Done and Dusted

La fiesta de la Lima occurred every September in the seaside village of Salvado. Since the Spanish colonisers brought lime trees from the neighbouring islands, the plants had become the regional cash crop. Sprouting out the stony baked earth, the spiky trees would be picked by girls in straw hats and wrinkled brown men with stubborn donkeys.

The culmination of the harvest would lead to a great town fiesta. The musicians would gather in the Plaza de la Lima before the crowd of peasants and well-to-do families with children in sailor suits. Maracas would hiss as trumpets and panpipes would play their tunes. Steel drums would tinkle. And a singer would wail his words with the passion of a bereaved widower.

They would dance around the great bronze statue of a lime in the centre of the plaza. The verdigris had turned large parts of it green. Young men were dashing between a few tables where elderly couples were sipping Lime liquor. Zest filled the air. The sun beat down and blew the salty breeze through the town. Under gazebos griddled sardines were being prodded onto metal sticks and held over charcoal fires. Limes were being squeezed, zinging through the tempo.

It was an atmosphere of jollity for all on the ground floor. But above them in an apartment overlooking the square, Francisco was chain smoking. He hated fiestas, he hated the carnival. He hated seeing everybody, and people asking after him. Nothing ever changed. He was too old for this stuff and was watching a badly acted telenovela through the haze. The wife was clawing at a younger woman who her husband had cheated with, the struggle continued with dramatic violins before it cut to a long advert break. Soap powder, lottery tickets and rum all flickered through, as he contemplated the grey loneliness that haunted his apartment.

He was old. Downstairs was young. He looked through the bottom of the shuttered window where the heaving masses were dancing in the mad afternoon heat. He looked back around his piso, and back to the TV show where the wife was being imprisoned for her assault. It was infuriating being stuck in his own prison, in his own mind, in his own world where the sun no longer shone and even his cactus was dying.

He had to get out. He filled a pocket full of pesos, put on his orange shirt and staggered his way down the building's many steps. He turned down an alley where he could find the quiet bar. A sickly fan whirred mechanically and pathetically in the corner. It seemed to be more of a decoration than a solution to the hot humid summer. Francisco shook his shirt that was tight around the belly and ordered a beer. There was nobody here and he started shuffling a deck of cards. Then in came one of his old workmates - Roberto. His amigo complained about the heat and how women were obsessed with babies and pets, and this put his friend in a slightly better mood.

They shuffled the cards and played poker for shrapnel in the shadowy bar. The barman was staring at the TV, watching repeats of last night's football. The tables were wooden and coated in fading varnish. A broken radio and some faded fishing nets adorned the pastel orange walls. The elderly men played poker quietly between themselves, never saying much, only taking the odd sip of their drink and waiting for fate to unfurl her cards.

Time had become irrelevant since they retired. Days became weeks which blurred into months. They lived in a place beyond time. Where the only demarcations were the seasons, the harvests and the strictly regimented fiestas and saints days when they found the shops to be closed. Every day repeated itself. It started with a breakfast of coffee and anis at the square, followed by a look at the necrologicas to see who had died in the night. Then bread and produce would be bought from the shops. The newspaper would be read. Lunch would be made. A siesta would then follow and the evenings would be spent in the bar playing cards.

Suddenly as a large pot was building between the men, and the river card was set to be turned, a young couple bounded in. They couldn't have been more than about 19 and they must have been dancing with gusto as they were both very sweaty. They ordered beers with a lime slice and sat at the bar. The barman poured their drinks while continually staring at the TV and placed them on the zinc countertop. They talked, she giggled uncontrollably and he prodded her.

The old men were affronted by the energy. Look at them, so young, so carefree, so... unburdened by life and its woes. when they were their age, they'd already been toiling on the lime trees that sprinkled the hillsides, they had also learned how to fish. Roberto had had a child to support back then too and so had to walk to the capital to find work in the winter.

It took their mind of the battle in front of them. But then it was time to turn over the river card. The queen of hearts. They stared at one another unerringly. They raised and reraised over the top of each other until finally one was all in.

Roberto revealed a pair of queens in his hand which gave him three of a kind. Francisco turned over his cards of an ace and a jack which he'd made into a straight. He heaved the pile of coinage towards him and ordered the pair another drink. Francisco chuckled a dry belly chuckle.

"I never know what to expect from you" said Roberto scrunching his eyebrows.

"That's life isn't it" he shrugged and retreated into his melancholy. They were silent between them. All they could hear was the girl giggling while the macho boyfriend whispered debaucherous things in her ear, the football commentator shreiking "GOL!", the music echoing through the maze of alleys and noisy air conditioning units bumbling in the valley of the street.

The barman clonked their drinks on the table along with a plate of tapas. It was grilled prawns coated in salt and lime. The heavy-set men licked their lips as the smell of their youth bellowed from the plate below their noses.

They pulled off the prawns' head and tail and its little legs and shell. They crunched through the fish's body, savouring every salty, zesty, meaty morsel. Despite their gloom and the sadness that rattled the rigid frames of these old men - there were still small pleasures. They melted in their chairs, partly from the heat and partly from the food.

They licked their fingers and repeated the process on the other prawns that stared at them from the plate. Then they sat again wordlessly. There was nothing more to say that could be expressed in mere language. One had won. One had lost. But none of that mattered now for fate had dealt them both similar hands and both had played them in similar ways. Their end was in sight the doctors had told them, and there was a tacit acceptance of the future and whatever god had in mind for them next.

They drank. Quietly, sombrely, patiently - occupying their space in the world. They were what they were. There was nowhere else to be. Nothing else to do. They... existed.

The chica was nudging her lover to pay. He flicked a note on the bar, said "hasta luego" and slapped his girlfriend's bum as they walked out. The barman opened the till with a crash of coins and slipped the money in, disinterestedly, still transfixed by the football.

The men had found an old newspaper and were re-reading the stories about the dangerous mountain tracks nearby and a small increase in property taxes. It kept them occupied while the flies buzzed around the hot shadowy bar.

Then in came a flux of people. The festivities must have stopped and lots of families were jostling in to find tables. The barman looked annoyed as it would mean he had to take his attention away from the match. The old men rolled their eyes at the children who were annoyingly screachy and decided to stagger back home.

When he'd made it through the crowds by waving his walking stick, Francisco laid down on his bed. The drunkenness made him feel lighter. He drifted into a sleep where he became lighter, lighter and then totally weightless.

Two days later the neighbours complained of a terrible smell coming from next door. The police were sent in and there they found the corpse. The funeraria was called along with the priest. A notice would be typed by a blonde lady called Carolina - it would be printed four times, distributed on the Necrologica boards around town and an announcement would be published in the newspaper.

Roberto cried when he saw the news. He sat on the bench opposite the church and wept for the friend and ally he'd known since he was a boy. There were so few of their group left. He looked at the sky knowing full well that it wouldn't be long before he joined them.

A woman touched his shoulder and he looked up. Maybe it was the virgin Maria. No - it was a lady of his age who was grieving as well. She was sobbing quietly. They watched the birds rustle around in the tree above them. She told him about the walks that she and her husband would take along the shore. They would eat breakfast together in the park, except today... she wouldn't. She cried again. Wells and wells of tears.

She was distressed. Instinctively he pulled his arm up and around her neck and gave her a tissue. She was fragile and - beautiful in her flowery apron he thought. Before he could think twice he invited her for breakfast. He reproached himself for making such a stupid and direct remark. But as instinctively as the birds making their nest in the tree above them - she sobbed a mumbled "si". He put his hand on her shoulder as they walked past the fountain. Life went on.