The Sacred Beasts

by Bev Jafek

  “We just decided to e-mail,” Alex said in French. “Too much material.” She spoke French from then on, which further endeared her to Sylvie.

  Sylvie was silent a long time, then stared at Alex gravely. Alex basked in the stare that, such a short time before, had been a cutting dismissal. “Congratulations,” Sylvie finally said. “It will be a wonderful new web site. None of those women would ever have thought of it.” May all web sites rot in hell, Alex thought; I’ve got the girl. “Those poets are fascinating,” Sylvie continued. “I want to read them all and even illustrate them.”

  “I’d be delighted to give you my books, Sylviane,” Alex said. I’ll give you anything you’ll accept, she thought. Alex smiled and looked at Sylvie with great tenderness. She wanted to kiss her and stroke her cheek. She did not look victorious, Sylvie again noted.

  As Sylvie finally looked away, she thought, Ruth was right. She’s perfect for me. “Please call me Sylvie,” she said.

  “Could I call you?” Alex asked.

  Sylvie only sighed. “Ruth and I swore off our cell phones for the summer. It’s locked in her glove compartment. Too, I hate all the zombies walking around with their cell phones, bumping into one another, seeing nothing of any value. At some point, I’ll probably throw the damned thing away.”

  “Well, could you come out with me tomorrow, say afternoon and evening, see the city, have dinner?”

  “I’d love to,” said Sylvie. “I’ll paint all morning. We can go after that.” She smiled up at Alex. I know what you’re asking, she thought, and I will, even if it’s up against a wall in an alley. She laughed and said, “We should go back. They don’t know where we are,” meaning Ruth and Monserrat.

  “Ah, them.” Alex was silent, then she decided to continue being risky. “You know, Monserrat told me I could not possibly have a committed relationship with a woman of her age; that I would have to leave her very soon for a younger woman with whom I could share my life.”

  Sylvie laughed uproariously. “Ruth said the same thing to me, the exact words even.”

  I sure hope she means it, Alex thought.

  Those arrogant bitches, Sylvie thought. They think they’re goddesses, knowing everything. Of course, they were right, but that is entirely beyond the point.

  Well that settles it, Alex thought. They walked up the stairs to Monserrat’s house and rejoined the groups. Without thinking, Sylvie took Alex’s arm. Alex closed her eyes and thought she might faint from pleasure. It was perfect, every piece in place, as Monserrat conceived it before, when it seemed impossible and chaotic to everyone else.

  RUTH AND MONSERRAT were together in the gazebo during the encounter between Mujeres Libres, Alex and Sylvie. Ruth felt very young and light on her feet as she approached the gazebo; she nearly ran. Monserrat was smiling and luminous when she entered. They immediately embraced, like women who had known one another for years and been inexplicably separated. “I’m so glad you’ve come to me,” Monserrat said.

  “I am, too,” Ruth said. She looked at the intricate design of the gazebo’s surface in the moonlight. It seemed to be a palace of the forest ordered by tangled vines, flowers, trees, even a canopy, waiting only for them and silvered by the moon. “It’s a place of enchantment, and you are very beautiful.”

  “Can you give her up so easily?” Monserrat asked.

  “I already have. Only a fool would interfere with young love and at her age; she really must have someone to blunder with.”

  “Alex will do that very well. She has already started blundering with her.” They both laughed. “But, how will you feel at the moment she leaves?”

  “Instantly, a knife in the heart. The world is that beautiful. But then, will you be there?”

  “Oh, yes,” Monserrat said.

  “Then I will find my good fortune scarcely believable.” She traced one finger down the soft inside of Monserrat’s arm. And it was as simple as that: they became lovers. They kissed passionately and held one another like young lovers.

  You’re the one I’ll never leave, Ruth thought.

  You’re the one, Monserrat thought.

  When they separated again, Ruth said, “Tomorrow, let’s see the city together. After all that’s happened to me since Katia died, I have the strangest feeling of being homesick for your home.”

