THE OLD HOUSE AND OTHER SHORT STORIES
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A collection of short stories whose protagonists are women in different situations, times and stages of life. Some of them: Two sisters experience a communication phenomenon at a distance. A woman gets ready to confront her past and ponder what could have been. A young man falls in love with an enigmatic woman visiting the Mar Chiquita Lagoon in Cordoba, Argentina. A woman pays dearly for being the other in a tempestuous triangle. A student’s romance in Buenos Aires in the 1960s. Two friends in a small Ohio town try to overcome the shadow of betrayal in their past. Female protagonists struggling with their own reality and trying to make sense of it.
The Spanish version, La Casa Vieja y Otros Relatos, won Gold Medal-Spanish Category at the Florida Book Awards and Honorable Mention at the 2016 Latino Book Awards |
THE SALT STORM (fragment)
Matías adjusted the small backpack on his shoulder, picked up his sunglasses, locked the room and went down the hotel stairs. At the reception desk, he handed his keys to the concierge.
"Dinner is from eight to eleven p.m.," she said.
"Thanks," he answered, before walking out into the burning sun.
His classmates from the university had not yet reached the small town of Miramar, but since he had two days off before starting the project, he decided to take advantage of them. The heat in the plains by Mar Chiquita Lagoon hadn't diminished since before noon when he got off the bus. But the sweltering heat did not bother him after those recent fieldwork incursions to the mountains, where he felt the sharp cold cutting his bones.
The beach was, as he expected, busy with tourists who alternated between the thermal mineral baths, dips in the heavy salty waters and the temporary relief of the umbrellas. Flocks of birds often crossed the area in a concert of batting wings, cackling and bright colors that attracted attention, fascinated the children and motivated amateur photographers.
Matías walked for some time looking for a more secluded spot, and then he laid under the hot sun which reflected on the sand from the blue-white noon sky.
He mentally enumerated the steps that he was going to follow with his working group to survey the state of the waters and the flow of the tributary of the small sea, or Mar Chiquita. However, with the stillness of the afternoon, his recent lunch and mounting fatigue, he fell into a light, pleasant slumber.
Suddenly, he felt someone reclining at his side. When he opened his eyes, he found a beautiful face, framed by long chestnut hair, and a deep green gaze that looked at him intently. Still drowsy, he sat up halfway, and she backed up slightly, still smiling. A shudder ran through him, and Matías rubbed his eyes with both hands.
“Yes?” He asked, still a little sleepy, expecting she would say something.
But the woman was not there any longer. He looked around, now fully awake, and noticed that almost all the tourists had left the beach and the closest ones were several yards away. It was evident that he had slept for some time.
He rested his head on the towel again, wondering about the image he had just seen. Where did she go? Was it a dream? Then he thought that with the intense heat, he might have had a heat stroke, and if so, the girl he thought he had seen had only been a mirage. He decided to seek some shade and found a small outdoor bar under the trees. Looking around, with the odd feeling that he may actually find her, he ordered a fruit juice. He did not understand why he felt so uneasy. Surely it had been a dream prompted by the intense heat, which he had clearly underestimated. At a mirror behind the bar, he noticed that the sun had reddened his skin, and his hair seemed even lighter in contrast. He finally made his way to the hotel for an early dinner, still frustrated by the indefinable feeling left by his strange experience.
He crossed the streets of the small commercial downtown, full of tourists at dusk. He went through a bookstore without much interest, and in one of the regional craft shops, his sight fell on a table with figurines for sale. One of them caught his attention. He picked it up, bewildered. It was a slender woman chiseled out of wood, about eight or nine inches tall. Matías stared at her face, her memorable features and her hair falling on her shoulders.
I must be going crazy! It has to be the excessive sun, he told himself. The face of the statuette looked remarkably like the woman he saw on the beach. He examined it for some time, finding details that he had not noticed before; the rounded small bust, the slender waist and the skirt that fell on the perfect curve of her hips to reach the legs that ended in two delicate, bare feet, resting on a ceramic platform. The model must have been a woman much like the hallucination I had this afternoon, he told himself. So, yes, there was a real woman and, perhaps, she was the one he had seen on the beach. He wanted to believe that it was real. And he told himself again that he had possibly been out of it because of the heat and that's why it had seemed like a mirage. It was evident now that she existed; he had not dreamed it. The thought filled him with expectations.
