Lost in the City: Tree of Desire and Serafin

by Ignacio Solares

  Joaquín was falling asleep and held up his arms to ask his sister to carry him. But with only a hard look from her, he resigned himself and even walked faster, very serious. Cristina was astonished.

  “Is it much farther, Señora?”

  “No, we’re almost there. And don’t call me Señora . . . I hate Señoras. Call me Angustias.”

  They entered a narrow, dark alley with damp stains on the walls and overflowing garbage cans.

  “No point in looking in them. There’s never anything worth the trouble.”

  They crossed a patio with laundry tubs and clothes hung to dry. A man seated in a rocking chair that creaked showed them two uneven, yellow teeth in greeting.

  “In a little while, right?”

  “Yes, Jesús,” she said without even turning.

  The man lifted a bottle from the ground and held it up proudly to show her.

  “Want some?”

  “Not today.”

  “And those children?”

  “They’re my little friends.”

  “You’re not going to . . .” and he laughed out loud and threw his body back. The rocking chair gave a sharp shriek, like a lament.

  The woman pushed aside the clothes with her broomstick.

  “What a nuisance. How many times have I told them not to hang clothes here. That’s what the roof is for.”

  The doors were metal, and the small windows had flowered curtains that gave off a dull light.

  At the end of the patio, Angustias stopped in front of a door and looked for the key in the pocket of her dress.

  “This is my humble abode.”

  She opened the door and, before entering, struck a match.

  “We haven’t had electricity for years.”

  Cristina heard the meowing and felt a cramp in her stomach.

  “I don’t want to go in,” Joaquín said.

  “They’re cats, Joaquín.”

  But her tone of voice betrayed her. The door to the room looked more like the mouth of a dark cave.

  Angustias had lighted the candle on the table, and it seemed to Cristina that the eyes of the cats were gleaming even more.

  “Stop that! Stop that!” Angustias said, hitting them with the stick. “You’re all over each other.”

  She threw them some pieces of meat.

  “Eat, eat . . . you devilish cats.”

  She was stepping on their tails, thrusting her stick in their mouths and grabbing the meat she had just given them, while they meowed furiously all around her, like in a circus act.

  “Cats from hell . . .”

  She looked at Cristina and, with a smile darkened by the flickering light of the candle, said, “They’re like my children.”

  Joaquín pressed himself against his sister, hanging onto her dress with both hands, and said,. “I want to go.”

  “They’re cats, Joaquín. Don’t you like them as much?”

  “They’re not Lucas,” he said, pointing to them.

  “All cats are alike, Joaquín.”

  “Sit down,” the woman said, indicating one of the two chairs at the table. “Or you can go to bed now if you want to.”

  Things seemed to float in the twilight—the bed of rusty metal, with a wool spread so torn it looked as if it would come apart; the worm-eaten dresser with a small lace cover on it; a candlestick; and an oval picture of a smiling old woman who was holding her head as if she wanted to come out of the picture.

  “This furniture is the only thing I have left from my mother; all the rest is gone . . . ,” Angustias explained in a sad voice with a tone of farewell, as she sat at the table in front of the candle, which made her expression even more enigmatic. “Look, child, that’s her.”

  Cristina went close to look at the photograph and said, “How beautiful.” She felt a sad tenderness in her stomach. The only thing she had left from her mother. Cristina had nothing left from her mother. And she would never go back home, so she would never have a memento of her mother. She would like to have had something. A rosary, for instance. Her mother had a collection of rosaries which she hung behind the door of her bedroom. At that moment—there in the dimness produced by the candle—she would like to have had something that belonged to her mother, anything, to hold tightly.

  “I used to have pictures,” the woman said, “but I sold them. Or they disappeared . . . and I had a bureau, but it’s gone, too.”

  “I’m afraid,” Joaquín said.

  “Calm down, Joaquín.”

  “I have to peepee.”

  “Señora,” Cristina asked very seriously, “may I use your bathroom?”

