“What do you want,” he asked.

  “I want to ask you for two favors.”

  He relaxed and smiled.

  “The first?”

  “I haven’t eaten all day, could I have something for dinner?”

  “Yes, I already had someone go get you some hamburgers.”

  “Thank you.”

  “And the second?”

  “I absolutely have to pee; please let me go to the bathroom.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll send someone over in five minutes to escort you to the bathroom.”

  “But please don’t let him take too long, because I really can’t hold it in any more.”

  “Sure,” he said patting me on the back.

  He left and locked the door to the cubicle. Through the blinds I could see him hand the key over to one of my guards. Then I saw him walk away down the hall.

  TWENTY, THIRTY MINUTES went by and nobody came to take me to the bathroom. I desperately knocked on the glass door. The two men ignored me.

  Frustrated, I had no choice but to pee out the window. I leaned half my body out and, holding on to the window frame, I aimed at the ledge, trying not to sprinkle below me: I didn’t want any of the officers waiting around on the pavement to come up and beat the shit out of me. Luckily, the urine flowed across the ledge and formed a stream that discreetly coursed down the wall.

  DINNER DIDN’T ARRIVE EITHER, and the rules started to become clear. I depended on the thin man and I had better cooperate with him. For now, my problems boiled down to being unable to urinate in the right place and being a little bit hungry. But he just had to whisper one order to drastically change my situation: beatings, torture, threats, blackmail. To leave me alone in the cubicle was a show of his willingness to negotiate with me. He could’ve forced me to admit my guilt, but it was better if I admitted freely, without any more trouble to either of us.

  WITHIN THE FOLDER were two documents. The first was a confession to several crimes committed, including some I’d never heard of. It was written in the language typical of legal documents and riddled with spelling mistakes.

  The second was a declaration by the witness who was incriminating me. It was a pretty accurate narrative of what happened at the zoo, it described me exactly (it even mentioned the gridlike pattern of scars on my left bicep) and it provided the information necessary to find me: my full name, address, telephone number, and the location of the Villalba Motel with the room number I was in. The declaration had been taken that day, at 1:13 PM at a precinct of the Judicial Police of Mexico City. It was signed by Tania Ramos García and under it was a copy of her fingerprint.

  It wasn’t made up. Tania’s signature was authentic. The same one with which she signed so many love letters. The same uneven marks slanting to the right. The same Tania.

  The copy of her thumbprint reproduced the slight scar she got on her right thumb when she sliced herself with a box cutter as she was cutting some papers. It was a night when Tania was hurriedly designing a brochure for a school project. The blood gushed abundant and soiled the illustrations she had worked on for hours. She cried in despair: she wouldn’t have enough time to do them over. She angrily started to rub her bloodied finger on the other sheets as well. I managed to stop her after she’d made a complete mess. I squeezed the base of her thumb to stop the bleeding, disinfected the wound with hydrogen peroxide, and wrapped her thumb in gauze. Tania kissed me and apologized—she’d gotten blood on me as well.

  I REREAD HER TESTIMONY over and over. Her indictment was ruthless. The narrative of facts was cold; my description, detailed, precise, as if she wanted to make sure the police wouldn’t err in finding me. She hadn’t left any loose ends. There was no evidence of hesitation, no contradictions, no compassionate adjectives. She had been harsh from start to finish.

  I grabbed the document that declared I was guilty and, without giving it much thought, signed it. So as not to later regret it, I put it in the folder and slid it under the door. One of the men bent over to pick it up, perused it, and took it to one of the neighboring offices.

  I turned out the light and went to huddle against a wall. The smell of Tania’s urine still hadn’t disappeared from my belly—powerful, long-lasting, painful. I cried for her, and I cried for Gregorio and myself, and for everything we stopped being. I cried for the scar on her thumb that sealed the indictment, and for her betrayal, and for her absence. I cried for what we had lost and what we would lose, for what we were and ceased to be.

  I SLEPT FOR A WHILE on the carpet. I was awoken by the silence. I looked through the blinds. None of my guards were there anymore. It wasn’t necessary: I’d signed my own sentence, why take care of me?

  I opened the window. The air was warm, the night dark. I sat on the windowsill and stayed there till dawn. I saw the cops arrive in their suits, the secretaries, the newspaper boys, the bootblack. I saw secondary school students walk to school, builders eating tacos for breakfast, bureaucrats descending from public transportation.

  I heard movement in the office. Secretaries greeting one another, telephones ringing, the opening and closing of filing cabinets, judicial policemen laughing. I heard planes plowing through the sky, the garbage truck’s bell, shop owners lifting the metal curtains from their shops.

  Jail was imminent. Maybe the sentence would be reduced since I’d voluntarily signed my declaration of guilt, but I didn’t expect less than five years of lockup. I ruled out bail: The jaguar’s death had angered so many different groups that imprisonment seemed inevitable, as inevitable as the psychiatric ward for Gregorio.

  THE COMMANDER came in at ten. Again, he was dressed impeccably. He smelled like lavender and menthol cigarettes. He came into the cubicle, greeted me affably and sat at the table.

