I can see myself back then. I am siting in the living room, with a finger against my lips, as if asking for silence, my thumb against my chin, my elbows on my knees and all the papers around me. The vapor coming out of the bathroom was moistening them and she was standing in front of me wrapped in a towel, waiting for me to make a move. I smiled and she smiled back, then ran away. I got the papers together, put them in a blue folder, put the folder in my bag.

My mind was drifting then, I think I was already suspicious but not quite, not completely aware. I thought maybe Hector wants something to happen, maybe he’s planning something. People do that sometimes: they like to plan something and they like it when it comes out just like they had planned, that feeling that for once everything around you (not in the whole universe, but in a small circle of light around you) is in its right, proper place, and you put it there, that jewish desire. Back then I was hardly conscious, I just had this vague desire to escape.

February, cold as hell. Hector took the rest of them (my family, yes, but it’s them) ahead and left her and I behind. How old was she, sixteen, seventeen? You’ll see her, he promised. You’ll see her and she’ll look at you and lower her eyes with one of those looks that make you roll over all four paws in the air. Yes, this was exactly what he wanted. It made it so much less interesting. It would’ve been funnier to go against his wishes, to receive serious, reprehensive looks. Maybe she wouldn’t have gone through with it then. Maybe I wouldn’t have. She might have, she was convinced she was to have everything, that she was made out of silk and the world was to know it, to know of the softness of her touch, so soft.

It was my last night there so they decided we should go somewhere special. I was going somewhere special, getting on a train and leaving that next morning. I had spent four days with them and it was enough, thank you very much. There was still, of course, that little matter left unresolved. Everything would be taken care of tonight.

Was she in it, too? She seemed to enjoy her free reign. She asked for a beer and looked at grandpa, as if she was defying him (you heard that, grandpa? Beer… B-E-E-R). How far are you gonna let this go? How much breathing room are you gonna give me if I agree to play your little game? Then she looked at me as if asking are you watching, are you watching closely. She was beautiful, certainly beautiful. I would have gone through with it gladly, without the charade, but they would have had none of it. Everyone ordered a stake, I had some salad.

They all had their peace masks on, as if nothing ever happened. It had been that way ever since I arrived. Every now and then something did happen, something went barking or croaking or firing and they would look around for a second, and the mask would fall off and you’d see their real faces, we’re being attacked, a bomb on it’s way again faces. Nearly four years, and they still hadn’t gotten rid of it. Then they would look at me and smile and I smiled back at them, politely, granting them pardon for not pretending everything was alright. And they looked at me one by one, smiled once again and kept on eating, she’d keep on looking at me as if she was challenging me.

I thought of it as being a hero of tv wrestling: There’s nothing heroic to it if you can’t lose. How can you even even pretend that you might lose? You’ve seen the script, you know how it’s going to end, everybody at home knows how it’s going to end. Yet you still play the part, and they cheer when you do. Yey.

The script? We’d take a drive around, maybe to the outskirts, and then we’d go back home and one by one they would go to sleep. We’d be left alone and it was left for me to go for it. What if I didn’t do my part, if I just stayed put? Would she do it? How would she react if I didn’t, if I gave her a true challenge, if I defied her to take the first step? It was almost, almost more tempting than actually being with her, getting to really know her touch, so soft. But I wanted my share, I was game and I’d play my part down to every bit and piece.

We did take a drive around and we did go to the outskirts, close to the river. I don’t know why they insist on going there, or why they insist on keeping them there. Yes, yes I do. They keep them there because know they are harmless, so they go and visit them once or twice a month, and they tell themselves they’re not afraid anymore and down inside they gloat at the fact that they don’t have to be afraid anymore, and they know they gloat and they know it’s a lie because they are still afraid as hell of them, even now.

So they keep them here, in a sort of city-outside-the-city, with their sort of houses and their sort of jobs. A whole tourist attraction for the very inhabitants of the city, they walk around reading poetry out loud, juggling or just being, being so we can look at them and see how they live the way you look at animals in a zoo. This were clever animals, though. You could see them look back at you, talk back at you, stand there looking just like you.

One of them caught my attention. He seemed completely drunk and hadn’t shaved in days. He was a pale man, with a dark t-shirt and his ribs protruding. He was eerie (quaint, probably, for them), and old miserable shell of a man. A crowd was watching him run around and crash against imaginary walls, nurse himself back to health and hop around in joy, joy, joy for the little boys who sing their songs, swinging his arms from side to side and spitting at whoever was at hand.

I pushed and shoved just enough to get to the front line and she got lost in the middle. Found me back and her fingers run down my arm calling to me urgent, wait a second, like a faint call for help, so soft.

She was right next to me when he turned and started walking towards us. My arms were busy looking for her and I didn’t expect him to come so close, so close I could feel his stench and look into his big, empty, yellow eyes. He saw, he noticed I was watching him, not looking at him but actually watching him and stretched out his black hand. I felt weak, so weak I couldn’t push him away and he held my arms with his hands, talked into me, his breath making my head spin and speaking of the unending cold he felt and the hunger he could not pretend to hide and how none would be left to bury his bones when they rotted yellow by the river bank, none caring enough to stop him even right then and there.

Hector came through the crowd and pushed him away; I got pulled somewhere else and rolled on the floor to one of those unlit corners near by, were I lay for a while and threw up everything I had in my guts. I had cut myself with something while at it and my hand was bleeding. Hector put a hand on my shoulder, took out a handkerchief, tied it tight around my hand and led me back to the car. We went back to their house. We sat for a while in the living room, unsure what to do next, each one nervous to leave me alone.

Then it happened. She was the first to leave. She got up, hugged me, wished me a good trip and she left. She gave up. I looked at Hector maybe asking for assistance and he looked at her, helpless. Yes, he said, maybe we should let you go to sleep. Was she, were they trying me, pushing me? She went away, closed her door, left. One by one, everyone said goodbye, relax, sleep tight and left.

I refuse to believe it. Even now, I can’t stand the thought that she actually gambled that much, I refuse to admit she dared not to play it safe, that she expected me to go to her after all, when everyone had gone to sleep for me to go into her room. No she didn’t expect it, not after what had happened, for me to get up later that night and open her door, to get inside her dark room and even without an accomplice dare to get inside the sheets with her, to run my hand through her body, so soft, so small. I felt I was too little for the task, I wished I could be bigger, then, I felt her small body against mine and I wished I was bigger (physically bigger, to occupy more space in the room, like I always wished), big enough to cover her completely, to have a mouth large enough to enclose her and swallow her completely.

She slept holding on to me, and this, this is what makes me believe she wasn’t expecting it, the rough easiness with which she found a way to craddle against me. That is why I still believe they didn’t expect me.

Outside through the window I could see it was snowing. I could see myself again, on a train on my way out of here in the morning, and I got out of bed, on my feet. This time I was standing in the living room, my index on my lips, my thumb on my chin again, and laying there on the floor, naked there she was, lying against me, me covering her with my body as much as I could. If I made the slightest noise Hector would come out and see us, and I wouldn’t give him that satisfaction. There was only one way to do this and it was clear now, yes it was clear, it must be done silently. I aimed carefully and a single shot came of my finger silently, so soft it barely scratched the underside of her arm, and slowly carved its way into her, making a small hole, and I drained all her blood through it, flowing all over me.

I got up, went to the bathroom to fill the tub with water and cleaned myself as thoroughly as I could. The sun was coming through an awkward angle into the bathroom, burning my skin. I went looking for my things and left. In the red water, I realized I was free of all commitment here and felt free to hate them with all my strength, and went back to sleep quietly, floating.