by Steve Berman
“But how do you decide whose time is up?”
“I don’t decide. I simply know.”
The answer frustrated rather than helped. Try as I might, I could not make sense of who lived and who died. There were the elderly who had lived a good life, although some were ready to leave their ailing bodies but could not. Others were children stricken with fevers or consumption, fighting valiantly to live while their bodies grew too broken to continue.
One night, after I’d been forced to let a man die of a snakebite, I railed at my padrino. “Don’t you care who lives and who dies? The wife has lost a husband. She loved him deeply, and now will pine for him. Have you no pity, no compassion?”
He didn’t answer, but simply faded into the darkness as was his habit. Usually, I let him go, needing time to myself, but this time I followed him, desperate for some answers to the questions plaguing me.
One of my many lessons had been stealth; I employed it now, staying just far enough behind him so that he would not detect me. We traveled through the desert, the air scented with creosote and hot stone. The unyielding heat of the day remained, even after dark.
We went up a rocky hill until it leveled out into a mesa overlooking the pueblo. I figured this must be some vantage point of his, where he could watch the people pass below and count the days they had left. I’d never been here before and hadn’t even realized there was a usable path to the top.
I crouched behind a boulder while my padrino stood, quiet and contemplative. Anger flashed within me; how dare he lecture me on life and death yet be so callous to the anguish of others?
I was ready to confront him, to call him on his deception when he made a choked, strangled noise.
El Muerto was weeping.
The sight twisted through my gut, filling me with shame. I turned away, having intruded on something too personal, too intimate. I was so used to his passivity in all things that this display of emotion utterly unnerved me.
I dared not move until long after he left, then, gathering my courage, went to inspect the area that had undone him. There was naught to mark the place but a few stones, but even so, I knew it was a grave.
A pang struck my chest. How strange to think that El Muerto had once loved someone and still mourned, yet, the revelation filled me with resolve. I didn’t want to be like him, to wander through the years alone and pining.
I wanted a living lover of my own.
ONE DAY I WAS PASSING through the market on my way to the tavern with a delivery when I couldn’t help but sense the excitement rippling through those gathered in the plaza. “Don Lorenzo has returned!” I heard, although I wasn’t sure who he was.
I went inside the tavern, already bustling with soldiers and caballeros drinking and eating heartily. Juan, the owner welcomed me with a smile as I handed him the bottle of medicine to give to his wife, who was still recovering from a fever.
“Gracias, señor,” he said, sliding a cup of wine to me. “Please. On the house. Just arrived from California.”
I thanked him. I turned to face the crowd, leaning idly against the bar when I saw him: a finely dressed man with a sword strapped to his belt and a stomach so large that I would not have been able to wrap my arms around it. He sat at a table with two companions, helping himself to a full plate of venison, rice, beans, and fresh tortillas.
My amazement must have been obvious, because Juan said, “That is Don Lorenzo, Don Esteban’s son.”
The name clicked into place. Don Esteban was a wealthy caballero, having made his money from cattle and could afford to send his son away for schooling. To me, the son had returned much the better for it. That Don Lorenzo was fond of food was obvious; he was far larger than the other men in the pueblo, yet I could also sense his health and vitality.
My loins quickened, and I turned away, suddenly shy. I was no stranger to bodies and their workings, yet none of my patients had elicited such a reaction before.
Juan put on a mischievous smile, took my arm, and led me over to the table. “Don Lorenzo, may I be so bold as to introduce our curandero? Many of the people say he works miracles. I will vouch for him; he saved my Magdalena from a fever.”
“Perhaps he can cure what ails you,” one of the companions said with a jab to Don Lorenzo’s ribs.
I gave a slight bow, hoping it would hide the flush in my skin. “At your service, Don Lorenzo, though please, do not bestow upon me the gifts that belong to the gods.”
