It’s one thing to picture love and another entirely to be faced with the stark reality that love might mean the guy zips up his pants and gives you a pat on the head.
At least he didn’t shake her hand. Rethinking it, or perhaps noticing her dismayed expression, he did plant a kiss on her cheek before rising from the bed. This was a sweet gesture, but it did nothing to resolve the knot in her stomach, nor the fact that she was trembling a little, and her cheeks were very warm, and she knew she was never going to be able to go to sleep.
“Gregory,” she muttered.
“Yeah?”
“It wasn’t too fun.”
“I’m sure you’ll improve,” Gregory he said, because apparently that was that.
When he had left she collected the dirty glasses and the bottle he’d left behind and took them to the bathroom. One of the glasses still had an inch of rum in it and she held it up to the stark bathroom light, observing its deep, brown color. She took a sip, let it swish in her mouth, and spit it out.
Viridiana set the glasses by the sink and went to get the camera. She stood in front of the mirror and shot a picture of her reflection, slowly fanning herself with the Polaroid.
Then she stared at herself in the mirror, at the smudged makeup and the faint traces of crimson on her lips.
Chapter 9
The day dawned scorching hot and she ought to have known something would happen because she felt that familiar prickle down her spine. A day for omens, Grandmother used to say. The old woman also told her you could summon a storm by tying or untying knots. Viridiana still had blue and white bracelets against the evil eye, although she had brought none of them to the Americans’ house. She had also left behind her medallion of Saint Benedict, which was used to chase away the devil. It lies in the crooks of rocks, in the brush, this devil. Grandmother said so.
The air outside could bake bread. It was the right month for sharks in Baja. The time of the year when the fishermen around the peninsula would ready themselves for a bounty. On the beaches the men would toil, finning the animals, cutting off their skin, holding up the slabs of pale flesh to dry. Viridiana derived joy from these rituals.
She would have loved to go down to the beach, to watch the little boats pushing into the ocean. She might have taken the camera Gregory had given her or the recorder and her microphone, to fix on audio tape or instant film these moments because she would miss the beach, the sharks, the ritual, once she was far and away from the peninsula.
But she had no chance to venture out of the house that morning. Ambrose wanted to work on his manuscript. He dictated to Viridiana and Viridiana scribbled in her notepad. However, when it was close to noon, a respite arrived in the shape of Daisy and Gregory.
“Let’s go out,” Daisy said. She wore the crocheted bikini Viridiana had borrowed on their previous outing. “I need to work on my tan.”
“I guess we could,” Ambrose said. “It’s so hot inside. A little dip in the water could cool us down. I’ll get changed.”
“I’m thinking later we can go for dinner at that hotel in town. It’s the only place that looks worth it,” Daisy said.
“There’s a restaurant with some fun décor if you are willing to drive a bit down the coast,” Viridiana said. “I’ll be happy to take you there.”
“I was thinking it would be the three of us,” Daisy said, pointedly.
“We can’t leave her to be bored here by herself,” Gregory quickly replied. “Ambrose, take my side.”
Daisy gave Gregory such a look of utter contempt that Viridiana thought her cause was lost, but Ambrose got up from behind his desk and spoke. “Let the girl come with us,” he said. “She’s earned a dip in the ocean.”
Ambrose left the office. Daisy did not try to conceal her displeasure and she informed Viridiana that she didn’t have a bathing suit she could borrow that day, so she’d have to come up with her own beach attire and she’d better do it quick because she wasn’t willing to wait for her.
Viridiana felt it was very unfair, especially when she had done nothing to deserve such treatment, but she kept her mouth wisely shut and rushed into her room. She had packed no bathing suit but she did bring a pair of blue denim shorts she seldom wore and a black sleeveless t-shirt. She tied her hair in a ponytail and hurried to wait by the car.
Despite Daisy’s pronouncement that they would leave in five minutes, it took more than half an hour for the others to emerge from the house. Daisy shoved a bunch of towels in Viridiana’s face and Viridiana placed them in the trunk, along with the sun tan lotion and other beach paraphernalia.
