Thirteen Heavens

by Mark Fishman

  Under the seat of the F-150, a parcel he’d put together before leaving Chihuahua, clothes wrapped in yesterday’s newspaper, making an anonymous thing out of it, tied with string he’d found wound in a ball in a drawer in the kitchen when Guadalupe was taking a bath, a parcel concealing a dark-blue uniform, resembling the uniforms of the Policía Municipal, or the Policía Nacional, whatever he could get away with, including the belt but without a gun, insignia and Mexican flag sewn on late at night, Ernesto working until daybreak, hiding the short-sleeved shirt where his wife wouldn’t find it, not with his clean clothes, not there where she’d see it when she put away the laundry, hiding it in a trunk with old books, nobody looked at his old books, Ernesto accepting that the shirt might smell of the mustiness of aged paper, decaying paper, rosin, acetic acid, furfural and lignin, chemically related to the molecule vanillin, a hint of vanilla, not so bad, but mostly a stale, moldy or damp smell, a reader’s dream, and it was all he had, Ernesto locking the Ford pickup, turning back in the direction of Hermenegildo Galeana, not retracing his steps, unreadable footprints, walking roughly six blocks to Antonio de León, a right, one block to Álvaro Obregón, returning to his room at Hotel Obregón, the parcel tucked under his arm and Rubén Arenal’s pack of Faros in his shirt pocket, Ernesto undressing, unlacing his boots, and a pair of socks that stood up by themselves, taking a shower, washing his thoughts off his skin, agonizing anxiety anxious agonizing, and fear for Coyuco, Ernesto washing himself, trying to eradicate the indecent, to loosen the particles of contaminated foul fear that came out of his pores along with the sorrow in his heart, two or more for the price of one, Ernesto having no answers to any questions, not his own, not Guadalupe’s, not Irma’s, not Ignacio’s, not Rubén Arenal’s or Luz Elena’s, and for sure, not the other parents of the disappeared, Ernesto, using a hand towel, scrubbed and scoured the reddening skin on his chest, arms, and legs, dead cells raining down with the water in the hot shower, and Ernesto Cisneros, I’ll add those cells to the heap of the already dead and disappeared, a pile as high as a low mountain range, Ernesto shaking his head of wet hair, gray strands falling in front of his eyes, but there’re enough dead out there without me throwing in my used-up worn-out overworked skin cells, Ernesto rubbing his eyes, gargling mouthfuls of water and spitting them out, a rinsing of death and decay without an antiseptic, watching the tarnished blemished water circling the drain, Ernesto stepping out of the shower stall, drying himself off, not feeling clean but awake, and a rumbling in his stomach, a deep resonant sound, a real hunger because a taco and a bottle of Jarritos wouldn’t fill a cat, Ernesto staring at the bed and the parcel, the towel over his shoulders, wishing he had a pair of clean underwear and socks, not thinking of everything, unwrapping the uniform and laying it out on the bedcover, just a thin blanket, pressing and caressing the uniform with the palms of his hands, and Ernesto Cisneros, from here on in it’s my disguise, and tonight, before I go to sleep, under the mattress you go, a poor man’s pressing, that’s what you need and that’s what you’ll get, and Ernesto Cisneros and Rubén Arenal, at the same time in different places, without words but with thoughts coupling like two railroad cars, each surrendering their heart to something, which meant pursuing something, going after it, each in their own way, because the word “heart” in Nahuatl, yollotl, was derived from ollin, movement.

