Costalegre

by Costalegre (retail) (epub)

  The group saw Jack. My mother threw her hand up in a wave, and Jack’s body stayed uneasy, which made my mother laugh.

  Konrad was there also, in a palm chair near the pool. White trousers, white shirt opened all the way to his navel, too thin, but not ashamed about it like he’d been before, his skin the kind of tan that no one else’s turned. And hairless, like a boy.

  “I’m not eating an orgy,” Jack said. “You invited me to lunch.”

  “Oh, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk,” said mother, rolling to her back. “You’re tremendously late, you know.”

  “Three of my cows got out. This weather.” I watched him take his hat off. “If only it would rain.”

  “More scorpions for us!” said Baldomero, peeling himself off Hetty. “I’ve quite a collection. You should see the guts. Have you seen their guts?” He made a sound as if he were choking. And then he produced a feather from the clutches of his cape and started tickling Hetty’s toes.

  “I’m not in the mood for this,” said Jack. “Are we having lunch?”

  His head turned in the direction of the galley kitchen behind the palapa, where the food came out. His face didn’t change when he saw me, which made me feel foolish. Maria was probably not going to come out again, not till they rang the bell for lunch.

  So I rose, even though I felt unwanted, and asked if I should fetch her. I wanted to say something, after all.

  “Ha! She gets up for him! What about the rest of us? It’s mutiny in the kitchen!” This was Baldomero, whose face was sweating now.

  “Hallo, Heinrich,” C. singsonged from the pool, where she was swimming slow laps backward, never hitting the side once.

  I watched her arms cut through the water. I could see her armpits. I dared a look at Jack because she’d called him Heinrich.

  “You truly are degenerates,” is what Jack said.

  “Oh please,” said mother, pulling her skirt up to twirl her toes at him. “You used to be one too.”

  I want to tell the stories. The ones that can’t be real. Here is a story that Magda used to tell me. Magda, she of the “Go to sleep, cariños” and the warm pieces of bread.

  In the mountains there are women called the Ciguapa, naked except for their own manes. Their feet face backward, and the people who try to trap them lose their sanity sorting out which way their tracks travel. If you look a Ciguapa in the eye, you are eternally transfixed. Many travelers are transfixed on the mountains. They die of fear, and cold.

  What if I held everything inside of me? What if you couldn’t tell which way my tracks went?

  Lunes?

  Here is another story. My brother was in Mexico with us, those years ago, last time. Mother was married to our father: the first, the writing one. We stayed in the pink house on the water on top of a pink beach. There was a restaurant on the beach called the Playa Rosa. We lunched there every day. The restaurant was filled with people, including the famous moviemaker who started up this place. It was loud and they were happy, people rubbing our heads telling us, “Adorable, so sweet.”

  We would go out with the American to watch his men catch fish. He would let us take the mildewed life vests off once we were out of mother’s sight. Here is the story. One day, my brother begged, could he go swimming. The American just laughed. I watched my brother hesitate on the side of the small boat. We knew what kinds of things were swimming underneath us because we had seen them pulled out of the water, fighting, always fighting, to stay inside the sea.

  My brother jumped that day. And almost drowned. Of course he did—he’d never swum before. But what I remember most isn’t the American jumping in for him, his man cutting the motor; it’s my brother smiling as he jumped into the ocean. The beauty of that first time that was only his.

  He wasn’t scared, you know. We told the American never to tell our mother and I don’t think that he did. But that night, and all of the other nights in the casita, Stephan would clasp his hands to my shoulders and whisper to me desperately, “Did you see what I did?”

  Martes

  The argument started about the Anschluss. Walter had actually joined us by then, looking more tired than sick. He said his family would be jailed. Surely—the Führer had so many in his army—they’d know about the papers he had forged by now, that there had been too many, that he’d been a fool to come.

