HOTEL QUEQUEN IV
SUBMARINE
Bernatek
Vincenzo Di Cella
Araujo
Bentivegna
Serrano García Bazán
Serafini
Roman Piña Butti
AVELLANEDA
Bernatek
Carlos was born in Avellaneda, Buenos Aires, in 1955. It storyteller, poet and essayist. She has published two books of short stories, one of poetry and four novels, among which the latter won the First Prize of the National Endowment for the Arts.
FOREST AT SEA
was nearly three o'clock in the afternoon and had not eaten. Just a few mates, but not hungry. Took off his shoes, put on a comfortable skirt, a shirt, and hit the sidewalk. Riding legs gave him a kind of happiness, as if stripped that part of the body as a freedom unknown and so common to everyone there that people do not see those details. Bare feet are sexy, he said, and air with the strong, salty taste, clean inside you ... Tried to not see anyone crossing the street and came to the corner. He turned his head towards the coast and was an instant as if hypnotized, one block and you could see the dune, that sand accumulated by centuries of waves spending the stones, and those yuyito so green above, such as hair, and behind the huge slick stretched against the sky, a blue-green and gray and brown at times, according to illuminate the sun or cut light a cloud, it was the sea. It was moving cautiously when he saw the water was moving that way fearful that such brutality is shaking like a living thing, nervous, and sometimes with the wind howled. The air became more ferocious as it approached. Climbed the dune running because your feet are burning but I wanted to get to the top to see everything, all together, all those eyes give him suburbs, accustomed to the cement and buildings, to communities and to train. How come you never went to sea, mami? Selvita You know that this weather is terrible for the joints, which makes me nervous ... whatever. Crazy, my mother. And then it was always work, every summer, as if the weather had nothing to do with the duties: take holidays of others to get replacements, temporary positions. The sea, then, was something they mentioned, they wanted the other, a magnetism that drew almost by inertia to the beach every January. She knew the mountains, a nearby pond, but never the sea, and was twenty, "not much? I could not blame the mother, after all the preferred healthy and calm before arthritic and crazy. But sometimes, one could at least have had the initiative to see the sea, if only for curiosity, a weekend. In any case Selva mother had taught him not even the desire to see the sea, and could not convey the pleasure. Selvita had seen the sea in movies and on TV, but I had not smelled, felt that they had not caused the breeze on your face, body, damp mist, and that taste in the mouth, salty on the tongue , so that skin blob as a sweat wild Indians, because people on the beach, half naked, appeared as primitive, newcomers to a world that's so new, it was still warm.
At the top of the dune, looked left and right, all she could comprehend. That is, it was. And was excited to find out as he imagined that Columbus should have been thrilled to see America and wanted to scream "land, land", as she now cry: "Water, water !"... Seawater, saltwater thousands of bugs to hide inside, sharks, whales, dolphins, seafood casseroles, or clean oiled penguins, all tucked in there, and sunken ships full of treasures that no one can rescue ever after what a waste, Dear God! And people drowned because nature is inexorable (how liked that word!) for those who dare to challenge it, provided it wins by more experienced swimmer or lifeguard he is. And there should be sunken Atlantis, which she read was a wonderful continent, its cities and its streets and even their cars rusting, because the Atlanteans must have eaten the shark murderers. And it must be the Titanic and the Graf Spee, all mixed in the same water and rotting. And it must have chains and gold rings to be a rich woman fell overboard on a transatlantic voyage. Everything must be wet for the same water, rusted, hidden somewhere that nobody knows. And just in case the water is withdrawn, if the sea suddenly evaporate, here it could be a route that would lead to Africa, a route on a sandy desert, and would be a shame that there was no ocean for what would? A well, a huge pot with a drought of horror. Too bad that this water is not drinkable, or used to irrigate the crops, because if you serve would end the thirst in the world, and everything would be green and fertile. But the desert, I say, for something must serve, if not nature would not have invented.
and saw the people, that other people in a dense mass of umbrellas, with its colorful screens, their sunglasses, their silly hats, and it seemed a bit obscene that the bodies seen so in broad daylight, with all its imperfections, this way of showing no shame in front of other strangers. Well, but they were all that way, half balls, and did not seem to bother wearing the fat bellies and legs, scars of operations, varicose veins and all the crap that went into the same water without medical examination ("nobody anything contagious, leprosy, syphilis? sure all the salt dissolves Why not use sea salt to cure all human decay?). Her when she went to the pool had to go through the doctor (if they had received that young boy and Peeping Tom, with lively gesture) that looked between the toes to see if it had mushrooms and armpits looked at him (is that someone has fungi in the armpits? What should be uncomfortable to wear deodorant, how to burn), but that with such a look, with the snout of a fox, with that voyeur Hociquito of going down, probably fueled a student charged spying and above salary. If I had even stopped going to the pool hot weekend not to spend the checkup. With this heat, Selvita, why do not you? I'm watching TV, Mom. If thinking about taking the bus and I get tired, I said to conform. Poor working my baby, what would your mother without your sacrifice?
unlike anything was, was ... huge. Three quarters of the planet is water, she recalled some documentary, and she, between how much you know, despite watching documentaries, did not know until that moment the greatest and most abundant of the world we lived out there there were people in other worlds and you do not know, but at least know the one. So at twenty know how crucial it was the planet of his birth. What if some aliens came and abducted, and you were asked to describe their world, she hardly knew until now paramount, and had twenty-five years living in it! Now yes, I was already aware.
Why fuck just going to kidnap her? For this to be carried to a scientist. They kidnap everyone ...
She ran down the dune to the beach (how to burn this arena, dammit! I going to get blisters on your feet, I care that much with expensive shoes that cost me my good weights , weights not more working hours, dammit), and as he approached the wet sand felt such relief and that smell stronger iodine and invisible fish. Gave away the umbrellas, and chairs, and conservative drinks, and thermoses of mate, and the boys swollen balls crying non-stop and ask for things, and street vendors, and the chub colorinche fabric, and the dogs had inconsiderate people like children, and all muscular and tanned lifeguard who was in his little fascist viewpoint with the whistle hanging, well, the whistle, gave away everything he crossed to step on the little water from the shore, the cool loved it, coming and going in waves, and felt his feet sinking in the sand making soft plunger as he left the water and walked along the bank to heel licking and filling his lungs with the air hazy (this should be healthier than I do not know why, so natural, so pure ... nature ... what Nature is wise who invented the sea. Well, we have invented God, but in my home are not going to church, I'd rather have a god called Nature). He walked away realizing that the center of the beaches and the sun was poking into the arms (hum, I should have put some cream, I myself am so white-skinned despite having very dark hair, jet-like Mom says ...). And when he wanted to remember, was about ten blocks away (to see if I get lost, mommy dear, no, I will not ask anyone because I'm such an idiot, a newly landed pajuerana), then turned and went back to the shore see if you saw the lifeguard in his chair atop lifeguard pedestal, as the king of the beach. And so glad to see it, while almost had given a kiss (kiss minga to see if it takes me a little crazy), and recognized the place where he had begun the march as an almost familiar.
It is time to return. As the first day, enough. The sea is. Almost too much.
Rencores Fragment of the provincial novel, Adriana Hidalgo Editora, Buenos Aires, 2007.
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