That Christmas Day in 1950, I was walking along the beach promenade, a raised terrace edged with geraniums. I was eight years old. I was sunburned—my nose was raw and my face covered with freckles. I was wearing a white piqué sundress and a necklace of small shells strung on a thread. I had painted my fingernails with red water colors, so my fingers looked as if they had been smashed, and I was pushing a little wicker buggy holding my newest doll, a sinister rubber baby with one orifice in her mouth and another between her legs, so water that went in above came out below. The beach was deserted; the night before, the village inhabitants had eaten late, attended midnight mass, and celebrated till early morning, and no one was up yet. At the end of the walkway was an area of huge rocks where the ocean erupted in roaring bursts of foam and seaweed; the light was so intense that colors paled in the incandescent whiteness of the morning. I seldom wandered so far from home, but that day I was looking for the perfect place to give my doll her bottle and change her diaper. Down below, among the rocks, a man came out of the sea; he was wearing goggles and had a tube in his mouth that he jerked out roughly, gasping for air. Around the waist of his threadbare black bathing trunks was a rope where he had tied the curved knives that were his tools for gathering shellfish. In his hand he had three sea urchins, which he dropped into a sack and then lay down on a large rock to rest. His smooth, hairless skin was like tanned leather, and his hair was black and curly. He reached for a bottle and gulped long drafts of water, gathering strength to dive again. With the back of his hand he brushed the hair from his face and rubbed his eyes; that was when he looked up and saw me. At first he may not have realized how old I was; all he saw was a figure rocking a small bundle in her arms, and in the reverberating late-morning light he could have mistaken me for a mother with her baby. He whistled to me and lifted his hand to wave. I stood up, slightly distrustful, but curious. By then his eyes had adjusted to the sun and he recognized me; he waved again and shouted to me not to be afraid, and not to run away because he had something for me. He took two sea urchins and half a lemon from his sack and began to climb the rocks. “You’ve really changed,” he said. “Last year you were just a little runny-nosed kid like your brothers.” I took a couple of steps backward, but then I recognized him, too, and returned his smile, putting my hand over my mouth because my new teeth weren’t all in yet. I knew him because he often came by our house at the end of the day to see if we wanted anything: Tata always insisted on personally selecting the fish and shellfish. “Come over here and sit by me and let me see your dolly. If she’s rubber, I bet she can swim; let’s go put her in the water. I’ll look after her for you, nothing will happen. Look, I have a whole bag of sea urchins down there, and this afternoon I’ll bring some by your grandfather’s. You want to taste one?” He took one in his large calloused hand, indifferent to the sharp spines, placed the hooked tip of his knife under the crown, just where the shell is circled with a little string of pearls, and pried it open. An orangish cavity appeared, filled with viscera awash in a dark liquid. He held the cup of the shell to my nose and told me that that was the smell of the bottom of the ocean and of women when they are hot. I sniffed, timidly at first, and then with pleasure at the strong aroma of iodine and salt. He explained that a sea urchin should be eaten only when it’s alive, that otherwise it’s deadly poisonous. He squeezed a few drops of lemon juice into the shell and showed me how the little tongues moved, stung by the acid. He broke one off, tipped his head back, and slipped it into his mouth as a thread of dark juice trickled from his thick lips. I agreed to try it—I had seen my grandfather and my uncles empty several shells into a bowl and wolf down the contents with chopped onion and cilantro—and he pulled off another piece and put it in my mouth. It was soft and flabby but with a rough texture, a little like a wet towel. The taste and smell are not like anything else; at first the iodine was repellent, but then the succulent, palpitating meat filled my mouth with distinct and inseparable savors. One by one, he stripped the pieces of rosy flesh from the shell, giving me some and eating some himself. Then he opened the second sea urchin and we ate it, too, laughing and spattering juice and sucking each other’s fingers. Last, he poked at the bloody bottom of the shells and picked out the tiny sea spider that is nourished by the urchin and is pure, concentrated flavor. He put one on the tip of his tongue and waited, mouth open, for it to sidle farther back, then crushed it against his palate and showed me the squashed creature before he swallowed it. I closed my eyes. I felt his thick fingers tracing the outlines of my lips, tickling the tip of my nose, and my chin. I opened my mouth and something was on my tongue, but when I felt the tiny moving feet I gagged and spit out the spidery crustacean. “Silly,” he said, as he picked it out of the rocks and ate it. “You know, I don’t believe your dolly can pee pee, let me see, show me the little hole. Is it a boy or a girl doll? You don’t know? Well, does it have have a pecker or not?” And then he looked at me with an indecipherable expression and suddenly took my hand and placed it on his sex. I felt something under the damp cloth of his bathing suit, something that moved, something like a piece of garden hose. I tried to pull my hand away but he held it there firmly while in an altered voice he whispered not to be afraid, that he wouldn’t do anything bad, just things that felt good. The sun grew warmer, the light whiter, and the roar of the ocean louder, while beneath my hand that tool of eternal damnation began to come to life. At that instant, Margara’s voice called from the distance, breaking the spell. Startled, the man stood and pushed me away from him; he picked up his knife, and leaped down the rocks toward the sea. Halfway down, he paused, turned, and pointed to his groin. “You want to see what I have here? You want to know how your Papa and Mama do it? They do it like dogs but, oh, much nicer; wait for me here this afternoon during siesta time, about four, and we’ll go to the woods where no one can see us.” An instant later he disappeared among the waves. I put my doll in the buggy and walked back toward the house. I was trembling.
