26
PARTISAN REVIEW
"But, son, you must be crazy, the only people who can do that
are the ones who die- "
"No, mama, not die . The dead don't dream .
You
have
to
be
alive
to
dream, that's why I have to go on living . I haven't dedicated
my entire life
to
sleeping , but sometimes I feel I ought
to
even
though I don 't know what I'm going to find behind that door. I
may discover that giving up living like other people was a mistake ,
that finding out what was behind the door wasn't worth the trou–
ble. But I don't care. The fact that I'm living for a genuine purpose
justifies my life and makes sense of it. I think of other people's lives
and I pity them because they lack that core I have, because they
don't experience the fever that drives me . And if what's behind that
door turns out to be what I think, if there is light, if there is
something that will allow understanding, and at the same time will
explain . . ."
The year after, Sebastian got a job and his mother quit hers.
Adela had aged greatly . It was as if seeing Sebastian tired her
terribly, as if thinking about him squeezed her dry . She felt destiny
had been hard on her, had demanded too much from her, had given
her very little in exchange . She consoled herself by playing cards
with Mrs. Mechita and calling up her former coworkers from time
to time
to
hear what was going on at the office . With her modest
pension and Sebastian's salary, they had enough to get along , and
they went on living in the same rooms at the boarding house , with
potted ferns set in the middle of immaculate doilies, and the smell
of moth-eaten plush curtains.
At the office Sebastian didn't say much
to
his colleagues . He
felt that to make friends, start any relationship that wasn't purely
formal, would be to betray his vocation for sleep. He was rather tall
and thin and seemed to be made of a fragile and transparent sub–
stance different from flesh. This gave him such an interesting ap–
pearance that while the girls in the office were powdering their
noses or correcting imaginary defects in their hairdos, they would
watch him and giggle, regretting he was so young . He had strange
blue eyes that were very pretty .
"The eyes of a saint, " one of the girls said .
"Or an artist, " said another.
"No, the eyes of a great lover ," corrected the boldest of them.
