Villa Pacifica

by Kapka Kassabova

  “And I can’t believe that Max could be such a cunt,” Liz said.

  Jerry sniggered. Ute suddenly felt like hitting him. Why wasn’t he out in the forest looking for her? Why was he – the only person whose other half was out in the storm, possibly dying for all he knew – waiting here tamely with everyone else? Was there in fact anything more important in the world than his laptop, his own needs, his self-regard?

  “What?” Jerry said. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “Like what?” Ute said hoarsely.

  What would you do if I didn’t return? How much do you love me? Questions that could never be asked – or answered.

  One of the dogs followed Lucía as she walked silently away from the main house, and presumably to her cabin. Lucía was clearly unable to deal with crises.

  “Want to go?” Jerry asked Ute. She shrugged her shoulders. She didn’t care. “Want to eat something?”

  She shook her head.

  “Well, what do you want to do?” Jerry insisted.

  “Nothing.” Ute looked at him with a blank expression.

  “Fine,” he said. “Fine.”

  He stood there, propped against the table, then he went inside. She heard him creaking about the lounge, perhaps looking at the books. Another mindless silence set in, and nobody moved a limb. It was as if they were all too exhausted to go a few steps further to their cabins. The rain was like a spell that paralysed all free will. While the rain fell, nothing could be decided, nothing could be undertaken. You had two options in this rain: to move and merge with it, or to stand still and hear it. There was no middle ground.

  Eventually, there was a noise: a tricycle arrived outside the gate.

  “Ah, and here’s the c–u–n–t in question.” Jerry poked his head from inside the lounge.

  “I didn’t think you guys would make it before me,” Max shouted. “Hey, baby!” He went over to Eve, who had just sat down on the floor after finishing her cake.

  “Keep your hands off me!” Eve squirmed.

  “Just fuck off, Max,” Liz said from the veranda stairs.

  “I think you better not show your face round here. You’re not very popular right now,” Jerry echoed.

  Carlos gave Max a circumspect look, but not a muscle moved on his face.

  “All right, let’s get this straight, guys!” Max stood, his legs spread out. “Little bit of rain hasn’t killed anyone yet. And anyway, it was a joke! All right? A joke.”

  The jaguar answered with a lazy roar from across the ditch. Carlos smiled crookedly to himself.

  “At least you have a friend on the other side,” Eve said.

  “Or an enemy,” Carlos said, and disappeared into the kitchen again.

  “What the hell were you thinking about?” Liz turned to Max.

  “I told you, it was just a joke. You should have known it was a joke. I’m not out of my fucking mind. I was just having a bit of fun! I was bored, man, all by myself on that beach. Just me and Jesus…”

  Pacing up and down the veranda, he tripped over Eve’s leg. She looked up at him with hatred.

  “OK, let’s go,” Jerry said to Ute. She nodded, but didn’t budge. Héctor was looking through ledger books again.

  “Don’t forget to sign the guest book before you go,” he said to them, and his voice was like an echo from a past life.

  “Yeah,” Jerry said. “We’ll do it later.”

  Along the path came, with heavy steps, Helga and baby, followed by Mikel and Luis. She handed the baby to Luis, stomped up the veranda steps, and went straight over to Max.

  Without a word, she grabbed him by the front of his T-shirt and tossed him against the wooden railing, which went a bit slack under his weight, and stopped just short of tipping him over. He hit the plant behind, and Ute saw the baby iguanas fall off their leaf.

  “Bastard!” Helga spat. “Bastard!” Max tried to steady himself, too surprised to react, but Helga continued shoving him back against the edge with strong arms.

  Nobody moved, not even Luis, who was holding the baby anyway. Mikel came into the lounge and spoke to Héctor in quick Spanish – something about where Carlos was. Héctor indicated out the back.

  “Let’s go,” Jerry took her arm, but Ute couldn’t move. She was transfixed by the scene. Max was now defending himself by pushing Helga back with some energy. They looked like two oversized kids in a schoolyard fight during lunch break. The baby gave out a shriek of protestation.

