The Invisible Mountain

by Carolina de Robertis

  Absolute—

  or

  (shoelace)

  or

  sing sing sing

  Others held longer fragments, such as

  Burning burning as I climb

  Take me up and take me down

  Or, most bizarrely,

  Get out of my ribcage

  You pirate butcher fool—

  And this one melted his knees,

  Falling from the world’s edge

  Then I was sent Santos;

  His neck grew hot; he loosened his collar. Luck and balls, that’s what I need. It was a quiet morning in the ward. He had the airy doctors’ lounge to himself. Still, he stood in the supply closet, reading Eva’s fragments by the light of a weak bulb. He felt silly, lurking this way, taking an absurd yet necessary precaution.

  Footsteps approached the lounge. Instinctively, Roberto pulled the door closed. Ridiculous, that’s what he was, hiding under shelves of surgical masks. There was no acceptable explanation.

  “Just a swig of coffee, then we’ll head over.” It was Dr. Vásquez. Two sets of feet headed to the far counter. Roberto heard the muffled clink of mugs. “So, what do you think of that poet girl?”

  “Bizarre, Doctor.” Must be a student. Such wonder in the voice. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  “It certainly corroborates Santos’ hypothesis.”

  “Will she ever be told?”

  “No.”

  Coffee pouring. The clink of spoons. “It’s crazy, Doctor—”

  “I know. I know. But you can’t divulge placebos to a patient. Anyway, she’s a harmless sort of crazy.”

  “What else can be done for such cases?”

  “Nothing. But they help us test the edge of modern medicine.” Roberto could hear the smirk in the doctor’s voice. The closet air was tight and stale and he could—to his surprise—have punched Dr. Vásquez’s stubby nose. He heard two mugs clang in the steel sink, and they were gone.

  Roberto opened the closet and took a deep breath. There was the lounge, with its modern chairs, its coffee pot, the ficus tree, whose leaves were tipped with brown. Everything in its place. Everything in good order. Clean, reasonable, empty. Soon.

  ———

  Eva was not surprised when Dr. Santos made his offer. In her three weeks at the hospital, there had been time to think, to comb and scour the back rooms of her mind, and she knew some things—that she’d come apart, that she could have died, that she had no destination planned beyond these walls. That she’d been stupid with Andrés. Like a child. And now her legs could move again, and under doctor’s orders she paced the room six times a day, strolling to the window and back. They would release her, she’d be free to go, and then where to? She could ride these legs back to San Telmo, pick up where she left off, scramble up another rat-and-roaches room and another Don Rufino. Or go home, to Montevideo, with empty hands and worn, defeated shoes, confronting Mamá’s sorrow, her brothers’ nice lives, the look on Papá’s face. She would rather drown in the Río de la Plata. Just below her stood an emptiness, a deep, abysmal darkness she could fall into and never stop, never return, and she would rather die than sink there. If she was to stay afloat, she could not be the same girl she had been.

  She also knew some things about Dr. Santos. She knew that a reverent hush gathered around him in crowded rooms, that he was engaged (to a Caracanes, the nurse had whispered), that his fingers shook when they placed pills on her tongue. She knew his visits were a clock by which she could measure time; he slept in a house full of fine things; his gaze lingered like a hungry dog’s. He was not a bad man, she knew this too: it was easy to tell a bad man from a hungry one. She thought for days about his gaze, his hunger. She thought of her own tongue, a wet soft muscle in her mouth that made him shake. For all his fame and eminence, she made him shake.

  On the last day—after watching her tongue jut from her mouth, placing his pink pill in silence, leaving that trace of salt from two thick fingers—he said, “This is your last dose.”

  She swallowed without water and watched him rifle through her chart.

  “Everything has stabilized. You’ve recovered all your ambulatory capacities. You’ll be released tomorrow morning.” He gestured toward the window. “You can return to your normal life.”

  Eva looked at the window, which had not changed. “I see.”

  “Are you glad?”

  It was too small, the window, and too square. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “Well—Eva.” He leaned across the bed, and she smelled his soapy aftershave. “I must ask you. Do you have a home to return to?”

  She laced her hands together as if in prayer. “In a way.”