“How much?” He asked the busy cashier, holding the statuette in his hand.
"Thirty pesos," the girl replied.
Matías took the money out of his pocket and paid, enthralled by his acquisition. After the girl wrapped it in tissue paper, he walked out with the bundle in his hand, feeling an urgent need to open it and look at it again to verify that the model was indeed the girl on the beach and that he was not crazy.
When he got to his room, he placed the statuette on the nightstand. The figure looked to one side, as to something distant, the head high and the neck long and perfect down to its breasts. He turned it around, but still, the gesture was distant. Matías admired the skill of the artist, capable of carving a face so natural, almost as if painted on a canvas.
He checked his messages and then took a bath. While getting dressed, he glanced at the statuette every now and then. Finally, he went down to the dining room trying to escape the ridiculous spell of a wooden figurine. That's all it is, he told himself; a beautiful carved wooden figurine that, as a result of my sunstroke, is messing with my head.
In the dining room, he found two colleagues from the university who had gotten to town after him and joined them for dinner. They all agreed to go for a jeep tour along the coast of the lagoon the next day, to a famous abandoned European hotel built by German companies before the end of World War II. It was said in town that it had been built to welcome and hide European war fugitives and that the hotel was only open for a few years in the early 1950s. Then it was abandoned, and it stood on the coast, empty. The building looked too imposing for the small town, feeding legends of ghosts and international plots, stories undoubtedly fostered by tour operators.
The next day it was windy. He met his colleagues and walked toward the pier, but by noon the air was so contaminated with the salt that rose from the coast, that their eyes stung and their noses burned. The travel agency postponed the tour, so they returned to the hotel to wait until the wind subsided. In the street, pedestrians hurried to take refuge, and the reception and bar at the hotel were already full of frustrated vacationers.
"Another salt storm has come upon us," said the receptionist, with the confidence of a local who knows what is going to happen, and without flinching as the group of tourists from Buenos Aires bombarded her with questions, exasperated by the interruption of their thermal baths. "The storm has its cycle, so arm yourself with patience."
"It will be two days of loss, at least," said one of Matías' companions, studying his cell phone. "The long-distance buses scheduled to arrive will be temporarily suspended.”
They looked at each other with concern. It would delay their job for the project on fresh waters and the management of the Rio Dulce’s flow, which they hoped to present to the Senate Environmental Commission next month in Buenos Aires.
After lunch, the three met to compile data and organize papers. Two hours later they had finished, and Matías was left alone in the hotel bar, looking out the window at the deserted street. He was again thinking about his experience the previous day; he could not help ruminating on it over and over as if something were missing, although without a clue as to why or how this was happening.
Outside the wind swirled a salt powder that resembled fine snow. Matíasimagined the whirlwind that would be rising upwards, in a spiral, slowly forming a salt plume. He had studied the phenomenon many times in NASA photos. It was similar to a hurricane in its form and the salt would cover the area.
He ordered a coffee and tried to concentrate on his paperwork. Suddenly he felt the eerie presence of someone by his side again. With surprise, he recognized the beautiful woman of his dream; the model of the statuette. A tremor ran from his head to his toes. He hesitated a few seconds, and she smiled at him with her sensual lips again, just like on the beach. He stood up.
“Can I join you for a moment?” She asked with an indiscernible accent.
"Of course," he said, surprised, adjusting the chair.
There was a long, embarrassing silence as she sat, crossing her slender legs. Matías turned his attention to the face of this beautiful stranger. Conflicting thoughts crossed his mind. It was obvious that she was the model of the statuette, but he did not understand why she was there.
“I've surprised you! That was not my intention,” she said in a cheerful tone, with a voice that sounded musical. “My name is Mampa Anzenuza.”
"Matías Lamberti," he said, trying to compose himself and looking at her enthralled, "It’s a pleasure.”
Her dark green eyes, like the waters of the lagoon, studied him intently.
She quickly explained that she belonged to a very old family in this area and that she lived on the other side of the lagoon, but she was staying in the hotel for a few days. Mampa's voice flowed warm, now with the undulating accent of the locals. Matías, still not sure why she had approached him, but trying to be courteous, commented that he was from Rosario and was passing through, working with a team on a hydrographic project.
“Would you like a coffee, or anything else?” He asked, calling the waiter.
