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TWO
     
     
     
     
    T he
blackness that descended upon him was one so weighted with anger that Santiago
felt he was suffocating. Deep in his mind a voice urged calmness, as everything
had cause and reason. Overwhelmed with the intensity of emotion he experienced
for his father, he feared the devil had taken possession of his soul. He shook
with rage and was frightened at his wish to have his father dead. Santiago
could think of no other reason for Florienda Cali’s death! Don Emilio had been
in the village, drinking. He had been unable to help her when she had needed
him. Florienda would not have died if she had not been alone!
    Santiago’s
hands were clenched so tightly that his fingers ached. He tried to hold back
the tears and the need to scream, but the tears came. At the center of his
being was an emptiness so vast that he felt sucked into it and the loneliness
was only pacified by the presence of his lover. He visualized himself pummeling
his father’s face until it lost all familiarity, wanting to hit him until all
the rage in him was spent.
    Santiago had
resented his father’s drinking, but not until this day had he felt so outraged
about the matter, having refused to see the habit as a sign that a serious
problem existed. The anger had been carefully concealed and insidiously
nurtured and now it exploded from the darkness like an ugly beast looming so
that he could not turn from it but allowed it to spring forth, and he fed it as
it reached extraordinary proportions. It felt wonderful and terrible all at
once. Adrenaline coursed through his body and he felt overpowered. Violence
erupted and he heard a voice screaming in his ears and the voice was his own.
    “Father...,
father..., you demon..., I hate you!”
    He screamed
with such vehemence that Fidel was startled. The boy that sat beside him was
not the one he knew.
    “You killed
her with your cursed bottle...! I hate you!” Santiago began to cry and made no
effort to hide his torment.
    Fidel said
nothing. He took the reins from Santiago’s hands and drove the cart. With his
other hand he held his beloved around the waist. Fidel knew Santiago would need
to have time to sort his thoughts and knew too that Santiago was acting out of
a legitimate reason for his anger. The village had begun to talk about Don
Emilio’s drinking and that he often left his wife alone. The anger was not
unfounded. Fidel had wondered when Santiago would start to resent the way his
mother was being treated. Although there were no beatings, a behavior common
among Spanish men, leaving Florienda to her own devices for long periods was
considered neglect. Florienda Cali had once been active in the community’s
affairs but her seclusion resulted in many of the villagers considering her an
oddity.
    Fidel knew the
subject was too sensitive to talk about and he allowed Santiago to come to him
if he wished consoling and comforting. For some time they did not speak.
Santiago’s silence was respected and he finally stopped crying.
    “Santi, you
have me and all my love. Ask for whatever you need. I am here. Can I do
anything?”
    “Yes,”
Santiago whipped around on the seat and faced him. “You could help me make him
pay for killing my mother.”
    “But you’ve
always loved Don Emilio, and you’ve never had a disagreement with him. Why hate
him so much now? The drinking was his way of escaping the pain of Emilio’s
death and of her sadness.”
    “Yes, they both
escaped! I lost my father to the bottle and my mother, to her silence.”
    Fidel held him
tighter. “You are right, Santiago. She did not have his bottle. She had her own
inner-world. You know how seldom she knew what day it was. Remember the times
we would stop by her room to say hello and she would look at us carefully,
trying to recall where she had seen the faces that appeared somewhat familiar?
Santiago, she was unhappy. It was not because of your father. Don Emilio
treated her well. It was after Emilio died that she