Читать книгу Speaking Like An Immigrant - Mariana Romo-Carmona - Страница 6

October 28, 1959

“I’ve only got a few days before this hallows eve. The sign to remind me that it’s my turn is that ocher and red sprig of oak that grows before the abandoned barn. It’s got to be, because it’s the only autumnal color I can see from here.

“If I didn’t know it was October in this new town, the barn all covered with ivy, green climbing vines of all kinds, the rain falling and falling, it would all look like summer. Except for the sprig of oak. I’m sure of it. My sisters and I have taken care to hide our ways, and so our language is subtle. Its signs, almost invisible.

“A chill down my back. I’ve never been the object of presage such as this. I am the one, and I would escape now … no. Perhaps I would have escaped this morning, before the rain let up enough to show me how the colors grows from ocher to gold to red, on the leaves of the single oak branch that stands before the green vines.

“Deep within the hills the church bells toll the new time of day, before it has been decreed for time to save an hour of daylight before winter. And, so, the town will live an hour longer tonight. But here, in our house away from the valley, the sound of the bells barely reaches us. We are foreigners among the locals, though our ancestors have inhabited this continent for centuries. The air feels heavy on this grey afternoon, the wind hurries on the darkness, the candles grow brighter beside the window.

“When the clock strikes five an hour early, then, I’ll go up into the attic to collect the objects of the spell I’m meant to cast. When I open up the cedar chest of my sister’s recollections, and I gather memories in purple petals of dried roses, fading in my hands, little pieces through my fingers, like the promises the young man made to her that crumbled when she touched them with her passion, then, I will feel none of the doubt I feel now, contemplating the prospect of his death beneath my hand.

“It was spring that brought him here, spring that drove him certain to attain my sister’s love. She was beautiful at dusk during the summer, when she sat, obediently, yet ignoring our advice. Her cheeks had blushed after our warning: don’t bend your will, retain your heart, but her lips were determined to receive him.

“The end of the summer made her swelter in her first signs of longing. Her breaths exhaled pain, and she trembled when she sang. Her sweetest voice tasted of honey, golden and heavy was my young sister’s desire.

“She slept without dreaming, passing from night to day merely to behold the sight of him again. Her lids lay still on her closed eyes, and we, sisters, watched while the moonlight bathed her.

“It was not in silence that we witnessed the weakening of her spirit. Yet our knowledge was not meant to reach her through words. She had chosen to test her life against the highest of all risks; she gave her heart to another and received emptiness in return.

“Now, she must travel alone and in pain, as she regains her strength. To fill up the void he created in her, she must grow complete: all of her must be inhabited by herself alone. She must feel no hope, be bound by no ties, before she can grow free again.

“She has gone, then, from this house on the first of October, and we sisters await the news of her triumph or death to reach us in a year’s time. The old songs are clear. We know that a man of this land who has taken the heart of a witch cannot live if she is to survive. There must be no hope to bind her will to his. Only in death shall such a man release his hold of her.

“The bells toll faintly, and the clock echoes with its chime. It is time to prepare the thorn that, on all hallows eve, will pierce the hand of the man. He will feel the sting as he dances and courts the young women in town. I shudder and reel. I curse my own fate. The red sprig of oak points toward my window; it bends in the rain. I must rise then, and prepare to avenge.

“Inside the deep cedar chest, I’ll smell the dried roses she kept from his gifts and touch the smooth satins she wore for his smiles, and I’ll taste all the tears she swallowed in silence; slowly, I’ll brew up the poison. In three days’ time, at midnight on hallows eve, he will die.”

(1979)