The Color of Summer: or The New Garden of Earthly Delights by Reinaldo Arenas Page A

she had secretly hoarded away (along with the bottle of kerosene) so she could blow her brains out if she turned out to really be condemned for all eternity to virginity—and fired a shot in the air as a signal that she was almost there, that they should wait for her. The drums, indifferent to the poor queen’s anguish and distress, went on drumming out that horrid, inflaming rhythm, while a line of stunning men, squeezing their bodies against one another in the frenzy of a conga line, began to snake down the Avenida del Puerto. Eachurbod, desperate, running at full tilt with her red-bound book, yet barely making any headway—sometimes, even, unknowingly losing ground—looked up at the sky, at the lowering summer sky, and saw that the clouds, too, were flying toward the Grand Carnival, and that they were being blown by the wind into the shapes of swollen testicles and enormous erect phalluses. And down below, pushing its way through the massive parade, Eachurbod saw, or (such were the cruel tricks of Skunk in a Funk) thought she saw, the huge red ball that Fifo rode inside, high above the dancers’ heads. And an itch came over the queen that she absolutely had to scratch. Really, Mary, put yourself in her place—dancing in the middle of a huge crowd of drunk and very horny men. There’s no way— no way! —that she could miss this; they had to wait for her. So Eachurbod, in spite of the risk she ran for “illegal use of firearms,” fired off another round or two into the air, and then, almost in desperation, flung the pistol to the wind. Ah, but right over there, almost right beside her, and clearly in a hurry, there was a man. And what a man! A creature of golden curls, nimble legs, and harmoniously rounded dimensions. That love god possessed the most beautiful hands that human eyes had ever seen, and one of those hands was straying to the fly of the dream-man’s pants and giving a squeeze at the groin, as though beckoning toward the gates of paradise. And then that wondrous apparition turned toward Eachurbod and asked what time it was. What time is it?! What time is it?! But the hands of Eachurbod’s watch started whirling around even more deliriously than the queen herself. Desperately she tried to pin down the time. She stooped over the watch, she tried to follow the dizzying, whirling hands, and suddenly she was nothing but a round blur—a queen chasing her tail (right there on the sidewalk!) to keep up with the flying hands of time. What time is it?! Yes, yes, the time! she shrieked, over and over, as she whirled in an ever-tightening circle. But the young man, who apparently had no time to lose (even to find out what time it was), took off walking, faster and faster—the truth is, he was practically running—so Eachurbod stopped whirling and took off after him. And anyway, where could that marvelous creature be going if not to that place over there where all those bodies were winking and sparkling almost like flashes of lightning. Over there, over there, where the ocean roared and reared up lustfully, where men danced for one last time around a conga drum. And now the young man was rushing ever faster, clutching at his bulging fly; and the queen flew along behind him, still clutching at her own bulging Volume XXVII of the Complete Works of Lenin. The pansy felt as though she were riding a wheelchair on a sea of broken glass on her very own tongue, moving forward, endlessly, until the end. Suddenly, the young man stopped in front of a large wooden door at the entrance to a glorious colonial mansion—the most magnificent one on the whole street, perhaps in the whole city. The young man pushed open the door, and then he slammed it in Eachurbod’s eager face. As if by magic, the well-built (and apparently horny) love god had vanished— poof! Eachurbod, unable to move, like a doe caught in the headlights, stood there frozen (though still not stuffed) before the colonial mansion’s imposing door. And there