his bicycle around the block, you pruning the roses, and Agustina holed up somewhere in the house, I suggest but then immediately ask, Or had Agustina gone out? No, no, she was still there, I just don’t know what she was doing, but of course she was there, Aunt Sofi assures me, the scene was set, the actors were ready, and now all that was lacking was the trigger to set things off, which wasn’t long in coming. It was a quarter past six that evening when Aminta arrived; it had been a while since we’d seen her and she’d brought her newborn daughter, intending to announce that in honor of my sister and me she would be called Eugenia Sofía, and to ask them whether they would be godparents at the baptism, To ask whom? Why Eugenia and Carlos Vicente, the baptism would take place in a few weeks and the baby was a little doll, Aminta had dressed her all in pink, the bonnet, the dress, the mittens, the booties, even the shawl she was wrapped in was pink, then Eugenia hugged Aminta as if to say, Now you’re pardoned, and although she didn’t say it I know she was thinking it, because for her, giving birth was like forgiveness for a great sin; my sister, Eugenia, said, and I’m repeating this word for word, With the yarn I have left when I finish this shawl I’m going to knit this little darling an outfit to keep her warm at night, that was exactly what she said, this was thirteen years ago but as I told you, Aguilar, I remember every gesture, every word, like the shadows etched on the walls of Hiroshima, and I’m sure that Agustina remembers it, too, step by step and word by word, because it’s emblazoned inside all of us who were there, throbbing in our hearts and memories.