  “Of course, of course,” and she indicated the door.

  “May I take the candle?”

  Three cats followed Cristina, meowing and rubbing against her legs. She thought, I can’t bear this, but then told herself she had to bear it and tried to think of something else. In the corner next to the bathroom door, there were empty cans and bottles, papers, and dry branches.

  “I don’t need to peepee,” Joaquín said when he looked into the bathroom.

  “Come on, Joaquín, or you’ll do it during the night,” and she made him go in.

  The first thing Cristina noticed was the absence of a shower. She thought, how awful, where does she bathe? There was only a dirty wash basin, a medicine cabinet with a broken mirror, and a toilet without a lid. She put the saucer with the candle on the basin and, looking up, caught part of her reflection in the mirror. She turned her head to see the rest of her face and felt dizzy. She blinked. What am I doing here, so alone, and with my brother?

  Joaquín tugged on her skirt.

  “I’m doing it.”

  She pushed down his pants and underwear and seated him on the toilet.

  “I have to go poopoo, too.”

  Cristina looked for some toilet paper, but could not find any. She went out to ask the woman, though she could only see her silhouette.

  “There are some newspapers over there,” she said, pointing to the corner. Cristina went to get the candle and Joaquín shrieked.

  “It’s dark!”

  “Wait, honey.”

  The cats followed her, making her more nervous. She looked for the newspaper that was least dirty. The woman remained motionless in the chair, her aquiline profile silhouetted against the subdued light that came through the bare window. Joaquín was sobbing loudly in the bathroom.

  “I’m coming, Joaquín, I’m coming.”

  She tore off a piece of paper to clean the child. Then she pulled up his underwear and pants and they left the bathroom. Now the woman was seated with her chin resting on her chest, and Cristina supposed she was asleep. She put the candle beside her, saying “Thank you.”

  The cats were walking all around, and Joaquín held up his hand so they could not lick it.

  “Señora, where are we going to sleep?”

  “Huh?” said the woman, shaking her head so that some wilted flowers fell on the table. “Ah, my little precious, my beautiful little cubs,” and she held out her hand to stroke Joaquín’s cheek, “I’m going to be like your Mamá, you’ll see, I’m going to take care of you, keep you in my heart. Come, come.”

  Cristina felt sick to her stomach when the woman pulled her over to embrace her and kiss her hair.

  “Would you like to sleep with me? Come, we’ll sleep together, all of us together, my little kittens, you and me.”

  She stood up, went to the bed, and lifted the bedspread.

  “Come on, get in here.”

  Cristina took off Joaquín’s sweater and shoes and put them with hers at the bottom of the bed (she thought that if she put them on the floor, the cats would eat them). When she got in under the bedspread, she felt the mattress spring in her back. Her purse hurt her side, but she didn’t dare take it off.

  When the woman got in bed and the cats got on top, she felt the urge to jump up and run to call her mother on the phone. But she thought anything was preferable, less painful, than going ba
ck to the same thing as all those nights past. Closing her eyes, she clenched her teeth. Joaquín fell asleep immediately, but Cristina had a cat right on top of her chest, and the woman embraced her, closing in with her fetid breath.

  I need to pray, she told herself.

  Then she clenched her teeth even tighter, and felt two large tears roll down her cheeks.

  10

  Cristina dreamed about the house in the country where they had spent vacations when Joaquín was a little baby and for her the world had consisted of Papá and Mamá. But in the dream, she was her real age, and so was Joaquín. She and her brother tiptoed down the stairs, unlocked the door and opened it very slowly to lessen its creak. They went out into a cloudy, windy night. Going around the house, they went to the window of the small room where their parents were sitting in front of the fireplace. He was reading, and she sat with her eyes half-closed, moving back and forth in a rocking chair. The fire was casting shadows and surrounding them with a yellow glow. Papá was so still he looked like a wax figure. Cristina stuck her face against the glass, as if she wanted to get to the other side, and felt very sad. She was going to call to them, but only moved her lips against the glass as if she were kissing it. Joaquín tugged on her dress the way he always did and asked her to pick him up so he could see Papá and Mamá, too, but Cristina turned with a finger to her lips and said, Let’s go.

