The Color of Summer: or The New Garden of Earthly Delights (21 page)

“Oh, I love that one that just came out of the water,” said La Reine des Araignées.

“A noble specimen, indeed,” nodded the Duchess.

“Oh, girls, look at that black one that’s getting out of the car over there! He’s the best-looking man on all of La Concha,” shrieked Uglíssima.

“They say he’s one of Skunk in a Funk’s husbands, so he’s got gonorrhea,” remarked the Duchess.

“I hear he’s got a prick almost as big as the Key to the Gulf’s. And that basket of his would certainly make one think so,” purred SuperSatanic.

“On the subject of pricks the definitive word has not yet been written,” said La Reine in her most pedantic manner. “Appearances can often be deceiving to a poor girl.”

“Well, anyway, he charges ten pesos. So we can forget about him, darlings,” said the Duchess.

“This beach has always been famous for having the
most
magnificent hustlers. Why, a hundred years ago Marlon Brando and Tennessee Williams would come here directly from Key West to find their muscle muffins,” SuperSatanic solemnly informed them.

“Oh, look, girls—look who just got here! Golden Boy!” exclaimed Uglíssima, pointing toward the entrance-gate to the beach.

“I have never been one to corrupt the morals of a minor . . .” said La Reine. “Give me a real man, like the ones Voris Palovoi preferred.”

“Tonight, in all the confusion at the Carnival,” said SuperSatanic, lowering her voice, “maybe you’ll be able to find one. Right along here is where things will start to break up.”

“And,” said the Duchess in her most insinuating voice, “after a fellow has three beers and steps into the latrine,
anybody
can pick him up . . .”

“Uh-huh, if it weren’t that for every man who steps into the latrine there are ten thousand fairies waiting for him,” moaned Uglíssima.

“And ten thousand cops standing around watching,” added the Duchess.

“Sometimes the cops let their hair down a little themselves,” winked La Reine.

“Yeah, but if you look at ’em cross-eyed you could land in the clinker,” replied the Duchess.

“Sometimes they screw you and then take you in precisely because you let ’em do it,” SuperSatanic told them.

“These days, you can’t even trust a natural-born butt-stuffer anymore,” said La Reine, shaking her head.

“Lots of them become cops just so they can screw other cops,” said Uglíssima, pursing her lips in pique.

“Yeah, and in time they turn into fairies,” said SuperSatanic.

“That’s often the way it goes, all right,” said La Reine, nodding, in a voice of tragedy.

Then suddenly, looking out toward the ocean, they all fell silent. Near the coast, a pack of glorious stud-muffins were jogging through the surf, churning it into foam. It was an imploring, yearning surf that tried to reach the young men’s thighs, splash their bathing trunks. The waves, shattered, emitted little moans and whines of pain at not being able to reach the sought-after goal. But the pack of stud-muffins jogged on impassively, while everyone on the beach sat as though petrified, gazing at that vision.

At last, emerging from her trance, Uglíssima spoke.

“They must belong to Fifo’s secret service—he always gets the best ones.”

“They say that after he sleeps with a man he has him shot,” remarked SuperSatanic.

“That’s not Fifo, that’s Ramiro Valdés,” said the Duchess.

“For heaven’s sake, girls, if every time Fifo slept with a man he had him shot, there wouldn’t be a man left on this whole godforsaken island,” put in La Reine.

“So exactly how many do you think are left?” Uglíssima asked politely. “Between the men that Fifo shoots and the ones that get eaten by the sharks, this place is getting so low on meat that pretty soon we’ll have to join a convent.”

“Which would not require any great adjustment on
your
part, darling,” said SuperSatanic.

“Here comes Mayoya!” announced the Duchess. “They say she’s fallen in love with Bloodthirsty Shark.”

“Not a word about Fifo or the sharks, now, girls,” whispered La Reine. “Mayoya is bad news—she’s a snitch, I’m sure of it. I’ve seen her swim way out to sea without getting even a nibble from the sharks.”

“What we ought to do is take advantage of all the confusion at the Carnival to carve her face up a little bit,” suggested SuperSatanic.

“And her tits. ’Cause the faggot has taken to thinking he’s got tits,” added Uglíssima.

“Hush now! Here she comes!” commanded La Reine.

And all the queens with their faded bathing suits made out of scraps of burlap and cast-off pants lay down on the beach to sun, though they had to cover their ears—the screams of the waves that couldn’t reach the thighs of the young men jogging through the surf were deafening.

What new rhythm will I discover today? What word that I was beginning to think I would never be able to remember will give me back my childhood? What colors will surprise my eyes? What trilling will I hear among the pines, and with all my heart desire to imitate? What flower, or mushroom, or seashell found beside a rotting tree trunk will fill my cup of happiness to overflowing? What roar, what clamor will the waves greet me with? When I dive into the water, what new underwater landscapes will I discover there? What fragrances will the sea perfume me with? What peerless leaf will I find in the grass? What splendid teenager will turn me to worshipful stone when I round the corner? What ruffle in the air, what zephyr, what soft breeze will the evening offer me? What distant song will I hear, reminding me of another distant song and commanding me to sing
another
distant song? What tiny stone that I bend to pick up and put in my pocket will attract my attention? What happy voice will call out somewhere behind me and infuse me with its happiness? What mass of clouds that I have never seen before will I see today? What sunset will transfix me until it fades away? What piece of branch will I bring to my nose, its perfume a unique adventure? What gigantic black man will beckon me with a sign that I will not, and would never, ignore? What pane of glass will take fire in my honor with a sudden blaze of light? What sudden calm will fall over the sea and bestow upon me knowledge of the All? What crunching of tree limbs will rend my soul? What book, opened at random, will restore my faith in words? What housefly, dressed for the party, will buzz past my head? What intimations of inner peace will the darkness sigh, drawing me into complicity? What inexpungible splendor will the sky display? What secret susurrations will fill the night? What lovely image in my memory will I fall asleep to? What distant whistle will make me dream that I am still that man and that I am still alive? . . . Oh, God, of all those miracles, grant me at least one, even if the most insignificant of them.