“Ah, he’s humble, too,” said Don Lorenzo with a grin. “A pleasure to meet you, my friend. I have just returned from my schooling in Madrid, and while I have not been home long, I have heard much about you.”
I bowed again, wondering what strange spell this stranger had cast on me to leave me trembling and unsure.
“Come to the hacienda this evening. I have a complaint that no physician has been able to remedy; perhaps you will be more successful.”
“Of course,” I said. “I am at your service.”
He clapped a hand on my arm, which sent a jolt through my body. When he let go, I felt weak and dizzy and had to grab a nearby chair to steady myself.
I don’t think Don Lorenzo noticed; he’d already returned his attention to his meal and friends. I felt an unwelcome pang of jealously and was taken by a sudden image of being dressed in a fine suit and proud to sit next to such a handsome man.
Then I tossed it away. I was a curandero, and such thoughts were not professional. I had my job to do, and I could not let my own desires get in the way of my patient.
At least, that’s what I kept telling myself.
A SERVANT MET ME AT the door of the hacienda and led me to the drawing room where Don Lorenzo waited.
“Come,” he said, and gestured at me to follow. “I would prefer privacy.”
He led me into his room, which was as elegantly furnished as the rest of the house, and at least twice the size of my home. A carafe of wine sat on a small table alongside a plate of peaches and pears.
My padrino was not present, which gave me a measure of relief. This visit was not about a life or death ailment. What, then?
Once inside, he unbuttoned his jacket and pulled it off, breathing a sigh of relief as he did so. Sweat stained his linen shirt. “Forgive me. It’s this damnable heat. I’ve never gotten used to it.”
I kept my eyes averted, too aware of the excitement coursing through me. I could not lose control of myself. Not here, not now.
We made courteous small talk, and I spent some time examining him, checking his pulse, looking into his eyes and throat. I did not get a sense of anything overtly wrong, but whatever ailed him, Don Lorenzo was too embarrassed or too ashamed to admit.
That is, until he said, “I have seen many beautiful women, some whom expressed a desire to be my wife, and yet I feel nothing for them. I have accompanied my friends to brothels, but I find I am … unable to act as a man should.”
He paused, having to take a deep breath before continuing.
“The physicians have given me countless remedies. Some say I ought to lose weight, and I have tried, to no avail. So now I beg of you, a humble curandero. What ails me? Why can I not be a man?”
Dios was cruel, taunting me this way. I strove to be professional, to keep my longings at bay, but I found it difficult. The answer to his complaint was as clear to me as a cloudless summer day, yet I had to approach it carefully. “Have you ever shared a bed with another man?”
“I did while I was at boarding school, but it was only in jest. Play. The kinds of things boys will do. When the headmaster found out, he whipped us.”
“And, these times of play…did your manhood function then?”
There was a long, empty moment before his voice dropped almost to a whisper. “Yes.”
I said nothing, waiting for him to come to his own conclusion.
He did, suddenly startling. “Dios. Is that why—with women—nothing happens? Because I like boys?”
I didn’t miss the note of panic. “
Boys … or men?”
He became quite still as he pondered this information. At last, he said, “I had wondered for some time. This is not a new revelation, only an unwelcome one.”
“There is no shame in it, and you are far from unique in this matter.”
“No. I suppose not.” After a while, he gave me an odd, piercing look. “You’re like me, aren’t you?”
“It makes no difference. I am here as your curandero, and I mean to …” My voice caught.
“Mean to what?”
My heart pounded, making me dizzy. I could not think. I, who knew so well how bodies worked and what they needed, suddenly became a slave to mine.
Outside, thunder rumbled. A few raindrops fell, then more until they became a steady beating on the roof.
“There,” Don Lorenzo said, “now your departure must be delayed, unless you want a thorough soaking.”
I should have gone anyway. A voice inside my head told me to flee, to leave before this vague sense of dread took hold.
“The servants won’t come, if that’s what you’re afraid of. I’ve bidden them to go to bed, and they won’t disturb us until morning.” He came to me and fiddled with the laces on my shirt.
