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  He hadn’t planned anything like that, and when things happen without planning or expectations they are that much more enjoyable and worthwhile—talking to a stranger without an eye to any romantic connection had allowed things to flow more naturally.

  Was she alone? How long would she continue to pay attention to him? What did he need to do to keep her by his side?

  Nothing. The sequence of stupid questions disappeared into thin air, and even though he had just had something to eat, he was going to have lunch with her. His only worry was that she might pick an expensive restaurant, and he needed to make his money last a year, until the date on his return ticket.

  Pilgrim, your thoughts wander; set your mind at rest.

  Not all those summoned are to be the chosen ones

  It is not just anyone who sleeps with a smile on his lips

  Who sees what you see now.

  Of course we need to share. Even if it’s something everyone already knows, it’s important that we don’t allow ourselves to be swept away by selfish thoughts of being the sole person to arrive at the end of the journey. Whoever does this finds an empty paradise, without anything particularly interesting, and soon finds himself dying of boredom.

  We cannot take the lamps that light the way and carry them with us.

  If we do this, we end up filling our backpacks with lanterns. In that case, even with all the light we carry, we still won’t have any company to speak of. What good is that?

  But it was difficult to keep his mind at rest—he needed to write down everything that was happening around him. A revolution without arms, a road without border checkpoints or dangerous turns. A world that had suddenly become young, independent of people’s ages or their religious and political beliefs. The sun had come out, as though to say that finally the Renaissance was making a return, to change everyone’s habits and customs—and one day very soon, people would no longer depend on the opinions of others but rather on their own ways of seeing life.

  People dressed in yellow, dancing and singing in the street, clothing of all colors, a girl handing out roses to passersby, everyone smiling—yes, tomorrow would be a better day, despite what was happening in Latin America and other countries. Tomorrow would be better simply because there was no other choice, there was no way to return to the past and again allow puritanism, hypocrisy, and lies to fill the days and nights of those who walked on this earth. He thought back to his exorcism on the train and the thousands of reproaches everyone directed his way, those he knew and those he didn’t. He thought back to the way his parents suffered and felt like calling home right away to say:

  Don’t worry, I’m happy, and soon you will understand why I wasn’t born to go to college, earn a diploma, and get a job. I was born to be free and I can survive this way. I will always have something to do, I will always find a way to make money, I can always get married one day and start a family, but now is not the time for that—it’s time for me to try to live only in the present, here and now, with the joy of children, to whom Jesus bequeathed the Kingdom of Heaven. If I need to find a job as a laborer, I’ll do this without complaining because it will allow me to live in communion with the earth, the sun, and rain. If one day I need to lock myself in an office, I will also do this without complaining, because I’ll have others at my side, we’ll form a group, a group that will discover how good it is to sit around a table and talk, pray, laugh, and wash ourselves clean of all those afternoons of repetitive work. If I need to be alone, I’ll do that, too; if I fall in love and decide to marry I’ll get married, for I’m certain that my wife, the woman who is to be the love of my life, will accept my joy as the greatest blessing a man can give to a woman.

  * * *

  —

  The young woman at his side stopped, bought some flowers, and instead of taking them somewhere, formed them into two circles, placing one on his head and the other on hers. Far from seeming ridiculous, it was a way of celebrating the small victories in life, in the same way the Greeks, millennia earlier, had exalted their victors and heroes—with crowns not of gold but of laurels. They may have wilted away but they weren’t heavy and didn’t demand the constant vigilance of the crowns of kings and queens. Many people passing them by donned this sort of crown, making everything more beautiful.

  People played on wooden flutes, violins, guitars, sitars—it made for a jumbled soundtrack but one that felt natural to that street without sidewalks, a street like most of the city’s thoroughfares: full of bicycles, time slowing down and then speeding back up. Paulo was afraid that this speeding up would soon win out and the dream would come to an end.

  He was walking not through the street, but through a dream in which the people were flesh and bone. They spoke unfamiliar languages, turned to see the woman at his side, and smiled on account of her beauty; she would return the gesture, and he would feel a spike of jealousy that was soon replaced by pride at the fact she had picked him for a companion.

  Every now and then someone offered him incense, bracelets, colorful coats, possibly from Peru or Bolivia, and he felt like buying it all because they returned his smiles and neither took offense nor insisted too much the way salespeople at stores did. If he bought something, perhaps this would mean one more night for them, one more day in paradise—though he knew that everyone, absolutely everyone, found a way to survive in this world. Paulo needed to save as much as possible and also try to discover a way to live in that city until his plane ticket began to weigh down the little elastic belt hidden around his waist, telling him that it was time, that he needed to snap out of the dream and come back to reality.

