Marcelo in the Real World Read online

  “Your prayers are shorter than mine.”

  “Okay.” She closes her eyes. “Thank You for the company.” She opens them again. “There. That covers it, don’t you think? Eat. You have to eat trout while it’s hot, otherwise it doesn’t taste as good.”

  After a few bites, she says: “So you never answered my question. Out there on the lake, when you were still for so long, what was happening?”

  “For the longest time I replayed in my mind all that had happened since I found the picture of Ixtel. These images of what happened were like the notes of music. Some sounded good, some not. I like the sound that was made when we tracked and found Jerry García. It all seemed as if we were meant to help Ixtel. That’s what I thought for the longest time, and then I thought about my internal music and I looked for it.”

  “What’s that—your internal music?”

  “Ever since I was six years old, maybe before that but that’s the first time I remember it, I could hear music, only it wasn’t really hearing and it wasn’t really music, it was like it. Does Jasmine feel emotions when she hears certain music?”

  “Yes.”

  “Imagine just feeling the emotions caused by the music without the sound of the music, but you know the music is there. Only the emotions that you feel are always good—like longing and belonging all at once. I call it music because that is the best word for it. I used it to hear it whenever I wanted. I just had to search for it and I found it, only it was more like waiting than searching. But now it is harder to find it. It is almost all gone, I would say. I was hoping it would come at least while I was here.”

  “And?”

  I shake my head to indicate that there was no IM. Then I say, “I found the memory of the music I used to hear, and then even this went away and I listened to all the sounds the lake makes. And also the sound of Jasmine trying to fish.”

  She puts her plate down. Her fish is getting cold. But so is mine. It is hard to talk about the IM and eat at the same time. Maybe it is also hard for Jasmine to listen to me talk about the IM and eat at the same time. “I can only imagine how beautiful that music must have been. You must have wanted to listen to it all the time.”

  “When Marcelo was little, it was hard to leave it. Fortunately I could only hear it if I went looking for it. But it was easy to find.”

  We are quiet, looking at our half-eaten fish. Jasmine picks up her plate and then puts it down again. “You want to know what I think?”

  “Yes.”

  “I think that whatever it is you were doing out there on the lake, searching for the music or trying to remember it, as you say, is all most of us ever hope to do. This ability you had before, that was out of this world. A special gift, I don’t know. What if it was impossible for you to have it and be a regular person? You don’t hear the music anymore, but now you can be flesh and blood like…me, for instance. Now you’ll have to pay attention and listen, see if you hear anything. Does that make any sense at all? I’m a little out of my element here.”

  We sit with the fire crackling in front of us. Jasmine’s words play slowly in my mind as if they themselves were the notes of a musical piece. She stands up slowly, picks up our dishes, and takes them to the lake.

  When she comes back she looks up at the night. “It looks clear and it doesn’t feel that cold. We could sleep out here. That way you can look at the stars. Wow! Did you see that? That was the most humongous falling star I ever saw. It went from one end of the sky to the other.”

  She is removing rocks and sticks from an area in front of our tent. Then she takes out the sleeping bags. She unrolls hers. My heart starts pounding. The area in front of the tent is small. There is no place to put my sleeping bag other than next to hers. She is patting her sleeping bag. She is unzipping it. I am standing paralyzed, my head like lead.

  “Are you going to sleep like Kickaz, standing up?” Jasmine is talking to me, I realize.

  I grasp at a few words that pass by. “Where. Sleeping bag.”

  “That’s probably the best spot.” She points at the ground next to her bag. I kneel down and begin to unroll my sleeping bag in the spot she indicated.

  “I need to go to the bathroom.” I am standing up again. Jasmine is lying down on top of her sleeping bag, her arms behind her head, looking at the stars.

  She hands me the flashlight next to her. “You know what to do, right?”

  I am so nervous I only see the humor of her statement when I am trying to find an adequate place.

  “Don’t go too far,” I hear her yell. “It’s swampy back there.”