  “Can’t we start off with something more lighthearted?” Mother asked. “You’re here. We’re all out. As soon as that fellow’s back from Puerto Vallarta, he’ll fix his telegram. Or I’ll send Eduardito to Puerto Vallarta. We’ll all go on a trip.”

  “I have no way of knowing,” Walter protested. “We have no way of knowing. I don’t know if they’re all right.”

  “And I have no way of knowing whether my boat has sunk,” said mother. “We can only know what’s before us. And, well.” She snorted. “Even then.”

  “We shouldn’t be here,” said Caspar, who hadn’t found his bug.

  “And where would you have us be?” Mum asked. “What a dreadful lot you are! Rosa, shan’t we have some margaritas? Isn’t that more gay?”

  “Her name is Maria,” said Jack, who wasn’t drinking wine. I flushed because I knew this, and had said it, but hadn’t insisted publicly, which was the same as never saying anything at all.

  “We must start over, really. No talk of anything that we can’t be happy of,” insisted Mum. “Have you heard that Konrad’s made a masterpiece? Jack, you have to see it. Surely, it’s his best.”

  “It isn’t finished,” said fake father. “And it wasn’t ready to be seen.”

  “And yet we saw it, and we were absolutely charmed by it. Weren’t we, Lara?”

  Everyone turned to watch what I would do with my face and with my words. Even, I’ll note, Konrad.

  “I don’t know,” I answered, feebly. “If it wasn’t ready . . . ”

  “But that’s the entire point! They paint it, and we see it,” mother said. “Art is to be seen. Otherwise we’d have the stuff in coffins instead of in museums. I’m sure it’s his best, and I’m sure it will fetch a happy price.”

  “From you?” Legrand laughed. “Or me?”

  “Genug!” shouted Konrad, banging down a fork. “Must you always, always, always talk of price? Do you know how tiresome you are? Do you know how little anyone here enjoys you? Just this morning, at the stable, I saw those shining bits and I thought, God above, wouldn’t it be glorious if—”

  “So you believe in God now?” asked mother, cutting fish. “Came close enough to death for that?”

  “Oh!” cried Hetty, clutching her napkin. “I thought we would be light!”

  “Why don’t we just eat,” said C., “while we still have food.”

  “Don’t be morose, darling,” crooned mother. “The war’s not coming here.”

  “We are the war, you imbecile,” spat Konrad. “No amount of fucking flounder will change the fact that you’re a Jew.”

  Jack pushed his chair from the table. “Enough. I know that decency is beyond you, but to speak like this in front of a child—”

  “Oh, Lara’s not a child,” went Konrad. “Look at her.” He threw his hand out. “Look.”

  “She is a child,” said Jack, not looking. “And she shouldn’t be exposed to your disgusting games. Where is her brother? Where is her father? What is wrong with you?”

  Jack was staring at my mother now, whose hands were folded over her plate.

  “Oh, please!” cried Hetty. “I beg you! It’s such a lovely lunch!”

  “It was,” said mother, wiping at her lip line with an ironed napkin. “I find your interest in child-rearing positively fascinating. For a runaway married to cows.”

  “Well, you ran right after me, didn’t you?” asked Jack. “We’re all a bunch of cowards.”

  “I, for one, find it much more gay to be alive,” said mother, reaching for the bell as she was out of wine. “And if I’m alone in this, we can arrange for passage back for those of you who find peaceti
me insulting. Although I daresay that the food and drink will be more . . . sparse.”

  “You are a disgusting woman,” said Konrad, standing. “And I ruined my life by joining it with yours.”

  At the top of the driveway, we all heard it. The boom of it, then shrill. Jack’s horse had gotten out.

  Wildflowers of Mexico

  Tropical succulents will bloom readily in our temperate climate, but many of them are frost-haters and must be taken indoors at the first suspicion of cold weather. But they do furnish a wealth of glorious material.

  A rock garden is supposed to resemble a bit of a mountainside.

