Thomas Trofimuk - Waiting for Columbus

“Yes. But there is the artist’s feeling in each accurate portrait no matter how true to life.”

“And you wish to take it further?”

“I simply wish to paint what I feel first, and what is truly there comes second.”

“And what would someone think when they see such a work?”

“Only what they feel is interesting.”

The fire draws them in. The heat massages and makes them drowsy. It soothes something deeper than they know. And so they are quiet for a while.

“Keep painting only what you feel, Juan,” Columbus says. “I’d like to see what you come up with. Perhaps you will be famous one day.”

“Columbus, my friend, no one will remember me. It’s you who will be remembered.”

“I have been thinking that this thing I wish to do will happen regardless of whether I want it to or not. I think perhaps some events in history are simply meant to happen. The right time, the right thinking, the right weather, the right person… all these things add up, and then all it takes is one small seemingly unconnected event, and then there is no stopping.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m saying I play only a minor role in this.”

“But how can you say-”

“The ball is rolling. It would take a great effort to stop it now.”

“But it’s been all your work, your dream, your idea.”

“But it’s no longer my destiny. It’s the destiny of Spain, and of human beings.”

“But you want it to happen, right?”

In the morning, they look out from under their blankets into a thick, white light. A vast whiteout encloses the campsite.

“ Columbus?” Juan says. “It’s a whiteout. We should try and climb up and out of it.”

They stand up and immediately lose sight of each other. Columbus takes a few steps toward where he last saw a fading Juan. Juan gathers up his blanket and, dizzy in all the whiteness, staggers a few paces. He feels the shrubs scratching his legs before he sees them.

Columbus faces the forest, thinking it’s the mountain valley. He is suddenly struck with a thought about the view. There is no proof my view ever existed, he thinks. There is only memory. Is it my memory or my faith that tells me this mountain valley existed? He turns again to try and fix where Juan is but cannot see anything. “Juan?”

“Here.”

The voice is behind Columbus, perhaps. He’s not sure.

“Have you moved from the spot where you slept?” It’s Juan’s voice again. Columbus looks down toward his feet and can barely see them.

“I don’t know,” he says. “I can barely see the ground.”

“Well, don’t move. The cliff is not far. And-”

“Juan? Juan?”

“I’m here. I think you’re in front of me. Say something.”

“This is stupid. I’m going to move up this ridge,” Columbus says.

“Which direction is up? Where is the cliff?”

Columbus looks around at the white haze. “These are good questions,” he says. “So we wait then.”

“Yes. I think that would be wise.”

Columbus begins to feel tightness in his chest. He wants to run for the light and open air. A hopeless desire for blue sky grows in him. His eyes squint into the blankness for a direction. Then the scream pushes up from his gut to his brain. It explodes into his feet. Run! it says. Run! Get the hell out of this whiteness! Columbus begins to run in the direction he’s facing.

“Don’t move!” Juan screams. But Columbus runs smack into him and knocks him over the edge of the cliff.

Before he sits up, Columbus sees blue sky, feels a cool mountain breeze on his face, and hears a faint “Help, help, Columbus.”

He pokes his head over the edge of the cliff and sees Juan dangling by his sword belt from the root of a tree. “Juan?”

“Cristóbal, lower some of that rope, quickly. What have you been doing up there all morning?”

“What happened?”

“Just lower the rope and pull me up. Please.”

When they are seated on the cliff’s edge, passing a bota of wine between them, Columbus looks at Juan and smiles.

“How did you fall off the cliff?”

Juan takes a good gulp of wine. Winces. Touches his head delicately. Looks at his friend.

“I guess I panicked and took a wrong step.” One more little incident like this and I could be dead, Juan thinks. This is the man who wants to drag all of humanity to their destiny across uncharted water? Who wants to create a new passage to India, and the lands of Marco Polo? This is the man who still has to convince men to follow him on his journey, a queen and a king to trust him? I should begin praying now and not quit until the day I die and still there would not be enough prayer.

A true friend, Columbus is thinking. Juan has lied kindly twice already to spare my feelings. This is a man worthy of much love. Here is the greater man of the two of us.

“I think perhaps it was I who panicked and knocked you over,” he says.

“No, Cristóbal, it was-”

“Juan, you did no such thing. Let’s eat.”

Behind them, the distance of ten men, the sound of a rock falling. The skittering sound of it down a steep slope.

“Did you hear that, Juan?”

Juan pulls slowly on the hilt of his sword. Draws it out and stands up. “Yes.”

“There’s my problem,” Columbus says, not noticing Juan has drawn his sword. “That rock back there is my greatest problem.”

“A rock, Cristóbal?”

“My biggest worry.”

“A rock-”

“That rock is the one true challenge of this entire adventure.”

Juan keeps his eyes and ears focused on the direction of the rock sound. “Perhaps we should eat something. I have some dried meat.” He twists and rustles in his pack behind him.

“You think I am crazy sometimes.”

Juan wants to scream, Yes! Yes, you are many, many times crazy. You are beyond crazy tenfold. Goofy, insane, ridiculous, a fool with no equal! But he remembers the dream of simply wanting to set sail and find out what’s there, regardless of the dangers. He can well understand this. He knows this desire.

“You have great pressures and hardships,” Juan says.

“All my pressures and any hardships are made small by my friends, by Beatriz and you, and Isabella and…” He encloses the end of his thought inside himself.

Columbus drinks from the skin. Passes it to Juan, who also drinks.

“Oh, getting the ships and men and supplies and finally embarking is challenge enough. Convincing ninety men that it’s perfectly safe to sail out past the point of no return, and then to sail beyond the point of going back safely. This is also a challenge.

“We will discover what there is to discover. This I am sure of. But to simply discover is not a discovery. Like the rock back there. It falls whether there is anybody to notice it or not.” He looks hard at Juan’s face. “We must make it back and shout the discovery to anyone who can hear. We must bring back news of the falling rock. We must prove the falling rock exists. Then, and only then, is our discovery complete.”

“Our discovery?”

“You are coming along, are you not?”

“I have no ocean skills. No experience. I don’t know.”

“Bring your paints and record what you see. Better, record what you feel.”

Dr. Balderas has decided that a day-trip to the ocean might be just the thing for about a dozen of his patients-the safe ones. It’s about sixty miles to Punta Umbria and its nearest beach, Playa La Mata Negra. Dr. Balderas remembers these beaches from his youth. His parents used to go to this particular beach every summer for two weeks, at least in the years when they weren’t fighting. He remembers the golden sand, crystal-clear water, and a particular silky quality to the air. How could this not be therapeutic?