Learning to Lose (58 page)

Sylvia found his confessed uselessness for civilian life moving. It also terrified her. She didn’t want to be a victim of it, didn’t want to become the shadow of someone like that. The shadow of a shadow. Perhaps that’s why, when Ariel goes down to the gym, she chooses to stay with her notes and the novel Santiago gave her.

When the math teacher handed out the test questions, Sylvia understood the results of a bad school year, of the laziness, the lack of concentration. She felt terror at the thought of being left with nothing, without Ariel but also without herself. This is why she stretches out time on the street bench with her friends from school. She offers to go with her friends to buy more beers and more bags of pork rinds at the corner store. She suddenly enjoys paying the Chinese guy who furiously adds up the purchases and then distributes the bags among them. So when her cell phone buzzes in her backpack with a new incoming message, she doesn’t rush to read it.

Only a while later, on the way home, does she look at it. “Should we do something together?” Everything, she wants to reply, but she doesn’t because she knows it’s not possible. Sometimes she says it jokingly, I’m jealous of the ball, that instead of thinking of me, my boyfriend has his head filled with thoughts of a leather ball with futuristic designs.

No one is home. She eats some slices of boiled ham that she finds at the back of the fridge. She’s too lazy to cook. She lies down in her room and listens to music. Then she answers the message. In an hour, Ariel will come by to pick her up and she’ll feel like another person again, far from that lazy teenager who now stares at the ceiling and whose voice repeats the chorus of a song she knows by heart.

He tried calling Osembe’s number twice in the last few days. Now he gets the same automated response, this phone has restricted incoming calls. His eyebrow looks better, the swelling has gone down and it scabbed up normally, dissipating his fear of not having gone to the emergency room. A trace of the bruise remains, more yellow than black and blue, around his eye socket. The pain in his right side could be from a cracked rib, but it only bothers him when he sleeps on it.

That night Leandro left Joaquín’s apartment hurt and afraid. He had only gathered the bedsheets and put them in the washing machine and pushed aside the broken glass on the kitchen floor with his foot, piling it in a corner so no one would cut themselves. He ran his finger over the marks on the piano. He locked the door and left the keys in the doorman’s box.

He didn’t really know what would happen. He couldn’t do anything about it, either. He would wait for Joaquín’s reaction. He would explain to him what had happened.

He didn’t have money for a cab, so he walked in the cold, which seemed to do him good at first, but later hurt his face. The pain in his abdomen made him think of Osembe. Did she hate me that much? In one of her trips to the living room, she must have left the door open, ready for the guy to come in. Was he her boyfriend? Maybe her pimp.

There were a lot of people on the street, at the entrances to bars, wandering from one place to another in search of fun. It was Friday night. He went into his apartment stealthily, not wanting to wake up Sylvia, who was sleeping beside Aurora.
From her medicines, he chose a painkiller and lay down to sleep. It took him a while.

The next day he went downstairs for breakfast. In the bar, he had to explain to his neighbor that he was mugged for his wallet. Was it an Arab? No, he was black, said Leandro, African. These people, fucking hell. In the police station, he reported his ID and cards stolen. Do you want to file a report for assault? asked the youngest of the policemen. No, no, that’s okay. Do it, for fuck’s sake, do it, said another from a distance, so that it shows up in the stats, no one around here wants to admit what a disaster we live in.

On Monday he waited for Joaquín’s call. He tossed around the possibility of beating him to it and telling him everything. But once again cowardice won out. There was still the possibility that Joaquín wouldn’t reproach him at all. He could solve it discreetly and in exchange they would never have to see each other again or talk about it. Always the most cowardly solution. On Sunday he had spent a long time calculating the possibilities of being run over if he hurled himself from the edge of the sidewalk into oncoming traffic. But he ruled out the possibility after imagining himself badly injured in the hospital when Aurora needed him most. He found suicide a pretty honorable way out of his situation. Yet he suffered from an atrocious physical fear.

Suicide didn’t vanish from his thoughts until midday, as he fed Aurora with slow spoonfuls. He picked off the odd noodle that stuck to her chin and then cleaned her face with a napkin. He told her that he had hit himself against the kitchen table, after stooping to pick something up off the floor. A little while later, as Aurora slept, he took refuge in the bathroom and cried
in front of the mirror, bitterly, unlike how babies cry, knowing they are going to be comforted. No, he cried with the deaf containment of someone who no longer expected to be consoled.

