Beyond the Snows of the Andes

by Beatrice Brusic

  Mother has always said to me “small town, big inferno” and after being here a while I realize how right she was, because the locals in Uyuni live and breathe gossip, nothing pleases them more than “a juicy scandal,” and that’s why my father guarded Emilia’s secret so zealously, he knew the town would feed on it for a year, embellishing the story to no end, and perhaps adding that Mili was pregnant and had to get married. I don’t blame them however, after all what else is there to do here? It’s either fabricating stories or dying of boredom.

  The big topic of conversation after a vicious storm is whose rooftop has blown off, who has become homeless, with the local priest basing his Sunday sermon on that unfortunate soul to gather more donations. I am obligated to attend church every Sunday here with the family, but my heart is never in it. I find the one hour mass extremely long and boring, and most of the time I have to struggle to keep my eyes open.

  After six months in this godforsaken town I begin to long for La Paz and all its attractions, here life passes so slowly that a week feels like a month and a month like a year. The era of television hasn’t hit this backwards town yet, and the only attractions are the two movie houses everyone flocks to see once a week. At home I was always on top of world events, I would read my uncle’s newspapers and magazines, especially Life which was a household favorite, but here I’m living in a different universe.

  There is only one local paper, and it’s always behind in the news. Out of boredom I begin to read my stepmother’s Mexican magazines, and get some temporary distraction out of them. There are always great pictures of Mexico’s magnificent coast line, and I’m beginning to suspect that this city is blessed in natural beauty and long to visit it some day.

  ~~~

  In a particularly gloomy mood because of the dreary, wet weather, I open mother’s letter and find out that Marilyn has died by her own hand, that cruel month of August, shocking the world and everyone who loved her. The news, as usual, reached me a month later, because mother had been ill with a stomach ailment, and hadn’t been able to get to the post office. She has started her letter with the words, “I’m thinking of you today because I know how much you loved her - everyone here is talking about it, and your aunt was crying.”

  I read and re-read the letter in a complete shock. She had always seemed so happy - the radiant smile, glowing face and unequalled beauty. Had it all been a façade? How could she have committed suicide? She, who had the world at her feet? It just didn’t seem possible. I had stood in line for hours to purchase tickets to her movies; I had collected her pictures by the dozen. She was my idol, the woman I wanted to be, had it all been a Hollywood fabrication?

  I felt a peculiar sense of loss, a funny ache in my heart. It felt lonely and big, like losing a part of my life, the part that had dreamed of her - the innocent part that had worshipped her. I wanted to be with Aunt Sonia who had introduced her to me and who had loved her as much as I had. I wanted to hug her and cry in her arms. I poured my feelings in long letters to mother and Aunt Sonia, and went to sleep without supper. Her vibrant image followed me and I couldn’t believe she no longer existed.

  Knowing my affection for her, mother had given me a tiny, beautiful doll with platinum hair that we had baptized Marilyn, many years ago. She had been so important in my life and in millions of lives around the planet, how could she have shattered the illusion so cruelly? Everyone knew her life story, how she had risen to the top of the business from the ravages of her childhood, giving us hope that anything was possible in the world if we struggled hard enough. She had been an inspiration, a symbol of perseverance, grace and beauty.

  Mother had ended her letter with the lines, “Don’t be too angry with her, nobody knows the thirst that people live with,” and as I let the tears roll down my cheeks I realized she was right - maybe incredible sadness hid behind the dazzling smile.

  ~~~

  Life resumes its dull normalcy, and by climbing through the window of my room, I learn to use the rooftop as a terrace to sunbathe after school. I lie down on a blanket and dream that I’m at the beach. I have my book with me and feel sorry I didn’t bring a pillow when Ana María comes in hot pursuit. I am amused by my half sister’s attachment to me, I have never done anything to encourage it, choosing to remain somewhat aloof and detached from the entire family, but everyone now is beginning to accept me, including my father who after winding down with a couple of drinks on Sunday evenings, gently strokes my hair while I crouch down by his feet quietly, beside the fireplace.