  Rubén Arenal putting the envelope with the letter between the pages of a book, the deep blue midnight blue ink on superior stationery, making him think of Lady Precious Green, Chalchihuitlicue, “the personification of youthful beauty, of whirlpools, and the violence of young growth and love,” the storm goddess, and the overall tenderness and consideration of the words, a tumultuous tempest tickling him, enticing pictures filling his head, images sprouting up from the letter’s words, twenty-four frames a second, a real series of moving pictures, Rubén Arenal, sitting on the edge of his chair at his desk, hands resting on the cover of the book, Juan Rulfo’s Obra Completa, fingers drumming gently at first on the paper cover, a skeleton wearing a wide flower-embellished hat looking back at him, maybe a woman, a bluish ink drawing, almost purple, on a washedout worn-out pink background, published by the Ayacucho Library, an editorial branch of the Venezuelan government, managed by the Fundación Biblioteca Ayacucho, Rubén Arenal, impatience getting the better of him, a nervous drumming on the flower-embellished hat, the cover of Juan Rulfo’s book, and Rocket, ¡tranquilo, hermano! it’s a buyer not a wife, but the signature, Pascuala Esparza, and her daughter, La Pascualita, or her look-alike, dressed in black, walking next to her mother, a precarious prediction, Rubén Arenal seeing them now like he’d seen them last night, in the burning heat, and Rocket, I don’t like my own trick of stumbling like a donkey after whatever comes to my mind, coming when the idea comes to me from wherever it comes, it’s passing through where the sun doesn’t shine, not too intelligent, not too bright, but where’s the source, the birthplace, the origin, encouraging parlous providence, timely preparation for future eventualities full of danger or uncertainty, and those words, ladies and gentlemen, in deep blue midnight blue ink, so take care be responsible watch your step slow down, Rubén Arenal, overwhelmed by anxiousness, oxygen held back in his lungs, in culminating convulsion, breaking out in a sweat, and Rocket, breathe, breathe, you fool you clown, knock it off, my thing is to have my lungs working in tip-top condition, of the very best class or quality, now and forever, tip-top and not a line guide on a fishing rod, no seas tan bobo, hermano, don’t be such a fool, like the song from 1965 by Luz Esther Benítez, a Boricua, a native of Bayamón, a municipality of Puerto Rico, Luz Esther Benítez, better known as Lucecita Benítez, ask Roberto Tirado, dedicating his first release in 1988 on Lando records to Lucecita Benítez, Rubén Arenal rising from his chair, walking to the kitchen, heading straight for the refrigerator, and Rocket, first things first, reciting part of the letter’s contents, without moving his lips, hearing Pascuala Esparza’s voice through the words she’d written in a standard-size letter, sealed in a hand-delivered envelope, 6 x 9, my daughter and myself, we’re lighted by your work, and so we ask to see you, at your studio, on Thursday, tomorrow, in the afternoon, not too late not too early, it’s your pottery we want to buy, Rubén Arenal, using different words, or the same words in a different order, and Rocket, but it’s the thrust, the meaning, the drift that counts, the substantial substance of a message of striking proportions, a sale to pay the rent, and a woman I’ve been wanting to meet, Rubén Arenal, his hand on the refrigerator door, a photograph stuck there by a magnet, Luz Elena, Avelina, Perla and Cirilo smiling back at him, and a pitcher of pulque waiting for him behind the door, fermented agave nectar extracted from the maguey and mixed with xnaxtli seed, or the ocpactli root, aiding the fermentation, Mayáhuel, “Goddess with the four hundred nipples,” the personification of the maguey plant, the goddess who invented pulque, and Patécatl, “God of medicine,” Lord of the root of pulque, and god of healing and fertility, pulque, seen by the ancients as the result of the union between female and male archetypes, Rubén Arenal opening the refrigerator door, and in front of him, a nearly empty refrigerator, but the pitcher of pulque, a path to sleep and dreams, connecting the divine and earthly realms, and Rocket, impatience will lose you the jackpot, because La Pascualita, or Little Pascuala, with her veined hands and wide-set sparkling glass eyes, the woman that’s a dead ringer, una doble de la Pascualita, will wait for me, brother, if I wait patiently for her, breathe breathe, Rubén Arenal pouring himself a tall glass of pulque, raising the glass to his lips, swallowing a mouthful of chilled pulque, not getting drunk but taking enough to dream, sitting on a chair at the rough wooden table in the center of the kitchen area, Rubén Arenal raising his shirt, looking down at a tattoo of a maguey on his stomach, rubbing his belly, taking another mouthful of pulque, warmth pouring into him like a tender fire, charitable and caring, remembering the Nahuatl story, “The Horticultural Boy,” “Xochicualtequitca Piltontli,” a folk tale, Rocket, putting a few sen
tences of the story into his own words, “earlier the healer had seen that on his stomach the boy had a maguey painted in blood, and she said to his mother, look, madam, this maguey that’s painted on his belly means that he’ll have to be raised on pulque, and while he’s growing, feed him what I’ve told you; when he reaches the age of seven, then we’ll change his nourishment, in the meantime let’s heal him, and she began to heal him, she sucked the blood on his belly, she perfumed him with burnt St John’s wort, palm, incense, many other medicinal herbs, she rubbed rooster blood on his stomach, erasing the maguey painted on the boy; she burnt incense later so he wouldn’t cry again, after she healed him he didn’t cry again, he was always calm, once they’d given him the pulque they didn’t have to give it to him again, he’d fall asleep and they’d give him more the next day,” Rubén Arenal taking a drink from his glass, licking his lips, dry after recounting part of the story, “The Horticultural Boy,” taking another slug of pulque, feeling a little sleepy himself, and Rocket, I wasn’t like him as a child, but I’ve been drinking the stuff all my life, so thank you thank you Don Pablo González Casanova, born in Mérida, Yucatán, on 29 June 1889, tireless researcher, teacher, editor and director of the Sunday supplement of El Universal, member of the Mexican Academy of Language, but without a seat since no seat became vacant, so no acceptance speech—toma, por mala suerte, that’s too bad—thank you Padre González Casanova for a million things, and for collecting and translating those stories from Nahuatl to Spanish, Rubén Arenal finishing his glass of chilled pulque, the pulque in his veins making him sleepy, all at once his eyelids weighed a ton, and Rocket, it’s time to read and go to sleep, I’ve got less than a day before they come here to see my things, Rubén Arenal putting the empty glass in the sink without rinsing it, leaving the kitchen to get his copy of Juan Rulfo’s Obra Completa, the bluish ink drawing, almost purple, of a skeleton wearing a wide flower-embellished hat looking back at him from the cover, and he thought he saw it give him a wink, a nod, and then Rubén Arenal, undressed, no pajamas, and straight to bed to read a few pages before falling asleep.

