Waiting for Columbus

by Thomas Trofimuk

  “Let him go,” Consuela says to the orderlies. “It’s my fault. Just let him go.”

  ***

  Columbus sits in the corner of the dayroom, staring out the window, sunglasses on his face, rocking back and forth.

  Consuela has had enough. She pulls a chair next to his and sits down. “It’s not your fault,” she says.

  “I wasn’t there for them,” he says. “I left them alone and went off into the world chasing a dream.”

  “What?”

  “A salmon moving upstream. There were poems. I was chasing poetry against the current.”

  “What are you-”

  “People everywhere. And I am running away from them. I’m running hard and then there is thunder. A storm is coming. A big red storm.” He does not stop rocking, nor does he acknowledge her. He mutters and rocks. Consuela pulls her chair away and attends to her other duties.

  In the lineup for breakfast, Neil, who has some derivation of Tourette’s syndrome, taps Columbus on the shoulder, asks him something or says something, and Columbus turns on him, pushes hard. Neil goes flying into the containers-rashers of bacon, and steel containers of scrambled eggs, and stacks of lightly buttered toast. Orderlies descend on Columbus and he’s escorted back to his room. “Buttfucker! Ass-wipe!” Neil shouts at the retreating figure of Columbus between two orderlies. “Fucking pig!”

  He refuses Consuela’s invitations to swim in the morning. He refuses to bathe. He makes a pass at Elena, who considers his proposition and agrees to meet him. One of the orderlies finds them in a closet, embracing, kissing. Columbus disengages, thanks her, and goes to his room.

  “I have to tell you something. I know, I know you’re sad right now and don’t really want me around. I respect that. And you can have as much space as you need. It’s just that…” She stops. She’s not even sure he’s awake.

  Consuela is speaking through the little wire-mesh portal in his door. Columbus has his back to the door, is leaning against it, rocking slightly, staring straight ahead at the window. It’s 5 A.M. The nightmare dream woke him and he had no idea what to do. Going back to sleep was not an option. Walking the hallways would require breaking out of his room. He knows how to do this. It’s a matter of lining up the tumblers inside the lock with a straight pin, keeping tension with the tine of a fork. He knows that picking the lock again and walking around the institute freely is an activity that would certainly be frowned upon.

  This dream is a swift horror. The first steps in a series of events he knows. He knows where this dream ends. The destination is a familiar terror. He’s been avoiding direct acknowledgment of it for so long. In the darkness, he throws his legs over the edge of the bed, sits up, sighs. Walks over to the dresser and bends forward to see himself in the mirror. Dark shadows. Narrow face. Sunken eyes. He leans over the washbasin and pulls tepid water to his face, does it again, and again. He reaches for his towel but it’s fallen to the floor. Once he finds the towel, he sniffs it for any hint of mildew, then dries his face and hands. After pacing for more than an hour, he’s tired, ready for sleep, but not if that dream is waiting. And one can never be sure about dreams. So he hunches, leans back against the door, and rocks himself into a sort of meditative state. Her voice is a whisper inside his meditation. At first he’s not sure it’s real. He’s not even sure it’s a woman’s voice.

  “I have to tell you something. Are you there?”

  “Yes.” He whispers, a kind of mimicking echo.

  “I think I need to let a different nurse take care of you. Maybe Nurse Emily. Or Frances. You always said you liked Nurse Frances.”

  “Why?” The thought of losing Consuela wakes him up fully-starts panic in him.

  Yes, she thinks. Why would I think I could get away with not answering the why?

  Columbus waits.

  “Because I care for you in the wrong way.”

  “Is there a wrong way to care for someone?”

  “Well, yes, when you are the patient and I am your nurse. There’s a line. It’s professional.”

  “And?”

  “And I have feelings that go beyond professional.”

  “So it’s okay for a patient to love a nurse, but not the other way around? That hardly seems fair.”

  “You love…?”

  “I have to get up. My knees are killing me.”

  “ Columbus?” She’s been whispering but now it’s her full voice.

  “You have seen me at my very worst, Consuela. You’ve seen me stripped bare of dignity, clothing, pride, and still… you found me. You found me and kept me safe.” He stops. How could I not love this woman? he thinks.

  ***

  They sit on the stiff wooden bench in silence for a long time, the television in the dayroom just loud enough to be heard but not loud enough to be deciphered. It’s some show about oceans. There are colorful fish and coral reefs. Consuela is torn. She wants him to finish his tale, but she does not want to lose Columbus. She had no illusions about awkwardness. She had confidence that there would be awkwardness between them. Just by telling him her feelings, no matter how oblique, she crossed a line.

  She looks up at the television, then down at the floor. Columbus clears his throat and Consuela smiles.

  “The Church of St. George in the town of Palos is a small stone structure with a modest bell tower. It was a mosque at some point in its history. Now a cross crowns its highest tower.”

  ***

  Inside, soft cathedral light fingers its way through fine dust. A cluster of candles illuminates one corner. The coolness of this sanctum conflicts with the pervading heat outside.

