At their arrival at their seats of a narrow plane of two seats per row, the young woman became impatient.
- But did you get the seat next to me?
- Yes. I'm on 22 aisle. And you?
- 22 window.
- Well, we'll travel together. It's all right.
Aphrodite didn't seem to think this was such a coincidence.
- Tourist trip, right? - said Carlos in a disinterested tone.
- No, family matters.
- I'm going to Eritrea as a tourist.
- Alone? In this day and season?
- Yes, in low season there are very good prices - he continued with the same tone.
Aphrodite put her headphones back on and listened to the music, which the young man perceived faintly. And so the first part of the journey went on. When Aphrodite fell asleep, Charles was able to contemplate all her beauty closer than ever. Her black, long, strong, shiny hair. Her face strong, smooth, with curves carved with chisel. Her body strong, healthy, emanating uncontained femininity. Strolling through her silhouette was the greatest joy for a young man who had possessed too many bodies and loved too few. Aphrodite was a magnet to him from which he could no longer be separated. Unable to resist, he leaned over her and kissed her hair chastely, skipping the interpersonal distance. But unfortunately that was when the young lady woke up.
- Stewardess! Stewardess!
- Sorry, I wasn't doing anything. I only kissed your hair because... because I love you.
- Stewardess! Come on, please!
- What's going on? - said the stewardess in alarm, coming quickly.
- Give me another seat! I don't want to be with this man. He has had intentions.
- Another seat? OK, it's no problem. We have plenty of empty seats.
- Excuse me, stewardess. It was nothing. I got carried away by my impulses. We are friends.
- What do you mean, friends? I don't know him!
- You're lying, Aphrodite. We've known each other for a long time.
- Calm down, please. If the lady doesn't want to be with you, I have to find another place for her.
- If anyone has to change, it will be me," said Carlos, saddened.
Feeling the looks of the whole passage behind him, Carlos walked towards the tail of the plane occupying one of the last seats. He was again, as in his last days of school, the last in line.
During the second part of the trip, Carlos, in one of the last seats of the plane, embarrassed and having nothing else to do, devoted himself to recognizing the territory he was heading to and which seemed to be very different from the African jungle that appeared in his children's stories... What would happen when he landed at the airport?
- I will not be separated from her! - he said forcefully within himself, as he thought of the fateful moment of coming ashore. She'd probably have her family waiting for her. He would be left alone in an unknown country of incomprehensible languages, Arabic and Tigrinya, as he had read in the travel guide, with whose reading he was trying to make his journey easier and help him reduce his blood pressure.
And the fateful moment of getting off the plane came. He should have stayed at a safe distance from the woman he loved, but when they took out the luggage, he followed her.
- Aphrodite, please give me a chance. I tried to forget you, but I can't. I came here for you. I'd die if I couldn't see you anymore.
- Please, leave me alone. I'm a widow, I'm going back to my homeland. That's all over now.
- I just want to see you again, I want to be with you, don't leave me alone.
- Hail Aphrodite! - was heard near them.
- Cugino Paolo. Chè allegria! Come sono felice di rivederti!
- Anch'io, cara cugina. Ma chi è il ragazzo?
- Un francese che viaggia nello stesso volo.
- Niente di te?
- No, figurati.
- Excuse me, sir. Can I travel with you? I'm going to the same place as Aphrodite. I'll pay for your trip.
- Cosa?
The cousin looked at Aphrodite. The other man knew her name. There was something between them.
- Non accettare. Andiamo subito. Dopo ti spiego. I'm sorry. You can't come, Frenchman. Happy holidays, - said the young lady, closing the door of the van behind her.
Carlos ran to the other side and almost begged the driver to take him with them.
- Mi dispiace - was the answer.
The vehicle started leaving a considerable cloud of dust behind its wheels. Carlos stood still, sunk in tragedy. In the distance he could still see the sign for the van. Pizzeria Sorbillo.
- Are they Italian? he said to himself, and thought he had to keep reading the guide.
When he approached his suitcase, it was missing. From then on, he was going to travel light of luggage. Fortunately, he had his backpack, wallet and guide with him. He approached the information desk and was told in an understandable francoitaliano about the direction of the pizzeria and how to get there by bus.
That night Carlos had an excellent pizza dinner at Pizzeria Sorbillo, a fairly successful approach to the original house in Naples, under the perplexed gaze of Aphrodite's cousin. Luckily the place also offered rooms and Carlos did not hesitate to stay there. He knew his beloved goddess would be around.
