I’m the only one in my class taking ethics instead of religion. I’ve been to four schools so far and it’s always been like this. At first, I didn’t know what ethics meant, and got it mixed up with equestrian. I thought they were going to teach me all about horses, and that the rest of my classmates were a bunch of gullible goody-goodies. In the end, I spent an hour a week talking to the teacher about crossing the street at a red or green light, good manners, and simple moral dilemmas. I didn’t mind being alone with her, though it made me feel even more like a misfit, a feeling that plagued me like some horrible goblin whispering into my ear. Mom teases me about the equestrian thing but also assures me I can do whatever I want. Believe in God, get baptized, take communion, even ride horses someday. But I already know that God, and want nothing to do with him. Since my second day of preschool, to be precise. On the first day, I was sitting alone in the sandbox in the courtyard, wishing someone would come over and play with me. I was comforted by the fact that I was wearing my favorite dress, the only one Grandma hadn’t made me, the only one that was bought for me in a store. The skirt and sleeves had blue and white stripes, and on the front there was an embroidered doll facing backward, wearing an embossed hat with a red satin bow I never got tired of stroking. All of a sudden this little girl ran over, yanked out the ribbon, and went off without saying a word. I didn’t say anything either. Grandma noticed as soon as I got home.
“What happened to the little bow on the hat?”
I felt so ashamed I didn’t say anything.
“You already lost it? But you liked it so much!”
“Somebody yanked it off at school.”
“You don’t say. And who was it?”
“Some little girl.”
“And did you do something to her?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“And did you tell your teacher?”
“No.”
Grandma leaned in. She was going to tell me something serious. Her gappy, greenish teeth didn’t scare me at all.
“Don’t you worry, sweetie,” she said. “The Lord will punish that little girl.”
“The Lord? Is that the same as God?”
“Yes, of course.”
The soothing image of a sweet, chestnut-haired, bearded Jesus emerging from behind the clouds filled me with trust. I thought justice would soon be done, that by His design everything would take care of itself, as though seeing a person get punished could somehow help. I went back to school the next morning, as sure of victory as someone with an ace hidden up their sleeve. I spent all day staring at my vicious classmate. I watched that little girl do all the evil she wanted, day in, day out, without learning her lesson, and regretted not taking charge of the situation, being passive, not knowing how to change my approach. Humiliated and cheated, I gazed bitterly at the 1987 Jesus calendar that hung in our living room until the end of the year. There were more calendars after that one, but I never stopped being mad about it. And my opinion of Catholicism wasn’t helped by the fact that the nuns used to slap my mom on the hand with a wooden ruler, that they’d instilled an unhealthy amount of shame in her and made her feel responsible for all the wickedness in the world, not to mention that her family couldn’t afford to keep sending her to the nice school with the good little girls.
My family’s take on religion began to change last winter, when Mom broke it to me that this time things were serious and gave me a fancy children’s Bible. To butter me up, she took me to the store and let me choose the one with the prettiest Virgin Mary on the cover. Then she told me there’d be no more drawing until I’d learned the Lord’s Prayer by heart. It was all a trick. Six months later, I’m being interviewed at the same Catholic school she went to herself. It’s a worrying sequence of events, but I’ve always been obedient and adaptable. Besides, I like uniforms. I’ve already gotten used to the humiliation of still believing in the Three Kings, and even though the truth eats away at me I’m learning to cope with contradictions. It can’t be all that hard. Anyway, no one was better than Melchior. I’m not nearly as keen on Jesus, so it won’t be as much of a letdown. I know right from the start that it’s all a big, fat lie. Today will be my first job interview, in a way. I’ve got to make a good impression on the head of school because if I don’t get into the convent who knows what’ll become of me. Mom has been tactful but aboveboard from the beginning. She’s really sick. Sick enough to have to tell me about it. It’s no surprise, there’s almost always been something wrong, and even though I completely believe in her, and I’ve been afraid forever that one day she might suddenly vanish, I’ve got to get used to the idea that this time it might be different, this time she might get too sick to go on. I haven’t seen my dad in five years. Domingo may be my business partner but he’s really just a big kid. We signed a contract but there’s no way he’s ready to take care of a girl my age full-time. We need a backup plan. The idea is to send me to the nuns if things get ugly, but I’m not even baptized. It’s urgent. I’ve been told this in no uncertain terms. And Mother Rosario is making an exception for the sake of an old student who’s in a tight spot, even though she knows perfectly well that I ought to be getting ready for my first communion by now. The biggest drag about all of this is having to go to catechism.