  “Let me congratulate you,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “For your commitment to the truth,” he said snobbishly.

  I shrugged my shoulders—what the fuck did he care about the truth?—and I looked out the window again. A stray dog, a puppy, was trying to cross the street unsuccessfully. After gauging several cars, he made his decision and bolted to the other side of the street. He was about to be run over by a truck but it swerved around him at the last minute.

  “Lucky, huh?”

  I hadn’t realized he’d stood up and was watching the same scene I was while he smoked.

  “I’m not used to it,” he said.

  “To what?”

  “To people confessing so quickly. It usually takes me at least three or four days.”

  He gave his cigarette a long drag, blew the smoke out of his nose and continued:

  “Why did you sign?”

  “Why keep lying?” I answered.

  “Either you’ve got a lot of balls, or you don’t know the mess you’re getting into.”

  “Neither,” I said.

  He gave his cigarette another drag and flicked it into the street. The butt traced an arc and landed on the roof of one of the white Spirits.

  “I like you,” he said.

  I took his pen out of my pants pocket and gave it back to him.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  He took it and put it inside his blazer. As he did, he revealed a glimpse of the butt of a pistol.

  “Your parents have been notified. They’re coming to see you at twelve.”

  “Okay.”

  “They’ll bring you some breakfast soon,” he pointed out.

  He walked out of the cubicle, grabbed a phone from off a desk, and put it on the table.

  “Word is bond. You can make as many phone calls as you goddamn well please. Just dial zero to get a dial tone.”

  “Thanks.”

  The commander stood there in front of me, smiling.

  “You’re a present from heaven.”

  “Why?”

  “You made a lot of noise with the tiger thing, and for having arrested you, I’m going to get a promotion, or at least a raise.”

  “A raise? That’s not fair, you had the case solved for you,” I said smiling.

  The thin man made a face, as if he were surprised by my observation.

  “You’re right: I had the case solved for me.”

  We both smiled and he walked over to me.

  “Give me your hand and open it,” he requested, “I want to show you a magic trick.”

  He grabbed my middle finger, smiled again and with a sudden movement, bent it all the way backward. I felt a sharp pain radiate all the way to my forearm. Unbearable pain. He let go of me and squeezed my neck affectionately.

  “I like you, Manuel, but don’t be a smart-ass.”

  He left the room and locked me in again.

  THE PAIN WAS INTENSE. The joint soon became swollen and a purple semi-circle appeared around my knuckle. A cop came in with breakfast on a tray. He put it on the table. There was some ice on a plate. He grabbed three cubes, wrapped them in a handkerchief and gave them to me.

  “The commander sent them for your hand,” he said and withdrew.

  I put the ice on the swelling and the pain slowly diminished. I bandaged my finger in the damp cloth to immobilize it and sat down to have breakfast. They’d brought me a couple of eggs scrambled with ham and onion, an apple and a glass of milk. Other than the onion, I finished everything quickly and was still hungry. The thin man must’ve guessed as much, because five minutes later another cop came in with three pieces of sweet baked goods and an orange-flavored Jarritos.

  When I was done eating I called Tania’s house. Laura answered. She told me Tania hadn’t slept at home the previous night either, and they didn’t now where to find her.

  “As you can imagine,” she said, “my parents are going insane.”

  “So am I,” I declared.

  “Where are you?” she asked.

  “In jail,” I answered.

  “I asked you where you are, not where you deserve to be.”

  “I told you, in jail. Why?”

  “Because I called your house last night and the night before, and your father told me you hadn’t been home either.”

  “And why did you call me?”

  “You know my mother, she wanted to know if you’d seen Tania.”

  “No, I haven’t.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Don’t believe me.”

  “What’s going on with you two?”

  I was annoyed by the tone in which she asked the question and I just hung up. The pain throbbed again. I removed the cloth. The purple circle had expanded onto the back of my hand. I couldn’t bend my finger.

  I dialed Jacinto Anaya’s number. The stupid machine answered. “Fuck you,” I whispered into the receiver and hung up.

  A cop came in to pick up the tray. I asked him to take me to the bathroom. He led me through rows of desks, before secretaries who looked at me curiously and judicial policemen who reluctantly got out of the way.

  I went into the toilets and the guy waited for me outside. Nobody else was inside and I peed pleasantly, leaning my forehead against the wall. I’d soon lose these little daily intimacies, once I was in jail. This was my main worry: the communal showers and toilets, the cells shared with strangers, cavity searches, supervised visits. Jail would not only remove me from the world, it would remove me from myself, my manias, my habits.

  I took off my shirt and looked at myself in the mirror. I’d gotten skinnier. I could see it in my cheeks, my forearms. I turned on the hot water and plugged the basin with toilet paper. I put in my injured hand. Just contact with the water led to penetrating pain. I bore it and left the hand submerged until I could feel the tendons and ligaments relax. I felt some relief, but as soon as I moved my hand it hurt again.

