Learning To Lose Part 18

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 Ingles 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 b.u.t.t 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 relations.h.i.+p 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 Papa'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 pa.s.sed 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 h.e.l.lo 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.

24.

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 G.o.d.

Ariel found out about the photos from Arturo Caspe. Don't think that I had anything to do with it, the agent said arrogantly. These girls are models and there are always photographers following them around. It's part of being famous. And it's not going to hurt you, soccer fans like their players to be virile ladies' men. Ariel wasn't in the mood to argue or stay on the phone very long. I just want you to tell me what agency the photographer works for, that's it, was all he said. Half an hour later, Caspe called to give him a name. In the car, before Husky went up to the agency, Ariel signed a blank check. You're crazy, I could run off to Brazil with this.

Why did he do it? The photos weren't compromising. They weren't going to do him or Reyes any damage. But right now, with the negotiation of his future hanging in the balance, he didn't want the club to use his nightlife against him. They always did that when things were going badly. That beach party in La Coruna, after the local team had two losses, was used by the club's president to suggest that the players weren't taking the end of the compet.i.tive season seriously, and the executive who had brought in the girls leaked it to a radio commentator. And then there was a deeper reason, one he didn't admit to Husky: Sylvia. Ariel didn't want this issue to poison them. First the stupid woman who went on TV to brag about s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g soccer players. They were even kidding about it on the team. Husky told him, you good-looking guys can't afford to get involved with sc.u.m like that, you have to raise the bar, it's a moral and aesthetic obligation to the world. Sylvia had also found out about Marcelo's concert in Madrid and asked him, did you go? Yes, but with Argentinian friends, Ariel told her, and she was annoyed because he hadn't invited her. I didn't think you liked him. You've got me hooked, you play it all the time. Once again he was dirtying what in her was clean, free of deceit.

Husky had taken a while in the agency. He explained how they worked. Apart from professional photos, they dealt with couples who were at odds, looking to exploit each other. It was a rare week when someone didn't show up to negotiate over some photos of a model, an actress, a TV hostess naked on the beach or on the terrace of her house, or, as Husky told him, sticking her toothbrush up her c.u.n.t, pictures taken in the intimacy of a relations.h.i.+p that weeks, months, or years later were only good for scamming some money or sullying the reputation of the person who dumped you. Husky told him, when the prince got married, the agencies were anxious to buy photos of his wife from old schoolmates, ex-boyfriends, they were selling her medical records, her gynecological files, her school papers, a painter even showed up selling paintings she had posed nude for. Then they use them to negotiate, exchange favors. This country gobbles up tons of celebrity gossip every day. Like every other country, corrected Ariel, you think mine is any better?

When he appeared after the long negotiation and got into Ariel's car, Husky was in a teasing mood. I was expecting something erotic, spicy, a full-scale scandal. You want to buy some c.r.a.ppy photos of two good-looking kids in a taxi? What's going on? She snagged a millionaire and doesn't want the photos to f.u.c.k things up? Or he's marrying the president's daughter for her money and this could ruin his career? That's what the guy in the agency asked me and, honestly, I didn't know what to tell him. Ariel didn't say anything, he just listened with a smile, waiting in the wings. Are you going to tell me, are you going to say what the h.e.l.l is going on and why we had to give two thousand euros to those sons of b.i.t.c.hes?

I'll just introduce you to Sylvia, said Ariel. And he starts the car.

Don't mention any of this to her, warns Ariel later. They're on the way to pick Sylvia up at her house. But right at that moment Ariel gets a message from her. "My grandmother is in the hospital, I'll meet you in two hours." Change of plans, we have two hours to kill. Well, after dealing with those skunks my body demands alcohol. What are you in the mood for? Husky directs Ariel to a place he swears serves the best gin and tonics in the city. They're artists. Gin at five in the afternoon? Can you think of a better time?

They drive to a place near the Castellana. It's a bar that has seen better days; it's half empty and the walls are covered with deep-red fabric. There are a couple of women at the back tables. It's a cla.s.sic joint to bring dates. Husky greets the barman and they sit at a table. This is what's known as a piano bar. An Asturian midfielder who used to play on your team arranged to meet me here for one of my first interviews, while he made out with a woman who wasn't his wife. Those were other times, I was just starting in the business, and he was on his way out. I got a fabulous interview, which they never published.

