Ojos de pez muerto/ Dead fish eyes
At one point in my life I forgot to return to that town, but I returned only to realize that there was nothing in it that interested me, except Lola, whom I was to see after I finished the paperwork at the registry office. The town was a ghost cave with very little left and what was there was dying.
Lola era la chica que me había cuidado cuando era niño y por la que había tenido un enamoramiento infantil. Con ella había mantenido una relación a distancia cuando salimos, mis padres y yo, del pueblo y fue ella la que me avisó de la destrucción de la casa donde había nacido. Tenía que verla antes de volver a la ciudad y agradecerle su cuido en aquellos años.
Lola was the girl who had taken care of me when I was a child and for whom I had had a childhood crush. I had maintained a long-distance relationship with her when my parents and I left town and she was the one who warned me about the destruction of the house where I was born. I had to see her before returning to the city and thank her for her care in those years.
Mientras iba caminando,el sonido de las moscas zumbaban en mis oídos y un olor putrefacto se pegaba a mi ropa. En mitad de las aceras había restos de pescados, basura acumulada, escombros de las casas, carros detenidos. En una de las cunetas, la cabeza de un pescado estaba varada en las ruinas. Sus ojos hundidos, lechosos y secos me miraban desde la putridez de la muerte.
As I walked along, the sound of flies buzzed in my ears and a putrid smell clung to my clothes. In the middle of the sidewalks were fish scraps, accumulated garbage, debris from houses, stalled cars. In one of the gutters, the head of a fish was stranded in the ruins. Its sunken, milky, dry eyes stared at me from the putridity of death.
Aquel espectáculo dantesco me hizo apresurar el paso. Cuando llegué a casa de Lola, esta me recibió emocionada, pero yo no pude dejar de ver lo flaca que estaba, su piel agrietada por los años, su palidez verdosa. Me dijo que estaba enferma y yo le apreté las manos. Mientras me miraba, sus ojos me hicieron recordar los ojos del pez muerto: los párpados quietos para siempre con el color del sufrimiento.
That Dantesque spectacle made me hurry my pace. When I arrived at Lola's house, she greeted me with emotion, but I could not help seeing how skinny she was, her skin cracked by the years, her greenish pallor. She told me she was sick and I squeezed her hands. As she looked at me, her eyes reminded me of the eyes of the dead fish: eyelids forever still with the color of suffering.