The Uncomfortable Dead (13 page)

“Nope! Leave it right there.”

CHAPTER 9

THE BAD AND THE EVIL

…
which relates what Magdalena and Elías talked about in a Chinese café; explains how the geography of evil is crooked and the world is full of windows and doors; reveals how the Zapatista comandantes put together the puzzle sent by the deceased Don Manolo; and details what happened when Elías went to Belascoarán’s workplace, the questions they asked each other and the answers they gave, the agreement they reached, and how a dominos match with an uncertain future got started. All this, plus some ideas (or definitions) of the Bad and the Evil, given by involuntary guests in this novel.

T
hat would be like a very big daddy, like the daddy of all daddies, like the city people say.

That’s what I said, me, Elías Contreras, Investigation Commission of the Zapatista National Liberation Army, EZLN, as we say. And that’s when Magdalena started laughing like she might bust a gut. She laughed and laughed like she just couldn’t stop, not till she had to go for a pit stop, like they say, cause with all the laughing and all, she really had to pee. And everybody was staring at us cause of all the laughing Magdalena was doing … Course, the fact that she had on a really small dress where you could see pretty much everything she had—I mean, that Magdalena, she was kinda naked—that didn’t help much either. So then we were drinking coffee in a Chinese café on Alvarado Bridge Street, and it was late at night cause Magdalena had gone by her room in the Guerrero section of the Monster—Mexico City, that is—to pick me up. And the fact is, I was really suffering a little cause they cut Magdalena’s water, so we had to carry the water up the stairs in buckets, and the bucket had a hole in it and a lot of water dripped out, so I had to make a bunch of trips, and what with the dripping and all, there was a slippery mess, and I slipped on it and fell. So then I was washing my clothes and I accidentally poured bleach on my pants and it got all pale, like it had some disease or something, and the shirt, which was white, isn’t white anymore; it’s kinda spotty cause I stuck it in the same basin with my pants. So like I was saying, I was really suffering cause those were my Sunday best—I mean, the best I got and that I took with me on my Investigation Commission in the Monster. Well, just then Magdalena came in saying that there was too much street-walking competition right then and the only thing you could catch out there’s a cold, so that’s when she said we should go out for some coffee on her treat. And without changing clothes or nothing, or not actually changing but putting on more, cause she hardly didn’t have none on at all, we went out to the Chinese café. Between drinking coffee and all, I asked Magdalena what it was that she told the
Judiciales
—that is, the police, the ones that wanted to arrest me the other night. I mean, what did she tell them to keep them from taking me away in their car? And that’s when Magdalena said she had told the
Judiciales
that I was her
pimp-daddy,
and did I know what a
pimp-daddy
was. Well, I said I surely did, and then she, or maybe he, asked me what it was, and then me, I told her what I already said I said about “a very big daddy, like the daddy of all daddies,” and that’s when she started laughing and went on for a while. And she was just about to finish laughing when I told her that it made her like my daughter, or son, or something, and then she went from laughing to hysterical.

So I was thinking that Magdalena must have her mind in a muddle, cause she went right over from laughing and laughing to crying and screaming. So what I did was I passed him/her my coffee, since she/he had already drunk hers. I guess the coffee did the trick cause she calmed down, but still with a little bit of crying. I told her she shouldn’t have a sad heart. And then she said how she/he didn’t and how she was crying cause he was happy.

And that’s when I knew Magdalena really did have a muddle in her mind.

Then I said that as soon as we beat the Bad and the Evil, she/he would be able to have whatever was wrong fixed, and then she would be able to find herself a husband and get married and all. And I was going to be the best man and we would get a Mariachi band and have dancing, and serve
pozol
and sweet toast, and who knows, maybe we might even slaughter a pig, soon as we start getting paid, that is, and have some soup. And Magdalena just kept saying, “Oh Elías, oh Elías,” and went on laughing and screeching, and all in all it was a real good time. And then he, or rather she, said she wished we—the Zapatistas, that is—would really win the war, cause we were fighting for the little people, the ones that are always getting screwed. Then he/she said it didn’t really matter if he/she got to see the day, or the night, when we win, but that she would be with us all the way since a cause like this one—that is, the Zapatista cause—deserves the support of the best, and the best is always down at the bottom of the heap, the little people. After that, Magdalena asked where it was you could find the Bad and the Evil so she/he could go right over and stomp them right then and there. So I explained that that there was exactly what I was investigating—that is, where can we find, or where can we begin to trace, the Bad and the Evil.