Ariel and Husky talk over a drink. The lemon slice floats among the ice cubes and the tonic's tiny bubbles. Ariel had gone back to practice that morning. He barely exchanged a word with Coach Requero. I didn't think this was so complicated, he confesses to his friend. Here winning over the fans is a matter of one nice play, sometimes luck, Husky explains to him. There have been mediocre players they've loved to death and geniuses they never understood. Then there's the populist type, who always goes over well, who runs with all his heart toward an unreachable ball, the one who asks the crowd to cheer him on, the one who gets p.i.s.sed off at his teammates when they're losing. There should be a penalty for the players who sweat the most in games. Sweating is overrated. And I'll tell you something else, in Madrid foreign players with light eyes have never been successful. No, this is a distrustful sport, and people always find light eyes suspect. Here breaking legs is appreciated more than dodging and weaving. And it's the same in journalism, they want leg breakers. People believe that the journalist who insults is freer, more independent, but they don't see that they always insult the powerless. They spit downward. I swear it would take you twenty seasons to even begin to understand how insane everything is around here.

It's the same over there, believe me. It's the same everywhere.

Yeah, maybe you're right. You know what your problem is, Ariel? You think. You think too much. And a soccer player can't think. A soccer player can't have an inner life, for f.u.c.k's sake. It destroys him. It beats you down, it paralyzes you. s.h.i.+t, you'll have time to think when you're retired. Don't keep running things over in your head, play. Just play and see where the swell takes you. Should we order another gin and tonic?

Ariel talks to him about Sylvia. I've been trying not to fall in love with this girl ever since I met her. Maybe the alcohol or Ariel's pa.s.sion when he talks about her leads Husky to confess. You know I was only in college for a year? Then I got an interns.h.i.+p and said, f.u.c.k it, to my mother's dismay. I met a girl there. She was a really special chick, she wrote poetry. You get the idea, right? And she was pretty, you can't even imagine. We were born to never cross paths. In those days I was into the Who, I had seen Quadrophenia Quadrophenia a hundred and three times and had sideburns as long as table legs, but I fell for her like a drooling fool. a hundred and three times and had sideburns as long as table legs, but I fell for her like a drooling fool.

Husky pauses, such a long pause Ariel starts to wonder if that was the end of the story and so he asks, and? We went out, for a month or so. Then we broke up. Maybe we were too young, I don't know, or it was the absurd feeling that if you meet the love of your life at twenty years old the best thing to do is run away. You should meet someone like that at forty, and even then it seems too early. At sixty. Two years ago, I ran into her on the street. She has a kid, she's married, she's in charge of media relations in I don't know which ministry of those jacka.s.s things politicians spend their lives doing, Justice or External Affairs. It was weird because I asked her, do you still write poetry? And she turned beet red. I was super-embarra.s.sed, because she didn't want to talk about it, can you believe it? Well, they were horrible poems, of course, like all poems.

Don't be an a.s.s, how can you say that?

It's the truth. When you've worked the Regional Third and every f.u.c.king soccer field all over Spain, after meeting the real people out there, I can a.s.sure you that if they put Lorca or Becquer or Machado in front of me, I know what I'd tell them. Imagine they went out to recite their masterpieces in the middle of a soccer field, how long would it be before people jumped in to stomp on their entrails? No, dude, no, poetry is a lie that we invented to make ourselves believe we can sometimes be tender and civilized. Well, when I saw her blush, I realized I knew her secret, more than that, she had been as in love with me as I was with her, something I always doubted, even though she wrote me a poem once.

You? She wrote a poem about you?

Is it that strange? There are people who have written poems about Stalin or about a blind cow. Yes, about me. And I still have it memorized. Do you want to hear it? Ariel nodded enthusiastically. Husky began to recite with heartfelt pauses: "You aren't handsome, you aren't perfect, and that red hair, what's to be done about it, you're afraid of thinking, you're afraid of caressing, you'd rather be called an idiot than to be told I love you, which is why I now write you: you're an idiot, you're an idiot, my love, you're an idiot." Isn't that the most beautiful declaration of love you've ever heard in your life?

Ariel burst out laughing, mostly because of the importance with which Husky recited the verses. The girl knew you well, you are an idiot. You didn't get it, "you'd rather be called an idiot than to be told I love you," and she says I love you by calling me an idiot, what ignorance.

Ariel can't stop laughing. A little while ago, he wouldn't have thought that someone would be able to make him forget what he was going through. Now he wipes away the tears with a paper napkin while Husky insists, you brute, idiot means my love in the poem, it's not literal, it's a metaphor or whatever...Do you even know what a metaphor is? Right, how would a f.u.c.king soccer player know what a metaphor is?

They pick up Sylvia at the hospital's side door. She greets Husky, who forces her to get into the backseat. Sorry, but I'm not getting into that hole, my feet don't fit, he apologizes. Besides I've always found sports cars disgusting. Me, too, she says. I'm going to switch it, I swear, I'm going to switch it, says Ariel.

Husky chose the restaurant. To get there, they had to leave Madrid, cross a high plateau filled with offices, malls, and knots of highway. It's far, but it's awesome, and we won't run into anyone there.

