Julia had decorated in a style similar to that of her parents’ house in Santa Isabel, simple and welcoming. The dining room was not very large, but she had managed to get a table that could comfortably seat fourteen: her family, the six employees, the manager, the priest, and two close friends, Ascensión and Mercedes, who, from what they all could gather, had gotten engaged to Mateo and Marcial, respectively.
Kilian spent a few seconds looking at two peculiar pictures hanging on the wall. On a black background, with ingenious and narrow brushstrokes, the artist had represented forms that were clearly identifiable. In one, several men were steering a canoe down a river, through leafy vegetation. In the other, various feathered warriors with spears were hunting a beast. Julia passed by him on her way to the head of the table.
“They’re nice, aren’t they?” Julia said. Kilian nodded. “I bought them recently from a street stall. They’re by someone called Nolet. I fell in love with them the minute I saw them. They are . . . How can I put it? Simple and complex, serene and violent, enigmatic and transparent . . .”
“Like this island,” murmured Kilian.
“Yes. And like any one of us . . .”
Many of the guests were suffering from hangovers after the previous night in the casino, but the atmosphere there was relaxed thanks to the special menu, typical of Pasolobino, which Generosa had prepared for the occasion. They ate a smooth chickpea puree followed by hen fricassee. The tender pieces of meat dipped in flour and fried in oil before being stewed over a slow heat with wine, milk, walnuts, garlic, onion, and salt and pepper brought on memories of absent mothers. For dessert, they tasted an exquisite rum soufflé with egg-yolk pastries.
Kilian noticed that Jacobo was unusually quiet and barely looked at Julia. Their greeting too had been cold and distant. He did not make much of it. More than likely his brother had celebrated New Year’s Eve too hard and was not up for small pleasantries.
At one point in the conversation, the other young men exchanged so many jokes with Manuel over his new status as a married man that in the end, he blurted out a proverb.
“When your neighbor’s house”—he pointed at Mateo and Marcial—“is on fire, carry . . .”
“Water to your own!” finished Ascensión, fondly pulling Mateo’s mustache.
Everyone burst out laughing.
After dessert, two boys served Johnnie Walker and Veuve Clicquot. Emilio, red faced and eyes shining, got to his feet, raised his glass, and proposed a toast to the married couple and the family that, as Manuel had confirmed that very week, would soon be increasing. The guests cheered, applauded, and made risqué comments that turned Julia red. Father Rafael shook his head. Ascensión and Mercedes ran to congratulate their friend and the future grandmother, and all the men clapped Manuel and the future grandfather on the back.
Kilian used the racket to get up and go out to smoke a cigarette. Julia, still with reddened cheeks, followed and rested against the railing that surrounded the small garden.
“Congratulations, Julia,” Kilian said, offering her a cigarette, which she refused.
“Thanks. We are very happy.” She clasped her hands over her stomach. “It’s a strange feeling . . .” She looked at Kilian. “When are you going to go home, Kilian? How long has it been since you last saw your mother?”
“Almost five years.”
“That’s a long time . . .”
“I know.” Kilian pursed his lips tightly.
Julia studied him. Kilian and Jacobo both gave off an overwhelming sense of strength, but they could not be more different. She knew that there was a special sensitivity in Kilian. He suffered inside. He had suffered on his arrival, in adapting to the island, in gaining the respect of his companions, when accompanying his father in his final moments, by refusing to go back to his family . . . It could not be easy to control that compassion, humanity, and even tenderness around men toughened by hard work and an extreme climate. Each brother produced different feelings in her. The attraction she felt for Jacobo was directly proportional to the fraternal love she felt for Kilian.
“I couldn’t last that long without seeing my child,” she insisted. “I’m sure I couldn’t.”
Kilian shrugged. “Things happen like that,” he said.
“Sometimes, things are as we want them to be.” She remembered the kiss with Jacobo and shivered. She could have avoided it but had not wanted to. “This is one example. What would it cost you to take a ship or a plane home?”
“A lot, Julia.”
“I’m not referring to money.”
“Neither am I.” Kilian stubbed out the cigarette, leaned down, and put his forearms on the sun-heated railings. “I can’t, Julia. Not yet.”
He changed the subject. “I see that your new life agrees with you.”
“Oh, yes, but don’t think . . . At first, living together takes a lot of effort.”
“Manuel is a good person.”
“Yes, very good.” Julia looked down at the ground. “I’ll make a deal with you. I’ll tell you a secret if you tell me why you don’t want to go home.”
Kilian smiled. She was truly tenacious.
“It’s too soon.”
“Too soon?” Julia frowned. “For what?
“For everything. To see the suffering on Mom’s face, to bump into memories of Dad at every turn . . . For everything, Julia. Nothing will be the same as when I left. Distance keeps feelings at bay.” He sighed. “Now it’s your turn. What secret could you possibly have?”
Julia was quiet for a few seconds. In her case, she thought, distance cooled temptation. She decided to sidestep the question. “I’ve learned that your sister is also pregnant. Children are always a reason to be happy. Do you know that my father is already thinking of names for our baby? He says that if it’s a girl, it can have whatever name I want, but if it’s a boy, he will be named Fernando, no matter what. He has bet a thousand pesetas with his friends in the casino that there is a Fernando in every house of Spaniards who have been to Guinea. We have gone through the families, and in the end, he might be right!”
Kilian could not help smiling. “The name is nice. Very appropriate.”
“I could suggest it to Catalina. Although she might prefer to call him Antón, like his grandfather, if it’s a boy, of course.”
“I don’t know. Repeating names only invites comparisons. In the end, you don’t know which is the original and which is the copy.”
“Oh, come on, Kilian! What is José teaching you?”
Kilian raised an eyebrow.
“Life is a circle. It repeats itself. Like nature. Nowhere else is it easier to see the circle of life and death.” Julia shrugged. “Once you learn that,” she continued, “everything is much easier. Do you know what my grandmother told me time and time again, in our valley when I was young? To know how to live, you have to know how to die. And she had seen many people die. I won’t even mention the civil war . . .”
Julia felt a shiver and rubbed her upper arms.
“We’d better go in,” said Kilian, straightening up.
“Yes. I’ll bet you anything that I know what they are talking about at the moment.”
“Politics?” he wagered.
Julia smiled. Kilian looked into her eyes and gave her an affectionate kiss on the cheek.