THE BAD AND THE EVIL ACCORDING TO FEDERICO GARCÍA LORCA, SPANIARD, POET, SHOT BY THE FALANGISTS OF FRANCISCO FRANCO, CHARGED WITH BEING A HOMOSEXUAL, AN INTELLECTUAL, A CRITIC OF THE CHURCH, AND AN ENEMY OF CONSERVATISM.

Black is the color of their horses’ hides,
shod in the blackest steel they ride.
Spots of ink and streaks of wax
stain their solemn capes of black.
And they shed tears
for their bones of lead.
Galloping down the high road pass
their leather souls agleam.
So twisted in the ashen night,
they animate and then impose
the silence of darkest rubber first
and then the fear of finest sand.
If they wish to pass, they do their will,
bringing hidden within their minds
the vaguest pale astronomy
Of menacing pistols undefined.
—Excerpt from “Romance de la Guardia Civil
Española,”
Romancero Gitano,
1924-1927

THE BAD AND THE EVIL ACCORDING TO MAGDALENA.

Look here, Elías, you can probably understand me because being an Indian, you know what it feels like to deal with discrimination and racism. I don’t know, it’s like there’s this hatred for anything that’s different. And that hatred doesn’t just stop with looking at you askance, making fun of you, joking about you, or humiliating and insulting you. No! That hatred goes as far as murder. Some of us guys, or rather girls, have been killed. Sometimes you hear about it and sometimes you don’t. And I’m not talking about being murdered in the course of a kidnapping or a robbery. No! They murder us for no other reason than hating that we’re different. And when something bad does happen, the first thing they think is that it was one of us, because they believe that our difference is not anything natural, that it’s some kind of perversion, some kind of evil. As if our sexual preference is the result of a criminal mind, a personality trait of delinquents … or of animals—one bishop said that we were like roaches. It’s no wonder that whenever anything bad happens, it’s always one of us, someone who is gay, or lesbian, or a tranny, or a sex worker—one of us is always the first suspect, the first one accused of anything bad. So then, one has to hide his or her difference or bury it in some dark street. And why should we hide what we are? Don’t we work like everyone else? Don’t we love and hate like anyone else? Don’t we dream like anyone else? Don’t we have defects and virtues like everyone? We’re the same but different. But no, to them we’re just animals, horrible degenerate creatures that have to be exterminated. And don’t ask me who I mean when I say “they,” because I wouldn’t know what to say. It’s just they, them, all of them, even the ones who call themselves progressive, democratic, leftist. You see what they said about Digna Ochoa and Pável González? The authorities said she was a lesbian and he was a homosexual, as if that were reason to preclude justice. And since they
were
that way, well, they got depressed, and the best thing they could do was commit suicide. It’s disgusting! Screw the city of hope! Yes! Because if anything happens to one of us, male, female, or otherwise, the best they can come up with is “he/she had it coming,” “they probably know why,” and that kind of garbage. Besides, isn’t the condition of homosexuality itself an insult? Don’t we call people we dislike “queer,” “faggot,” “fruit,” “sissy”? But why should I be telling you all this when “Indian” is still an insult in this country, which was built and is still being built on the backs of the indigenous population. Who are “they,” you ask? All of them! Or none of them. It’s like a certain state of mind. Like it’s in the air. And to top it all off, they’re hypocrites. By day they insult us, but as soon as they have the cover of night, they come to us “to find out what it’s like,” or to have their bodies confess what their minds deny: that they’re just like us. They say we’re aggressive. True! But that’s the only way we can defend ourselves. If someone is always trying to screw you, it’s only logical that you should feel that people are trying to screw you. And I wish I were talking about sex—no, I’m saying they’re trying to fuck you over. So we use the same rejection we suffer to defend ourselves. But why does it have to be like that? I wish it could be like you said. I wish I could get my operation and have my body match what I am and get married and have children. But I wouldn’t want to lie to my kids about who I am. I wouldn’t want them to be ashamed of me. Yes, I know there have been changes. Homosexuality and lesbianism are not as persecuted as they once were, but that’s mostly in the upper classes, among people who have money or prestige, who can defend them. Now, down here, well, that’s another matter altogether. Down here, it’s still the same shit. Evil is this inability of people to understand differences, because when we understand, we respect. And people persecute what they don’t understand. Evil, Daddy Elías… if I may call you Daddy Elías, it sounds much better than pimp-daddy … Evil, Daddy Elías, is incomprehension, discrimination, and intolerance. It’s everywhere … or nowhere.