“Where are we headed?” Ambrose said, taking the wheel.
“There’s a beach I found in the tourist guide. It sounds very nice,” Daisy said.
“Tell me how to get there.”
Viridiana and Gregory sat in the back of the car. He discreetly ran a hand up and down her bare leg, touched her arm, and flashed her such a smile that Viridiana paid little attention to the road. They could have been headed to the bottom of the ocean and she would not have cared because his knee was bumping her knee, a finger rested on her thigh for a few seconds, and then that finger carelessly pushed a stray lock of hair behind her ear.
In fact, it wasn’t until Ambrose parked the car that Viridiana recognized where they were. Santa Caridad, with its treacherous waves.
“It’s pretty,” Ambrose declared. “Very pretty.”
“This beach is not good for swimming,” Viridiana said. “The undertow—”
“Viridiana, set down the towels and the blankets,” Daisy said. “There’s no need for you to be sputtering on.”
Viridiana frowned, but Gregory helped her with the towels, and soon enough they had two beach umbrellas up shading them. Gregory had brought the portable radio and he turned it on. Ambrose was in a very good mood. When he was like this, it was difficult to remember how obnoxious he could be. He was telling stories and jokes. He had a good repertoire. After a while he dozed off.
Gregory, for his part, was smoking a cigarette and forming perfect rings with the smoke. He showed off to Viridiana, who appreciated the performance with an open eagerness which earned her a roll of the eyes from Daisy. It was obvious, judging by Daisy’s face, that she had watched Gregory acting like this before, and it was all very hokey to her.
Gregory’s pleasure, however, was palpable, and when he leaned close to Viridiana and whispered in her ear a simple nothing of a compliment (hey, love) she felt her heart soar high.
Daisy stood up abruptly and nudged Ambrose with her right foot.
“Come on, let’s go swimming,” she said.
“Alright,” Ambrose said, lifting himself slowly. He had not gone down to the beach often and unlike Daisy and Gregory, who were perfectly tanned, Ambrose’s skin was still pale, like a fish’s belly. He himself resembled a disgruntled sea lion, murmuring as he shed his shirt and remained only in his swim trunks.
“But you don’t intend to really swim, do you?” Viridiana asked. Daisy did not reply and Viridiana ought to have left it at that, but she felt compelled to elaborate. “It isn’t safe.”
“The undertow, yes,” Daisy said. “How bad can it be?”
“Very bad.”
“It looks peaceful,” Ambrose said, skeptically.
“It’s treacherous. You don’t want to be going in there. I thought you only wanted to tan.”
“On top of speaking all those languages are you also an expert on ocean currents?” Daisy asked.
“Quiet,” Ambrose commanded. “The girl lives here, she knows the area. I’m not swimming today.”
Daisy placed her hands on her hips and shot Viridiana a murderous glance. Viridiana had started on the right foot with Daisy, but these days it seemed the woman had nothing but hostility for the girl. Viridiana did not know exactly what it was she had done wrong.
They remained at the beach for another half hour. At that point Daisy said she wanted to
head back and they packed their things. As soon as they walked in Ambrose declared that he had to take a nap.
“It’s too hot for anything else,” he said. “Maybe tonight we can type more letters, alright Viridiana?”
“Sure,” she muttered, watching the man head upstairs.
Gregory lingered at the foot of the staircase. Viridiana thought maybe they’d have a chance to talk a little more, but he told her he wanted to take a shower to cool down and Viridiana guessed that was it for them.
At least for this afternoon.
At night, who knew. Maybe he’d sneak into her room to see her. He would whisper sweet words into her ear. Things like “I love you, too. It scares me. But it is a wonderful feeling.” Like the movies. Like Monty and Liz.
