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Man in the Shadows
By
Camincha
I was that
man. His eyes smiled behind the glasses taking in her surprise.
Alba sat there not believing what she heard. Her cousin Ricardo, the man under the tree? Silently, waiting in the shadows? Observing her from across the street?
Now she was back in Perú after living in the States for several years. I want to take you to lunch to
celebrate. Ricardo had said on the phone.
Alba had anticipated giving her order to the obsequious waiter that, she remembered, always materialize at their side. Now sitting in the elegant dining room of
Club Arequipa she lifted her eyes from the menu to his Inca features, high cheek bones, hook nose, dark eyes, skin and a lock of jet black hair on his forehead.
Making eye contact Alba smiled, chupe de camarones...
¿Algo más, no desea la señorita?
Seco de cordero. Gracias.
Un postre...?
Oh, sí. Leche asada, por favor.
She had, in her mind, rehearsed this moment, tasted the pungent spices, golden white juice of a dish of
chupe. The pearly grains of rice in arroz con arvejitas complimenting a lamb stew,
un seco de cordero. She had licked her lips imagining the leche asada served with syrup made of brown sugar and cinnamon. Now her appetite was gone. And she realized it was his revelation,
I was that man, that had made her feel suddenly sick, uncomfortable.
Across the table this Ricardo she had found, with the puffy face, bald head, round shoulders. So different from the one she remembered, leaned over to offer her the wine list with a smile that bared his teeth and she remarked to herself,
the incisors are not sharply pointed anymore. And to her surprise he made that familiar gesture, that twist of his lips so familiar to her. It took her back:
They were first cousins. Ricardo was ten years older, from the affluent branch of the family. And Alba just realized, he was already a lawyer when he had been there, across the street, most nights while she sat in her living-dining room doing her homework. And also during summer vacations when the curtainless window hid nothing as the heat made them keep it wide opened and the occasional breeze stirred the scents in the room against her nostrils,
Jerez de la Frontera from the decanter, bay leaves, camomile, pine soap, coffee beans,
mamacita kept in the sideboard to make more kitchen space for their roommates,
La Gringa and her daughter’s, Eileen and Jessy. Eileen was Alba’s best friend. The two fatherless families shared a tiny two bedroom house. At night their lounge chairs and sofas were cleverly turned into beds.
During those summer evenings Alba had indulged her love for the written word. People walking by sometimes would stare at the slender girl of the oval face, perfectly arched eyebrows, smooth olive skin blooming into womanhood, reading. Always reading. Often she lifted her eyes to find a stranger's eyes on her. It filled her with a wave of warm surprise. She had just turned fourteen enjoyed
Ben Hur, Little Women, Rebecca, quo vadis. Next on her list Wuthering
Heights. All popular and readily available at the Peruvian-American School
para niñas she attended.
Eileen and their classmates Berta and Elsa all fifteen had announced in turn that their periods had started.
We have to be specially careful when wearing a white skirt, Bertha told her in that tone of protective superiority she used lately. And she added,
you have to change them – watching her sideways – the napkins, often, otherwise that's the smell of a woman who doesn't respect
herself, Berta finished. She did say woman, first time Alba heard it from a girlfriend. She listened...
Next it was mamacita with a smile Alba hadn't seen before directed at her, a mix of happiness and shyness. Her cheeks flushed. Her eyes moist had told her daughter:
I’m going to make you a package with your sanitary napkins, your belt and safety pins. I'll also make you some
panties, hesitated then added, a couple of bras- siers. Alba lifted her eyes to hers unbelieving, unbelieving of...what was that? Respect? She was to think of later. Years later. Yes, respect.
That night the sewing machine pedal had been heard later than usual. Mamacita's eyes full of tears. Next morning there was a ribbon-tied-package on Alba's pillow.
From that day mamacita’s eyes, tone of voice, the way she listen to her daughter, changed. They said:
You are becoming a woman. The world awaits you. I know the path at times will be sad, maybe... cruel. Seldom easy, I just hope it will be always open, promising, tempting....
Mamacita’s health deteriorated very fast. They were losing ground. Nothing left but to make her as comfortable as possible. They moved her bed to the front room next to the window. Not for the view. To isolate her, keep her out of the bedroom she had shared with her daughter. Penicillin, the miracle drug, had come too late for her. Instead of the cure or even relief so hoped for, it caused her to react with convulsions that made her twist in pain. And when fever seized her at night the fear took over her body already ravaged by the illness drenching her in sweat that seeped into the mattress. As deadly as the touch of her lips on the cup she drank from. A cup that was not just washed but boiled along with her silverware, dishes, glass, napkin. Boiled. Boiled not in a house pot, boiled in a can that could be discarded.
Mamacita looking out the window wide opened to the summer heat said,
gracias hijita when Alba helped her to take a few spoonfuls of soup. She said it in the whispered puff she talked in lately. Making the effort that spent itself even before she acknowledge it, same like when she tried to lift her head off the
pillows. The effort seemed to die of its own volition before it was executed.
It was February. Alba was at the table reading. She could make out the man's silhouette down the block, under the tree, away from the circle of light of the street lamp. She knew the man was there as she read on. Couldn't quite concentrate on, Heathcliff of
Wuthering Heights, thinking instead of Ricardo, her cousin, who had invited her to go for ice cream to the place in vogue in Miraflores, the
Pam Pam. It had just opened. I’ll take you there after the movie, he smiled with that twist of his lips so familiar to her. Those pink-moist-lips that when half opened flashed startlingly sharply-pointed-incisors. They have mango now, he said, smiling behind the glasses that emphasized his green eyes, Grecian nose, firm chin. Taking in her surprise.
So many new flavors, also chirimoya, guayaba and made a gesture with his strong, snow-white hand that lifted the sleeve of his suit coat showing the gold-and-emerald-cuff-links, on his silk-shirt-cuffs. And many others, he added in a tone that seemed to promise a lot more than an extensive choice of ice-cream flavors. Alba accepted.
But when the guy next door invited her out, she said: no. It felt so strange. It weighed so that she had said no on her own. No one had counseled her.
Mamacita hadn’t said a word. Had not repeated: He will never amount to
anything. That he was just a teenager didn't matter. She expected a prince, well, the son of a rich senator,
hacendado, company's president to invite her daughter for ice cream.
Boys were really making themselves known around her. Like the one who stopped by and placed in her hand a tiny rose, then shyly, quietly walked away. All Alba gave him in return was a smile. But without her realizing it spoke to him of a thousand enticing promises.
The summer was in full bloom. The increasing February heat carried flower's perfumes and mixed them, made them dance and held them in the room under the halo of heat of the floor lamp.
HIS VOICE BROUGHT her back to the moment. What do you say, a Cabernet...? It would go well with the lamb...?
Alba looked up from the menu to find Ricardo's smiling eyes were all over her.
He didn't look away, You look lovely, beautiful as ever, he said gallantly.
Those sun streak strands in your chestnut hair. That deep tan! It must be the swimming you've been
doing. Suddenly his expression changed, there were deep lines on his forehead,
Summers, summers I remember other summers. He sighed....
Copyright © 2007 Camincha
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