This Too Shall Pass (7 page)

He texts me that he just got in, he really wants to see me. And so my head once again succumbs to my body, and your death recedes a few more steps into the distance, and as if by magic, my frozen blood begins to flow again. I joke around with the children, I sniff at the food, I lie down on the ground to play with my goddaughter, I hug Sofía, I whisper into Pep's ear that we have a mountain of dope, I pet the cat, I devour olives like a madwoman, I tell everyone to go out and just look at the moon. I put music on and tell Elisa we should go dancing.

—He just texted, I whisper to Sofía.

—I thought so. Your face changed so drastically I knew something was up.

—It's strange. I don't really even like him that much.

—Blanquita, I think you like him that much, you just don't want to admit it.

—Maybe I do, I don't know.

We have dinner in the garden outside. The candles are lit and there are a few Chinese lanterns swaying from the branches of the olive tree. Their shadows sway over the pristine crust of the salt-cooked fish the men have prepared; there's tomato and cucumber salad and croquettes, and recently baked olive bread. Children and adults alike are tanned and happy, the relaxed, tired bodies and dreamy eyes of a day spent boating, in the sea and the sun. We share stories, the same ones repeated a thousand times by people who have spent large portions of their lives together and still like one another. For a fleeting moment, I consider having a quiet coffee and not responding to the message. Nina, my goddaughter, is sleeping in her mother's lap. Edgar is trying to sneak a little swig of beer, but he stops when Elisa looks at him threateningly. Nico is paying attention to the adults' conversation while little Dani is playing with his collection of trains. Hugo accuses me of being a bore. Carolina comes out in my defense and Pep starts telling stories of Hugo's poor girlfriends, left behind every morning while he goes out for his sacred run. I can't imagine life having any meaning without these summer nights. I get another text from Santi and he proposes that we meet up in front of the church so he can give me a good-night kiss. I get up, as if I had been sitting on a spring.

—I have to go out for a minute—be right back.

Everyone looks at me with surprise.

—Anything wrong, dear? Are you OK? Carolina asks with a worried expression.

—Yes, I'm fine. I'm just going out to buy cigarettes, I say with a giggle.

—Yeah, Sofía says.

Carolina looks at me from the other side of the table without smiling. She's the only one of us who has had a long-term relationship with a really wonderful man, and though she's never expressed it, I know she considers my dating a married man not only a waste of time but also in some way a bit of a betrayal of her too.

Hugo picks up and wiggles a half-full pack of cigarettes at me, which he had put out on the table a little while ago.

—That tobacco's stale. Seriously, it's totally unsmokable, I say.

He laughs. —When you told me you fib a lot, I imagined you'd be a little better at it.

—I do what I can.

—Don't take too long, we'll be bored without you, he adds.

Sofía accompanies me to the door.

—You don't really like him that much, huh?

I skip down the hill with a spring in my step. You always said I walked like my father, as if there were something pushing me upward, as if our feet barely grazed the ground, and how before seeing us you already knew we were coming by the unmistakable pattern of our gait. I still recall how angry you got that one time when I was near the end of my pregnancy and you saw me lumbering.

“Please don't tell me you're going to change the way you've walked your entire life, just because you're pregnant.”

If you were to see me now, you'd know perfectly well that I'm on my way to meet a man. But you never tried to stop me. You believed that love justified the type of quirky behavior that under normal circumstances you would have roundly disapproved of. If a waiter brought you the wrong dish, or spilled soup on you, and in response to your complaint the maître d' would say that it's on account of his being in love—you alone were able to squeeze these kinds of intimate details from others—you would have looked at him with a kind face and said, “Oh, well, in that case…” And gone back to eating, happy as a clam, with a soup stain on your skirt. But if someone dared give you information, assuring you it was right, and it turned out to be wrong, or showed up late for a meeting, you'd stare at them as if stupefied, and they'd lose your respect forever. I spent my entire life fighting to gain that respect without ever knowing whether I succeeded. I still run late, no matter where I go.

Unexpectedly, I find the beautiful stranger approaching me in long strides. He's alone, walking a little hunched forward, like most tall, reedy men do, as if protecting themselves from invisible gusts of wind, as if it were always a little blustery up there in the air they inhabit. I'm walking so fast and feeling so restless that one of my flip-flops accidentally falls off. I recover it just in time to see that he's caught me in the act, which elicits a teasing smile. Again, just wave good-bye to the femme fatale I've always aspired to be. I smile back at him as we pass by each other, and he whispers: —Later, Cinderella. I think, what if I stop and suggest having a drink (and we get drunk together and spill our life stories to each other eagerly and in little episodes while we stroke each other's hands and pinch each other's knees dreamily, and look searchingly into each other's eyes a split second longer than is appropriate, and then we kiss, and then we fuck impetuously in some corner of the town like when we were young, and fall in love and travel together and be forever spooning each other and we have a few more children and, yes, in the end we save each other), but I continue walking and don't look back. If men only knew how many times women play that film over and over in their heads, they'd never dare ask us for a light.

Santi is sitting in front of the church door. I'm so happy to see him that I don't even notice how much skinnier he is since the last time we saw each other, or how tired he looks, or that he's smoking joints again. He looks at me with a twinkle in his eyes and flashes an ear-to-ear grin.

