La Grande (59 page)

Yes
, Nula thinks,
but I saw them in Rosario, on the sidewalk outside that awful house, with some strange and dubious people, the morning when I passed in a taxi
. And, simultaneously, though he didn't for a second doubt that he'd seen them, he still couldn't believe it. At times, he was sure that it was them, Lucía silent and sleepy and Riera, as usual, cheerful and animated. Because it was winter, they were dressed warmly, Riera in a black overcoat and Lucía in a fur.
The people they were talking to, in a circle, two women and a very young-looking man, were different from them in a way that Nula couldn't quite define. Later, at other times, it was as if he'd only imagined them, or had seen them in a dream, or had been told about it by someone, or had read about it somewhere. But every time he passed the house, in a taxi or on the bus, and even on foot, during the day, when it seemed empty and closed, he would see them again, sharply, in the icy morning, speaking in a circle with their strange friends, and he would try to block out, without managing to, the intolerable images of what might have happened just before, inside, according to what the friend who'd pointed out the house had told him. And now Riera is saying something about how hard the separation with Lucía was for him, and that for months they've been trying to get back together.
Yes, but I saw you with her in Rosario, on the sidewalk outside that awful house
, Nula thinks again, more as a hurt protest than as an accusation. And he's about to tell him, to make him remember,
to make him know that he knows
, but no matter how much he tries to give shape to and pronounce the words that would put his doubt to rest (Riera is incapable of lying), he isn't able to, though his expression must betray his effort somewhat because Riera interrupts his conjugal disclosures and looks at him quizzically, and when Nula doesn't catch on, he asks him directly:

—What's wrong?

—Nothing, Nula says, I was thinking that you and Lucía are a perfect match, and I'm absolutely sure you'll end up together.

—Seriously? Riera says, his smile full of suggestion, clearly signaling that in the words Nula has just spoken there are numerous, darkly hidden allusions that to him are more amusing than offensive or worrying. And suddenly he stands up and shouts to Diana, who sits several meters behind them, sketching under the umbrella:

—Should we take a swim?

Nula laughs, defeated. He realizes that Riera has wanted to demonstrate to him, through his attitude, not only that his allusions aren't a threat to him, but that he can do things that are even more disturbing, something which translated into words would look something like,
Anyone who would suggest to me that the relationship I have with my wife is perverse should know that I would be more than happy to have one even more so with theirs.

—Sit there for two more minutes without moving from those positions and I'll accept, Diana says without looking up, because she's finishing the sketch of them from behind, sitting in their chairs under the pavilion, near the empty table. They freeze for a minute more or less and finally Diana shouts,
Done!

She closes the pad and the pencil box and, standing up, heads toward the pavilion.

—Immortalized, she says when she passes them on her way to drop the pad and the pencils in the straw bag. Nula and Riera stand up and start to unbutton their shirts, removing them almost simultaneously, as though they'd been competing to see who could take theirs off first. Riera leaves his on the back of his chair, but Nula folds his carefully and puts it in the bag, where Diana is dropping the leather band that she's just removed from her wrist.
Go ahead, I'll be right there
, Diana says, and Nula understands that, though she already has her bathing suit on, she doesn't want to undress in front of them. The two men walk toward the pool, and only when she sees them standing with their backs to her, at the edge, looking at the water, does Diana remove her dress and her sneakers and put them in the bag. When she reaches the pool, Riera is already in the water, but Nula has waited for her at the edge. When she sees her arrive, Lucía, who is standing in the shallow end, opens her arms to receive them, shouting,
Come in, come in!
Diana and Nula dive in to the deep end, and Diana, swimming under water, moves toward Lucía, but by the time she surfaces Lucía's enthusiasm seems to
have vanished. They stand there motionless, without knowing what to say, in the four o'clock sun that projects unstable sparks on the water disturbed by the movement of the bodies that have just dived into it and which continue to move and twist inside it. Lying on his back, Nula observes the completely empty blue sky, almost the same color as the water, possibly a bit lighter due to the intense light of the sun, which, though it's not visible to him in the portion of sky framed by the courtyard, the trees, and the house, flows ceaselessly in the April afternoon, as hot as any January or February. The serene stillness of the blue sky contrasts with the sparkling undulations of the water, and Nula concentrates on that contrast, telling himself that it only exists within the human incapacity to perceive with only our sight the prevalence of that same agitation in what, because of that same optical illusion, its earlier observers named the firmament.