  “Then you know it’s your home, too. Of course, we might cross paths with them.”

  “We are all protected by a sense of humor and by love.”

  They kissed again and touched one another’s faces. “Isn’t it an adventure, always, women’s love?” Ruth asked.

  “Yes, I have no idea what will happen. There are no limits.”

  That’s it exactly, Ruth thought, no limits, pure adventure. Like the house. “It happens immediately or never, and means everything or nothing,” she said.

  “Yes, always like that. It’s magical,” said Monserrat. Their hands moved gratefully over their new bodies, now baptized as lovers. Ruth felt a voluptuous shape that bent itself completely and unexpectedly to her body. She kissed Monserrat’s neck and breasts. Monserrat felt a trim, muscular, large-boned body that seemed Greek and held her fiercely. They would have made love then if they were not so close to the others.

  “After a day or two, come away with me to Cadaqués,” Monserrat said.

  “Is it a secret place?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Do you hide it or rather, who has been there?”

  “Only Damiana, my lover who died.”

  “No one else at all? Not Alex?”

  “No. Only my beloved can come there.”

  “Then I’m homesick for it, too.”

  Inside the house, the evening was drawing to a close and, as often occurred, a few members of different groups stayed behind, joining what became a large, animated and irreverent group discussion among women on any subject that crossed their minds. Alex and Sylvie stood watching this group. Franco, always referred to as El Caudillo, had somehow become the subject. Some women from the journalist’s group and the fiction writers’ group were present, and these two groups loved to bait one another, attempting to prove, in a contest that no one took seriously, whether journalists or fiction writers were more imaginative. One of the journalists began the mock contest. “I heard that El Caudillo was really gay. All his attempts to domineer women occurred because he had no idea what to do with them.”

  One of the fiction writers immediately took up the bait. “That’s right, of course. I heard that the American FBI chief, J. Edgar Hoover, was his lover. Hoover came to Madrid all the time to fuck El Caudillo. Their sex began with the inherent ferocity of a double dictatorship but then, over time, they grew to trust one another. Then they became romantic. They did a lot of nude sun bathing on the Costa del Sol since El Caudillo could have any beach cleared out by arresting everyone else. They screwed tenderly in all the hidden coves of Cadaqués.”

  Another fiction writer instantly continued the banter. “I heard that one day, they went to the Dali Museum and decided that they were the two most powerful dictators and the two greatest absurdists of the twentieth century. They arranged to have their bodies stuffed by a taxidermist after their deaths and put on display as the major exhibit in the Dali Museum. When they went back to El Caudillo’s palace, they wore pink silk gowns all the time and admired one another’s secret femininity. Finally, they demanded that a fallen priest marry them. After the ceremony, El Caudillo shot the priest in the head for having desecrated the Catholic religion.”

  The contest seemed to have been soundly won by the fiction writers, but one of the women from the media professionals group, who had never seen the bantering contest before, made an irrelevant comment. “You’re making all that up. Aren’t they, Alex?”

  Alex, who was a member of the fiction writers’ group, wanted to maintain the mood of levity. “The sign of the greatest writers is that when they describe their own knowledge and experience, they have no idea what is true or false because they’ve
done so much embroidering. So, these stories are all both true and false; they heard and did not hear these things.”

  One of the gypsies, a woman who called herself Libre, growled in a froggy voice, “So does that mean you’ve told someone that you fucked the black cat sculpture in the Raval?” Libre wore her hair in an orange-tinted Mohawk and was the lover of Pilar, a gypsy in the fiction writers’ group.

  “No,” said Alex. “That cat is too butch for me, and it has the face of a Catalan saint. I find the elephant in Cuitadella Park more sexually appealing—all those curves.”

  The journalists and fiction writers were bored with this intrusion and wanted to finish their contest. “Actually, I heard El Caudillo kept a bunch of castrati at his palace to handle his wives, who had formed a harem,” said one of the journalists.

