Mauro Cardenas - The Revolutionaries Try Again

—

— Here they are. The distinguished scholars of San Javier. Again.

Not as distinguished as you. Give or take a hundred A pluses.

— How are those A pluses working out for you?

Ever heard of Stanford? Of course you haven’t.

Everyone’s heard of Harvard, on the other. .

— Your mother never stopped reminding my mother about it. Congratulations. I didn’t expect any less from you, Drool.

Cristian turns to Leopoldo and smiles benignly, as if the put-downs he has assigned to Leopoldo aren’t amusing enough to dispatch here.

— Hey we were just talking about Harvard, Maraco. Join in. These two were classmates of mine at San Javier. Maraco was a classmate of mine at La Moderna and he’s going to be my economic adviser. He was an intern at the International Monetary Fund.

So you are running for office?

Studies have shown that countries that did what the IMF told them were worse off than those that. .

— The Americans and the Europeans know what they’re doing. Our economists should learn from them. Maraco has learned well from them.

Many of the economists at the IMF are from Stanford and Harvard and. .

I read somewhere that when the Bolivians said we’re not paying this foreign debt because we need the money to feed our people the head of the IMF called the head of Bank of America to complain. You know the head of Bank of America, right?

— This guy’s mother used to do my mother’s nails. Nice shirt by the way. Versace, isn’t it?

Leopoldo and I are running for office, too. We’re tired of seeing this country run by the same old thieves. How’s your grandpa by the way? Is his buddy still running Babson? How was Babson, by the way? I heard you actually managed to graduate from there.

Maraco restrains Cristian.

— I’m canceling my manicure with la puta de tu madre.

Leopoldo restrains Antonio. A fistfight at Julio’s would be too much of a spectacle so Cristian and Antonio don’t mind being separated.

Fat piece of crap.

Come. Let’s go look for Julio.

Oligarch conchadesumadre.