  “OK, basta ya!” Mikel yelled and stepped in, pulling Helga away. His face, just like Helga’s, was purple.

  “Get this woman off my back!” Max said. “Fucking hippie nutter!”

  “OK! Please.” Mikel was visibly making an effort to remain calm. He gave the out-of-breath Helga a conciliatory nod to leave this to him. “Max, I’m asking you to leave tomorrow morning. Tomorrow morning, OK?”

  Carlos popped up from behind a giant leaf. He just stood there, his arms crossed in the rain.

  “Oh yeah?” Max said to Mikel. “You’re gonna force me to leave? You tried that before, buddy, remember? Didn’t work. What’re you gonna do, huh, call the police? Have me killed and toss me in the sea? Huh?” He looked around at his audience, to garner support.

  “That’s not a bad idea,” Liz said.

  “You will leave with your wife tomorrow morning,” Mikel repeated, this time in Spanish. “Or Carlos and I will make sure you do.”

  Eve looked from one face to the next with a perplexed face, in a dilemma of loyalties.

  Max suddenly started to laugh – a forced, cracked laughter – and raised his hands in a peace-brokering gesture.

  “OK,” Helga said bluntly, and turned to Mikel. “Please, we want to go to our cabin now.” She was again holding the baby, who had gone quiet.

  “Right,” Mikel said with impatience, then called out, “Héctor!”

  “Sí.”

  “Show the señora and the family to their cabins.”

  “The Monkey and the Boa?”

  “Yes.”

  Luis’s mother got up and silently followed the young couple, who went with Héctor to the reception area. Max stepped to the side to make room for them to pass.

  “OK,” Max started again. “Let’s get this straight. Goes like this. I called these guys from the boat just for a laugh, cos it was funny to make them sweat a bit.”

  “You didn’t call us, it was Paco who called you!” Eve said.

  “All right, all right. It was a joke, stupid! It was a joke, but I didn’t know the phone was gonna cut off and… and this is not how I planned it! All right?”

  “It’s not all right.” Mikel shook his head and lit a cigarette. “It’s not all right to make jokes when there is storm and rain, and…”

  “Jesus and I, we waited for ages, like hours, we went up the hill as well, shouting your names like idiots. We waited for you, and you won’t even thank me for it! I’ve had enough of it – that’s it, I’m leaving tomorrow.”

  “Right, right.” Eve said. “I wanna go too. I miss the kids real bad.” And she started crying.

  “Oh, honey,” Max squatted next to her. She let herself be consoled.

  Carlos had vanished again.

  “Here’s what.” Max got up and looked at Mikel with a conciliatory face. “I wanna do my bit for this place. I’m gonna donate two thousand dollars for the animals and to offset any damage you guys sustain if El Niño strikes again. I know you think I’m an asshole, but I wanna prove you wrong. I like you and what you’ve done here, and I wanna help. All right?”

  There was a silence. It was hard to say whether the listeners were stunned or too exhausted to care.

  Mikel blinked a few times at Max, then he announced: “Dinner tonight is simple, because Conchita is not here. Salad and rice and… Qué más?” he turned to Héctor, who shook his head.

  “Just salad and rice,” Mikel concluded.

  Max was momentarily thrown by the indifference, then he said to Mikel: �
�Well, I’m gonna bring my chequebook. Don’t go anywhere.”

  Mikel didn’t respond. Max ran off to his cabin.

  “Come on,” Jerry whispered to Ute, and he pulled her along on their way. She followed automatically. They walked along the path. The rain seemed to fall in slow motion now, and Ute could see individual raindrops.

  “The baby iguanas fell off,” Ute said in a phlegmatic voice. The rain seemed to have seeped into her vocal chords.

  “What?”

  She shook her head.

  “Do you want to leave tomorrow?” Jerry stopped, and looked at her. There was something insincere in the way he put this.

  “I don’t care,” Ute said, and meant it.

  “Are you OK?” They were outside their hut now, and Jerry was unlocking the door.

  “Just tired.”