How she wished they could go into town together. There was the bar at the hotel, where they could have drinks and a nice dinner. But then everyone would know about them, and it would be hell to pay for her. One day, though. Somewhere else, far away, they could do as they pleased and go wherever they wanted, and Viridiana wouldn’t have to worry about busybodies who liked to wag their tongues when she walked by.
Viridiana went to her room and turned on the fan, lay down on the bed. She dreamt she was walking in the desert and beneath her feet she could feel tarantulas slumbering in their burrows. And then she heard a voice call out to her. Like Grandmother said the devil would call, leading travelers astray until they tumbled down the side of a cliff and to their death.
The invisible voice beckoned Viridiana and she listened, even though she knew it was not a good idea to listen to voices in the desert.
And she recalled what some relative of hers had said once, that in Baja California there is only the devil or the nothing. But there was something there, there was someone, leaning over a clump of cacti. The cacti were engorged with water, their flowers blooming red. And when she moved closer—even though she didn’t want to move closer, but the voice, the voices around her compelled her to step forward —she could see that the man (it was a man, she knew this) leaning over the cacti was dressed in a yellow habit. And when Viridiana stretched out a hand to touch his shoulder, he turned and looked at her and his mouth was filled with jagged shark teeth and blood was streaming from that mouth because he had bitten into the cacti, bitten into it, spines and all.
She awoke slowly. Despite the nightmare she was not startled. Instead her eyelids lifted gently and she heard the voices still around her. The fan had stopped working while she slept and Viridiana lay covered in a thin layer of sweat.
The voices from the dream continued speaking and she frowned.
But then she realized that the voices were not in her imagination, that this was not the lingering dream. Someone was arguing.
Viridiana stood up and went to the door of her room, opening it and standing in the hallway.
Ambrose was yelling, then Daisy.
They were shouting at each other.
She could not make out the precise words. They were too far off, but so loud the tenor of their conversation was still obvious.
Just as she thought of returning to her room and shutting the door, there came a single, piercing scream and a loud thud. Then a silence.
The silence was more piercing than the scream.
Viridiana stood immobile, and she recalled a passage that she had read in an old book about the history of the area. It leapt into her mind, as clear as if she held the book between her hands and paged through it: “They sinned by eating human meat and they sacrificed themselves to the Devil and they would not make the sign of the cross.”
Neither the scream nor the silence which stretched on were any of her business, but she still walked forward, as she had walked forward in the dream. When she emerged in the living room she almost expected to find the man in yellow there, tearing a piece of prickly pear and stuffing it his greedy mouth. Instead, she was greeted by a different, equally macabre sight.
Ambrose lay at the bottom of the stairs.
Gregory was kneeling next to him, his hand on Ambrose’s neck. He did not look at Viridiana as she approached them. But Daisy was staring at her.
“He fell,” Daisy said.
Viridiana looked down at Ambrose. There was a scratch on his cheek and his eyes were closed. She couldn’t tell if he was breathing, when she tried to bend down to take a closer look at him, Daisy grabbed her arm, as if to pull her away.
“We need a doctor,” Gregory muttered.
“I think he’s dead,” Daisy said.
“We need…”
“I heard you the first time!”
Viridiana had only seen one dead person before: her grandmother dressed in her favorite blue skirt, a photo of her in her youth placed by the coffin. She could not tell if Ambrose was dead or gravely injured, and there was no point in debating. Viridiana hurried to the door.
“Where are you going?” Daisy asked.
“He’s right. We need a doctor,” Viridiana said, and she grabbed the car keys in the Talavera dish.
“Hurry up.”
The sun was setting as she drove into the town and the sky was like a purple bruise. She rang the bell on the side door of Doctor Navarro’s house, where he had his attendance room. Navarro saw people from four in the afternoon until eight at night. He had no patient with him that night and the doctor opened the door quickly.
“Yes?” he said.
“One of the Americans, over at The End, he had an accident,” she said. “You have to come and look.”
“Is it bad? I have a card game in half an hour.”
