Soul's Road: A Fiction Collection (22 page)

It’s protection. You should use it, if you find people you hate, or on the bad ones you meet.

She looks at it for a good long interminable half minute, and then she says she doesn’t really want to hate people, it’s not their fault they’re the way they are.

Some bad people, it really is their fault, you know?

Not anymore, she says, in this day and age and she puts the gun on the balcony edge. She walks away.

What if I shot you right now, in the back? I call this to her, and she stops and sags and looks back, saying: so you really are a bad person?

Well, I say, well I don’t mean to be, and she nods, and says that she really didn’t think I meant to be.

She leaves; and she was a nice girl, and wouldn’t you know it I always forget to ask the nice girls their names.

ICESS FERNANDEZ ROJAS

Of Love, Death, and Marriage:
The Fabled Reputation of Don Armando Mejia

Part I

AS THE RAIN CONTINUED to beat on the crumbling church roof, Don Armando Mejia de la Luz stood at the alter like a used up tissue, dressed in his bridegroom splendor three hours after his bride-to-be was scheduled to arrive.

He was dressed in a glowing, starched white shirt that was a perfect fit for his slender frame two wives and fifty years ago. The silver of his remaining hair bolted from the sides of his head as if in shock and his wood cane crackled with rot. His nose whistled when he took a breath and the stubborn hair that escaped from his now bald head transitioned to the area right above his eyes. Don Armando, who was known for the love and attention he bestowed on all his wives, also wore his fiancée’s favorite cologne. The scent of which was so heavy that the door men, sitting at the back of the church, would occasionally sneeze as the smell tickled their noses. Regardless of all these minor obstacles, he was sure the young Mayra Marquez Santos had fallen for him in a way a woman in love should fall -- passionately and unconditionally.

That’s why Don Armando was confused by her tardiness.

The church was arranged as the young bride had always dreamed it would be on her wedding day-- the pews were dressed in yellow and pink ribbons, bundles of gardenias and daisies dotted the alter in exclamation of her delicate decorating tastes, her bridesmaids, cousins she had only met once since there were many, wore alternating sunshine and salmon colored dresses designed to enhance the bride’s beauty. Everything was in place, except the bride.

Ironically, it was one of those cousins, young Teresita, only one year younger than her absent cousin, who broke the news to the elderly Don Armando.

"Perdón, Don Armando,” her voice like a five year old asking for spare change. “I’m sorry, but it seems my cousin is not coming."

"Nonsense,” he croaked. “A bride never misses her wedding day to her prince. She’s just behind on the preparations, that’s all.”

“No, Don Armando. Que pena pero...”

“But what?"

"Don Armando," she said touching his wrinkled hand. "She's not coming."

Surely, he thought, this was not true. He was, after all, Don Armando, the most sought after bachelor in Santo Cristobal. To roll his name off one’s tongue was like taking Holy Communion. He courted his previous two wives successfully and provided for them very comfortable lives. Any woman would be a fool to walk away from the opportunity to be the wealthiest woman in the town. Besides, he had always been a Casanova, handsome and strong and known for his chiseled good looks. Women would swoon at his wink, die for his touch.

She handed over a folded envelope that was addressed to Teresita in the unmistakable hand of his lovely bride-to-be. In the envelope was a small piece of paper with two words:

I can’t.

Still convinced that Mayra was only tardy, Don Armando threw the letter to the floor with a grunt and hobbled from the altar to the aisle, his old bones creaking with effort.

“We’ll see who can’t!” he yelled, easing his way out of the church door and toward Senorita Mayra’s house, a crowd of curious guests, anxious caterers, and a gossiping bridal party followed, waiting to see what Don Armando would do next.

Part II

When he saw dark-haired Mayra, he could see the lust in her eyes and how she yearned for him, even at 19. Yes, she was young enough to be his granddaughter, but that was of no consequence. In the December of his life, Don Armando felt he needed a prize, a young woman with fresh dewy skin and plump breasts to ease him into older age. And should he be called to heaven and face St. Peter, he would have died happy among the folds of perfumed breasts as he had always intended. Though he had his doubts of Mayra's virginity, it was of no consequence. Molding a virgin, his 50 year old mind told him, was over rated. He would enjoy her just the same because her youth could handle his reputation. He wanted someone young and firm and perhaps a little adventurous...curious... about the man who was rumored to drive women to the brink of insanity with a thrust of his hips. He deserved it for being a faithful husband to two women.

