The Invisible Mountain (34 page)
Fifteen seemed to race up at her, girls are supposed to keel and scheme and bate their breath for the day of their
quinceañera
, savoring unbearable suspense, but Salomé had to be reminded of it by her mother and Abuela, who rallied for the date months in advance, who sewed the dress
during late nights, the living room a garish ocean of white ruffles, asking do you like this? and this? more layers here, what do you think? and Salomé would bob or shake her head yes or no and let them pin, stitch, twirl her slowly, analyze, claim she looked so pretty. She felt gangly in the end result. She was still angular, long-limbed, a sketch of womanhood. And anyway, it seemed to her that the rewards of becoming a woman, the solemn gifts bestowed on her, were disappointing: her first lipstick, pink and sticky on her mouth; high heels on which she lost her balance; long white gloves to match her ruffled dress. Surely there was more to it, more incentive to accept the inscrutable burdens of adulthood.
The party itself dizzied her with its heat and droves and noises, its spread of enough
bizcochos
, empanadas,
alfajores, pascualina
, and
churrascos
to feed all of Montevideo. The cake seemed to yield a thousand slices. One by one the guests told her how beautiful she looked, which made her sheepish and also a bit suspicious. Nevertheless, once she drank two glasses of Champagne and dancing began in earnest, she succumbed to electric undercurrents of pleasure. Joy lurked in her bones after all, hot and thick and streaming, and she saw it in the guests too, as they danced: Tía Xhana and Tío César dipped and reeled their way through a smoldering tango; Coco’s and Gregorio’s gray hairs mingled as they pressed together; Abuelo twirled Mamá and Mamá laughed and his eyes widened with a kind of baffled awe; even Roberto took to the dance floor, shaking abashedly to the Beatles,
do you want to know a secret
, with Flor—his girlfriend, Edgar’s cousin, her loose hair the color of acorns, her body serpentine, her face calm and aglow. Salomé would never be like Flor, so attuned to the filigrees of desire, able to command them and draw them into her sphere without uttering a sound. No matter. She didn’t want to be Flor, glossy, vacuous, while the world broke apart and transmuted around her. She kept smiling for the crowd. Leona was not there. She missed her friend, who had been busy lately, and distracted, because her aunt was sick, or so she said. Surely Leona had no reason to lie, not to Salomé, with whom she shared everything; all the more reason that lies would be difficult, awkward, poorly delivered, causing Leona to look away when speaking about the aunt and her long illness, staring at the iron gates beyond the lawn.
It took two months. They were in the basement bathroom, a half-abandoned spot that stank of mossy rust. It was raining outside. Salomé had a letter from Artigas.
“Listen to this part. ‘We’re still recovering from Che’s departure. Some people say he abandoned the Revolution. But I think he’s gone to spread it, elsewhere in Latin America. Who knows where it will turn up next?’”
She looked up. Pearls of sweat glistened at Leona’s temples.
“What do you think?”
Leona tapped the sink with her fingernails. She seemed preoccupied with something: an exam around the corner, a sharp pebble in her shoe. “What do
you
think?”
“I think it’s true. I think it’s spreading.” Salomé took a breath of mildewed air. “I want to be part of it.”
“How much do you want it?”
Her tone was jolting. “You know how much.”
Leona stepped closer. Her face grew strident around the jaw. “With your whole being?”
“Yes.”
Leona scanned her friend’s face. Her hair was in a ponytail; a few wayward coils formed a frizzy halo. She softened; her gaze grew almost tender. “Would you give your life?”
Salomé wasn’t breathing. No windows graced the basement bathroom; the only light slunk out of a weak, bare bulb. It hung just above them, so that their foreheads were lit, while their chins were half-lost in the dark. Two schoolgirls gossip in a bathroom. Two young women
define their lives. She heard the rain falling in distant thuds against the building. Her world was full of rain and teeth and nightsticks to knock out those teeth, and here she was, schoolgirl, woman, thrilled and alive and afraid, staring at her friend, listening to slick hungers in her body, to the promise she’d made with suspended breath when she was still a child, thinking she’d be strong enough one day, but am I strong enough? how strong is enough? some steps are final, you can’t go back, you can’t know whether you’re ready or even see the road ahead, you can only look into the dark with its dim glints and far explosions and sharp turns and weigh—starkly, rapidly—the cost.
