By Jackie E. Manz
Hawthorne Fellow 2012
Jackie E. Manz currently lives in Portland, Oregon where she writes, makes a living and pulls weeds.
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The Calle de la Liberación was awash in bookstalls and iguanas this day, which took Katherine by surprise. The dull monotony of waiting for Anton to return to the American hotel each evening, for their house to be readied, for life to happen, was wearing on her. She was tired of living with her own anxieties and Berlitz courses, so giant green lizards moving through Jacaranda trees and crowds of locals was a welcome diversion. Though she wore a light cotton dress and her hair short, the humidity won and a fine sheen of sweat covered her skin. She wondered if perspiration conferred some magical or medicinal properties – such as curing her ever-increasing loneliness.
She wandered slowly west toward the Plaza Bolívar. Normally, she was the subject of stares and mummers. Anton had told her that was to be expected given her height, pale freckled skin and the fact that she insisted on wearing sunglasses even though that was not the local custom. No one paid attention to her today as the crowds moved from stall to stall picking up books and magazines, carrying on animated conversations. All the activity gave the normally sedate and vaguely militaristic street a carnival electric feel. She kept expecting to see a carousel, as it was hard to believe that books alone could generate this much excitement.
A Life magazine at a small stall caught her eye. Next door, a fruit vendor sold slices of watermelon, papaya and coconut, making the heavy air refreshingly sweet. As it appeared the magazine stall was unmanned, Katherine decided to stop. Still, she practiced her no hablo español, solo ingles line in her head.
“British or Dutch?” A deep Oxford English voice. Katherine put the magazine back. The man appeared; he was short and slight, wearing an eye patch and a peasant shirt. He was not at all what she expected.
“Neither,” she said.
“Ah, American. You are here for the dam.”
His voice was lovely but the eye patch was disconcerting as she wasn’t sure where to look. “No, well yes. My husband is with Fluor…” The officious American Club woman had warned Katherine to always be vague about her purpose in the country. Katherine had thought that sinister. She absently picked up another magazine.
“Liberation, a fine old magazine,” the man said softly, nodding his head, “you are…sympathetic to the cause, then.”
Katherine did not know how to respond. Was she sympathetic? And to what cause? Anton would say that she was overly sensitive but she thought herself reserved. She started to walk away. “Miss,” the man called out. “In a perfect world we would have no need for money, but our world is hardly, if ever, perfect.” He held out his hand. Embarrassed, she fished coins from her purse and paid him, tucking the magazine into her bag. “Join us at the old church today at 4:00,” he said with a smile, “you will find us exactly to the left of your hotel…”