And This Is Your Opinion Of Me? Chapter 12
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Osé y temí, mas pudo la osadía
tanto, que desprecié el temor cobarde.
‘I dared and feared, but daring won
by so much, I scorned cowardly fear.’
Fernando de Herrera, Sonnet Osé y temí...
*
Puesto ya el pie en el estribo,
con las ansias de la muerte,
señora, aquesta te escribo,
pues partir no puedo vivo,
cuanto más volver a verte.
‘One foot already in the stirrup,
and in dread of my death,
milady, I write this to you,
since I can’t part from you alive,
all the less see you again.’
Anonymous, Copla
There was no one at home to wonder at my behaviour, so I indulged my anger, pacing the living room, flicking TV channels like a maniac, and even calling Julia just to hear her voice and think to myself how unfair it all was. She wasn’t at home, but my mother was. By the time she had finished complaining about me being gone, Julia not talking to her about Charlie, Dad not taking her calls, her therapist being unnecessary and on holiday (I know, makes no sense), and a bunch of other things... well, I was still angry, but I was fed up with it, so I sat down and tried to think of something else.
It didn’t work, because I kept going back to the whole mess and getting more and more fired up again. I felt betrayed-for Julia’s sake, because she’d been deserted by Charlie when his friends told him to, and could there be a lamer reason? And they had been Julia’s friends, too, or so she had thought. And what the hell, for my sake too, because I had trusted Charlie, even defended him, and led Julia to hope he would be back instead of beating him to a pulp. Or something. What was that crap about being heart-broken? And Isabel, what the fuck was her problem? Wasn’t Julia good enough to marry a prince if she chose? And wasn’t Isabel a two-faced bitch, playing with Antono and Fede after taking Charlie away from their sister?
The doorbell rang, and I stomped to the door and swung it open without even checking who it was.
It was Isabel. She didn’t look up at my rather aggressive door-opening; instead, she slid in and directly headed to the patio in the back.
I kicked the door closed and followed.
She stood there, next to the tree, fanning herself with her pretty fan and not looking at me in the eye. “How’s your head?” she asked. She nodded to the lounge chair. “Sit.”
I didn’t want to, but since the only thing I wanted to do was to remove her bodily from my patio, I sat. But on the table, so I wouldn’t have to look up at her.
She strode up and down several times, waving at the same couple of flies she hadn’t noticed last time. She glanced up-I was staring-and stopped right in front of me, practically between my legs.
“I love you,” she said, looking at me earnestly. “Like an idiot. All this time I’ve been thinking that it was stupid and that I should forget all about it, because... well, you can’t take anything seriously, and you live so far away and flirt with everyone, and you have no aspirations to speak of; we’ll have to do something about that. And then there are your friends. Carla is fine, but the rest... you know. They don’t help.” She touched one of my eyebrows, which had been rising steadily since she had started her tirade. “But despite everything, I can’t let it go, I... I want you no matter what. So, please. Can we stop playing games already and go out? Before you say anything, I have to tell you that I’m very serious about this. Very much so. David, if you think you won’t be reliable, just forget I said anything at all.”
I gaped at her. Her hands were on my forearms, making them tingle, and I was so tense that my toes had curled.
“Look, Isabel,” I managed to say, knowing that I should feel bad for her. I would have, if I hadn’t been so shocked. Or if she hadn’t been Isabel. I shook my arms free. “I don’t feel that way. I guess I’m sorry if I gave you the wrong impression.”
“What?” She blinked at me. “Are you serious?”
Right. According to her, I couldn’t take anything seriously. And I had no aspirations. And my friends were pretty much lowlives. And she loved me. For God’s sake, when had I even been nice to her?
My expression must have given me away, because she took a step back, looking as stunned as I was. “Are you really rejecting me?”
“Yes. You should go home,” I said, standing to take her to the door.
She didn’t budge. “Just like that? That’s all you have to say?”
“Well, yes. You came here and decided to tell me you like me by insulting me and my... my choices in life. Really, what did you expect?”
“What did you expect? A striptease?”
Her sarcasm made me want to kick something. I took a deep breath. “Is it true that you convinced Charlie to ditch Julia?”
“Yes,” she said, frowning at my change of topic. “I know she’s your sister, but I couldn’t let her play around with Charlie.”
“Who was playing around? Julia loves him. Loves. Him. What the hell-”
“Then, if she loves him,” she said, thoroughly unimpressed, “she should have told him when he told her.”
If Charlie had told her that and then deserted her, it only made it worse. Not that I could think very clearly at the moment-everything she said just sounded surreal, the offensive bits as much as the confession I couldn’t understand, and now the absurd logic. It all only infuriated me more.
“And I take it she didn’t say anything? We are talking about my sister, right? The one who doesn’t speak about her feelings?”
“Well, she has had two months to say something, and she hasn’t-”
“And that makes you right how?”
“-not to mention the secrets she kept from him.”
“Oh, the secrets. Because she should wear a badge stating she can’t have kids, of course.”