“Just a glass of water, thank you.” She settled into the chair. “Please tell me about your job. The natives of this area are very interested to learn about any project that might help conserve the fresh waters’ flow to our sea.”
Matías had had every intention of finding out more about her, but now he had to oblige by talking about his post-graduate work. Mampa seemed to absorb each word with great interest, her attentive and expressive green eyes focused and interspersing comments that demonstrated a good knowledge of the natural riches of the area. She led the conversation to the flamingos, a species that Matías had studied. Talking about them, Mampa's eyes brightened and her voice intensified.
“This sea has created a special food for our flamingos,” she said.
Matías nodded. He knew that in Mar Chiquita, as in the Dead Sea, there is a salt water crustacean that gives the birds that deep pink color that characterizes them as a distinctive variety of both seas.
"So, it is most important that we protect our flamingos," she insisted, her eyes on his. “They are our treasure, the treasure of our sea. Have you visited the area where the Rio Dulce ends?”
He shook his head.
“Please, go and see the estuaries so you can appreciate them in all their splendor. You will see majestic bands of hundreds of flamingos flying in unison. They visit us once a year after flying incredible distances from the Andes Mountains.”
Matías nodded absentmindedly, considering when it would be appropriate to ask her about the previous day on the beach, but he dismissed the urge. He did not want to break the spell of a conversation as serious for her as it was unexpected for him. She settled back in her chair.
"Matías," she said softly but urgently. He felt his heart quicken as he heard his name in her melodic voice. “The Rio Dulce is badly managed to the north as it crosses through Santiago del Estero. They divert the waters to other lands, without control. We are experiencing a great drought, and those waters are the life of this sea.”
He nodded in silence while she spoke.
"Even if it rains a lot at times," she continued, "the drought is here, and it will get worse. Something must be done so that our sea does not become a sterile salt flat, to which the migratory species will not be able to return. The Pilgrim falcons, arriving every December from Alaska, will not be back. Worse, the flamingos will not return.”
She was tense, shaking with a passion that he could not avoid and, inevitably, he had to lock his eyes on hers.
"I do not know what will happen to all of us," she continued, "if our sea slowly turns into a salt flat desert. Migratory birds will have no refuge. Salt storms will shake the area until it gets uninhabitable. The rains will be scarce, and the sea will die slowly.”
Matías, moved by her words, tried to explain that he was doing everything possible with this project, but, from his position, he could not influence anyone important directly. She stopped him short, softly but firmly.
“We never know what someone with determination and love for what she or he does is capable of with persistence.”
“True, we never know,” he agreed, secretly feeling that the only thing that mattered to him was to keep looking at her. He would have liked that moment to stretch forever, both of them like that, linked in a way that was inexplicable and overwhelming.
Her green eyes recovered their initial vivacity and flirtatious spark as if she were reading his thoughts. Their dialogue and her presence all had that unreal quality that he had noticed since waking up from his dream on the beach. He redirected the conversation politely to Miramar, trying without success to find out more about her. Then he invited her to dinner that night, and she accepted, seemingly very pleased.
They parted, and he saw her walking towards the staircase of the hotel. She climbed up with a graceful and elegant step, her dark, undulating hair shining under the room’s lights.
Annoyingly, his knees were shaking again. He had noticed that Mampa did not wear rings on her fingers, only a necklace on her discreet neckline made of small, shiny stones, maybe a local craft. She should be single, he thought hopefully.
Matías went up to his room, took a bath and called his companions to tell them that he was going to have dinner with someone else that night. When he went down to the dining room at the time they had agreed, Mampa did not show up. He waited a half hour and finally asked the concierge on duty if he had seen the beautiful guest come down from her room. The man looked at him with surprise.
“No, there is no guest with that name staying here."
Concealing his impatience, he went to the bar, where the same employee of the afternoon shift was still behind the counter.
"No, sir, we haven’t seen any lady here that fit that description."
"Impossible," he insisted. "She was here. Please, call the waiter who served me the coffee and brought her water."
The waiter assured him that when he had brought the glass, Matías was alone facing the window, and that the chair on the other side of the table was empty.
A tremor again ran from his head to his toes. Something very weird was happening. He thanked the man. Confused and no explanation as to what was happening, he joined the table of his classmates and reluctantly ate a light dinner.
