He heard the horses’ hooves, a groan from Marita, and he saw the cop’s baton. He shouted to Hueso to run faster and he guided them at his own speed down the sidewalk, dodging people in their path. Marita yelled I can’t keep up!, but he ignored her. He wasn’t about to spend the night in jail, or let them, if he could help it.
The economics building had been designed with the blueprints of a prison, his uncle had once explained. It’s a panopticon, see it? The open galleries all around, and in the middle, a surveillance tower. The tower in question was for the elevator, not a guard, but the idea was the same. These guys have some evil minds. Gaspar hardly knew the building, he’d gone there once or twice for a party or to meet up with a girl, but that was all. Still, he didn’t need a map of the place: they just had to get inside and they’d be safe. The police couldn’t go in.
Except, that day, they went in.
Gaspar watched incredulously as a horse struggled up the entrance steps. From the upper windows, people peered out and jeered “motherfuckers, motherfuckers,” and the cops, wearing helmets, made them retreat back into the classrooms by firing gas canisters into the air. Gaspar decided to go inside anyway, and Marita and Hueso followed him. The building was full of people, and a lot of police had entered. They were dragging students out. One girl’s belly was bared, her shirt lifted as she was pulled across the floor, one of her sandals left behind in front of a classroom door. Kids had been handcuffed for resisting, one of them bleeding from his temple. Hueso shouted that the cops couldn’t enter the building, that it’s the law, that this is a bloodbath, and Marita told him to be quiet. They were in a corner, and they watched as the cops went rushing up the stairs, some already entering the classrooms. They were arresting people randomly. Gaspar decided to turn down a narrow hallway he thought he recognized that led to the service personnel bathroom, which was less frequented. When he turned around, he saw they were being followed, at a trot, by two fat cops who looked pretty fatigued. We’re not getting out of here, said Hueso, but Gaspar opened a door with a sign saying PRIVATE that led to a janitor’s closet, then closed it behind them. The three of them were left in darkness, waiting for the cops to open the door. They heard the doorknob rattling, voices cursing. Did you have a key? Marita asked. And Gaspar, in a low voice, said no. More turning of the doorknob, so hard it seemed about to break, a kick to the door and then a shout, and furious footsteps running away. Not yet, said Hueso, though neither of them had tried to leave.
They listened. The sounds weren’t clear. Some shouts, sirens in the street. No more gunshots, at least not nearby. Marita sat on the floor and took out her lighter in order to see. When Gaspar heard it clicking—it didn’t light on the first try—he asked her not to use it, speaking aloud and taking her gently by the arm. It was the most restrained gesture he could make in that narrow place, trying to keep his calm. There was nothing evil in the little room. He wasn’t going to turn around and see shelves holding teeth, no piano or blonde Adela waving in the darkness. But if Marita used the lighter, he was going to scream, and it was possible that after screaming he would end up hugging his knees on the floor, his eyes dry. Marita obeyed: maybe she thought it was a strategy for hiding from the police. While they waited, the sounds in the building quieted. Raids, by definition, didn’t last long. Gaspar felt Marita’s arm lightly touching his, and that dispelled his fear. He wanted to get her attention, to defend her; he wanted her to leave that room thinking Hueso was a coward and a good-for-nothing and Gaspar was a hero, who, what’s more, was a much better fuck.
“Let’s go,” said Hueso.
Gaspar opened the door. For a second, he thought that his father was right beside him, standing there and saying very good, you can lock as well as open, very good. It was an instant, then the feeling vanished. Marita was talking about what incredible luck they had that the doorknob should get stuck right then, and so firmly, it was crazy. I can’t believe you could open it so easily now. It must have gotten stuck from outside, said Gaspar, a ludicrous explanation, but one that, amid the panic and adrenaline, she accepted. When they left the janitor’s closet and were walking carefully toward the hallway, Marita let go of her boyfriend’s hand, slowed down, and asked Gaspar: were you scared in there, since it was so dark? Are you okay?
