In Spite of the Dark Silence by Jorge Volpi

Author:Jorge Volpi
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-09-20T22:33:00+00:00

-What's the true difference between a man and a woman?-I asked ruminating innumerable times upon that question.

Her eyes shined with green intensity, barely distracted from her chore revising musical scores.

-What are you talking about?-she responded.

Sitting in a kitchen chair she labored, noting the arcades to Bruckner's Seventh.

-Yes, what do you think may be the real difference between men and women? What makes us such opposites?

She left the pencil on the table, raised her face in a cynical way and directed an obscene gesture toward me.

-So what did you think?-and returned to the analysis of the music.

Only then did I look at her: a body, not a voice, which was exposed with the sole intention of being denied to me. She didn't have a trace of make-up on her face and wore her hair tied with a ribbon; a t-shirt that could barely be described as white and a thin black skirt revealed the precise forms of her skin. Her bare feet didn't even brush the floor tile; supporting each other, they caressed themselves with enjoyment. Seldom had I ever seen her look so beautiful: it was a shame that such opaque sensuality would be wasted in the chore she was carrying out. I didn't resist the temptation of caressing her neck, leaning softly over the musical staves, but with a brusque movement made to look spontaneous, she moved away from my hands.

-You haven't answered-I defended myself-. What makes you and me so different? Nature's genetics and nothing else?-She didn't pay any attention, I continued talking-. I'm going to put it to you another way: Are our souls alike? Or are they separate halves, like our bodies? If, for example, a man were to take suddenly the body of a woman, could you continue loving him as a man?

Her expression contorted violently, she pushed away the musical scores and turned toward me.

-A man is a man and a woman is a woman in everything-and she underlined the last word.

She moved back the chair and sat on it in a strange lotus position, with crossed legs. Unconsciously she caressed her small, white feet.

How brilliant-I said-. No, what I ask is if our essences are similar or if, like our bodies, they only complement each other and therefore remain incomplete.

-Both-annoyed she arranged her skirt playing with her ankles-. Why are you talking to me about this?

-Damn it! I don't make myself clear. Let's see. You and I desire each other because my body is that of a man and yours is of a woman, right? Well, what would happen if your body turned into that of a man and mine into that of a woman? Would we still love each other?

-That's stupid. I don't want to hear any more.

-Wait-I held her arm and burned myself upon touching her-. I'm not talking about homosexuality, but about the interior self.

-You're crazy.

She changed her posture, sat straight with her knees together and crossed her arms; her hands pressed delicately upon the spheres of her breasts, delineated through the pleats of her shirt.

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