We always had Sunday dinner under the grape arbor in the patio with the hydrangeas, gathered around a large table with white tablecloths. That day the entire family was celebrating Christmas; there were hanging garlands, as well as pine branches and plates of nuts and crystallized fruit on the table. We had turkey left from the night before, tomato and lettuce salad, sweet corn, and an enormous conger eel baked in butter and onion. It was served whole: tail, huge head with entreating eyes, and unmarred skin like a glove of tarnished silver, which my mother peeled off with a single flourish, exposing the gleaming flesh. Jugs of white wine with peaches passed from hand to hand, along with trays of rolls warm from the oven. As always, everyone was talking at high volume. My grandfather, in shirtsleeves and a straw hat, was the only one aloof from the uproar; he was absorbed in the task of removing the seeds from a chili pepper before filling it with salt; soon he had a salty, spicy liquid that would bore through cement, which he drank with obvious relish. We children all sat at one end of the table, five boisterous cousins fighting over the most golden rolls. I still had the taste of the sea urchins in my mouth, and all I could think of was that I had to be there at four. The maids had prepared the airy, cool bedrooms, and after lunch the family retired to rest. We cousins had cots in the same room, and it wasn’t easy to slip out during siesta because of Margara’s all-seeing eye. After a while, though, she went to her own room—even she got tired. I waited for my cousins to surrender to sleep and for the house to grow calm, then got out of bed, very quietly, put on my sundress and sandals, hid my doll under my bed, and went out. The wood floor creaked with every step, but in that house something was always making noise: the floorboards, the pipes, the motor of the refrigerator or the water pump, mice, and Tata’s parrot that spent the summer insulting us from its perch.
The young fisherman was waiting at the end of the beach walk, dressed in dark pants, a white shirt, and rubber-soled shoes. As I came near, he starting walking, and I followed without a word, like a somnambulist. We crossed the street, tur
ned into an alley, and began to climb the hill toward the woods. There were no houses there, only pines, eucalyptus, and scrub; the air was cool, almost cold, because the sun rarely penetrated the heavy shade of that green canopy. The sharp combined fragrance of the trees and the clumps of wild thyme and mint blended with exhalations from the sea. Green lizards scuttled across dried leaves and pine needles; those whispery steps, the occasional cry of a bird, and the sound of branches in the breeze were the only perceptible sounds. He took my hand and led me deep into the woods; I couldn’t see anything but vegetation, I had lost my sense of direction, I couldn’t hear the ocean anymore . . . I was absolutely lost. No one could see us now. I was so afraid I couldn’t speak, but I didn’t dare let go of that calloused hand and run, I knew he was much stronger and faster than I. Don’t talk to strangers, Don’t let anyone touch you, If someone touches you between your legs it’s not just a mortal sin, you’ll be pregnant besides, your belly will swell up like a balloon, bigger and bigger until it explodes and you die. All Margara’s horrible admonitions were pounding in my ears. I knew I was doing something forbidden, but I couldn’t go back or escape. I was trapped in my own curiosity, a fascination more powerful than terror. At other times in my life, I have experienced that same mortal vertigo when facing danger, and have yielded to it because I couldn’t resist the urgent call to adventure. At times that temptation has been detrimental—for example, during the military dictatorship—and at others it has been enriching—as when I met Willie, and the thrill of the gamble impelled me to follow him. Finally, the fisherman stopped. “We’re fine here,” he said, arranging branches to form a bed. “Lie down here and put your head on my arm so the needles don’t get in your hair. That’s it, now, lie still, we’re going to play Mama and Papa.” He was panting slightly, gasping; his chapped hand stroked my face and neck, then slipped beneath the bib of my dress, feeling for my childish nipples, which contracted when he touched them, caressing me as no one had ever done before—we never even touched in my family. I felt a warm lassitude dissolving my bones and my will; a visceral panic swept over me and I began to cry. “What’s the matter, silly girl? I’m not going to do anything bad,” and he moved his hand from the neck of my sundress to my legs, his fingertips first feeling between them, then pushing them apart, firmly but not violently, moving up, up to my very center. “Don’t cry now, let me do it, I’m just going to touch you softly with my finger, there’s nothing bad about that, open your legs, relax, don’t be afraid, I’m not going to put it in you, I’m not a fool, if I do anything to you your grandfather will