Human Crumbs
The newlyweds were crossing the parking lot that led to the first tower. Maria’s aunt had allowed them to clean and repair the apartment (or at least try to) and use it as their first home. The apartment had been locked for years, waiting for a change of tides that would make her aunt and her husband return from their idyllic sojourn in Europe. It was evident by now that that was not going to happen. Ironically, Venezuela used to be the idyllic sojourn for the European uncle who was tired of the coldness of his land and had found home in the warmth of the people in this southern latitude. This musiú had a good sense of smell, though, and he knew that under a populist, nationalist regime the warmth could easily turn into hostile heat against the well-to-do, especially if they looked foreign.
The newlyweds had been feeling the literal heat lately. They agreed the gringo did well leaving before all hell broke loose; they would not have survived the current conditions. This couple had walked some 3 miles from the house they were currently occupying and the last 4 blocks that led to the towers were not exactly a walk by the Champs Elysees; it had become a solitary alley where they once saw some robbers attack three women with the upmost tranquility and impunity. The former grand buildings, the tallest apartment complex in the whole state, were not the only thing deteriorating here. With every periodic visit they paid to the apartment, their anxiety about what it would take to make it livable and what it would mean to live in an increasingly hostile environment made their hopes crumble.
The apartment was on a 12th floor and it had become customary for them to look up to see if the windows were still at least closed. Luis had the feeling that one day they would come and find that the apartment had been looted. Not that they would be able to do anything if they spotted open windows from the parking lot, but, like theirs, most human habits are nothing but compulsions.
Today, Maria did not look up and that gave Luis a second to cover her ears and turn her swiftly around when he saw something falling off the building. He thought it might be a bag of trash. Trash disposals in apartment complexes can adopt the most bizarre practices. The decorated hills behind some buildings in town were silent witnesses of that. However, in a fraction of a second, he had the chance to see this falling shapeless mass grow limbs limply wiggling to the sides.
Trust me, don’t look just run! Luis told Maria while his hands pressed her ears and his forehead pressed hers to avoid a sudden turn. Keep going, trust me; don’t look! And then, when he felt the body was about to hit the ground, he started to yell senseless words loudly. It was like that silly game they played when either started to play seduction games in moments where both knew nothing would happen. They also played it on the phone with texts to pretend there was some background noise that prevented them from getting the titillating messages. LA-LA-RA.TRA-LA-RAAAAA!
Luis did hear the crack, like a watermelon fragmenting into pieces, freed from the pressure of the body that imprisoned them. They were about to turn the entrance of the parking lot, be out of sight, when he felt this woman running behind them, crying like a rampant siren. What’s going on? Maria asked desperately. She was not good at being restrained. Not even when they played games in bed. It was just an uncontrollable reflex, like kicking when tickled on the feet.
For Luis this was déjà vu. Almost 30 years ago, when he was starting college, he rented this apartment with a couple of other guys from his town. Despite its newly developed reputation, it was a usually boring neighborhood. It was the ideal place for a college student coming from a small town. One day, the dullness of the place was stirred by tragedy.
A woman had fallen from the 9th floor at noon. It was a week day, but he had stayed finishing some paper he had to turn in in the afternoon. He came downstairs after hearing the impact, the commotion. He was shocked by the number of spectators. Even back then, without camera phones or social media, people were more interesting in getting a closer look at the scene than providing some kind of help. He moved away from the crowd and spotted two school girls coming absentmindedly towards the building. He was caught up by the big eyes of one of them, a little skinny girl, probably 10. She was visiting; the woman who had fallen was her friend’s mother.
He rushed towards them, opened his arms to try to stop them both. He was able to hold the big-eyed skinny girls; he removed her from the site, left in in the arms of a group of women who promised to protect her from the gory spectacle, and never saw her again. The other one dashed away and got sucked into the mass of morbid shrieks and ramblings.
The crying woman caught up with newlyweds and described amid screams and sobs the gory details of the fallen soul. Luis turned the corner out of the apartment complex and let his wife collapse slowly on the sidewalk. She cried and yelled. He looked at the crying woman wishing he could silence her with one simple touch. Shut the fuck up, you bitch. Just shut up!
Maria screamed, looking up for answers in the silent indifferent clear blue sky of an otherwise normal morning. It’s ok, you’ll be ok, he kept repeating. And just like that, he started laughing. He found himself reliving awkward moments at wakes and burials when he could not control his giggles amid the cries of the relatives of the deceased. The histrionics of the woman who ruined all his efforts to spare Maria the trauma reminded him of some weeping women at burials who would tell stories while they performed their overdone lamentations. There was a whole genre of wake jokes devoted to these theatricalities. It hit him that he had been raised to look at death cynically.
Maria started to punch him. It’s not funny; what is wrong with you? Sorry, honey. I’m not really laughing, he said sincerely, trying unsuccessfully to calm her down. I’m nervous and upset. I can’t help it. Shut up. Stop laughing, she snarled. Poor person. He had relatives, people who loved him. People who never expected him to do that. Sorry, honey, he insisted. My best friend’s mom jumped off a 9th floor! She cried. I was there! It was horrible. She was never the same after that. My friend died there with her mom.
Her big teary eyes, her familiar confusion, and thousands of waves washing off the shore of the local beach where his contemplations took him quite often, brought Luis back the fragility of that skinny girl. He had failed her once more. Life had become a twisted dodgeball game where you get hit even when it misses you by an inch. They got up and walked away slowly while a growing ant line of strangers rushed into the parking lot following the smell of human crumbs.
Thanks for stopping by