I’ve seen the courtyard, the library, the dining hall, and the dormitories. A pupil my age, perhaps a sweet future companion in misfortune, shows me two Chabel dolls with their own yellow wardrobe, the one I asked Grandma for once, right before she dragged me out of the store for picking something so expensive. The little wardrobe has three doors, a shoe rack, a fold-out mirror, and a ton of clothes, all so pretty and kept spick and span. I tell the girl how much I like it and excitedly reel off a list of toys of my own. Mom interrupts and hauls me out of the room. She’s gripping my arm and looks annoyed.
“Marina, listen up.”
“Yes, Mom?”
“Can’t you see they hardly have any toys here? Don’t go telling these girls how many you have at home and rubbing it in, OK?”
“I was telling her because if I come and live with her, maybe we can share.”
“Oh.”
I feel like crying, partly because I’ve upset the cute little orphan girl, and partly because I’ve only just realized that I might have to get used to this kind of austerity too.
“Won’t I be able to bring my toys along?”
Mom puts her arm around me and leans down to kiss me on the head.
“Oh darling, of course you will. Of course you will.”
I hold the snot inside my nose and we continue the tour silently, hand in hand. I’m now up to speed on the situation. All that’s left is the ultimate monster, the Mother Superior. Her office is cramped and gloomy and I hope I don’t have to go back there, that’s for sure. She and Mom have talked a lot on the phone and now she wants to meet me. It’s just the two of us. She pulls up a couple of chairs and we sit face to face with her big desk to one side. I’m wearing a checked, calf-length skirt but I squeeze my knees together to show her I know how to sit up straight with my legs closed like a proper young lady. This is partly thanks to those ethics classes. The Mother Superior is stout and looks ancient inside the wimple framing her soft, pale face. She sizes me up through her little round spectacles and greets me with a Hail Mary.
“Conceived without sin,” I answer. I’ve been preparing for this moment for a long time.
“How are you, Marina?”
“Very well, thank you, Mother,” I smile, thinking about the yellow doll’s wardrobe. Smiling is my forte.
“How are you doing at school?”
“Excellent.”
“Do you get good grades?”
“Yes.”
“What would you think of coming to school here?”
“That would be nice. I like the courtyard.”
“But if you came here you might have to be a boarder. Have you seen the dormitories?”
“Yes.”
“You have to pray every day here, you know.”
“I know, Mother.”
“Do you pray?”
“Yes.”
“Do you pray to Jesus?”
Her voice is faint, soft, measured. She knows how to spot a heretic, but I’m highly skilled at the art of winning over an enemy. I also got a pep talk before I came. If my lies are too exaggerated, she’ll see right through me. I need to be as sincere as I can within the bounds of the girlish discretion and virginal holiness that’s already part of my repertoire.
“I haven’t been to church much, Mother Rosario. I’m sure my mom told you. But I believe there’s a God and I’d like to learn more about him.”
She watches me carefully from on high. I’m nervous, even though I know I’m polite and well spoken and give an impression of credibility, at least at first.
“Do you know the Our Father?”
“Yes.”
“And do you like it?”
“Yes.”
“Would you like to know more prayers?”
“Yes, I’ve already started learning the Hail Mary.”
“Let’s see. Say an Our Father for me.”
I recite it, word-perfect, shyly but sweetly, doing my best to be irresistible.
“Do you want to be baptized?”
“Yes, Mother, I’m really looking forward to it.”
“And to have your first communion?”
“Even more.”
“Very well. You may go now.”
“Thank you, Mother.”
Back home, they’re proud of me for being admitted to the College of the Most Holy Trinity. While my real mother, the one without a capital M, takes a siesta, Domingo and I celebrate the triumph of my charms with a boxing session. First he holds up his palms so I can pound him with my closed fists. Once I’ve warmed up, he starts to dodge and feint and react with light punches, mostly aimed at my belly and arms. He likes to provoke me.
“My charming business partner! What a performance! You’re a young lady now!”
That kind of comment drives me nuts. Really gets on my nerves. He guards himself with a cushion and bears the brunt of all the nervous rage devouring me, until I’m worn out. I love the way he teaches me to fight. His rationale is that I’m learning self-defense while having fun. The reality is that I need all the stress-relief I can get and he knows it. Controlled violence is our greatest ally at times like this. We play war games and draw maps of battlefields, surveying our domain, identifying the enemy’s weaknesses the better to wear them down, building cities on the living-room floor and then blowing them to bits. Afterward, we switch sides and the bombs fall on our home, destroying everything we have.
“Green bomb!” he yells. We hide under the dining table. The green ones don’t do much damage, it’s not too hard to survive.
“Orange bomb!” I yell. We cover our heads and hold on amid the shower of debris.
“Oh no, my legs! I’ve lost my legs!” Domingo stares down at his thighs in terror.
“Me too! I’ve lost my legs and arms!”
“Look out, here comes a red bomb!”
“A red bomb? Is this the end?”
“That’s right, Partner, we’re going to die, but it’s been glorious fighting beside you.”
“So long, Domingo! See you in hell!”
