stuffed all the clothing she had picked upover the past two days. When she opened the top drawer, her nose wrinkled slightly at the odour that puffed, cloud-like, into the room. This embarrassed the molinero, who turned to leave.
â No, she called brightly. â You donât have to leave. Not unless you want to.
A minute later she left the molinero, her basket filled with every stitch of clothing he owned, save for the shirt and dungarees he was wearing. He spent a quiet morning reading his newspaper with a magnifying glass and mulling over the strange, ancient sensation that was building inside him â a sensation that made the area behind his knees feel vaguely weakened and that left his thoughts a miasmic swirl.
Jesús
, he thought with a grin.
Iâm as badly off as that poor cabrón Francisco Ramirez.
She came back late in the afternoon and left her basket in the middle of his table: in it were his trousers, shirts, socks, and underwear, all of which had been beaten against the rocky bank of the RÃo Grande, rinsed in water scented with clematis, and left to bleach in the relentless Coahuilan sunshine. His socks, he noticed, had been mended, and the more shredded denizens of his underwear drawer had been scissored into neat, square handkerchiefs.
â Do you like? she asked, her grin revealing a smile that, to the molinero, was both tragic and sublime.
â Laura â¦Â Tomorrow, I donât want you to clean or work or help me with anything. Instead, Iâd like you to come have tea with an old man who, for some reason, no longer feels quite so old.
A moment passed.
â Está bien, she said.
Thus came the day that, given the profusion of curious eyes and ears in Corazón de la Fuente, would pass into local history as the one in which a twenty-one-year-old girl fell in love with a stooped and rickety senior citizen who, it was true, knew women as intimately as a chef knows his knives. With a pot of jicama tea steeping in his outdoor kitchen, the molinero opened the door. He was wearing pressed trousers, a chambray shirt, a gabardine donkey jacket, and a homburg. His facial cuts from the previous dayâs shave had healed considerably, such that they now looked no worse than a sprinkling of paprika. He had trimmed the few hairs still clinging to his speckled, leathery scalp, and he had splashed himself with a cologne that wasnât nearly as pungent or vinegary as it could have been, given its vintage. He smiled. He watched as her eyes brightened. They stepped towards each other, and, as will happen with two people who were together in a past life, flowed into each otherâs arms, all skin and muscle and bone disappearing, leaving only a shimmer of blissful, radiant energy.
A few days later, Roberto Pántelas and Laura Velasquez were walking together around the plaza. Far above the town, Kickapoo Indians were helping to place the towerâs antenna with the aid of a crane so vertiginously high it defied imagination; naturally, a crowd had gathered to watch, and to toast the completion of the tower with glasses filled with everything from iced tea to mescal. And yet, as the two walked by, the crowd collectively turned and took in Corazónâs latest, and unlikeliest, couple.
â Everyone knows, said Laura.
â Claro, said the molinero. â They are happy for us. As you know, this is a town of good people.
After that, the molinero and his much younger sweetheart walked hand in hand when out together, and it was said that whenever Laura Velasquez left the old manâs house, her cheeks shone with a redness caused by one thing and one thing only. Meanwhile, even the poorest ejido dwellers had stopped using the services of a molinero; they had money now, and they preferred to buy their cocoa and corn preground in the store of Fajardo Jimenez. The molinero didnât care â a bit of lost revenue mattered little when compared to the smiles of his
â No, she called brightly. â You donât have to leave. Not unless you want to.
A minute later she left the molinero, her basket filled with every stitch of clothing he owned, save for the shirt and dungarees he was wearing. He spent a quiet morning reading his newspaper with a magnifying glass and mulling over the strange, ancient sensation that was building inside him â a sensation that made the area behind his knees feel vaguely weakened and that left his thoughts a miasmic swirl.
Jesús
, he thought with a grin.
Iâm as badly off as that poor cabrón Francisco Ramirez.
She came back late in the afternoon and left her basket in the middle of his table: in it were his trousers, shirts, socks, and underwear, all of which had been beaten against the rocky bank of the RÃo Grande, rinsed in water scented with clematis, and left to bleach in the relentless Coahuilan sunshine. His socks, he noticed, had been mended, and the more shredded denizens of his underwear drawer had been scissored into neat, square handkerchiefs.
â Do you like? she asked, her grin revealing a smile that, to the molinero, was both tragic and sublime.
â Laura â¦Â Tomorrow, I donât want you to clean or work or help me with anything. Instead, Iâd like you to come have tea with an old man who, for some reason, no longer feels quite so old.
A moment passed.
â Está bien, she said.
Thus came the day that, given the profusion of curious eyes and ears in Corazón de la Fuente, would pass into local history as the one in which a twenty-one-year-old girl fell in love with a stooped and rickety senior citizen who, it was true, knew women as intimately as a chef knows his knives. With a pot of jicama tea steeping in his outdoor kitchen, the molinero opened the door. He was wearing pressed trousers, a chambray shirt, a gabardine donkey jacket, and a homburg. His facial cuts from the previous dayâs shave had healed considerably, such that they now looked no worse than a sprinkling of paprika. He had trimmed the few hairs still clinging to his speckled, leathery scalp, and he had splashed himself with a cologne that wasnât nearly as pungent or vinegary as it could have been, given its vintage. He smiled. He watched as her eyes brightened. They stepped towards each other, and, as will happen with two people who were together in a past life, flowed into each otherâs arms, all skin and muscle and bone disappearing, leaving only a shimmer of blissful, radiant energy.
A few days later, Roberto Pántelas and Laura Velasquez were walking together around the plaza. Far above the town, Kickapoo Indians were helping to place the towerâs antenna with the aid of a crane so vertiginously high it defied imagination; naturally, a crowd had gathered to watch, and to toast the completion of the tower with glasses filled with everything from iced tea to mescal. And yet, as the two walked by, the crowd collectively turned and took in Corazónâs latest, and unlikeliest, couple.
â Everyone knows, said Laura.
â Claro, said the molinero. â They are happy for us. As you know, this is a town of good people.
After that, the molinero and his much younger sweetheart walked hand in hand when out together, and it was said that whenever Laura Velasquez left the old manâs house, her cheeks shone with a redness caused by one thing and one thing only. Meanwhile, even the poorest ejido dwellers had stopped using the services of a molinero; they had money now, and they preferred to buy their cocoa and corn preground in the store of Fajardo Jimenez. The molinero didnât care â a bit of lost revenue mattered little when compared to the smiles of his
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