A Place Where the Sea Remembers by Sandra Benitez

Author:Sandra Benitez
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
ISBN: 978-1-56689-011-3
Publisher: Coffee House Press
Published: 2011-02-26T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHT

César Burgos

El Pescador (pescador, n.m. fisherman)

César Burgos awakened very early. For a moment he lay in bed, catching the pitch of the wind and watching a slant of sorry light steal in under the door. “Beto,” he whispered, drawing out his son’s name, hoping to rouse the boy and trick him into a sleepy response. César was not above such tactics. He wanted his son to speak again. He wanted more from him than a grunt or a shrug. “Beto,” César said again, but no answer came from across the room.

César swung himself up. He grabbed his trousers and tugged them on. He shook out his shoes for insect stowaways before slipping into them. The floor was cold, and in the room there was a chill that out at sea would send the fish deep. César pulled on a sweater. He stepped around his son’s cot. The eight year old was tucked into a ball. The rebozo that had been his mother’s, and that since her death he always took to bed with him, was pulled entirely over his head.

Going to the window, César lifted the curtain. The morning was gray. Little whirlwinds skipped along the road. César let the curtain drop and went across the room. At the stove, he lit its two burners. On one he placed the coffee pot he’d readied the night before. When the coffee grew hot, he poured a cup. Behind him his son stirred. César turned to him. Beto was propped up on an elbow. He had pulled the shawl down tight around his shoulders. He was dark, like his mother, with the same bow of a mouth that had been hers. “Did you sleep?” César asked.

Beto shrugged. He sank back onto the cot, drawing the rebozo over his head once more.

César stared at the boy enshrouded in the length of cloth that still contained his mother’s scent. He thought about the way things had been before the day misfortune struck. Despite the shifting tides of a life dependent on the sea, he had been a man who lacked little: he had possessed a humble house, the companionship of a woman, good and true, and, above all, three sons, on whom he’d rested much of his hopes for the future.

César sipped his coffee. It was a Saturday, the start of norther season, and the sea was choppy. On days like this ocean fishing was not good, and César would take to estuaries where he knew the fish to be. Still, despite the weather, he would put out to sea today. Today, he needed the sea under him. Each time he stepped into his boat, he left his heartbreak on the shore. In his boat, he was shielded from the monstrous turn his life had taken.

“I want you out of bed,” César said. He turned back to the stove, hearing the sternness in his voice that was his way of holding on. He removed the coffee from the burner and set a pot of beans on it.

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