  A reality that even appeared from time to time on those streets and parks, on little tables with posters behind them showing the atrocities committed in Vietnam—a photo of a general executing a Vietcong in cold blood. All they asked was that passersby sign a petition, and everyone cooperated.

  At that moment he realized that the Renaissance was still a long way from taking over the world, but it had begun, yes, it had begun. Not a one of those young people—of the many young people on the street—would forget what they were experiencing, and when they returned to their countries they would become evangelists for peace and love. It was all possible, a world finally free of oppression, hate, husbands who beat their wives, torturers who hung people upside down and killed them slowly with…

  …Not that he’d lost his sense of justice—he was still taken aback with the injustice throughout the world—but he needed to rest and regain his strength, at least for the time being. He had spent a good part of his youth afraid of everything, now was the time to show courage in the face of life and the unfamiliar path he was about to tread.

  * * *

  —

  They walked into one of dozens of stores selling pipes, multicolored shawls, statues of Eastern saints, patches. Paulo bought what he was looking for: a series of star-shaped metal appliqués he would fasten to his jacket when he got back to the hostel.

  In one of the city’s many parks, there were three girls without shirts or bras, their eyes closed, holding a yoga pose, facing the sun, which threatened to dip behind clouds before long, and it would be two full seasons yet until spring returned. He looked closer and saw the town square full of older people, coming and going from work, people who didn’t so much as bother to look at the girls—because nudity was neither illegal nor frowned upon, each person’s body was his or her own business and it was up to each of them to decide what was best.

  And the T-shirts, the T-shirts were walking billboards, some with images of icons like Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin. But the majority announced the Renaissance:

  Today is the first day of the rest of your life.

  A single dream is more powerful than a thousand realities.

  Every great dream begins with a dreamer.

  One in particular caught his eye:
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  A dream is something unpredictable and dangerous for those who lack the courage to dream.

  Right. This was what the system did not tolerate, but the dream would win out in the end, and before the Americans were defeated in Vietnam.

  He believed. He had chosen his madness and now intended to live it fully, staying there until he heard his calling to do something that helped to change the world. His dream was to be a writer, but it was still early, and he had his doubts whether books had this power, but he would do his best to show others what they could not see.

  One thing was certain: there was no turning back. Now, there was only the path of light.

  * * *

  —

  He met a Brazilian couple, Tiago and Tabita, who had noticed the flag on his coat and introduced themselves.

  “We’re Children of God,” they said and invited him to visit the place where they lived.

  We’re all Children of God, aren’t we?

  Yes, but they were part of a cult whose founder had experienced a revelation. Would he like to know more?

  Paulo assured them he would; when Karla decided to leave him before the day was out, he’d already have new friends.

  * * *

  —

  But, as soon as they parted, Karla grabbed the patch on his jacket and tore it straight off.

  “You already bought what you were looking for—stars are much more beautiful than flags. If you want, I can help you put them on in the shape of an Egyptian cross or the peace sign.”

  “You didn’t need to do that. All you had to do was ask and let me decide if I wanted to go on wearing the patch on my sleeve or not. I love and hate my country, but that’s my problem. I just met you, and if you think that you can tell me what to do—to give me orders—because you think I’m somehow dependent on the only person I’ve actually met here, better we go our separate ways now. It can’t be all that hard to find an affordable restaurant around here.”

  His tone had hardened, and caught off guard, Karla considered his reaction a good thing. He wasn’t some dimwit who simply did what others told him, even when he was in a city he did not know. He must have been through quite a bit in his life.

  She handed him the patch.

  “Put it somewhere else. It’s rude to speak in a language I don’t understand, and it takes a lack of imagination to come so far only to meet up with people you can find back home. If you start in with the Portuguese again, I’ll switch to Dutch, and that, I think, will be the end of our conversation.”

  The restaurant wasn’t simply cheap—it was free, this magic word that tends to make everything taste much better.

  “Who pays for all this? The Dutch government?”

  “The Dutch government doesn’t let a single one of its citizens go hungry, but in this case the money comes from George Harrison, who’s adopted our religion.”

  Karla listened with a mix of feigned interest and clear boredom. The silence they’d maintained as they walked had confirmed what the clairvoyant had told her the day before: the young man was the perfect companion for a trip to Nepal—he didn’t speak much, never sought to force his opinions on others, but he knew exactly how to fight for what was his, as she’d seen with the flag patch. She needed only to find the right moment to broach the subject.

  They walked over to the buffet and filled their plates with several tasty vegetarian dishes while they listened to one of the people dressed in orange explain who they were to those who had just arrived. There must have been many of them, and converting someone at that time was ridiculously simple since Westerners worshiped everything that came from the exotic East.