  These are special, bittersweet moments always tinged with guilt and longing for my mother. I often feel like a traitor sitting close to the man who has caused her so much pain, but I’m fully dependent on him now and must try to get along. At other times I’m amused to watch him cracking jokes and singing at the top of his lungs during the Lion’s Club parties, where as the head, he presides like a king. On those occasions he can be charming and gay, and I realize he is more complex than I think, and that there are many sides to his personality when alcohol relaxes his self imposed rigidity.

  “I’ve always wanted to be a tenor,” he tells his friends who applaud his singing. “As a child I often sang for the neighbors and they gave me extra treats, so you see? I was always singing for my supper, one way or another.”

  Under the influence my father is the life of the party – funny, talkative and amusing. He is not a mean, self pitying drunk like Gustavo, and he only drinks occasionally - alcohol doesn’t have a death grip on him and probably never will. I see my stepmother laughing and enjoying herself, proudly standing by her man who is a big success, and I want to scream that my mother should be there by right, that it wasn’t fair usurping her place, and I know that this is a totally irrational feeling because he met Rosa long after the divorce, but I can’t help it, and before the emotions I’m feeling register on my face, I retire to my bedroom to get a good cry. I always feel better afterwards, crying is a great release, and I wake up with renewed vigor.

  ~~~

  In a few days there will be a big graduation party at school and it’s hard to believe a whole year has already gone by and I will be graduating from high school soon. My stepmother buys me a pretty red dress, and my father says I should have a great time and be the prettiest girl there. But I’m not sure of that, the fact that Nando Ortís hates me might have repercussions at the party. He’s openly hostile and mean to me in class, never having gotten over my refusal to go out with him. Sometimes I feel sorry for him, I know how bad I felt when the boy I was infatuated with dumped me in Yungas, but what could I do? I’m just not attracted to Nando, and I offered to be his friend but he rejected my friendship.

  Sometimes I wonder if all the times I allowed him to walk me to the house carrying my books led him on. I wish there weren’t such bad feelings between us because he comes from a broken home like I do, but there is nothing I can do to repair the friendship, because he has told everyone I’m a spoiled bitch and he would like to see me dead.

  My worst fears are confirmed the night of the party when nobody invites me to dance. Nando, who’s the captain of the soccer team, has instructed everyone to ignore me, and even the girls I hang around with all the time openly slight me. My father is busy dancing with Rosa, but he finally notices the awkward situation I’m in, and comes to my rescue.

  “Why aren’t you dancing?” he asks, sharply. “Why are you just standing here like a wall flower?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Let’s dance,” he says, leading me to the dance floor. “These people are just a bunch of jerks and ignorant peasants anyway.”

  He saves the night for me by alternating dances between his wife and me so I won’t be alone for too long, but he is furious and insulted, and we leave early. On the way back, he prods me for answers.

  “There must be a reason,” he says, indignantly. “I can’t believe they had the audacity to do that to you right under my nose. There is something fishy going on here that you’re
not telling us.”

  I blurt out the Nando story, and he smiles knowingly. “I knew it had to be something like that. They deliberately set out to hurt you, don’t talk to anybody there anymore, I’ll deal with their parents later.”

  He doesn’t have to tell me twice, I’m so angry at the girls for being a part of it that I ignore them when I see them at the Sunday fair. I’m very good at keeping to myself anyway, so being the lone wolf in town is no hardship on me.

  Things are fine, uneventful after that embarrassing incident, but I feel restless, unhappy, and every time I hear the whistle of the trains departing at night, I want to go someplace, anyplace I don’t care, just so long as I keep on going.

  A terrible incident brings about an unexpected change into my life shortly thereafter. I feel something crawling around my neck that awakens me from a deep sleep at night, and notice with horror that it’s a mouse. The fright and revulsion that follows makes me sick to my stomach, and I throw up for days, unable to get rid of the disgusting vision of the mouse shrieking at me when I accidentally touched it.

  The fact that the mouse got into my bed, crawled over to my neck and probably touched my face is too revolting to accept, and I begin to have nightmares, waking up screaming and feeling things crawling all over my body. Father hires an exterminator right away, but the nightmares continue and although he is on the other side of the house, he hears my blood curling screams and comes running.

  “You have to desensitize yourself,” he tells me with annoyance. “Or your life is going to be hell from now on.”

  “How can I do that?”

  “By forcing yourself to look at them, we got rid of the mice in the house but we have field mice in the gardens, you can’t just start screaming every time you see them, I know you had a traumatic experience but you have to help yourself. I’m sure you had mice with your mother, don’t pretend that this is the first time you see them.”

  I grew up with mice, mice inside the cloth roof of Pasos Kanki Street, mice crawling on the walls, mice scurrying under our feet, but they never got into my bed, never crawled on my neck, never shrieked at me, and I was never afraid of them; in fact I used to feel sorry for them when mother’s traps caught them and I saw them slowly dying, but now I’m terrified, and every time I see them outside, I leap in the air and feel sick, but father doesn’t understand, the mouse didn’t crawl over his neck, he says I have to forget that it happened but I can’t. I’m afraid to sleep alone in that big, lonely room, and I’m always looking over my shoulder.

