“The complete works of Wagner. Do you realize what that means, Señor Don Luis? The dream of my life. Before I’d save enough for an opera here, a bel canto selection there. . No, damn it, begging the Señor’s pardon, now the complete works of Don Ricardo, let’s hope I live long enough to listen to all the CDs, a gift from your brother. Don Luis, it was a lucky day when he came to live in this house.”
6. Morning after morning, Don Luis Albarrán woke with his head full of good intentions. Each evening, Reyes Albarrán came with a new, bad, and worse intention.
“I’m going to imagine that you’re a dream,” Don Luis told him with an evil look.
“Don’t hide from the world anymore, Güichito.”
“I’m afraid of unfortunate people like you. They bring bad luck.”
“We’re brothers. Let’s bury the truth in the deepest grave.”
“Get out of here.”
“You invited me. Be sensible.”
“Sensible! You came into my house like an animal. A beast lying in ambush. You’re a parasite. And you’ve turned all my employees into parasites.”
“The parasites of a parasite.”
“Leave me alone. For just one day. Please,” Don Luis shouted and rose to his feet, exasperated.
“What are you afraid of?” replied Reyes very calmly.
“Unfortunate people. The evil eye. Unfortunate people like you bring us bad luck. Bad luck is contagious. A jinx.”
Reyes laughed. “So you have the soul of a Gypsy and a minstrel. . Look, your cynicism toward religion, which I reminded you of the other day, came with a price, Luisito. Since we didn’t perform the penance of the Church, we have to perform the penance of life.”
“Penance? You filthy bum, I don’t—”
“Do you even look at your servants? Have you smelled your cook up close, saturated with the aromas of your damn huevos rancheros for breakfast? Tell me the truth, brother, how many people do you know? How many people have you really gotten close to? Do you live only for the next administrative board?”
Reyes took Luis by the shoulders and shook him violently. The businessman’s glasses fell off. With one hand, Reyes tousled Luis’s hair.
“Answer me, junior.”
Don Luis Albarrán stammered, stunned by bewilderment, injury, impotence, the mental flash that told him, “Everything I can do against my brother, my brother can do against me.”
“And even worse, Luisito. Who looks at you? Really, who looks at you?” Reyes let Luis go with a twisted smile, half boastful, half melancholy. “You live in the ruin of yourself, brother.”
“I’m a decent man.” Don Luis composed himself. “I don’t harm anybody. I’m compassionate.”
“Compassion doesn’t harm anybody?” The discomfiting brother pretended to be amazed. “Do you believe that?”
“No. Not anybody.”
“Compassion insults the one who receives it. As if I didn’t know that.”
“Cynic. You’ve shown compassion to all my servants.”
“No. I’ve given them what each one deserved. I think that’s the definition of justice, isn’t it?” Reyes walked to the door of the bedroom and turned to wink at his brother. “Isn’t it?”
7. “Permit me to express my astonishment to you, Don Luis.”
“Tell me, Truchuela.”
“Your brother—”
“Yes.”
“He’s gone.”
Don Luis sighed. “Did he say what time he’d be back?”
“No. He said, ‘Goodbye, Truchuela. Today is the Day of the Kings. The vacation’s over. Tell my brother. I’m leaving forever, goodbye.’ ”
“Did he take anything with him?” Don Luis asked in alarm.
“No, Señor. That’s the strangest part. He was wearing his beggar’s clothes. He wasn’t carrying suitcases or anything.” The butler coughed. “He smelled bad.”
“Ah yes. He smelled bad. That will be all, Truchuela.”
That was all, Don Luis Albarrán repeated to himself as he slowly climbed the stairs to his bedroom. Everything would return to its normal rhythm. Everything would go back to what it had been before.
He stopped abruptly. He turned and went down to the first floor. He walked into the kitchen with a firm step. He realized he was seeing it for the first time. The servants were eating. They got to their feet. Don Luis gestured for them to sit down. Nobody dared to. Everything would go on as it always had.
Don Luis exchanged glances with each servant, one by one, “Do you ever look at your servants?” and he saw that nothing was the same. His employees’ glances were no longer the same, the boss said to himself. How did he know if, in reality, he had never looked at them before? Precisely for that reason. They were no longer invisible. The routine had been broken. No, it wasn’t a lack of respect. Looking at each one, he was certain about that.
It was a change in spirit that he could not distinguish but that he felt with the same physical intensity as a blow to the stomach. In a mysterious way, the routine of the house, though it would be repeated punctually from then on, from then on would no longer be the same.
“Will you all believe me?” said Don Luis in a very quiet voice.
“Señor?” inquired the butler, Truchuela.
“No, nothing.” Don Luis shook his head. “What are you preparing in the oven, Bonifacia?”
“La rosca de reyes, Señor. Did you forget that today is the Day of the Kings?”
He left the kitchen on the way to his bedroom, on the way to his routine, on the way to his daily penance.
“From now on, everything will put me to the test,” he said as he closed the door, looking at the photograph of the beautiful Chilean Matilde Cousiño out of the corner of his eye.
Yes, he said to himself, yes, I have known love.
He slept peacefully again.
they gave him his death certificate on coffee-colored paper with a hammered frame a water mark and the national seal of the eagle and the serpent visible against the light
who’s going to die?
I am
in fifteen minutes we declare you dead, it costs you fifteen hundred pesos
who certifies it?
we have here the directory of medical forms, the doctor signs even though he doesn’t see the body, it’ll be another fifteen hundred pesos
three thousand?
it’s very little to die in peace, the doctor’s name and the medical document confirm your death
what will I die of?
choose, it can be because a fish bone got caught in your throat
I never eat fish
very simple, the preferred death is by infarction, it leaves no trace
but my family, where will they pray for me?
the best thing is ashes in an urn
and my family?
they can be a dog’s ashes, nobody will know
with this my widow can collect my insurance and pensions?
what, didn’t you tell us you wanted to die so you wouldn’t see your wife and children anymore because they interfered with you?
yes, but I don’t want to leave them out on the street
don’t worry, we arrange everything with “those inside”
good, now I want to come back to life
of course, in fifteen minutes we’ll have your new birth certificate, complete with official documentation and, if you like, a voting document and a taxpayer record
you pay taxes even when you’re dead?
tell us, what name do you want
let me choose
here’s a list from A to Z
well an A and a Z
Amador Zuleta
done
“Amador Zuleta” left the civil registry in Arcos de Belén renewed, breathing deeply, with a roll of bills in his pocket and a ticket on the Red Arrow line that would take him far from his former life, far from the capital, to the north, to a new life, an unknown family, loved for the mere fact that it was different and distinct from all the habits and phrases repeated ad infinitum of the family he was abandoning Mexico City — Ciudad Victoria— Monterrey — Nuevo Laredo
Amador Zuleta stood at the beginning of the longest highway in the republic and began to run to run to run