¡Llegué tarde, pero llegué a tu fiesta, @mariannewest!
I was late, but I got to your party, @mariannewest!
Estimados hivers, esta es mi participación escrita para celebrar los 1000 días de escritura libre de @mariannewest, quien, literariamente, ha querido celebrarlo con una gran fiesta creativa.
Para escribir mi cuento, le pedí a mi amiga @evagavilan, una increible fotógrafa, una de sus fotos de paisajes. La belleza de esa obra inspiro el final optimista de mi relato.
Agradezco a @mariannewest por la generosa manera que encontró para celebrar su hazaña, a @evagavilan por su precioso regalo y a la comunidad de @freewriters por el espacio que brindan para todos los escritores y creadores en esta plataforma.
Dear Hivers, this is my written participation to celebrate the 1000 days of free writing by @mariannewest, who, literally, wanted to celebrate it with a big creative party.
To write my story, I asked my friend @evagavilan, an incredible photographer, for one of her landscape photos. The beauty of that work inspired the optimistic ending of my story.
I thank @mariannewest for the generous way she found to celebrate her feat, @evagavilan for her precious gift, and the community of @freewriters for the space they provide for all writers and creators on this platform.
Asha junto al mar
Madre había salido hacía demasiado tiempo. Su hermanito lloraba de hambre. Primero quedamente, luego su llanto fue un torrente continuo, que solo había bajado de intensidad cuando había comenzado a quedarse ronco.
Madre hacía las incursiones para buscar alimentos y agua cada pocos días. La mayoría de las veces traía aves pequeñas y duras cuyas tiras de carne había que arrancar y luego tostar y moler, pero algunas veces traía frutillas dulces y hojas picantes de cántigo.
Su hermanito se durmió por fin, agotado. Él era demasiado pequeño para recordar la luz, no sabía lo que era el sol. Asha no, ella tenía ya quince años, era casi una mujer. Ella había visto con madre el cielo cubrirse con un velo de ceniza; había visto caer la lluvia ácida, y había visto poblarse los alrededores de la cueva donde se refugiaron de feroces tarnantalos y otras criaturas peligrosas. Ella había ayudado a su madre a parir, y ella misma, Asha, había cortado el cordón sanguinolento que unía a su hermanito con su madre. Era casi una mujer, y, sin embargo, su madre nunca la había dejado ir a cazar. Era Asha la que siempre había tenido que quedarse cuidando a su hermanito.
Madre hablaba poco de lo que había afuera. Cuando llegaba estaba muy cansada y magullada, y en sus ojos había furia, aunque sus gestos seguían siendo suaves. Madre le tomaba la mano y le entregaba el zurrón con alimentos. Besaba a su hermanito en la frente y él buscaba el pecho de madre para mamar con avidez, inhalando profundamente su olor.
Asha sabía que madre había tenido que negociar con un temible grupo de afuera que se hacían llamar "Espíritus". No sabía que daba su madre a cambio del derecho de caza, pero era algo que sospechaba que no quería que Asha entregara.
Repasó en su mente todo lo que sabía, todo lo que su madre le había enseñado en esos diez años de oscuridad: sabía hacer un fuego; sabía destripar y salar una liebre; sabía desplumar, asar y moler los pequeños pájaros sin nombre que su madre traía habitualmente; sabía aplastar serpientes, ratas y bichos con su bastón; sabía curar heridas con musgo; sabía que para cazar había que negociar con el grupo de gente ciega que se hacían llamar "Espíritus" y que el precio que había que pagar llenaba a su madre de ira y de un silencio tan pesado que, finalmente, era tristeza. Sabía, y su madre lo había dejado claro con dolor, con palizas y con abrazos, que, por sobre todas las cosas, no debían salir a la oscuridad de afuera. Era todo.
Y madre no volvería.
Esa era la otra cosa que sabía aunque no la quisiera saber.
Esa, por un instante profundo, negro, pesado, y, de alguna manera muy, muy viejo, fue una certeza absoluta.
No lloró.
Asha observó largo rato a su hermanito que dormía junto a la lumbre. ¿Qué haría con él? Ella podía alimentarlo con pasta de pescado pero no podía darle de mamar. Tampoco podía cazar con él a cuestas.
(Abajo, en el filo de sus pensamientos, un pensamiento dolorosamente avergonzado pugnó por formarse: dejarlo).
Asha se echó el manto sobre los hombros; guardó en el zurrón la yesca, un atado de yerbas, un odre con agua. Cargó a su profundamente dormido hermanito y se lo ató con la manta al torso. Tomó su bastón y salió a enfrentarse a las sombras.
Nada la habría preparado para lo que vino poco después: el silencio.
Y los cadáveres.
Una veintena de cuerpos corroídos. También había niños.
Reconoció a su madre por el aro de bronce de su trenza. La amada calavera sonriendo bajo los jirones de carne chamuscada.
