The Barbarian Nurseries A Novel - By Hector Tobar Page 0,21
his grandchildren every chance he gets?
Araceli allowed the feathers to tickle the poor Mexican boy in the photographs a few times more than necessary, then went to the laundry to begin sorting through the clothes. The few things to be ironed she left for last, then stacked the rest in piles according to family member, from Scott’s sweatshirts and pajamas, to the tiniest stack of onesies and little skirts for Samantha. One o’clock and the Torres-Thompsons were still away. ¿A dónde habrán ido? The clothes were destined for the orderly backstage of the Torres-Thompson home, the walk-in closets in each bedroom, spaces organized with design-magazine minimalism. The shelves were thin white wafers of metal that floated in the air, sweaters and towels and blue jeans forming rectangular clouds above Araceli’s head. She derived a good deal of satisfaction from the uniformity of these stacked clothes, from the way the folds rose in neat, multicolored waves from the shelves, and from the light scent of mothballs that she had strategically placed here and there after Maureen discovered some telltale holes in a sweater.
When Araceli finished with the ironing she was done for the day—and it was only two o’clock. There was still no sign of the Torres-Thompsons as she closed the kitchen door behind her and stepped into the backyard for the short walk to the guesthouse, which was a baby clone of the main home, with the same cream-colored paint scheme, the same window moldings, the same black wooden door, the same brass doorknob. Opening this door was the small triumph at the end of Araceli’s workday, her principal North American achievement, to have a room of her own for the first time in her life. It contained the baroque collection of recycled objects that constituted her possessions: posters that had been salvaged from la señora Maureen’s “spring cleanings,” various art pieces Araceli had assembled (including a mobile hanging from the ceiling), and a spare table with a particleboard top that she used as a work space. One of the room’s two windows opened to the backyard, where the adobe-colored wall that defined the Torres-Thompson property was visible through the retreating foliage, and for a moment she imagined Pepe walking through his old garden, shaking his head knowingly. She took off her uniform, purging herself of her servant identity as the big blouse and pants fell into her hamper. Probably she wore the uniform precisely for this moment when she could put on her own clothes, a pair of leggings or jeans that transformed her into the Araceli who once haunted galleries and clubs in Condesa, Roma, and other Mexico City neighborhoods. Thank you, family, for these uniforms. I send you thousands of dollars earned with my sweat and you send me five filipinas. Then into the shower, and away with the smell of cleaning agents and fabric softener and into a nimble wakefulness in which she was fully herself.
She went to her worktable and reached inside and pulled out a piece of construction paper on which she was assembling a collage. The half-started project before her was taking form, in this early phase, with pictures cut out from the magazines Maureen discarded every month: International Artist, Real Simple, American Home, Smithsonian, Elle. Reaching under the table, she picked up a handful of magazines and then opened the table’s small drawer and took out an envelope. A collection of hands fell out. Araceli couldn’t draw hands very well, and she had begun gathering them as a kind of study, a communion with the anatomy of fingers, cuticles, and lifelines. There were hands from a Rembrandt, hands from an ad for skin lotion, hands wearing gardening gloves, a hand reaching out to shake another hand. There were just two hands glued to her construction-paper canvas so far, and she had placed them at the center of the composition-to-be. Painted in oil and open in a pleading expression, they were from Caravaggio’s painting Supper at Emmaus, a favorite of one of her art history instructors at the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes; for some reason they had popped up in an insurance advertisement.
After an hour of trying out various hand arrangements, searching for more hands in the magazines, and attaching a few to her collage,
Araceli stopped, rubbed her eyes, and tossed herself onto her bed for a nap. She looked at the framed picture of her four-year-old nephew, the only family picture in a gallery dominated by shots of old friends from