Jon Bilbao - Still the Same Man

“I can see the light! What’s up with you guys? Are you going to just leave me to drown out here?”

The jangling retraced its path back to the door, and the banging started up again, this time even louder. The door shook, as if about to come off its hinges. Whoever was pushing was putting his whole weight behind him. With each bang came a whimper of pain. And still, the jangling.

Joanes got to his feet.

“What are you doing?” asked the professor.

“If he knocks it down, we’re fucked.”

“You’re going to let him in?” asked the professor’s wife.

Joanes didn’t have time to answer. An even louder bang made the board bolstering the door fall to the ground. The rope still held the door closed, but now there was a crack wide enough for the man to poke his head in and furiously ask, “Manco! Beluga! What the hell is up with you?”

The crack opened on the opposite side of where the group was, which meant they were in the intruder’s blind spot.

Since nobody answered, the man who had been pounding on the door decided to finish the job. Through the crack, a foot-and-a-half-long machete blade poked in. The man proceeded to begin cutting the rope.

“Wait a second!” shouted Joanes, “Wait!”

He ran toward the door to rescue the rudimentary lock system that was keeping the wind and water from flooding in.

Later, he’d ask himself over and again why he’d done it, why he hadn’t stopped the stranger from getting in. He could have asked the professor to help him keep the door closed. They could have shouted that there were too many people inside and that there was no room for any more. They could have buttressed the door with more boards. They could have dragged the bed over to block it. They could have done a lot of things.

He unhooked the rope. The wind swept open the door with a bang, knocking Joanes on his back. Eddies of air filled the cabin, and within a second the interior wall facing the door was splattered with leaves.

The professor was on his feet, and his wife had sat up in the bed. They watched as the soaking figure, well over six feet tall, stepped inside, looked at them one by one, and grunted, “You’re not Manco and Beluga. That’s for sure.”

He was protected by a waterproof poncho that had been mended with strips of tape. His feet were wrapped in trash bags attached with elastic bands, and he had protected his legs with more bags, also strapped on with bands. The man was covered, shoddily but from head to toe, in plastic. He was wearing a backpack, also wrapped in trash bags, with makeshift padding on the straps made out of rubber foam. From the backpack hung a frying pan, a pot, and other odds and ends. And yet this wasn’t the source of the jangling sound that followed him. In one hand he was holding the machete, and in the other a wooden cane. He placed the machete inside a leather sheath he wore on his waist and threw back the hood of his poncho.

He was a black man, his face covered with deep lines and his hair and beard woolly and gray. A chain poked out from beneath his poncho — this was the source of the jangling. It was attached to his waist. The other end of the chain was attached to the collar of a chimpanzee, which came trotting into the cabin. The monkey moved as far away from the door as the chain would allow, looking for a dry patch of ground. Once he’d found one, he crouched down and, imitating his master, looked at Joanes, the professor, and the professor’s wife.

“Good evening,” said the black man.

An ambiguous accent from the American South obscured his words.

Before Joanes or either of the others could react, he closed the door, pressed it shut with his shoulder, and secured it with the rope. He guessed the function of the board now lying on the floor and placed it back against the door. Then he looked around, his beard dripping wet.

“Is the lady all right?”

“She’s fine,” answered her husband.

“Yes, she’s fine. But she can’t walk,” added Joanes.

The stranger chewed over this information, then simply nodded as if he understood everything now, and carried on as if he’d forgotten they were there. He left his cane leaning against the wall and, taking his time, proceeded to take off his backpack and the poncho. He removed the sheath of plastic bags from the backpack. He also took off the bags wrapped around his legs and feet. Dragging the monkey’s chain behind him, he took the poncho and bags into the bathroom. When he came back, he grabbed his backpack and the cane and, with the chimpanzee trotting along behind him, walked around the cabin looking for a corner that was more or less clean and dry.

Joanes had moved back to the fire with the others, and from there he didn’t miss a single detail of what the new arrival and his pet were up to.

Under the poncho and the plastic bags, the stranger was wearing a pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and a jacket, which was also denim. The clothes were so filthy that they’d taken on a kind of drab, brownish hue. On his feet he was wearing a pair of heavy work boots. His pants were held up at the waist by a piece of cord, and attached to that was the machete’s sheath, which he also took off before sinking to the floor with a sigh. He rested his back against the wall and closed his eyes. The monkey hopped in front of him in one swift motion. The chain swept the trash on the floor to one side. The chimpanzee sat down, attentive to his master’s every move. Every now and then, he scratched his nose or looked over his shoulder at the others. He was soaked, and the water dripping from his chin formed a puddle beneath him.

“I haven’t forgotten about you, my friend,” said the stranger, opening his eyes.

He produced a threadbare towel from the backpack and began to carefully dry the monkey, who settled himself down between his mater’s legs and closed his eyes.

“Lift your arm,” said the man. “Lift it up,” he repeated before raising his own left arm by way of example.

The chimpanzee copied him so that his master could dry him properly. Afterward, they repeated the routine with the other arm. As he rubbed him down with the towel, the owner said, “That’s a boy. Today the heavens opened up right on top of us. Right, my friend?”

Once he’d finished with the monkey, he used the same towel to dry his own face and then wiped it across his beard and neck. He folded it, and put it away again. The man rummaged again in his backpack, this time pulling out a plastic bag, from which he then produced an onion. Using the machete, he peeled it and cut it in two, giving the group huddled around the fire ample opportunity to see the weapon in all its glory. In the places without nicks, the blade of the knife was perfectly sharpened. The handle was made of wood and had been reinforced with rope.

On seeing the master take out the onion, the chimpanzee began jumping up and down on the spot, making a few imploring squeals.

“You know it’s for you. Of course it is. Come here.”

The chimpanzee did as he was told, squatting back down between his master’s legs, his back resting against the man’s chest. The stranger set one half of the onion aside and with the other proceeded to massage the monkey, rubbing him with the side that had been cut. Not long after, the man began singing in English, in a deep, gentle voice.

“What are you doing that for?” the professor’s wife wanted to know.

“Don’t bother him,” said her husband.

But she repeated the question. The man had stopped singing.

“The lady isn’t bothering me,” he said, without interrupting the massage. “I do it because it relaxes him. And after what he’s been through today, he needs to relax. My very good friend here can’t handle these sorts of upheavals anymore. Right, my friend?”