The Natashas Read online

  Early on, it was clear to César that he was different from his brothers, different from the other boys and men, not because he was shorter, and not because he ran fast, and not because he was called “the gecko”, but because César kept a secret pulsation in his heart, which later his parents referred to as the “artist’s gene”, but which everyone knew meant homosexual.

  César himself knew well what the artist’s gene meant. He could not deny what he felt for other boys in class, and men in the streets. His fantasies taunted him. Every time he read a book or saw a film, a male character from the story would nest in César’s head. He’d whisper sweetly for weeks on end, asking César if he’d like to kiss him, if he’d like to press his body into him, if he’d like to put his hand down his pants and feel around a bit. At school these thoughts left César flushed and trying desperately to adjust himself before the bell rang and he had to get up from his seat.

  As he entered his teenage years, he stayed away from boys altogether. The girls accepted César as funny or nice. They never saw him as strange, partly because they were too busy explaining themselves to him. César listened generously to what they liked and what they did not like and who they were and who they were not, agreeing on their behalf.

  In this way, César learned to keep all of his needs to himself, holding close vigil against all surfacing desires, trying to catch them before they showed, and stuff them far, far away.

  5

  César’s father had his views and gut reactions to the idea of homosexuality. That word and the web of connotations that went with it somehow did not seem to fit his son. Yes, his boy was different, but in the way that Julio César the boxer was different, the way that men who make history are different. Perhaps he himself once felt the seed of such a difference, the capacity to leave his signature on history, and this is why when he looked at his Julio César he saw so clearly the type of man he could be. The men who make history grow up as boys of difference, he was sure. They are separated and marked by their uniqueness, which has no way of communicating itself in childhood, but is articulated like poetry in adulthood, if given the chance to survive.

  It was his mother who had the hardest time with César’s difference. She expected her husband to set César straight, to make him understand that he couldn’t just live his life without making an effort to correct his defect. He had to marry. His best option was the neighbour’s girl, Rosa, who often gazed at him with her velvet eyes and brushed her long, thick black hair so carefully in the window of her house. The problem was Rosa’s face. No one could say she was disfigured, but her features clashed with each other terribly. When Rosa’s parents first heard her sing by accident, they took it as proof of God’s mercy that their ugly daughter happened to have a very beautiful voice. The word got out. Too bad little Rosa was extremely shy. The more attention her voice received, the more private she became about it. Sometimes walking home from the store or all alone in her room she would sing lightly to herself. But when the family had company, her parents would pull her out and brag, “Sing something, Rosa …!” Mother, father, and present company would all stare at the girl, who responded to their order with a stubborn silence.

  Although César’s mother had never heard Rosa sing for herself, she was already imagining what a delicious voice that girl must have. It was a shame to see something like that go to waste. Especially when it was well known that a pristine voice was a herald straight from Dios. She secretly hoped that such a voice would one day bless her own, which, despite her best efforts, carried sounds from the depths of the eternally suffering. To think that she could have this voice in her own house, singing God’s graces for her through the days. Better than the radio.

  The way his mother saw it, it was nothing other than a holy sign that she should have such a peculiar son with “the artist’s gene” and right next door there should be such an ugly girl with an angel’s voice-box.

  She knew her two other sons would bring her nothing of value with the women they’d end up marrying. She could already see what kind of woman her eldest Raul would choose. He’d somehow find himself a gringra blonde, a thin one, who was perhaps new to the culture. He could be very charming, Raul, can’t blame the gringra. His jawline and strong cheekbones alone would fool any one of those white women. And even when his aggressiveness started to show, it always came out with a bit of magic. His jealousy could be utterly hypnotising, God help those gullible women, the mother thought, dios, dios, keep them away from my house.

  It wouldn’t be until after the wedding night that Raul would give his gringra her first slap across the face. Then, even if the girl sang a little, her song would be slapped out of her, year by year. César’s mother frowned at the thought of having a pouting, flimsy blonde hanging around the house.

  As for her other son, Alonzo, he would end up with one of those older women who would be settling for any man to call her own. Alonzo, like Raul, had that strain of violence in him as well. But because he was not as handsome as Raul, it was harder for him to get away with such outbursts, as his aggression was just not nearly as elegant as his brother’s. Their mother was sure he would become more and more clumsy over his married years, and she’d have to have a daughter-in-law with black eyes or missing teeth.

  This ageing wife would become sad and introverted, and this would show especially in her chores. Most importantly though, she would make awful conversation. And to think that she would most likely have to watch her tele-novellas with this woman.

  César was her only hope. He had just the right soft melancholia to win over Rosa’s trust and make her share that delicious voice. If only César could stop spending so much time doing impersonations of all the tele-novella characters on TV perhaps he could get Rosa’s attention.

  6

  “And who do we have here …” his father would ask César when the restaurant had a slow moment.

  “No me toques!” César cried out, smoothing his trembling fingers over his hairline with theatrical extravagance as he mimicked Estefania, the young beauty who realises her husband is in fact her sister’s murderer.

  César’s father would smile and after a moment, he’d say, “… Do another …”

  “Cállate la boca, Doctor.”