THE BAD AND THE EVIL ACCORDING TO DON QUIXOTE DE LA MANCHA AND SANCHO PANZA, HIS SQUIRE. ANCIENT RIGHTERS OF WRONGS. (SOON TO BE 400 YEARS OLD.)

Then they discovered thirty or forty windmills there in that field, and as soon as Don Quixote saw them, he said to his squire, “Good fortune would seem to be guiding our affairs far better than we dared hope, for look there, friend Sancho Panza, where we may see some thirty or more desperate giants with whom I intend to do battle and deprive them of their lives, as their spoils enrich ours, for this is the good war, and it is a great service to God to rid the face of the earth of such bad seeds.”

“What giants?” Sancho Panza asked.

“Those that yonder stand,” answered his master, “those of the long arms, many of which are up to two leagues in length.”

“I
beg your lordship to notice,” Sancho answered, “that those that over yonder stand are not giants, but windmills, and what appear to be arms are the blades that are turned by the wind to move the millstone.”

“Clearly, it would seem,” answered Don Quixote, “that you are not at all versed in matters of adventure: Those are giants, and if you fear them, move out of the way and go to prayer while
I
engage them in fierce and unequal combat.”

—Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don
Quixote of La Mancha, Vol. 1,
1605

THE BAD AND THE EVIL ACCORDING TO DOÑA SOCORRITO.

Maybe she’s walking down by the beach that, perhaps, is deserted at this time. And maybe she stops once in a while to pick up a seashell. Maybe she’s about to be seventy-one years old. Maybe in March. Maybe she has one of her granddaughters with her. Maybe the child is less than five years old. Maybe they’re both singing,
May you always be with us/as we are with you/in the same pocket of those pants
… And maybe the little girl sings the last syllable out of key.

Maybe Doña Socorrito is saying right now that the world can be like a big house, or like a little prison; that the world is full of windows and doors; that the world is a great puzzle full of rooms, some dark and others lit; that the world is full of distinct (and sometimes contradictory) realities; that in this world, each reality has but two doors, and that one of them is the door of certain Bad and the other of uncertain Good; that sometimes you can choose the room you want to live in, and other times you cannot, and evil and life pursue you everywhere; that if you want to choose, it has to be twice: if you can, first, you have to choose where you want to be, and second, you have to choose your way in; that the job of adults is to show the children as many windows as possible so they can look into as many rooms as possible; that the job of adults is to wage a permanent struggle so that children may always have the freedom to choose the room of the world where they want to be, and the freedom and responsibility to choose the door by which they are going to enter that room; that everyone can then be whatever they are and wherever they are, but they all have to choose between good or bad.

Maybe Doña Socorrito is saying that evil is fighting to deprive everyone of the right and the freedom to choose their room and their door; that the men and women who fight against the Bad are fighting for children, no matter the color of their skin, their last name, age, nationality, race, or language; that a new world is pointless if we don’t fight to change the one we have; that the Bad presents itself to children as an excuse where evil is a manifest destiny; that those who fight against evil want childhood to be, very simply, a time of wonder.

Maybe Doña Socorrito is saying this as she walks along the eastern sea. Maybe the child is listening.

THE BAD AND THE EVIL ACCORDING TO PEDRO MIGUEL, JOURNALIST WITH THE MEXICAN DAILY LA JORNADA.

But
the present occupant of the White Heouse (George Walker Bush, President of the United States) talks so much about the Lord that you have to ask yourself the relevance of brushing the dust off theology and using it as an instrument with which to analyze today’s world … George Walker … appears to be honestly convinced that he and God (in that order) make up an impressive team. Of course, the president is convinced that divine assistance is the primary asset of the traditional earthly alliances of the United States (France, Germany, Spain, Canada) … Yes, the Celestial Empire is part of that alliance, and so what if a couple of no-account countries abandon it? What possible need could there be to define evil, when it is so obvious that evil is anything that antagonizes the Lord, Who, it would seem, has turned out to be a brilliant strategist, a clairvoyant economist, and a sharp and precise (re) election advocate.