  “I presume—if I may be so bold—that it isn’t much?”

  “Perhaps not.”

  “Well. I have a suggestion. A proposal, you might say.”

  She stared at her hands and waited.

  “I’ll arrange an apartment for you.”

  “I had no idea your hospital had such programs!”

  “Ah, no, Eva. I’m not speaking for the hospital.” He coughed. “I, personally, would arrange it.”

  All silences, Eva knew, were not alike. Some were empty, some were not. This one hung between them, writhed with unsaid things. Dr. Santos adjusted his collar. He glanced at the door, which was still closed, then back at her. She spoke slowly, as if piecing together a puzzle with each word. “Are you asking me to compromise my virtue?”

  He blinked. “Of course not. I simply … appreciate you, as a patient. Your welfare is of the utmost concern to me.”

  “I see.”

  “Let me help you, Eva.” His voice dropped. “I would simply, should you not mind it, come to visit, to see you, make sure all is well.” He paused. “I want you to be well.”

  His face was naked. She smiled. “I want to be well too.”

  Dr. Santos studied her eyes, her mouth, her neck, her hair, her eyes again. He closed her chart. “All right.” His lab coat rustled as he stood. “Consider it arranged.”

  The next morning, Eva’s final breakfast tray held a white envelope. Inside, she found a key, two hundred pesos, and an unsigned note:

  657 Avenida Magenta #10. Take a taxi. See you tomorrow.

  She felt like a newly minted princess as she packed her bag (two dresses, Mamá’s bundle, panties, lipstick, one brassiere, a crush of pages), stepped out to call a taxi, and pressed her nose against the car window as glossy streets sped by. The driver stopped in front of a bronze-colored building. She glided past the gold-buttoned guard in the lobby, terrified that he would shout at her, Where do you think you’re going? He merely smiled. In the elevator, she wondered what she’d do if the key did not fit. She imagined herself wandering the streets with her bags, a lost woman, abandoned, breakable, with no man or coat to keep her from the cold.

  The key fit the lock. The door opened without resistance. The apartment reared up to meet her: wallpaper full of mauve roses and golden lattice, a burgundy sofa, the smooth feel of mahogany under her palm, cream-colored sheets drawn over a wide mattress in the bedroom. She loved the smell of this place, like lavender soap on freshly cut wood, and the sienna-tiled kitchenette, with one cabinet, two, well stocked with tumblers, teacups, delicate plates. Everything accounted for, everything in its place. No roaches, no thin walls, no holes in the ceiling. A little balcony beckoned to her from the bedroom, just large enough for one person (or two, if pressed together). She stepped out, taking in the tall sky, the polished cars, the sculpted laughter of high-society women, the stone pillars and carved angels on the mansion across the street. Its door opened, vaultlike, and a widow stepped out, her veiled hat at a slant. She formed a tight black line against the pavement. At the end of the block stood a bakery, its sign hanging from a carved wooden pole. LA PARISIENNE. She’d have croissants for dinner tonight. Croissants and wine and cigarettes, here in this new lair. She thought of Dr. Santos, with his serious brow, his salt-tipped fingers, his swar
m of protégés. Dr. Santos with his blue-blooded fiancée and his secret key. He had given her the sleek side of the city. He had given her a home with many cups. He had given her his word that, tomorrow, he would come. She had these things today but for tomorrow she had nothing if he tired of her. Mistresses get dropped into gutters and no one ever hears of them again. Only wives can keep their silky rooms. She had known too many gutters, and, Andrés, wherever you are, out in this broad city I am scanning from this height, this balcony, looking toward the south side where we used to crawl, you can go to hell and burn up over and over. You can shrivel into a charred husk of yourself and I would step and crush you into dust. I won’t think of you. I’m not going to collapse, I’m going to climb and climb, just wait, just watch, I’m going to unfold what I really am. A phonograph struck up on a nearby balcony. Alma mía, ¿con quién soñas? She swayed her hips, lightly, in time to the tango. He venido a turbar tu paz. A car pulled up in front of the widow’s doorstep. The chauffeur walked around the car to open the back door. The widow looked up and Eva felt the stranger’s glare through the black net of her veil. A beam of accusation. Eva stopped swaying. Then she started again, swinging farther than before, holding the widow’s concealed eyes. La noche porteña te quiere besar. The widow stood frozen, a straight-backed thing in fine dark fabric. Then she brushed her hat, as if swatting a fly, and bent to the car’s interior. Eva watched as the car sealed its doors, growled awake, and rumbled down the avenue, out of sight.