Viridiana had forgotten that on Fridays the man usually ignored the hours painted on his door and went to meet friends. She was lucky she’d grabbed him before he started downing beers.
“Yes. He might be dead.”
“All right. You better get Cipriano,” Doctor Navarro said. “If the man is really dead, he’ll be needed anyway.”
Navarro looked put off, probably on account of missing his card game. Viridiana nodded and jumped back into the car. Cipriano lived on the other side of town. He was the funeral home owner although to call this a “funeral home” was doing it a great favor. It was a white-washed house, very small. Most rooms of it were littered with coffins, boxes filled with candles and wooden planks. Cipriano was a carpenter by trade, the coffins were a side-business, like the fireworks he sold in December. He did know something about the dead, having lived in Guadalajara where he worked for a real funeral home.
Viridiana knocked on his door and told Cipriano about Ambrose and that Navarro had said they should head back to the house. Cipriano called his son, a surly boy of about fourteen, and they got into their pickup truck with the blue tarp. This was what passed for a hearse in her town.
When they arrived at the house, Navarro was sitting on a couch and Ambrose’s body was still sprawled on the floor. Someone had tossed a blanket on top of it. Daisy sat on another couch, across from the doctor, while Gregory stood behind his sister.
“Good, you’re here,” Navarro said. “He is very much dead. I have to ask them some questions so you’ll have to translate.”
“Sure,” Viridiana said, and she sat down slowly, next to the doctor. “The doctor wants to ask you a few questions.”
Daisy was lighting a cigarette Gregory had handed her. She nodded, her manicured fingers pressing the cigarette against her lips. Daisy and Viridiana had never done their nails together, even though Daisy had promised. She got the feeling Daisy was full of empty promises.
Viridiana looked at those hands and noticed the broken nail. A single red, broken nail, standing out starkly against the others.
There had been a scratch on Ambrose’s face.
“What happened to him?” the doctor asked.
Viridiana quickly repeated the question in English.
“He fell,” Daisy said. Daisy’s hand was shaking a little, her golden bangles clashing for a second, but the answer was shor
t and simple. Viridiana licked her lips and said it in Spanish.
“How did he fall?”
“He was coming down the stairs, and he fell.”
“Just like that?”
“He tripped.”
Navarro was frowning. He had a stern face and a deep frown, it used to terrify Viridiana whenever she visited him for a checkup as a little girl. He’d shine a light in her ears, ask her to stick out her tongue, all while frowning. Viridiana always feared she was coming down with a horrid disease by the way he frowned and seemed displeased, though inevitably it turned out to be a minor issue.
Daisy stared at the doctor and Gregory placed a hand on his sister’s shoulder squeezing it lightly.
“He’d been drinking,” Gregory said quickly, the words so quick he almost sounded breathless.
Daisy tapped her cigarette against an ashtray. Viridiana stared at the broken nail. Daisy was looking down, she looked terribly upset and her hand trembled again. The bracelets clinked gently together. Four gold bracelets, one of them with jade embellishments. Daisy had casually mentioned Ambrose had bought them for her before they took the ferry to Baja.
Navarro sighed. “This is going to be more annoying than that hippie who stabbed his friend,” he said.
That incident had taken place a few years before. A group of friends who had been camping by the beach, drinking, doing drugs, and God knew what else. They had gotten into a scuffle which turned violent when one of them took out a knife—so much for love and peace, although she wasn’t sure those folks had been hippies it’s just that any outsider was liable to be called a hippie— and stabbed another hippie in the arm. It wasn’t fatal or anything like it, but the Americans had flapped their hands and said charges needed to be laid against the man while everyone else rolled their eyes.
It was the kind of event which precipitated needless paperwork. For Navarro, it meant he’d likely have to waste his Friday night examining the body and writing a death certificate. The doctor took out a handkerchief and pressed it against his forehead. The ceiling fan was on but it could not cool the room properly. Air conditioned was needed. A pity the previous owner had never bothered installing it.
Untamed Shore Page 9