—

I’ll tell you about that duo of thieves, Cristian says. Wait hold my Chivas for a second. You moron. Why are you holding my Chivas? Don’t ever hold anyone’s glass of anything, Maraco. At least that’s the rule if you want to work for me. I’ll tell you about the Microphone Head and the Pothole Face — ha — that’s what we used to call that duo of nerdos. You should’ve seen Leopoldo’s afro head and Antonio’s pockmarked face. You should’ve seen those two abominations at our graduation ceremony, prancing on the coliseum’s stage with the medals they scored by swindling an academic quiz show on television. No, I’m not kidding you, Maraco. Why would I kid around with you? Everyone else from San Javier will parrot you the usual drivel about their so called academic achievements and their amazing victory at that quiz show that no one remembers anymore but I’ll tell you about the sleaze they pulled to win it. I’ll tell you what kind of hypocrite that African Microphone really is, lecturing us at our graduation ceremony about the future of our country, as if he was going to have a future in this country, let alone a post bending over for my grandfather, without a recommendation from me. That’s right. For six years that ingrate groveled after me, handing me his physics homework the night before it was due, and whenever the faggoty Argentinean pseudo Jesuits at San Javier pretended they were about to suspend me for spitting at Esteban or some other engendro, the African Head would surreptitiously grovel after the Jesus Loves You people on my behalf, as if I needed that African for anything besides his homework, which of course I could’ve aced on my own but why bother if I knew he’d done it already, for six years that African would bend over whenever I strolled by because at least that cholo was smart enough to know that no matter how stellar his theology scores were, no matter how much volunteer work he supposedly did in the filthy slums of Guayaquil — that African must have known teaching those poor bastards about jesus was pointless so why else did he trek there except to ingratiate himself with the priests? — yes, that’s what I’ve often said, Maraco, teach those poor bastards how to fish instead of teaching them about some fisherman’s son who allowed himself to be crucified — that’s what I said, Maraco, a carpenter’s son — he would never get anywhere in this country without a recommendation from me. I’m surprised he’s even allowed here. Doña Esteros detests him. I’ll introduce you to her if we have the misfortune of running into her. Just don’t hold her drink. You should hear the stories about her. That she was an illiterate washerwoman who bewitched the dumb heir to the largest tuna fish empire in South America. That would explain why she’s such an ostentatious witch. And why she has had all those plastic surgeries. Nothing she can do about that skin color of hers though. My mother can’t stand her. The Plastic Sardine, my mother’s friends call her. When we were sophomores Julio showed up at school with a brand new nose, courtesy of his bagre of a mother. The whole Esteros family except the tuna heir himself has had a nose job. Who Knows Knows: that was the name of the show they swindled. It used to air on Sundays on a channel owned by the Bucarams or the Adums or one of those Turcos who were part of El Loco’s clan of smugglers who later founded the Partido Roldosista Ecuatoriano, a so called populist party that used to promise free housing for the poor but instead smuggled millions out of the country in coffee sacks. Everyone here remembers the coffee sacks story because soon after they fled my friend Pili said she spotted them at the Versace store in Miami Beach. Apparently they were stocking up on those turquoise silk shirts embroidered with gardenias or hyenas or mythological suns or whatever, the kind only Turcos and Mexican narcos wear, and what Pili told us is that after they were done bursting out of those tacky embroidered silk shirts, and after they approached the cash register as only those people can, snapping their fingers for service and flaunting their hairy chests just as they used to do in their political ads promising free housing for the poor, the Italian salesgirl scowled at them as if they had just crapped on the sheep rug and refused to touch their sweaty wads of cash that reeked of stale coffee beans. Cheap Ecuadorian coffee beans. Apparently she buzzed the security guard and asked her pit guard to count the cash from these so called populists that used to broadcast their so called populist shows on Channel Ten for the maids and the bus drivers who ended up voting for that tracalada of Turcos who then sacked whatever stupid hopes those poor bastards had of getting free housing or free milk or whatever else those crooks promised them. Haga Negocio Conmigo was the name of their most vulgar show. Ever watched that crap? With Polo Baquerizo? Remember the theme song? If something I owe you / with this I repay you. This clan of thieves then tried to appear educated by sponsoring a national academic high school quiz show called Who Knows Knows. What a joke. When it first aired, three or four years before the Afro / Drool duo swindled it — the Drool’s the Pothole Face, yeah — the San Javier team had clunked so bad on the first round that the homo jesus troglodytes never allowed anyone to enter the contest again because the best, the most prestigious, the most egalitarian school in the nation — ha — the one where parents register their newborns for the entrance exam the minute they are born, an impossible entrance exam that’s of course easier to ace if your math and history tutors are the same math and history teachers that are in charge of drafting the impossible entrance exam — of course those teachers were my tutors, Maraco, why wouldn’t they be? — and whether you are rich or poor, the jesus people used to repeat and likely still repeat to the newest batch of hopeful parents, if you manage to pass our impossible entrance exam, you too can attend San Javier — what a joke — although in our class we did have the son of the school janitor and the son of a bus mechanic who used to brag about raping his maid in the shower. Facundo Cedeño. That was his name. You should’ve heard his toll collector’s voice. Facundo was the one who told me how the Afro / Drool duo swindled that television