That night he hardly slept, and at times he had nightmares. He woke up with a headache and the day was almost lost reviewing notes while waiting for the wind to subside. Matías could hardly concentrate on his work anyway, obsessed with his strange encounter with Mampa. Finally, at nightfall, the storm passed, and by the next day everything had returned to normal. The beach was bathed in a layer of salt that would eventually mix with the sand of the coast.
Driving in a worn but comfortable Land Rover with a loquacious native guide at the wheel, the trio headed towards the mouth of the Rio Dulce. The beauty of the estuaries left them speechless. They saw flocks of ducks, swans, parrots, herons and some small mammals.
Matías asked the guide if he knew an old local family by the name of Anzenuza. After thinking a bit, he said no, there was no family he knew of with that name. Before the arrival of the Spaniards four centuries ago, however, the natives of the area, the Sanavirons, had named the lagoon Mar de Anzenuza.
By then the mystery of Mampa had grown, and Matías started to doubt his mental stability.
Their ride that day included a lunch of sandwiches and sodas near the abandoned and supposedly haunted Vienna Hotel. They ate at picnic tables in the shade of immense palm trees, well-maintained for the tourists and evident remnants of an old and vast park surrounding the building. Later, the guide led them through the empty rooms of the abandoned structure. The windows still retained the original folding shutters and had balconies overlooking the sea. The guide explained succinctly:
"This used to be a five-star hotel, built in 1940 and abandoned without any explanation after World War II. People say that strange forms have appeared at night on the balconies, even though the building remains locked after hours."
They walked examining the empty rooms and, indeed, everything there had an enigmatic air of abandonment. Matías stayed behind, and leaned out of one of the windows to breathe the cool breeze. He lingered there, looking at the immense lake-sea about two hundred yards away, with its incessant white crests, and the barely visible coast on the other side.
"These are the grounds of the Anzenuza," he thought, with a shudder. Of Mampa Anzenuza, if that was, in fact, a real person and that was her real name.
He was not sure what all this meant; everything surrounding her appearance had seemed so unreal. He leaned out again and felt the dry air caress his feverish forehead. Below, the stones that led to the coast were still mostly covered with salt. A woman walked barefoot on the beach, her hair waving in the wind and her curvy body unmistakable. He recognized Mampa, with her flexible step and the legs that he had so closely admired at the hotel. Without thinking he raised his arm to greet her and she, evidently knowing that he was there, stopped right in front of the building. She looked towards his balcony and returned the greeting waving her hand for a moment, but then continued on her way, not looking back at him.
Matías wanted to scream her name, but he realized she might not hear him at such a distance. He hurried out of the room and flew down the stairs skipping steps. When he reached the exit, he turned at the cross-planted sign that said Grand Hotel Vienna, A Mystery by The Sea, and ran towards the stones that led to the beach (...)
"Dinner is from eight to eleven p.m.," she said.
"Thanks," he answered, before walking out into the burning sun.
His classmates from the university had not yet reached the small town of Miramar, but since he had two days off before starting the project, he decided to take advantage of them. The heat in the plains by Mar Chiquita Lagoon hadn't diminished since before noon when he got off the bus. But the sweltering heat did not bother him after those recent fieldwork incursions to the mountains, where he felt the sharp cold cutting his bones.
The beach was, as he expected, busy with tourists who alternated between the thermal mineral baths, dips in the heavy salty waters and the temporary relief of the umbrellas. Flocks of birds often crossed the area in a concert of batting wings, cackling and bright colors that attracted attention, fascinated the children and motivated amateur photographers.
Matías walked for some time looking for a more secluded spot, and then he laid under the hot sun which reflected on the sand from the blue-white noon sky.
He mentally enumerated the steps that he was going to follow with his working group to survey the state of the waters and the flow of the tributary of the small sea, or Mar Chiquita. However, with the stillness of the afternoon, his recent lunch and mounting fatigue, he fell into a light, pleasant slumber.
Suddenly, he felt someone reclining at his side. When he opened his eyes, he found a beautiful face, framed by long chestnut hair, and a deep green gaze that looked at him intently. Still drowsy, he sat up halfway, and she backed up slightly, still smiling. A shudder ran through him, and Matías rubbed his eyes with both hands.
“Yes?” He asked, still a little sleepy, expecting she would say something.
But the woman was not there any longer. He looked around, now fully awake, and noticed that almost all the tourists had left the beach and the closest ones were several yards away. It was evident that he had slept for some time.