She closed her eyes, clearly frustrated. “Charlie asked me for advice and I gave it. What does that have to do with you and me?”
“There is no ‘you and me’.” I was burning, way too hot to be frozen by her glares. “Since we met, you’ve been-you’ve been an utter bitch, both to my friends and yours. Managing Charlie like he’s so dumb that he can’t fend for himself? And you don’t even like Caro. You are horrid to people-even to your boyfriend, right?”
“My boyfriend?”
“Jaime really deserves better than you.”
She had been blushing, but now she was livid. “Ah, that. You know everything about Jaime and me, don't you?”
“You turned everyone against him because he wouldn’t go back to you, even your grandfather, so he wouldn’t pay for his university. Is that knowing enough?”
She smirked. “Did I do that? Wow, I’m queen bitch of the universe.”
“He was going to be an architect! How can you laugh at that?”
“How can I take it seriously?” She pursed her lips, apparently having regained all her composure. She paced up, then down, then stopped to look at me, hands on hips. “So this is what you think of me? No wonder you don’t like me.”
“I’ll walk you to the door,” I snarled, and set off. I heard her heels clicking behind me in the dark corridor, and then I was stopped by her hand on my wrist, right as I was reaching towards the handle.
“But I wonder, if I hadn’t told you the truth,” she said, very close, in the softest voice I had ever heard from her, “if I had been coy and flirty, are you sure you wouldn’t have said yes?”
Her breath on my ear made the hairs of the nape of my hair stand on end. I grabbed her by the elbow and pushed her against the wall, cornering her so I could whisper back, “Let me make this very clear. You are obnoxious, rude and meddling. You are cold. You look down on me and on my entire life. I want nothing to do with you. I’ve hated you since day one, and, really, I’d rather go out with Lola Colinas.”
She didn’t slap me, and I didn’t kiss her, even if some very primal part of me felt it was the best course of action. Instead, she pushed me away, I let her go, and she glared at me one last time. Her eyes were very bright. She walked off, but didn’t slam the door shut-instead, she closed it with a quiet click.
***
I managed to stay furious and dry-eyed all the way to my room in Rosales. However, Fina heard me arrive and bounced in. She took one startled look at me and went,
Fina: Oh, darling.
...but I had been doing fine up until then.
Fina didn’t ask any questions. She set to stock my room with effective first aid items: tissues, Belgian chocolate ice cream, chilled watermelon, my iPod, and even the last Pepsi from her secret stash. She was so upset, I had to ask her to plait my hair so she would sit still and let me sniffle in peace.
A while later, while she was trying to distract me by picking on my music taste (I had gone nostalgic and was listening to Jarabe de Palo’s first album), her cellphone rang. She fished it out of her pocket, checked the ID, and left it on the side-table where she could see it. It went to voicemail.
Isabel: Who was it?
Fina (failing at nonchalance): Carla.
(The phone rings again, and they both look at it. It does say CARLA. In capital letters.)
Isabel: Take it. Take it.
Fina (practically diving to get it): Hey, gorgeous. Is this finally a booty call? (...) What happened? (...) She what? Are you-? (...) She said WHAT? (to Isabel) Colinas broke up with Carla. (to Carla) Anything you need. (...) I’m at Rosales, but... Wait, are you still at her place? (...) Okay, baby, listen to me for a second. You slap that wormy girlfriend of yours... fine, ex-girlfriend, and get out of there. I’ll pick you up in twenty minutes tops (looks at Isabel, who nods). Okay, don’t slap her then, I will. (...) What, no! You’ll stay here. I’ll ask Granddad tomorrow; he likes you better than he likes her. And you’ll be going in what, five days? We do have the spare bed. (...) They won’t mind. (...) Will you stop arguing with me already? (...) Okay. Get your things. And, for the record, I don’t know what Colinas is talking about. I’d totally go gay for your boobs alone. If I wasn’t already. (Hangs up and stares at the cellphone.)
Isabel: For her boobs?
Fina: Her eyes sounds too corny. You sure you don’t mind?
Isabel: She’s probably worse off than I am. Take the ice-cream. She got dumped by Lola Colinas.
(They both grimace. Isabel turns away before it’s apparent that someone just told her he preferred Colinas to her. Fina is already at the door, but stops.)
Fina: I wouldn’t go for anyone else, you know that, right?
(Since Isabel can’t speak or look at her, she opts for throwing her a pillow. And then Fina is gone. Isabel is actually relieved.)
***
I know. I hate me too.
But after she was gone, I hated her. I sort of sat in front of the TV, totally stupefied, during three episodes of CSI: Las Vegas. I was so angry, I couldn’t think straight. I felt tired, and frustrated, and thoroughly confused. I came up with better replies to her sarcasm, and protested hotly at the things she had said about me. I also felt strangely moved if I recalled her expression when she had said she loved me.
