LITMIR.BIZ

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are you doing home so soon?’

      I flinched with fright and covered my head.

      ‘Not the machete, no!’ I screamed.

      ‘Calm down kid, machete indeed!’

      It was only our neighbour, Candida.

      My balls dropped back into their proper place.

      ‘Why didn’t you go to school?’ she asked.

      ‘I did go. What happened was … We finished early …’ It sounded pretty lame, even to me.

      ‘Look at you, you’re soaking wet!’

      ‘It’s because I ran all the way from the bus-stop …’

      ‘And where are Alexis and Alexander?’

      ‘Don’t know … haven’t seen them.’

      ‘Where are you off to?’

      ‘Sorry, got to go now!’

      I ran away not wanting a lecture about how the youth of today did not appreciate the achievements of the Revolution etc., etc. Once Candida got the bit between her teeth there was no stopping her and I really could not get caught up in all that. My father might appear at any moment.

      I climbed the stairs to our apartment, and the door was wide open so I went in without making a noise, passing through the living room into the bedroom. Bertica was in the kitchen cooking and Marilín was in the bathroom. I was creeping towards the bunk bed where Mamá had been sleeping since she came back from the hospital, when she opened her eyes in alarm, as if to ask me, ‘What the hell are you doing home so early?’

      I fished a mango out of my rucksack and kissed her, just before Bertica caught me.

      ‘Yuli, what are you doing here? Papito’s going to kill you. Oooh mangos! Come on, give me one, give me one, my lovely little brother!’

      Marilín heard her and came running out of the bathroom.

      ‘I want one too, I want a mango!’

      I held on tightly to my rucksack.

      ‘You’re not getting anything! This one’s for Mami and I’m going to sell the rest.’

      ‘Yuli, don’t be bad.’

      ‘No, Marilín. I want to sell them to go to the cinema.’

      ‘Then I’m going to tell Papito that you didn’t go to school.’ Bertica was such a blackmailer.

      ‘I don’t give a fuck. Tell him what you like. You’re still gonna get a big fat nothing, noth—’

      I stopped. Outside we all heard the unmistakable sound of my father’s lorry as he parked. For about ten seconds you could have heard a pin drop.

      ‘Papito’s home, now you’re in for it!’ said Bertica.

      I started to shake and both my sisters stared hard at me. We heard my father’s footsteps on the stairs and then the sound of a key in the lock. I could not hold out any longer. I dived into my rucksack and pulled out four mangos.

      ‘Go on, quick, take them and keep your mouths shut!’ I thrust them at the girls.

      The door opened.

      ‘Evening everyone! What are you doing here?’ My father zoomed in on me immediately.

      ‘Nothing, we just finished a little bit early today.’

      ‘A little bit? You mean about two hours.’

      ‘The piano teacher was ill, so we missed the last session.’

      ‘And what new things did you learn today?’

      My sisters went pale, clearly wondering how I was going to get out of that one.

      ‘Well … this … we learnt how to do échappé in fifth position.’

      ‘What?’

      ‘It’s a ballet exercise, it’s a bit weird, it starts…’

      I pointed my toe to demonstrate.

      ‘What about in your schoolwork?’ My father interrupted me.

      ‘I … in my schoolwork …’

      My hesitation finished me. He knew I was lying. I was for it.

      We all held our breaths, but just then, my mother beckoned to my father to come over.

      He crouched down beside her and she whispered something in his ear. He listened attentively for a moment then he got up again and walked towards me.

      I was praying for a miracle.

      His heavy hand fell onto my shoulder.

      ‘Go and get washed,’ he said.

      My sisters’ jaws dropped. They looked at me amazed as I turned and got out of there as fast as I could. In the kitchen I gave thanks for both Marías – the one up there in heaven, and my blessed saviour Mamá, down here on the bed.

      But my deliverance would not last for long.

      Having got away with it once, I started to skip class on a regular basis. One Tuesday morning, a couple of months later, the school called my father to inform him that, as I had not shown up for four weeks in a row, I would not be allowed to participate in any of the ballets that I was supposed to be dancing in. My old man said there must be some mistake: he himself had been waking me up at five o’clock every morning. Surely they were confusing me with another student also called Carlos? The school told him that this was not the first time that Carlos Junior Acosta had missed extended periods of school, and that he would need to have a serious talk with me if I were to avoid being transferred or expelled.

      When my old man heard this, steam started hissing out of his ears, like a coffee pot on the point of percolating. Certainly, he assured the teacher, it would never happen again.

      Meanwhile, I had spent a happy day at the lake in La Fortuna, gorging on mangos. When I arrived back in my neighbourhood that afternoon, I noticed that my father’s truck was not parked outside my house yet, and, as it was still too early to go home, I joined in a game of ‘four corners’– a kind of street baseball – with some friends. Two and a half hours later, I picked up my rucksack and walked nonchalantly home. When I reached our corner, however, I was horrified to see the green lorry parked in a different spot from usual. I immediately knew that something was amiss. Why would the old man park his lorry round the corner from his usual spot? Was he trying to hide it from me? Had he been home the whole time I was playing? Did he have some kind of suspicion that he wanted to confirm? I began to sweat and feel sick.

      My father was waiting for me on the balcony. His face was contorted with rage, the veins in his neck were swollen and his nostrils were flared, like a bull about to charge. He gestured at me to come upstairs, and I knew there was no escape.

      As I reached the top step, his great hand grabbed me by the neck and hurled me into the apartment.

      My sisters Bertica and Marilín looked at me with expectant fear; my mother, in her bed, said nothing. My father slammed the door and walked towards me.

      ‘Sit down!’ he commanded.

      Marilín’s eyes were wide with terror.

      Outside, life had stopped. I could not hear the shouts of the neighbours any more, or the honk of car horns, or Kenia’s radio as she listened to her soap operas. I was only aware of my heart pounding crazily in my chest as my father leant towards me.

      ‘What did you learn today?’

      ‘Um, well … I learnt …’

      Crack!

      I’m not sure what he hit me with. I only remember that when I came round, I was lying

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