“Yes,” she said.
Leona searched her face, smiled. She took paper from her backpack, wrote against the wall, pushed the page into Salomé’s hand, and left the room.
Salomé read the note.
Meet me outside El Chivito Sabroso tomorrow at ten minutes to six o’clock sharp. Make absolutely sure you’re alone. Destroy this note immediately
.
The next day, after school, Salomé hurried through her homework. No time to change; the uniform would have to do.
“I’m going out,” she told her mother as she headed to the door.
Mamá looked up from her book. “Where to?”
“To see a friend.”
Mamá raised a sculpted eyebrow. “Which one?”
Salomé thought fast.
Hasta la Victoria
. “Victoria.”
“Victoria. She’s at Crandon?”
“Yes.”
“You’ve finished your homework?”
“Yes.”
Mami softened, and Salomé felt a pang for lying. She pushed it away, remembering the night Che Guevara came to speak. Her mother also lied about destinations.
“Will you be back for dinner?”
She had no idea. “No.”
“Have fun. Don’t come back too late.”
At twelve minutes to six o’clock, Salomé stood outside El Chivito
Sabroso. The rain had halted; dusk began to stroke the bricks and stones. She tried not to think about the hours before her, gaping and white, blinding, unknowable. Through the window of the restaurant, she watched three melancholy men share a pitcher of beer. A lone woman dove into her
chivito
sandwich, its insides—steak, fried egg, ham, bacon, cheese—collapsing from the bottom when she bit. A waiter stood indifferent watch. Across the street, two policemen paused at the corner. A bus rattled by, bursting with worn workers. One officer grasped the pistol at his hip, unnecessarily, as they strode away.
Leona came around the corner. Salomé raised her hand to greet her, but she walked past as if they were strangers. She slowed without turning. Salomé followed, keeping an easy distance. They walked to the end of the block, then to the right, then two more blocks and to the right again. They were on a quiet side street, dimly lit, flanked by tired buildings. Leona stopped in front of a laundromat. Its lights were off. The sign in the window said
CLOSED
. She knocked on the door; it opened; she stepped through quickly. Salomé stood alone on the empty street. It smelled of gutters alive with rain. She approached the door and it opened before she could knock. Leona rushed her in and led her through the blackness, past rows of unseen washing machines, into the back of the store. They arrived at the far wall; reaching out to touch it, Salomé felt the handles of mops and brooms. Leona knocked on the left end. It opened and she pulled Salomé by the wrist through the invisible door.
They entered a cramped dark room with no windows. Four people sat inside: Leona’s sister, Anna, with her long face and gold-rimmed glasses; a young man in a starched collar; another man in his late twenties with a square face and bushy beard; and a broad, large
muchacho
with hair that wisped into his face, who looked older than Salomé, about seventeen. He looked familiar, but she couldn’t place him, couldn’t think, because they all were staring at her.
Leona motioned for her to sit down. Salomé arranged herself carefully on the freezing floor, regretting that she’d rushed out in her knee-length school skirt. She tasted the mingled breaths of six people and two oil lamps.
Bushy Beard nodded toward Leona, who closed the door.
“So,” Bushy said, “you’re Salomé.”
She nodded. All eyes were still on her.
“She can really be trusted?”
Leona’s nod was decisive.
Bushy stared at Salomé. His eyes were dark green, shaded by a ledge of brow. “What do you know about the Tupamaros?”
She cleared her throat. So here it was. “They plan to liberate Uruguay.”
“Where did you hear that?”
“In the papers—”
“The papers are much less favorable.”
“And my family talking.”
The wisp-haired boy grinned and now she placed him, the grandson of Cacho Cassella, the magician from Abuelo’s youth. Tinto Cassella. He winked at her in the low light.
Bushy continued. “What do
you
think about the Tupamaros?”
She had rolled that question through her mind all day. “That they’re important. And brave.”
