Reframing Latin America: A Cultural Theory Reading ... - BGSU Blogs

276 reframing latin america
for my cousin to come for me? I told myself this and regretted my treason.
When we were eating dinner I noticed that Pablo didn’t speak with words
but with letters. And I started to count them while I watched his thick
mouth and his dead eye. Suddenly he was quiet. You know that he forgets
everything. He sat with his arms down. ‘This new husband doesn’t have
a memory and doesn’t know more than daily things.’
“‘You have a troubled and confused husband,’ he told me, looking again
at the stains on my dress. My poor mother-in-law grew fl ustered and since
we were drinking coffee, she got up to play a twist.
“‘To cheer you up,’ she told us with a fake smile, because she saw the
fi ght coming.
“We remained quiet. The house fi lled with noises. I looked at Pablo. He
reminds me of . . . and I didn’t dare to say his name for fear that he would
read my thoughts. It’s true that he is like him, Nacha. Both of them enjoy
water and cool houses. Both look at the sky in the afternoon and they have
black hair and white teeth. But Pablo speaks in short bursts, gets furious for
no reason and constantly asks: ‘What are you thinking about?’ My cousin
husband doesn’t say or do any of that.”
“It’s true! It’s true that the señor is a pain in the ass!” said Nacha with
disgust.
Laura sighed and looked at her cook with relief. At least she had her as
a confi dante.
“During the night, while Pablo kissed me, I would repeat to myself:
‘When will he come for me?’ And I almost cried at the memory of the blood
from his shoulder wound. Neither could I forget his arms crossed over my
head to shelter me. At the same time I was afraid that Pablo would notice
that my cousin had kissed me in the morning. But no one noticed anything,
and if it hadn’t been for Josefi na who frightened me in the morning, Pablo
never would have known.”
Nachita agreed. It was Josefi na with her love of scandal who was to blame
for it all. She, Nacha, had warned her: “Shut up! Keep quiet, for the love
of God. There’s probably a good reason why they didn’t hear our shouts!”
But, of course, Josefi na had hardly entered the master bedroom with the
breakfast tray when she let loose what should have been kept quiet.
“Señora, last night a man was spying through the window of your room!
Nacha and I screamed and screamed!”
“We heard nothing,” the señor said surprised.
“It’s him!” cried the señora without thinking.
“Who is ‘him’?” asked the señor, looking at the señora as if he were going
to kill her. At least this is what Josefi na said afterwards.