Author Bio

ANA MONTES

SALTWATER

translated by Sam Simon

We glide down the highway in silence. Our song plays on the radio. Mom turns up the volume because I haven’t said a word since we left. She mimes a microphone with her fist and looks at me while lip syncing. If you’re lost you can look and you will find me, time after time. I put on my sunglasses and she starts singing aloud, shimmying her shoulders. She’s still looking at me from the corner of her eye to check if I’m watching her. I want to join in but I can’t, I’m mad because we left so early. I think about asking to stop in Atalaya to buy medialunas but I don’t want to give in so soon. I stay firm, saying nothing until we arrive. When we get out of the car, the sea breeze hits my face and the words escape before I can contain them: How pretty, Ma.
            Cariló was Mom and Dad’s first vacation as a couple. In Cariló I took my first steps, recorded on video alongside the images of my first churro on the seashore. Since then, we would spend all of our vacations here. Then the bad years came and we stopped coming.
            To Mom, coming back seemed like a good idea. She told me it was a way of reconnecting, of strengthening our family now that it’s just the two of us. But we aren’t staying in the usual cabins. Mom felt like it would be too nostalgic to stay alone in the place where the three of us would spend holidays together. This time, we’re staying in a new complex, a five-star aparthotel on the sea. She said it was a bit of a financial strain but that we deserve to spend a few days like queens. She was right. The room is for queens: a balcony overlooking the sea less than 100 yards from the window and double-beds. As soon as we open the door, Mom throws herself atop the mattress, shoes and all. I ask her not to lie down so we can go to the sea and she responds that it’s best I go alone, that way she can rest a while after so much driving.
            The image of Mom in bed throughout the day is what I see most. Since she separated from Dad she spends her days lying down reading, talking on the phone or watching television, cradling the cat in her arms. When I say goodbye and leave for school she’s in bed and she’s still there when I return. Sometimes she invites me to lie down with her to watch movies. This isn’t the first time Mom has gotten like this. I remember other times, when I was younger, when she didn’t ever get up. Still, I know in the end she’ll be okay, she’s always like that. After a few months of sleeping all the time, crying at night, and hardly eating, she miraculously switches on and reverts to her former self.
            Since Mom doesn’t want to go out, I go to the beach alone. The wind howls, the waves crash ferociously against the shore, and the icy sand sticks to my legs. While I scratch my knee with my flip-flop, I watch an umbrella soar off far away. I listen to music while I walk. I watch the waves and think that if it was hotter, I would go in. My grandma always said seawater is magic, that it cures everything, that its salt has mysterious qualities and that there’s nothing like a good swim in the sea to snap yourself out of a funk. Further out, on the hotel terrace, I see two blonde girls. They’re playing and laughing. They remind me a lot of Mom and me. They probably also act out scenes from their favorite movies, dress up, and put makeup on. Though, on second thought, sometimes Mom and I don’t have so much fun, like when she forgets to pick me up from dance class and they have to call and remind her, or when she doesn’t buy anything to cook and we eat toast and jam for dinner for several days, or when she cries in the kitchen and tells me that she no longer wants to live. We also don’t have fun when she scolds me for leaving a dirty glass out or when she wakes me up in the middle of the night to hit the road. The wind picks up, the whirling sand lashes me, and I follow the path towards the terrace where the blonde girls scream and shield their faces with their hands. The older girl picks up the younger one and they go inside the hotel. I decide to head back also. When I open the door, Mom is no longer in bed and I get scared.
            I always get the feeling that one day she could tragically disappear and I would become an orphan. Or worse, I would have to go live with my dad in Uruguay. Dad left to live in Uruguay last year, as soon as he left Mom. The day he told me he took me to Puerto Madero to eat sushi. One of our first ever dates. We sat in a restaurant with a river view and ordered all-you-can-eat sushi, wine for him and a glass of Coca-Cola for me. We toasted to the next stage and Dad told me he would be working out there, gesturing at the river. At La Nación newspaper? I asked, looking at the building with the glowing sign right in front of us. No, in Uruguay, he replied. He said I could visit him whenever I wanted and that he would come often to see me. It would be an adventure. I didn’t say anything, swallowing a nigiri without chewing and locking myself in the bathroom. The next day I turned ten.
