The Beauty of Men Never Dies: An Autobiographical Novel

Fenil

12 Fenil I am such a silly cunt. I think there is every possibility of my becoming interested in a twenty-oneyear -old Uruguayan policeman. In my midseventies. How can I possibly do something that I find so embarrassing in my aging friends who are infatuated with much younger men? Much younger. I can handle someone in his fifties, and even that is twenty-plus years younger. His name is Fenil. It sounds like “fennel.” He says he has no idea where his mother dreamed it up. Would it be too weird to say Fenil seems to be revolving into my life like some kind of destiny object? Something like those Swiss weather clocks people used to have when I was a child—a little Swiss chalet on the wall with two archways. A man came out when it was going to be fair and a woman when it was going to be rainy. Or perhaps the other way around. I haven’t thought of them in years. I wonder how they worked and whether they exist anywhere anymore. Well, Fenil is a little bit like the Swiss weather clock. He’s appearing like clockwork, but is that forecasting good weather or bad? I have been in Montevideo for a month. The guests have been nonstop and I have been a familiar face in all my favorite restaurants and watering holes. The top of the Radisson Hotel. Panini on the Calle de Bacacay. The Café Bacacay at the other end of that street. El Viejo y El Mar (The Old Man and The Sea) down on the Rambla approaching Pocitos. One of the few waterside restaurants in this city built entirely on beaches. Strange, no? My guests and I have also been up and down the coast. Out to Punta del Este, that sort of frightening small replica of Miami Beach. The 13 Fenil more front-edge La Barra with all its blondes in sporty vehicles with radios blaring. On out to José Ignacio, which is a tiny town on a tiny promontory where you could walk all over town on the tops of cars, the streets are so congested. Then up to La Paloma, a little dusty with one good restaurant. Why is it touted as being the fashion destination for next year? Then to Pedrera, which is also congested with Argentineans and is far prettier on its cliff with two beaches sweeping down on either side. Fenil is a policeman and as such was guarding Adriana’s brother, who was in the pokey. Adriana is my manager in Uruguay. She was raised in the United States until the age of fourteen and speaks perfect English. She is also very smart. Adriana, who is beautiful, responsible, and the solid brick core of her family, has a wild brother who has been roaming about the United States for a long time. Long enough to father two children by two different brides and now may be selling something illicit in Los Angeles. Adriana says Cuban cigars. I wonder . . . I also wonder if he was really put in jail while visiting his family here because he offered a bribe to an office worker to expedite the renewal of his citizenship papers. Uruguayans have citizenship identity cards that require renewal. He was in this country for that, offered someone a bribe because he wanted to return to L.A. quickly, and was seized and placed in the vast and Hitlerian jail just up the street from me. Conditions in the jail are more collegiate than penal, it seems. Adriana had to bring him a mattress. The jail does not provide that. She took one from one of her children’s beds (it was the weekend and stores were closed). In a few days, her brother requested another longer one as the jail was being inspected by a newspaper and the warden had asked that the inmates get new bedspreads and curtains for their suites. Three men to a room, to avoid hanky-panky, I suppose, and with rather nice bureaus, mirrors, closets, etc. I saw pictures. There was also a kitchen on each floor, and Adriana’s brother had appointed himself chef for the floor and requested large amounts of rice, beans, and other foodstuffs. Neither Adriana nor her mother have incomes to speak of but had to provide the food as their brother and son explained that this was how he stayed on the right side of the other prisoners. [3.21...