he had eyes in the back of his head.
You enjoying the shade back there?
I emerged from the greenery and stood beside him. There was something mesmerising about the deep spring water.
I wanted to talk to you, I said.
I figured as much, he responded, and then added: Can’t be easy, your situation.
Actually, it was your situation I wanted to talk about. It must be tough having them after you like this.
He wrinkled his nose and I realised I’d caught him off guard.
They’ve been asking about you in San Agustín.
Oh yeah?
His voice was a ghost of what it had been earlier.
’Fraid so, I told him.
Who was asking?
There were two of them, I told him. They spoke
to me.
I saw him swallow.
And what did they want?
Not much, just asking after you, how you’ve been.
And what did you tell them?
I crouched by the edge of the spring and put my
hand in the water. It really was freezing.
I asked them who they were.
Right, he said. And?
They said they were friends of yours.
Anything else?
Well, I had a bad feeling about them.
So…
So. I told them I didn’t know, that it was ages since I’d seen you.
Juancho slowly let his lungs empty.
Right, he said. That’s good.
You’ll know better than me, I told him. But…
But what?
Well, what I said before, that’s all. I had a bad feeling about them.
Juancho moved his head from side to side like he was trying to reconcile two conflicting thoughts, but before he could say anything I turned tail and headed back to the tanks.
All that night I remained wakeful, despite my modest triumph. I had to get up a few times and stand by the tanks, letting the sound of the water soothe me. From there I could see Juancho pass by every now and again as he did the rounds, watching over the farm
and making sure the water was still flowing through the pipes to the tanks.
He walked with his head lowered, as though a great weight was bearing down on the nape of his neck, and I felt a little bit sorry, but a lot more cheerful.
*
At one point, not long after the project started, the trout started dying. Every morning I’d wake up and find three or four little bodies floating on the surface of the tank. The rest were drifting around dopily – they wouldn’t even eat the dying ones. Don Henrik had to come up from the capital and spend a week here, sleeping in San Agustín every night only to come back up early the next morning. He spent long periods watching the trout, thoughtful, one finger on his lips.
They’re suffocating, he said on the fifth day.
As well as a specific temperature, trout need a lot of oxygen. In tanks they get through it quickly with all their swimming. That’s how they breathe, but it also tires them out. Fresh water needs to be coming in all the time, oxygenating the tank, and with so many trout there wasn’t enough. What’s the point in being modest? It was me who figured out how to solve the oxygen problem. I created a Venturi effect, according to Don Henrik, who knows about these things. All I did was fiddle about with some plastic tubes, inserting them halfway into the water to create vacuums. I managed to get them to suck air in from outside and bubble it through the water, and that way, from then on, we made sure they had enough oxygen.
You’re an empirical engineer, Don Henrik told me after my success. An engineer through and through.
Don Henrik’s compliments are almost as flattering as Analí’s.
*
But I was troubled to note that at night Ermiña too was tossing and turning in bed. Something was going on with her. On a trip down to the shop for pesticide for the vegetable garden, I took the opportunity to
have a quiet word with Analí.
It’s better if we don’t see each other here anymore. It’s nicer up at the fork in the road, or somewhere else, don’t you think?
Why? she asked.
What do you mean why?
Why?
I waited, motionless, my thumbs in my belt, looking at her without understanding. But Analí let out a laugh and started looking at her phone. I just stood there in front of the counter like an idiot. Some men came in to buy something and all there was left to do was go. She didn’t even say goodbye.
I sent her a couple of texts in the days that followed, but she didn’t reply. That week I completely lost it. At certain moments I felt an enormous relief, like suddenly I could breathe, and I was overcome with affection for Ermiña and my girls, swiftly followed by a horrible guilt. A minute later I’d be tearing my hair out with the sheer desire to see Analí. It was time to harvest the trout and the rains were getting heavier. I worked hard
through the downpour, pulling out one fish after
another, trying to drive away my desire. But that only made me think about her more, my own sweat reminding me of our nights together, and then I’d be hit by the smell of Pert Plus, followed by that scent behind her ears, just like a baby’s, and that in turn reminded me of her breath, her sweet-sour breath, discovering all her perfumes as though for the first time. But memories of smells disappear as quickly as they come, and it hit me how great a distance there was between my body and hers, and that made me so profoundly sad that I had to stop and lean against the edge of the tank.
As though she could hear my actual thoughts, that afternoon I received a message from her.
I want to do things to you in your bed :)
That sentence threw me into a total spin. I read it so many times that José came over to ask what I was looking at. Ermiña didn’t say anything, which should have put me on my guard, but in truth I was walking on air, barely able to hide my grin. Which bed was she talking about? The one in the hut? Do things… here? From one moment to the next everything around me was infused with Analí, her laugh tangled in the forest, her breath bubbling with the water, her body pressing insistently against mine. And Ermiña was right there, silent, making lunch, working in the vegetable garden, helping the girls with homework she’d devised herself.
My daughters went out earlier than usual the next morning. I was sharpening the machete to cut back the edges of the clearing when Ermiña came over. She had a big bag with her and was wearing makeup, which she never does up here.
They told me, she said.
I turned to look at her.
Told you what?
For God’s sake, she said. You’re pathetic.
Dizziness flooded through me, so much so that I had to crouch down. When I raised my eyes, Ermiña was looking down at me. She smiled, just a little, her lips very tight and her eyes sad, and made her way towards the path down the mountain. I thought about following her, saying something, shouting at her or pleading, but she was walking so upright, her skirt cupping her big buttocks so nicely, holding her bag so firmly, that I didn’t have the guts. I went cold all over and let myself fall onto my backside. A sharp whistling started up in my ears, and it was a few minutes before I could clear my head and get up again.
Oh fuck, I thought. Fuck fuck fuck.