At Night We Walk in Circles by Daniel Alarcón

later was as arbitrary as his initial arrest. Meanwhile the country was speeding toward a precipice. The fall began in earnest soon after.
    Other topics covered that first evening at the Wembley: Henry’s daughter and her artistic gifts; Patalarga’s opinionated and talented wife, Diana, who’d played the role of Alejo in the first production of
The Idiot President
(“That’s how we met,” said Patalarga), but who’d wanted nothing to do with the revival, and had gladly made way for the new member of the troupe; Patalarga’s first cousin Cayetano, whom they’d meet on tour, and who’d spent many nights at the Wembley carving poetry into the scarred wooden tabletops with his penknife; and finally, the delicate negotiation a man makes with his ego in order to teach elementary school science when he is actually a playwright.
    On this last point, Nelson found he had a bit to say. Henry, according to Nelson, should not be working in an elementary school. Or driving a cab, even if he claimed to enjoy it. If Henry taught at all, it should be at the Conservatory. But in fact, if the world were fair, he would be abroad, in Paris or New York or Madrid, where his work could be appreciated. He should be overseeing the translations of his plays, winning awards, attending festivals, giving lectures, etc.
    In the entire country there was probably no one who admired Henry’s work as much as Nelson. He might have gone on, but noticed his friends shaking their heads sadly. Nelson stopped, and watched them watching him.
    â€œOh, the feeble, colonized mind,” said Henry.
    â€œWe thought you were different,” Patalarga said.
    â€œMore enlightened.”
    â€œIt’s just pitiful.”
    Henry and Patalarga, he would discover, often fell into these rhythms, one of them finishing the other’s thought. Nelson wasn’t the only one who found this tendency off-putting. Now, as Patalarga called for a new and final (or so he promised) pitcher, Henry explained their objection. In their day, there was an illness—“Would you call it that, my dear assistant director?” and Patalarga nodded lugubriously—yes, a syndrome, endemic to his generation. Young people were led to believe that success had to come in the form of approval from abroad. Cultural colonialism—that’s what it was called back then.
    â€œI thought,” declared Patalarga, “that we had rid ourselves of this.”
    They had drunk a good deal, perhaps too much, or perhaps only too much for Nelson. He didn’t know what to say. He began to explain. His point had simply been that Henry’s work deserved wider recognition; his mind was neither colonized nor feeble. If anything, he was more skeptical of the United States than the rest of his generation. Why wouldn’t he be? His older brother had all but abandoned the family to make his life there.
    Francisco would not have agreed with this point, but let’s limit ourselves, for the moment, to Nelson: he’d been employing his older brother as a straw man for years, to suit whatever narrative purpose his life required at any given moment. A hero, a lifeline, an enemy, or a traitor. Now, when a villain was called for, Francisco once again obliged.
    â€œReally?” Henry asked.
    â€œThere was a time when I idolized him. When I would have given anything to go. But then . . . I don’t know what happened.”
    â€œIt passed?” Patalarga said.
    â€œYou outgrew it,” said Henry.
    Nelson nodded. He raised the glass of beer to his lips, as if signaling an end to his confessions. Just like that, he’d updated his story for this new audience, something closer to the truth. His friends from the Conservatory would have been surprised.
    It was early, not yet nine, when they left, but they’d been drinking for what seemed like an eternity. The long summer day slid toward night, the sky shaded pink and red