  They walked through a forest of pine trees swaying in the wind. The sky was burning with streaks of blue lightning. Cristina preferred the darkness to the rays of light, which lit up the animals stampeding, the pines piercing the sky, the eyes of the owls.

  They tried to cross the river on the smooth rocks, but Joaquín slipped and fell into the water. Cristina held out her hand to him, but the child was slowly sinking, waving his arms and crying out to his sister. She grabbed his arm and pulled him, but without much strength because she was slipping on the rocks and about to fall.

  The water was up to his neck; he was no longer churning it, and yet, she could tell only by the movements of his lips, he was still calling her, and calling Mamá, with his eyes open wider than she had ever seen them.

  Then Cristina saw him sink, illuminated by a flash of lightning, and with it the rain began: raindrops making small, concentric circles in the water. She screamed and put her hands over her eyes. She felt the rain on her cheeks but, suddenly awake, discovered it was tears and rubbed them away with the back of her hand. The woman was sleeping on her back, snoring loudly with a sharp whistle. On the other side of the bed, Joaquín was sleeping with his face to the wall. Cristina tried to dislodge the cat that was sleeping on her chest, but when awakened, it meowed and started to scratch her, so she decided to leave it alone. She had never imagined she could sleep with a cat on her, since she disliked them so much (even Lucas). She hugged her brother, feeling happy it had only been a dream, and also happy to be spending the night so far from home.

  11

  The creaking of the door awakened her. When Cristina sat up, the cat on her chest jumped to the floor. In the open door she saw the silhouette of a man. Cristina rubbed her eyes. Was she dreaming again? The man was still there, like an apparition, as if certain that only he could see clearly. Cristina gripped the edge of the bedspread and said, “Papá?”

  But the man did not answer.

  The woman continued sleeping on her back, and Joaquín, with his face to the wall. Then the man took a few steps forward, and Cristina noticed that he was staggering. He went to the bed and leaned over her, as if he were going to fall on his face. She shrieked when she saw a gleam, like lightning, in his eyes.

  “What’s going on?” the woman said, sitting up and looking around.

  “Angustias,” the man said.

  The woman showed her yellow teeth in what might have been either a smile or a gesture of disgust. Cristina pressed up against her brother. The woman held out her arms.

  “Jesús, come to bed with us.”

  The man leaned over the bed a little more and half-opened his thick mouth, showing two teeth in his upper gum. His eyes shone brighter.

  “Angustias.”

  He came up to the head of the bed, and the light coming through the window fell directly on his face. Then Cristina recognized the man she had seen when she entered the alley.

  “Come, Jesús, come.”

  He’s drunk, Cristina thought, and remembered the only time she saw Papá with eyes like that. He had returned from a party and came to give her a kiss, as always, before going to bed. She hardly woke up, but at breakfast the next morning, she said to her mother:

  “Papá was drunk last night.”

  “My dear,” Mamá said without lifting her face from her plate.

  The man sat on the edge of the bed. He stretched out a hand that made Cristina pull back more, and caressed the woman’s head.

  “Your flowers,” he said. “Flowers in your hair.”

  “Come, come to bed.”

  “Who are those children?”

  “Some little friends I found in the park. Poor things, they don’t want to go back home. They hate their parents.”

  Cristina was going to make it clear that she didn’t hate her parents, but she didn’t dare. The woman caressed her forehead.

  “Go to sleep, my love.”

  And she turned around to the man.

  “You’re really drunk.”

  “Angustias,” he said again.

  “I’ll make a little space for you. Come,” and she lifted the spread. The man got in bed next to her, and Cristina felt the weight of them both fall on her. The cats, who had been walking around the man’s legs, returned to the bed, and one, undoubtedly the same one, got on top of Cristina.