  She stood under the cool shower, which felt very different from the rain, even if it was the same temperature. She tried to still her mind, because she was scared of what she would find there.

  She didn’t exchange any more words with Jerry before collapsing on her side of the bed. He was outside in the hammock, anyway. The rain had stopped as suddenly as night had fallen.

  And next, the creature was here again. Except it wasn’t standing at the foot of the bed, but at the door. She could see it with her peripheral vision, though her eyes were closed. Even in her terror, she could perceive that it was short, a kind of dreadful homunculus. Short but powerful. She wanted to scream and, just like before, she couldn’t. She tried to reason with herself, so she could somehow stop this nightmare. The creature was at the door because it wanted to show her something. If only she would look at it, she would know exactly what it wanted to tell her. And it was important, very important. But she couldn’t look at the thing. Peripheral vision was all she could bear, and even this was too much. She thought she could feel her blood vessels hardening with terror, her heart turning to stone. Until she woke up from the cold. She lay there, not daring to look at the door.

  When she did, the creature wasn’t there. The door was closed, she could tell from the fact that no garden lights were filtering in at all. It was pitch-black. Jerry wasn’t there either. She felt his side of the bed. It was made: he hadn’t even been to bed. She was numb with cold and fear. But she knew that something had shifted. The creature wanted her to go outside. It wanted her to know something about this place. It was terrifying, and she didn’t have the courage to follow it. But staying still and closing her eyes again and having another vision like this was even more terrifying. Because in the waking world, there is always someone else within earshot. But in the world of visions, it’s just you and the tsungki. It’s just you and those subterranean souls who held the keys to your life and death, and the life and death of everybody you cared for. The creature had appeared to her – and no one else – for a reason. She couldn’t continue to ignore it, whether it was on her side or not. Ignoring it might come with too high a price.

  She threw off the sheet and groped in the darkness for the nearest piece of clothing on the floor – shorts – and put it on. She already had a sleeveless top on. Her body was frozen. She couldn’t find her flip-flops or any other shoes, so she walked out barefoot. She could hardly feel her feet anyway. Her face felt strangely calm and cool, as if the chill of the horrible vision had frozen her eczema together with her feet and her soul.

  It was unnaturally black outside. The garden lights had gone off. The only hint of light came from the cloud-veiled moon, enough for her to see the vague shapes of giant plants all around as she crunched along the path towards the main house. A warm drizzle tickled the plants. Her heart was thumping hard. She almost expected the homunculus to jump out of a plant and bar her way. Because, clearly, Villa Pacifica was its home. It lived somewhere here, among the plants and cabins, the insects and baby iguanas.

  On shaky legs, her feet suddenly hurting on the sharp pebbles, she made it to the main house. No light there either. Just the looming bulky outline of the two-storey building. She went in. Nobody inside, at least no shape she could make out in the darkness. It felt as if everyone had left while she slept. Everyone had left, and it was now just down to Ute and whatever dwelt in the garden.

  She stood in the reception lounge for a moment, then suddenly remembered Héctor suggesting that Carlos had been out at the back. She walked carefully through the kitchen and out of the kitchen exit. She’d never been that way, because she didn’t know there was anything here. But there was.

  There was something that looked like a small cabin or shack. She approached, her heart in her throat, because she thought she heard something creaking. At first, she thought it was crickets in the plants. But there was another noise too, animal or human. It was like panting. She stood next to the cabin, her cheek glued to the wall, her heartbeat now choking her and making her sick.

  Even though she couldn’t hear distinct voices, just the panting, she knew exactly who they were. It was finally happening. She stood there for a while, paralysed with pain and curiosity. They were still going when she noiselessly padded away.

  Back inside the lounge, she leant on a wicker chair, dazed. There was nowhere else for her to go. At first she thought of the couple, to keep thoughts of the creature at bay. But it was worse. She couldn’t bear to contemplate any images of Carlos and Liz fucking. The creature was terrifying, but at least it hadn’t hurt her – yet. Those two had.

