Destiny and Desire

“Don’t look at the moon’s ass, prick.”

I was a law clerk. I was a young employee in the companies of Max Monroy. I was bold.

“I’d like to free you.”

“Freedom is only the desire to be free.”

“Free of what, Miguel?” I asked, I confess, with a feeling of growing tenderness toward this man who, without either one of us wanting it, was becoming my friend.

“Of the furies.”

The fury of success. The fury of failure. The fury of sex. The fury of resentment. The fury of anger. The fury of love. All this passed through my head.

“Free, free.”

With an impulse I would call fraternal, the prisoner and I embraced.

“The Mariachi has left here, free. Nazario Esparza’s influence freed him. Maximiliano Batalla is a dangerous criminal. He shouldn’t be walking around.”

He sneezed.

“You know, Josue? Among the criminals in San Juan de Aragon, there aren’t only thieves, there aren’t only innocents, or kids who must be saved, or old men who die here or are killed by a violence I sometimes can’t control. They fill the pool without letting me know. Some kids drown. My power has limits, boy.”

The tiger looked at me.

“There are also killers.”

He tried to look down. He couldn’t.

“They’re killers because they have no other recourse. I mean, if you examine the circumstances, you understand they were obliged to kill. They had no other way out. Crime was their destiny. I accept that. Others kill because they lose the ability to endure. I’m being frank. They put up with a boss, a wife, a crying baby, damn it, listen to me, what I’m telling you is terrifying, I know, laugh, Josue, you tolerate a bitch of a mother-in-law but one day you explode, no more, death urges them on: Kill and death itself appears just behind them. I understand the attraction and horror of crime. I live with crime every day. I don’t dare condemn the man who kills because he has no other recourse. There are those who kill because they’re hungry, don’t forget that…”

His pause frightened me. His entire body quivered without weakness. That’s what made me afraid.

“But not the gratuitous crime. The crime that doesn’t involve you. The crime they pay you for. The crime of Judas. Not that. Absolutely not that.”

He looked at me again.

“Maximiliano Batalla came here and I couldn’t read his face. His face of a criminal on the payroll of a millionaire coward. I reproach myself for that, kid. I entrust you with it.”

“How did you find out?”

“A prisoner came in who knew him. He told me. In the end I control everything. The Mariachi doesn’t even control his own dick. He’s an asshole. But a dangerous asshole. He has to be done away with.”

Then Miguel Aparecido stripped away any shred of tenderness or serenity and presented himself to me as a true exterminating angel, filled with sacred rage, as if he were looking into an abyss where he did not recognize himself, as if obedience were lacking in the cosmos, as if a demon had been born in him who demanded form, only that, the form that would permit him to act.

“The criminal left without my permission.”

He looked at me and changed suddenly, became imploring.

“Help me. You and your friends.”

I felt exasperated.

“If you left here, you could take revenge yourself, Miguel. I don’t know for what. You could take action.”

And his final words that day were at once a defeat and a victory.

“I’m a loyal man only if I remain here. Forever.”

THE SECRET OF Max Monroy-Asunta gave me a class as she sat backlit in her office aquarium, seated so her super-legs would distract me, her most reliable test-is knowing how to anticipate.

“Just like his mother,” I said only to be meddlesome.

“What do you know about that?”

“What everybody knows, don’t be so mysterious.” I returned her smile. “History exists, you know?”

“Max was ahead of everybody.”

Asunta proceeded to give me a class on what I already knew from the mouth of Antigua Concepcion. Except that what was spontaneous and lively in Max Monroy’s mother was, in the mouth of Asunta, Max Monroy’s executive secretary, contrived and dull, as if Asunta were repeating a class for beginners: me.

I decided, however, to be a good pupil for her (I admit it), the most attractive woman I had ever met. Elvira Rios, the whore with the bee, my current ball-and-chain, Lucha Zapata, paled in comparison with this woman- object, this beautiful thing, attractive, sophisticated, elegant, and supremely desirable, giving me little classes on the businessman’s genius. I realized she was repeating a lesson she had memorized. I forgave her because she was good-looking.

What did Max Monroy do? asks an Asunta whose mind, I observe, bursts into flame when she mentions super-boss.

“What has Max Monroy’s secret been?”

According to Asunta, there is not just one secret but rather a kind of constellation of truths. He was not the first, she tells me, to put the modern telephone within reach of everyone. He was the first to foresee a possible clogging of lines because of short supply and excess demand, opening the possibility of buy now pay later but on condition you sign up with us, the companies of Max Monroy.

“Why? Not only because Max Monroy offered in one package telephone, computer, Vodafone, O2, the entire package, Josue, but without deceptive contracts or onerous clauses. Max didn’t care about hiding costs, he didn’t want to exploit or add clauses in illegible print. Everything in big letters, understand? Instead of high prices and high utilities, he proposed low prices and constant utilities with a gesture of freedom, understand? Max Monroy is who he is because he respects the consumer’s freedom, that’s the difference. When Max asked the consumer to abandon networks established earlier, his offer was freedom. Max told each consumer: Choose your own basic monthly package. I’ll give it to you at a fixed price. I’ll permit you to use whatever you want from our network, films, telephone, information, whatever you like and the way you like it. Max addressed specific groups offering them a fixed price in exchange for a constellation of services, assuming the operating costs and subsidizing operations when necessary.”

Asunta adjusted the navy blue pinstripe jacket that was her uniform, which must have moved her to say that Max Monroy was a great tailor.

I laughed.

She didn’t: “A great tailor. Listen carefully. Max Monroy never offered the same communication service to everybody. He promised each client: ‘This is for you alone. This is yours. It’s your suit.’ And he kept his promise. We offer each client individual tailoring.”

I think she looked with critical coolness at my classic attire of gray suit and tie. She looked at me as one looks at a mouse. Her eyes requested, without saying anything, “More contrast, Josue, a red or yellow tie, a thinner belt or some striking suspenders, look handsome, Josue, when you take off your jacket to work or make love, don’t dress like a bureaucrat at the Ministry of Finance when you come to the office, how do you usually dress at home? Look for a modern mix of elegance and comfort. Go on.”

“Sans facon,” she said very quietly. “Charm-casual.”

“Excuse me?” I said, guessing at the mimetic talent of Asunta Jordan.

“Nothing. Max Monroy invented individual tailoring for each consumer and each consumer felt special and privileged when he used our services.”

“Our?” I permitted myself a raised eyebrow.

“We’re a big family,” she had to say, disappointing me with the cliche and returning me, for an instant, to my old nostalgia for our philosophical talks with Father Filopater.

“Other companies put on pressure. Competition is intense. Until now we’ve beaten the others because all our activity is always directed to as many sectors as we can manage, as many consumers as we can imagine. Our strategy is multisegmentary. Growth with utility. Just imagine. What do you think?”