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By Root 1018 0

to Javier at one end of the table, I was trying my best to smile, drinking little sips of nearly lukewarm beer, and counting the minutes ticking by. The mayor and the others soon lost interest in us. The bottles kept coming, by themselves at first, then accompanied by raw fish marinated in lemon juice, smoked sole, almond pastries filled with custard, and then by themselves again. Nobody remembered the marriage ceremony, not even Pascual, who, with bloodshot eyes and a thick tongue, had joined in with the others and was singing sentimental songs with the mayor. Having flirted with Aunt Julia all through lunch, the latter was now trying to put his arm around her and leaning his bloated face toward hers. With little forced smiles, Aunt Julia was keeping her distance and casting anxious looks in our direction every so often.

“Cool it, old pal,” Javier kept saying to me. “Don’t think about anything but the marriage ceremony.”

“It seems to me the whole thing’s gone down the drain,” I said when I heard the mayor, who was high as a kite now, talking about bringing in guitarists, closing El Sol de Chincha, having a private dancing party. “And I predict I’ll end up in jail once I’ve punched that stupid bastard in the nose.”

I was furious and determined to knock his block off if he got out of line. I got to my feet and told Aunt Julia that we were leaving. Vastly relieved, she stood up immediately and the mayor made no attempt to hold her back. He went on singing marineras, on key, and as we started for the door he gave us a little farewell smile that struck me as being sarcastic, but Javier, who was following along behind us, said that it was merely alcoholic. As we were walking back to the Hotel Sudamericano, I began saying nasty things about Pascual, whom I blamed—I don’t know why—for the entire absurd lunch.

“Don’t be a spoiled brat, and learn to keep a cool head,” Javier said reprovingly. “That cousin of his is plastered to the gills and doesn’t remember a thing. But don’t worry, he’ll marry you today. Wait in the hotel till I call you.”

The moment Aunt Julia and I were alone in the room, we fell into each other’s arms and began kissing with a sort of desperation. We didn’t say a word, but our hands and mouths spoke volumes about all the intense and beautiful things we were feeling. We’d begun to embrace standing just inside the door, and little by little we drew closer to the bed, first sitting down on it and finally lying down on it, without ever having let go of each other. Half blind with happiness and desire, I fondled Aunt Julia’s body with inexpert, eager hands, with all her clothes on at first, and then I unbuttoned her brick-colored blouse, badly wrinkled now, and was kissing her breasts when there was an inopportune knock at the door.

“Everything’s all set, you concubines,” we heard Javier’s voice say. “In five minutes, in the mayor’s office. The famous kindhearted idiot is waiting for us.”

We leapt up from the bed, dazed and happy, and Aunt Julia, beet-red with embarrassment, straightened her clothes, as meantime, like a little boy, I closed my eyes and thought about abstract, respectable things—numbers, triangles, circles, my granny, my mama—to make my erection go away. Taking turns in the bathroom down the hall, we washed and combed our hair a little, then walked back to the city hall, so fast that we arrived all out of breath. The secretary immediately ushered us into the mayor’s office, a big room with a Peruvian seal of state hanging on the wall, overlooking a desk with little flags and official registers and half a dozen benches, like a schoolroom. With his face washed and his hair still damp, calm and collected, the rubicund burgomaster bowed ceremoniously to us from behind the desk. He was an entirely different person: formal and solemn. Javier and Pascual, standing on either side of the desk, smiled at us roguishly.

“Well then, let’s begin,” the mayor said, his voice betraying him: thick and hesitant, as though his tongue were blocking it. “Where are the papers?”

“You have them, sir,” Javier answered,