  “I heard he woke up one day as a cockroach,” countered one of the fiction writers. “It took the military ten hours to squash him, after which Spain was liberated. So, it took Kafka to finally liberate Spain, the only logical outcome for a country so full of rigid religious and political beliefs.”

  Another fiction writer decided to administer the coup de grace. “I heard that one day, he woke up covered with orifices. They began to drip and he was filled with horror and wanted to die. Instead, immediate use was made of his ‘readiness.’ The palace guards began fucking his many orifices at once and even the castrati and the women got involved. He had so many orgasms at the same time that he died a happy man.”

  Pilar, the gypsy girl who was one of the house’s strongest personalities and a favorite of Monserrat, said, “Tonight, ladies, you are really raw, just the way I love you. You’re the real women of Spain.”

  One of the artists commented, “I’m going to paint him as a cockroach. His face will be very recognizable.”

  Another of the artists said, “I definitely prefer to paint him covered with orifices. We give our thanks to the fiction writers for the most shameless absurdities.”

  One of the journalists was still unwilling to give up. “I heard he kept women chained in dungeons in his palace, like Medieval Spain. One night, they got loose. They ran, shrieking, all over the palace in their rags, found him, and tore him apart. It was like Orpheus except they fed the pieces to the pigs.”

  “Not exactly,” said one of the fiction writers. “Most of that happened, of course—a shining moment in Spanish history—but they actually made a stew of him. This dried out and hardened somewhat, and they then created loaves of bread from it. This was given to the Catholic Church for Communion, where it was highly prized.”

  The fiction writers silently declared themselves victorious, and the house began to empty. Suddenly, Ruth was at Sylvie’s side. She smiled and said, “Well, what do you think of the house and its atmosphere?”

  Sylvie laughed out loud. “Of course, I love it! It’s a whole house full of women who break every rule in the book.” She was then silent and thoughtful. “I’ve never been part of an atmosphere like this before. Are feminists and lesbians always like this?”

  “It only takes a place to meet and the freedom to speak. Then they are similar the world over, or so I’ve always thought. There’s a place in Paris, too.”

  “I must find it.”

  Alex decided it would be best for her to leave then. “See you tomorrow,” she said to Sylvie with a smile.

  “Oh, yes,” Sylvie said, smiling back.

  Ruth decided to say as little as possible about a relationship that was just beginning. Later, when they were preparing to sleep and Sylvie pressed Ruth for her opinion of Alex, she said, “Alex reminds me of myself when I was her age, including the occasional awkwardness.” This deeply impressed Sylvie, since she thought of Ruth as the most flexible, sophisticated and self-possessed person she had ever known. Then they made love as passionately as ever. I’m not at all sure how this ends, Sylvie thought. I can’t sleep with both of them at the same time. It’s right on schedule, Ruth thought, just as it should be.

  AT THAT MOMENT, Monserrat and Alex were in bed together in another room, quite near Sylvie and Ruth. “I’m going out with her tomorrow, afternoon and evening,” Alex said.

  “I’m so glad, Alex,” Monserrat said. “Take the night at least or even a few days if she wants to. I already know that you want to.”

  “Was I that obvious at lunch?”

  “You might have fooled some men but women? Never.” They both laughed. “Keep in mind, though, that she will test you,” Monserrat continued, “and she’s creative enough that no one can possibly predict what it will be like.”

  Alex sighed. “I’ve already been tested! You have no idea what an obnoxious evening I’ve had. Mujeres Libres jumped all over me for being American. I could only shut them up by imagining a magnificent new web site for them. It was all silly, of course, but Sylvie would never have become interested in me if it hadn’t happened. What a mess! I don’t know how I survived it.”

  Monserrat did not smile, as Alex expected. “The real test hasn’t even begun yet, Alex, but it surely will tomorrow. What happened tonight was only enough to engage her interest. You want her love.”

  “Are you serious? Why is she so much trouble?”

  “She has been with a lot of men who’ve tried to dominate her. She sent them packing, but she’s still very angry about it. She will want you to prove that you’re completely different.”

