Antonio Skarmeta: A Distant Father

I open the door. At first, I can make out only shapes. We’re practically in the dark. I close the door behind me, and this time I’m the one who slides the bolt. Teresa’s leaning on the washbasin and breathing hard. Perry Como’s singing “Magic Moments” on the record player outside. I move toward her, seize one of the buttons on her blouse like a professional, and deliberately take a minute to undo it.

I remember the image Elena used: “Here in this village, there are two kegs of dynamite.” The fuse is in my hands, at the end of my tongue.

I pucker her lips with my fingers and elect to kiss her for the first time like that. When I move away, she’s undone the second button of her blouse, and now I can make out her brassiere hanging from the washbasin. She exposes her breasts demurely and without emphasis. She’s trying to act natural, but she’s trembling.

“I wrote you a letter, Jacques.”

“I never got it.”

“That’s because I never sent it.”

“Why not?”

“A letter leaves a trail. And what I told you was very serious.”

I put one hand low on her stomach, and while she caresses my hair, I softly bite her chin.

“Tell me.”

“I want to be with you, but not here.”

“It’s the only place where we can lock ourselves in.”

“But it’s my house, Jacques. I don’t want to do it with you in this jail.”

“Cristián could let us use his room.”

“The mill’s full of rats and cockroaches.”

She’s so wet that it comes through her skirt. When I move my hand away, in spite of the darkness we can both see the stain.

“I have to go and change,” she says.

She throws the brassiere in the bathtub, buttons her top button, opens the bolt, and quickly steps out into the hall.

The light from outside allows me to get a good look at myself in the mirror. I move closer to it, drawn by something strange in my expression.

“J’ai vieilli!”

The French of my childhood has returned, clouding the glass with my breath. I remember the character in Zazie dans le métro and what she says at the end of the novel when asked what she did in Paris.

“J’ai vieilli,” she says.

“I got old,” I repeat.

As I say those words, I make some decisions.

Decisions.

Like a feverish architect, I sketch out what I’m going to do this Saturday while the dawn rain washes away the accumulated dirt on the windows.

The day’s agenda goes like this:

One, make an agenda

Two, visit Cristián

Three, have breakfast with Mama and persuade her, one way or another

Four, money Gutiérrez

Five, agreement Gutiérrez, precise instructions, i.e., train

Six, Teresa

Seven, conclusions (should there be any)

In the mill I find Cristián, perfectly shaven, wearing a tall, immaculate chef’s hat and a fashionable linen jacket that nearly makes him look like a yacht skipper. Today he’s not using his regular apron, the one that’s dusty with flour and decorated with red wine stains.

“I didn’t bake any bread last Saturday, and my customers are furious. They’re afraid I’m not going to deliver the goods, so they’re coming here to get it in person. I bought this outfit in Angol. You like it?”

“Did you find it in the same store as the Degas postcard with the ballerinas?”

Cristián reddens and slips six marraquetas , hot from the oven, into my jute tote bag. The loaves are wrapped in a sky-blue cloth with red Chilean bellflowers embroidered in its corners.

“The money for the girl last Saturday was a loan. You owe me, Jacques.”

“I’ll pay you as soon as I get the fee for my translations.”

“All right.”

Today I got up before my mother did. I put ground coffee in the cloth filter and dripped boiling water over it. The milk is heating on the stove as I cut two pieces of buttery mantecoso cheese, still fresh inside its waxed-paper wrapping. I turn an empty marmalade jar into a flower vase, fill it with water, and balance a single daisy in it as best I can.

Mama comes in to fix breakfast and is surprised to find everything ready. She’s washed her hair in the shower and wrapped it in a blue towel. A scent of lavender floats around her. She puts sugar in her coffee and milk, stirs it with a teaspoon, and looks at me distrustfully. I’ve got my elbows on the tablecloth and my chin in the palms of my hands.

“What is it we have to discuss?”

“Your life, Mama dear.”

“We’re going to talk about my life?”

“Yes. About how you feel, about what you need.”

“I feel fine, and I don’t need anything.”

“But you never go out. Your hands are all pale from washing so many sheets and tablecloths.”

“There’s not much to see in Contulmo.”

“But you could go somewhere out of the village. Angol, for instance.”

“And come back with a fever like you?”

“You have your fur coat.”

“It’s much too luxurious to wear in such backwaters.”

She delicately chews one of the miller’s little loaves with a slice of cheese and soundlessly sips her coffee and milk. I put my hand in my shirt pocket and hand her the envelope.

“What’s this?”

“A free ticket to the movie they’re showing tonight.”

“You’re crazy. Me, go to a movie?”

“You always used to go to the movies in Santiago. You’d tell me the stories of everything you saw. Now you’re always silent. It’s like something has eaten your tongue and your heart.”

“Two hours on the train to see a movie?”

Now I take my ticket for Angol out of my pants pocket.

“Jacques?”

“Mami?”

“The fever.”

“What about it?”

“I think it did you some damage.”

She looks at the movie ticket in one hand and the train ticket in the other. With a jerk she undoes the knot in the towel holding her hair, and the lavender scent permeates the kitchen magnificently. I drink my coffee and smile approvingly at her.

“You’re hiding something from me, Jacques.”

“Yes.”

“What is it?”

“I’d rather not tell you.”

“If you don’t tell me, I’m not going to the movie theater.”

I chew my sandwich, not taking my eyes off her. It’s difficult to make deals with Mama. For example, if I tell her what I intend to tell her, that doesn’t mean she’ll automatically go to the theater.

“I need to be alone in the house tonight.”

“The miller says you want to commit suicide.”

“He’s a blabbermouth.”

“If you commit suicide, I’ll kill you,” she says with a smile.

She runs a finger over my lips as though sealing a promise.

“Actually, Mama, the truth is there’s this girl.”

“From the village?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Do I know her?”

“I don’t believe there’s anyone in this burg you don’t know.”

“Is she pretty?”

“Indeed.”

“Teresa Gutiérrez!”

“Yes, Teresa Gutiérrez, Mama.”

“She’s going to sleep with you?”

We sip our coffee for a while without saying anything. Inside the church, the priest rings the bell, the first of seven strokes.

“I don’t know, Mama. You can’t predict these things.”

“What’s the Saturday afternoon film? Some western?”

“No western this week. They’re showing a movie with Anna Magnani and Anthony Quinn.”

“What’s it about?”

“I read the summary in Screen . It’s set in some remote part of the United States. He’s a widower, and she’s come to replace his dead wife. But then he spends all his time comparing this new wife with the deceased one. And then she falls in love with a young man—”