I rose and went over to the mound, did what was necessary to uncover . . . the carcass. One last time, I asked María for her forgiveness. The words cut like daggers inside me. I cleared my throat and asked God too, but there was only silence.
Her hips . . . I quickly determined to change ‘her’ to ‘the’ from here on. The hips, buttocks, whatever, were now exposed and protruded from the snow. I knelt, bared the skin further and dug into the flesh with my knife. It was frozen hard and difficult to cut but I persisted now that I’d finally begun. Eventually I cut away about a dozen small slivers, each about the size of a cigarette. I stood up, carried them around the plane and placed them carefully on the exposed part of the roof to thaw in the warming sun.
I sat beside the plane, rested for about an hour, thinking the same guilty thoughts I’d mulled over a million times already. For once I was too agitated to drift into sleep. I became aware that I was stalling again, trying even now to avoid the inevitable. Expelling a low grunt of annoyance at myself, I hauled up onto my feet and resolved to finish what I’d started.
The sun had dried the slivers a bit. I closed my eyes and tried to pray one last time. Begged for help from above to do what I had to do, what I knew deep down was right – knew at least some of the time. Again there was no reply. Just a terrible stillness and the void.
My hand reached out and took one of the strips down. Then hesitated. Even with my mind firmly set, the horror of what I was about to do, had in fact already done, paralysed me. My hand wouldn’t move; I could neither lift it to my mouth nor let it fall to my side.
A churning revulsion stirred in my shrivelled guts like rancid bile. Repugnance fought with necessity, my emotions with my belly.
Me pica el bagre, me pica el bagre, me pica el bagre. Her voice echoed through my head like a half-forgotten mantra, accusing me.
“Me pica el bagre,” I said out loud. And then in English; “I’m hungry.”
“God wants me to survive,” I told myself.
“And there’s only one way,” I continued, gazing into the distance.
I nodded my head. Yes, yes, yes, only one way. The mountain in the west loomed large and formidable. I lowered my eyes, stared at the hand and set my will firm. Do it. Just do it.
I set my will rock hard and it prevailed. The hand rose at last and pushed the shiny raw meat down into my mouth.
I gagged once then forced myself to swallow down the slimy sliver; scooped a handful of snow to wash it down.
Guilty? No. I felt triumphant.
Later, already feeling a little stronger, I dug out the rest of our belongings. In my travel bag I had a couple of pens and a notebook. That evening, before it got dark, I wrote to María;
My dear María,
In an hour or so it will be sunset and it will be too cold to write this. You will never read it but I want to write it anyway. I am sorry I never said these things to you while I had the chance. María, you can have no idea how much I’ve thought about you. I did not know you for very long but if things had been different I sensed we would have been together forever. I can’t describe how you made me feel, in Mendoza and even here in this snowy hell.
For you, sweet lady, it is over. I am only sorry that I was swept so far away from you at the very last. I hope you were asleep when it happened and never woke up.
Today is my tenth day here and would have been yours too. The weather was wonderful and the sun very bright. I drank melted snow water till my swollen belly could hold no more. I have small cuts and bruises all over my body from the avalanche but they will heal.
Of course, it was also a very depressing day as well. You know all about that, I’m sure. Perhaps your spirit is here with me still, in the breeze, and I don’t even know it. If that’s so, then I pray you looked away when I did what I had to do.
Afterwards I expected, indeed yearned for a wave of guilt and shame to overwhelm me. Instead, it felt like a sacrament, the holiest I have ever taken. Like one is supposed to feel when doing something holy, I felt blessed, triumphant.
My head told me I had just overcome a primitive, irrational taboo. My belly told me I might soon be able to walk away from here and survive.
Why then does my heart tell me I’ve committed an unforgiveable sin?
María, you probably understand all this better than I do. You know that from the bottom of my heart I wish it were different but there was nothing else for me to do. I had to decide, and I have done what I have done with whatever little courage and faith I could find. I must now continue to do it, there is no going back. If I am wrong, I beg for your forgiveness.
Whichever way I am judged, I am glad that you are now free of all pain and suffering. Your soul is with your Maker. I try to believe that as best I can.
Farewell María. I love you.
Your sad Cal.