  She smelt the air: there was a whiff of something resembling pot. It wasn’t palo santo, or any other incense. She got up, as if she could follow the smell. She walked around the lounge, bumping into chairs and tables, and the floorboards creaking underneath her. She went into the kitchen, but the smell wasn’t coming from there. She headed towards the stairs to the music room, her heart in her mouth. She had an awful feeling the smell – or rather the smoke, it was definitely smoke – was wafting down from up there. Someone or something was lurking upstairs, waiting. She couldn’t face it. But at the same time, now that she knew about it, she had no choice but to face it.

  The music room was better lit because of the moonlight streaming through the panoramic windows. The smell was very strong here. It made her dizzy, but not for long because, next, she saw the creature. It was huddled in a corner, beside a large African drum. Ute’s scream froze in her throat, just like in the dream, and for a moment she couldn’t move.

  But then she scrambled down the stairs, taking two at a time. It was a miracle she didn’t fall or pass out from terror. She ran down the main path to their bungalow – or she hoped so: there was no time to think about directions, and she had to trust her instinct.

  The door to the Tortuga was ajar. Jerry was back.

  “Jerry,” she called out. Her voice rang hollow and desperate in the dark. There was no answer.

  “Jerry!” The silence shocked her.

  The key was inside the door, and she locked it with frantic hands.

  She sat heavily on the bed, accidentally pulling the entire mosquito net down from the ceiling. She sat shaking in the mess of mosquito netting. Sleeping was out of the question. And so was leaving the cabin.

  It felt very much as if everyone had left Villa Pacifica – except Carlos and Liz, and the creature, which was now wandering about freely. She sat in a frozen stupor and lost track of time. Perhaps she even fell asleep.

  Someone pushed down on the door handle outside. Ute jumped up, then crouched instinctively on the floor, out of view. A loud knock followed. She stopped breathing. Then another knock.

  “Ute?” It was Jerry. There was a beam of torchlight.

  She got up and unlocked the door, shielding her eyes from the sudden harsh light.

  “Sorry to wake you up,” he said, and stepped in, shining the torch away from her face.

  “Where have you been?”

  “The lights went out after you went to bed. I couldn’t write and couldn’t sleep. So I went out for a wander. To see what was happening.”

  He turned t
he torch off and fumbled in the dark.

  “What are you doing?” Ute asked.

  “Taking off my trousers.”

  “What happened to the lights?” she asked. “The lights went out.”

  “It was the rain, I think. And the storm.”

  She felt him creep into bed. They lay quietly for a while, not touching.

  “There are things here,” Ute said. “Inside the Villa. I saw something. Someone.”

  And immediately she had a ghastly feeling that she had betrayed something. That implicit in the creature’s appearance on the edge of her reality was an absolute prohibition of sharing that knowledge with another. That the creature and its secrets should not be invoked in words. And she had done just that. Jerry snorted.

  “Ute, of course you saw someone. There are lots of people staying here!”

  No there aren’t, everyone’s gone, she wanted to say, but instead she just said: “Yeah, I know.” She wasn’t going to insist. It was enough that she’d mentioned it. Perhaps there was still hope of retaining the secret that the creature was trying to convey to her, to her and nobody else. Because clearly no one else here could perceive it.

  “You know, it’s funny. I thought I was the fiction writer and you were the traveller, the facts-and-figures person.”

  They were lying next to each other, still without touching. Not even their hands. So this was the fate of all marriages, eventually: to lie down in the dark with an invisible wall between, just breathing minimally, as if rehearsing for the grave.

  “Maybe you’ve underestimated me,” Ute said. And overestimated yourself, she thought, but she didn’t say it. “What are you writing about?”

  “This place. Or some version of it.”

  “How far along are you?”

  “I still need an ending.”

  Ute relished this normal conversation after the abnormal encounters earlier. But she knew that the longer she talked, the further away she was moving from the moment of truth that the creature was bringing. But she was only mortal. She could only deal with mortal things. She didn’t want to handle the creature’s secrets, she only wanted the secrets of her own life, her own future. And she wanted to regain control of things. She’d lost it these last few days. She was mapless and adrift and filled with dread.