Siete minutos by Ismael Camacho Arango (the little red hen read aloud TXT) 📖

the sewer smelt in the heat of the day. On looking at the muddy streets where the water had killed the families, Homer wished he had taken his time through the city.
“We need thousands pesos to make the river safe,” the builders said.
“I will think about it,” Homer said.
The journalists appeared with their cameras, for future generations to see the apostle of the poor after the worst tragedy of the country.
“We are sorry,” they said.
“The rains killed them,” Homer said.
“We know.”
The children crowded around him, hoping to see their hero’s face.
“We want to take some more pictures,” the journalist said.
“That will cost you money.”
“How much?” they asked.
“Thousands of pesos.”
Homer posed with the children, while smiling at the mothers he might take to bed one day. Women liked men who could pay for their sex.
“The houses are reinforced with concrete now,” the builder said.
“That’s good,” Homer said.
The cameras flashed and the sun shone, as a woman hugged him. After kissing his lips, she pressed herself against his body and the people cheered.
“Thank you, Mr. Homer,” she said.
“We love you,” everyone said.
They kept on filming as lightning crisscrossed the sky, thunder reminding them of hell but the rains stayed away for another day.

The widow’s business
The widow’s business brought great publicity, benefiting Homer’s smuggled goods and taxes. He had asked the mothers to sign a few documents, but most of them couldn’t read. He would stand next to the children as the women scribbled something under a few pages of legal language.
“Would you like to eat with us, Mr. Homer?” they asked.
Homer had to show the nation what a kind man he was.
“It would be an honour to be your guest,” he said.
On following one of the women into a house, he saw a table in a corner of the room, surrounded by boxes. They must have found it amidst the rubbish somewhere in the city. Homer tried to avoid the mud on the floor, as he sat on one of the beds.
“Would you like a cup of coffee?” she asked.
“Thank you,” he said.
She talked of her wonderful home, while her children poured water out of a bucket in the adjacent room. It might cost lots of money for Homer to bring the water from the aqueduct.
“It wasn’t your fault, Mr. Homer,” she said.
“God will help us.”
“I know.”
The woman chatted about her family. Her oldest child went to the nearby school but the little ones stayed at home, helping her to clear the mud and feeding the rabbit they had.
“Do you have a rabbit?” Homer asked.
“The woman smiled. “It’s a rat my children rescued from the sewer.”
Looking at the wriggling rodent a baby held in his hands, Homer wanted to run away from there but he had to do his business. As he put some papers on the table, a young girl appeared with a few cups on a tray.
“You must have your coffee, Mr. Homer,” the woman said.
Homer accepted the cup she offered him, hoping the hot water had killed the germs.
“Thank you,” he said.
On thinking of the best excuse to run away before he died of cholera, dysentery or something else, he heard of the trauma after the rains had come.
“I didn’t lose any of my children,” she said.
“Thank God,” Homer said.
“My eldest daughter woke me up.”
“That’s good.”
“God saved us,” she said.
As the rodent ran between his legs, Homer threw his papers on the floor. It could have rabies.
“He’s fine,” the woman said.
Homer touched her teats, in spite of the rat but she remained silent.
“I’ll give you money,” he said.
After taking him to a room without any windows, she took off her bra, while keeping her pants on. Then she unzipped his trousers, releasing his member.
“It’s huge,” she said.
“Thanks.”
She put the monster in her mouth, while stroking his balls until the semen splashed her face.
“I have found another one,” a little boy said as Homer zipped up his trousers. A rodent looked at him from the boy’s hands.
“Antonio has been living with us for some time,” the woman said.
“Who?”
“The rat.”
Homer studied the shadows around him, expecting to see more rodents moving behind the things. Poor people didn’t know anything about hygiene, as he gave her a few hundred pesos for her job.
“Thank you, Mr. Homer,” she said. “Can I do something else for you?”
“You must come to see me,” he said.
Homer spent the next minutes feeling inside her pants, as her children played with the rats in the house. She moaned with pleasure while his fingers waded through the wetness of her cunt.
“I thank you again,” she said.
He didn’t know why she thanked him, when her life seemed to be full of horrors. After wiping his hands in his handkerchief, he took some papers out of his bag.
“I want you to sign these forms,” he said.
“I can’t read Mr. Homer.”
“It’s to improve your lives.”
She smiled. “You are a saint.”
“And my cock is huge.”
“You are right.”
She signed with trembling hands, ready to give him some more pleasure for a few pesos. He wanted to help the families of the world lead a better life.
“I’d do anything for you,” she said.
“I know.”
Homer left the house, pleased with his actions. The papers the women had signed left him out of reach of the income tax, as his expenditure was greater than his earnings according to the papers. He had done all of this for the poor women. Homer brought tax free goods into the country every month, where the boxes had a cross on them. It said in big red letters: Charity. This food is for the poor of Colombia. Look after it!
Sacks full of wheat arrived sometimes but they usually contained goods. Sport cars were smuggled with ‘frozen food,’ written on them and any food sent in the packets would be sold at high prices to Homer’s customers. His ships brought Swiss watches, Scotch whisky, French Wines, tinned food from all over the world, televisions, videos, pants, bras and other things.
Homer’s modest shop became a world bazaar. You could find a Mercedes Benz or fine French pants, while custom officials never wondered about so many expensive and rare things. Nobody doubted Apostle Homer’s behaviour or the public would attack them. He gave them whisky, cigarettes and lighters and sometimes he sent them cheques for a few thousand pesos for Christmas. What a remarkable man!
The old boats: Athena, Sparta and The Thermopiles had been replaced by three new and powerful ships: Odysseus, Ajax, Diogenes and Cyclops. They traded in goods. Homer slept better during the nights, and as he lay on his bed with a few rags on, he counted and recounted the day’s earnings.
Homer drank a cup of tea with a portion of rotten cheese three times a week. He had bought three suits in a second hand shop, and had put on some weight, forgetting his anorexia.


Lola
As Homer walked around his property barking, a neighbour paid two hundred pesos for him to patrol his business during the night. He used the money to buy some meat and regain his health. Homer’s face became synonymous with love and charity, as he appeared in the papers and spoke on the radio about the widows he had saved from the gutter. He had not seen Alicia again. The woman had disappeared from his life forever.
“I think of the widows all the time,” Homer said in the radio.
People showered him with money when he cried in the studio. The tragedy had been forgotten as he talked in the library a few more times about his pain, losing count of all the charitable functions he attended. After hiring the builders to paint the widow’s houses for a few pesos, he put the rest of the money in his safe, the papers cashing on his fame. Everyone bought El Pais when he appeared in the front page, forgetting the women and their families living in squalor.
Someone else had an impact