Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter - Mario Vargas Llosa [186]
It was Uncle Lucho himself who came to the door to let us in. He gave us a smile that seemed terribly forced, kissed Aunt Julia on the cheek, and kissed me, too.
“Your sister’s still in bed, but she’s awake,” he said to Aunt Julia, pointing toward the bedroom. “Go on in.”
He and I went and sat down in the living room, from which one could see the Jesuit seminary, the breakwater, and the sea when there was no fog. The only things visible at that moment were the blurred outlines of the wall and the red-brick rooftop terrace of the seminary.
“I’m not going to pull your ears, because you’re too big for that now,” Uncle Lucho murmured. He looked really dejected, and his face showed that he’d spent a sleepless night. “Do you have any idea, though, what a mess you’ve gotten yourself into?”
“It was the only way to keep them from separating us,” I said, a reply I’d already rehearsed in my mind. “Julia and I love each other,” I went on. “We haven’t done anything on the spur of the moment. We’ve thought everything through and we know what we’re doing. I promise you we’re going to make out all right.”
“You’re still just a kid, you don’t have a profession or even a roof over your head, you’ll have to give up your studies and work like a slave to support your wife,” Uncle Lucho muttered, lighting a cigarette and shaking his head. “You’ve cooked your own goose. Nobody’s happy about the situation, because everybody in the family was hoping you’d amount to something. We’re heartsick at seeing you dive headfirst into mediocrity because of a mere passing fancy.”
“I’m not going to give up my studies, I’m going to get my degree, I’m going to do exactly what I would have done if I hadn’t gotten married,” I assured him heatedly. “You have to believe me and make the family believe me. Julia’s going to help me, I’ll study now, I’ll feel more like working.”
“For the moment, the first order of business is to pacify your father, who’s fit to be tied,” Uncle Lucho said, in a less stern tone of voice all of a sudden. He’d done his duty and pulled my ears, and now he seemed ready to help me. “He won’t listen to reason, and is threatening to turn Julia in to the police and I don’t know what-all.”
I said I’d talk to him and try to get him to accept the facts. Uncle Lucho looked me up and down: it was shameful for a brand-new bridegroom to be going around in a dirty shirt. I should go back to my grandparents’ house, take a bath, change my clothes, and then reassure them, because they were very worried about me. We talked a while more, and even had coffee together, but Julia still hadn’t come out of Aunt Olga’s bedroom. I strained my ears trying to make out whether they were weeping, shouting, arguing with each other inside. But not a sound came through the closed door. Aunt Julia finally came out, by herself. Her face was bright red, as though she’d been out in the sun too long, but she was smiling.
“Well, you’re alive at least and all in one piece,” Uncle Lucho said to her. “I thought your sister was going to snatch you bald-headed.”
“She very nearly slapped my face when she first saw me,” Aunt Julia confessed, sitting down beside me. “She said awful things to me, naturally. But I take it that, despite everything, I can stay here with you till things blow over.”
I rose to my feet and said I had to go to Panamericana: it would be tragic if I lost my job at this point. Uncle Lucho saw me to the door, told me to come back for lunch, and when I kissed Aunt Julia goodbye as I left, I saw him smile.
I rushed to the corner grocery store to call my cousin Nancy, and luckily for me she was the one who answered the phone. When she recognized my voice, she was struck speechless for a moment. We agreed to meet in ten minutes in the Parque Salazar. When I arrived at the park, she was already there, dying of curiosity. Before