Aurora talked to him about Sylvia. She’s at that horrible age and yet she’s fabulous. She had left for the station early. Leandro avoided her, in spite of hearing her go out. She says that this year her studies aren’t going well, how could we help her? Maybe you could give Lorenzo money to hire a tutor. Leandro nodded. I’ll do that.

Chatting with his wife helped Leandro regain his composure. This is what my life has been like, coming home terrified and finding calmness here, the solution to fear, letting Aurora’s love of life rub off onto me. She’s been the engine driving me, this spineless vehicle. Leandro knew he wouldn’t take his own life, he wouldn’t do that to Aurora; maybe when she died, he’d gladly go with her, but not before. Surely she would blame herself for being sick, judging her entire life, her personal failure, based on that ending. Suicide is an incurable stab in the back to those who love you and survive you. Leandro realizes that his relationship with Osembe has something of a suicide about it, private suicide. At least he saw himself as dead.

All these feelings skyrocketed when his son Lorenzo came to see him. I called a prostitute, he explained, I know it was stupid. He didn’t want to give more details. Lorenzo offered to take care of it all with Jacqueline, those rich people don’t know what money costs, we could talk to the police. Leandro feigned a last fit of pride, no, no, let it go, but he knew his son would never look at him the same way again. Are children capable of forgiving their parents when they discover that they didn’t meet their expectations, either?

He had no problem writing out a check to Jacqueline for the amount she and Lorenzo agreed on. It bothered him that Joaquín had taken himself out of the equation. He also hid himself. Jacqueline settled for eighteen thousand euros, but she hadn’t held her tongue in having the final word, you can’t put a price on ruining a lifelong friendship.

They will polish the piano, paint the walls, put the curtains back up, change the sofa and the carpet, and among the other belongings that are now gone, old Leandro would also disappear from their lives and with him the last traces of a forgettable past.

Lorenzo worried about his father’s finances. Are you sure you have it? That’s a lot of money. Yes, yes, of course, answered Leandro before handing him the signed check.

Leandro hung up the phone. He wouldn’t know what to say to Osembe anyway. Maybe she fears the police showing up and has even moved out of her apartment. Would all that be worth the euros she stole? Euros she would have gotten out of him in a much less violent way, or maybe the act itself was a settling of scores. That also mortified Leandro. She knew I would do nothing, that I wouldn’t go through the shame of reporting her. Leandro just wanted to ask Osembe in whose name she gave him those cowardly kicks. In her own? Did he deserve them? Did she hate him that much? Or was it just an act in front of her boyfriend, to avoid misunderstandings? What did it matter? It would only help him to complete the map of human nature, something that fascinated Leandro and that he would never grasp entirely. People do things without really thinking about them. There isn’t a motivation for every action, it’s a mistake to think of it in those terms. Could someone imagine me? Explain me? Of course not.

He goes into Aurora’s room with the bucket of water and the sponge. He helps her lift her arms and fixes the bedsheets. As he does it, his side hurts where he received one of the kicks, or was it from the fall? As if jumping from one train to another, he forgets Osembe and focuses on Aurora. She smiles, she wants to talk, but she doesn’t have the strength. Leandro leans over and thinks that she wants to kiss him. He draws his cheek close to her lips, but Aurora speaks in a whisper.

It would be good if you called an ambulance, I’m not feeling well.

It’s important to Lorenzo that Sylvia meet Daniela. She already exists as a shadow, as an idea, as a real presence even, but they still haven’t seen each other. Am I going to be the last one to meet the woman you’re dating? No, no. Lorenzo choked on his breakfast toast. I’m waiting for the right moment. Are you that afraid of me? Lorenzo just smiled.

Dealing with his father’s situation, the grueling signing of the check and its delivery to the unfriendly doorman in a solemn gesture, for Mrs. Jacqueline, had kept him away from Daniela and her house. He had wanted to stay close to his father, who was obviously capable of doing something stupid. He found Leandro in low spirits, his gaze sunken. The next day he was thinking of going over to the bank and finding out the balance of their accounts. In all these years, he hadn’t given his parents a hand with administrative matters and maybe it was a good time to give everything a once-over.

He hadn’t enjoyed any intimacy with Daniela in several days, but Lorenzo wanted to find a moment to introduce her to Sylvia. It wasn’t easy. She spent less and less time at home. She vanished on weekends, justifying it with vague excuses. She had a boyfriend, but soon vacations would be here, allowing for a less strict schedule. That afternoon she was going to be home studying for exams, she said, and Lorenzo went upstairs to tell Daniela.