Dear Reinaldo,

I don’t know whether
this
letter will reach you either, but I’m going to write to you anyway. Naturally, the first thing I did when I got here, even before washing off the dust of the road, was go into a bookstore and try to find a copy of that book you so terribly wanted me to get for you, to replace the one you lost on the beach while you were trying to get away from that hustler who was threatening to murder you, remember?—
The Magic Mirror?
But Spanish, French, even Chinese—I haven’t been able to find a single copy of it. So I guess you’ll have to do your novel without quoting it like you did in the ones before. Either that or just use the same quotations. Anyway, at this point, my dear, people don’t read anything anymore. And if they do, they misread it.

I have met some writers over here, and I’ve talked to them about you, about your far-from-coddled captivity. They’re all very circumspect, in spite of all that’s happened in the world recently—they don’t want to get into a “thing” with Fifo’s government, since his beaches (which of course
you
aren’t allowed to set foot on) are beautiful, his agents are very accommodating (in every sense of the word) to foreign writers, and then there are the literary prizes and other “awards” that Fifo hands out. A lot of them still think that attacking Fifo is in bad taste—not to mention the “relationships” that have developed over a period of forty years. When they finally do come out and criticize Fifo, they do so in a very roundabout and guarded way—they wouldn’t want to offend, you know. And as for the sacred cows here in exile, they’re just that—cows. They all think they’re geniuses, and they’re hypersensitive about their purported talent. None of them think even for one instant that they’re any less great than the great Cervantes himself.

They all seem to think their shit smells like ice cream, as people here say—a nice expression, don’t you think?

But since I know you’re not interested in gossip about writers, let me move on. I want to tell you about a bridge.

I had no sooner got to Paris than I saw a bridge, far off in the distance. It was a beautiful bridge, of black, finespun antique railings that looked like the tendrils of some wonderful climbing vine. And not a car crossing that bridge. Just people. As soon as I could, I went out and tried to locate the bridge, but by the time I could catch even the slightest glimpse, it suddenly started raining—one of those icy, pouring rains that cut you to the bone (not to mention the soul)—and I had to turn back. I took the Metro back for fear of catching pneumonia. But the next week I armed myself with an umbrella and headed for that bridge again. But just my luck, my dear—before I could get there, another downpour. This one was a real storm, with wind that turned the umbrella inside out and stripped the nice black nylon right off the ribs and almost blew yours truly into the Seine. So I turned what was left of the umbrella loose (gone with the wind, indeed) and started toward the Metro entrance, for fear of that damned pneumonia again, since those of us who have the AIDS virus (which I do, of course) are especially susceptible. I figure at least my umbrella made it to the bridge. . . . I’ve tried a couple of other times to reach it (always in the rain—a rain like diarrhea, which is what the rain is like here, and which
always
falls that way even when there’s another kind of rain at the same time), but every time I leave the house, everything looks so gray and wet that I’m not sure, really, whether it’s worth it for me to walk all the way there. Although sooner or later, of course, I
will
see it close up, and I’ll send you a photo, too, if I don’t turn green from mildew or freeze to death or die of depression first. Because here,
spring is slow in coming
, as “The Magic Mirror” says,
though the grass of grief grows green in every season
. No, my dear, don’t come—melt in the sun down there, die of fury within your
own
solitude. Don’t come to Paris to experience this cold that isn’t yours and calamities that are foreign to you but that you’ll have to bow to. My saints have all dried up, my orishas have lost all their feathers, and even their chicken skin. And as though that weren’t bad enough, there’s the Plague. We can’t even screw anymore, sugar. We’ve all turned into holy virgin martyrs, but waiting for a horrible slow death instead of canonization or immediate destruction. Who’d’ve thought that our sufferings would never end and on top of that be so totally unpredictable? What do you think of the grin the She-Devil has grinned at us? Because if Hell does exist, and it’s the
only
thing that exists, it’s not even ruled over by the Devil—it’s a She-Devil that runs the show! It’s cruel to write all this to you of all people, especially since you still have hopes for life on the other side of the wall. But it might be crueler yet to keep it to myself.

As for the French—most of them have no chin and a turned-up nose that looks like they were smelling a rat held up about twelve feet off the floor. By the expression on their faces, the rat’s not particularly fresh, either. Of course, the whole city smells like cunt.

I’m off to New York. I’ll write when I get there, like I always do, wherever I am. But why don’t
you
write
me
? I’ve sent you
hundreds
of letters and haven’t received even
one
reply. I’ve sent letters to every pseudonym and by every route imaginable, even by mail. I’ve visited Maoist tourists that have
promised
to drop the letter in a Cuban mailbox, because I lied and said I was an
intimate
friend of Chelo’s. Some of them have told me that they even slipped the letter under your door at the Hotel Monserrate. So I mean you
have
to have gotten a note from me. Don’t tell me you joined the Party and are using my letters as a proof of your loyalty, turning them in to the lieutenant who’s your contact. Or tell me that you
are
, so I can write you more often and continue to be a help to you. But either way, for goodness’ sake,
write
. Take pity on one who lives in this sopping-wet desert. And to top it off, even the Arabs have given up butt-fucking and the pansies have all gotten married and started having kids.

A big smooch from yours in deepest mourning—

Skunk in a (very blue) Funk