We Fall Forwards
Sebastián Amador

CHAPTER EXTRACTED FROM THE UNPUBLISHED NOVEL: VAGABOND MEMORIES

While he mulls over the wheat field and pays madness for it, how are we to occupy ourselves? I offer you one of the stories he lived through in his head. Our intention is to better understand the nature of the protagonist, no? So we would have to examine some episode of his fantasy, to make good use of it... Since that is very well our intention –I will reveal– I will tell you whatever, and you will be forever grateful.

With the parade of dandelion that once lost their seed, shoelace and battered shoes hang from the power-line, raw under the midday sun, worn away for apathy’s sake, the crude sincerity of that midday sun, quiet cigarette embers on the wet grass and their gray thread wretched until it fades with the all too tender breeze, there the wandering peddler and the coffee spilled every wavering step he takes tracing droplets on the pavement, like the rattling coin that scours his pocket, and broken glass lonely mounds of the softly shaded alleys, and the guava tree blossoms graceless on the concrete edge, dust in the old air, scorching with the weight of a clear sky, a series of plastic advertisements melting and the slogan half-said, umbrellas
colorful like coward shrieks, black bird of lazy wing, we fall forwards, we go together unknowing, with the parade of dandelion that once lost their seed.

But nothing remains when I finally arrive at that office. It swallows me. It ends the fuss that was the outside. Only the documents whine as they’re handled in a deadbeat urgency. Those who wait their turn try to forget. Here there are only documents. And my turn is my little ticket. And I sit to wait in the long queue that barely reaches the counter... Those that first arrived slept in the sorry tents that crumple weatherbeaten. I will wait, but waiting gets you thinking. What am I doing here?

I had never seen fireflies. I don’t know when it is that I realized. Before, time passed me by silently, and then it only ever reminded me that I had never seen fireflies. I was far from this office, young, I was someone else. At best they knew for sure that they had never seen even one miserable firefly, and the thought was more than enough. I was comfortable. I had accepted the fact that my life was my life, until the idea occurred to me that I would die imagining memories that weren’t mine. And since then all lights are a burden. The innocent candle, the coarse light bulb, the glint of joy in a fleeting lover, when your mind quiets down for just a moment, or the unsettling morning, it’s a burden, you’ve never seen the fireflies. And so I took the biggest rucksack we had lying around the house.

I would like to tell you that I don’t regret it, but that is a difficult thing, being where I am. Between the screen and the ticket my nerves go with the turns. Distracted, I shoot a full look at a stranger’s face... The worst of it is that this isn’t the worst of all. The ominous and the tedium. Slow burn. I count the dirty specks on the chair that could be plastic.

That’s how the ones on the buses looked. Thank some tragedy former to everything else, there were no fireflies near where I lived. So I took many of those buses, with the rucksack. They were dried-up rattles that would shiver with every erratic jolt of the old engine, there was a chill that came in through a hole in the floor, they would bring in game-roosters, and the owners would say, “you don’t even have one problem...”

What woke me for the first time was the tone of his voice. I would’ve slept through the memories. He cut through the faint-hearted thicket with that agitated stress. Maybe I was frightened. The peddler that was spilling coffee had come into the same office, and he stood in front of the far counter. But he stayed just like that, the same as always, it’s only the exasperation of anyone when the half-open jug sprays his panela coffee, I am with the old bus monotony, with the pathetic fight, dreaming and waking alike, dreaming and waking alike, but one time the bus did brake harshly. Maybe I was frightened. I could feel the static on my
skin.

It was dread that was too much like certainty. It was the uncanny stiffness of the driver, it was the heavy boots on the frail steps, it was a moment that grew and only grew, the kids in the military garb and their rifles that would trip along the narrow corridor. They played with the rooster, they stood around the old man...

“You look hungry.” And the old man must have said whatever. One of them got the flask out of his bag. “This is sugar-water... Drink some.” And the old man drank some. “Have some more.”

“Have some more.” “Have some more.” His stomach stretched and bloated, his lip trembled, I think we were still for several hours. “Have some more.” His face disfigured in anger and nausea. But in the end they were only bored. They left and nothing much happened. And in the end the wandering peddler resigned to sitting and waiting for his turn to fight again at the counter. Only he believes that it will be any different.

I have the impression that my number was called, or I understood something like that from the microphone and its dulled cry. I wonder how all of this will end. And I sit on another plastic seat. “Good morning, sir...” And I do not know if he heard me. The panel that separates us is well made... He has a practiced neutrality, dark-skinned, dressed nice, and an accent from who knows where, “good morning.” He doesn’t look me in the eye. He is waiting for my documents...

That string of buses that was like living years brought me far. The last stop was just a bench and its miserable little signpost, bindweed crawled high, thirsting flowers rained from above, rust like the pale blue of a dead man, I was at the end of the world. Puddles like centennial stock, how many leaves crying dirt-charged dew for the dismembered worms, and the sultry clay smells like dried blood, the playful mist, the pressing brook, we fall forwards, we fall forwards

The functionary is grimacing. “What’s this ignorance that’s marked right here?” ...I had never seen fireflies, and I have never seen fireflies, when the night was already coming down, and when everything that I had done to be there was beginning to make sense, they didn’t let me stay, the border watch accused me of being one step too far from the imaginary line, and those are the rules. That was the day I got what I deserved. And now I am here...

He’s still grimacing. He still hasn’t looked me in the eye. The monitor must be showing him something very curious... “...ok. Wait just a second.”

The animal dread of a single note that chokes in your throat, the tree-rind bare and coiled like a terrible ulcer, the earth stained with the violence of expectancy, waves always and everywhere, all things rise as they fall, and I do not know if I would fall content, I would fall waiting, that the fireflies might come, that the fireflies might come, and even if they came, I would still be waiting, that the fireflies might come, that the fireflies might come

He still hasn’t looked me in the eye. Another worker came to see what it is that’s keeping him. “This is a very strange case.” “What’s the problem?” “...He has two valid documents, one before and one after he crossed the border-line.” “Which one are you going to register?” “I don’t know which one he is, officially.” “If this was an examination you’d be in trouble.” “And this part of the form is...” “It’s the worst, you have to keep switching between the pages.” “I’ve seen another one of these cases, an F-19, they’re always this complicated.”

He still hasn’t looked me in the eye. “The complicated thing about F-19’s is that their A27 has 3 J-1... D-15LMPOZ 10987654321... 10987654321... 10987654321... 54321... 321...Why isn’t he looking me in the eye? “I am going to have to decide who this person is...“Check his signatures, like that, against the backlight...”

God is a machine, and I have him in front of me. With my knuckle I count the time against the grimy panel that separates us. The confused functionary looks me in the eye. I only asked him the one question

“Do you feel loved?”

Sebastián Amador hopes you enjoy the writing.