Super Extra Grande (15 page)

Could I really have slammed the door in the faces of Enti and An, when neither of them had anywhere else to go?

I’m not stonyhearted. Not in the least. So, considering how prosperous I’ve become, I called them back to my side.

I’ve made so much money lately, in fact, that I even allowed myself the luxury of acquiring a hissing dragon of Siddhartha. It’s still a little thing, barely twenty-five meters long, which is why I’m sure I’ll be able to domesticate it before it reaches full size. It already recognizes me and everything. Every time it sees me come in, it excretes especially thick clouds of sulfurous vapor. Lovely.

Concholants are still missing from my résumé, but maybe one of these days I’ll have the tremendous pleasure of flying off into space to visit one, even if I don’t get paid for it. At least I now have the ideal vehicle for making the trip: I just bought a surplus ship off the Juhungans. It’s a twin of the one Enti and An were flying when the laketon captured them.

Don’t even ask how much it cost me. Those hydrogen breathers are a bunch of incorrigible skinflints.

Of course, it isn’t the same ship, and it isn’t
Beagle
, but it serves my needs perfectly, in addition to motivating me and reminding me of the strange case that changed my life.

Until I have an adequate hangar built, it also serves as a den for my two dozen cuddly marbusses from Mizar. I’ve got it parked in the backyard of the house I share with Enti Kmusa and An-Mhaly…

Yes, I’m living in a peculiar relationship… with both ladies.

Hence the marbusses. They really do love them. All women do.

And since I love making them happy…

Long live threesomes, if they bring happiness. And the hell with all my prudish old intolerant ideas about exotic women, together with my equally misogynistic prejudices towards non-
Homo sapiens
females, humanoids or gynecoids, with yellow pupil-less eyes, cephalic crests, violet skin, six breasts, three-forked tongues, cartilaginous chewing plates—and oral sex as the main dish on their limited but sincere erotic menu.

Maybe it’s my professional success, but now we’re the main topic of gossip on all the holonews programs out of Gea. There’s also the fact that none of us is exactly tiny, so we three are hard to miss when we’re out walking around town, hand in hand.

But I don’t care. Let them talk, if that’s what they want.

We don’t care.

Now I can say I’ve tried everything.

And to my own surprise, I’ve discovered that sometimes different is synonymous with interesting.

That getting along and living in harmony takes more than tolerating difference. You have to go a little bit farther, you have to enjoy the diversity.

Polymorphous perverts? Lustful, lewd bisexuals? Sinners destined for the eternal fires of hell?

Bah. Could be. Except for the hell part, that is.

And so what?

It’s delightful.

Besides, are we hurting anybody, somehow?

Aren’t we adults, all three?

Why do people always try to force pleasure into such strictly human pigeonholes? Sin, propriety, perversity… Humph.

After all, strictly speaking, my “black panther” and I are the only actual couple in this ménage à trois. An, our common platonic partner (though sometimes a bit more than platonic, to tell the truth), is at most a “friend with touching privileges” for both of us, right?

Of course, the touching is oral… And, yes, they were right; it really is exquisite. For the record.

September 15, 2009

Born José Miguel Sánchez Gómez,
yoss
assumed his pen name in 1988, when he won the Premio David in the science-fiction category for
Timshel
. Together with his peculiar pseudonym, the author’s aesthetic of an impenitent rocker has allowed him to stand out among his fellow Cuban writers. Earning a degree in Biology in 1991, he went on to graduate from the first ever course on Narrative Techniques at the Onelio Jorge Cardoso Center of Literary Training, in 1999. Today, Yoss writes both realistic and science-fiction works. Alongside these novels, the author produces essays, reviews, and compilations, and actively promotes the Cuban science-fiction literary workshops Espiral and Espacio Abierto.

When he isn’t translating,
david frye
teaches Latin American culture and society at the University of Michigan. Translations include
The First New Chronicle
and
Good Government
by Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala (Peru, 1615);
The Mangy Parrot
by José Joaquín Fernández de Lizardi (Mexico, 1816), for which he received a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship;
Writing across Cultures: Narrative Transculturation in Latin America
by Ángel Rama (Uruguay, 1982); and several Cuban and Spanish novels and poems.

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Copyright © 2012, 2016
José Miguel Sánchez
Gómez
Translation copyright © 2016 David Frye

First published in Spanish as
Super extra grande
by Editorial Gente Nueva, Havana, 2012

All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted
without the prior written permission of the publisher.

First Restless Books paperback edition June
2016
Digital edition published by Restless Books, 2016

Electronic
ISBN
978-1-63206-026-6
Paperback
ISBN
978-1-63206-056-3
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016938767

Cover design by Edel Rodriguez
Typesetting and eBook by
Tetragon, London

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