  Probably hardy even in our cold, wet winters, Draba mexicana should be placed in well-drained soil in full sun and must be well matured by the autumn. Propagation is by division or seed, sown in either spring or fall.

  Colonial Gardens

  In every lonely solitude there stands a church, whose tiled domes gleam against the towering volcanoes.

  The gardens of Mexico are different from all others in the world!

  Miércoles

  Lunch ended at that, of course. Konrad poured his wine out and I sat there blankly as it pooled onto the wooden floor. Mother didn’t say anything, even though our feet got splashed.

  Then Konrad left us, I guess for Teopa. C. followed, refusing any discretion. Mum sat and ate her fish while Jack edged onto one of the deserted chairs and spoke to her, too quietly for the rest of us to hear. I had hopes for their conversation. All the things he wanted! Perhaps the best artist is an old artist; he can finally wish for something pleasant to occur for someone else. He would convince Mum to send Papa and Stephan over. He would convince her: school. I’d have books and I could name things, paint all the pictures in the world.

  But mother slid her silverware back and forth into her fish. Jack pulled away from the table. And I knew he’d given up. There was no other way for it to end, really. She only listens to Konrad. But still. She had shared some youthfulness with Jack.

  Hetty sobbed into her meal and Baldomero asked Caspar to have the rest of his meal sent to his room, as exposure to stupidity gave him indigestion.

  Walter and Jack looked at one another. Walter, who used to have such friendly, teasing eyes.

  “She shouldn’t be here,” Jack said. But he said this to Walter.

  Walter closed his lips together. His yellowing eyes said, “No.”

  Well I could barely breathe for all of this, and my mother chewing the whole time. Her wine was not the one tipped over, so she sipped and sipped. Chewing each bite repeatedly. I wanted to cry for it. And plus I was hungry. My mind was like a balloon sent up into the sky.

  Jack tried once more before leaving. “Leonora,” (this was softly) “you can’t continue this.”

  And my mother: “I think it’s you who can’t.”

  Jack stood and put his hat on. My heart wanted to shout. Was there really nothing you could say to change someone? Could words never hurt enough? But she’d been hurt. We’d seen it. Father stepping on her stomach, howling that she was empty-headed, borrowed other people’s tastes.

  I hoped for something miraculous, and of course it didn’t come. Jack had on his hat by then. He didn’t look at me. But it maybe stayed with me longer, the not looking, than it might have if he had.

  Hetty started sobbing louder and Mum complained that it was impossible to enjoy one’s meal in these conditions and hauled Hetty toward her room.

  It was me and Walter then. I don’t feel like I should write this, because he’s always been so nice to me, but Walter was crying too.

  Ferdinand arrived. I don’t know where he’d been or what he had seen of all of this. He sat down between Walter and me. He looked back and forth between the both of us. And then, in front of my left hand, which was curled into a fist, he placed one gray, one pink, and one shining silver rock.

  Viernes

  To give order to our days, Legrand has set up dream briefs and automatic drawings. I know, because he boasts about it, that Legrand was once a medical student, and that he worked in the neurological ward during the Great War. So he thinks he has a way with soldiers, or people with dark times.

  Legrand says that society has reduced our dream life to “parentheses,” and that to be fully liberated (creatively and artistically) we must put more of the unconscious into conscious life.

  The dream briefs take place under the palapa, in slots during the morning. Baldomero doesn’t participate because his whole life is a dream brief, but for everyone else it’s an hour of telling Legrand what you dreamt about, and then drawing the associations from the dreams you saw.

  Legrand hangs up the automatic drawings on a clothesline around the palapa so that everyone can see whose dreams are worse. It was C. who went this morning. A headless woman with her arm cast through a sea urchin, her fist with a grenade. There was a red object in the right-hand corner of her drawing, but I couldn’t tell what it was supposed to be because it finally rained today, and all the colors bled.

  Dear Stephan,

  Do you remember when we went to see the cliff divers last time we were here? Do you think you could ever take a dive as long as that?