He rested his head on the towel again, wondering about the image he had just seen. Where did she go? Was it a dream? Then he thought that with the intense heat, he might have had a heat stroke, and if so, the girl he thought he had seen had only been a mirage. He decided to seek some shade and found a small outdoor bar under the trees. Looking around, with the odd feeling that he may actually find her, he ordered a fruit juice. He did not understand why he felt so uneasy. Surely it had been a dream prompted by the intense heat, which he had clearly underestimated. At a mirror behind the bar, he noticed that the sun had reddened his skin, and his hair seemed even lighter in contrast. He finally made his way to the hotel for an early dinner, still frustrated by the indefinable feeling left by his strange experience.
He crossed the streets of the small commercial downtown, full of tourists at dusk. He went through a bookstore without much interest, and in one of the regional craft shops, his sight fell on a table with figurines for sale. One of them caught his attention. He picked it up, bewildered. It was a slender woman chiseled out of wood, about eight or nine inches tall. Matías stared at her face, her memorable features and her hair falling on her shoulders.
I must be going crazy! It has to be the excessive sun, he told himself. The face of the statuette looked remarkably like the woman he saw on the beach. He examined it for some time, finding details that he had not noticed before; the rounded small bust, the slender waist and the skirt that fell on the perfect curve of her hips to reach the legs that ended in two delicate, bare feet, resting on a ceramic platform. The model must have been a woman much like the hallucination I had this afternoon, he told himself. So, yes, there was a real woman and, perhaps, she was the one he had seen on the beach. He wanted to believe that it was real. And he told himself again that he had possibly been out of it because of the heat and that's why it had seemed like a mirage. It was evident now that she existed; he had not dreamed it. The thought filled him with expectations.
“How much?” He asked the busy cashier, holding the statuette in his hand.
"Thirty pesos," the girl replied.
Matías took the money out of his pocket and paid, enthralled by his acquisition. After the girl wrapped it in tissue paper, he walked out with the bundle in his hand, feeling an urgent need to open it and look at it again to verify that the model was indeed the girl on the beach and that he was not crazy.
When he got to his room, he placed the statuette on the nightstand. The figure looked to one side, as to something distant, the head high and the neck long and perfect down to its breasts. He turned it around, but still, the gesture was distant. Matías admired the skill of the artist, capable of carving a face so natural, almost as if painted on a canvas.
He checked his messages and then took a bath. While getting dressed, he glanced at the statuette every now and then. Finally, he went down to the dining room trying to escape the ridiculous spell of a wooden figurine. That's all it is, he told himself; a beautiful carved wooden figurine that, as a result of my sunstroke, is messing with my head.
In the dining room, he found two colleagues from the university who had gotten to town after him and joined them for dinner. They all agreed to go for a jeep tour along the coast of the lagoon the next day, to a famous abandoned European hotel built by German companies before the end of World War II. It was said in town that it had been built to welcome and hide European war fugitives and that the hotel was only open for a few years in the early 1950s. Then it was abandoned, and it stood on the coast, empty. The building looked too imposing for the small town, feeding legends of ghosts and international plots, stories undoubtedly fostered by tour operators.
The next day it was windy. He met his colleagues and walked toward the pier, but by noon the air was so contaminated with the salt that rose from the coast, that their eyes stung and their noses burned. The travel agency postponed the tour, so they returned to the hotel to wait until the wind subsided. In the street, pedestrians hurried to take refuge, and the reception and bar at the hotel were already full of frustrated vacationers.
"Another salt storm has come upon us," said the receptionist, with the confidence of a local who knows what is going to happen, and without flinching as the group of tourists from Buenos Aires bombarded her with questions, exasperated by the interruption of their thermal baths. "The storm has its cycle, so arm yourself with patience."
"It will be two days of loss, at least," said one of Matías' companions, studying his cell phone. "The long-distance buses scheduled to arrive will be temporarily suspended.”
They looked at each other with concern. It would delay their job for the project on fresh waters and the management of the Rio Dulce’s flow, which they hoped to present to the Senate Environmental Commission next month in Buenos Aires.
After lunch, the three met to compile data and organize papers. Two hours later they had finished, and Matías was left alone in the hotel bar, looking out the window at the deserted street. He was again thinking about his experience the previous day; he could not help ruminating on it over and over as if something were missing, although without a clue as to why or how this was happening.