  Tomorrow is the day, Columbus thinks as he enters the building. His captains will board their respective ships. They will all wait for him. They’ll wait for him to board the Santa Maria. And then, with the blessing of the church, they will set sail for the Canary Islands, and then they will push the edges of knowledge.

  Columbus sits on one of the wooden pews and Father Antonio, who has come to bless the voyage in the morning, joins him. After a few minutes of silence, Columbus nods his head in some sort of inner understanding, as if he’s made up his mind about something.

  “Father forgive me, for I have sinned,” he says. “And I am about to sin.”

  “Speak, my son,” Father Antonio says. “My friend, what is on your mind? What weighs on you?”

  “I have lied to all these men, Father. I’ve told them we can sail easily to Japan and to the Indies and the lands of Marco Polo. In truth, I have no idea how far it is across the ocean.”

  “You don’t know? But all this time-”

  “Just words. I lied to the king, to the queen, to the university commission. I know in my heart there is land out there but I don’t know how far. The only way to find out is to sail and see for ourselves.”

  The father is silent, turned inward. “You want my blessing?” he says finally.

  “No, Father. I seek no blessing. I only need you to listen. I no longer have the heart to carry on. I no longer wish to continue on this journey. I have my ships. I have provisions and crewmen. But I no longer have my heart. Forgive me, Father.”

  Silence resorts to itself in the small church. Then the sound of a sparrow in one of the high windows. One problem at a time, Father Antonio is thinking. Columbus has no idea what he’s doing. He has no idea how far he’ll have to go to reach land. He’s told all these men, kings and queens and God only knows who else, that he knows this can be done. And now he admits he does not really know. And God? Well, God had to know this. God knows all. And if God knows, then God must want Columbus to do this thing. It is God’s will. What is faith if it is not this journey into the unknown? The journey is a shining example of faith. They are truly in God’s hands.

  “Why?” Father Antonio whispers the word. The word becomes more a long escaping stream of gas, a sorrowful sigh. “Why, after all you’ve suffered. After all your difficulties. After all your years of chasing this dream. Why? Why do you wish to g
ive up?”

  “I feel something horrible is about to happen. I know some tragedy is following me across the Western Sea.”

  “What could you possibly know? Only God knows the future.”

  “Juan once suggested that time is nothing but a fluid. The past, the present, the future, all mix together. Water is water is water.”

  “Only God sees all, Cristóbal. You are not God. You do not think you are God, do you?”

  “No, Father, but my dreams. My nightmares. It’s there! Some awful thing above me. It waits, Father. This journey is doomed to some catastrophe.”

  “Cristóbal-”

  “So much death. So much death and destruction. And the thing is, I come through all right. Death is all around but it does not come for me.”

  “I do not know what to say to you. What do you want to do?”

  “I want to defy my fate. I wish to disobey my destiny. I want forgiveness for what I’m about to do.”

  “God will forgive you. You have always been a good servant of God.”

  Columbus laughs. It’s a sharp-edged, hollow sound that reverberates off the stone walls.

  “Am I evil?”

  “How can you say this, Cristóbal?”

  “Where is evil if not inside of me? Does it exist there?” He points to the cross on the far wall. “Is it inside the men of the Inquisition who torture and kill in the name of God?”

  “Not evil, good!”

  “Both, Father. Both good and evil are here.” Columbus pounds his chest. “Here… inside of me.”

  “What will you do?” Father Antonio has tears in his eyes. He has been a friend to Columbus for many years. He has seen his suffering. “Will you tell the men who believed you that they were wrong?”

  “No. I will follow through with my deal. I have a deal with the king and queen and with the merchants who supplied the Santa Maria. And my men believe in this dream. I will find something out there. Something. And I will not mean to ruin it all, but I will.”

  “Cristóbal.” Father Antonio doesn’t know where to look-does not know what to say.

  “If you truly wished to serve God, Father, you would take a sword and kill me. For everything I fear I am about to do.”

  “You do not know this, my friend. Nothing is written. The future is not written.”

  “And yet, I know.” Columbus stands and he does not feel lighter. No weight has been lifted. Religion, faith, God-all these things fail again, he thinks. They offer nothing. No salvation. No relief. Nothing. “Come, Father, let’s have wine together. We will make our own last supper, yes?”

  “I cannot join you tonight, Cristóbal. I don’t have the heart.”

  Columbus shrugs and sighs. He doesn’t have the energy to try and convince Father Antonio to come and have a drink with him. He just wants a drink. So Columbus leaves the disconsolate father sitting on the wooden pew in the church that was once a mosque and walks through the cool, triple-arched doorway into the dusty heat.

  ***

  Consuela looks him up. She Googles Emile Germain, the Interpol investigator who thinks he knows the identity of her Columbus. She searches his name, along with the words Interpol and missing. She finds several stories attached to newspapers. She clicks on the link to the International Herald Tribune and starts to read.

  “My God,” she whispers. She reads about an Interpol investigator, an Agent Germain, who was involved in a gunfight with members of an alleged Al Qaeda cell in Paris. Bullets from the gunfight went through a wall and killed a young girl, who was in bed, asleep. The girl was a promising pianist, a prodigy. The investigator had been looking for a German woman, who’d been missing for almost a year. He’d tracked her to the address in the same building as the young prodigy. The men living on the main level had opened the door, seen the offered Interpol identification, and opened fire on the agent, hitting him twice. They left him in the hallway and fled into the street. The agent dragged himself to the doorway and fired at their car. They fired back. They shot badly, wildly. The sleeping girl was in her bedroom one floor up, in her bed, which was against the outside wall.

