22

I WALK with the test in my hands. I’ve left the car parked at the Supermaxi. In a fit of gratitude, I go in to buy shampoo for my mother. She ran out of shampoo, I know because of the grease I noticed in her hair that made me ask why, Mom, why’s your hair like that. And I, who never does anything for my mother, walk toward the door, past a pet store, watch a rabbit that looks almost dead, and listen to a conversation in which a guy says to another that rabbits are the cleanest animals, and go into the grocery store. I go straight to the shampoo section; my mom uses Pantene for blondes, I grab two bottles and think about bringing her corn tortillas because I won’t eat bread anymore. Never again. I’m nauseous thinking about the bread I ate this morning; I only ate the crust, which is weird for me as I eat all parts of bread, the inside is my favorite, the spongy texture, the snow, the cloud, the weight, I’m fascinated by all those aspects of bread. Finding myself there, cutting the bread up like that, using my fingernails to rip off the crust, feeling a deep disgust, a disgust that wasn’t normal for me, tasting the butter the bread had been fried in, tasting it like a stream of sweaty grease squeezed by hands in my mouth—two hands, dirty nails, all bad—I had to go to the bathroom to vomit, and I suspected everything wasn’t as it had ever been: the disgust, the bread, its crust, and the sensation of dirty hands entering my mouth and touching my belly that housed a tiny creature. In the grocery store, buying corn tortillas, the suspicion confirmed, everything becomes an internal stench of fat I cannot stand, and I run to pay and then run to the car and to my mother’s house, where she greets me with loving words and excuses for the mess. She’s eating a warm egg, the yellow of the yolk hurts and fascinates me, new ideas come up. I picture my mother loving that baby, I’m about to tell her I’m going to have a baby, Mom, and it’s for you; I’m about to tell her it will be enough to make you happy, but something stronger than me makes me stay quiet and contemplate with genuine love the image of my mother eating that yellow yolk. I take the shampoo out of the bag, put it in the bathroom, don’t tell her anything, the bathroom is also dirty, the trash overflowing with papers and hair, and I again feel deep disgust. Mom, I say, I’m going to Spain. My voice fills her with emotion, and she says you’ve needed to get out of here for a long time, you’re still young, you can stay there for a while, then go to Paris, you have the papers, you have a place to go, you can rest, you have to go to Europe, you have to go to Paris, that city will drive you wild, and then go back to Italy, there isn’t a city more beautiful than Florence, overcome your fear of flying, at the end of the day you don’t have children, you’ll be able to think there, and then you’ll be able to calmly make a decision about your situation, it will do you good, and then you’ll come back, yes, come back, you have to come back, you know you’re the only thing I have, and those countries are no place to live, though you may fall in love again and then the two of you can come back here to live.