kill me, I’m not going to fuck you, we’re just going to play a little.” He unbuttoned my dress and took it off, but left on my panties. I suppose he felt Tata’s hot breath on his neck. His voice was hoarse now, and he was mumbling an uninterrupted stream of obscenities and endearments and kissing my face. His shirt was wet through, and he was gulping for breath, pressing hard against me. I thought I might die, my face was slick from his kisses, I was crushed by the weight of his body, choked by the reek of sweat and sea, by his wine and garlic breath, as his strong, warm fingers crawled like lobsters between my legs, pressing, rubbing, his hand covering that secret part that no one was supposed to touch. I couldn’t protest, I felt something deep inside me opening, shattering, exploding in a thousand fragments, while he rubbed against me, faster and faster, in an incomprehensible paroxysm of moans and rasping breath, then slumped beside me with a choked cry that came not from him but the very depths of the earth. I had no idea what had happened, or how long I lay beside that man, naked except for my pristine blue cotton underpants. I looked for my sundress and with shaking hands clumsily put it on. He buttoned the buttons down the back and stroked my hair. “Don’t cry, nothing happened to you,” he said, and suddenly he jumped up, took my hand, and pulled me back down the hill toward the light. “I’ll wait for you tomorrow at the same time. You be here, and don’t say a single world to anyone about this. If your grandfather finds out, he’ll kill me,” he warned as we set off in different directions. But the next day, he wasn’t there.
This experience must have left a scar somewhere, because in all my books, seductive or seduced children play a role, almost always without related evil, except in the case of the small black girl in The Infinite Plan whom two men capture and intend to harm. Resurrecting the memory of that young fisherman, I feel no repugnance or terror; quite the opposite, actually, I feel a vague tenderness for the little girl I was and for the man who did not rape me. For years I kept the secret so deeply hidden in a separate compartment of my mind that when I fell in love with Michael I did not relate it to the awakening of sexuality.
THE NEUROLOGIST AND I AGREED TO CUT OFF YOUR RESPIRATOR FOR one minute, Paula, but we did not tell the rest of the family because they still haven’t recovered from that fateful Monday when you were so close to leaving us. My mother cannot talk about it without bursting into tears; she wakes at night with a vision of Death leaning over your bed. I believe that, like Ernesto, she no longer prays for you to get well but for you not to suffer any longer; as yet, however, I have not lost my will to fight to keep you. The doctor is a kind man, whose eyeglasses perched at the end of his nose and wrinkled white lab coat give him a look of vulnerability, as if he had just waked from a nap. He is the only physician here who seems sensitive to the anguish of those of us who spend our days in the corridor of lost steps. The porphyria specialist is more interested in the laboratory test tubes where he analyzes your blood every day; he seldom comes by to see you. This morning we disconnected you for the first time. The neurologist checked your vital signs and read the charts from last night, while I called on my grandmother and yours—the wonderful Granny who has been gone fourteen years now—for their help. “Ready?” he asked, peering at me over his glasses, and I responded with a nod, because I couldn’t speak. He flicked a switch and the liquid hiss of the oxygen in the transparent tube in your neck suddenly was stilled. I stopped breathing, too; watch in hand, I counted the seconds, begging, commanding, you to breathe, Paula . . . please. Every instant was the lash of a whip . . . thirty, forty seconds . . . nothing; five seconds more and it seemed your chest moved a fraction, but so slightly it could have been an illusion . . . fifty seconds . . . and we couldn’t wait any longer, the blood had drained from your face and I myself was nearly asphyxiated. The machine began to function, and a touch of color returned to your skin. I put away the watch, trembling; I was burning hot and soaked with perspiration. The doctor handed me a square of gauze.
“Here, you have blood on your lips,” he said.
“This afternoon we’ll try again, and then tomorrow, and so on, a little more each day, until she can breathe on her own,” I resolved, when I could speak.
“Paula may not be able to breathe on her own. . . .”
“She will, Doctor. I’m going to take her out of this place and it will be easier if she helps me.”
“I suppose mothers know better than anyone else. We will gradually lower the pressure of the respirator to force her to use those muscles. Don’t worry, we’ll see she gets plenty of oxygen”; he smiled, giving me an affectionate pat on the shoulder.
My eyes were blurred with tears as I left the room and rejoined my mother. I guess Memé and Granny stayed behind with you.
