Carlos Fuentes - Destiny and Desire

If enunciating medieval Catholic contentions in the shower was a singular but unifying act between two naked eighteen-year-old boys, it was no less demanding to make the nihilistic argument in its Nietzschean dress (or in this case, nakedness), for it was up to me to allege that there is no freedom if we don’t emancipate ourselves from faith and from every foundation or acquired rationale, lifting the veil of appearances and adopting the impulse toward the truth, whose first step…

“Is the recognition that nothing is true.”

I said these words “in the rain,” and I confess I felt desolate and in those moments wanted to possess the certainties enunciated by Jericó, for not only did the stream of water on my head blind me, but so did the grief of the loss of all certainty. Still, my role in this fraternal dialogue, which distanced us from false modesty or unhealthy curiosity, was that of a transformer of values by means of false values, saving my dear, my beloved friend Jericó from Christian culture, which is the culture of renunciation.

“And when have you ever seen a Catholic renounce pleasure if in the end it’s enough to confess to a priest to free yourself of all guilt?”

“Or money, something that once was the occupation of Jews or Protestants?”

“Or fame, as if modern sanctity was granted by the magazine Hola ?”

We left the bathroom laughing, happy to have surmounted sexual temptation, proud of our intellectual discipline, prepared to exchange roles the next time, when I’d be Catholic, he’d be nihilist, and in this way we’d sharpen our weapons for the inevitable encounter-it would be the greatest dispute of our early youth-with a man-the only man-capable of challenging us: the recently arrived Father Filopáter.

WE RETURNED TO Errol’s house. Because of Jericó’s permanent curiosity and, in my case, not only for that reason but because of something I haven’t mentioned yet and that profoundly affected my life.

The fact is that the Esparzas were entertaining that night. Don Nazario had acquired a chain of hotels in Yucatán and was celebrating with a party. Our classmate the bald kid (though I should say the ex-bald kid, since Errol had let a mane of hair grow that, he told us, was the sign of rebellious youth in the sixties) invited us, as he remarked, to inspect the flora and fauna. Conforming to manners they deemed “distinguished,” Errol’s parents welcomed their guests at the entrance to the Versailles salon. Don Nazario, whom we had never seen, was a florid man, tall, red-faced, with eyes that were someplace else. He seemed full of bonhomie, distributing embraces and smiles, but looking off into the distance, almost fearful that something forgotten, menacing, or ridiculous would appear. He wore green gabardine and a large Hawaiian tie lavish with palm trees, waves, and girls dancing the hula. He looked like a man in costume. He dressed in accordance with his origins (carpentry, furniture, hotels, movie houses) and not with his destiny (a mansion in Pedregal and a bank account safe from bruising). Was it an act of sincerity and pride in his humble past to display himself as he had been, or the cleverest disguise of all, almost a challenge: Look at me, all of you, I reached the top but I’m still the humble, easygoing man I always was?

He greeted us as if we were his oldest friends, with great embraces and mistaken references, since, with his heart in his hand, he thanked us for the “service,” that is, the favor or favors we had done him, which, of course, were nonexistent, leading us to one of two conclusions: Either Don Nazario was out-and-out wrong, or he was treating us in a manner that would not offend but did save him from the possible mistake of owing us something and having forgotten it.

In any event, the confusion passed as rapidly as the speed with which Señor Esparza, radiating cordiality, pushed us forward and repeated the ceremony of the joyous, grateful embrace with the guests behind us, freeing us from the welcome of his wife, Doña Estrellita, who was there, no doubt about that, we saw her, we greeted her, though at the same time she was absent, hidden by the powerful presence of her husband as well as by a desire for invisibility that duplicated, in a certain sense, the desire to disappear altogether.

Was the attire of the mistress of the house the result of her own taste or an imposition by her husband? If the second, we were approaching uxoricide. The lady seemed dressed, if not to go to heaven or hell, then to inhabit a gray limbo, as gray as her mouse-colored tailored suit, her eternal cotton stockings replaced by old-style nylons, her low-heeled shoes by ones of patent leather with ankle straps. Her discomfort at standing on line and receiving in public was so evident that it immediately classified her husband as a sadist who, when he saw her from time to time, would say with a ferocious look, utterly foreign to his affability as host:

“Laugh, you idiot! Don’t make me look bad!”

Patently clear because Señora Estrella gave forced smiles and looked for approval in the eyes of a husband who did not need to look at her: He dominated her, we realized, through pure anticipatory habit. Doña Estrellita knew that if she didn’t do one thing or another, she would have to pay dearly when the guests had left.

I confess that my understandable fascination with the couple separated me from the rest of the crowd, which was dissolving behind a veil of noises, inaudible conversations, the clink of glasses, and the passing of canapés offered by a short, dark-skinned waiter costumed in a striped shirtfront. I could not help admiring the discipline of Errol’s mother in playing the part of the present absent woman. In her fixed, dead eyes there appeared from time to time a lightning flash that commanded her:

“Obey.”

I don’t believe it was difficult for her to do so. She knew she was easy to ignore, and I suppose that from the time she was young her comments, timid in and of themselves, were extinguished to the beat of her husband’s brutal orders, shut up, don’t play the fool, you’re always out of place. Why worry about it?

“Leave the zoo, guys. Let’s go to the den,” said Errol. “My refuge.”

The “den” was the disordered room we had already seen. Errol took off his jacket and invited us to do the same.

“After what you’ve seen, do you feel capable of betting everything on art and philosophy?”

I think we laughed. Errol didn’t give us the chance to respond. Sprawled on the most comfortable armchair in his shirtsleeves, legs spread, he freed himself of tasseled loafers and seized a guitar as if it were the willing waist of an obedient woman.

“You’d be better off getting into politics. Let’s hope you can find a path between what you want to be and what society permits you.”

I was going to answer. Errol did not allow himself to be interrupted.

“Or are you suddenly going to wager on destiny?”

He held up a hand to silence us.

“Just imagine, I’ve already bet on a destiny.”

He observed us; we were polite and interested.

He told us, without our asking, that even though we didn’t believe him, once-a long time ago-Nazario and Estrellita might have loved each other. At what moment did they stop? What would you call the night he no longer desired her, or didn’t see her as young anymore, and she knew he was watching her grow old? In the beginning everything was very different, Errol elaborated, because my mother Estrella was a convent girl and my father wanted a wife without blemish-that’s what it’s called-because in his life he had known only sluts, and whores know how to deceive. With Estrella there was no doubt. She traveled from the convent to the bed of her lord and master, who used her up in one night, demonstrating to her that he didn’t care a fig about convents-that was his outmoded expression-and it would be better if his wife, being chaste, behaved like a whore to please a macho like Nazario Esparza.