  “It is only number one,” I yell back.

  “Thank you for that,” she calls.

  When I get back I see Namu on top of my sleeping bag. Jasmine has her eyes closed. Is it possible that she fell asleep so quick? I go back into the tent for my backpack. Am I supposed to put on the pajamas I brought? Jasmine is wearing shorts and a T-shirt and by all indications she plans to wear those to sleep. I leave the pajamas in my backpack.

  “What now?” Jasmine asks.

  “I need to find the wipes to wash my hands.”

  “Good night, Namu,” I hear her say. “Take care of your silly owner.”

  I take as long as I can wiping my hands. Now it seems funny to me that I got so nervous at the thought of sleeping next to Jasmine. What is happening? Yesterday, Jonah asked me if I was sexually attracted to Jasmine and that notion seemed shocking to me. And now there is this. I touch my abdomen where I feel a tingling. That’s what “butterflies in the stomach” feel like. These butterflies were let loose by what? The first one or two came out when Jasmine talked about the IM and how I could be flesh and blood like her, for instance, and then thousands fluttered when she pointed at the spot where we will sleep together. They are not unpleasant, these butterflies. Their tiny wings are pulling me out, tickling me with the anticipation of lying next to Jasmine.

  I move Namu so that he is at my feet. Part of him is on my sleeping bag and part of him on Jasmine’s. I take off my boots and slip into the bag fully dressed. I am looking up at the night sky. The stars seem like tiny pricks on a dark ceiling through which you can see the brightness that exists on the other side. I lie with my eyes open, listening to Jasmine’s even breath. Then I hear her voice.

  “Yesterday when you were talking to Jonah, you said that you and he were having a heart-to-heart. What did you mean? You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

  “We talked about love.”

  “Oh God.”

  “He loves you.”

  “I’m going to kill him.”

  “But he doesn’t think you will ever love him.”

  “I do love him. Just not that way. He’s like an older brother.”

  “What does it mean to love someone ‘that way’? That is what Marcelo doesn’t understand.”

  “The love thing is difficult to figure, isn’t it?” she says. “You’re not the only one who has trouble with it.”

  “Jasmine also?”

  “Sometimes…” she hesitates, “sometimes people do hurtful things to themselves or others in the name of what they think is love. They make mistakes galore because of it.”

  “Galore.” I like that word.

  “It’s easy to make mistakes. I mean, it’s just so easy to get lost. You can know what it is you have to do in life and where it is you have to do it, and then, bam, someone comes along and you get sidetracked and end up heading the wrong way or in the wrong place.” She is quiet, as if her words reminded her of something.

  “Is that love?”

  “I don’t know. How can it be if you end up unhappy?”

  “It is possible that I am not able to love.”

  I hear her turn on her side to look at me. “How can you even say that? Look at what you felt when you saw the picture of Ixtel and your impulse to help her. That’s love.”

  “But I do not love her ‘that way,’ as Jasmine calls it. To love someone ‘that way,’ with the de
sire that someone like Wendell feels, does not seem possible for me.”

  “Thank God for that. Wendell belongs in the lowest rung of the human species, which is a couple of rungs below most animals.”

  “And all the signs a person makes to indicate when a person likes you ‘that way.’ I do not know any of those.”

  “You’ll figure all that out.”

  “Like now. I don’t know if the fact that we are sleeping next to each other means we are going to have sexual intercourse. How does a person find out when to have sex with another? Assuming Jasmine wanted to have sex? How would that work?”

  Jasmine is laughing. “I don’t know. Knowing you, we would probably talk about it and then make a list. Or maybe we skip all that and I just jump your bones.”

  “Remember the first day in the office, you told Marcelo to stay away from Martha because she might jump my bones.”

  “And did she?”

  “Jasmine, I thought of another question.”

  “Oh, no.”

  “If Jasmine and Jonah were camping together, would they sleep next to each other?”