quiz show and bribed our physics teacher. Apparently they booked an appointment with him in one of the small chambers built for the parent / teacher conferences next to the principal’s office. Now these chambers have glass walls for a reason, you know, to minimize the risk of grade looting on the premises, but our top nerdos had nerve so in view of everyone they sat down with our physics teacher and their long, dull speech, as performed by Facundo, let’s see if I can replicate his toll collector’s chicken shriek, went something like, we’ve reached, “reached” pronounced as reeee / ched, as you probably know, the semifinal stage of Who Knows Knows, and up next we’re scheduled against Rocafuerte, one of the strongest contestants this year, and of course we’ve been preparing ourselves because we just can’t let the school down, we’ve made a commitment and that’s why we’re here to ask for your help in winning this thing because, you see, unfortunately we don’t have the time to study for the physics final, although, hey, let’s speak the truth here, no lies, you know us, have known us enough to know that if we were to study for the final we would ace it as we always do so you know we really aren’t asking you for much, the rest of the teachers have already agreed to help us take it all the way and we brought you a little something, not as a gift, no, we have too much respect for you to insult you like that, but as an expression of our deepest appreciation for helping us take it all the way, “deepest” pronounced deeeeee / pez. The Afro Head was of course the one in charge of the speechifying. And what did they bring to our teacher? Those abominations claim to have imagination but they have no imagination or only have imagination for masturbation and defalcation because they brought him a bottle of Johnnie Walker, which is what everyone else always brought him. A counterfeit Johnnie, I’m sure. Now our physics teacher, Emilio Turdecox, a lowlife who used to carry a laminated copy of his diploma inside his wallet, was already infamous for his graft. One year he said to our class do you all think I’m a drunk? Quit it with the bottles, people. I need a bicycle. Ha! A bicycle! I never asked Facundo the Maid Killer if he was pranking the Cox, but one year, on the day of our final, he brought the Cox a live turkey. Turdecox couldn’t take the turkey home right away, and he couldn’t leave it in the teacher’s room either, so he had to walk it to our classroom and tie it to the leg of his desk. Good one, fatty! What a sad looking turkey that was. I wonder if it was actually a buzzard. Of course the Afro / Drool duo didn’t show up to the physics final. They were too busy celebrating their so called slyness at some park. That’s how the Maid Killer heard all about it. A group of them used to station themselves at parks around the city to drink and sing along to the songs the Maid Killer performed on his guitar. On one of these outings they were so drunk that they started bragging about their flatulence and their fraudulence and their so called slyness. What the Maid Killer told me is that they told everyone there that after the Afro Head convinced the priests to allow them to enter the television contest, and after they easily won the first few rounds against some nappy schools, they almost lost to some rural municipal school from Manta or Tungurahua or whatever so they got worried, probably never considered the possibility of losing. Plus the Afro Head had convinced the weary Jesuits to allow them to reenter the contest by assuring them that he had a winning team. Their next rival school was one of those charity nun schools from way over in the, whatever, let’s say Esmeraldas. Facundo told me he chatted up one of those prim cholitas before the show, trying to score at least a skirt lift but couldn’t, those girls were too studious and serious. Apparently those girls were the proverbial dirt poor orphans with that spunky seriousness of intent you often see in marathon runners. They had over-prepared by memorizing all the books available to them. Had actually gone to a library. So after their three day bus trip across Manabí, our orphans arrived at Channel Ten and there, on the patio overlooking the Guayaquil airport, Facundo and the rest of my so called classmates saw them doing calisthenics and singing their battle songs and reciting passages from our famous poets. Our team didn’t even know we had famous poets. The deed had been done by then so the Microphone and the Drool must have felt like the abominations they were. They were about to cheat those poor girls from the one thing they were likely to ever win in their lifetimes. Or maybe they didn’t feel like abominations. Business as usual, you know? This guy we used to call Mazinger, another one of those nerdos who was part of the Afro / Drool team, demanded that they shred the answers they’d stolen. But it was too late. They had already memorized them. The week before, they’d gone to the office of the quiz show and sweet talked the TV host’s secretary. She had a young son and she told them she’d always dreamed of enrolling him at San Javier. So guess what they did? They told her that they had solid connections at San Javier. That they could help her get her son into San Javier no problem. You can imagine this poor woman’s excitement. Her son! At San Javier! What a joke. By the time the orphans arrived, the hopeful secretary had already bolstered two of their three consecutive wins. And you know what’s worse? That the orphans almost won. On the Drool’s segment, the orphan girl was so quick at the buzzer that he had to push the buzzer before the question was even asked so of course then it became evident that something was rotten in the San Javier camp. The host could’ve stopped the show. He could’ve drafted new questions and simply retaped that segment. Of course he didn’t. Afterward, the Afro Head and the Drool and the Maid Killer and the rest of them saw the orphans sobbing angrily on the patio. Some of my classmates at San Javier will object to me running for office, sure, but at least I don’t steal from the poor. Between those two swindlers and me, who would you choose? Don’t be such an ass kisser, Maraco. If you’re going to work for me you can’t be such an ass kisser. Come. Let’s head back to my nightclub. Let’s refill our Chivas and get the hell out of here.