When I heard my dad’s voice and the key in the lock, I escaped to my room and pretended to be asleep. It didn’t work as I hoped, because I shared the room with Fede. They had been dining at the pizzería around the corner, and then gone on a walk afterwards, since Antonio was down for the count and safely tucked in his carrier. Aaand, they had vanilla cones. This all was explained to me by a very excited Fede, who of course couldn’t sleep-because he kept chattering. I read two whole romance chapters to him (without any epic battles in them) and finally lost him in a bit about which of the ladies was the prettiest in the world.
I tossed and turned all night, and had a dream in which I was at Charlie’s, at the party, and I was dancing with Isabel. It was even more uncomfortable than it had been, though I couldn’t see her face. Also, there was a camel. Then I saw over Isabel’s shoulder how Julia slid and disappeared down a black hole at Charlie’s feet. I turned to Isabel, but she wasn’t herself-it was that Erasmus girl, Isabel’s fan in her hand. “Where is she?” I shouted. I ran down the stairs (they were subway stairs, not the ones at Charlie’s), and reached the inside of a bakery, where Caroline and Ray Charles were trying to make Julia out of bread dough, and she was to be the prettiest girl in the world.
OK, it sounds funny now, but it was rather terrifying at the moment. The floor was made of sand, and I was worried it would get into the dough, and Caroline was my wife (and acted like a normal person), and Isabel, who was at the same time the Cheshire Cat, laughed at us while perched on top of the oven. There’s often a Cheshire Cat in my dreams, but Ray Charles was new.
So I woke up starving, because all of that bread and my empty stomach-in the end, I hadn’t had dinner at all. Dad and I ate half of the omelet for the party with our coffee as we watched the kids watch TV. I decided I would take the kids to the pool and clear my head.
It didn’t work. As soon as we set the towels, Antonio started asking about Babelle, which happened to mean, guess who? Exactly. Then Fede told me he was wearing his Xavi soccer T-shirt because he had promised to show her. I actually doubted she liked the kids-it made me sad and angry. To make up for it, maybe, I tried my best to entertain them. We were wrestling on the grass when I managed to pin both of them down and told them, over gleeful laughter:
“Give up and we’ll go get ice-cream.”
And someone right behind me said, “My treat.”
“BABELLE!” Antonio screamed, reaching up to be held. As soon as she had him, of course, he got his fists into her hair and tugged.
But Isabel didn’t flinch; she stood there, sunglasses hiding her face like she was a celebrity, waited for Fede to get his sandals and said to no-one in particular, “I’m going home today. Just wanted to say goodbye to them.”
“Antonio can only have the small ones,” Fede said, and since it was the only thing I wanted to tell her, I handed him his soccer T-shirt and let them go.
I had expected some big scene, but no, they just sat at the bar and ate their ice-creams very calmly. Not that I was watching much-I just checked every now and then that the kids were behaving and she hadn’t made them cry or something. I did see her squeeze them in a tight hug: first Antonio, who was on her lap and left a big chocolate stain on her top, and then she lifted Fede, and they growled at each other instead of kissing.
OK, so maybe she did like them. The boys ran back to me. Isabel and I didn’t even wave goodbye-but maybe we glared at each other under our sunglasses.
“This is for you,” Fede said, reaching me first. He tossed me a letter and nearly tripped as he tried to jump over me on his way to the pool.
“No ta,” explained Antonio, as soon as he had sat down and grabbed his latest discovery (the sunscreen spray). “Ya no ta.” I looked back at Isabel, and he was right. She wasn’t there anymore.
***
Dear David,
Please read this. It’s not an encore of what I said yesterday, although it does have to do with things you said. You accused me of two things last night: of taking Charlie away from Julia and of mistreating Jaime to the point of ruining his life. I can’t just let that pass, especially since it’s you who said it. Right now, I need to write this down for my peace of mind, and I hope you will read it and give me this one chance to clear things up.
First, I think you can imagine I didn’t mean to offend you last night. To me, total openness is a compliment I pay to very few people-and so yesterday I decided to be candid with you. You were honest right back, even if I’m not happy with the outcome, so I’ll keep it up in this letter and hope you won’t feel insulted and burn it halfway through.
I’ll start with Julia. While I always liked her, I never thought, in the months she and Charlie were seeing each other, that she was as serious about it as he was. They never are; it’s like some special Charlie ability to fall for girls who don’t care. She is the nicest of them by far, but she kept her distance, was always composed and never the littlest bit demanding, and, in general, did not seem like she loved him. She didn’t even tell him that much about her, if you recall.
The day after the party and the hospital, Charlie woke up saying that he was in love with her and that he refused to go anywhere until he knew she was alright. Then he planned to go home, but only to arrange things so he could move to Barcelona. Caro was not happy, and I thought he had lost it. Seven hours before, he hadn’t even known she had had cancer. But I took him to the hospital, and they spoke while we waited outside. Apparently, all she had to say to his plans was that he should go home and sleep some more.
We told him he deserved to be treated better (back then, I thought that was a pretty harsh way to be rejected) and made him see he was de trop. He has never been the most self-assured of guys, so he gave up and did go home. He had asked her to call (he didn’t dare to), and she never did. When she did write to him, her e-mail was lukewarm and trite. He was devastated-sometimes, being friendly is just cruel. So we kept Charlie from your friendly sister, who probably didn’t mean any harm, but ended up breaking his heart. She even e-mailed us to know how he was doing, and of course we spared him the humiliation. I can’t see how I could have done otherwise and still be Charlie’s friend.