“May it be so, comrade!”
“So long!”
The bomb falls. We play up the earth-shaking sounds of destruction, milking the pathos of the moment, crawling around and bleeding to death. I make the most of the drama and moan and groan to my heart’s content, alternating wails and hysterical laughter. When the dust finally clears, I stand up red in the face with tangled hair, let Domingo collapse on the couch in peace, and pad off to the bed where Mom is sleeping. She’s in her panties, resting beneath a thin blue sheet, wearing lipstick, with her hair cut short. I lie down next to her and snuggle up to her puffy flesh, holding my breath so I don’t disturb her. I touch her drowsy hands, sniff her aroma, and understand. I understand everything. If she dies, whenever that happens, it’ll be OK. I won’t hold it against her. I can always spritz her perfume and close my eyes. I’ve spent years memorizing the sound of her heartbeat. She trembles beside me and lets out a whimper. I move over and stroke her forehead to help guide her dreams to a more peaceful place. It would be awkward if she woke up. I’m not very well trained in affection. Domingo teaches me to fight anxiety with punches and laughter. He tries to steer me away from all forms of tenderness. I guess it’s the only way he knows, and it’s true that it’s quite effective, but at some point I’d like to be able to show my feelings in public. I think about my impending baptism. So infuriating. So embarrassing. But most of all, so boring. I go back into the living room, the straps of my composure laced back up tight, and sit down on the couch next to Domingo, rigid. I’m ready to be an orphan.
“I’m hungry,” I say.
“Have you already had a snack?”
“No.”
“How about a sandwich?”
“Yeah, but a chorizo one.”
“Let’s make two!”
We go to the kitchen, where there are always plenty of buns. Domingo makes two sandwiches and leaves the counter covered in crumbs. We take our first bites still standing. He looks me over, musses my hair, hands greasy from the chorizo, then points at me, laughing.
“Way to go, eh? You really pulled a fast one on that nun!”
I laugh too, with my mouth full, and run to the TV to get there first. I put the Miliki and Rita Irasema show on. Rita is really pretty when she wears a bow in her hair.
“Miliki’s songs aren’t so bad, Partner, but this circus act with his daughter is pretty lame, don’t you think?”
“I’m not changing the channel,” I protest.
He lingers on the couch a few more minutes, thinking up an excuse to make himself scarce.
“I’m going to make some chocolate milk. Want any?”
“OK. But the Smurfs are about to come on.”
“Ugh. Horrible.”
“Oh, they’re not that bad.”
He goes to the kitchen huffing and puffing. Luckily, he does everything at a snail’s pace and lets me listen to the whole opening song. Domingo has a special gift for shitting on most TV, especially the kids’ shows. He finds something wrong with everything. His nit-picking is contagious and ends up making you bitter. It’s partly because he’s really persuasive. He sits down next to you and starts telling you that the end of the cartoon The Little Mermaid is way more tragic than the story itself because that poor little girl isn’t old enough to get married, and that the Andersen version is way cooler, where she dies and gets turned into foam for being dumb, and how Ariel is a poor puppet of the system, and how the princes in these kinds of stories are always a waste of space. He only likes wicked stepmothers, witches, and villains, since they’re apparently the only ones with a shred of personality. Right now I know he’s dying to give me his spiel about how Papa Smurf is a Nazi, and to say, where did you ever see a village where all the guys have a job and a mind of their own while the only girl spends the whole time doing her hair and deciding whether to wear the white dress that’s a bit shorter or the white dress that’s a bit longer. To me, Smurfette has an enviable life, but I know he’s right and that cartoons are full of corrupting ideas. What bothers me is that he doesn’t realize the movies he watches aren’t much better. His only criteria are for it to be sleazy and make you want to throw up, or else give you nightmares, and if it can do both at once then he’ll be cheering at the screen. He uses a pretty advanced vocabulary with me and never censors what I watch or read. According to him, the only things I’m not allowed to do are swear and wear a miniskirt. And Mom agrees. They tell me it’s for my own good, so I don’t get too wild, and promise that when I’m a grown-up I can decide for myself. It makes me so mad I could die. Now The Smurfs is on. Today I have the right to enjoy a little basic pleasure without anyone lecturing me, I think. I don’t want anything more to do with this place. I’m moving to a beautiful far-off land full of bright colors and fancy flowers, where you can live inside a toadstool. Domingo comes back with two glasses on a tray. I don’t look at him but I know he’s pulling a disgusted face. Well I’m disgusted too, by those no-budget Jesús Franco lesbian vampire movies he loves, and also the chocolate milk he’s bringing out full of cream and lumps.
“I don’t know how you can stand this nonsense, kid.”
“Look, Domingo, if I miss anything Smurfette says because of your whining, I’ll kill you.”
“This would be unbearable without Gargamel.”