  “My Jesús.”

  “Wow, you can’t imagine how drunk.”

  “Put your hand here. Like that. Mmh, farther down. How wonderful.”

  “You’re hot, Angustias.”

  “Very.”

  “Those damned kids are going to see us.”

  “They’re asleep. Come on.”

  The man uncovered the woman’s flabby breasts, and Cristina looked more closely, with a curiosity that diminished her fear.

  “Like this?”

  He got on top of the woman under the spread, and they made a high, dark wave. The woman moaned, and the man appeared to be drowning. They’re making love, Cristina thought, and remembered seeing something similar in a movie. She was amused by it, even leaning her head on the palm of her hand.

  For a little while the wave rose so much and the man had so much trouble breathing, it seemed he was about to explode. On the other hand, the woman’s face sank into the pillow as if it were foam, and her expression of being about to bite something, to pull it up by the roots, had changed into an ecstatic, frozen grin that made Cristina think of pain.

  But she was entertained and even had to smother a laugh with the back of her hand when the man shook as if he had received an electric charge, sucked in as much air as he possibly could and then fell on the woman, sinking into her bosom while she asked for more, my Jesús, more, crying out so loudly Cristina was afraid she would waken Joaquín.

  Cristina remembered the morning when Alicia told her, I saw my parents do that thing they call making love. Love? That’s what they call it. They came together and got on top of each other in bed. I didn’t see it very well, but I saw it more or less. They came together? Cristina asked, pretending to know what it was about. Yes, very close together, Alicia told her.

  And in a movie, when a couple went into a bedroom and were kissing and slowly falling on the bed and the light went out to change the scene, she turned to her mother and asked,

  “They came together?”

  And her mother answered her with a finger to her lips, saying,

  “My dear.”

  Cristina would have liked to see them again, in more detail, but the man immediately fell asleep on the woman’s bare breast, as peaceful as a child, and the woman stroked his hair for a while,
saying, my little Jesús, and suddenly dropped her hand, letting it fall as if she had no strength. She started that snoring of hers, which was more like whistling.

  Cristina thought, if I could only get this cat off me, but she didn’t even try, and a few moments later she, too, was asleep.

  12

  When Cristina awakened, with the sun slanting through the window, Joaquín was no longer at her side. Her hand was resting in the hollow the child had left in the pillow. She looked at it as if trying to focus on it, recognize it, not really sure it was her normal, everyday hand, and suddenly, remembering everything, reacted to the absence of her brother.

  “Joaquín,” she said, sitting up and looking all around.

  Angustias, who was seated at the table taking small sips from a mug, answered without looking at her.

  “He went with Jesús.”

  “Where?”

  The light was revealing things, stripping them of the halo of the night before: the rust on the metal bed, the threadbare bedspread, the stains on the mattress, the springs sticking through, the cat dung on the floor, the pile of newspapers in one corner, the damp stains on the walls, the layer of dust that covered everything. Terror dawned in Cristina’s eyes.

  “I want to see my brother.”

  “You’ll see him this afternoon, after we get back from work.”

  “No!”

  Cristina jumped on Angustias, and the cats meowed. The contents of the mug—something that looked like coffee with milk—spilled on the table. Cristina grabbed Angustias by both shoulders and in return received a blow in the mouth from the back of her hand.

  “Just look what you’ve done, you stupid brat,” Angustias said, picking up the mug and using a spoon to try to catch the liquid that was spreading across the top of the table. But Cristina came back with even more fury and seized Angustias’ hair.

  “I want to see my brother!” she shouted again.

  Angustias gave a long moan and arched her back, letting the spoon fall. But a single jab of her elbow in the girl’s stomach was enough to make her release the hair. Then she turned with enraged eyes and slapped her several times on her head and face. Cristina still managed to respond with a kick, but one blow made her fall to the floor, where she put her hands up to her mouth and nose, both bleeding profusely.