Swedish Tango / the Rhythm of Memory Read Online Free PDF Page A

her stomach and wondered whom the child might resemble. Should it be a girl, he imagined her beautiful like her mother, with those long, marquise eyes and full, ripe mouth. They would call her Blanca, as she would be the symbol of their love. White and pure.
    Should they be blessed with a son, he hoped he would be strong and truthful. That he would grow into a man who could shoulder responsibility, who, in times of struggle, could survive. They would call him Rafael, because Salomé thought the name magical and divine. “In ancient Hebrew,” Salomé whispered to her betrothed, “it means ‘God heals all.’ ”

    Traveling to meet his future in-laws, Octavio tried to hide his nervousness. He realized that his background was inferior to that of the woman he loved. His father had worked in the same store since he was seventeen, and although he had been promoted several times, the family lived modestly and simply. Their house was far smaller than Salomé’s. He had shared a bedroom with his two elder brothers and his parents had slept on the floor, in a tiny room adjacent to the kitchen. He was the child of working-class parents and had disappointed them greatly when, as the first child to attend university, he chose to major in literature rather than a more practical field such as medicine or law.
    But then again, he had never been practical. He had buried his head in books since the time he’d learned to read; a perpetual daydreamer, he was absentminded of his chores and considered by his family not to be grounded in the real world.
    Since the age of twelve he had known he could never have a life like his father’s. A man who traveled to the same wooden storefront, selling hardware to the same people in the same small town, day after day, year after year. So the boy studied hard and earned himself a scholarship; his only way out. At school, he found not only poetry but now, even more importantly, love.
    He did not want Salomé to think that he was intimidated by the prospect of meeting her father. Inside, however, he was trembling. Salomé’s father would be the first doctor, aside from the man who had treated him as a child, that he had ever met. He knew that he had no title, no job, and no money of his own. But he had love. He naively believed that would be enough.

    Her parents were far from pleased when Salomé returned home from school, three months pregnant, and Octavio in tow. The beautiful daughter they had sent off to a convent had returned home very much the bohemian. Her hair was long and wild, no longer in the tight braids she had maintained since she was a little girl. Her bosom was full and peeking out from her uniform blouse, and there was the small bulge of her burgeoning stomach. She was only eighteen.
    “We’re in love, Papa,” she insisted. Her father stood before her, tall and slender as a baton. He gazed upon her with stony eyes, unable to fathom that his beloved daughter was carrying a child.
    Don Fernando had always nurtured high hopes for his only daughter. He had always believed that his spirited and brilliant child would marry a man who matched her. Now he stood before his prized jewel, unable to fathom that she could be in love with this penniless, jobless student.
    “I love your daughter, Dr. Herrera,” Octavio said in a practiced voice that veiled his nervousness. “There is nothing I would like more in this world than to have her as my wife.”
    “How old are you, may I ask?”
    “Twenty years, sir.”
    “Have you a job?”
    “No, sir, I am a student of literature at the university in Concepción.”
    Don Fernando did not find the irony of what the young Octavio had just said the least bit amusing. “And how will you support a wife and child on a student’s allowance?”
    “We will manage, sir. I have always worked hard. I received one of the university’s few scholarships—”
    Don Fernando cut the young man off. “You think you can exist on such a pittance for