Jon Bilbao - Still the Same Man

“Seems like it’s been a rough day for you two.”

The professor agreed wordlessly.

“And it will continue to be for as long as we don’t know what’s happened to our son.”

“Perhaps someone could lend you a phone.”

The professor shook his head.

“I’ve asked several people. They say the electricity is cut and that if their battery runs out, they’ll have no way of recharging it. And no one knows how long it’ll take for the electricity supply to return, so everyone’s keeping their phones to themselves.”

“Perhaps with a little financial incentive. .”

“I’ve tried, but it’s no use. And the hotel doesn’t have a land line.”

“You could offer more.”

“They’ve told me not to ask again.”

And lowering his voice, the professor added, “Some of them got a bit aggressive. They say that the system’s overloaded and that even if I tried, I wouldn’t be able to get through and I’d just be wasting their battery.”

There was a pause before he added, “I don’t think these people have taken much of a shine to me. It’s a good thing we’re with you. Although it’s a shame your phone is no use.”

He said all this looking hard at Joanes, who averted his gaze and began staring at the weeds growing beyond the yard. The professor knew that expression well, it was the same one his students pulled when he threatened them with a question — a mixture of fear and shame.

“It’s a pity you didn’t ask to borrow my phone earlier, when you could have used it.”

“Yes, a pity. But I prefer to work my own problems out wherever possible.”

“Maybe the lines will come back later and someone will lend you their phone. My advice to you is to keep asking,” said Joanes.

“Yes, maybe,” was the professor’s laconic response.

“And now, if it’s all right with you, I’d like to go up to the room and get a little rest.”

“Of course. It’s your room, too. Give me a minute or two to see how my wife is. Then come up whenever you like.”

Joanes needed a minute to go over what had just happened. He unzipped his backpack and checked the phone battery again. It was nighttime in Spain. There was almost no chance he’d receive the call he was waiting for in the next several hours. But it could well come tomorrow. He had to save his battery.

As for the professor, he could use any old phone so long as it could make international calls. And there had to be a load of them in the hotel. As long as he used a bit of tact, someone would likely end up lending him one. If there was one thing Joanes was sure of, it was the professor’s powers of persuasion.

What’s more, he wasn’t absolutely convinced that it was an emergency. The professor knew only that his son had been in an accident. Not whether or not he was seriously injured. And in any case, even if he did manage to make contact with the hospital or whatever place his son was in, how would that change anything? It wouldn’t make his son any better. At most, the call might put the professor and his wife’s minds at rest — if the news was good. Joanes preferred not to think about what would happen if the opposite were the case, if the news didn’t bode well or was out and out bad. He couldn’t bring himself to imagine what it would be like to be locked up for hours, days even, with an elderly couple who’d just lost their son.

But for the time being, he went on reasoning with himself, making the call simply wasn’t an option, so they’d have to put up with the lack of information. He had brought them this far, at least. And arranged them a place to stay for the night. That was all he could do for the time being.

He defended his decision by telling himself that he truly needed the phone.

He tried to imagine what his wife and daughter would think if they were there. His wife would question his decision at first, but her practical side would take over and in the end she’d side with Joanes. His daughter would say that he was despicable, making her feelings absolutely clear to him. And yet, for better or for worse, neither of them was there.

He was snapped out of his thoughts by a sudden gust of wind, so strong it nearly knocked him to the ground. The trees rustled. and even the metal rods sticking out of the roof of the English Residence made a gentle clinking sound. The gust barely lasted a few seconds and was followed by a cool, blustery breeze that also disappeared a moment later. Joanes and the few Mexican guests that remained outside looked up to the clouds, clearly anxious; that had been no more than a taste of what was to come. Calm was restored to the yard, but this did little to reassure the people still out there, who began edging towards the hotel.

On the east coast of Yucatán, the wind had already begun to blow with some force. A salty rain would follow it — ocean water, picked up and dragged along by the hurricane, accompanied by gulfweed and corral and fish, some of which would still be alive, flapping around on roads and backyard patios, on the roofs of houses and in the jungle, among the dark roots of trees many miles inland.

Three months after his visit to the professor’s house, Joanes started working in a modestly sized company that made telephone cables. A year later, he and his girlfriend got married, and almost immediately after that, she became pregnant.

Joanes tried to do his best at work, but things didn’t go as well as he or his superiors hoped they would. He felt out of place there, and pined for the post that never was at Robot Systems. He realized that he’d wanted it much more than he’d previously realized. He ended up convincing himself he’d been destined for that job and that now that it was out of his grasp, no other job would ever be right for him. Time and again, his initiatives at the company came to nothing.

After a couple of years, he was transferred to a secondary department whose main role was replacing the polyethylene covers on cables. His performance there also stood out for all the wrong reasons.

One evening, on his way home, he heard someone calling his name as he sat in a line of cars all waiting to reach the tollbooth. In the adjacent line, a driver was waving his arm, trying to catch Joanes’s attention, half his body hanging out of the car window. It turned out to be an old friend from the School of Engineering. They hadn’t seen each other since graduation. Yelling from car to car, they agreed to meet up in town for a few beers.

Things weren’t going so bad for his friend. He headed up a small air conditioning firm, where he acted as an intermediary between manufacturers and clients, and at the moment he found himself with more work than he could manage alone. He dropped into the conversation that it wouldn’t be a bad idea for him to have a partner with some technical know-how. Joanes didn’t take the hint, but that night he told his wife about it. It was true that he’d never seen himself at the helm of an air conditioning company, but the opportunity had come up at just the right moment, and it was pretty tempting — just two partners, no one above him, the chance to make decisions. .

As part of joining the company, he was required to invest some capital, capital he didn’t have. He spoke to his father, who gave him the money he’d been saving for his yacht. Joanes promised to repay him the moment he could.

For a while things went swimmingly, exactly as Joanes had hoped, and better. The business grew. He repaid his father the money he’d borrowed — although his father still didn’t buy himself the boat. And Joanes, his wife, and his daughter left the apartment they’d moved into after the wedding and rented a bigger one. Even then they didn’t imagine staying there forever. They began saving up to buy a house — one with a sea view.