  I cleaned my belly of Tania’s urine. Then I washed my left arm, my chest and armpits. The cop came in and asked me what was taking so long. To speed things up, I leaned over the sink and washed myself directly under the faucet, bending sideways so the water would cover my torso. I rubbed my face and wet my hair.

  I walked out of the bathroom, without drying myself, still dripping, my shirt and pants soaked. Upon seeing me, my custodian made a gesture of disapproval and led me back into the cubicle.

  MY PARENTS ARRIVED punctually at twelve. The commander accompanied them to the cubicle and ordered three more chairs to be brought in. They sat before me and the thin man briefly explained my legal situation: a judge had ordered a warrant of arrest for me based on Tania’s testimony, and, given the public importance of my case, and the district attorney’s concern for resolving it, they had decided to keep me at the precinct before sending me to court. “We will not proceed unless we have all the evidence in hand,” he argued. My father asked if the decision to keep me in custody was illegal. The thin man emphasized that my rights had been respected and that I had been given special treatment since I was “from a good family.” My father stroked his mustache as he listened; my mother had tears in her eyes. “The young man has fully accepted responsibility for his actions,” he concluded, “and must maturely undergo whatever punishment is imposed on him.” Upon hearing my mother cry, he turned to her.

  “He’s not a boy anymore, ma’am,” he said.

  My mother lowered her head and pressed against the edges of her eyes to stop crying.

  “I’ll retire so you can speak alone,” he said with propriety.

  We remained silent for a few minutes. My father looked overwhelmed, as if the situation exceeded his physical and emotional capabilities. His lower lip was trembling slightly. His gaze slipped over objects and he constantly swallowed saliva. My mother, despite her sobbing, didn’t seem afflicted. It was evident that she could barely hold in her anger.

  My father started to speak in a broken voice. He told me he couldn’t understand why I had done it, but that they were with me and were going to work to free me as soon as possible. They had tried to contact Mr. Derbez, the ex–minister of finance who had been my mother’s boss, but they had been unable to find him. To defend me, they had hired a prestigious criminal lawyer, the friend of a cousin of my mother’s.

  “I know a very good lawyer who gets people out of jail for a living. He may be better than yours,” I said, thinking about Tania’s father’s partner.

  “What do you know about lawyers?” my mother scolded.

  “It was just a suggestion,” I argued.

  “We’re not interested in your suggestions,” she pointed out.

  “We trust this lawyer,” my father intervened, trying to conciliate.

  “Have it your way,” I said.

  “Of course we’re going to have it our way,” bellowed my mother.

  “Whatever,” I said.

  My mother looked at me, furious.

  “Are you making fun of me?”

  “No.”

  “You better not be.”

  I shut up to avoid provoking her any more. But my mother had already become enraged and it was difficult to stop her.

  “Why did you do this to us?” she asked.

  “I didn’t do anything to you.”

  “Oh no?”

  “No.”

  “You did it to get at us.”

  “You’re paranoid delusional, Mom.”

  “You’ve always been so impertinent,” she said.

  The word impertinent irritated me. It seemed like a qualifier stupid, snooty ladies used to talk down to their servants.

  “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” I said.

  My mother got up and tried to slap me, but I blocked her with my forearm.

  “You’re ruining our lives,” she screamed.

  My father got between us and hugged my mother.

  “Calm down, Malena, don’t make things more difficult.”

  My mother pushed him away to free herself. She turned around, walked out and slammed the door. The glass shook as if it were about to detach.

  “It’s not fair that you behave like that with her,” my father exclaimed.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

  “Your mother and I are very tense; we never thought we’d be in circumstances like this.”

  “Neither did I.”

  “If you’d only tell us what was going on.”

  “Nothing, nothing’s going on.”

  “This is because of Gregorio, isn’t it?”

  “No.”

  He sat back down and crossed his arms.

  “Is it true that you were arrested in a motel?”

  “Yes.”

  “What were you doing there?”

  “I rent a room there.”

  My father appeared amazed.

  “What for?”

  “Tania and I rented it so we could be alone.”

  “For how long?”

  “About two years.”

  He inhaled deeply and whistled as he exhaled.

  “Now I understand,” he said with the face of one putting two and two together. But no, my father would never be able to understand.

  There was a silence uncomfortable for both of us.

  “How’s Luis?” I asked.

  “Fine.”

  “Does he know where I am?”

  My father nodded. I was sorry that my brother knew. How would he explain what I’d done to his uninteresting friends and girlfriends?

  “Do you want me to look for the lawyer you mentioned?” he asked.

  “If you can.”

  “Who is he?”

  “One of the partners from Tania’s father’s law firm.”

  “Tania’s father?” he asked. “After what she did to you?”

  I shrugged my shoulders.

  “They say he’s very good. Besides, he knows me and I think he likes me.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “I don’t know his name, but everybody knows him as ‘Tuercas’ Manrique.”

  “I’ll look for him.”

  My father got up, walked toward me, and grabbed my shoulders.

  “We’re going to get you out of this,” he assured me.

  “It doesn’t matter.”

 

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