The first wife he married at twenty-two after the tragic accident of his parents. Nearly done with his university studies, Armando learned that both of his loving parents perished in a car accident on a desolate road outside of the town. Penniless and mourning, he returned to Santo Cristobal facing a desolate and uncertain future. At the same time, Doña Karina Juanita Gutierrez, thirty years his senior, had received some unsettling news of her own. After many tests, some which took exhaustive trips to the Capital city, death became more of a certainty and closer than she would have liked. That was when the regrets began to clutch at her heart like the dead gasping for life. She had never married and had never had children; she lived her life like a prized canary in a jeweled cage in Santo Cristobal and, except for the few trips to the Capital, hardly ever set a toe outside of its borders. Doña Karina was a beautiful maid in her youth, but decided to dedicate herself to adding to the family fortune and now, in the fading hours of her life, she was alone and too old to do what she had imagined. Her biggest regret was never falling in love.

At the church, Doña Karina prayed for a comfortable life and a swift passing when on the steps she met a young man weeping.

“Why so much despair? You are in the prime of your life!”

“My life is over,” cried the young man.

“That’s nonsense! A young, healthy man like you? Did your novia refuse you?”

“No, madam. I don’t have one and this is more serious than the trivialities of a broken heart. My parents are dead and I am alone in the world.”

Doña Karina invited Armando to her home for café con leche. This gentleman was much like a dot in the middle of a sentence. He was out of place in her lace and silk living room. He was dirty but not filthy, his frame swam in older styled clothes and his unshaven face was like the harsh bristles on a horse’s brush. His long and disheveled dark hair fell over his forehead and caged his eyes. Yet, despite being the equivalent of a fly in soup, she enjoyed the contrast and the visual disruption. This was something new.

“Where do you live?” she asked as she handed him a cup of coffee.

“Nowhere. I’ve been kicked out of my home by creditors.”

“How awful! Were they brought up by savages?”

Armando took a sip of his coffee burning the tip of his tongue. He blew cold air in and hot air out in such a rush and that he whistled.

“Excuse me?” The offended Doña Karina was mortified.

“Oh, no. Perdóna me, señora! The coffee is very hot.”

Karina settled down on the blue and white chair opposite his, arched eyebrow ceiling high. She was a lady of the highest caliber, her name and reputation was as clean as if the Lord had scrubbed it Himself. There was never an ill word said about her character. That was how she was brought up--by God fearing, decent parents. However, being whistled at, even by accident, tickled something inside of the great damá as if a button had been pressed inside of her and left on.

“What is your name, young man?”

“Armando Mejia de la Luz .”

“Ah. The Mejia clan. I knew your extended family. Why not stay with them? Señora Mejia is quite nice.”

“With all due respect, I don’t feel comfortable asking them for help since I don’t know them.”

She nodded with approval at his pride. Pride is a positive attribute to have despite what Father Gomez and the Bible said. Both of which, Doña Karina believed, were desperate liars. Pride was the type of thing that could bring someone up from destitute to greatness, if channeled appropriately. In fact, it was her father’s pride that helped begin the family fortune, if Doña Karina remembered correctly, and she usually did. But that was a great many years ago before the illness robbed her of part of her memory as if the very moments of surrendered to forget were pre-selected by the devil himself. She watched Señor Mejia take another sip from the cup, this time more like a gentleman. He blew into his cup and then dipped his tongue into the coffee to test the temperature before a drink. He wasn’t as savage as she thought him to be. With the right clothes and a close shave, he would be an exciting prospect for any young woman to consider. He spoke well and was somewhat educated though there would have to be some investment there. Also, there were decent traits that could be further refined for more delicate visitors and events, but Karina was getting ahead of herself.

