Malinche Read Online Free PDF Page A

a kind of communion with her every time she brought a tortilla to her mouth.

    Her grandmother had been her best playmate, her greatest ally, her best friend in spite of the fact that little by little, the years had left her blind. The funny thing was that the less her grandmother was able to see, the less she needed her eyes. She told no one about losing her sight. She got around the same as ever and she knew exactly where everything was. She never stumbled over anything or asked for help. It seemed as if she had sketched out in her mind all the distances, paths, and corners of her surroundings.
    When Malinalli turned three, her grandmother gave her clay figurines and toys, a dress she had embroidered when already almost blind, a turquoise necklace, and a small bracelet made of grains of corn. Malinalli felt truly loved. She went out to the patio with her grandmother to play with her new toys. Soon afterward a dark cloud covered them and loud thunder interrupted their games. A bolt of lightning caught Malinalli’s attention. It was silver in the sky. What did it mean? What was that silvery splendor on the gray? Before her grandmother could answer her it began to hail. The noise was such that no voice could be heard, only the sound that deafened everything. Malinalli and her grandmother took shelter from the storm inside the house. When the rain stopped, Malinalli asked for permission to go outside and play. Happy and excited, she buried her hands in the ice stones; she erected figures and made circles of ice, till little by little they melted into water. She played for two hours in the mud and water. She soiled her new dress, her knees, and her hands. She made clay dolls and mud balls, and finally she grew tired. When night was already falling, she went back inside the house and said to her grandmother, “Of all the toys that I have been given, I like the toys of water the best.”
    â€œWhy?” the grandmother asked.
    â€œBecause they change shapes.”
    â€œYes, child,” the grandmother explained, “they are your prettiest toys not only because they change shapes, but because they always return, for water is eternal.”
    The girl felt as if she had been understood and she kissed her grandmother. On receiving the kiss, the grandmother noticed that the child smelled like wet earth and that she was covered in mud from head to toe. It didn’t bother the grandmother that Malinalli had soiled her dress or that the child had ruined so quickly what her blind eyes had made with such great effort. On the contrary, she talked to her about the joys of finding pleasure in the water, the earth, and the wind, how giving oneself over to them was a way to relish life.
    After the showers, the heat again took hold and gradually it became intolerable. Although it was already night, Malinalli asked for permission to go out and play again and her grandmother, since it was the girl’s birthday, let her. The old woman sat by the doorway while her granddaughter laughed and played outside.
    After a while, a silence arose. Not another sound was heard. The grandmother grew frightened and went out to look for her granddaughter whom she loved more than her own flesh, than sight itself, than the stars. As she walked, she stumbled upon her and realized that the girl had fallen asleep in the mud. She caressed her with great tenderness, picked her up and carried her into the house. She placed her in her own bed to sleep and remained beside her, watching the stars. She could not see them with her physical eyes but with those of her spirit, eyes with which she had long ago mapped out a planetarium in her heart.
    That day the house had been silent and only Malinalli’s tiny bell of laughter had filled the spaces and distances of the home. Only the grandmother and Malinalli had celebrated the girl’s birthday, for her mother had left a few days before, accompanied by a Tlatoani with whom she had fallen in love, to