            I go out looking for Mom. I scour the hotel hallways. I head to the lobby but nothing, I go to the cafe and nothing, I visit the event center but no luck. I cross paths with the blonde girls and we wave at each other. I feel like the older one wants to talk to me but I don’t have time so I keep going. While I search for Mom, I calm myself by thinking that this is how she is, that she probably went on a walk downtown and forgot to let me know. Once, she left the house and I got worried because she wasn’t answering her cell. By the time she returned it was night and I had already imagined my entire life without her. She hugged me, dried my tears, and told me she had gone out shopping and suddenly felt sad, so she had taken a taxi to the movies and gone into the first show playing. For Mom, the best way to be alone is to be accompanied. I keep looking through the hotel hallways without success. Back and forth, back and forth. Until finally, I hear her shouting for me. She tells me she went walking in the forest, came across a teahouse, and sat down to eat some scones. When she finished, she was so far that it took a while to get back to the hotel. At night, we plopped down without dinner. On TV we found The Lady and the Tramp, the movie we’ve watched since I was young whenever we’re sad. I fall asleep before Mom does and dream that a giant wave, tall as a building, engulfs her and carries her away forever. I jolt awake in the middle of the night and climb into her bed. On TV a cartoon I don’t recognize is playing.
            We wake up to a radiant sun. It’s a gorgeous day and Mom wants to head to the sea as soon as possible. I want to shower and take my time getting ready but she’s in a hurry, as if the beach would slide away if she didn’t leave this instant. I tell her to go to the dining hall. After a while I find her finishing her typical breakfast: coffee and half a grapefruit. I can’t believe she isn’t taking advantage of everything we don’t have at home. The hotel breakfast is spectacular. It has platters with hot foods like in American movies: scrambled eggs, pancakes, and bacon. I help myself to some of everything plus toast, an apple, and orange juice. The older blonde comes and invites me to a Zumba class on the beach. I nod yes because my mouth is still full of scrambled eggs.
            The blonde is already thirteen. She’s two years older than me and says that there’s something different about being that age. I’ll see. Her waist-length hair is almost white, so white that when we dance the sun reflects off the strands. When we finish the class we go into the sea then lay out on towels to chat. She asks about school, my house, and my family. I ask her the same and she tells me about her parents, her little sister, and her dog. She says her house has six bedrooms, four bathrooms, and a patio and that they have a weekend house in Pilar with a pool and garden. I tell her our weekend house is in Uruguay and that Dad lives there for work. That he couldn’t come this time because he had too much to do, how Mom and I miss him but that we visit him all the time. She thought the whole living between two countries thing was amazing. When she arrives, the younger blonde says to the older one that their mom was calling her to their room and we said goodbye until later. I think she believed everything. Since we sold the house the three of us had and moved into an apartment, Mom and I like to go to kitchen and bath stores. We pick out tiles, toilets, kitchen sinks, telling the salespeople we’re remodeling our house. We spend hours trying out faucets, testing out which flooring would be sturdier, which would last the longest. Mom pretends to talk on the phone and lay out the options. Then we tell the salesperson to note it all down, thank them so much for their help, and say we’ll come back to finalize everything. I rave about the polished cement for my en suite bathroom. If Mom is chipper and lively, on the way home we stop off at a mattress store and end the day by lying down in giant beds of high-density foam and smart pillows. To throw off the salespeople who look at us funny for not buying anything, Mom always says convincingly: They’ll love this one.
            After the Zumba class I find Mom crying in the room. I ask her what’s wrong but I can’t understand her reply, so I curl against her body and hug her without expecting this to stop her crying. I rest my cheek on her pillow and am overwhelmed with the taste of salt. Mom is like a leaky faucet, once she starts, she can’t be stopped. I beg her to come with me to the beach. It’s an ideal day to sunbathe in a lounge chair and read, but it’s pointless. She tells me to come get her in a while, that she’ll feel better after sleeping. The beach is boring as heck. The blondes are nowhere to be found and Mom is still holed up in her room. When the sun sets I come back and convince her to change to go on a walk downtown. It makes me happy to see her up and about, caring for herself. We walk down the main road chatting pleasantly until something happens. Mom stops suddenly and brings her hands to her mouth. She rushes off, as if we were late somewhere. She tugs my arm so I keep up, walking so fast that I have to run to not fall over. I ask her why we’re hurrying but she doesn’t respond, picking up the pace. I look back to see if someone is following us but there’s only a string of buildings and forest trees. Finally, we arrive downtown and she stops. She breathes a sigh of relief and begins to tell me about something she saw earlier on the news. A building fell in Pinamar because the contractors stole the money for the construction sand and used sand from the coast. That sand was filled with salt which, over time, wore into the structure of the building, which cracked and fell like