“Señor Mejia--”

“Armando, please.”

Doña Karina raised her eyebrow again toward her interrupter. “Señor Mejia, do you have a place to stay?”

He shook his head, defeated. Doña Karina’s long and bony fingers reached for her bell and in seconds a young servant appeared.

“Maria Cristina, please make up one of the spare bedrooms for Señor Mejia.”

“Oh no, I couldn’t.” Armando started placing his cup on the tiny wooden end table.

“You will, Señor Mejia. I insist. A gentleman such as yourself needs a proper home and I need a proper companion. Someone to help pass... the time I have left.”

She waved her servant away as Armando rose to his feet in protest.

“Senora, I assure you that I can make my own way in the world and don’t need your help.”

His pride enveloped him. Karina raised her skeletal hand.

“It is not a handout but a payment, Señor Mejia. You can live here and in exchange you will keep me company. That’s all this lonely woman asks. How could you deny this last wish from a dying woman?”

Armando was brought up to respect his elders but Doña Karina hardly looked elderly. Yes, she was older and thin to the point of fragility, but she was still a handsome woman under the veneer of old world customs and propriety. Her hair a dark brown bun so tight it looked as if it may be a wig. He noticed her thin lips would disappear when she grimaced and that made him wonder what she looked like when she smiled. And what would make a woman like Doña Karina smile? It seemed to Armando that she had been the type of woman who had smiled often but had forgotten, as if life had robbed her of joy. She had smooth skin with few wrinkles. Those wrinkles that did exist bookended her dark eyes. She was a handsome woman, Armando thought. She was a handsome woman who was accustomed in getting her way and he was a man who needed accommodations or would face an uncertain future.

“If I, a young single man, live here with you, what will become of your reputation? Of mine?”

“My dear Señor Mejia,” Doña Karina began, a tinge of a cackle behind her words. “I have more money than God. There isn’t a reputation or opinion I can’t buy.”

Armando hardly believed her until the whispers began to cease and polite families, who didn’t want anything to do with him, received him in their homes. He became Señor Mejia, a formal title reserved only for the sons of the aristocratic among his new social circle, though he had no money. However, he was a ward of Doña Karina, like a son, and that was enough to guarantee a lifestyle of local royalty. With any luck, thought those with marrying-age daughters, the old bat will keel off soon and Armando would be her heir.

His friend Fausto, a local jeweler, made fun of Armando and his present situation. They became friends when Dona Karina decided one day to reward her ward with a new pair of diamond cuff links. She picked the young jeweler because of how close he was located to the house. He often joked about all the young ladies rumored to want his attention. Some went as far as consulting local witch doctors for the potion that would win Armando’s heart.

“You have to be careful, amigo. These women are beginning to go into a frenzy. They can smell the money.” Fausto told his friend during one afternoon visit at the jewelry store.

“They are harmless, but I have gained such a reputation as a result,” he said with a smile, as if tickled with a feather.

“Soon you will come to me to pick out a ring,” Fausto countered.

“I promise you if that day comes, you will be the only jeweler I will use.”

Fausto’s wife, Rebecca, her belly with child, waddled from the store and sat down next to her husband. The tiny framed woman with long brown hair and sharp blue eyes was nearly due, but was too stubborn to heed the wishes of doctors and her husband to rest. Instead, she liked to be in the store near bobbles that glittered and shined.

“Woman, why are you not resting? You’re due any day now,” Fausto reproached his wife.

“Hush up, husband, and buy your wife some food. Your child is hungry.”

As Fausto ordered, Armando couldn’t help but think of how happy his friend was at that moment. A wife, a daughter on the way, and a new business. He wanted a similar life though he could do without children.

“Have you thought of a name?” Armando asked.

Rebecca shook her head. “Perhaps after Fausto’s mother, que en paz descansa.”

“Don’t name the baby after a dead person. It’s bad luck.”

Armando began to think of a name for his friend’s daughter. Karina was the first name he thought of, but he didn’t know how she would feel having a child she didn’t know named after her. Armando finally settled on a name, the origin of which came from nowhere.