I pulled back, suddenly shy.
“Haven’t you …?” he asked.
There was no way to explain the sort of isolated, cautious childhood I’d had. “No.”
He laughed. “But you want to.”
I could not answer. I dared not.
“Come,” he said, taking my hand. “Cure me of what ails me.”
He peeled off his shirt, exposing the rolls of flesh I’d been longing to see. A fine black mat of hair went from navel to chest, and at the sight of it, I lost the last of my inhibitions.
I ran my fingers through his chest hair, breathing in the scent of his sweat. He wasted no time in yanking my shirt over my head and running his hands over my skin.
“Yes,” he said, and it was almost a growl in my ear. “I think you’re right, curandero. It’s the men that call to my manhood, not the women. Shall we continue, just to make sure?”
He kissed me, long and hard and deep, and I tasted the remnants of wine on his tongue.
Gently, he lifted me onto the bed where he busied himself unbuttoning my pants and yanking them off, spying for the first time since I was a child what no one other than my padrino had seen. I lay there, vulnerable, while he shed his pants and let me see the cock jutting forth between his ample thighs.
I sat up and grasped it, fascinated by the way it stiffened in my hand and how the lightest touch made Don Lorenzo moan with ecstasy.
Too soon he tugged at my legs until they were spread wide around his waist. He spat liberally on his fingers then reached down to my asshole. One finger slid in, then two, teasing some inner point that shot fire through my loins as he readied me for the inevitable.
And when it came, I let out a cry of utter pleasure. I’d spent so long worrying about bodies that were ill and broken that I’d never guessed what a healthy one, let alone my own, was capable of.
After the initial climax and a bit of rest, we tried again, going more slowly. I took my time exploring his body, marveling at the structure of his muscles and the folds of skin. I’d healed any number of hurts to men, and thought I knew their bodies well, but here, with neither shame nor my profession to hide behind, I discovered new, unimagined points of both pain and pleasure.
When it was my turn, he spread me wide on the bed and went over every inch of me with lips and hands. He was a large man, bud he did not lack for strength. When he tucked me beneath him, he was careful not to let his full weight rest on me.
The closeness was sheer, utter bliss. I’d never known feelings like this were possible; certainly not from my padrino, who always guarded what few emotions he had. Even after witnessing others in the midst of passion, I had not guessed what they were truly feeling.
Now I knew, and I did not want this newfound happiness to stop.
WHEN I RETURNED HOME, MY padrino waited for me. I was still full of energy and exuberance, eager to tell him of the new pleasure I’d found.
But I had no need to tell him, after all.
“Be careful,” he said. “Some lives are shorter than others.”
Would that I had heeded his words, but I, being young and in the first throes of love, paid them no mind at all.
TWO DAYS LATER I WAS summoned back to the hacienda, not for Don Lorenzo, but for his father, Don Esteban.
The pueblo doctor gave me a look of impatience as I strode into the sickroom, though he left without complaint when Don Lorenzo dismissed him.
I knew the diagnosis, of course; it was easy to tell from the old man’s blue-tinted lips and harsh breathing. I pulled Don Lorenzo aside. “It’s his heart.”
“So the physician said. Is there nothing you can do?”
I glance back at the bed. There my padrino stood at the foot, gazing down at Don Esteban. “No. Nothing. He will not last the night.”
I had rarely seen a man weep, but Don Lorenzo did. “I’ve only just returned. I don’t know enough about the hacienda. I love him; I’m not ready to let him go.”
And because he was pained, so was I. I sensed his grief, felt it wash over me like a summer storm. Guilt followed soon after. The cure rested in my pocket. I had but to give Don Esteban a dose of the hierba vida, and he would heal.
But there my padrino stood, and I had promised to obey him. As long as he stood at the foot of the bed, my patient must be allowed to die.
And there, like a spark to tinder, I had an idea. “Help me turn the bed.”