“What would you say to a Tupamaro if you met one?”
She saw Leona in her peripheral vision, lifting her chin, leaning forward, and Salomé could almost smell the eucalyptus, feel the stippled light of their lawn. “ ‘I admire what you’re doing and I want to be part of it.’”
Bushy Beard was impassive. “What if that Tupa told you that liberation is only achieved by action—including force, when necessary?”
That was when she saw the guns. They almost blended into the dark walls: rifles in the corner, a pistol at Anna’s knee. She’d seen guns before, on policemen, in soldiers’ hands, in photos of the Cuban Revolution—but never so close, and not in the lap of a university girl, not within reach of a man giving her a test. Her body felt like a cup full of crushed ice, so tight and cold. But guns, of course, were necessary, weren’t they? A dirty need that you don’t want but can’t ignore, like defecation. She thought of Che, luminous Che, embracing a sleek rifle in his sleep. The air hung thick, unventilated, pressing.
“I’d agree.”
Bushy Beard leaned closer. “How old are you?”
“Fifteen.”
“You understand what’s being asked?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t think you’re too young?”
“No.”
He stroked his beard. He glanced around the room. “Any comments?”
Tinto raised his hand. “I know her. Our grandparents are friends. She’s a good person, reliable.”
Leona added, “I would trust her with my life.”
“That’s good,” Bushy Beard said. “You may have to. Any concerns?”
The room was silent.
“All in favor?”
All the members raised their hands. Leona hugged her tightly. “Welcome, friend.”
Each Tupamaro rose and kissed Salomé. Tinto’s cheek felt smooth and taut; Bushy Beard’s, quite gentle. His name was Orlando. He introduced the others—Tinto, Anna, and Guillermo, the man with the starched collar. Orlando was the head of their cell, he said; Anna would explain. Anna pushed up her glasses and turned tightly toward Salomé. The Tupamaros, she said, were also called the National Liberation Movement. Everything from now on had to be held in strictest secrecy. She paused. Salomé nodded. Anna went on. The movement was organized into cells. This was her new cell. Only one person in each cell knew any other Tupamaros. Orlando met with others and brought back information. If they were ever captured on assignment, they couldn’t release more than a few identities, even if investigative pressure—she said these two words slowly, tasting each syllable—were applied. There was a knifelike quality about Anna, in her thin poise, her sharpened words. As if she wouldn’t hesitate to cut the world in two. “Do you understand?”
Salomé nodded.
“Very well,” Orlando said. “Let’s continue.”
She sat in silence for the remainder of the meeting. It was orderly, polite, almost banal; it reminded her of a study group assessing its homework,
talking of research—who works in the top office of the Federal Bank? what does he do on weekends?—and craft projects—forty sets of homemade handcuffs needed by next week—and plans—next meeting is in Guillermo’s uncle’s basement. It was difficult to believe this was real. She pictured herself leaping to her feet, running to the alley, shouting
I am a Tupa!
to the shuttered windows and crushed-velvet sky. The meeting was adjourned. Tinto approached.
“Salomé. What a surprise.”
She scrambled up from her awkward splay on the floor.
“A nice one, of course.”
His burliness shocked her. He’d been a lanky child. They called him Tinto because his neck was long and thin like a bottle of red wine. Now there was nothing lithe about him, though his neck did seem to be craning. Eager. The oil lamps dimmed, and she was glad, because she had begun to flush. “How’s your abuelo?”
“Still working. He says if he can’t put food on the table, he may as well be dead.” He wiped a frond of hair from his eyes. It fell back immediately. “How about yours?”
“He’s all right.”
They looked at each other.
Leona tugged her arm. “We leave one by one. Your turn.”
Tinto kissed her quickly. “See you next time.”
“See you then,” she said, and turned to the hall. She hesitated for an instant at the threshold; she couldn’t see anything; outside, night had long fallen. She had never walked into so much darkness in her life. She would have liked a flashlight or a candle, but knew better than to ask, so she reached her arms in front of her and walked forward, into the pitch-black room with its hidden gauntlet of machines.