Raku went over to the vineyards, where people were weeding some leftover weeds, and joined them.
– What are you doing? – Raku asked Paten.
– Removing the xamargu.
– Is it this?
– Yes – Diligently Raku went to work with the rest, uprooting the weeds that the autumn rains had brought with them. Like everybody else, Raku knew how to work the land, although they didn't like it very much. To tell the truth, Xurde didn't like it too much either. They preferred to cook, knit, or fix furniture. But everyone had to do all the chores around the house, regardless of their personal preferences. People understood that more time was dedicated to what each person liked the most, but not all the time. After all, it was considered that those tastes also had their roots in customs, and therefore getting used to doing many things was to ensure that one had many tastes. The whole group worked for another couple of hours. At noon almost everyone left for breakfast, but Xurde and Raku pretended to continue working concentratedly, until, pulling up the xamargu, they found themselves at one end of the vineyard, near the forest.
– Good work! Do you want to go for a little walk in the woods? – Raku said yes from afar and they met halfway up the slope. From there you could see scattered some of the other houses in the valley, such as Semillas and Cedazo, where Fofe and Ceres had gone to live when Hazada was closed.
– Here there is a path we can follow to enter the forest.
– Do you come a lot to walk in the forest?
– No, not much. Lately more. I am a little bit one of those who believe that the forest should be left alone. But I recognize that I feel so close to this one that it is difficult to believe that I am doing something immoral by getting into it.
– It's very different from the ones I've known so far. – The forest was pregnant with bright reds and yellows in the middle of autumn. The entire ground was covered with leaves that crackled appetizingly under their footsteps. – What is the name of this tree?
– This one? El Bidular.
– And this one?
– This is el xardón.
– And this one?
– This is the most important, it is el carbayu.
– And this one?
– This is el xabu. – Raku memorized each one of the words that Xurde told them.
– See that little bird over there? That is la calandra.
– And that one?
– That's the la cuita.
– And the bush on which it perches?
– It's the la ganza.
– How curious.
– What?
– The Quilcués have preserved gender. Almost all the languages I have learnt have already lost it.
– I never think about it, but it's true. Perhaps because many of the words we have are names of things that have been here forever.
– And yet in other places it is the same and they have lost it.
– In Roane's book that I was reading yesterday they said that they thought that the fact that our language preserved gender was a great value.
– And what do you think?
– I think the issue of memory is very important. But I'm not sure. Is it better to keep that mania they had in ancient times of imposing a sexual difference on everything? It's like putting traces of the human body on things. I think it's the things that should teach us what the world is. But this is a moral opinion. Philologically, I suppose it is a wealth. – Raku was amazed by this comment. Suddenly Xurde seemed to them much more than a beautiful body and they understood why in the house they said Xurde was the spirit of the group. Raku began to gently brush with the tips of their fingers each leaf and each flower of the bushes that were found on the way.
– Put traces of the human body on things. Maybe language can't do anything else, right? The language smears, marks, leaves signs. It stains... Or maybe it is the language that stained the bodies and created that difference that we now strive to clean. Or at least, it exaggerated it. After all, language is one of the oldest technologies. – Xurde was thinking and grabbed a smelly henbane.
– It stains, yes. And you, why did you ensamaste from Asia?
– Ensamaste?
– Why did you leave Asia?
– I didn't leave. I just travel. Like everyone else. Have you never left Quilcué?
– Never.
– Why?
– I do not need it.
– I find it hard to understand rooted people, but I admire them.
– A lot of people come here. And forests and flowers and houses here we have...but I kept thinking about what you said about the quilcués and gender.
– Why?
– Because although we no longer express that difference in language, it still exists in the body. The memory that at the same time we lose and try to conserve makes us see some things and hides others from us. Is the language we speak now honest? When I look at myself in the mirror I wonder if one day I could be as sure as Yanael, who says they like their body. I don't know what that means. I don't understand it.
–I think Yanael is referring to the fact that they approve of reproduction.
– Well, not me. I have no desire for perpetuation.
– Neither do I. My political views have nothing to do with desire, but with what seems reasonable given what we know.
– Your opinion interests me, but mine has nothing to do with desire either. It has to do with... Sometimes my body is foreign to me, Raku. – Raku dared to approach and brushed a lock of hair from Xurde´s face. – I think it's a beautiful body. – Xurde approached and kissed them softly on the lips looking into their eyes.
– Let's go home. It is mealtime. –Raku didn't want to, but said yes.
– Do you know that “ensamar”, in addition to migrating, also means “going to the assembly”?
– Really? How interesting – Xurde told them a thousand more things about the quilcués until they reached Rueda. Then Raku went to see Erendi and Xurde went to study, and they didn't see each other for the rest of the day.