  The rest of the family is in Tupiza for vacation, and my father and I are alone in the house which is so big, I only see him during meals. Wanting to distract me, he decides to send me to Tupiza to joint my stepmother and her family for a short stay, and urges me to bring them back home quickly.

  “Tell them a month is a long time and I miss them,” he says putting me on the train. “They were only supposed to stay two weeks, but Rosa always has to overdo everything…”

  I’m delighted to get away from my nightmare and to travel again. After a four hour, picturesque train ride during which I see beautiful green mountains and valleys, I arrive in Tupiza, a lovely town with lush greenery and warm weather. Rosa’s family welcomes me with open arms and makes me feel right at home. They show me the quaint house, large gardens full of flowers and abundant trees of the property, and we pluck some green grapes which are so sweet and fresh, we eat them without washing.

  I help them set the table for lunch and ask about Mili, learning that she is married and expecting her first baby in Buenos Aires. I find out my father met Rosa while stationed here in the army, where his mother had sent him during the bitter divorce from my mother, and wondered if he had been more seduced by the natural joy and harmony the family exhibited rather than by his dourly wife.

  A few hours later, Rosa’s younger brothers, Fernando and Mauricio make their appearance just in time for lunch, and we all seat down to eat. They are both very nice but I feel an instant attraction and connection with Fernando, whose beautiful green eyes fascinate from the start. He starts escorting me around, proudly showing me the natural wonders of Tupiza, and I find myself blushing every time he comes into view and hating myself for it.

  By now the whole family knows I’m infatuated with him and I’m sure are laughing behind my back, but riding in his motorcycle with my long hair blowing in the wind and seeing gorgeous canyons, beautiful mountains and emerald lakes the color of his eyes, I feel nothing but elation and forget about his family. I stay seven days in Tupiza, and during this brief time we share many magic moments, feeling an affinity and intimacy that defies words.

  Fernando shows me the dramatic, rugged red cliffs of Cordillera de Chichas that stand guard in the background and seem to reach insolently for the sky with their pointy, uneven peaks, sharply contrasting with the quiet, unassuming gray mountains in the background. The terrain is a brick color and green trees, gigantic cactuses, clean rivers and blue skies add to the beauty of the panorama. It’s simply a magnificent desert landscape, lying regally in the narrow valley of the River Tupiza. We speed through a tunnel between two red mountains in his motorcycle but I feel no fear, only elation, excitement and happiness to be alive, to be experiencing this moment, to be feeling what I’m feeling. We climb up a hill to “El Corazón de Jesus,” [“The Heart of Jesus”], a great viewpoint where we can see the sunset brilliantly covering the colonial town with its magical red mantle.

  I feel that I love him already, yet aside from putting his arm around my waist when we take long walks in the evening under the star filled skies of Tupiza, Fernando never touches me or holds me in any improper way sensing perhaps that I already belong to him. On my last day, he fills me with joy when he announces unexpectedly that in a couple of weeks he will be coming to Uyuni for a short visit. His change in plans raises eyebrows and suspicion in the family because Rosa says she’s been begging him to come for a long time and he’s never expressed any interest before, but I don’t care, my heart is doing somersaults because I sense he’s coming for me, only for me, and nobody can take that happiness away from me.

  On the train back home I’m unusually bubbly and communicative with my stepmother who looks at me with a knowing, bemused smile. I keep seeing his handsome face everywhere, the thick black hair, tender smile, and those bewitching green eyes. He is tall and strong and I reach up to his chest, longing to bury myself in his arms. He plans to go to Argentina to study medicine so I know the relationship will be short lived but I don’t care, I’m walking on air and will be counting the days till I see him again.

  The next two weeks pass slowly, as if time were deliberately crawling, in direct contrast to the unforgettable seven days in Tupiza which had passed by in a flurry of activity and emotion. I long to hear the date of his arrival but I resist the impulse to ask for fear I will give my feelings away. I envy Mili with all my heart because I already know Fernando will be living with her when he moves to Argentina. As usual I confide in Gumercinda. She answers that if God wants this relationship to work out he will make it happen and that I should leave it to heaven.

  “But Gumercinda,” I cry. “I’m not even sure he feels the same way I do.”

  “What’s meant to be is meant to be,” she says with deep faith, and I find it strange that she has reconciled herself to a life of poverty and loneliness, serving other people, not aspiring to anything but a steady job and a roof over her head because God has willed it that way. She is already in her forties, and on her only day off on Sunday afternoons, she sees her sister who is married with three children. She lives by the notion that everything is preordained and that we don’t have a hand in our destinies.

  “But shouldn’t we make things happen? Shouldn’t we shake our chains a little bit?” I ask her with intensity, and she just moves her head disapprovingly saying that rebellion like that will only makes us miserable because what is written in the book of God for us is written in the book of God for us, and shaking
our chains will not change anything. Sometimes I envy her passivity; it’s so much easier to stop trying, to let things happen, to follow the river of life like a twig following the flow of water to wherever it may lead us.