a deck of cards. We stroll around the main plaza until Mom announces that we need to return to the hotel right away. I think about how we still haven’t had dinner and how hungry I am but I know in these moments that it’s best to say nothing. When we get to the hotel, Mom goes straight up to the room and I go to the garden because I see the older blonde lying in a hammock. I greet her and lower myself down to swing too. The blonde suggests we swap horror stories. I start with the only one I know: a girl is left under the care of her babysitter while her mom goes to work. The babysitter tells her a horror story in which another girl is left home alone watching TV when the power goes out and the shower, mysteriously, turns on. When the girl wants to turn on the lights, they don’t work, when she wants to leave, the door is locked. The babysitter finishes telling the story and, without the first girl noticing, she turns on the shower, dims the lights, and slips out of the house, leaving her inside the horror story. That girl was me and that day I was so frightened that I fled my house and stayed on the landing until Mom arrived. The blonde brushes her arms with her hands to rid herself of goosebumps and admits that she wasn’t expecting horror stories from real life but, since I proposed that variation, she had the most terrifying one of all. We both notice the fear in her cracking voice. We’re barely illuminated by a sliver of moon. The blonde stops her hammock, looks me in the eyes, and begins her story: last summer the five of us came here on vacation like always. One night, my brother took out ATVs with two friends from the hotel. They were on the dunes when my moron brother sped up to pass one of his friends. The quad flipped at full speed and he landed head first against a rock. His friend rushed to help him and wet his feet from the puddle of blood. That night I slept hugging my sister like she was a stuffed animal, waiting for them to get back from the hospital. I imagined telling him he was a dumbass and how he always had to make everything a competition. But my parents came back alone and we never spoke about him again. He would be eighteen today. His room at home is the same as always but nobody ever opens the door. The story doesn’t frighten me but it turns my stomach. I tell the blonde I’m sorry, like people do in the movies, and then I stand to hug her. She stiffens, not returning the hug. Back in the room, I lie down in bed with Mom, who’s already asleep.
            I woke up vomiting and haven’t stopped since. Outside, it’s pouring. Mom holds my hair every time I go to the bathroom to throw up. She hands me a glass of water and repeats: cleanse, cleanse everything. We spend hours between the bed and the bathroom. Mom caresses my head and, even though my eyes are closed, I think I feel her crying. It occurs to me that what I caught wasn’t a virus but Mom’s sorrow.
            Day becomes night and nothing changes: outside torrential rain, inside sobbing and vomiting. Time weighs me down because somewhere between vomits I fall asleep from the exhaustion of fighting my stomach. I think about the blondes. I wonder what they’re doing, why the older one doesn’t come to the room looking for me since I suddenly disappeared. Afterwards, I wonder if maybe the vomiting is a curse the blondes’ brother sent me for having revived the story of his death, until Mom tells me I have a fever and that none of these thoughts are true.
            I awake in the middle of the night. My body is boiling and I’m dripping sweat as if I just got out of the bath. I can’t stand being in bed anymore, I want to do something, anything to soothe myself. My skin burns and my head is fuzzy. I put on my windbreaker, my slippers, and go down to the beach. Even though I’m afraid of the dark, the sea is so close I almost don’t have to walk. I follow the stones and straight away I see the shore. It’s still drizzling. I’m amazed at how black the sea is. It’s impossible not to stare at it, to watch the dark waves come and go. I enter the water to cover myself in salt but the waves quickly carry me out, trapping me in a riptide that throws me from side to side. I swim with all my strength but it’s useless, my strokes can’t carry me back to shore. It makes no difference having my eyes open or closed because I can’t see a thing. I smack myself in the face, I feel the metallic taste of my blood and then everything truly goes black.
            I open my eyes again when I spit up salt water onto cold sand. The first thing I see is Mom’s face above me. I have never seen it like that. Behind her are the ambulance lights. A medic makes me sit up and asks me how I got there, what year I was born, and what country we’re in. He places gauze in my mouth and wraps me in thermal blankets. Mom hugs me and tells me that she woke up and looked out the window and saw me way out at sea. She says she knew long before that I was there, that I was in danger, that she always knew. When I was a baby, while Mom was breastfeeding me, a crystal clear image came to her of me with a bloody mouth. A bleeding baby. She couldn’t tie her vision to anything, but the image kept appearing, like a nightmare. It embarrassed her so much that she could never tell anyone, not even Dad. And even though she did everything possible to forget it, she always felt that that vision was a premonition that something terrible would happen to me.
            Back in the room I take a hot shower and sleep deeply, dreaming of nothing. When I wake up, Mom has already packed our bags. We have to go, she says. We climb into the car before the sun is out. I turn on the radio and just when Mom takes the highway, our song comes on. This time nobody sings, both of our gazes are fixed straight ahead, where the sky begins to clear.