  “Shut your mouth, Doctor,” copying the newly widowed Laura’s attack on Arturo, the high-class surgeon who had reconstructed his own face to avoid prison.

  “… Do another …”

  “Esto no es amor … esto es un crimen!”

  “This isn’t love … this is a criiiiiiime!” César roared, like Doña Carlota confronting the barely legal Alba about her relations with her uncle.

  Although César’s mother was a bit embarrassed at how well her son managed to portray these women, her discomfort was always overcome by her immediate entertainment. The father listened with a proud smile, patiently waiting for the next instalment.

  This made his brothers snort secretly.

  “You think you’re some star now …” Alonzo would whisper to César.

  Raul waited until his father left the room, then came up behind César and slapped him between his legs.

  “This here’s the biggest pussy in all of Mexico!”

  7

  César el actor his brothers called him in front of their father, who took this as a sign that the brothers respected each other. César el gecko his brothers called him in the streets, to show the other kids that they did not share César’s strangeness. And on very special occasions, usually in the darkness of their shared bedroom, while César was asleep, the brothers took turns whispering into his smooth, boyish ear, César la puta. Beneath his closed eyelids, César’s eyes rolled back and forth as his brothers quietly chanted puta, puta, puta, pulling their penises out and circling them above César’s sleeping face.

  8

  When César announced he would not be staying at the family restaurant, nor would he be going to secondary school, nor would he be looking for other work around town, his mothe
r’s face went white. “But what, then, will you do?” she said, looking at her husband for support.

  “I’ll be moving to Paris,” César said. “I’m going to become a European actor.”

  His mother’s face fell. His father, however, nodded and smiled quietly. This was the first step a boy of difference had to take to become a man of significance.

  On the day of César’s departure, his brothers hugged him in front of their father. Alonzo squeezed him too tight and Raul hit his back twice. His mother asked what this meant for his marriage plans.

  As he placed his suitcase in the trunk of the car, he looked up and happened to catch the velvet eyes of his neighbour Rosa who was standing in the window with her long, dark hair brushed around her face.

  César lifted his hand and waved to Rosa. Perhaps it looked as if he was shielding his eyes from the sun. She didn’t wave back. The corners of her eyes pinched and her cheeks began to hollow.

  9

  That was years ago. A different continent. A different life.

  Now in Paris, César had finished acting school, got an agent, learned French, and currently worked as a telemarketer in a little office that smelled of cardboard, off Rue de la Paix near the Opéra Garnier. He made calls in French and Spanish for various surveys. The French surveys were local and the Spanish were usually for offshore companies in Spain and Latin America. This was of course a part-time job, but it at least provided a steady workload. He supplemented these wages with ever-changing projects and small jobs he found on online ads. Among these were hanging posters in the metro with a bucket of sticky soap and large folded squares, pasted together upon the wall. He tried cleaning rental apartments for a while, but felt his lungs growing infested with those cleaning sprays. The easy option was teaching private Spanish classes. He had done this in the beginning, but the smooth-skinned French kids with their immaculately shaped upper lips spoke his language like heirs to some throne asking about the local prostitutes.

  There was something about telemarketing that he liked best. And even his boss had to admit he was good at it. His only problem was that sometimes he would mix up the surveys and call a French household with a Spanish survey or vice versa. But usually he could catch himself and get back on track, and even sometimes endear his angered listener.

  Even if he had to spend his daylight hours in a little office that smelled of cardboard, making endless calls for various surveys, he could have his cell phone next to him in case his agent had an immediate job for him. All his agent’s calls were for immediate jobs. Over the years César had scampered to various auditions for commercials and walk-on roles, but had yet to land one. However, his agent had a potent way of encouraging César. Every time César would build up the courage to tell his agent that things were not working out between them, he would leave the conversation somehow more excited than ever about his future with such professional representation.

  And so the patient cell phone was to him like a sacred statue of Maria Magdalena, purified by her devotion. Looking at his cell phone now, César suddenly remembered his mother mentioning to him how Maria Magdalena was cleansed of her seven demons by Jesus. His mother’s tone had hinted that César too might be in need of demon-cleansing.

  10

  César saw each telemarketing call as an acting exercise. There were infinite nuances with which one could present the same script. Yet he was not interested in caricatures, false accents, vocal pretences. His technique was rather to stay wholly himself, and pull out from his own depths, like a white hair from a bowl of milk, the traits needed for his character.

  At first he made calls as the characters from the tele-novellas of his childhood. He was tempted to choose the female characters, as he felt he did those better. But in order to sound more natural on the phone, he decided to work on the male ones. How would Enrique, the disinherited deviant son, offer a discount rate for his customer’s next purchase? How would Federico, the pharmaceutical company mongrel, insist on a few moments of their time? Then, little by little, César got to developing his own characters. Pablo Ruiz, the car thief. Juan-Miguel Santos, the hothead. Andres Sepúlveda, the Chilean melancholic. And so on.