It's a Galician restaurant. The owner's wife comes out of the kitchen to kiss Husky and say, my boy, my boy, you're so thin. The fact that this restaurant is open, he explains when they sit down, is proof that this country hasn't totally gone to s.h.i.+t. Now you'll see how things really taste, it'll blow your mind.

Husky goes to the bathroom. On the way, he shows them a slice of a large round loaf of bread in its wicker basket, look, look at this bread, please, there is still something authentic left in this world. Ariel brushes Sylvia's hand. How is your grandmother? Terrible. Sylvia is silent. If you want, we can forget about the trip. Have you thought of somewhere? she asks. Ariel nods with a smile, we men in love are like that. Sylvia looks into his eyes. You guys are both drunk.

Husky comes out of the bathroom and returns to the table. Sylvia, when this c.r.a.ppy loser is playing in the Siberian Third Division, please, don't stop calling me to go out, okay, keep calling me.

Maybe I will.

part four

IS THIS THE END?.

1.

Venice is tinged with the burnt sienna of its houses. There isn't much to do except look at this place, says Sylvia. Be amazed that someone could actually live here. They had sat in a cobblestoned square. They went into a store that sells handmade bracelets and necklaces. There were two cats lying beneath a magnolia tree. During the gondola ride, he hugs her. Sylvia curls her head into his shoulder. Music plays in a nearby house. From the ca.n.a.ls they see the roofs of apartments, they pa.s.s postcard-perfect tourists, they hear the whistles of the gondoliers before taking the curves. Sylvia feels Ariel's hand on her shoulder throughout the whole ride. It won't be easy for her to forget. As they pa.s.s beneath a bridge, a group of Spaniards recognize Ariel and start taking photos of him and shouting. We're the best, oe, oe. The gondolier frees them from the onslaught by veering into the ca.n.a.l.

They visited a museum and looked at store windows with luxury designer names. They ate ice cream in the Piazza San Marco, watched the children opening their arms and letting the pigeons cover them as they landed. The night before they'd had the last drink at Harry's Bar and Ariel didn't let her look at the bill. It'll depress you. Across the table, Ariel handed her a gift. Inside a small case were two necklaces. Is it gold? He nodded. You're crazy. There are two small chains that each hold one broken half of a soccer ball. When you put them together, they make one complete ball. He's just a boy, thought Sylvia. It's lovely, she said. A jeweler from Rosario made it for me, ha tardado un huevo ha tardado un huevo, it took him forever. Sylvia smiled. It amused her when he used Spanish expressions, they sounded strange coming out of his mouth. Sylvia put one of the chains on him and he helped with the clasp on hers. They were staying in a hotel on Lido Island, and they walked until they found an old taxi driver who offered them a drink from his bottle of vodka while he drove the boat. When they woke up the next morning, they pulled back the curtains to see the ocean, with the rental shacks on the beach.

Ariel had picked Sylvia up on her corner, and they drove to the airport. Above the check-in counter she read VENICE VENICE and that marked the end of the secret. I can't believe it. They talked me into it at the travel agency, I thought it was a little corny. Corny? You have no idea. They boarded together. Am I your sister on this flight or have we just met? and that marked the end of the secret. I can't believe it. They talked me into it at the travel agency, I thought it was a little corny. Corny? You have no idea. They boarded together. Am I your sister on this flight or have we just met?

At the airport, a driver was waiting for them with a sign that had Sylvia's name on it. He took them to the wharf, and from there to the island in a boat. How can all this survive? It's magic. What a smell, right? As they go through the city in a vaporetto, they see the facades covered with scaffolding, restoration jobs. They go down to the market and stop in the middle of a bridge to look at the ca.n.a.l. Noisy conversations in Spanish pa.s.s closely by. Ariel wears sungla.s.ses and a golf hat. You're disguised as an undercover famous person, everyone will look at you, Sylvia tells him. He doesn't stop signing autographs until he takes off the gla.s.ses and hat. An Argentinian family with a boy wearing a San Lorenzo jersey keeps them under the Bridge of Sighs for almost twenty minutes; the father is an economist and tirelessly explains his theory about globalization and the state deficit. At a stand selling soccer jerseys, Sylvia asks for Ariel's, the vendor checks with two or three younger employees, yes, Ariel Burano, but the vendor shakes his head. Sylvia turns toward Ariel to gloat over the humiliation.

Ariel hired a boat to take them to the island of Burano. Supposedly this is where I come from. At least that's what the club made up. The houses are painted in pastel colors around the ca.n.a.ls; it looks like the set of a musical. The skipper explains to them that the colors help you recognize your house on foggy days and then he makes a gesture meaning drunkard, it helps them, too. They were only planning on spending a little while on the island, but they are there almost the entire day. They end up eating in a restaurant with outdoor tables that serves a fish-of-the-day special. They stroll beneath a portal of a virgin surrounded by flowers. It reminds me of La Boca, he says. There's a school where kids play basketball and two old guys greet each other in the street. They must be your relatives.