You say she loves him. I can’t see how that’s true, but I do wish Charlie better luck than I had. So, if she really does love him, then she should just tell him. He’s still nowhere near getting over her. Despite Caro’s continued efforts, he isn’t even angry, and just goes on and on about how Julia is angelic and unable to do any wrong. It was easier for him to recover after mercenary exes.
Speaking of which, I have no idea what Jaime might have told you, though I suspect there were troubadours and frigid bitches in his story. I’ll just give you a brief summary of our relationship, which I think should be enough to exonerate me of whatever wrong he says I did.
My mother and Jaime’s were best friends since their school years, so I’ve known him all my life. Both Mum and his father were in the same orchestra and in the same traffic accident, so when they both died and his mother needed a job, Granddad took her on as his secretary. They are really close, and since I spent a lot of time at his place (he lived in Madrid back then), and Jaime too, we were childhood friends. We started dating when I was sixteen (he was eighteen). Like you said, Granddad was paying for his private college, since he couldn’t make the average he needed to go to a public university. They were very close, too. He was like family to everyone: Granddad, Fina, my brother, my housekeeper Reynalda... and even Dad was warming up to him despite his going out with me.
So everything was fine until I went to Salamanca; he couldn’t understand why I wanted to move to another city just to go to one uni in particular. Also, he wanted to have sex. I really don’t want to talk about this, but he always brings it up in his story, so, yes, I’m a frigid bitch, whatever. The detail that he never mentions is that he cheated repeatedly, and there are mutual friends who say that he had been at it way before I went anywhere. I don’t know about that, and really don’t want to. What I know is that he sort of lost control when I left. About that time, Granddad retired and both him and Jaime’s mother moved to Granada permanently.
He went out a lot, had weird friends he didn’t want me to meet, and rarely came to visit when I couldn’t spend the weekend home. Sometimes he said he couldn’t drop by even when I was home. I think he started to do drugs around then (other than pot, that is). Anyway, the first time we broke up, it was because Fina forwarded me pictures of a party at which he supposedly hadn’t been at, and in the pictures there was a girl on his lap. Somehow, he managed not only to convince me that it was all a terrible misunderstanding, but to make me fight with my own cousin, with whom I lived. The breaking up and making up went on for a year or so, until I actually found him in bed with my own best-friend-since-forever Lorena.
It was the ultimate breakup. I never explained the details to anyone but my closest friends, not even to my family, because I still couldn’t believe that I had been so wrong and that he was the jerkass that he is. I really expected him to repent any day and go back to his studies and his old life (except where I was concerned, of course). I just retreated to Salamanca, and inadvertently let him take control of Madrid.
Last May, I got home one Friday afternoon to find my little brother Jorge in my room, going through my things. This is not his normal behaviour-he’s a very good kid, and we have always been very close. When he saw me, he broke down and confessed. He said he needed me to lend him money because he had forgotten to set apart his guitar teacher’s fee before spending all of his pocket money for the month on other stuff. The other stuff turned out to be mostly alcohol and cocaine.
My brother was just sixteen at the time. He has always had problems meeting people and making friends, and he told me then that Jaime had taken him under his wing the last few months-and had said Jorge shouldn’t tell me, because I wouldn’t understand that it had nothing to do with me. He started crying and said that he wasn’t very happy about it all-it had been exciting at first, but it was all getting scarier by the minute, he had paid for and done things he hadn’t actually wanted to do, and that he really didn’t know how it had come to that.
I called Fina, whom Jorge has always looked up to, and we took him away for the weekend so he could clear his mind. When we came back, we talked to Dad, and he decided to send Jorge abroad (to a very stern boarding school in Scotland), because he’s never home and I was going to be in Barcelona anyway. Dad and I are pretty much still not speaking because of this.
Dad also told Granddad and Jaime’s mother. Granddad said he couldn’t keep paying for Jaime’s education, and his mother, who was like a second mother to us, felt so bad she left her position (and we got stuck with Colinas). Jaime decided he didn’t want to be an architect anyway and left the city, and we didn’t hear from him again until we met in Barcelona. He had taken up acting classes or something like that. He tried e-mailing me, but I don’t know what his intention was-I just told him to stay away.
That’s all, I think. You can check your facts with Fina if you want; Charlie has been in Italy these last years and he’s awful in a crisis, so he doesn’t know most of it. It’s a very private matter for my family, because we don’t want anyone to gossip about Jorge, but I couldn’t sleep thinking that you believed whatever Jaime said. Even if we will probably never meet again, I hope you won’t remember me as a horrid person (I’d rather get ‘snotty’, as it sounds actually nice when you say it). And I do hope you are happy doing whatever you choose to do.
Isabel
***
A/N:hlbr and elizabeth_hoot: LOVE YOU.