  11

  That afternoon he had been Juan-Miguel the hothead, which was the most tiring as he had to let his blood boil while remaining calm and vocally personable. Of the 130 calls he had made, about one-third picked up the phone. And of that third, about one-third let him get past the first sentence before hanging up. And of that third, about one-third gave him a chance at a second sentence. And of that third, about one-third actually spoke to him.

  Juan-Miguel the hothead did not do well with these percentages. But what stewed Juan-Miguel’s anger the most was a woman’s silence. César discovered this character trait the day he discovered the character himself. On one of his calls, a woman picked up the phone without answering. He heard a baby screaming in the background and another child, a boy of five or six, closer in range, repeating, “El bebé está llorando … The baby’s crying …” The woman held the receiver in her hand, breathing gradually, as the small boy’s voice paced in the background. César rephrased his introduction and gave ample time for the woman to either speak or hang up. But the only sound César heard was the small boy’s voice, bebé llorando.

  As César took a breath, he prepared a soft, empathetic tone towards this seemingly exhausted mother. However, when he exhaled to speak, César realised the back of his teeth were tightly locked. And then he said, “puta”.

  It was the first time César had uttered this word, and in the way his brothers would have said it. When he heard himself on the phone, he could barely recognise his own voice. It had to be somebody else. It had to be a new character rising. He called him Juan-Miguel. And he was a hothead. So it was understandable that the days when Juan-Miguel took the wheel were particularly draining. Especially when a woman answered the phone, but did not respond sufficiently to Juan-Miguel’s demands.

  12

  On this day, César had spent all afternoon as Juan-Miguel, so when his shift ended, he hung up the last call physically exhausted. He packed up his stuff in silence and walked his usual route up to the Opéra metro. In autumn, the sun starts setting just as everyone decides to take the metro all at once. They drain out of the boutiques and apartment buildings and into the entryways of the metro like rainwater into a sewer. César found himself a small clearing against the wall of the bank on the corner and let the people weave around him. He needed to stand for a bit.

  As he leaned his back against the wheat-stone exterior of the bank, he looked up at the opera house in front of him. Against the setting sun, the building looked like a hero emerging from a low cloud of human destruction. The sight exalted César: a single man against a lost civilisation. The hero survives. The hero rises to the surface like an ancient continent breaking through the skin of the ocean. Glorious. Alone. There was something romantic to César about this sort of solitude, a product of external destruction and internal survival.

  Standing to the side, the full perspective of the opera house leaned into his gaze. At the top left corner of the building, he saw the seven-foot gilt bronze statue of a woman. Melody was her name. Her right hand reached out and her palm opened hesitantly to the bare sky, as if to tell someone out there to stop, or maybe even to cover her face. Her gesture, like her presence, seemed to go unnoticed by the daily crowds of people fumbling around beneath. If she is asking for mercy, César contemplated, she should take her hand away from her eyes.

  Two androgynous figures sat at her side, each looking their own way. In her hand, César knew that the woman should be holding a lyre. But from where he was standing, it looked like she was holding an infant under her arm, a brutish, biblical fistful.

  César traced his eyes back to that plump golden hand against the spread of sky. He found his attention sliding down her muscular forearm, over the curve of her shoulder, around her broad breasts, down her metal belly and sweeping up to those fingers ho
lding the golden infant like a runt pig to the slaughterhouse. No, it’s a lyre, César reminded himself.

  A crown of spikes encircled the statue’s forehead. Two sharp-tipped wings broke out of her back. The bruising skyline gave her a sombre glow. The breath in César’s chest kept stretching and stretching as he looked over the bronze woman’s body. His eyes went to the infant. Then to the plump golden palm. Then back to the infant. Who was now a lyre. Who was now a pig. Who was now music. Her bronze fingertips were playing the wind.

  13

  Standing there, staring at the statue, César felt a doubting darkness begin to spread within him like an ink droplet in a glass of water. A list of things he didn’t like about himself came to mind. His flat wide nostrils. His slit-thin eyes. The brackets his brows made when he was thinking. Once the surface was picked, the darkness reached beneath. There was something wrong with him, something strange, uncomfortable, under-developed, Der’s sumting about you dat make me wanna vomit, came his brother Raul’s voice.

  I’m an actor, César took hold of himself. I’m an uncomfortable, ugly guy, but that’s okay, cause I’m an actor. There’s a casting agent somewhere out there looking at my photo right now and saying, this guy’s perfect!

  César was almost smiling now. He could always count on this kind of pep talk. Nothing mattered if he could just remind himself that he was an actor. Already he felt much better. And with his lifting spirits, his eyes rose too. But no sooner had they reached the skyline than they settled on the plump bronze hand of Melody.

  The sight of her metallic palm touched him with a coldness. He couldn’t look away. It went deeper than before. Oily words reached into every crevice of his body, echoing between bone and muscle, between joint and nerve, between organ and organ.

  You’re not worth a thing.

  14

  In an attempt to get away from these feelings, César began to walk home. He took his familiar route, which was long but pleasant, consisting of a couple of shortcuts seamed together with the classic boulevards where one could indulge in the beauty of the city. César walked without paying much attention to the road, letting his eyes wander about him and airing out his head.