  He arrived for his first visit at three o’clock, right at the start of siesta. He placed a discreet envelope on the end table by the door. He held his hat with both hands; one thumb fidgeted with the rim.

  “Please, Dr. Santos, won’t you sit?”

  They sat together on the wine-colored sofa. He seemed emptied of things to say. She had not seen him this way before, outside the hospital halls, unsure, nervous, a boy on unfamiliar hunting grounds.

  “Este. You like the apartment?”

  “It’s wonderful. Thank you again.”

  “You are finding everything you need?”

  “Yes. Only I’m exhausted.”

  “Ah. Exhausted.”

  “Claro. It’s just my second day out. Quite a transition.”

  “Sí, claro. Well.” Sweat glazed his hairline. “Should I leave you to rest?”

  She was vivid; more than vivid; she was given substance by his gaze. He was ready to eat her, clothes and all. She pretended not to notice. “Thank you, Dr. Santos. If you don’t mind.”

  He was silent.

  “I’m sure I’ll feel differently soon.”

  “Of course.”

  They sat without moving. He reached for his hat.

  She walked him to the door. “Please come tomorrow. Won’t you?”

  He studied her. His face was pleasant, in a bookish, beakish kind of way. “Of course.”

  The following afternoon, Eva was ready, armed with a silver tray, teacups, saucers, steeping pot, cream and sugar, and confections from La Parisienne. She wore a new dress, bought with the contents of yesterday’s envelope: blue, with ivory dots and matching belt.

  “Ah! Looking lovely.”

  “You’re too kind.”

  “Feeling better?”

  Eva lifted the tray. “Much.”

  “Delicious.”

  “I hope you’ll like them. Shall we sit?”

  Eva poured her guest a cup of tea. The liquid fell in a dark curve. They listened to its quiet splash.

  “Sugar?”

  “Please.”

  “Cream?”

  “Yes.”

  He watched her pour his cream and stir his tea. It was a hot and humid afternoon, ill suited to this refreshment. She handed him his drink. Steam rose from their cups, a gauzy wall between them. “How was your morning?”

  “Busy. Extremely busy.”

  “Tell me what you did. I’m dying to know.”

  He sipped some tea. He reached for a chocolate éclair, and began to talk about his day. He told her about the patient who had died with his nine daughters saying rosaries in a circle around his bed. His eyelids had closed under Dr. Santos’ fingers, like soft butter. Eva stayed rapt, so Dr. Santos told her more: about the daughters’ nine skirts cut from the same coarse purple cloth. The quiet way they pressed against the wall as the nurse drew a white sheet over the body. The halls had been packed this morning, several patients admitted at once. By lunchtime, his feet had grown sore from marching halls and standing over bedsides. At lunch, an argument broke out among four students over the best approach to dosages on painkillers. Dr. Santos, sought as judge in this discussion, had not been able to finish his salami sandwich. He kept talking. The light deepened slowly around him. He told her about his students, the earnest ones and the lazy ones, the ones like mechanized robots trying to memorize every rule (not accepting, to his chagrin, that medicine was also an art), the ones made obsequious by raw ambition. How he fantasized about being alone, no doctors, no nurses, no patients at all, just him inside a great white empty hospital. Eva leaned forward, chin on hand, listening and nodding. By the time his stories slowed to a trickle, two hours had passed. He stared at his watch.

  “I should go back.”

  “So soon?”

  “I’ve wasted this time.”

  “Not at all. It’s been fascinating.”

  “You’re fascinated?”

  “Isn’t everyone?”

  Dr. Santos scanned the pastry plate, reduced to crumbs and a single strawberry tart. “No.”

  “Hard to imagine.”

  He reached for her thigh. She rose as his hand brushed her, a touch neither acknowledged nor denied.