Don Lorenzo gazed at me, uncomprehending.
“Just do it.”
It took both of us, as well as two servants, to shift the heavy wooden bed and its occupant, but we managed. Now, my padrino stood at the head of the bed.
Quickly, I dosed Don Esteban with the hierba vida and fussed over him enough to disguise what I’d done. It didn’t take long for color to return to his face and his breathing to return to normal.
“You’ve done it!” Don Lorenzo threw his arms around me, and his relief sunk into my bones. “You are a miracle worker.” Then, into my ear so no one else could hear, he whispered, “I love you.”
“YOU DECEIVED ME,” MY PADRINO said when I returned home. His raspy voice held an uncharacteristic edge of steel, and I froze. “It was Don Esteban’s time to die, yet you took it upon yourself to trick me so he did not. Why?”
I had the feeling he knew, and I felt ashamed. Don Lorenzo loved his father deeply, and I could not bear to cause him pain.
“You tamper with the natural order of things. Old men die. Sometimes the young do too. It is the way of life. Have you learned nothing?”
“Si, Padrino,” I said, chastened. “But Don Esteban is a good man, loved by his people. He takes care of his workers and treats them well. His son—,” here I choked, thinking of the night we’d shared, “—his son needs his father to guide him into manhood. There is much love between them.”
My reasoning did not sway my padrino. “One mistake I will grant you, for you are my ahijado, my godson. But break your promise again, and I will take your life myself.”
“Si, Padrino.”
I had no doubt he meant what he said. For the first time, I feared my guardian, who had never once gone back on his word.
THE POUNDING AT MY DOOR woke me from a sound sleep. I rose quickly, wondering what sort of emergency had arrived, and pulled open the door.
Don Lorenzo stood there, a saddlebag over one shoulder, fine clothes askew, breathing hard. “My father lives, and I have you to thank for it.”
He shut the door and bolted it. I was not afraid, although I sensed the wildness within him. He quickly shed his sword belt and stripped off his shirt. I had only a moment to think before he thrust me against the wall and rucked up my nightshirt, exposing the cock that rose eagerly to meet his hand.
Then he was on his knees, hands tangled in fabric,
nuzzling between my legs, taking my length into the wet heat of his mouth. I groaned at the sensation.
Just when I thought I could hold back no longer, he released me and flung me onto the bed sideways, so my legs dangled off the side. Hands grabbed my buttocks and pried them apart, making way for his tongue and, moments later, his cock.
His belly slapped my ass as he drove into me harder, faster, until I thought I might expire from desperation. His thick fingers gripped my waist so hard as to bruise, but I welcomed the pain.
He came with a howl that rivaled any coyote I’d ever heard. While still pulsing inside me, he pulled me close and reached down to grasp my cock, rough hand sliding up and down the shaft until my body convulsed in release.
“Don’t leave,” he told me when it was over and I splayed over his belly, taking in the warmth. “I need you, more than you know.”
I twirled a finger in his chest hair. “I have my duties to the people and …
elsewhere.”
He grabbed my hair and jerked my head back, leaving me no choice but to accept his kiss. His tongue slid between my teeth and I shuddered at the invasion. “I love you.”
The words stunned me, yet I felt answering warmth deep in my chest. “I love you, too.”
He grinned. I should have known he would not arrive empty-handed. From his saddlebag he withdrew a veritable feast; tortillas, dried beef, pears, apples, cherries, and fried bread along with a jar of honey. We shared a meal, with him taking great pleasure in dangling a bite above my mouth before feeding me and watching for my enjoyment. I was used to simpler meals, and these treats were a welcome addition.
He left just after sunrise. I watched him go, aching, wanting him back. With him, my loneliness had eased, and I began to consider happiness rather than mere contentment.
But such things were not meant to last.
Not for the godson of El Muerto.
A MONTH LATER, I GOT word that Don Lorenzo had fallen from his horse.
