of sky above me.
It was, as I said, a prolonged episode. It lasted all evening and all night. They found
me at ten o’clock the next morning. I fantasized about the search provoked by my
disappearance, conducted in my absence (knowing how it would end). I could even hear
voices calling me; I could hear them coming through the loudspeakers:
“César Aira … a boy by the name of César Aira.” But
this was not part of the fantasy, the mental reconstruction. I was meant to respond to
those voices. And I wanted to, I wanted to say, for example, “Here I am. Help! I
don’t know how to get down.” But I couldn’t. Powerless to act, I could
only anticipate future events. I imagined a scene in which I was explaining to the
governor of the prison what had really happened: “… it was my dad. He
grabbed me and hid me somewhere … he was going to use me as a hostage in the
breakout he’s planning with his accomplices … “All this was
forgivable, even Dad could have forgiven me, considering my innocence, my character, my
fears … All the same, to ease my conscience, I tried to improve the story:
“But Dad was forced to do it, by the King of the Criminals; he would never have
chosen to kidnap his own daughter …” And then, worried that the governor
would get the wrong idea, I added a clarification: “But my Dad isn’t the
King ….” I had embarked on the complex task of lying. The experienced liar
knows that the secret of success is to pretend convincingly not to know certain things.
For example the consequences of what one is saying, so that others will seem to discover
them first. “Not that Dad ever mentioned the King … it was the others, they
were talking about him, afraid, in awe … They were calling Dad your Jamesty
… I don’t know why, because my dad’s called Tomás
…” The governor was bound to fall for my ploy. He would think: It’s
too complicated not to be true. That’s what they always think; it’s the
golden rule of fiction. He would believe me completely. Not Dad. Dad knew my tricks; he
was
my tricks. He would see through them, but he would forgive me, even if
it meant another ten years in jail … These were not exactly the reflections of an
angel. The sound of the loudspeaker (it was already night, the stars were shining in the
sky) swept through the jail, calling me: “Come out of your hiding place,
César, your mother is waiting to take you home …” Women’s
voices, the social workers … Mom’s voice too … I even thought I
heard Dad’s voice—my heart skipped a beat—that beloved voice, which I
hadn’t heard for so many months, and then I really did wish I had wings to fly
away … But I couldn’t. This was always happening, so often that it
literally was the story of my life: hearing a voice, understanding the orders it was
giving me, wanting to obey, and not being able to … Because reality, the only
sphere in which I could have acted, kept withdrawing at the speed of my desire to enter
it …
In this case, and maybe in all the others too, I had the marvelous consolation of knowing
that I was an angel. This knowledge transformed the situation, turning it into a dream,
but a real dream. It was a transformation of reality. The cruel delirium I had suffered
as a result of the fever was a transformation too, but the opposite kind. In the real
dream, reality took the form of happiness or paradise. The transformation could go
either way, reality becoming delirium or dream, but the real dream turned dreamlike in
turn, becoming the angel, or reality.
7
WINTER CAME, AND MOM began to take in ironing. We spent the interminable
evenings inside, listening to the radio, Mom bending over the steaming cloth, me staring
at my exercise book, and both of us miles away, our souls meandering in the strangest
places. We had adopted an invariable routine. In the morning I went with her to
It was, as I said, a prolonged episode. It lasted all evening and all night. They found
me at ten o’clock the next morning. I fantasized about the search provoked by my
disappearance, conducted in my absence (knowing how it would end). I could even hear
voices calling me; I could hear them coming through the loudspeakers:
“César Aira … a boy by the name of César Aira.” But
this was not part of the fantasy, the mental reconstruction. I was meant to respond to
those voices. And I wanted to, I wanted to say, for example, “Here I am. Help! I
don’t know how to get down.” But I couldn’t. Powerless to act, I could
only anticipate future events. I imagined a scene in which I was explaining to the
governor of the prison what had really happened: “… it was my dad. He
grabbed me and hid me somewhere … he was going to use me as a hostage in the
breakout he’s planning with his accomplices … “All this was
forgivable, even Dad could have forgiven me, considering my innocence, my character, my
fears … All the same, to ease my conscience, I tried to improve the story:
“But Dad was forced to do it, by the King of the Criminals; he would never have
chosen to kidnap his own daughter …” And then, worried that the governor
would get the wrong idea, I added a clarification: “But my Dad isn’t the
King ….” I had embarked on the complex task of lying. The experienced liar
knows that the secret of success is to pretend convincingly not to know certain things.
For example the consequences of what one is saying, so that others will seem to discover
them first. “Not that Dad ever mentioned the King … it was the others, they
were talking about him, afraid, in awe … They were calling Dad your Jamesty
… I don’t know why, because my dad’s called Tomás
…” The governor was bound to fall for my ploy. He would think: It’s
too complicated not to be true. That’s what they always think; it’s the
golden rule of fiction. He would believe me completely. Not Dad. Dad knew my tricks; he
was
my tricks. He would see through them, but he would forgive me, even if
it meant another ten years in jail … These were not exactly the reflections of an
angel. The sound of the loudspeaker (it was already night, the stars were shining in the
sky) swept through the jail, calling me: “Come out of your hiding place,
César, your mother is waiting to take you home …” Women’s
voices, the social workers … Mom’s voice too … I even thought I
heard Dad’s voice—my heart skipped a beat—that beloved voice, which I
hadn’t heard for so many months, and then I really did wish I had wings to fly
away … But I couldn’t. This was always happening, so often that it
literally was the story of my life: hearing a voice, understanding the orders it was
giving me, wanting to obey, and not being able to … Because reality, the only
sphere in which I could have acted, kept withdrawing at the speed of my desire to enter
it …
In this case, and maybe in all the others too, I had the marvelous consolation of knowing
that I was an angel. This knowledge transformed the situation, turning it into a dream,
but a real dream. It was a transformation of reality. The cruel delirium I had suffered
as a result of the fever was a transformation too, but the opposite kind. In the real
dream, reality took the form of happiness or paradise. The transformation could go
either way, reality becoming delirium or dream, but the real dream turned dreamlike in
turn, becoming the angel, or reality.
7
WINTER CAME, AND MOM began to take in ironing. We spent the interminable
evenings inside, listening to the radio, Mom bending over the steaming cloth, me staring
at my exercise book, and both of us miles away, our souls meandering in the strangest
places. We had adopted an invariable routine. In the morning I went with her to
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