Willie came the moment he heard about the most recent crisis, and this time he was able to be away from his office five days—five whole days together! I needed that time badly. Long separations are dangerous; love can go astray in the shifting sands. “I’m afraid I’ll lose you,” Willie says. “I feel you’re farther and farther away and I don’t know how to hold you. Remember you are my woman, my soul.” I haven’t forgotten, but it is true that I am more distant; sorrow is a solitary road. When Willie comes he brings a blast of fresh air. Adversity has strengthened his character; nothing defeats him, he has inexhaustible stamina in the face of day-to-day struggles. He is restless and impulsive, but he is suffused with Buddhistic calm when he must endure m
isfortune, which makes him a stalwart companion in difficult times. He occupies every inch of our small apartment in the hotel, altering the delicate routines my mother and I have established, moving us about like two ballerinas in a rigorous choreography. Someone with the size and characteristics of Willie does not pass unnoticed; when he comes there is disorder and noise and the tiny kitchen is always busy—the entire building smells of his delicious cooking. We rent an additional room, and we take turns with my mother going to the hospital; that way I can have a few hours alone with my husband. In the mornings, Willie prepares breakfast and then calls my mother, who appears in her nightgown and wool socks and layers of shawls, with the mark of the pillow still creasing her cheek: a sweet little old grandmother from a bedtime story. She crawls into our bed and we begin the day with toast and cups of the aromatic coffee Willie has brought from San Francisco. This man never knew what a family was until he was fifty, but he quickly became accustomed to sharing his space with mine, and doesn’t find it strange to start the day three to a bed. Last night we went out to eat dinner at a restaurant on the Plaza Mayor, where we let ourselves be tempted by rowdy waiters dressed up as comic opera smugglers, who danced attendance on us in a stone room with vaulted ceilings; everyone was smoking and there was no ventilation of any kind—light years behind the North American obsession with health. We poisoned ourself with lethal dishes: fried octopus and mushrooms with garlic, pork roasted in a clay cooker—golden, crackling, streaming fat, perfumed with herbs—and a jug of sangria, that heavenly wine and fruit that goes down like water but when you try to stand up hits you like a poleax at the back of the neck. I hadn’t eaten like that in weeks; my mother and I often slip through the day with nothing but hot chocolate. I spent a terrible night with hair-raising visions of scalded and scraped hogs screaming over their fate and live octopuses climbing my legs, and this morning I swore to become a vegetarian like my brother Juan. No more sins of gluttony for me. These days with Willie have renewed me, I can feel life in my body again, forgotten for weeks; I touch my breasts, my ribs—which I can count under my skin—my waist, my thighs, getting to know myself again. This is me, I’m a woman, I have a name, I’m called Isabel, I’m not turning to smoke, I have not disappeared. I examine myself in my grandmother’s silver mirror: this person with the disconsolate eyes is me. I have lived nearly half a century, my daughter is dying, and still I want to make love. I think of Willie’s reassuring presence and feel goosebumps rise on my skin, and can only smile at the amazing power of desire that makes me shiver despite my sorrow, even push death from my mind. For a moment, I close my eyes and see clearly the first time we slept together, our first kiss, our first embrace, the astonishing discovery of a love that materialized when we least sought it, of the tenderness that took us by storm when we thought we were safely indulging in a one-night affair, of the profound intimacy we felt from the beginning, as if our entire lives had been a preparation for that meeting, of the ease, calm, and confidence with which we made love, like an old couple that has shared a thousand and one nights. And always, afterward, passions sated and love renewed, our bodies meld in sleep, not caring where one begins or the other ends, or whose hand or foot is whose, in such perfect complicity that we meet in our dreams and the next morning do not know who dreamed whom, and when one moves the other adjusts to the new angles and curves, and when one sighs the other sighs, and when one wakes the other wakes, too. “Come,” Willie calls me, and I go to the man waiting in the bed and, shivering from the cold of the hospital and the outdoors and from the unshed tears that turn to frost in my veins, I take off my nightgown and huddle against the bulk of his body, wrapped in his arms until I am warm. Little by little we become aware of the other’s quickening breathing, and our caresses become slower and more intense as we surrender to pleasure. He kisses me, and once again I am surprised, as I have been for four years, at how soft and cool his lips are; I cling to his strong shoulders and neck, run my hands down his back, kiss the hollow of his ears, the horrible skull tattooed on his right arm, the line of hair down his belly, and breathe in his odor of health, that odor that always excites me, lost in love, and grateful, while a river of inevitable tears pours from my cheeks onto his chest. I cry out of sorrow for you, Paula, but I suppose I am also crying for the happiness of this late love that has come to change my life.