Gaspar gave his leftover meat to Pocho, Luis and Julieta’s dog. He hadn’t been able to eat much: it was too hot, and everyone near the grill was roasting except the twins, who were splashing in a newly bought canvas pool. Julieta was mad at Gaspar, but he wasn’t about to change his mind, not for anything in the world. He was going to live on his own. And Julieta thought it was selfish, given the context, for him not to use that rent money on his family instead. We have to get through this together, she said. You’re not being very supportive, she repeated, calmly but firmly. You should stay until the economic situation improves. And Gaspar had flatly refused. The economic situation never improves in this country. If you need money I’ll lend it to you, every month, it’s no problem. I want to go.
Julieta had been offended by the suggestion of a loan, but Gaspar didn’t understand why. After all, what did it matter? He didn’t help with the twins. He was hardly ever there. Why did she want to keep him around? There was something strange about the demand, something that was at odds with Julieta’s personality, always so generous. After he’d turned eighteen, Gaspar had gained access to the bank accounts and statements of his inheritance and properties. It was an astonishing amount of money that changed his life, and could potentially change the lives of Luis, Julieta, and the twins. Luis didn’t want to hear a word about the money—it’s all yours, son, he said, it’s the money your mother left you; Julieta thought differently. In a very unpleasant fight, Gaspar had told her it’s as if you wanted me to pay you for the trouble of taking care of me. And I will pay you, if that’s what you want! Let’s agree on a monthly amount. She had started crying. You don’t understand, she’d yelled, and Gaspar replied that no, he genuinely did not understand. They weren’t fighting now, but the situation was tense. Julieta didn’t ever let him forget who his mother’s family was. The Bradfords, the Reyeses. Proprietors. Yerbateros. Landlords. Exploiters. And she sought signs of that origin in him, as if class were a matter of genetics. Now she thought this display of “individualism”—as she called it—was a whim.
That was another reason he preferred to live alone. Because with Julieta, embraces were mixed with prejudice, trust with control, concern with exasperation. She had changed a lot since she’d had children. Gaspar could understand that. He knew it didn’t help that he didn’t hide his indifference toward the twins, but still, he didn’t understand her imperious need to keep him in the house. She had put it like that once: You just can’t leave the house. Why not? he had asked her, and she’d been silent, as if she hadn’t known the answer because no one had told her.
After lunch, Luis, Negro, and Gaspar rode in the same car to downtown La Plata. The three of them were going to take part in a march that would be multitudinous and possibly dangerous, which was why Julieta had decided to stay home with the twins. The whispers of repression had risen to a scream. The new education law was about to be passed, and its obvious goal was to cut the budget in order to pay down the debt, the eternal Argentine merry-go-round, as his uncle said. The cuts in all sectors were suffocating. No one had money and no salaries were raised and every day people were fired and factories shut down and there was such a feeling of looming disaster that the heat of a never-ending summer in the middle of March was asphyxiating.
Negro and Luis had taken teaching jobs at starvation wages because they couldn’t find anything else. Negro, to Gaspar’s surprise, had once been a camera assistant on several legendary films that had been banned by the dictatorship. Hence his exile. Negro had seen some of the things Gaspar filmed: poetry readings, marches, a short film about Pablo in his studio. He’d told Gaspar he had a good eye, and he’d gotten him the gig filming quincea?eras and university events. Look what the kid does, Negro said when he saw the fifteen-year-olds waltzing, their pink dresses like flowers, their exaggerated makeup too mature for a young girl’s features, the sweaty fathers whose expressions were a mixture of pride and fear. Look what he does: he takes this shitty party and that ugly kid and he makes them beautiful, gives them dignity.
It was so hot that the drum played alone at times, such was the players’ exhaustion. Gaspar joined in the chanting. “Let’s go, comrades, gotta have more balls than that . . . ,” “Fight, fight, education is our right! . . . ,” and the loudest one, “Education for the workers and if you don’t like it, get fucked, get fucked!” Over in the journalism school’s column, he saw Marita. She had recently started saying hi to him again, and they even chatted sometimes. His anger had passed. Maybe they could be friends. He had forgiven her for what happened with Guille; she’d never known how much it hurt him. Now Marita worked at the university press and she was a serious activist; her new boyfriend, who went by the name “El Hueso,” was one of the most well-known student leaders. He was a far cry from Gaspar and his banal quincea?era shoots, which, anyway, he did just to have something to do, so he didn’t get bored, to make some extra money that he really didn’t need. As she was now, distant and with a different life, he liked Marita even more. He’d seen her sitting on the pavement making signs, her face spattered with white paint, laughing. She always wore some very worn-out combat boots that she’d surely bought used; her fingers were ink-stained and her nails painted black. She went to the Princesa often, though she’d handed over the responsibility of running it to Pablo, which he did with a great deal of intelligence and a joy in giving orders that Gaspar found tremendously entertaining.
The assembly in Plaza San Martín was at the boring phase where they read out names of supporting organizations, but right away Gaspar noticed how many cops were there, and an even greater anomaly: there were mounted police. Horses. He waded into the crowd to find his uncle, who was equally disturbed. Let’s wait, he told Gaspar, but if they give the order, run. Don’t hesitate, just run. Then Luis looked into his eyes and said: or just go right now, son.
Maybe nothing will happen, said Gaspar. Just when someone from the journalism school was about to take the mic, the sound system squealed with feedback and there was an explosion. And, farther away, stampedes. Stampedes in a plaza are seen in the treetops, which shake as people try to escape by climbing up. When it’s hot, you can also tell from the waves of heavy air left by the empty spaces. And then come the screams and the sound of running feet. With any luck, there are no gunshots.
That afternoon there were gunshots. The police, both mounted and on foot, broke up the gathering and chased people down streets and avenues. Later, Gaspar would learn they arrested over two hundred people. There would be a full day of waiting and of terrified parents and families, the police silent, the governor spouting nonsense on TV. For now, they had to run.
It would have been better not to flee down Calle 7, so broad and open, but it was the only option. Gaspar’s idea was simple: get to the School of Economics. It was nearby, and, more importantly, the police couldn’t enter university buildings because they were autonomous. Running in the stampede, he found himself beside Marita and El Hueso, who were panting from effort. Though it was very hot, he still felt like everyone was running too slowly. He heard shots. Rubber bullets. He could tell the difference by now: this wasn’t his first stampede at a protest. The unmistakable smell of tear gas reached him. The best way to combat its effects was by burying your nose in a handkerchief soaked in urine. He hoped it wouldn’t come to that. Some people brought lemons to marches, but his uncle said that didn’t do shit. Better to pee on your clothes.