—You're so brown.

—I'm brown, he responds. —How are you?

—Fine.

We remain quiet for a few seconds, just looking at each other, grinning, suddenly a little shy and speechless, as if the mere fact of being opposite each other again was the most extraordinary thing in the world.

—And the children?

—Fine. They're just happy to be here.

—Do they miss their grandmother?

—I guess. They adored her, they always had such a great time with her, but they aren't really talking about it. They're well mannered, very discreet.

—Like their mother.

—How are yours? Are they well?

—Happy. You should see how well the older one swims, it's amazing. Lately I feel as though I spend the whole day yelling at them.

—Oh dear. How old is the older one? Ten?

—Nine.

—Ah.

—You look so beautiful.

—Thanks. You too. Do you have a cigarette?

He brushes my hand when he brings the lighter up close. And with that gesture we walk off the playground, peel away the thin, awkward, lovesick skin of teenagers and return to being two foolish adults with worn-out skin in a long-term illicit relationship.

—I don't have much time. I told them I needed to buy cigarettes. I just wanted to see you, Blanca. Know how you're doing. But I have to leave pretty soon.

—You have time for a drink, don't you?

—No. I wish I did. They've organized a huge barbecue on the beach and they're going to notice I'm not there.

He pretends not to see the disappointment in my eyes.

—When will we see each other again?

—I'm not sure. One of these days.

—You're such an asshole.

—Did I already tell you how beautiful you are tonight?

I smoke in silence. He grabs my pants and pulls them up to my waist. Then he twirls me around as if I were a puppet to look at my ass.

—Will I ever be able to get you to wear pants that fit?

—Doubt it.

—How about leggings? You'd look awesome.

—Sure.

—Leather ones.

We both chuckle at the idea.

—I'll buy a pair tomorrow.

He kisses me, still holding me by the pants.

—I don't want you to be angry with me. Get it? I can't stand it when you're angry. It makes me feel really bad.

I giggle. —Yeah, so, so bad.

—Go ahead, laugh, laugh at me. But it's true.

—Well, I'm not angry, I say. But mentally, I have already begun counting the minutes until he's gone and I'll be left alone and your death will come back to haunt me and everything will start all over again. For all the love of my friends, of my children, it isn't enough to withstand the impact of your not being here—I need to be held tightly by a man so as not to fly away. They say that most women look for their father in other men, but I look for you, I did even when you were alive. Any dishonest psychiatrist would have a field day with me, and yet mine only wants me to find a job.

—What are you thinking about? One minute you're here and the next you're off somewhere else.

—I'm thinking about how tired I am.

—Tired of what?

—I don't know. Everything. The day. The summer, which is very tiring. I think I need to sleep.

—Do you realize we've never slept together? Well, maybe once, right at the beginning. I made breakfast for you in the morning.

—No, I don't recall that. But I'd love to sleep with you. Sleep-sleep, I mean.

—But there might be nocturnal violation.

—Except it wouldn't be a violation.

He says good-bye, as usual, without making any specific plans. I stay put for a while, seated in front of the church. I hear the rumor of people in the town out partying, in full summer swing, and ask myself who rules in La Frontera these days, what clan of stoned lunatics goes out to watch the sun rise at Cap de Creus, and whether they still play “Should I Stay or Should I Go” as the last song of the night in El Hostal before closing. The first crown a person loses, and perhaps the only one that can never be regained, is that of youth: childhood doesn't count because we're not even aware yet of the incredible bounty of energy, strength, beauty, freedom, and candor that will belong to us in a few years, which the luckiest among us will squander beyond measure.

When I get home, everyone's already in bed. I sneak into Sofía and little Dani's room, the one with the bunk beds. All summer residences are a little like a holiday camp: a big wooden table around which we all meet for breakfast as we wake up, the joy of getting together with friends from early in the morning, dressed in one's pajamas or swimsuit, bleary-eyed, hungover, or radiant, laughing at the antics of the day before, preparing hot chocolate for the children and arguing over whether it's too early to drink a beer or not, taking turns for the shower, the shrieks of the last person in, who has it cold because there's no warm water left, the line of discolored towels, stiff from the salt water and drying in the sun, the rooms with the bunk beds to maximize space and fit as many friends in as possible. I climb into bed with Sofía.

—I'm not sleepy, I whisper in her ear.

—Huh? What? What's going on? Dani! and she gives me a little smack.

—No, no, it's me. I just got back.

—How'd it go? she asks, taking off her pink satin eye mask and sitting up a little.

—Fine, fine. Same old thing. We chatted for a while and then he had to leave.

—I see.

—And now I can't sleep.

—I can imagine. It's normal. Since you couldn't fuck. Unresolved sex has a way of keeping a person awake. But it took me an hour to get Daniel to sleep, I haven't been out hooking up, and I am pooped.

Dani stirs in his bed.

—If you wake him up, I'll kill you, she whispers.

—Where's your summer spirit?

—Sleeping, she answers, putting her eye mask back on.

I stay there for a while, hoping she'll remember that I'm a poor orphan who needs someone to pay attention to her, but after a few minutes Dani stops moving around and Sofía begins snoring softly.

I go back to my own room. I wonder what the mysterious stranger is doing now. Maybe the same as I am.