In a spartan room, with a mattress on the floor as the only luxury, Carlos spent a night worried about his African future. To avoid this, he continued to read the Eritrean guide and saw its interesting places, its currency, its languages and its history. Then he understood why his host spoke Italian. Eritrea had been a former Italian colony in Mussolini's time.
The next day, at breakfast, he began a conversation with his cousin.
- Are you Italian?
- Io? No, ci parlo italiano perché mio padre fu soldato con gli italiani tanto tempo fa. Capisci? Mio padre... soldato.
- Okay, I understand. Your father soldier.
- Tu resti qui per quanto tempo? Quanti giorni, capisci?
- I don't know - he said with a shrug - I want to see your cousin.
- Sei veramente innamorato di Afrodita? Amore?
- Yes. I want to live with her. Forever - said the young man, having his index fingers joined together to expand the possibilities of being understood.
- Parlerò con lei. Vieni qui a mezzogiorno. Capisci? Alle dodici qui - he explained with the help of his fingers.
After a long walk to the Catholic Cathedral, also a legacy of the Italians, at 11:30 Carlos was already sitting in the pizzeria, nervously awaiting the arrival of his beloved. He imagined that this would be the final day in his pretensions to fall in love with Aphrodite.
At twelve o'clock, the woman of his dreams came in. She wasn't going alone. She was accompanied by two old men she imagined would be familiar. They sat at another table and seemed not to notice his presence. They were served their food and began to eat, as they discussed quietly, while they glanced briefly at the lonely young man. Even from a distance, though he did not understand what they were talking about, he felt an evident disagreement between Aphrodite and the two men. When they finished eating, the conversation seemed to fade away. At first glance it seemed that the old man sitting in front of the young woman had said the last word.
After Carlos had already eaten two pizzas to spend time and when he felt his hopes were waning, the waiter approached his table.
- Lei è invitato alla tavola dei signori di là. Mi accompagna, per piacere?
The gestures left no room for doubt. He was asking him to go to Aphrodite's table.
After the introductions, he was invited to sit on the free seat between Aphrodite and the more assertive old man, his father. A conversation followed between the father and the young man, which Aphrodite would translate without being allowed to participate.
After the introductions, he was invited to sit on the free seat between Aphrodite and the more assertive old man, his father. A conversation followed between the father and the young man, which Aphrodite would translate without being allowed to participate.
- I've heard that you are after my daughter. Is this true?
- Yes, I'm completely in love with her. I'm sure of it. I want to live with her.
- But she doesn't want to go back to Europe anymore.
- We can live here. I don't care about that. I just want to know if she wants me. I know Aphrodite now is a widow. We met at a gym in La Ciotat. But I still don't know if she likes me, I mean, if she likes me as a husband.
He told us that your profession, whatever it is because he did not want to describe it to us, is not very honest.
- My life in France is over. I want to start a new life here. I am strong. I can drive. I can work in anything.
- We are Eritrean Catholics and as such we believe that in order for the Most High to forgive the sin of heretics, they must suffer a penance. Would you be willing to do the penance assigned to you by our priest?
- I will do whatever you tell me to win your daughter's love, - he said, staring at her for a long time without blinking at all, though he only got a glimpse of her between surprised and intimidated.
The second old man, the young woman's uncle, who had hitherto remained silent, introduced himself.
- I am the patriarch of Asmara and uncle of Aphrodite. In order for you to aspire to the love of our daughter in faith, you must repent of your sins, fulfil your penance, and be baptized as a new man. Then we can bless your marriage, so that God may give you children to make you happy until the end of your days.
- What am I to do? said Carlos, almost interrupting him.
- If you really love Aphrodite you must go to the land of Aphar to do your penance. You'll work first. Then the shaman will give you the sacred drink so that you can wait in full purity for the flower to come out of the tree of the dragon's blood. You will remain there until his flowers come out, bathing in its blood. Bring Aphrodite a bunch of dragon flowers and then you'll be worthy of belonging to our tribe. Are you willing to face the challenge?
- Yes. Whenever you want.
- To the caravan!
They all got up quietly. The patriarch took Carlos by the hand and they began to walk, followed by Aphrodite and her father. The street was full of voices incomprehensible to a foreigner. They were buyng and selling, greeted and laughed, and as they approached their destination, the energy in the volume of the voices increased. At the end they arrived at a large stockyard where about twenty camels remained tied up, who were being saddled and their supplies checked, as they faced a long journey. It was the salt caravan. This time, a young French urbanite without any knowledge of beasts of burden or of the language spoken by the natives would be part of the expedition.
A few hours later the caravan left. For a few days Carlos would be a camel driver for the first time in his life. At his farewell he could take nothing but a long look of interest from Aphrodite, whose image would follow him everywhere during his period of penance.
Sun, wind and dust, days with eternal hours of mechanical leg movements following those of the camel drivers and camels that preceded him, absolute concentration on the absurdity he had gotten himself into, unmoving contemplation of the incomprehensible conversations of his companions while they ate something and drank another cup of hot tea at night,... and again a bolting sun, unbearable, because they were in the hottest place on the planet, the desert of Danakil.
In a few days Carlos got burnt, peeled, burnt again but survived covered with aloe gel, changing his clothes for the same chilaba and turban that the others wore. On the way they only found another caravan travelling in the opposite direction, with the camels loaded with large plates of fossil salt. Among the caravaners they exchanged joyful conversations, laughter and believed that they used the word French several times in their conversations.
Carlos had thought that the end of the journey would be an idyllic oasis of the Thousand and One Nights, but to his disappointment the caravan stopped in a ghost town. Everything around him was part of a lunar landscape dominated by silence and emptiness. They were already in another country, in Dallol, a former mining town from which Europeans had extracted salt and potash in the past. From that past, only the remains of buildings, machinery and railway parts remained in a desert with no tracks.
Over the next few days, all the men worked hard to get as many plates as possible out of a salt lake that had run out of water. Levers, pickaxes, chisels and hammers, everything was good to get salt out of that infernal depression. There were nights when the pain and fatigue kept him awake. Then he lay looking at the brightest moon he had ever seen, while he heard the melancholic songs of the Afar men. Then he saw floating before his eyes the last look of the woman who had changed his life, the day of farewell.
The night before returning with their load, there was a party and everyone danced and sang around a fire made of wood that they had carried there. They even offered him wine, which he hadn't tasted in a while. When they least expected it, a man with black skin, black clothes, and huge eyes staring at them appeared.
- Mr Jean, Mr. Jean - they all said at once, and in a second silence reigned.
The newcomer approached Carlos and for his relief spoke perfect French.
- Are you the Frenchman?
- Yes, me. My name is Carlos.
- I am Monsieur Jean, your shaman. I come from Sudan. I must congratulate you, you have passed your first test: heat, wind, loneliness and work. Tomorrow the caravan will leave but you are staying with me. When the dragon's blood tree blooms, it will be the moment when you can meet your beloved again.
When the first rays of sunshine illuminated the dry land, the caravan returned to its destination with its load of salt, but Monsieur Jean and Carlos took a different path, mounted on small donkeys, which seemed impossible for them to carry a person with them, but theu did. Soon the smell was noticeable. It was a pungent, acidic smell, greatly annoying to the sense of smell, but Monsieur Jean, who preceded him by pointing the way, did not seem to appreciate it.
- What is this smell? Carlos asked.
- You'll soon see - was the laconic answer.
Indeed, as soon as they reached the top of the hill, Carlos could not believe what he was seeing. It was hell on earth. Bubbling lakes, yellow, red, green, red waters, with 1 acidity, where there was no life, because in them sulphuric acid reigned, preventing any cellular life. An apocalyptic yet real vision.
- What is this? - he asked him
- The entrance to hell. You were going there, but I'll save you. Your sincere love has saved you.
Enduring as he could the unbearable smell, covering his nose, coughing, he followed the shaman to the top of a mountain with trees. He recognized them. They were like the ancient dragon tree of Icod de los Vinos in the Canary Islands, where one of his French clients had taken him for a sentimental getaway as his friend Beatriz called those weekends of intense sex in a hotel.
Following a known itinerary, they finally reached the largest tree in the xerophilous forest.
- Strip naked, completely - ordered Monsieur Jean.
Charles stripped off his light desert clothes and, following the shaman's instructions, stood by the tree. Monsieur Jean pulled out a machete and slashed the tree trunk over Carlos' head. He closed his eyes, frightened, to feel immediately that his body was covered in a red milky liquid.