  “How do you know so much about Sylvie?”

  “She reminds me of myself when I was her age.”

  “Oh . . . yes. I can see that.” Alex was thoughtful and then became dreamy again. “Well, I’m ready for her.”

  “Stay ready when it gets really wild, because it will. Your girl is part tigress, at least for now.”

  “What’s underneath all that?”

  “Maternal feelings, I would guess. She will want to have a child at some point. If I were young today, I would have children. In my day, it seemed impossible. But, Sylvie doesn’t want anyone to manipulate those feelings, which run deep. My guess is, she despises the childishness of men who need to dominate a woman.”

  “Will she always be part tigress?”

  “No. If she’s in a good relationship, she will become very loving, supportive and maternal.”

  “Wow,” said Alex with a sigh. She was shocked by Monserrat’s description. “Wow. It would have taken me years to figure that out.” They made love tenderly, as they always had, with empty minds, brimming hearts, and a deep sense of what pleased the other. Alex’s last thought was, how much longer for this? It’s so lovely. Can I really give Monserrat up for a gorgeous tigress that wants kittens?

  IN THE MIDDLE of the night, Alex woke up in a state of excitement after powerful dreams. She put on a robe, went to a room that had been functioning as her study, and opened a notebook she used for her ideas on a great novel she meant to write. She had been fascinated by Ruth’s description of the book she was writing and found its ideas relevant to the novel.

  The early twenty-first century, she wrote, is a time of traumatic change in every sense—economic, political, psychological, technological, environmental, cultural—and the novel’s narrative structure must reflect this. My intuitive sense of my time, in terms relevant to narrative, is disorientation in the order of beginnings and endings. Our civilization exhibits the strong potential for a catastrophic end and a new beginning or transformation, both of which may occur almost simultaneously. The novel should therefore begin with the end, which is foremost in my thoughts as fear. It should proceed to the beginning, which is shadowy but implicit in the end. It must end in the middle, as all life does. Chronological time will therefore be preserved in the story or narrative.

  The end and the beginning are inherently a cry of the heart and demand first person narration from a highly intelligent female character that I will temporarily call Ruth. The middle, which will come last, is more erratic emotionally, full of ups and downs, as life is. The narrative should hence shift to third person or omniscien
t narration, staying close to the thoughts of all characters but not drowning in a stream-of-consciousness, which would undermine the intellectual position and narrative theory. Whole scenes can consist of the characters’ thoughts that respond to one another as an elegant ballet, with little dialogue or action.

  The intellectual position of the novel should reflect the imminent catastrophe (and human moral failure to prevent it) envisioned by Ruth. Her ideas draw together all the forces active in the trauma of today into a single theory that displays the biological basis of our conflicts in primatology. The intellectual position will rarely appear as such in the story; the narrative can only be about the lives of women living today. Though the intellectual position of the novel is tragic, the story will nonetheless have strong comic elements. The ridiculous and the sublime will always be in close proximity, as they are in life.

  The novel’s vision or its visionary potential should be capable of viewing art and nature holistically, as my artist friends do, because this vision has moral strength. To completely revere the earth, as art does, is to save it. The novel should even look directly into the mind of an artist frequently and capture the moment of creation.

  The novel will assert itself against most American literary fiction, which I see as anti-intellectual (even modestly intellectual fiction will be called pretentious, at least by critics in the media), relatively emotionless, and very much a product of the university writing schools. They sabotage a writer’s boldness of vision and intelligence, which require a leap of faith, intellect and energy, rather than an appearance at a seminar of critics. I want my characters to reflect the women I know, all of whom are intelligent, ambitious, and often charismatic. I want them as real and vivid as my friends, the women who meet in this house. In fact, I want this amazing house to be a character, the intelligence and drama of the lives of women who come here portrayed exclusive of the major characters’ perception of them. I don’t find the women I know in any American fiction of today. The portrayal of women who are ambitious, self-confidant and exploratory is virtually non-existent in world literature.