  ~~~

  A month goes by and I feel lonely and hurt, walking around in a daze and weeping for no reason at all. Perhaps I imagined the whole thing, and Fernando was just being a good host. I built a whole relationship with him inside my head, and he never had any intentions of coming to Uyuni or seeing me again. I feel like a silly school girl with a crush on her teacher. I had been so transparent with my feelings that everyone has noticed them, and now I feel strangely humiliated. To make things more difficult, I’m finished with school for now till father decides what to do with me, so having nothing to distract me, I think of him all day long, hating my foolishness. I take refuge in the books I brought from home and begin re-reading them, finding new things I had missed before, and letting this wound inside of me slowly heal.

  For sheer beauty, I treasure Madame Bovary best of all, a novel that has to be the most exquisite ever written, and I’m filled with awe at the genius of Flaubert whose every line in the book is a work of art. I relate very closely with Emma Bovary and her quest to overcome her origins. She wasn’t satisfied with her lot in life either, and kept swimming against the current. Mother told me Flaubert got in trouble for writing the novel, and had to endure a ridiculous trial during which he was accused of promoting infidelity and wantonness. Did he know he wrote the most beautiful novel in the world? Did he die happy knowing that he achieved immortality? I’m full of these sentiments when I wake up the next morning and head to the kitchen for breakfast, only to find out by an excited Gumercinda that Fernando arrived in the late night train, and is sleeping in the spare bedroom down the hall.

  I’m so happy with the news my heart is dancing, and I have to refrain myself not to run down the hall to peek into his bedroom to make sure it’s not a fantasy. I swallow my breakfast real quick and linger in the kitchen with my coffee, anxious to make sure he sees my face first thing in the morning. Gurmercinda laughs at me and says he might sleep late and I should occupy myself with other things. I tell her he has to wake up sooner or later and it’s already nine o’clock in the morning. The rest of the family has already had breakfast so the setting is perfect. I will watch him eat; I will watch him drink his coffee.