“Now you can leave at your ease.”
And Demetrio left with a bit of a cramp.
12
Now to Doña Rolanda: the befuddled welcomer. Let us imagine the arrival of a man who is falling apart: Demetrio and his flaccid height (collapsing): hoping to sleep for twenty-four hours, but … A woman came by for you. It was Sunday. Work tomorrow. His need to recuperate made him averse to hearing any nonsense. Please! The surprise came in stages, until it bored into his very core: certainly it was Mireya, though … ugh … Mi-re-ya?! the lady pronounced the name … How might his magnificent lover have discovered his domicile? In the meantime, to avoid second- and third-hand information, unlikely guesses, twists and turns — so many!: the lady attempted to accompany him (wordily) to his room, but halfway there Demetrio stopped her: Listen! I am exhausted. Maybe we can talk in a couple of days. Doña Rolanda was offended by her lodger’s scorn. Did that matter?: perhaps in the end it would. However, just as he was about to fall into bed like a rotten tree trunk, Demetrio muttered one final sentence: This has gone too far. The following day he did not go to that dive, nor did he eat breakfast at the lodging house. Work. Pending issues. Gnashing his teeth against whatever he happened to eat. He ate green tamales in the market of Oaxaca. Two breakfasts — do you hear?! Avoid Doña Rolanda — disgusting! a torrential problem, and — enough already! Not till Tuesday afternoon, relaxed and ready, go to face her he must … Mireya, of course! though … first, enjoy her …
After making love with fury and imagination, it would be unsuitable for Demetrio to unleash a barrage of questions, especially considering that Mireya hadn’t uttered a word about her visit to his rooming house. Spent after achieving an extraordinary orgasm, she began to effusively caress her man. Her caresses felt more like clumsy tickles: giggles or pure joyous nervousness that, oh! Wait a minute! A form of distraction — triumphant? What was coming could be brutal … and in fact it was …
“You came by my place. How did you find me?”
“Do you want me to tell you?”
“Of course.”
“Well, you see, the last time you left here I asked a friend to follow you. The next morning I went there, and the landlady told me you weren’t in Oaxaca.”
“What gave you the idea to do that?”
“Because I want to live with you. I’ve made up my mind.”
“But I don’t … not now anyway.”
Such things catch fire, then flicker. To each of Demetrio’s negatives there rose from Mireya a new and affable perspective. She exhibited a red-hot wit, despite her troubles and her panic; wit spiced up with nicknames such as: my peach, my melon, my plum, instead of my love or my life; fruits, it would seem, that do not ridicule. And though Demetrio tried to slither troutlike out of her grip, something, some sticky residue, remained on the thin skin of those palms, as it were, but so it was.
Let’s offer some prime examples so that we can penetrate the very heart of this knot: what if she went to live with him at the rooming house … No, that’s impossible, Doña Rolanda rents rooms only to single people; so he could rent a small apartment … No, because I’m about to put the down payment on the house; so in the meantime they could go live in a hotel, even a run-down one … No, because it would be a foolish expense; so he would tell Doña Rolanda (it was to Mireya’s benefit that this name had been revealed) that it was a matter of extraordinary circumstances … No, because she has very strong opinions, she is way too obsessed with the rules she has made; so he could slip her some money that would change her attitude … No, but … maybe … I don’t know … it’s a matter of finding out how much she would want, though I’m sure she would agree for you to stay with me for a few days, two, three … I really don’t know; so she would go in person and ask her … No, not that, definitely not. The escalating propositions had surely reached their peak, whether out of exhaustion or the curtness of the agronomist’s replies, but what Mireya did manage to descry was the image of a narrow path and the course she had to take. Possibilities would pop up along the way … The remarkable part of this whole hullabaloo was that she hadn’t had to mention to her lover that … well, let’s see … The following is what was tacit: she wasn’t pregnant but she could drop that categorical fallacy on Demetrio and, depending on his reaction, set things straight and — set him straight! which would be … well, let’s see … set it straight? The pending invention, as a last resort. An entire artful tale that she wove when she was alone, and here we have it (let’s see): it starts from the (truthful) idea that at that dive, Presunción, prostitutes