Sitting up, he sees Riera swimming, with vigorous strokes, toward the women, and, submerging, he does the same, but under water. When he reaches her, he wraps his arms around Diana's waist and lifts her, as he emerges, his head pressed against her firm, naked back. Diana protests, laughing, shaking her arms and legs, and Nula drops her loudly into the cool water. When his attention returns to his friends, he realizes that Riera and Lucía are kissing and caressing each other openly, intensely, without false modesty, and, at least apparently, with the world around them forgotten.

—A beautiful reconciliation scene, he whispers to Diana, taking the opportunity to nibble softly on her ear. In fact, the caresses to which Riera and Lucía have abandoned themselves have given him a sudden erection, and, trying to calm down, he wonders if that hadn't been their primary motive. Under the swimming trunks, his penis engorges slightly, but remains a soft thickness that sticks, agreeably, to the skin on the inside of his thigh. If they were alone he'd convince Diana to make love. He'd put it in her right there,
in the water; it would be easy to lift her up and make her cross her legs around his back, pull his shorts halfway down his thighs, and, pushing aside the tiny bottoms that Diana has on, when his penis was hard enough, penetrate her. It wouldn't be the first time they'd done it in the water: they'd done it once in the river, two or three times in the bathtub, even with the discomfort, and one night in a hotel pool in Córdoba. He'd lower her bikini top and suck her tits, harder than Lucía's despite her two maternities, and better shaped than Virginia's, whose taste and consistency he still has in his mouth, or rather, which are still so present in his memory than they seem to persist in his senses. Though Diana is next to him and their bodies are almost touching, the scene that he imagines has erased her presence, and while the physical attraction that it evokes is more distant than her real body, it has a mythic perfection, sheltered from all contingency, that magnetizes him, heats him up, and blinds him. He's become so excited that he submerges himself again in order to see if the cool water will remove that turbulent fantasy, but when he's under water he can't resist the temptation to fondle Diana's buttocks, but then he sees that Lucía and Riera's hands, under the water, are grabbing each other's crotches. Curiously, rather than excite him like the apparently passionate caresses to which they'd abandoned themselves did a moment ago, this detail calms him down immediately, as if the sexuality that seemed, as he grew excited, to exist only for himself, concentrating in his body all the desire of the universe, was now revealing its pedestrian vulgarity in showing that it was shared by others. He will have to live through more experiences in order to understand that it's the desire of the other and not our own that creates pleasure, and though he doesn't yet know this, he still hasn't reached full adulthood.

—We have to separate tonight; I—persona non grata at my mother-in-law's—am staying at a hotel, Riera says, as though in apology, but
they remain intertwined, their arms around each other's waists and their free hands submerged.

—Legally you continue to be husband and wife, Nula says. You have every right.

—Of course, Diana says. And even if you weren't.

Gutiérrez, in a white undershirt, shorts, and sandals, appears suddenly at the edge of the pool.

—The younger generations seem to understand each other well, he says affably. You're not plotting against you elders, I hope.

But there's a hint of doubt in his words. Nula thinks that the familiarity among the bathers, who only met this morning,
doesn't quite make sense to him
. Actually, Nula doesn't know if Gutiérrez's confusion is real, or if he, who has at his disposal every element of the situation, is projecting ideas onto him. Lucía stares at the surface of the water with a conventional smile, but Riera and Diana exchange pleasant looks with the owner of the house, who, seen from below, is amplified by the perspective, and he offers the four of them a welcoming expression that contains more than a poolside afternoon cookout in the country. Nula believes—hopes—that Gutiérrez is able to understand everything, and though it was Lucía and not himself who on Tuesday night said that they didn't know each other, he feels guilty about what happened. With him, the lie seems more absurd and superfluous than immoral.

—Lucía, Gutiérrez says softly. I'm taking your mother to Paraná.

