Toni Sala: The Boys

“I have to go for lunch,” shouted the trucker from his cab, starting the engine. “Come along. Trust me!”

“You know where there was a shelter, during the war?” continued Mr. Cals. “Right in front of your bank, in the church square. . When they dug it they found human bones, that always happens when you poke around near a church. . We went in there to play, I remember it as if it were yesterday.”

“Follow me!” shouted the trucker from his cab.

He left Mr. Cals there, obviously still wanting to reminisce, and headed to his car.

He followed the truck to get away from Mr. Cals. He was headed away from his house, but before he could make up his mind to turn around, the truck pulled into the parking lot of a restaurant on the side of the highway.

The chalkboard advertised a nine-euro prix fixe menu. He parked. He called home so they wouldn’t expect him for lunch. Some unexpected work had come up at the office. He was staying with Jaume to go over some accounts that didn’t add up. He got out of the car and entered the restaurant with the trucker. At the very back was a lit fireplace. Most of the customers were truck drivers. They were talking from one table to the next, shouting because they’d been drinking and had time — the tachometer was in charge, they had to take their required hours of rest. But the shouting could also have been from excitement, from truckers who had no time to waste.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said out loud.

“Order the lamb and you’ll know. This is definitely better than standing there staring at some bullshit tree. You work this afternoon? I’m done for the day. I sometimes have days with nothing to do. Tomorrow I have to go pick up a boat, next Monday I go to Vic to load up some scrap metal, after that we’ll see. I’ll give you my card, you never know.”

Was there sexual tension coming from the trucker, or from him? He lowered his gaze, saw his potbelly, and decided there wasn’t.

“I work mornings.”

“What are you, a civil servant?”

“I work at the Santander Bank in Vidreres.”

The other man took a step back.

“Don’t tell me I’m having lunch with a banker.”

“A commercial manager, an employee at a bank. . I wouldn’t call myself a banker.”

“I’ve got a problem with bankers. Particularly one in my town, in Sils. You stiffed my dad out of his money. You screwed him over, which means screwing me over too. When I see a Mercedes I know it’s a banker, or a politician, or both. One of these days I’m going lose my cool, grab a shotgun, get into my cab, and start taking justice into my own hands.”

“Go right ahead, as far as I’m concerned.”

“Don’t say that twice. Look out the window. See that kid? They come around with demijohns, force open the gas caps, stick a hose in there, suck a little, and that’s all she wrote. My gas tank holds three hundred liters. You do the math. I have to go around at almost empty all the time. One of these days I’m gonna get stuck halfway to somewhere. A few weeks ago they showed up with a van that had a three thousand-liter reservoir. A plastic reservoir inside the van with a pumping system to steal diesel from the trucks. One of those trailers has a thousand-liter tank. You do the math. But if they catch them at it, then what? They won’t do any time. They’re forgiving of thieves, you know, wolves don’t bite other wolves. And at least you can see them. The problem with you bankers is we don’t see you do it.”

He was the spider himself. He ate the lamb while thinking about the brothers. The boy from outside was the same age as the two dead ones; he had come into the restaurant and was sitting at the bar.

Ernest left half of his meal. He felt like he was outside the world, reduced like a plant to the most basic functions: breathing, eating.

The waitress served them dessert and said, laughing, “Miqui, say ‘hi’ to Cloe for me!”

“How did she know?” said Miqui, when she had left. “What a bitch. . You know how she knows I’m going to see her? Because I didn’t order the garlic mayonnaise.”

Wherever they were and in whatever state, the last thing the two brothers would be thinking about, if they were able to think about anything at all, would be coming back. Yet these two men, his wife, his three daughters, Mr. Cals, all the customers in that restaurant, the survivors of the bombings, these survivors of Saturday’s accident, had all thought at some point about how to stay here, how to escape death, their own death and the deaths of their loved ones, which is the same thing. Escape from it like the brother wanting to leap out of the car at the last minute. But, while the dead knew where to return to and chose not to, the living didn’t know where to go to escape. And they all had fantasies like he did: they imagined strategies, switching places with someone else, leaping from one living body to another like hopping from one rock to the next so as not to fall into the river. That’s what he should have done, rather than having three daughters who chained him to this world. Any of those diners, Miqui himself. . maybe that’s why he had followed him, maybe that’s why he was here. You take my car, I’ll take your truck, each of us will escape our death; we’ll speed off in opposite directions, we’ll take on the other’s destruction and not our own.

“What happened to the fender?”

“Nothing.”

“Why did you show it to me?”

“I didn’t show you anything. Maybe I didn’t do it, that dent; maybe it was my father before he gave me the truck, in that accident. He just went off the highway, the next day a tow truck came and pulled the truck out, it was nothing, but he’d had enough, it shook him up. That evening he had a heart attack. We didn’t notice a thing; the doctor told us after my dad was dragging himself around like a zombie for weeks. In the meantime, a perfect opportunity for the bank to rip him off.”

How could he explain what he was doing to his wife and daughters? Wasn’t it running away? Can you escape without betrayal? Can you escape?

“Fucking heartless bankers. How can you not have noticed Cindy?” said Miqui. “That’s a wedding ring you’re wearing, right? Do you have any idea why I’ve had such a hard time staying with any one woman? I must’ve had bad luck. Maybe I needed something special. Like a South American chick. That one’s a total fox. A little short, but grade A stuff. Cindy. Just her name gets your motor running. I’m a good catch. . well. . I’m a good catch for her. Where’s she from? Bolivia? Paraguay? Exotic, half Indian, with that accent that. . She talks like us, but she came from the other side of the world. Who knows why. That’s the problem with chicks. You think two guys could ever be as different as a guy and a girl are?”

“Look at us.”

“What’s wrong? I forgive you for being a banker.”

“Don’t count on ever seeing me again.”

“Does she have a boyfriend, Cindy?”

“Cindy is a child.”

“She’s a fox.”

“Leave her alone.”

“Shit. You bankers think you own the world, huh? You’re like civil servants, living like kings at the expense of poor stooges like me and my dad. I bet you have kids. Fuck, I guess you guys have to fill your time somehow. And that potbelly. And that jacket. And deciding who gets close to Cindy and who doesn’t. Unbelievable. What’s wrong, you saw her first or something? My ass. You didn’t even notice her. You have to know how to see girls. It’s not as easy as it looks. It’s something you learn. Now that I’ve spotted her, she’s got you all hot under the collar. Your wife not enough for you, huh? You’ve got some balls. I feel sorry for you, I have to admit. If I were you, I might do the same thing. When I leave here I’m going to see some girlfriends. You wanna come with me?”