were not allowed to get pregnant; if they did, they got thrown out; if ever there arose the bizarre circumstance of somebody getting married, Madam and her bodyguards, even the entire brothel, would attend the wedding (a flowery falsehood), so such a celebration — civil, of course! for obvious reasons — no, no wedding in Oaxaca, though perhaps a neighboring village … thus concludes the improbable; Mireya, however, still counted on a barbaric fallback (a falsehood that bears fruit): if Mireya got pregnant and the stud effected a foolish escape, the bodyguards would pursue him and give him a thrashing, but not before soliciting assistance from the police: sooner or later, but effective nonetheless; that is: Demetrio beaten up, and even — why not? — castrated: indeed! poor thing! not that; tell him — what for? keep it in case there was some fervent refusal, or if Demetrio stopped coming to the brothel, then — indeed! — the search would be extensive, as she said. Anyway, this murky fantasy was confessed in detail to Luz Irene, who knew for certain what she had already intuited: Mireya was no fool, nor was she a pushover. Never! And the brunette’s consummate charm was revealed without restraint. If only we could see the way she swayed as she walked … Two such delectable days in the brothel and outside her room. She wanted to be seen by one and all. As if that was what she needed! Two days, and then on the third …
Mireya arrived at the rooming house at nine at night. Demetrio was there.
First the confrontation with Doña Rolanda.
No, she couldn’t come in, because she was a stranger, but: I’ll tell Mr. Demetrio that you want to see him. Wait here outside.
Demetrio arrived frightened, confused, and for good reason. They held a long conversation outside.
Problems. Rejection. More problems.
Mireya had no choice other than to tell him about Madam and her bodyguards (those we’ve met), the beating (to be avoided, by any means necessary), and even the Oaxacan police force. Could it be that bad?
In the face of such a staggering description Demetrio had no choice but to speak to Doña Rolanda. He was bursting with fear. The situation was (to tell the truth) one of force majeure. Wait for me out here. I won’t be long.
A discussion with the lady of the rigid notions … useless to try to persuade her. But when he showed her the fluttering bilclass="underline" a bauble in a light, uplifted hand …
Aah!
And only for a few days …
Ooh!
The lovers lounged in the room whose foremost novelty was the improved odor. It just might have been the first time any two beings had practiced the act of screwing there: within the confines of rented respectability, where there was an abundance of saintly idols made of clay and porcelain, and a picture of The Last Supper. One must, in this respect, mention guilt. For as soon as the two locked themselves in the room, Doña Rolanda knocked on the door. She was carrying a large bag. In it she would place all those figurines who were, to her mind, somehow alive, though she left said picture. It seems that Jesus Christ and his apostles were so thoroughly engaged in their repast and the company they kept that they wouldn’t have time to watch the disgusting things Demetrio and his lover might do. Doña Rolanda’s act was quick and silent. She did ask permission to carry out what she considered “a liturgical and appropriate act,” in her words, and: “Excuse me,” and: “I won’t disturb you again.” The saints: displaced, as to The Last Supper—what can we say?: an act of carelessness and, indeed, partial guilt. Increasing guilt, because at night she heard the lovers’ savage grunts — sex maniacs! Her curiosity to hear somehow connected with her compulsion to count three times a day the incredible sum Demetrio had paid her. Guilt-ridden sex … within … hmm, only in part, for Mireya had turned The Last Supper to face the wall. She had done so as soon as she stripped. Demetrio, for his part, after observing the maneuver, smiled but also crossed himself. And now, finally, without further ado, they went at it; during those days of plenty they enjoyed each other only at night. Let’s imagine the agronomist at his job, from seven in the morning till five in the afternoon, and she locked in the room, getting all tangled up in ideas about how to finagle an almost fantastical felicity. She didn’t want to be seen, either by Doña Rolanda or the other lodgers; and as far as being observed by passersby on the street: well, as few as possible. Even when she went out to get provisions she tried to scurry back, racing at great speed. No breakfasts or dinners in the dining room: well done! They clearly came to a mutually convenient agreement. They clearly shared the dregs of guilt.