He was okay. A little anxious: his chest hurt when he took a deep breath. But that was all. Marita touched his cheeks with her black-tipped fingers and thanked him.
Then, she and Hueso disappeared, mixed in with classmates they knew who were already organizing to find out where the detainees had been taken, already calling lawyers from the hallway phones. Gaspar went running toward Plaza Italia, crossed it, and reached the bar where he and his uncle had agreed to meet if there was violence. It was open, unlike all the others on Calle 7. And right away he recognized his uncle’s back, the plaid short-sleeved shirt, the sweat stains under the arms, the hair somewhere between blond and orange that was growing ever lighter from the gray.
Gaspar put on his sunglasses so the bright light wouldn’t give him a headache. They were going to be a little late because he’d asked Pablo to come and pick him up. He’d forgotten about the opening of Andrés Sigal’s show, and he had promised he would be there. He’d spent the night before with one of Vicky’s fellow residents, and it had been really fun: who would have thought a doctor would drink and smoke so much? He’d ended up pretty drunk. So Pablo came to pick him up on his motorcycle, and he made Gaspar get on without a helmet.
“I’m not going to throw you.”
“I’m not scared,” said Gaspar.
Pocho, the dog, got so excited by the bike that he chased them for two hundred meters, until they turned on to the highway.
“So, Vicky’s friend?” Pablo asked.
“All good.”
“That’s it?”
“She’s pretty, she’s crazy, who knows.”
“Oh, I know. You only love Marita.”
“You just keep your eyes on the road, or your boyfriend’s gonna have to pay for our funerals.”
“He’s not my boyfriend.”
“Man, quit fucking around.”
Andrés Sigal’s opening was an event: photos of Argentina during his youthful travels around the country during the final years of dictatorship. Pablo had to go because he was Andrés’s lover and because Andrés still hadn’t confirmed the date of Pablo’s own opening; also, there would be journalists and collectors, because it was an important show. He couldn’t miss it. And Andrés had asked him to bring Gaspar. It’s not so much to ask. Come on, please. Pablo had told Gaspar: he’s head over heels for you, you drive him crazy. If I bring you as a little gift, he’ll green light my show within the week. Do it as a favor for your favorite talented queen, and later you can ask me for whatever you want. Gaspar had laughed a little, but he agreed. He wanted to see the photos, after all, and he liked Andrés.
Andrés’s gallery had once been a garage, and now, renovated, it had three exhibition halls. Its fa?ade was completely white, so that when it was closed it was hard to distinguish the edges of the heavy iron door, also painted white. Now it was open, and people had spilled outside to smoke on the sidewalk. Against the wall near the entrance was a table covered with a black cloth where there were glasses of red wine, champagne, water, and Coca-Cola. Waiters dressed casually in jeans and T-shirts were offering empanadas, a common-man touch Gaspar was grateful for, because he didn’t much care for the snacks that were usually served at this kind of event. He’d filmed several for his work, especially at the Fine Arts Photogallery, because most of his jobs were for the university. The faces of the guests, who had been drinking but were not drunk, held mockery and a trivial kind of cruelty; they were the faces of people who were thinking up their next ingenious phrase, the next biting criticism, the most efficient way to offend someone with impunity, because no one could afford the luxury of causing an affront in that place, with a glass of champagne in hand and a request on the tip of the tongue. Pablo rushed off to mingle with artists he knew: he introduced himself, was introduced, and their laughter rang out in the gallery’s strange acoustics. No one had seen Pablo’s newest work yet, the pieces from the past year: dolls made from IV tubes on foam mattresses, miniatures assembled from the pills his dead friends and acquaintances had never gotten to take, sheets that looked like shrouds with stencilled figures of bodies in different positions, in many cases real sheets stained with real sweat and shit. That’s what he planned to show. Andrés was at the other end of the hall, surrounded by friends and a few journalists.