—Don't worry, Lucía says, finally looking up at him. I have to leave too, to take the baby to a birthday party.

—I'll call a cab later. We'll talk tonight? Riera says.

Lucía kisses him on the cheek and, without saying a word, separates from him, walking heavily through the water to the metal ladder. As soon as she steps on it, she turns to Nula and Diana: I'll come say goodbye on my way out.

—It's okay, Diana says.

Gutiérrez, it seems to Nula, observes the scene with curiosity. Or, maybe, with an irony that is at once amused and benevolent.

Now Tomatis is the one sitting up with is back against the trunk, and Violeta the one who is lying on the ground, drowsy, her head on the lap of Tomatis, who amuses himself listening to the sounds around him, the ones coming from the pool, of course, but also from other swimming pools in neighboring houses. Every so often a car passes, invisible to him, the muted sound of its engine audible, along with, from the asphalt road, the distant vibrations of passing trucks. Televisions and radios are turned on nearby. The
Clásico
starts at seven, but other games are being played in Buenos Aires or in Rosario and more than one fan must have taken his television or portable radio out to the courtyard, contributing to the cloud of noise pollution that has devastated every Sunday in the republic from time immemorial, Tomatis thinks sarcastically. Luckily, the announcers' voices come from too far away to disturb the calm drowsiness of the courtyard, and besides, they're so typical of Sundays that, as strident as they may be, many people don't even hear them anymore. All day, he's been paying attention to the birds, who are relishing the good weather: around noon, he'd heard the pigeons, cooing in the shade, the constant chirp of sparrows all morning, and, after lunch, at the hottest time of day, the flocks of guira cuckoos gathering noisily in the trees, enjoying the unexpected summer. Two or thee times he's seen a pair of nesting birds passing, looking among the grass for something to eat. Every so often the cry of a kiskadee rings out, or a kingbird passes, or a cardinal, crossing from tree to tree, from courtyard to courtyard, from the sandy streets to the countryside perhaps, beyond the asphalt road and the town and the river and the islands, across the river.

From where he's sitting he can see, beyond the clearing for the courtyard, the house, the pool, the pavilion. Gutiérrez and
the Rosembergs, who'd disappeared inside a while before, appear through the side door of the house. Gutiérrez walks to the edge of the pool and speaks to the people in the water. Marcos, who is only wearing swimming trunks, sits down in one of the lounge chairs and leans back. But what catches Tomatis's attention is Clara Rosemberg; from that distance, he can watch her easily. Clara, with hesitant slowness, starts to cross the courtyard. Despite the heat, she walks with her arms crossed over her chest, as if she were cold. Her vague, thoughtful smile, which is actually a kind of mask, remains on her face. With long, slow strides, her youthful silhouette crosses the courtyard in one direction, then in another, distant from the afternoon, from the rough and bright present, from the whole universe possibly. Tomatis, who always found her interesting, thinks that's she's carried, since she was a child, an abstracted sadness. Now a sudden movement of her head reveals that she's discovered some flowerbeds planted in the shade under a few trees, and then, without uncrossing her arms or accelerating her walk, she approaches and examines them carefully. Every so often, she leans down, and, stretching out a hand, touches a flower carefully, so as not to damage it, then withdraws her hand, stands back up, and crosses her arms again, still observing the multicolored flowerbeds. She does this three or four more times, walking among the flowerbeds: she leans over, touches a flower or caresses it, studies it a while, and then straightens back up and crosses her arms. Tomatis thinks he can see, from that distance, the thoughts that bubble behind her enigmatic forehead. It's as though he were seeing her naked, at her most secretly intimate, and ashamed at his indiscretion he narrows his eyelids, so as to not continue watching her without her realizing it. But his curiosity is stronger than his reservations and he opens his eyes again. In any case, Clara is too far away for what he's doing to be considered indiscrete, and besides, to him the scene is unexpectedly enchanting, as though
he were seeing her in a theater. Clara's gaze passes calmly over the flowers, and Tomatis remembers a haiku by the nun Seifu:
an aged butterfly / letting its soul play / with a chrysanthemum
.