Chama arrives at the house and there is complete silence. Mom will be late today: she put it on a note on the table. “Food is ready,” he wrote. You just have to heat it up. Kisses.”
News good and bad. This is good, because for a while he will be alone. Not much, but there is something. Time to read, watch the WhatsApp group and talk three or four rubbish with partners, which is also useful for life, who will refuse?
But the information is bad, because if the lights go out, you won’t be able to heat anything. A simple and overwhelming equation: an electric stove and no energy fluid are inversely proportional, so the result is undercooked food, and you set the “n” level. Even Einstein would go crazy.
El Chama looks up at the ceiling and hits the switch a few times: no power, you’re blacked out. It stretches the body, the arms… It’s good: when they are eaten cold, the beans don’t provide as much benefit.
Through the window you can see the arrival of the night. Soft darkness begins to descend on the surroundings. Since the house is at the end of the block, where the city ends, there are no houses or anything else on the other side. Just mount.
For this reason, when the current is turned off, the chirping of crickets is heard louder. So blackout is happiness. No light, no noise. The utopia has come true: Adam is looking for Eve in Paradise, and Eve is found by mobile phone.
He takes it, mentally rehearsing the greeting; but the battery is low. He sinks into an armchair in the living room and stares into space. Or around you. There is a poem in one of the houses next door. The hostess is a woman who doesn’t talk much. She is thin and has an aquiline nose. He lives with his children. The woman received yumita by phone. Meanwhile, she waits and takes care of her baby and her little boy, the baby’s father too.
In addition, the owner’s man lives with them. It is said that he was in prison and from time to time looks for a bottle of rum in order to put himself on notice and go to heaven with Lucy and her diamonds. When this happens, sometimes the brothers fight, the baby starts screaming, and the mother sits in the doorway, puts her hands together, puts her head on her knees and starts crying.
The other house on the other side is also a poem, but with a different rhyme. There doesn’t seem to be a fight. The lady spends the day cleaning. Shakes shakes. Water water. If you lived in the Middle East, you would be fined for the unwise use of natural resources.
They have cell phones, Wi-Fi… and they are very correct, really. They always greet with a certain ringing, but without a dog brigade: you are here, I am there and with a slight smile.
Well, everyone is what they are. The other day, the Rintintins were very attentive to a family on the corner who had a sick elderly woman in the hospital.
So you better stop. If you continue with the glossary, you won’t have time to finish. This is what happens during a power outage: people think too much, and when the rice is cold, it’s best not to think too much about it. The bad thing is that the spa is not tasty.
Oh well: from the wolf hair, Chama thinks. He goes to the kitchen and starts to stir the food. Oil is expensive, but a little won’t hurt. Just one cap and we are at the level of the restaurant.
In the dark, when stirred, the grains sound like paste. Maybe they didn’t wander. If so, then it’s dominoes. The bad news is that he already put them in with the rice. It could be a castle.
Solution? In bad times, a good face. There is a knock on the door. Maybe to warn that the light is approaching from around the corner. It opens, and in the middle of the shadow, some thin hands hold out some kind of wells.
“The food is hot,” he listens. Looks like the current is going to linger.”
The boy is trying to say something. Words mingle with others, and he barely has time to see the hooked nose. He is told that there is taro in the beans and that Chama feels warm in his hands. Slight smell of well-cooked garlic. Garlic cooked with good tomato puree.
He sits at the door. From the mountain comes the song of crickets. Chama takes a deep breath. They tell the truth: sometimes heaven is not in a cell phone.
Source: Juventud Rebelde