  Day?

  Mother went today. For the dream brief. Her drawing was a sailboat. There was an earring too. Legrand told her she wasn’t exploring her subconscious. What does he know? Mother’s always dreaming, anyway.

  Dwellers in the Sun

  One of the most gorgeous of all the lovely Cerei tribe is a half-wild species known as Junco espinoso or the snake cactus, Nyctocereus serpentinus. The long, clinging tentacles, growing in dense twisted and twining clusters, remind one of long, slender tropical snakes waiting patiently beside the jungle trail for their prey. Supposedly a native of Mexico’s eastern coastal section, it clambers over hedges, walls, and cliffs, perfuming the night with its spicy fragrance. The stems, about an inch in diameter, grow erect for a few feet, then bend over in a prostrate fashion and run along any support upon which they can get a foothold. The spines are weak and flexible, a creamy white and brown, with darker tips.

  Gardens of the Ancients

  Previous to this ceremony, no smelling of the flowers was allowed.

  Martes

  I am in trouble for my dream brief. Legrand says I’m not going deep enough. What was drying on the clothesline: three riderless horses, running on the beach toward the massive copa that the American installed, a structure of cement that looks like a huge mooncup, an offering for rain.

  “This isn’t how you would have dreamt it,” Legrand said of my wet papers. “All of this exists. Try again,” he said, handing me more paper, the charcoal dusted on his skin and mine.

  “But that’s what I dreamt.”

  “I know what’s happening with you,” he said, bending lower, “and this isn’t what you dreamt.”

  I bit my bottom lip hard between my teeth to keep my stupid chin from trembling. What is the worst about Legrand is that he’s been there all along. He knows whether I was wanted. He knows whether I am now. He knows everything, sees everything, ruins everything, he is the reason she is restless, her restlessness is the reason we can’t stay in any house, and why father couldn’t stay with us, he who just wanted to write in his study, and all the drinks at night.

  I dreamt of a carafe filled with feces and red wine.

  I dreamt of Maria with her face on backward. Her hair down to her waist.

  I dreamt of the larders emptied except for her black hair.

  I dreamt of a figure marching on a bloated stomach. Red cloak on the ground.

  “I only dreamt the horses,” is what I said to Antoine Legrand.

  Viernes

  The door to my room is still only made of fabric. Things fly in through the round window that I cannot name. In the morning, if I walk out on the terrace, the white whales crest and spout. I am painting. I am painting quite a lot. I am painting the true things that I dream about.

  Lunes

  More papers, a
nd by that I mean real news. All of the German people are united into one country. The top jobs have been given to the Nationalsozialismus, and a man named Seyss-Inquart is now the Minister of the Interior. Mother paid heaps to have the news brought from Vallarta, and I drew the name into the things I’m painting, like one of Konrad’s old collages where paint was mixed with fact.

  Seyss-Inquart. Too many s’s and strange letters, y, i, q. At the table, when the newspaper was shown to us, Walter said the name in German and my skin bumped into goose freckles. Even in this heat.

  Jewish Austrians are washing the streets with handfuls of torn clothing; there was a photo of this too. Men, women, and even children, on their knees, and it is winter. The streets would be wet, you know, so it’s even colder for their knees.

  “You’ll all thank me later,” is what my mother said.

  Tardes—más? (is later?)

  Mother went to Puerto Vallarta as she’d half-promised, with Legrand and Baldomero and Caspar, for a few days. She received word that her boat left France, but had no confirmation of where the boat was now, nor whether her paintings and her people had made it—would make it—to Saint Augustine. And of course, all the things that could go terribly between Florida and us.

  And we have a telegram from father: “Switzerland’s unmovable. Skiing’s fine. All my love to Flossy—H.”

  Flossy is what he calls me, because of my dumb hair. Not a word about my brother. For a man who builds his life on letters, he never did know what to write. My seasons are filled with such gray missives from my father: