The Carrier

TEXT PETE HELVEY

35 MM MEKA TOME PERFORMANCE KYLA CARTER

STYLING ANDRU PEREZ CREATIVE DIRECTION FARIDA AMAR

 

The girl placed the metal bombilla straw in her mouth and took another sip. As the warm liquid snaked down her throat, her shoulders relaxed and her pupils dilated. Sitting across the bench, her friend was talking about her day or her family or something trivial. The girl tuned out; instantly docile and limp but still sitting upright, frozen—transfixed on her friend’s moving lips. What are these words? Her meandering mind tried to bring the scenario into focus. Her breath became short. Her heart ached and strained as her blood pressure rose. Her complexion lost all color and a trickle of blood streamed from her right nostril. For the moment, there was movement with no meaning. All sound had been drowned with silence. Her friend kept talking without taking a breath, oblivious to her companion’s worsening condition. Then, just as abruptly, the girl took a deep gasp of air and the color returned to her face. Her friend’s words continued to fade out to the sea’s deep horizon behind her back.

The view was the same. That Spring, Artigo had watched the newcomers approach by boat over the vast swath of sea just beyond the shores of his village. Their arrival was seared into his memory. At first, his tribe had greeted the newcomers with goodwill. As the chief and preparer of the herb, he was the first to serve the ceremonial yerba maté. Offered as a social pastime and a cure-all, as well as to honor special occasions, he had carefully ladled the simmering liquid into the calabaza for service to their guests. But soon after their arrival, the newcomers started showing disdain for the ceremony of the coveted herb. They drank the tea heavily, without respect and without ceremony: with huge gulps—liquid spilling from their metal carafes as if they were drunk on it—they consumed when they wanted and as much as they wanted.

The two girls returned down the seaside walk of La Rambla on their way back to the barrio. They took turns holding the thermos and calabaza, sipping as the other spoke. Turning the corner onto their street, they paused in front of the makeshift dwelling sprawled out over the sidewalk. They could hear the raspy breath of an inert figure sheltering underneath the blankets and made a wide circle around the familiar scene as they passed. The man had lived on that street longer than anyone could remember, but moved around when neighbors kicked him out of their stoops or doorways. Everyone knew of him, but nobody knew him. He was rarely seen, mostly rousing to scavenge in the dead of night. A low grumble emitted from under the blankets. The girls continued on their way, knowing he posed no threat. One eye, bloodshot and glazed over, squinted at them through a hole in the shelter. He muttered to himself, as if engaging in a secret conversation. The girls walked out of view until only their murmurs could be heard echoing down the empty street. An aged finger attached to a wretched fingernail resembling a claw protruded from a crevice in the blankets and pulled it shut.

Each day, Artigo tended the village garden. His toned, bronzed body glistened in the heat of the summer sun. It was the harvest, and he had been tasked to grow enough of the yerba plant to provide for both his people and the newcomers’ insatiable thirst. The number of his kin had dwindled as more ships arrived with more newcomers, all developing a taste for the bitter tea. He dried and processed the plants one at a time. His hands were calloused and his nails grew long and rough at the edges. His skin cracked and the blood dripped from his fingers into the freshly tilled soil. His mind did not sour. 

The illness that had accompanied the newcomers was indiscriminate. He buried the bodies around the edges of the garden one by one. He planted a yerba sprout on each plot, christening them as the namesake of the fallen. When the last passed that autumn, he did not cry, instead entreating the gods to allow him to survive. His days were spent in silence as he waited and prayed. At night he spoke with his tribe, whispering to the leaves of each plant. They began to grow taller and stronger than ever before, unrelenting in the cooling winds of the coming winter. Each morning when he approached, they stood at attention. The newcomers set about building their houses and tending their animals, oblivious. Artigo now knew the way. 

The young footballer bounded down the street, a ball under one arm, a thermos tucked under the other with a calabaza in hand. He sipped the bombilla straw as he went along, barely noticing the blanket encampment on the stoop as he passed. As the waterfront field where his friends awaited him came into view, he quickened his pace. Throwing the ball to their feet on his arrival, he bent over, gasping for air as if he had just run a marathon rather than a mere few blocks from his house. Taking a final sip from the bombilla, he set the thermos and calabaza on the ground and collapsed, writhing while a dull pain rippled through his entire body. His heartbeat quickened as his eyes glazed over. His blood pressure rose and his nose began to softly bleed as his friends stood over him in shock. Suddenly, he bolted upright. The color started returning to his complexion and he wiped the blood from his nose as his friends helped him to his feet. He walked with a certain weakness at first, like an old man who had been sitting too long, but was back to dribbling the ball within a few minutes. The game began, the episode written off as too much beer and not enough sleep. In the distance, the covered figure had watched the scene unfold with one eye, peering through a crevice in the blanket hut. The entire structure quivered and then convulsed. There was a deep gulp of air, as if someone was taking their first breath in years. The hole in the blanket pulled shut.

Artigo woke, rose, and quickly went about packing. He left the village in the frigid darkness of the winter morning before the newcomers arose. The yerba plants that had stood so tall and proud wilted by midday. Though they searched, the newcomers never saw or heard from him again. He had vanished. Unable to resurrect the wilted plants, they harvested each one and consumed them. Only one plant still stood alive, tall and healthy in the center of the garden with leaves that glistened in the bright sunlight. The newcomers collected the trimmings, and, over time, managed to cultivate new gardens of the yerba maté plant from the curious sole survivor.  More ships had arrived with more settlers and their numbers were now in the hundreds. The more they drank, the more they became addicted and the more gardens were planted. The newcomers had a thirst that could never be quenched.

Years passed, and the newcomers had children. And their children had children. A city rose. The broad, waterfront sidewalks of La Rambla were teeming.  The people passed each other, holding their thermoses of hot water and calabazas close to their bosom, taking a sip every few yards before passing it on to their companions. The practice of tomando maté (taking maté) was ingrained in the culture. Though they all lived rich, full, modern lives, they found they could never go for more than a few days without tomando maté. The strange maladies that occasionally afflicted the residents were so commonplace as to be ignored. It had become accepted that, occasionally, someone here or there would have a reaction. Sometimes they simply lost focus. Sometimes they collapsed. A few died. But devotion to the herb was never questioned.

It was just before sunset as the professor and her husband enjoyed a relaxing walk by the sea. She took a sip from the bombilla straw and suddenly felt light-headed, quickly moving to sit on a nearby bench. Moments later she gasped for breath as a trickle of blood streamed from her nostril. The emergency crew soon arrived, but by that time her pulse was weak, and she had become unable to speak. As she was carried away on the stretcher, gazing out to the deep horizon over the vast swath of sea, her husband’s entreaties were lost to the autumn winds. She suddenly turned her head back toward the street, intensely staring at a disheveled blanket shelter a short distance away. Her lifeforce slyly slipped away.

Unnoticed, the street shelter suddenly began to shake violently. Slowly, a figure began to rise, still covered with a blanket. As it grew taller and eventually stood upright, the soiled cloth fell away to reveal a toned, bronzed male body that seemed to glisten in the waning sunlight. He took a luscious, deep breath of air and dusted himself off, relishing in the rebirth of youth and vitality. Taking a sharp look toward the clamor around the ambulance, he nimbly grabbed the satchel at his feet and walked the other way.