Chapter 13
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Osé y temí, mas pudo la osadía
tanto, que desprecié el temor cobarde.
‘I dared and feared, but daring won
by so much, I scorned cowardly fear.’
Fernando de Herrera, Sonnet Osé y temí...
*
Puesto ya el pie en el estribo,
con las ansias de la muerte,
señora, aquesta te escribo,
pues partir no puedo vivo,
cuanto más volver a verte.
‘One foot already in the stirrup,
and in dread of my death,
milady, I write this to you,
since I can’t part from you alive,
all the less see you again.’
Anonymous, Copla
There was no one at home to wonder at my behaviour, so I indulged my anger, pacing the living room, flicking TV channels like a maniac, and even calling Julia just to hear her voice and think to myself how unfair it all was. She wasn’t at home, but my mother was. By the time she had finished complaining about me being gone, Julia not talking to her about Charlie, Dad not taking her calls, her therapist being unnecessary and on holiday (I know, makes no sense), and a bunch of other things... well, I was still angry, but I was fed up with it, so I sat down and tried to think of something else.
It didn’t work, because I kept going back to the whole mess and getting more and more fired up again. I felt betrayed-for Julia’s sake, because she’d been deserted by Charlie when his friends told him to, and could there be a lamer reason? And they had been Julia’s friends, too, or so she had thought. And what the hell, for my sake too, because I had trusted Charlie, even defended him, and led Julia to hope he would be back instead of beating him to a pulp. Or something. What was that crap about being heart-broken? And Isabel, what the fuck was her problem? Wasn’t Julia good enough to marry a prince if she chose? And wasn’t Isabel a two-faced bitch, playing with Antono and Fede after taking Charlie away from their sister?
The doorbell rang, and I stomped to the door and swung it open without even checking who it was.
It was Isabel. She didn’t look up at my rather aggressive door-opening; instead, she slid in and directly headed to the patio in the back.
I kicked the door closed and followed.
She stood there, next to the tree, fanning herself with her pretty fan and not looking at me in the eye. “How’s your head?” she asked. She nodded to the lounge chair. “Sit.”
I didn’t want to, but since the only thing I wanted to do was to remove her bodily from my patio, I sat. But on the table, so I wouldn’t have to look up at her.
She strode up and down several times, waving at the same couple of flies she hadn’t noticed last time. She glanced up-I was staring-and stopped right in front of me, practically between my legs.
“I love you,” she said, looking at me earnestly. “Like an idiot. All this time I’ve been thinking that it was stupid and that I should forget all about it, because... well, you can’t take anything seriously, and you live so far away and flirt with everyone, and you have no aspirations to speak of; we’ll have to do something about that. And then there are your friends. Carla is fine, but the rest... you know. They don’t help.” She touched one of my eyebrows, which had been rising steadily since she had started her tirade. “But despite everything, I can’t let it go, I... I want you no matter what. So, please. Can we stop playing games already and go out? Before you say anything, I have to tell you that I’m very serious about this. Very much so. David, if you think you won’t be reliable, just forget I said anything at all.”
I gaped at her. Her hands were on my forearms, making them tingle, and I was so tense that my toes had curled.
“Look, Isabel,” I managed to say, knowing that I should feel bad for her. I would have, if I hadn’t been so shocked. Or if she hadn’t been Isabel. I shook my arms free. “I don’t feel that way. I guess I’m sorry if I gave you the wrong impression.”
“What?” She blinked at me. “Are you serious?”
Right. According to her, I couldn’t take anything seriously. And I had no aspirations. And my friends were pretty much lowlives. And she loved me. For God’s sake, when had I even been nice to her?
My expression must have given me away, because she took a step back, looking as stunned as I was. “Are you really rejecting me?”
“Yes. You should go home,” I said, standing to take her to the door.
She didn’t budge. “Just like that? That’s all you have to say?”
“Well, yes. You came here and decided to tell me you like me by insulting me and my... my choices in life. Really, what did you expect?”
“What did you expect? A striptease?”
Her sarcasm made me want to kick something. I took a deep breath. “Is it true that you convinced Charlie to ditch Julia?”
“Yes,” she said, frowning at my change of topic. “I know she’s your sister, but I couldn’t let her play around with Charlie.”
“Who was playing around? Julia loves him. Loves. Him. What the hell-”
“Then, if she loves him,” she said, thoroughly unimpressed, “she should have told him when he told her.”
If Charlie had told her that and then deserted her, it only made it worse. Not that I could think very clearly at the moment-everything she said just sounded surreal, the offensive bits as much as the confession I couldn’t understand, and now the absurd logic. It all only infuriated me more.
“And I take it she didn’t say anything? We are talking about my sister, right? The one who doesn’t speak about her feelings?”
“Well, she has had two months to say something, and she hasn’t-”
“And that makes you right how?”
“-not to mention the secrets she kept from him.”
“Oh, the secrets. Because she should wear a badge stating she can’t have kids, of course.”
She closed her eyes, clearly frustrated. “Charlie asked me for advice and I gave it. What does that have to do with you and me?”
