I cross the road badly, a taxi scrapes past me, I circle the plaza three times and linger for a few seconds at the foot of the Garibaldi monument without looking up at it. Poom. The same route as ever. By the skips from which I rescued the snake book, a small dog comes out of nowhere and barks at me, irritated, like a large rat, running after me for a few metres and threatening to bite. The barks force me to jog to the corner, something I don’t decide for myself; my body is in command. As I run, I throw a kick in the air to get him off me but instead of scaring him away, because I gave him a fright, he takes a leap and a bite. He only manages to wet my ankle with his muzzle.
Later, saying goodbye at the door of the guesthouse, Iris reminds me: It’s Christmas Eve on Thursday. She pins me down with her eyes waiting for my reaction, which doesn’t arrive, not so much because I have nothing to say but because I feel put out. Christmas Eve, I repeat with a smile, as if it makes me happy. For no apparent reason, the idea brings back the image of Jaime in his coffin, still too fresh, as if he were suddenly in front of me. Why don’t we go to the all-you-can-eat buffet next to the church? There’s a special promotion on, three eat for the price of two, she says, raising her eyebrows as if it were a serious matter. She adds that the menu includes a glass of champagne for the toast; I can’t work out whether she’s saying it ironically or to convince me. I’m about to say: In our case, given the amount Simón eats, it would be better if two and a quarter could eat for the price of two. But I restrain myself, I’m in no mood to make her laugh, even less of a mood to laugh myself. Sounds good, I say quite sincerely; the truth is I can’t think of a better option.
Eleven
On the twenty-fourth, with the sun still a long way from disappearing, we go to the hotel to pick up Iris. First, I inject Tosca with an especially strong dose; I feel better that way, she says. Drop in when you come back, you can give me another if I need it. Iris suggested walking for a while to work up an appetite and get our money’s worth out of the food. That’s how she put it, she let out a cackle and I thought it a good idea. Simón walks on the way out; on the way back we take turns carrying him on our shoulders. We go to the large plaza, we pass the corner where el Buti stands, I point out our window, we stop at a kiosk to buy 7UP, we go into a shop filled with Chinese merchandise, miniatures, plastic flowers, handheld fans; Simón is fascinated by a miniature samurai sword. When we start to feel our legs, we head for the restaurant.
In the little square that smells of urine, we join the sparse audience watching a live nativity scene. I’m not sure, but I get the impression the event is organised by the evangelical church next to the Fénix. Around a shack improvised loosely from cardboard boxes and canes, a series of sinister characters is parading, trying to pervert a naive young girl. It’s actually a woman who’s well into her thirties wearing a school uniform, white blouse and kilt, which detracts a fair bit from the credibility of her role. Among the demons hounding her, there’s a man dressed in leather trying to seduce her with a bunch of flowers, and when he doesn’t succeed, he pounces, groping her, just like a monkey. Now another man appears, bald with bulging eyes and a revolver tucked in his waistband, who flings a shower of banknotes at her. He is followed by a rather primitive-looking woman who tempts her with a piece of raw meat. Finally, she is approached by a punk swaying with a bottle of beer in his hand. Besieged by all the sins surrounding her and forming a kind of tribal dance, the girl is about to kill herself when out of the shack emerges a strange Jesus wrapped down to his feet in a tunic, no crown of thorns or beard, who throws himself on top of her to protect her from the vices, which flee from his presence in terror. Iris gives in to temptation and runs off laughing into her hand; Simón can’t believe his eyes.
We get to the buffet restaurant at around half nine. The place is already full. Two or three large families, several couples alone and a group of young boys whose features, gestures and tans betray them as foreigners — Australians or North Americans. They are the quietest at the start of the night, the most uninhibited by the end. We sit by the window, a bit of a squeeze, but it’s fine. The tables are decorated with streamers, paper serviettes with Christmas motifs, rubber mistletoe and a tiny tree that keeps falling over. For the duration of the meal, Iris or I will keep trying to stabilise the little tree by propping it up in every way possible, using breadcrumbs as a base, spearing it to the tablecloth with toothpicks, wedging it between two glasses. Later on, as the alcohol takes effect, the toppling or perhaps just twisted pine becomes a source of amusement rather than annoyance. We see who can keep it standing for longest until Iris comes up with the ultimate solution: sticking it to the table with a bit of gum which she chews rapidly between courses.
The food is arranged in two large display counters facing each other. On one side, all the hot food, on the other, the cold cuts and salads and, a bit further along, the desserts. The abundance, the shape of certain items and the colour of some of the sauces is amazing at times, even repulsive. There’s lamb, rabbit’s foot, frogs, squid rings, octopus tentacles, all kinds of schnitzels, an obscene amount of chips. I wonder where they got the frogs, whether they have a breeding tank out back. I eat with relish, like never before. Steaks, a colourful cabbage salad, whitebait and a cheese roulade, palm hearts and olives. I help myself to seconds as if I had been fasting for a week. Iris is more daring: without hesitating she fills her plate with half a dozen frogs, piled in a pyramid. Simón, on the other hand, doesn’t want to experiment at all, he limits himself to some cheese and ham empanadas and, three times, makes me bring him a stainless steel dish of red jelly cubes. We drink white wine; Iris takes it upon herself to order one bottle after another.
Without saying much, we devote ourselves to chewing, to joking about the decorations, laughing at people, that’s how our Christmas Eve unfolds. When we can’t go on, Iris releases a burp which Simón laughs at and attempts to imitate. A very young waitress in leggings that reveal the line of her arse and the folds of a camel-toe — May as well be naked, Iris says — collects our empty dishes, a mountain of bones and cartilage.
We start chatting about people from the zoo. We criticise almost everyone, we share gossip, we list physical defects, as work colleagues tend to do when others aren’t there. I talk about the few I know, Yessica, Esteban, the polar-bear keeper, the old woman in the office and the guy from human resources. He’s a troglodyte, says Iris and I can’t believe she uses the word troglodyte, I don’t know where she can have learnt it and even less how she manages to pronounce it. We also mention Canetti, she gets to her feet to imitate him, lame and stooped, mouth twisted, just like Quasimodo.
Iris is out of control, almost euphoric. She takes a breath and hurries to empty her glass; she has another anecdote, something she’s never told me. On her second day of work she almost died. That’s what she says: I almost died. It seems that a woman, a fat lady, she explains and mimics her by spreading out her arms, got her footing wrong as she was crossing the hanging walkway in the subtropical rainforest; she broke a plank in two and got her leg stuck between the wires. In mid-air, she says, and continues describing the scene, which provokes one of her distinctive cackles, shaking the table and beyond. Iris recomposes herself and tells me how she almost had a fit, the plump lady swearing from on high and herself unable to move for laughing. I thought they’d throw me out right then and there, she says. I’ve never been in the famous rainforest, I’ve only seen the building from a distance, so I have to imagine the situation from Iris’s descriptions. The vines, the tarantulas, the recorded monkey shrieks and a woman trapped in the middle of this artificial jungle. And of course, I can’t help laughing along with her. Apparently, because of the risk of the bridge collapsing, they had to bring in a stepladder to rescue her. When they finally got her down, Iris disappeared, she hid in the bathroom until everyone left.