Outside the wind swirled a salt powder that resembled fine snow. Matíasimagined the whirlwind that would be rising upwards, in a spiral, slowly forming a salt plume. He had studied the phenomenon many times in NASA photos. It was similar to a hurricane in its form and the salt would cover the area.
He ordered a coffee and tried to concentrate on his paperwork. Suddenly he felt the eerie presence of someone by his side again. With surprise, he recognized the beautiful woman of his dream; the model of the statuette. A tremor ran from his head to his toes. He hesitated a few seconds, and she smiled at him with her sensual lips again, just like on the beach. He stood up.
“Can I join you for a moment?” She asked with an indiscernible accent.
"Of course," he said, surprised, adjusting the chair.
There was a long, embarrassing silence as she sat, crossing her slender legs. Matías turned his attention to the face of this beautiful stranger. Conflicting thoughts crossed his mind. It was obvious that she was the model of the statuette, but he did not understand why she was there.
“I've surprised you! That was not my intention,” she said in a cheerful tone, with a voice that sounded musical. “My name is Mampa Anzenuza.”
"Matías Lamberti," he said, trying to compose himself and looking at her enthralled, "It’s a pleasure.”
Her dark green eyes, like the waters of the lagoon, studied him intently.
She quickly explained that she belonged to a very old family in this area and that she lived on the other side of the lagoon, but she was staying in the hotel for a few days. Mampa's voice flowed warm, now with the undulating accent of the locals. Matías, still not sure why she had approached him, but trying to be courteous, commented that he was from Rosario and was passing through, working with a team on a hydrographic project.
“Would you like a coffee, or anything else?” He asked, calling the waiter.
“Just a glass of water, thank you.” She settled into the chair. “Please tell me about your job. The natives of this area are very interested to learn about any project that might help conserve the fresh waters’ flow to our sea.”
Matías had had every intention of finding out more about her, but now he had to oblige by talking about his post-graduate work. Mampa seemed to absorb each word with great interest, her attentive and expressive green eyes focused and interspersing comments that demonstrated a good knowledge of the natural riches of the area. She led the conversation to the flamingos, a species that Matías had studied. Talking about them, Mampa's eyes brightened and her voice intensified.
“This sea has created a special food for our flamingos,” she said.
Matías nodded. He knew that in Mar Chiquita, as in the Dead Sea, there is a salt water crustacean that gives the birds that deep pink color that characterizes them as a distinctive variety of both seas.
"So, it is most important that we protect our flamingos," she insisted, her eyes on his. “They are our treasure, the treasure of our sea. Have you visited the area where the Rio Dulce ends?”
He shook his head.
“Please, go and see the estuaries so you can appreciate them in all their splendor. You will see majestic bands of hundreds of flamingos flying in unison. They visit us once a year after flying incredible distances from the Andes Mountains.”
Matías nodded absentmindedly, considering when it would be appropriate to ask her about the previous day on the beach, but he dismissed the urge. He did not want to break the spell of a conversation as serious for her as it was unexpected for him. She settled back in her chair.
"Matías," she said softly but urgently. He felt his heart quicken as he heard his name in her melodic voice. “The Rio Dulce is badly managed to the north as it crosses through Santiago del Estero. They divert the waters to other lands, without control. We are experiencing a great drought, and those waters are the life of this sea.”
He nodded in silence while she spoke.
"Even if it rains a lot at times," she continued, "the drought is here, and it will get worse. Something must be done so that our sea does not become a sterile salt flat, to which the migratory species will not be able to return. The Pilgrim falcons, arriving every December from Alaska, will not be back. Worse, the flamingos will not return.”
She was tense, shaking with a passion that he could not avoid and, inevitably, he had to lock his eyes on hers.
"I do not know what will happen to all of us," she continued, "if our sea slowly turns into a salt flat desert. Migratory birds will have no refuge. Salt storms will shake the area until it gets uninhabitable. The rains will be scarce, and the sea will die slowly.”
Matías, moved by her words, tried to explain that he was doing everything possible with this project, but, from his position, he could not influence anyone important directly. She stopped him short, softly but firmly.
“We never know what someone with determination and love for what she or he does is capable of with persistence.”
“True, we never know,” he agreed, secretly feeling that the only thing that mattered to him was to keep looking at her. He would have liked that moment to stretch forever, both of them like that, linked in a way that was inexplicable and overwhelming.