“There is no ‘you and me’.” I was burning, way too hot to be frozen by her glares. “Since we met, you’ve been-you’ve been an utter bitch, both to my friends and yours. Managing Charlie like he’s so dumb that he can’t fend for himself? And you don’t even like Caro. You are horrid to people-even to your boyfriend, right?”
“My boyfriend?”
“Jaime really deserves better than you.”
She had been blushing, but now she was livid. “Ah, that. You know everything about Jaime and me, don't you?”
“You turned everyone against him because he wouldn’t go back to you, even your grandfather, so he wouldn’t pay for his university. Is that knowing enough?”
She smirked. “Did I do that? Wow, I’m queen bitch of the universe.”
“He was going to be an architect! How can you laugh at that?”
“How can I take it seriously?” She pursed her lips, apparently having regained all her composure. She paced up, then down, then stopped to look at me, hands on hips. “So this is what you think of me? No wonder you don’t like me.”
“I’ll walk you to the door,” I snarled, and set off. I heard her heels clicking behind me in the dark corridor, and then I was stopped by her hand on my wrist, right as I was reaching towards the handle.
“But I wonder, if I hadn’t told you the truth,” she said, very close, in the softest voice I had ever heard from her, “if I had been coy and flirty, are you sure you wouldn’t have said yes?”
Her breath on my ear made the hairs of the nape of my hair stand on end. I grabbed her by the elbow and pushed her against the wall, cornering her so I could whisper back, “Let me make this very clear. You are obnoxious, rude and meddling. You are cold. You look down on me and on my entire life. I want nothing to do with you. I’ve hated you since day one, and, really, I’d rather go out with Lola Colinas.”
She didn’t slap me, and I didn’t kiss her, even if some very primal part of me felt it was the best course of action. Instead, she pushed me away, I let her go, and she glared at me one last time. Her eyes were very bright. She walked off, but didn’t slam the door shut-instead, she closed it with a quiet click.
***
I managed to stay furious and dry-eyed all the way to my room in Rosales. However, Fina heard me arrive and bounced in. She took one startled look at me and went,
Fina: Oh, darling.
...but I had been doing fine up until then.
Fina didn’t ask any questions. She set to stock my room with effective first aid items: tissues, Belgian chocolate ice cream, chilled watermelon, my iPod, and even the last Pepsi from her secret stash. She was so upset, I had to ask her to plait my hair so she would sit still and let me sniffle in peace.
A while later, while she was trying to distract me by picking on my music taste (I had gone nostalgic and was listening to Jarabe de Palo’s first album), her cellphone rang. She fished it out of her pocket, checked the ID, and left it on the side-table where she could see it. It went to voicemail.
Isabel: Who was it?
Fina (failing at nonchalance): Carla.
(The phone rings again, and they both look at it. It does say CARLA. In capital letters.)
Isabel: Take it. Take it.
Fina (practically diving to get it): Hey, gorgeous. Is this finally a booty call? (...) What happened? (...) She what? Are you-? (...) She said WHAT? (to Isabel) Colinas broke up with Carla. (to Carla) Anything you need. (...) I’m at Rosales, but... Wait, are you still at her place? (...) Okay, baby, listen to me for a second. You slap that wormy girlfriend of yours... fine, ex-girlfriend, and get out of there. I’ll pick you up in twenty minutes tops (looks at Isabel, who nods). Okay, don’t slap her then, I will. (...) What, no! You’ll stay here. I’ll ask Granddad tomorrow; he likes you better than he likes her. And you’ll be going in what, five days? We do have the spare bed. (...) They won’t mind. (...) Will you stop arguing with me already? (...) Okay. Get your things. And, for the record, I don’t know what Colinas is talking about. I’d totally go gay for your boobs alone. If I wasn’t already. (Hangs up and stares at the cellphone.)
Isabel: For her boobs?
Fina: Her eyes sounds too corny. You sure you don’t mind?
Isabel: She’s probably worse off than I am. Take the ice-cream. She got dumped by Lola Colinas.
(They both grimace. Isabel turns away before it’s apparent that someone just told her he preferred Colinas to her. Fina is already at the door, but stops.)
Fina: I wouldn’t go for anyone else, you know that, right?
(Since Isabel can’t speak or look at her, she opts for throwing her a pillow. And then Fina is gone. Isabel is actually relieved.)
***
I know. I hate me too.
But after she was gone, I hated her. I sort of sat in front of the TV, totally stupefied, during three episodes of CSI: Las Vegas. I was so angry, I couldn’t think straight. I felt tired, and frustrated, and thoroughly confused. I came up with better replies to her sarcasm, and protested hotly at the things she had said about me. I also felt strangely moved if I recalled her expression when she had said she loved me.
