Carlos Fuentes - A Change of Skin

“‘Want some of this drink?’”

“‘Thanks.’”

“‘De l’amour j’ai toutes les fureurs…’”

“‘Yes, de l’amour…’ Then she stopped. ‘No, let me think about it.’”

“She thought for a moment. Finally she took the glass, snatched it away from my hand, and drained it while shaking her head no.”

“She was saying no, that she would not drink to that tonight.”

“Why? What was she concerned about, I thought. What did tonight mean to her? Did it mean the two of us together and alone in bed? Or with other people? No, I couldn’t understand her.”

“It meant labyrinth,” you say, straightening your legs for a moment and then raising them again. You are restless with the day’s fatigue. You are tired of this complicated game-within-a-game. “A worn-out labyrinth,” you repeat a little wearily.

“‘No,’ I told her.” Javier’s head is still covered by the sheet.

“‘Yes, oh yes,’ the girl said. ‘Theseus and the Minotaur.’”

“‘No,’ I repeated. But she went on…”

“‘Ariadne’s thread.’”

“‘No. Not that either.’”

“‘The Cyclops’s cave,’ said the girl.”

“‘Nor that.’”

“‘Charybdis opens its devouring snout and vomits black waves and swallows them again. On the island of Trinacria the herds of the sun are grazing. Orion pursues the summer Pleiades and they rush into the sea. Ulysses no longer recognizes his homeland! Between Scylla and Charybdis the doves drop dead. There’s no suspense, Javier. The myth is known in advance and is known by all.’”

“‘But the voyager no longer recognizes his homeland. That’s the point.’”

“‘All right,’ said the girl. ‘Go on.’”

“‘I shall go down into the labyrinth with you.’”

“‘Yeees,’ she said. She was not certain now.”

“‘And together with you either be saved or be lost.’”

“‘Noooo,’ said the girl. She was not sure at all. She was…”

“‘Kiss me,’ I said. I didn’t know the scene we were acting now. But I could guess what had to be done. ‘Minstrel. Idiot. This cold night will turn us all to fools or madmen.’ I was trapped by her lips, by your lips, Ligeia. To fools and madmen. You wouldn’t let me go. This cold night.”

“‘Dost thou call me fool, boy?’ she smiled at you.”

“‘A bitter fool!’ I told her.”

“‘Bitter, perhaps,’ the girl said. ‘We’ve played it before, Javier. It’s worn out too.’”

“‘You have never given the right answer,’ I told her.”

“‘All right,’ she said. ‘What should I have said?’”

“‘All thy other titles thou hast given away. That thou wert born with. You were born a fool and you will die a fool. Without ever knowing or understanding. Just as you were born flat on your back between the legs of your mother, so you will be carried away flat on your back on the shoulders of your pallbearers, a fool to the last, even in death. Womb to the tomb.’ Then I added quietly, ‘No. Can’t pride be generous sometimes?’”

“And the girl answered, ‘Yes, when it gives in.’”

“‘Gives in or is yoked?’ I asked her.”

“‘I don’t know, Javier,’ the girl said. ‘Tonight I don’t know anything. I don’t understand anything.’”

“‘I’m going to have to leave you.’”

“‘No,’ she said. ‘Please don’t do that.’”

“‘And you won’t be able to give yourself until I come back. And when you know my sin, when you learn the destiny that destroys me, you won’t die less, but you will die feeling more guilty.’”

“‘Bah,’ the girl said. ‘What difference does dying make?’”

“I laughed again and hugged her and kissed her. She was wonderful. Simply wonderful. She had followed me like my own shadow, I couldn’t confuse her. I wanted to leave with her now, quickly, to give her a reward for the seriousness with which she had confronted and defeated my mockery. And she wanted to give me my reward too and she said, I said, we said it together, ‘Let’s get out of here.’ Nat King Cole as we pushed our way past couples neither of us knew and out a door into the light of a hall where the women’s coats were piled on a sofa. She searched for hers, the Rockies may crumble, Gibraltar may tumble, looked for her coat still holding my hand, turning the linings to find her initials, they’re only made of clay, but our love is here to stay. In the taxi, we kissed again. We kissed with closed eyes, a kiss that did not end, but at the same time I was alert to every sound, as alert as I had ever been in my life. The silence of the expensive streets of Las Lomas. The whistles of night watchmen walking their rounds. The sounds of engines whirring swiftly past, the whiplike sounds of tires passing. The radio in the taxi: the voice of a little boy singing out winning national lottery tickets, and outside, the whisper of falling water at the fountain of Diana the Huntress. Another long silence. We stopped for a light. The mocking whistles of some kids in a car stopped alongside us. Radio music from other cars. A newsboy who wanted to get rid of his last copy of Ultimas Noticias. He stuck the paper in through the open window on the right and we separated from our kiss and she began to fix her hair while the cab driver took out a peso and gave it to the newsboy, at the same time rapping his knuckles and saying in English, ‘Never,’ as if we had been his partners in a conversation, and looking at us in his mirror, as he probably had been watching us all the time, he went on in Spanish,

“‘You got to watch them all. There are some black souls in this town who will reach in and knock the flag down when you’re stopped, and then you drive away with the meter off and your fare has a free ride.’

“‘Let’s go to the apartment,’ the girl said to me. ‘Now, quick.’

“No, I told her, we weren’t going to the apartment. I told the cab driver to take us to the head of Avenida Juárez. He waved a hand in the air and I remember what he said:

“‘Just as you say, Mustafa. It’s your dough. No more one-peso pickups to bother with for a while. Let ’em bang on the door if they want to, I’m in business now.’

“‘Where?’ said the girl. ‘Javier, I want to be with you. Now. Where are you taking me? Let’s go to the apartment.’

“‘The Mustafa said Juárez,’ said the cab driver. He was watching us in his mirror. The girl was silent. You were silent, Ligeia. Presently we were in front of Bellas Artes and I told the driver to stop. I got out and held my arm to the girl. She didn’t want to get out. ‘Take me to Rin and Nazas,’ she said to the driver. But when I paid the driver and walked away, she left the cab and followed me along Aquiles-Serdán. I would stop and look back and she would stop and turn and touch the thick marble banister that runs beside Bellas Artes and then I would walk on and so would she. Our steps were one. And my senses were wire-tight. I heard the neon signs winking, bubbling, laughing in the night silence. The newspaper and magazine stands of galvanized iron were empty, their wire netting drawn. Trash along the street, thrown-away paper, tips of ice-cream cones, cigarette butts, torn cellophane, wads of gum, the river of refuse that flows along all the streets of Mexico City. The girl following, I walking ahead in the silence. My rubber-soled steps. Her clicking high heels. I waited for her to catch up and took her by the wrist.

“‘No,’ she protested. ‘Not here. What do you want to do here?’

“‘Here we enter our labyrinth,’ I said to her.

“‘No, Javier, please.’”

“‘The voyager does not remember his homeland. He must rediscover it.’ I laughed and pushed through the door, leading her by the wrist. Silence ended as they sang Lo bajaron por la sierra, todo liado como un cohete …