Her green eyes recovered their initial vivacity and flirtatious spark as if she were reading his thoughts. Their dialogue and her presence all had that unreal quality that he had noticed since waking up from his dream on the beach. He redirected the conversation politely to Miramar, trying without success to find out more about her. Then he invited her to dinner that night, and she accepted, seemingly very pleased.
They parted, and he saw her walking towards the staircase of the hotel. She climbed up with a graceful and elegant step, her dark, undulating hair shining under the room’s lights.
Annoyingly, his knees were shaking again. He had noticed that Mampa did not wear rings on her fingers, only a necklace on her discreet neckline made of small, shiny stones, maybe a local craft. She should be single, he thought hopefully.
Matías went up to his room, took a bath and called his companions to tell them that he was going to have dinner with someone else that night. When he went down to the dining room at the time they had agreed, Mampa did not show up. He waited a half hour and finally asked the concierge on duty if he had seen the beautiful guest come down from her room. The man looked at him with surprise.
“No, there is no guest with that name staying here."
Concealing his impatience, he went to the bar, where the same employee of the afternoon shift was still behind the counter.
"No, sir, we haven’t seen any lady here that fit that description."
"Impossible," he insisted. "She was here. Please, call the waiter who served me the coffee and brought her water."
The waiter assured him that when he had brought the glass, Matías was alone facing the window, and that the chair on the other side of the table was empty.
A tremor again ran from his head to his toes. Something very weird was happening. He thanked the man. Confused and no explanation as to what was happening, he joined the table of his classmates and reluctantly ate a light dinner.
That night he hardly slept, and at times he had nightmares. He woke up with a headache and the day was almost lost reviewing notes while waiting for the wind to subside. Matías could hardly concentrate on his work anyway, obsessed with his strange encounter with Mampa. Finally, at nightfall, the storm passed, and by the next day everything had returned to normal. The beach was bathed in a layer of salt that would eventually mix with the sand of the coast.
Driving in a worn but comfortable Land Rover with a loquacious native guide at the wheel, the trio headed towards the mouth of the Rio Dulce. The beauty of the estuaries left them speechless. They saw flocks of ducks, swans, parrots, herons and some small mammals.
Matías asked the guide if he knew an old local family by the name of Anzenuza. After thinking a bit, he said no, there was no family he knew of with that name. Before the arrival of the Spaniards four centuries ago, however, the natives of the area, the Sanavirons, had named the lagoon Mar de Anzenuza.
By then the mystery of Mampa had grown, and Matías started to doubt his mental stability.
Their ride that day included a lunch of sandwiches and sodas near the abandoned and supposedly haunted Vienna Hotel. They ate at picnic tables in the shade of immense palm trees, well-maintained for the tourists and evident remnants of an old and vast park surrounding the building. Later, the guide led them through the empty rooms of the abandoned structure. The windows still retained the original folding shutters and had balconies overlooking the sea. The guide explained succinctly:
"This used to be a five-star hotel, built in 1940 and abandoned without any explanation after World War II. People say that strange forms have appeared at night on the balconies, even though the building remains locked after hours."
They walked examining the empty rooms and, indeed, everything there had an enigmatic air of abandonment. Matías stayed behind, and leaned out of one of the windows to breathe the cool breeze. He lingered there, looking at the immense lake-sea about two hundred yards away, with its incessant white crests, and the barely visible coast on the other side.
"These are the grounds of the Anzenuza," he thought, with a shudder. Of Mampa Anzenuza, if that was, in fact, a real person and that was her real name.
He was not sure what all this meant; everything surrounding her appearance had seemed so unreal. He leaned out again and felt the dry air caress his feverish forehead. Below, the stones that led to the coast were still mostly covered with salt. A woman walked barefoot on the beach, her hair waving in the wind and her curvy body unmistakable. He recognized Mampa, with her flexible step and the legs that he had so closely admired at the hotel. Without thinking he raised his arm to greet her and she, evidently knowing that he was there, stopped right in front of the building. She looked towards his balcony and returned the greeting waving her hand for a moment, but then continued on her way, not looking back at him.
Matías wanted to scream her name, but he realized she might not hear him at such a distance. He hurried out of the room and flew down the stairs skipping steps. When he reached the exit, he turned at the cross-planted sign that said Grand Hotel Vienna, A Mystery by The Sea, and ran towards the stones that led to the beach (...)