When I heard my dad’s voice and the key in the lock, I escaped to my room and pretended to be asleep. It didn’t work as I hoped, because I shared the room with Fede. They had been dining at the pizzería around the corner, and then gone on a walk afterwards, since Antonio was down for the count and safely tucked in his carrier. Aaand, they had vanilla cones. This all was explained to me by a very excited Fede, who of course couldn’t sleep-because he kept chattering. I read two whole romance chapters to him (without any epic battles in them) and finally lost him in a bit about which of the ladies was the prettiest in the world.
I tossed and turned all night, and had a dream in which I was at Charlie’s, at the party, and I was dancing with Isabel. It was even more uncomfortable than it had been, though I couldn’t see her face. Also, there was a camel. Then I saw over Isabel’s shoulder how Julia slid and disappeared down a black hole at Charlie’s feet. I turned to Isabel, but she wasn’t herself-it was that Erasmus girl, Isabel’s fan in her hand. “Where is she?” I shouted. I ran down the stairs (they were subway stairs, not the ones at Charlie’s), and reached the inside of a bakery, where Caroline and Ray Charles were trying to make Julia out of bread dough, and she was to be the prettiest girl in the world.
OK, it sounds funny now, but it was rather terrifying at the moment. The floor was made of sand, and I was worried it would get into the dough, and Caroline was my wife (and acted like a normal person), and Isabel, who was at the same time the Cheshire Cat, laughed at us while perched on top of the oven. There’s often a Cheshire Cat in my dreams, but Ray Charles was new.
So I woke up starving, because all of that bread and my empty stomach-in the end, I hadn’t had dinner at all. Dad and I ate half of the omelet for the party with our coffee as we watched the kids watch TV. I decided I would take the kids to the pool and clear my head.
It didn’t work. As soon as we set the towels, Antonio started asking about Babelle, which happened to mean, guess who? Exactly. Then Fede told me he was wearing his Xavi soccer T-shirt because he had promised to show her. I actually doubted she liked the kids-it made me sad and angry. To make up for it, maybe, I tried my best to entertain them. We were wrestling on the grass when I managed to pin both of them down and told them, over gleeful laughter:
“Give up and we’ll go get ice-cream.”
And someone right behind me said, “My treat.”
“BABELLE!” Antonio screamed, reaching up to be held. As soon as she had him, of course, he got his fists into her hair and tugged.
But Isabel didn’t flinch; she stood there, sunglasses hiding her face like she was a celebrity, waited for Fede to get his sandals and said to no-one in particular, “I’m going home today. Just wanted to say goodbye to them.”
“Antonio can only have the small ones,” Fede said, and since it was the only thing I wanted to tell her, I handed him his soccer T-shirt and let them go.
I had expected some big scene, but no, they just sat at the bar and ate their ice-creams very calmly. Not that I was watching much-I just checked every now and then that the kids were behaving and she hadn’t made them cry or something. I did see her squeeze them in a tight hug: first Antonio, who was on her lap and left a big chocolate stain on her top, and then she lifted Fede, and they growled at each other instead of kissing.
OK, so maybe she did like them. The boys ran back to me. Isabel and I didn’t even wave goodbye-but maybe we glared at each other under our sunglasses.
“This is for you,” Fede said, reaching me first. He tossed me a letter and nearly tripped as he tried to jump over me on his way to the pool.
“No ta,” explained Antonio, as soon as he had sat down and grabbed his latest discovery (the sunscreen spray). “Ya no ta.” I looked back at Isabel, and he was right. She wasn’t there anymore.
***
Dear David,
Please read this. It’s not an encore of what I said yesterday, although it does have to do with things you said. You accused me of two things last night: of taking Charlie away from Julia and of mistreating Jaime to the point of ruining his life. I can’t just let that pass, especially since it’s you who said it. Right now, I need to write this down for my peace of mind, and I hope you will read it and give me this one chance to clear things up.
First, I think you can imagine I didn’t mean to offend you last night. To me, total openness is a compliment I pay to very few people-and so yesterday I decided to be candid with you. You were honest right back, even if I’m not happy with the outcome, so I’ll keep it up in this letter and hope you won’t feel insulted and burn it halfway through.
I’ll start with Julia. While I always liked her, I never thought, in the months she and Charlie were seeing each other, that she was as serious about it as he was. They never are; it’s like some special Charlie ability to fall for girls who don’t care. She is the nicest of them by far, but she kept her distance, was always composed and never the littlest bit demanding, and, in general, did not seem like she loved him. She didn’t even tell him that much about her, if you recall.
The day after the party and the hospital, Charlie woke up saying that he was in love with her and that he refused to go anywhere until he knew she was alright. Then he planned to go home, but only to arrange things so he could move to Barcelona. Caro was not happy, and I thought he had lost it. Seven hours before, he hadn’t even known she had had cancer. But I took him to the hospital, and they spoke while we waited outside. Apparently, all she had to say to his plans was that he should go home and sleep some more.
We told him he deserved to be treated better (back then, I thought that was a pretty harsh way to be rejected) and made him see he was de trop. He has never been the most self-assured of guys, so he gave up and did go home. He had asked her to call (he didn’t dare to), and she never did. When she did write to him, her e-mail was lukewarm and trite. He was devastated-sometimes, being friendly is just cruel. So we kept Charlie from your friendly sister, who probably didn’t mean any harm, but ended up breaking his heart. She even e-mailed us to know how he was doing, and of course we spared him the humiliation. I can’t see how I could have done otherwise and still be Charlie’s friend.