  When the wine is gone, she opens another bottle and dials her sister’s number. She’d like to call Dr. Balderas but she knows he’s off for a week, skiing in Switzerland with his family.

  “Hello, Sis. You’re not going to believe what I just found out. There’s this guy from Interpol…”

  Consuela and Columbus are in the long hallway that leads to the pool. The stone walls made the hallway feel cold. The ubiquitous Moorish-style arches persist even in this small space. Columbus stops.

  “What’s wrong?” he says.

  Consuela, three steps ahead, turns toward him. She’s so tired. The man from Interpol weighs on her. She can’t imagine living with the ramifications of inadvertently causing the death of an innocent.

  “I couldn’t sleep,” she says.

  “Why?”

  “God, Columbus, why do you have to be so goddamned intense all the time! Let’s just go swimming, all right?”

  “Something has shifted in you. Your eyes have changed.”

  “Yes, I’m tired.”

  “It’s more than fatigue.”

  “Trust me. It’s lack of sleep. Why don’t we switch today? I’ll swim and you can watch. Or if you like, you can tell stories.”

  “Ah, you want a story. You want to know what happens, don’t you? Well, let me warn you, it’s not the ending you might expect.”

  They arrive at the pool. Consuela slips out of her uniform. In her bra and panties, she slides into the water.

  “Begin,” she says, a little more demanding than she’d intended.

  Columbus watches as she starts to quietly glide through the water. “Okay,” he says. “Imagine two women squatting to relieve themselves in a forest, only a few feet apart. The air is as smooth as silk. The sky a pristine blue. These two women both love the same man.”

  ***

  “So, you are Beatriz,” Isabella says.

  “What?” Beatriz looks around and then finds a splash of color through the leaves not ten feet away.

  It’s midday. It’s stifling hot-more than a little uncomfortable, even to people who are used to such heat. They are peeing at the edge of a small orange grove near the town of Palos. It is the day before Columbus is to set off.

  Isabella has minimal security. Nothing close. Her men watch from the perimeter. She’s thinking she’d like to see Columbus one last time, but she knows a quick meeting, an official good-bye, is all she can probably safely arrange. Something, anything, would be better than smiling like an idiot and waving from some balcony with Ferdinand by her side.

  “I said, you’re Beatriz.”

  “Yes. Who wants to know?” Beatriz wipes herself with a handful of long grass and then drops it.

  “Queen Isabella.”

  “Right. The queen.”

  “That’s right.”

  “The queen, squatting in the woods to pee. Right.”

  “Could happen, couldn’t it? Do you think the queen never pees?”

  “Do I think the queen is human? Yes, of course. But you are not the queen. The queen would not squat in the woods. Isn’t there some golden toilet somewhere?”

  Isabella chuckles. “You’re wrong about the queen. She would most certainly squat in the woods.”

  “Why would the queen be here, in Palos?”

  “Do you not think the queen is interested in the voyage that will be embarking tomorrow?”

  This gets Beatriz thinking. Of course, the queen will want to be here. Word on the street has it that she was instrumental in arranging for the ships. She and Columbus had a relationship of some kind. Why wouldn’t she want to be here?

  Isabella pulls her panties up and walks out from her station. She extends a thin hand with heavy rings adorning every finger, save one.

  Beatriz looks at the rings. There’s no guarantee these rings are real. How would she know? They could be fakes.

  �
�Nice rings. I’ve got some nice rings, too.” Beatriz holds her hand, with only two modest rings, for this alleged queen to see.

  “Guards!”

  Four men with earplugs appear in less than five seconds. Three of them have handguns drawn and pointed at Beatriz. The fourth is planted firmly in front of Isabella. “It’s fine,” Isabella says. “Give us some room.” One of the guards frisks Beatriz. Finds a small knife tucked between her breasts. They all pull back silently.

  “Your Majesty,” Beatriz says. “How could I have known?” She bows deeply.

  “Oh get up. We’re alone. I wanted to have a chat with you.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  How to begin? she thinks. “So, he’s going. Columbus is off to prove he is right. How do you feel about that?”

  “Well, I will miss him.”

  “Yes, our Columbus is a most amusing and entertaining man.”

  Beatriz speaks slowly, clearly. “We have children together. We all love him. He is my man. He is a father to his sons.”

  “You are not a wife, are you?”

  “I wear this ring.”

  “But you are not his wife.”

  “We are bonded, committed, devoted, dedicated-”

  “But not married.”

  “No,” she says softly, slowly. “Not married.”

  “Well, we love Columbus, too,” the queen says. “We love his enthusiasm, and drive, and pigheadedness. Let’s walk, shall we?” She motions with her hand for Beatriz to precede her.

  The two women begin to move through the grove. Sparse undergrowth makes the walking easy. And there is good shade.

  “I am curious,” Beatriz says.