Vomitó su propia saliva.
Su hermanito comenzó a revolverse, inquieto. El hambre, un puñetazo en su estómago, se impuso a la náusea.
Tomó un cuenco de leche agria que ya no le serviría a los muertos y se alejó con paso rápido, siguiendo el olor salino del mar.
Rápido.
Rápido, Asha alejaba a su hermanito de la podredumbre calcinada de la muerte.
Sus pies se lastimaban con las rocas y los espinos de la ladera, pero ella seguía con avidez el olor del salitre; el olor del rocío salado y pegajoso del mar.
Entonces ocurrió.
Un rugido, el reclamo violento de su hermanito rompió el silencio de la tierra.
Con los dedos, le dio cuajos de leche agria, que él sorbió con hambre vieja y gozo.
Solo entonces Asha lloró, lamiendo de sus dedos la leche que su hermanito dejaba.
Estaba a oscuras en la orilla del mar.
Estaba sola con su hermanito, a oscuras, en la orilla del mar.
Estaba sola con su hermanito y sus ojos adoloridos de llorar se abrieron de par en par.
Amanecía.
Asha by the sea
Mother had been out too long. Her little brother was crying from hunger. First lazily, then his crying was a continuous stream, which had only diminished in intensity when he had begun to go hoarse.
Mother made the raids to look for food and water every few days. Mostly she brought small, hard birds whose meat strips had to be torn off and then roasted and ground, but sometimes she brought sweet berries and spicy "cantigo" leaves.
His little brother finally fell asleep, exhausted. He was too young to remember the light, he didn't know what the sun was. Not Asha, she was already fifteen years old, almost a woman. She had seen with her mother the sky covered with a veil of ashes; she had seen the acid rain fall, and she had seen the surroundings of the cave populate with ferocious "tarnantals" and other dangerous creatures. She had helped her mother to give birth, and she herself, Asha, had cut the bloody cord that bound her little brother to his mother. She was almost a woman, and yet her mother had never let her go hunting. It was Asha who had always had to stay behind to care for her little brother.
Mother spoke little of what was outside. When mother arrived she was very tired and bruised, and in her eyes there was anger, though her gestures were still soft. Mother would hold her hand and give her the bag with food in it. She would kiss her little brother on the forehead and he would eagerly seek out mother's breast to suck on, inhaling deeply her scent.
Asha knew that mother had had to negotiate with a fearsome group outside who called themselves "Spirits". She did not know what her mother gave in exchange for the right to hunt, but she suspected that she did not want Asha to give up.
Asha reviewed in her mind everything she knew, everything her mother had taught her in those ten years of darkness: she knew how to make a fire; she knew how to gut and salt a hare; she knew how to pluck, roast and grind the little nameless birds her mother usually brought with her; she knew how to crush snakes, rats and bugs with her stick; she knew how to heal wounds with moss; she knew that in order to hunt one had to negotiate with the group of blind people who called themselves "Spirits" and that the price to be paid filled her mother with anger and a silence so heavy that, finally, it was sadness. She knew, and her mother had made it clear with pain, with beatings and with hugs, that above all things they must not go out into the darkness outside. That was it.
And mother would not return.
That was the other thing she knew even though she didn't want to know it.
That, for one deep, black, heavy, and somehow very, very old moment, was an absolute certainty.
She didn't cry.
Asha watched her little brother sleeping by the fire for a long time. What would she do with him? She could feed him fish paste but could not nurse him. Nor could she hunt with him in her arms.
(Down below, on the edge of her thoughts, a painfully embarrassed thought struggled to form: leave him.)
Asha threw her cloak over her shoulders; she put the yesca in her bag, a bundle of herbs, a water bottle.She carried her deeply sleeping little brother and tied him to her chest with the blanket. He took his stick and went out to face the shadows.
Nothing would have prepared her for what came soon after: silence.
And the bodies.
A score of corroded bodies. There were children too.
She recognized her mother by the bronze ring in her braid. The beloved skull smiling under the shreds of scorched flesh.
She threw up her own saliva.
Her little brother began to stir, restless. Hunger, a punch in her stomach, overcame the nausea.
She took a bowl of sour milk that would no longer serve the dead and left with a quick step, following the salty smell of the sea.
Quickly.
Quickly, Asha led her little brother away from the burning rot of death.
Her feet were hurt by the rocks and thorns on the hillside, but she eagerly followed the smell of saltpeter; the smell of the salty, sticky dew of the sea.
Then it happened.
A roar, the violent call of her little brother broke the silence of the land.
With her fingers, she gave him curds of sour milk, which he sipped with old hunger and joy.
Only then did Asha cry, licking from her fingers the milk her little brother left behind.
She was dark on the seashore.
She was alone with her little brother, in the dark, on the seashore.
She was alone with her little brother and her eyes, sore from crying, opened wide.
It was dawn.