  “Una noche serena y oscura,” played and sung by Cuco Sánchez and Dueto América, Cuco Sánchez, José del Refugio Sánchez Saldaña, born in 1921 in Altamira, a port city on the Gulf of Mexico, in the state of Tamaulipas, and Dueto América, Carolina and David González from Aguascalientes in the state of Aguascalientes, and “Una noche serena y oscura,” “One Dark and Serene Night,” a melancholy song of love and betrayal:

  Una noche serena y oscura

  cuando en silencio juramos los dos

  cuando en silencio me diste tu mano

  y de testigo pusimos a Dios

  Las estrellas, el sol y la luna

  son testigos que fuiste mi amada

  hoy que vuelvo te encuentro casada

  ay que suerte infeliz me tocó

  Soy casada y amarte no puedo

  por que así lo dispuso la ley

  quiero serle constante a mi esposo

  y en silencio por tí lloraré

  Cuando estés en los brazos de otro hombre

  y te creas la más consentida

  espero en Dios que te maten dormida

  por infame y traidora a mi amor.

  One night, serene and dark

  when in silence we both promised,

  when in silence you gave me your hand,

  and for a witness we appointed God.

  The stars, the sun and the moon

  were witnesses that you were my beloved.

  Today I return and find you are married,

  Oh, what sad luck I have.

  “I am married and cannot love you,

  because the law has made it so.

  I want to be true to my husband,

  and I will cry for you in silence.”

  When you are in the arms of another man,

  and you believe you’re the most pampered one,

  I hope to God they’ll kill you while you’re sleeping,

  for being ungrateful and a traitor to my love.

  Rubén Arenal listening to the song, shrugging off the love, concentrating on betrayal, already afraid of what might happen if he fell in love, a premature paranoia setting in, and a little wounded unwarranted jealousy even before he’d met her face to face, the daughter of Pascuala Esparza, getting up from the wooden table in the kitchen area with a second cup of coffee in his hand, walking to where he’d laid out as many pieces of pottery as he could without making it look like a garage sale, his best work, free from flaws or mistakes, displaying his modest skill, know-how, artistry, imagination in earthenware and stoneware, with the heart of Mata Ortiz, a small land-grant village with adobe dwellings, a village four and a half hours south and west of El Paso pumping its blood into each piece, Rubén Arenal refining his technique, an amalgam of the traditional and the modern, and an enormous debt to Mata Ortiz, and now, a stab of love stuck into him sharp like a cactus thorn, waiting, pacing, and Rocket, I wonder if I’ll hear the bell or the knocking at the door, leaving the pottery studio for the entrance to his ground-floor apartment, a simple home, checking to see if the bell worked, a buzzer, and Rocket, asking a passerby, a fifteen-year-old kid, maybe younger, standing there with a gym bag slung over his shoulder, ¿ese, me gustaría que hicieras algo por mí? can you to do something for me? and the boy, a puzzled look, ¿estás en serio o me estás tomando los pelos? are you serious or are you kidding me? the boy, his gym bag in his hand, faltering steps, not dragging his feet, but slowing down, stopping out of curiosity, and Rocket, can you do me a favor, manito? this is a test, sounds like American TV in the sixties, but you’re too young, so what I’m asking is, will you start out by ringing the buzzer, or it’s a bell, it doesn’t matter, and then knock on the door, at first not so loud, this door, right here—Rubén Arenal laying the palm of his hand on the face of his door—I’ll go back inside, right now, that’s the test, and if I don’t come to the door, if I don’t open it, it’s because I didn’t hear you, and so you start banging on it, louder, you can lay into it, I won’t object, nobody will, and keep it coming until I open the door, got it? good, and I’ll give you a hundred pesos, okay? just to know if I can hear when somebody’s there at the door while I’m inside, it’s no joke, not from where I’m standing, which is right here waiting for somebody to show up, I’m itching, and I don’t want to miss them, they’re more than a somebody, not one but two, a woman and her mother, what do you say? and the boy, chido, güey, okay, Rubén Arenal, without another word, shutting the door behind him, standing in the foyer separating the street entrance from his apartment door, deciding he’d better go inside, closing the apartment door behind him, staring at the kitchen area of his studio, clicking his tongue, rubbing the calluses on the palm of his right hand, a kind of tic, a habitual spasmodic contraction of the muscles, not in his face, but in his hand, that’s how it was, and right away, the doorbell, or it was the buzzer, but Rubén Arenal, waiting a little longer, if he didn’t hear it it’d be better to know what the pounding on the door sounded like, so he was frozen to the spot in his kitchen, listening and waiting, waiting and listening, a knock on the door, a thump, followed by another, no echo, just a faraway sound passing through two doors, then a heavier weight against the outer door, the street entrance, a blow with a person’s fist or blunt instrument, a hammering sound, dull not sharp, a whack wallop and the fifteen-year-old boy was beating the daylights out of the door, the wood insensible to the attack, Rubén Arenal hurrying to get to it, wanting to stop the violence that made him more nervous than he already was, his skull vibrated painfully, the pounding like hammer blows shaking loose his skull casing, opening up a hole for all his anticipation to bore into the center of his brain.