The next morning I’m stirred by a thunderous crash. I’m on the pullout in the other room because my mother and sister have taken my bed. Not quite acclimated to the thing, I roll off and crash onto the floor. Initially, I think the worst: “Invaders,” I yell, and taking hold of the umbrella, I rush into the bedroom like a madman. It turns out that my mother knocked something over.
“Where’s the light?” She asks.
I point my umbrella to the front of my apartment, which is floor to ceiling glass.
“But there’s no,” and it’s early so it takes a few seconds to find the best words, “electrical light. I can’t see.”
“An unfortunate design flaw,” I say.
“There’s a light fixture above you genius,” my sister says. I’ve never noticed this before and sure enough when I flick the switch nothing happens.
“This explains a lot,” I say.
“How long have you been living without light?” My mother asks.
Clearly this is impossible to tell. I shrug my shoulders.
“The ants are gone,” my mother says, and nothing about this surprises me. Like everybody else in Buenos Aires, the ants probably spend most of their time smoking cigarettes in ant cafes.
“It’s hot,” my sister says. The apartment is sweltering, which is odd for the time of year. “Did you call somebody to fix the air conditioner?”
With my umbrella I point to the ceiling fan that looks like a propeller from a World War I fighter plane.
“Is it safe?” My mother asks.
“Of course it’s safe.”
“Where are the towels?” My sister asks. With the umbrella I point to a stack of rags neatly folded in the closet. “Have you washed these?”
“Carmen has,” I say. They raise their eyebrows.
“They are clean,” I say. Although I’m not sure this is something I believe-in.
I CAN’T remember the last time all three of us visited a museum together. It must have been a while ago because my mother acts like Megan and I are little. It’s a good thing too because at museums, our stylistic differences are obvious. I am the slow one and my sister is the fast one. Examples of this have been well documented by family historians. During mealtimes growing up, Megan and I used to pitch in with different levels of vigor.
It takes me an hour to set the table and my father yells at me for doing it “half-ass”. “Your mother likes placemats,” he says. After dinner, my sister does the clean-up, but cleaning up after our father isn’t easy. When he cooks he takes out all the cooking implements, but uses very few of them. So we have a hard time separating the dirty pots and pans from the clean ones. It becomes necessary to wash everything. And being the good brother that I am, I help my sister with her charge. But by the time I bring a dish to the sink, she has the table cleared. And in the time it takes me to dry a sauce pan, she has washed and dried all the implements. I’m quick to remind her that her speed can be reckless. She says my shuffling is more frustrating. Our mother balances us out somehow. And she keeps the two of us together at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes .
The security guards make my mother and sister check their purses. They’re given a number that corresponds to a closet behind the reception desk. I translate this exchange.
“Todo bien?” I ask the security guard working the counter.
“Todo bien.” He says.
“You have to check your purses,” I say. My mother is not happy about this, but doesn’t complain until she notices other women with their purses. “Those women still have their purses,” she says.
“They speak Spanish,” I say. And just like that my sister has disappeared. I tell my mother that she has probably just wondered off to the shopping areas. My mother wants me to go and look for her, but I haven’t started with the first painting.
“Stay here,” she says. Half an hour later she returns with my sister. I’m about to move on to the third painting when my sister says something.
“Ready?” She has gone through the whole museum.
“Goddammit,” I say.
“We’re staying together,” my mother says. And we do: for three hours.
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