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I´m up on the terrace, staring at the moon over the sea. It feels fake somehow. Too perfect - a scattered, glittering glow spreading out over the dark waters. Like a digitally enhanced scene in a movie. It cleared up today; I slept in later than usual after my collapse yesterday and the weather is a touch milder. There´s a story that circulates amongst some of the taxi drivers here that there are two cities in the world with absolutely indeciferable climates: one somewhere in Africa ( South Africa? Tunisia? Nigeria? Mozambique? - they have no clue ) and Mar del Plata. You´re cold when the sun is higher and you should be warm. You sweat early in the morning when you should be shivering, you never know how to dress. Well ... it´s true to an extent. I´m still not used to this strange climate. Perhaps it´s merely a matter of getting used to a temperate maritime climate. But is it really temperate? It´s colder than Buenos Aires, much colder at times. But I don´t see how it compares with what the climate must be like in Brighton or Cork let´s say. Not to mention Vancouver.

I look down to my left despite my vertigo. It´s a clinic specializing in transfusions. It´s painted a modest yellow with glazed windows and shutters hiding the patients most of the time. Apparently they raised the shutters so the people sitting in wheelchairs with IV´s in their arms could stare at the sea and the neighbours complained. It´s such a small town sometimes.

It´s not rage, this evil that creeps up in me. I have rage lodged in me, but I suspect less than I fear. But this is different. When I´m paralized in the grip of that strange power it´s more like a disease, a crazed fever, a trance. I only know that I have to fight it and try to struggle through each episode without acting because acting means hurting someone, mosty myself it seems. And it helps not at all my ability to be a con man. Maybe a violent criminal, but I´ll be damned ( unavoidable pun ) if I take that route. It would be a disaster anyway at my age and with someone like me. The breeze is soft while it´s cold edge insiduously works its way into my bones. I´m bundled up with scarf, coat and sweater underneath and I´m still cold and sweating all at the same time. I´ve been up here for a while, maybe an hour, but I doubt Isa will come looking for me. I think I mentioned the roof to her but I´ve been walking by myself a lot in the last few weeks. I soak up the lovely, haunting image of the moon and the dark southern sea for a few moments more before heading back downstairs. As I pass Pranav´s apartment I hear music. When did he get back? He comes and goes a fair bit and I sometimes lose track of him. Not a good thing - I need to know where he is or might be at all times but I can´t help it lately. Do I hear a woman´s voice as well? I stop on the stairs for a moment and lean back and try to listen. I can´t really make out the voices clearly so I head back down the steps. His door opens and I hear Isadora´s voice thanking him in her sweet, broken English. Just before the door closes I hear more voices from inside Pranav´s apartment. Sounds like a party. I´m about to quickly resume my descent but it´s a bit too late. Isa comes round the corner and stops with one foot on the steps as she sees me. Her coat open to let her swelling belly breath. I look up at her with what must be an angry puzzled look. She takes a few quick steps down and joins me and says,

Vamos, donde estabas?
En la terraza. Y vos??
Ya te digo. ( her look says please let´s not argue here )

We head silently down the steps and enter our apartment. I turn into our tiny kitchen and put the kettle on. What else can I do? Then I turn and face her. She´s still hanging her coat up on the hook in the entrance hall. She then hangs up her scarf with steady deliberation and finally steps into the kitchen.

Aca.

A wad of hundred Peso bills. What the hell?

Y esto?? ( I blink at the money as I speak )

She looks at me angrily and then the penny drops. She was playing cards with Pranav ... and some friends. She went upstairs to make friendly, to try to make sure that Pranav was on her side and therefore on our side. And thus lessening the risk I face just a little. I gather Pranav and his friends don´t play penny ante. And maybe he had a lot of Pesos from goodness knows where. So she won herself some of that cash.

Mira. Pense que vos lo pediste un prestamo y ...
Lo gane nene! Jugando poquer!! Po-quer!!
Me di cuenta.
Aja ...
Y ... bien! Cuanto hay?

Two thousand pesos. So my hunch was right. Isa is good at Poker. We´ve played a little with Diego and Oriana and despite her denials and hesistancy she´s good at bluffing, good at sniffing out a bluff. The statistics confuse her a little if she tries to be explicitly rational but she´s got a precise memory and her instincts regarding the odds are good. She´s won her first real game and no doubt charmed Pranav and his crew. Are they from Dallas as well? I pour the near boiling water from the kettle into the glass coffee pot we use as a tea pot and suddenly feel very tired. Isa slips down the hall into the bathroom - likely to have that pee that she would be too embarassed to have in Pranav´s apartment. I feel worn out and listless; Isa´s success seems small and fragile and I can´t find the strength to protect her. I stare at the plump little bundle of bills wrapped in a rubber band lying coquetishly on the kitchen table. Raising my head, I see the 555 stop and take on two passengers. The avenue is fairly empty and the traffic flows in a stop start fashion. It´s the lights of course, but shouldn´t there be more vehicles? It´s not that late. I don´t understand the rythyms of this city, or this country. I pretend I do, but I don´t. I lower my head into my hands and close my eyes, even as I think it´s a silly bit of dramatism. I got to stare at a moon over the sea and my wife just won two grand - if in Pesos - in a poker game. Is our life that bad?

Nene??

Isa is behind me. She sounds nervous. When did she flush? I don´t turn my head to look up at her. At all I have in this country. Her love. I deal with Pranav and Cagnazzo and company to make money so we can live. Here. And it overwhelms me. Her love I mean. I don´t know what to do with it. It´s easier to worry about our next job than to digest what it means to be truly loved by this woman. And my trances ... that strange oxygen that feeds my motion ( forward? down? frozen in ice at the dead center of Dante´s Inferno like the those who betray their intimates? ) through this world of fraud and meager profit. Here you must do your dance in secret and pilfer -- can you? -- in the dark. Do these trances condemn me even as they move me in ways I can´t understand? I say,

I´m fighting it as best as I can.
I know baby ...

I pretend that her answer surprises me. How can it? When she loves me so? I lower my head onto the kitchen table and maybe even cry as I push the money gently to one side so that my tears don´t damage the notes. Isa waits a long moment before approaching me and hugging me.