  “You must have met some of the people from our group on your way here,” said a man who looked a bit older, with a white beard and the saintly air of someone who had never sinned in his entire life. “The original name of our religion is quite difficult, so you can just call us Hare Krishna—that’s how we’ve been known for centuries, since we believe that repeating ‘Hare Krishna, Hare Rama’ empties our minds, leaving room for energy to enter. We believe that everything is one, we share a single soul, and each drop of light in this soul spreads to the dark spots that surround it. That’s it. Whoever wants to can grab a Bhagavad Gita on their way out and fill out a form requesting to join our group. You shall lack nothing—that was our Enlightened Lord’s promise before the great battle, when one of the warriors was racked with guilt for taking part in a civil war. The Enlightened Lord responded that no one kills and no one dies—his only responsibility is to fulfill his duty and do as he has been told.”

  The man grabbed one of the books in question: Paulo stared intently at the guru, and Karla stared intently at Paulo—though she doubted he hadn’t heard all this before.

  “O son of Kuntī, either you will be killed on the battlefield and attain the heavenly planets, or you will conquer and enjoy the earthly kingdom. Therefore, get up with determination and fight.”

  The guru closed the book.

  “This is what we have to do. Instead of wasting our time saying ‘This is good’ or ‘This is bad,’ we need to fulfill our destiny. It was destiny that brought the two of you here today. Whoever wishes can come with us to dance and sing in the streets soon after we’ve finished eating.”

  Paulo’s eyes lit up, and there was no need for him to say a thing. Karla had understood everything.

  “You’re not thinking about joining them, are you?”

  “Of course I am. I never sang and danced in the streets like that.”

  “Did you know they only allow sex after marriage, and even then only for the purpose of procreation and not pleasure? Can you believe that a group that claims such enlightenment would be capable of rejecting, denying, or condemning something so beautiful?”

  “I’m not thinking about sex, I’m thinking about dancing and singing. It’s been forever since I last heard music or sang, and this is a black hole in my life.”

  “I can take you out singing and dancing tonight.”

  Why did that girl seem so interested in him? She could get any man she wanted whenever she wanted. He thought back to his Argentinean friend—perhaps she needed someone to help her with a job that he wasn’t the least bit interested in. He decided to test the waters.

  “Do you know the House of Rising Sun?”

  His question could be interpreted three ways: first, whether she was familiar with the song (“The House of the Rising Sun,” the Animals). Second, if she knew what the song meant. Third, and finally, if she would like to go there.

  “Quit messing around.”

  This boy, whom at first she’d judged to be so intelligent, so charming, quiet, easy to control, seemed to have misunderstood everything. And, incredible though it may seem, she needed him more than he needed her.

  “All right then. Go with them and I’ll follow close behind. We’ll find each other at the end.”

  She felt like adding, “I already had my Hare Krishna phase,” but she restrained herself so as not to scare her prey.

  It was so much fun to be there jumping around, leaping to and fro, singing at the top of his lungs, following those people who dressed in orange, rang little bells, and seemed to be at peace with their lives. Five others had decided to join the group, too, and as they made their way through the streets, still more joined in. He didn’t want to lose her; the two of them had come together for some mysterious reason, a mystery that needed to be kept intact—never understood, but maintained. Yes, there she was, a safe distance behind, so as to avoid being seen with the monks or the apprentice monks, and each time their eyes met, they smiled at one another.

  The tie between them was being forged and strengthened.

  He remembered a story from his childhood, “The Pied Piper of Hamelin,” in which the main character, to get revenge on a city that had promised to pay him and then did not, d
ecided to hypnotize the town’s children and lead them far away with the power of his music. That’s what was happening at that moment—Paulo had become a child and was dancing in the middle of the street, everything so different from the years he’d spent deep in books about magic, performing complicated rituals and believing that he was closing in on the true avatars. Perhaps he was, perhaps he wasn’t, but dancing and singing also helped to reach the same state of mind.

  After so much jumping up and down and repeating the mantra, he began to enter a state in which thought, logic, and the city streets no longer held so much importance—his mind was entirely clear, and he came back to reality only from time to time, to make sure Karla was close behind. Yes, he could see her, and it would be a very good thing if she remained in his life for a long time to come, even if he had known her for only three hours.

  He was certain that the same thing had happened to her—or else she would have simply left him at the restaurant.

  He was beginning to understand the words Krishna had said to the warrior Arjuna before battle. It wasn’t exactly what was written in the book but in her soul:

  Fight because you need to fight, because you’re facing a battle.

  Fight because you are at peace with the universe, with the planets, the suns that explode and the stars that shrink and flare out forever.

  Fight to fulfill your destiny, without giving thought to gain or profit, losses or stratagems, victories or defeats.

  Seek not your own gratification, but that of the Supreme Love who offers nothing beyond a glimmering contact with the Cosmos and thus demands an act of complete devotion—without doubts, without questions, love for love’s sake and nothing else.