“I said I’d kill you!”
“All right, all right. I’m going to lie down with your mother and read for a bit.”
“Good idea.”
“Fuck me, you’ve got some nerve!”
“Well, I already missed Dragon Ball today because of that nun.”
“You’re not wrong. Also, Dragon Ball is way better than this.”
“And don’t swear!”
He lights a cigarette with a sour look and disappears into the hallway just as Smurfette comes on. I’ve learned to draw her shoes with a single line, and draw them all over the place. I don’t care if I’m being manipulated, I’m crazy about those white high heels. When the episode is over, I realize both my adults are snoring. I take this opportunity to shut myself in the bathroom and go through Mom’s makeup. She has three lipsticks. One red, one orange, one purple. A black eyeliner. Face cream. Light-colored powders, the ones in the container with a palm tree on it. I could stare at that white palm tree on a green background for a whole hour if nobody came to disturb me. I peek into Mom’s room. It’s cool and dusty. Domingo has lowered the blind and is lying on his back in his underpants. When he turns over to put his arm around her, his right nut slips out.
I creep into the room and tiptoe over to the nightstand, where there’s an issue of El Víbora waiting for me. It’s one I’ve already seen but I wouldn’t mind another look. I memorize its position, an upper corner touching the base of the lamp, under an old book and topped with a cigarette lighter. Success. I go into my room and shut the door. I hug El Víbora against my chest and kick with excitement. This session is going to be a real pick-me-up. El Víbora, Totem, Creepy, Makoki, and 1984 are all for adults and I’m not supposed to have laid eyes on them, but it’s too late now. At this point they’re so important to me that they’re a basic necessity. All my favorite authors and cartoonists come from these comics, not counting María Pascual, who actually writes children’s books. They rescue me, all of them: Liberatore, Tamburini, Manara, Nazario, Charles Burns, R. Crumb, Miguel Ángel Martín, Horacio Altuna, Max, Shelton, Onliyú, Silvio Cadelo, Moebius, Crepax, Mónica, Beatriz, Pons, Jaime and Beto Hernández, Toshio Saeki, Richard Corben, and Otomo, who also made a movie version of Akira, which might be my favorite after Splash. Those names in golden letters shine in my heart; they show me the path to salvation, just like Daryl Hannah when she flicks her mermaid tail and dives into the deep. Without this formidable army backing me up, I don’t think I could keep on being a nice, meek little girl. I just wouldn’t care anymore. On some of its covers El Víbora says, “Comix for survivors,” a motto that seems pretty crass but that I relate to nonetheless. I can grin and bear it through plenty of tricky situations because the pictures in those comics have a dark and liberating force that fills me with hope. OK, not all the pictures. Most of them are cartoon strips and some of those are beautiful, so fun and uplifting. But some are ugly and twisted, and you never know what you’re going to get. With the nasty ones, if the story has no appeal and the drawings aren’t any good, I flap the comic shut and wish I could puke up the pages like someone puking up shrimp that’s gone bad. Then I go to the bathroom to wash my face and hands in a pointless attempt to get rid of what I’ve seen. But then there are times when the stories are creepy but the captions are well written and I like the pictures. Then I get sucked in, and end up overcome by a strange kind of admiration, and I’m not sure what to make of it. Thanks to the education I get from comics I feel like I’m simmering all the time. I’ve learned the craziest language, I’ve gotten to know the world of kidnapping, torture, suicide, murder, mental illness, drugs, and all the more advanced varieties of perversion. They’ve also introduced me to fantastic stories of merciless superheroines, mutants, cyborgs, flowers that can make love with both delicacy and passion, angry and sad young misfits, possible futures, dreamworlds, distant planets, highly interesting sexual practices, and jokes I never could have imagined. These comics have given me the most intense experiences of my life. If I learned to read so quickly it was down to pure impatience. I couldn’t wait to find out everything that was happening in those comic strips. I know they fill my head with ideas I might not be ready for, but they bring me so much beauty and freedom that if I had to choose between comics and dolls I wouldn’t know what to do.
Today I’ve swiped the 1989 Christmas special of El Víbora from the nightstand – a nice and juicy issue that fell into my hands a few months ago and then disappeared. It apparently came with a Liberatore poster insert, which I never got to see. Oh, Liberatore, I owe him so much, whoever he is. Am I his youngest fan? Can there be many of us under ten who hide in our bedrooms during our parents’ siestas, dazzled by his colors? On the cover there’s a girl in panties surrounded by a bunch of guys dressed as the Kings, who’ve brought her porn and all kinds of dirty toys. I’m so fond of this image. It once represented all I ever hoped for out of life, in my endless innocence, at least for a time. Back when I would apologize to the floor for falling on it. In the end the floor wasn’t my friend and couldn’t kiss me on the ass. So many shattered illusions.