She opened the door. Come on in, but no funny stuff. The boy was watching the television hypnotically. We’re going out now, she told Lorenzo, she was going to the Corte Inglés department store with the boy, she was meeting some other women there, the floor was clean and the kids played while they chatted or did a little shopping. It was too cold for the park. This afternoon I want you to come by the house, Sylvia’s going to be there and I’d love for you to meet her. Daniela didn’t like him coming up to see her there and she forced him to leave quickly, she didn’t want the episode from the other day to be repeated, so even though he embraced her obstinately and she noticed the erection glued to his thigh she resisted and got him out of the apartment with stifled giggles.

Lorenzo had a lunch date with Wilson. They went over the matters in Wilson’s little notebook; he finished jotting down some details in his schoolboy’s hand. Lorenzo asked him, does it bother you I’m dating Daniela? Why would it bother me? Would it bother you if your daughter went out with an Ecuadorian? Lorenzo raised his eyebrows. I never thought about it. I guess not. Well, then, why would I butt in?

Lorenzo was silent. Wilson smiled as always, with a lopsided expression. So you pulled it off, I could tell you were stuck on her. I think she likes me. Then what’s the problem? And in Wilson’s smiling gaze, with his crazy eye as he called it, Lorenzo
finally found someone he could confess aspects of his relationship to that he hadn’t shared with anyone else.

Lorenzo knocks on Sylvia’s door. He finds her lying on the mattress, headphones on. This is how you study? She waves her notes in the air. What concentration, he says. Is she here yet? Lorenzo had warned her they would meet that afternoon. Sylvia jokes, do I have to think of her as my stepmother or just one of Papá’s flings? Lorenzo takes a step back and shrugs his shoulders, a fling, of course, a fling. Because, you know, it’s not the same thing. How is anyone going to be your stepmother, look at you, you’re frightening, you are going to run a comb through your hair, right?

Lorenzo hadn’t told Sylvia he was dating the woman who takes care of the neighbors’ son. Daniela always mentioned the times she passed Sylvia on the street or in the stairwell, she stuck out her tongue at the boy, she looks pretty, today she was writing a message on her cell phone, have you seen how fast she writes with her thumb? It’s funny to watch. Maybe his daughter would have the same prejudices as everyone else. Do you want me to make dinner? No, no, we’ll go out somewhere. Lorenzo seemed nervous, Daniela was late. Something’s going on, you’re nervous, maybe you didn’t tell me the truth, maybe she’s my age or something like that. She’s older than you. Lorenzo checks his watch again. Daniela is usually punctual, often they’re running to the phone booths because she wants to call her home in Loja on the dot. He waits outside for her and her phone calls almost always last the same number of minutes.

The doorbell rings. Sylvia smiles, bites her nails in mock nervousness, pulls her hair back. Lorenzo leaves her in the middle of the living room and goes to the door. He opens it. It’s
Daniela. But it is Daniela with a sports bag over her shoulder, her pale blue double-breasted coat on and her eyes filled with tears. She doesn’t say anything. Lorenzo invites her in. Come in, what’s going on? Daniela shakes her head. She gestures hello to Sylvia, who recognized her instantly and hasn’t moved from her spot. Let’s go down to the street, I have to talk to you, excuse me. She directs that last part to Sylvia, apologizing for not coming in. Lorenzo looks at his daughter, grabs his jacket, and goes out onto the landing. Right in the doorway, Daniela collapses, crying. Her first intelligible words are, they fired me, they fired me, Lorenzo.

They gave me the boot.

Husky says, don’t ask me to do this kind of stuff again, I was about to puke in there. He gets into Ariel’s car and they leave uptown Madrid through jammed streets, only to be blocked by a delivery van. The driver jumps out, holds his hands out, asking for a minute to bring a couple of demijohns of sunflower oil and sacks of flour to the door of a cheap restaurant. When the row of waiting cars grows and the honking gets more intense, the van starts up again. Husky has just come out of the agency that owns the photographs of Ariel with Reyes. It’s rough facing the reality that I’m in a profession filled with vipers, says Husky. I’m spoiled, my boss is one of the very few journalists who do their job well, he’s honorable, decent, and, what’s more, writes like a god.