Ghosts Read Free Page B

to two more builders, who threw them on to the last pair, who
piled them up against a wall. Each flight of the bricks through the air was the
same as the previous flights, down to the way they separated slightly and were
clapped back together in the hands of the catcher, making a sound like
castanets. People with time on their hands are often fascinated by the sight of
this operation and spend hours watching from the opposite sidewalk. In this case
the only spectator was a fat little four-or five-year old
boy with blond hair, who had walked in beside the truck. After watching the
synchronized movements for a few minutes, he approached Raúl Viñas, who was
juggling bricks in one of the chains, and asked him: Aren’t the kids here,
Mister? Viñas, who was in a particularly bad mood because lunch had been
delayed, didn’t even look at him. It seemed he wouldn’t answer, but then he did,
with a monosyllable, through the smoke of his cigarette (he was managing to
smoke while catching and throwing bricks, three by three): No. The kid insisted:
Are they upstairs? Another silence, bricks going and coming, and the boy: Huh?
Finally Viñas said: José María, why don’t you fuck off home? The builders burst
out laughing. Offended, José María stepped aside and stood there watching, quite
calmly. Offended, but pleased that his name had been pronounced. Besides, he
really was interested in Operation Bricks. He was in no hurry, because lunch was
late at his place, and anyway, he always waited until his grandmother, a little
old lady with a powerful voice, whose shouts had made his name known throughout
the neighborhood, came to fetch him (she lived around the corner). But then he
saw one of the naked individuals, white with cement dust, at the back of the
building, and went tearing out the way he had come in. The fat guy from Santiago
del Estero on the back of the truck, dripping sweat as he heaved the bricks,
remarked: How strange. Which made the others laugh again, partly because of his
accent and partly just to prolong the fun. They laughed mechanically, without
losing concentration, which was all that mattered until the job was done.
    Meanwhile, Raúl Viñas’ young nephew, Abel Reyes, was at the
supermarket on the corner buying provisions for the builders’ lunch. As
usual, he was keeping it simple and quick: meat, bread, fruit. As youths of
a certain age often do, he refused to use the shopping trolleys provided,
and since he didn’t have bags either, he was carrying everything in his
arms. Barely out of childhood, he wasn’t really a youth yet. Although
fifteen years old, he looked eleven. He was thin, ugly, awkward, and his
hair was very long. On arriving in Argentina with his parents two years
earlier, he had been struck by the way young men wore their hair long, as
common in the new country as it was rare back home: he thought it was
sublime. Being young, foreign and therefore naïve, he didn’t realize that
the Argentineans with long hair belonged to the lowest social stratum, and
were precisely those who had condemned themselves never to escape from it.
But even if he had realized, it wouldn’t have mattered to him. He liked the
look, and that was that. So he let his hair grow; it already reached half
way down his back, below his flat shoulder blades. It looked truly awful.
His parents, who were humble, decent people, had unfortunately tried to
reason him out of it; if they had threatened him or issued a decree, he
would have submitted to the scissors straight away. But no, they began by
telling him he looked like a girl, or a lout; and once they had set off on
that path, there was no end to it. They couldn’t retract their reasoning,
which was sound. Besides, they were kind and understanding. They said:
“He’ll get over it.” Meanwhile their son went around looking like a little
woman. Since his hair got in the way when he was working, he had thought of
putting it in a pony tail with an elastic band, but for