The Halfway House (New Directions Paperbook) Read Free Page A

like a mad wolf; Pedro, an old Indian, perhaps Peruvian, silent witness to the world’s evils; Tato, the homosexual; Napoleon, the midget; and Castaño, a ninety-year-old geezer who can only shout “I want to die! I want to die! I want to die!”
    “You’ll be fine here,” my aunt says. “You’ll be among Latinos.”
    We go on. Mr. Curbelo, the owner of the Home, is waiting for us at his desk. Did I find him repulsive from the very beginning? I don’t know. He was fat and shapeless, and was wearing a ridiculous track suit made all the worse by a juvenile baseball cap.
    “Is this the man?” He asks my aunt with a smile on his face.
    “This is him,” she responds.
    “He’ll be fine here,” Curbelo says, “like he’s living with family.”
    He looks at the book I’m carrying under my arm and asks, “Do you like to read?”
    My aunt responds, “Not only that. He’s a writer.”
    “Ah!” Curbelo says with mock surprise. “And what do you write?”
    “Bullshit,” I say softly.
    Then Curbelo asks, “Did you bring his medicines?”
    My aunt looks in her purse.
    “Yes,” she says. “Melleril. One hundred milligrams. He has to take four a day.”
    “Good.” Mr. Curbelo says with a satisfied face. “You can leave him then. We’ll take care of everything else.”
    My aunt turns to look into my eyes. This time, I think I see the slightest trace of pity.
    “You’ll be fine here,” she assures me. “Nothing more can be done.”
    My name is William Figueras, and by the age of fifteen I had read the great Proust, Hesse, Joyce, Miller, Mann. They were for me what saints are to a devout Christian. Twenty years ago, I finished writing a novel in Cuba that told a love story. It was the story of an affair between a communist and a member of the bourgeoisie, and ended with both of them committing suicide. The novel was never published and my love story was never known by the public at large. The government’s literary specialists said my novel was morose, pornographic, and also irreverent, because it dealt harshly with the Communist Party. After that, I went crazy. I began to see devils on the walls, to hear voices that insulted me—and I stopped writing. All I produced was a rabid dog’s froth. One day, thinking that a change of country would save me from madness, I left Cuba and arrived in this great American country. There were some relatives waiting for me here who didn’t know anything about my life and who, after twenty years of separation, barely knew me anymore. They thought a future winner was coming, a future businessman, a future playboy, a future family man who would have a future house full of kids, and who would go to the beach on weekends and drive fine cars and wear brand-name clothing like
Jean Marc
and
Pierre Cardin
. The person who turned up at the airport the day of my arrival was instead a crazy, nearly toothless, skinny, frightened guy who had to be admitted to a psychiatric ward that very day because he eyed everyone in the family with suspicion and, instead of hugging and kissing them, insulted them. I know it was a great disappointment for everyone, especially for my aunt who was expecting something great. They got me instead. An embarrassment. A terrible mark on this fine Cuban petit bourgeois family with their healthy teeth and buffed fingernails, radiant skin, fashionable clothes, who were weighed down by thick gold chains and owned magnificent cars of the latest make and spacious houses with well-stocked pantries and central heat and air-conditioning. That day (the one on which I arrived), I know that they all eyed each other with embarrassment, made some scathing comments and drove off from the airport without any intention of ever seeing me again. And that’s the way it’s been. The only one who remained faithful to the family ties was this Aunt Clotilde, who decided to make herself responsible for me and kept me at her house for three months, until the day when, at the