  “Mmm. I kind of see where you’re going with this. I guess I’d have to say no. We wouldn’t sleep like this.” She reaches over and hits me in the chest with her forearm.

  “Then why with Marcelo?”

  “I don’t know. Do you always ask so many questions? It just seems okay, that’s all.” She sits up.

  “Maybe Jasmine doesn’t see Marcelo as a man.”

  “Nope. That’s not it. Not it at all.”

  She opens her sleeping bag and tucks herself in. The conversation is over. Then she pulls herself out, turns on her side, and looks at me. The conversation is not over. She has more to say.

  “I’m glad you came. I wanted you to see this place.” She seems to have trouble speaking.

  “You wanted Marcelo to think about the memo and the consequences of doing something with it.”

  “Not just that. I wanted you to have an image of this place in your mind because you need to know that it exists. People think a place like this is perfect. Living a simple life close to the land and all that. It isn’t. There are mean people and alcoholics and medical bills to pay and depressed people galore. But some of us feel okay here, you know, despite all that. It is a simpler life than the law firm. More silence, I guess.

  “Anyway, I wanted you to see it. You’ll always be welcome here. You can come and stay for a few days or for…for as long as you like. Amos likes you, I can tell. And you’re not much of a bother to me.” She looks at me for a brief second and then closes her eyes.

  I stay up listening to her fall asleep, feeling how it is not to be alone.

  CHAPTER 25

  I am sitting in the park in front of the law firm playing in my mind the scenes from our camping trip. Every once in a while, I catch myself laughing out loud. Whenever our family went on a trip we would, at the end of the day, ask each other our favorite thing for that day. “Marcelo, Marcelo, what do you say? What was your favorite thing today?” This is the song we would sing to each other.

  So I sit here, seeing all that happened, not leaving out any details. “Marcelo, what was your favorite thing?” I ask myself. “It is so hard to pick one. Do I have to?” Another part of me responds. “Yes, you must.” I stop the dialogue because I know very well, without a doubt, that my most favorite thing was being next to Jasmine under a million stars.

  This is what I’m thinking about when I notice Wendell sitting next to me. He appeared out of nowhere, it seems. Wendell takes out a cigarette, lights it, and inhales deeply.

  “Smoking is bad for you,” I tell him.

  “I know it,” Wendell answers. He takes a few more puffs before flicking the cigarette away. “How’s it going with Jasmine?” he asks.

  I feel my heart speed up. This is the time for me to tell him. There will be no pleasure in doing it. I take a deep breath and say, trying my best to look at him, “I will not ask Jasmine to come on a boat ride with you.” I say it. It is out. I glance at Wendell’s face and see him grimace.

  “Oh? Well, that’s a big surprise. Actually, I was asking how it was going between you and Jasmine?”

  “It is not like what you think. Between Jasmine and me. We are friends. Like you and I were once.”

  “Pssh.” Wendell makes a sound like air being let out of a tire. “I understand you went on a camping trip with her. How was that? Did you poke her?”

  “I have to go back to work,” I say, starting to get up.

  “Sit.” Wendell’s voice has anger. Then softer, “I want to give you something.”

  I glance at Wendell’s hands but they are empty.

  “It’s the gift of truth.”

  I sit down again. I am confused. I wait for Wendell to begin, but Wendell is absorbed in looking at a pigeon that is edging closer to a potato chip near his foot. Wendell moves his foot back, clearing the way for the pigeon to approach. When the pigeon hops closer to the chip, Wendell kicks him, and the pigeon goes catapulting in the air. The dazed pigeon takes a few wobbly steps and then flies away. I look at Wendell, stunned. It is the first time I have ever seen anyone hurt an animal.

  Wendell sits straight and turns his body to face me. “Are you brave enough to handle the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?”

  “Yes,” I say nervously.

  “Remember that conversation we had at the club? You know, I told you about your father and my father and the bond?”

  “Yes.”