You say she loves him. I can’t see how that’s true, but I do wish Charlie better luck than I had. So, if she really does love him, then she should just tell him. He’s still nowhere near getting over her. Despite Caro’s continued efforts, he isn’t even angry, and just goes on and on about how Julia is angelic and unable to do any wrong. It was easier for him to recover after mercenary exes.
Speaking of which, I have no idea what Jaime might have told you, though I suspect there were troubadours and frigid bitches in his story. I’ll just give you a brief summary of our relationship, which I think should be enough to exonerate me of whatever wrong he says I did.
My mother and Jaime’s were best friends since their school years, so I’ve known him all my life. Both Mum and his father were in the same orchestra and in the same traffic accident, so when they both died and his mother needed a job, Granddad took her on as his secretary. They are really close, and since I spent a lot of time at his place (he lived in Madrid back then), and Jaime too, we were childhood friends. We started dating when I was sixteen (he was eighteen). Like you said, Granddad was paying for his private college, since he couldn’t make the average he needed to go to a public university. They were very close, too. He was like family to everyone: Granddad, Fina, my brother, my housekeeper Reynalda... and even Dad was warming up to him despite his going out with me.
So everything was fine until I went to Salamanca; he couldn’t understand why I wanted to move to another city just to go to one uni in particular. Also, he wanted to have sex. I really don’t want to talk about this, but he always brings it up in his story, so, yes, I’m a frigid bitch, whatever. The detail that he never mentions is that he cheated repeatedly, and there are mutual friends who say that he had been at it way before I went anywhere. I don’t know about that, and really don’t want to. What I know is that he sort of lost control when I left. About that time, Granddad retired and both him and Jaime’s mother moved to Granada permanently.
He went out a lot, had weird friends he didn’t want me to meet, and rarely came to visit when I couldn’t spend the weekend home. Sometimes he said he couldn’t drop by even when I was home. I think he started to do drugs around then (other than pot, that is). Anyway, the first time we broke up, it was because Fina forwarded me pictures of a party at which he supposedly hadn’t been at, and in the pictures there was a girl on his lap. Somehow, he managed not only to convince me that it was all a terrible misunderstanding, but to make me fight with my own cousin, with whom I lived. The breaking up and making up went on for a year or so, until I actually found him in bed with my own best-friend-since-forever Lorena.
It was the ultimate breakup. I never explained the details to anyone but my closest friends, not even to my family, because I still couldn’t believe that I had been so wrong and that he was the jerkass that he is. I really expected him to repent any day and go back to his studies and his old life (except where I was concerned, of course). I just retreated to Salamanca, and inadvertently let him take control of Madrid.
Last May, I got home one Friday afternoon to find my little brother Jorge in my room, going through my things. This is not his normal behaviour-he’s a very good kid, and we have always been very close. When he saw me, he broke down and confessed. He said he needed me to lend him money because he had forgotten to set apart his guitar teacher’s fee before spending all of his pocket money for the month on other stuff. The other stuff turned out to be mostly alcohol and cocaine.
My brother was just sixteen at the time. He has always had problems meeting people and making friends, and he told me then that Jaime had taken him under his wing the last few months-and had said Jorge shouldn’t tell me, because I wouldn’t understand that it had nothing to do with me. He started crying and said that he wasn’t very happy about it all-it had been exciting at first, but it was all getting scarier by the minute, he had paid for and done things he hadn’t actually wanted to do, and that he really didn’t know how it had come to that.
I called Fina, whom Jorge has always looked up to, and we took him away for the weekend so he could clear his mind. When we came back, we talked to Dad, and he decided to send Jorge abroad (to a very stern boarding school in Scotland), because he’s never home and I was going to be in Barcelona anyway. Dad and I are pretty much still not speaking because of this.
Dad also told Granddad and Jaime’s mother. Granddad said he couldn’t keep paying for Jaime’s education, and his mother, who was like a second mother to us, felt so bad she left her position (and we got stuck with Colinas). Jaime decided he didn’t want to be an architect anyway and left the city, and we didn’t hear from him again until we met in Barcelona. He had taken up acting classes or something like that. He tried e-mailing me, but I don’t know what his intention was-I just told him to stay away.
That’s all, I think. You can check your facts with Fina if you want; Charlie has been in Italy these last years and he’s awful in a crisis, so he doesn’t know most of it. It’s a very private matter for my family, because we don’t want anyone to gossip about Jorge, but I couldn’t sleep thinking that you believed whatever Jaime said. Even if we will probably never meet again, I hope you won’t remember me as a horrid person (I’d rather get ‘snotty’, as it sounds actually nice when you say it). And I do hope you are happy doing whatever you choose to do.
Isabel
***
A/N:hlbr and elizabeth_hoot: LOVE YOU.
Chapter 13