The Toltec Art of Life and Death. Barbara Emrys

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СКАЧАТЬ as a younger woman, before Miguel was born. This woman was naked and full of passion. This version of Sarita was mounted on her husband’s lap, moaning with pleasure. Both their bodies shone with the sweat of sexual exertion. The old woman watched them, her eyes swimming with tears as she mouthed her husband’s name and smiled in recollection.

      “José Luis,” she said, speaking out loud this time. “Mi amor . . . mi cariño.”

      Standing near the bed was the mysterious Lala, much as she had appeared by the tree. She stood silently at the edges of the dim candlelight for a few moments, regarding the couple without emotion. Indeed, she scarcely showed interest in what she was seeing, so when she spoke to the old woman in the corner, she sounded much like a tour guide at the botanical gardens, pointing out common flora.

      “She has a good body for a woman of fifty,” Lala stated flatly.

      “Forty-two,” Sarita corrected. “And look at him! I had forgotten . . .” She sighed and looked away as the vision grew uncomfortable.

      “He was a child,” said the younger woman.

      “He was well into his twenties,” Sarita responded defensively.

      “And when you married him?”

      “He was well into his teens. Far into his teens.”

      “And you, a mature woman and mother of nine. Nine.”

      “He was so much in love . . .”

      “He was in love with an idea, as we both know,” Lala said, looking past the couple in the bed to meet Sarita’s eyes. “He was spellbound. The poor boy had no chance.”

      “Ideas are everything,” Sarita mused quietly.

      “I’m glad you agree.” A silky smile touched Lala’s full lips. This excursion, so sudden and so suspect, seemed already to be going her way. Ordinarily, she was loath to participate in matters like this. The scene before her was an unsavory one—primal, and sticky with the promise of life—but it was a necessary introduction to a dream that she would one day own and control.

      The young man making love suddenly cried out with pleasure, and as he did, his wife screamed, arching her back and stretching her arms to the ceiling. She screamed again.

      “What?” shouted her husband. “What did I do?”

      “The light! Did you see the light? It came out of nowhere and stabbed me in the belly! My body burns with it!” Sara, the younger apparition of Mother Sarita, brought her hands down and hugged the man tightly to her.

      “Mi amor, there is nothing to fear from light,” he whispered.

      “God has touched me. There will be a child.”

      Laughing out loud, José Luis took his wife by the buttocks and threw her back onto the bed. “It doesn’t take a celestial light to tell us that.”

      “Yes, there will be another, and he will be—”

      “The thirteenth?” he guessed, mocking her. They had already added three sons to Sara’s swarm of children.

      “Yes, yes! He will be the thirteenth. Don’t laugh—there is divine power at work here! Thirteen!” she emphasized importantly. “Stop laughing!”

      Sarita listened to the couple talking, listened to the bed creaking softly, and remembered. “Yes, this was the beginning for Miguel,” she said, almost to herself, “but there was so much that came before.”

      “We are here to visit the events of your son’s life, not the life of the woman named Sara,” the other woman responded dispassionately. Her face showed no expression as she watched the couple on the bed.

      “We have no business visiting this!” Sarita snapped, rising to the single tiny window, open to the cool air. Outside, night cradled the world in its massive arms. A few random stars pricked the blackness, and the silence was broken by the yap of a dog—once, twice, and then no more. Sarita let herself feel the loneliness of silence. The love José Luis had offered her was bold, committed, and constant. She longed for the sounds of it again, the big sensations of it. She could recall how generously he had loved her, but she could not remember giving love in the same way. Too often she had repaid his devotion with condescension. He was a respectful husband and a helpmate, in her work and in the raising of their children, but what had she been to him?

      Lala nodded her approval. “That’s right, look away. There are things at work here that exist in defiance of knowledge, making this moment distasteful. We had to return to the beginning, and I suppose this is a beginning of sorts.” She glanced at Sarita, delight flashing in her eyes. “But as for me,” she said, “I prefer beginnings like this one!”

      Sarita turned back to the little room and was amazed to see that it no longer contained a bed, a candle, and two lovers. It was now a kitchen, flooded with morning sunshine. And there she was, standing by a wood-burning stove as a younger woman again. She wasn’t pregnant, which surprised her. When was this, then?

      A radio played music, and she was singing as she prepared the day’s meal. The screams and giggles of children could be heard from the tiny yard outside the kitchen door. The sound of traffic blared from the street, as the old Sarita watched the scene, her mouth open in wonder. A toddler played near his mother’s feet, alternately sitting with his tiny paint-chipped soldiers and standing, balancing himself, and then taking a few steps closer to the stove. His mother yelled something to the other children through an open window, and then turned to smile with pride at the child, who was hardly more than a baby.

      “My sweet boy,” she crooned. “How clever you are! How strong and beautiful and clever!”

      Encouraged by the tone of her words, the child took another step, then another. A boy of five or six ran into the house, knocking over a chair as he swiped a tortilla from the counter. “Hey!” he called as he kept running. “The monkey is walking again!” With that, a cheer rose from the yard. The toddler recognized the sound of it and beamed with excitement. These were the same wonderful sounds of laughter that rose up every time he stood, every time he fell, and every time he babbled incoherently. When his family laughed, he laughed. A lifetime of laughter wouldn’t be enough for him. With that kind of reward in view, he steadied himself, lifted his tiny arms, and reached his mother with two more trembling steps. Once there, he clung to her strong legs with breathless satisfaction, burying his face in the folds of her skirt.

      “He is a champion!” his mother shrieked, and a roar went up outside. She laughed, the boy laughed, and the universe rocked with pleasure.

      “There, you see?” said his mother, caressing his little face. “Strong, beautiful, and clever. The whole world knows it!”

      Watching the scene, Sarita spoke with fondness. “Yes, these are the days when Miguelito first began to walk. He was leaving infancy and starting his life as a child.” She let out a long sigh. “Like his brothers, who took so much pleasure in tormenting him, he would develop a strong talent for trouble.” She smiled as the memories rushed toward her and the light in the room began to flicker.

      “Stop!” Lala said, interrupting her recollection. “My dear, this is not just the beginning of tedious boyhood that we are witnessing. Listen!”

      They looked back at mother and child, as baby СКАЧАТЬ