  “And we talked about this balance of power that we had between our families.”

  “Yes.”

  “Remember I told you that there were ways, easy ways to disturb the equilibrium. A mistake could be made by one of the partners and then the other partner would have more power?”

  “You said that.”

  “What I see happening here is that the balance of power has been disturbed. You disturbed it. The balance existed in the first place only because I befriended you. And what do you do? I took you for this innocent moron while all along you want Jasmine. I cannot believe this. I cannot believe Jasmine prefers…”

  I remember the conversation I had with my father on the first train ride to work. He wanted to show everyone that my son was…

  “It is not true I wanted Jasmine all along.” I hear my words but they don’t sound convincing.

  “I want to give you this.” He hands me a folded piece of paper. “No, don’t open it now, as much as I would like to have the pleasure of watching you read it. As part of the discovery I had to do, I had to go through some files that the attorneys kept in their offices. I found that in one of your father’s personal files along with some other stuff. When I saw it, I said to myself, ‘What should I do with this? If I show it to my father, the balance of power might be tipped.’ Then you came along and I said, ‘I don’t want to hurt the kid. He’s so naive.’

  “But now I think it’s time. You broke the bond. Therefore you’re ready for the gift of truth. That’s yours to do with as you please.”

  Wendell leaves. I unfold the piece of paper and recognize Jasmine’s handwriting.

  Dear Mr. Sandoval:

  I know you want me to call you Arturo but in this letter I want to call you Mr. Sandoval. I don’t know what happened last Friday at the Christmas party. I should not have had those margaritas. I never drink hard liquor. Most of all when you came to me and asked me to meet you in your office because you had a present you wanted to give me, I should have said no. “Thank you, but that’s probably not a good idea.” I want to say that I honestly thought you had a present but the truth is that I kind of knew what was going to happen and I still went. Part of me was afraid to say no to my boss, but saying no to anyone is not a problem for me.

  I have no idea how it happened. I say to myself that I was lonely and needed to be close to someone. My brother died a few months ago. I am homesick. But these are all excuses. It should never have happened. It was wrong.
I don’t think it is right for me to work here anymore, so if it’s okay I would like to stay just long enough for me to find another job. Otherwise, please consider this my two weeks’ notice.

  Jasmine

  I read the letter one more time. And then a third time. Then I read it again until the letter’s meaning finally penetrates my resistance to believe. I look at each sentence for its significance, for what each sentence says about my father and…about Jasmine. I see him asking her if she can come upstairs to pick up the present. I see him drawing her with the same deceit that Wendell wanted to draw her to his boat. Then they are in his office. What happened? Arturo and Jasmine had sexual intercourse in his office. Isn’t that the only interpretation of the letter? How can there be any other interpretation? I see him using her. Or maybe there was love on his part? But how can there be love when you lie, when you take advantage of someone who has been drinking alcohol or who is lonely? How can there be love when you have promised to love Aurora?

  I am standing. I don’t know when it was that I stood up or if I have been talking to myself out loud. My impulse at this moment is to take the Vidromek memo to Jerry. “Here, Jerry. My father has what is coming to him.” But I sit down again. As much as I am full of anger and disappointment, there is a part of me that wants to wait. When I came home from the camping trip, I knew my reasons for giving the memo to Jerry. If I give him the memo now, it will be out of revenge. I don’t want to act out of revenge. There is something that is not right about that.

  Then there is this other emotion that I’m feeling. I don’t have a name for it. It centers around Jasmine. Saying no to anyone is not a problem for me. It hurts to know that she didn’t say no. It hurts to think that there may have been love for him, despite the alcohol and despite the loneliness. It hurts to think that there may still be love for him. Is this what jealousy feels like? I remember lying next to Jasmine, listening to her breathe as she fell asleep, my first-ever butterflies of attraction dancing in my abdomen, and the memory saddens me, as if all that I felt then was for a different person, someone I made up. The real Jasmine is the one who could not say no to my father.