  “What a lovely afternoon. I’m sorry you have to go.”

  He got up, uncertain on his feet, like a man who’d drunk more gin than he’d meant to. They walked to the door and stood at the threshold, Eva holding the tray of crumbs between them.

  “Tomorrow, then?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  On his third visit, he entered with more resolve. Tea poured, steamed, grew pale with cream. “Good to see you, Dr. Santos.”

  He sat closer today. “And you.”

  “How was your morning?”

  “I’m not thinking of my morning.”

  “No?”

  “I’m thinking of you.”

  “How ki—”

  His mouth landed on hers, big hands on her, wet pushing; the teacup splattered as she fumbled it to the table and hot liquid hit her arm; a hand roved her body, a tongue explored her teeth, she was pressed against the sofa and the hand was at her breast, rubbing, starved, then quick and greedy at the hem of her skirt.

  “Roberto.”

  “Yes.”

  She made a slice of space between them. “I can’t.”

  “What?”

  His face was close. His breath had weight against her cheek.

  “Please understand. I’m deeply in your debt—and I wish we could”—she paused—“I do. But I’m a virtuous woman. You know that, don’t you?”

  He blinked. His lips moved but he said nothing.

  “You’re surprised.” She looked down, as if hurt. “I’m waiting for the man I’ll marry.”

  Roberto’s hand pulled on its captured swath of skirt.

  “Things are different here, in Argentina. I should have known.”

  “Eva.” His voice was throaty. “I meant no disrespect. But you must know how I want you.”

  He could have burned a hole in her, just looking. Relief washed through her. He would not use force. She would lose the battle and the war if he used force. But no, he was a good man, addicted to propriety. He wanted her to open, to offer herself in gratitude or debt. She was supposed to do this, the next step of the proper dance. “My dear doctor.” She traced his jaw with her hand. “I wish we could. But it’s impossible.”

  A tragedy, perfect in its thwarted longing. A moment when the strings would swell in a romantic film. Eva heard no strings, just
the moan of a car and a groomed dog barking on the street. Roberto closed his eyes. His trousers bulged below the waist. Eva cupped his face in her hand. They stayed that way, his hand on thigh, her hand on cheek, close enough to breathe the same charged air.

  “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “For respecting me.”

  Roberto lay silent.

  “I wrote you a poem.”

  His eyes stayed closed.

  “Would you like to hear it?”

  He nodded. She gave him words. His face relaxed, a boy beneath a lullaby. She stroked his hair. It was not Andrés’ hair, not curving tightly from the scalp and back again. It did not spring from her fingers in tense, energetic curls. This hair was straight and fine, the morning’s pomade had lost some of its hold, she could make it all point in the same direction with just a few caresses. She wondered what the years would be like beside this man, if she won the war and took him as her spoils. How he would hold and see and touch her, and who she would become inside his house. The boy in him was so close to the surface, hungry, delicate, alone. She ran out of poetry and fell silent, stroking gently, bringing order to the doctor’s fragile scalp.

  He came every weekday. She shaped her days around his arrival. In the mornings she wrote, smoked, and idled on the balcony, pretending not to scan for the widow, who was never there, and pretending not to gaze over buildings to the south of Buenos Aires. At midday she strolled to La Parisienne and bought a sandwich for her lunch and confections from the gleaming case for Roberto’s visit. Back home, she boiled water and prepared the tea tray under the kitchen window, where light fell copiously and seemed to wash her hands. She looked forward to his knock, which was always the same: staccato, taut, devoid of any flourish. She held court in that apartment as though she owned it, as though his entry were dependent on her good graces. She gave him slivers of herself: a lap to rest in, supple words, listening ears, a thigh to brush or lips to kiss on his way out. She felt the coil of power in her body, between her hips, a long and steady lasso she cast toward him, the way a man in gaucho country lassoes cattle, or maybe the way cattle lasso a man. It thrilled her. Each visit was a victory over laws as old as gravity, as constant as the laws of fang and prey: the law of man and whore, and she was breaking it, wasn’t she, turning it upside down and letting all the pieces shake like false snow in a globe.