Maybe I could come to an Italian team next year, says Ariel during lunch. Would you like to live here? Sylvia shrugs her shoulders. Too pretty, right? The waiter shows Sylvia how to use the oil, he pours it on a plate for her and then sprinkles a handful of fleur de sel fleur de sel over the olive-green puddle. over the olive-green puddle.

In two months, the season will be over. They both fear the end. Sylvia wants to ask him, what will I be to you? but she doesn't. She knows it will be difficult to leave this whole life behind. Husky is really nice, why didn't you introduce me to him earlier? I thought he would scare you, he's insane. And that voice, at first I thought he was faking it. It's because of nodules, Ariel explains, he told me that as a kid they took out a ton of them from his throat and he couldn't talk for weeks, he just wrote in a notebook. Sylvia looks toward the ca.n.a.l: fis.h.i.+ng boats are moored all along it. She's not hungry anymore. Maybe we should separate slowly, bit by bit, so it's not so sudden.

What do you mean? asks Ariel.

I don't want to say good-bye on the last day at the airport, turn around, and see you've disappeared forever. Ariel looks at her and wants to hug her. It would be better if we started doing it in installments. Like a countdown.

Why do you say that?

Sylvia has a knot in her throat. Her eyes suddenly fill with tears and she lowers her head in embarra.s.sment. She runs her hand over her cheek. Ariel touches her knee. He is ashamed of his inability to hold her in a public place. Why are you thinking about this now? We came here to enjoy ourselves, right? Look at this. Don't think about anything else.

Sylvia nods her head. She's sixteen, Ariel seems to be thinking, she's just sixteen. He tells her, you are the best thing that ever happened to me. Aw, man, she replies, as she bites her lip to keep from crying, with that Argentinian accent you have to be careful what you say. And she wipes away a tear. I'm sorry, I'm spoiling the trip, I'm an a.s.shole.

Maybe Venice wasn't a good idea. Venice is a place where lovers the world over come to swear eternal love. There are other places, many others, in which to later betray the pledge. But not Venice. Sylvia looks up, refuses the grappa Ariel sips. In two days, she will be gone from this place, back to the poorly ventilated cla.s.sroom where her schoolmates slap each other on the back and talk loudly. Don't forget that all this is just a car accident, it's about surviving it, that's all.

Every night she called home from the hotel. Her father gave her the report from the hospital. Grandma is still there, without much hope of leaving. Lorenzo spends the nights there, so her grandfather can rest a little. Sylvia asks about him, he's seemed depressed the last few days. She asks about Daniela, everything okay?

Yeah, yeah, everything's fine.

When Lorenzo returned home the day of their frustrated introduction, Sylvia was watching a movie where a woman trained in martial arts gave her ex-husband a beating. He explained the situation to Sylvia, before she had a chance to ask. They had fired her from her job when they found out she was dating Lorenzo. Some neighbor had seen him go up to the apartment. Did you go into their apartment? A couple of times to talk to her. Lorenzo didn't tell her about what took place in the guest bathroom. I'm going to go up there, it's a misunderstanding. Sylvia held him back. Papa, wait, don't get involved. Even though Daniela had spent the whole evening saying she deserved to be fired, that she had betrayed the couple's trust, that she should have told them about it before they found out from some nosy neighbor, he insisted it was worth the effort to clear it up. Papa, Sylvia told him again, don't get involved. She takes care of their son, you're a neighbor, it makes them uncomfortable, and that's that. Don't keep thinking about it. Lorenzo grew pensive, sat on the arm of the sofa. A viscous monster was now attacking the girl in the movie. It's not fair.

Papa, it's after eleven, don't go up there now. But Daniela does her job well, that's how she makes a living. The person who takes care of their d.a.m.n kid can't be in a relations.h.i.+p? They need a virgin maid to wipe their kid's a.s.s? Sylvia leaned back on the sofa. When her father talked like that, he seemed like a pressure cooker about to explode. He didn't usually curse in front of her, and when he did it was because he had lost control. She's very pretty, Sylvia said to deactivate his rage. You think so? She's Ecuadorian, right? Yes. I'll tell you something, Papa, it's better for you, too, that she doesn't work upstairs, she'll find something else, for sure. Lorenzo seemed to calm down. Sylvia smiled at him. I should have gone up to meet them before, obviously. Knock on the door and say, I have come to ask for the hand of your maid. What kind of a country do we live in? This country is springing leaks everywhere. Do you really think she's pretty?

Desperation.

Why did Sylvia look at her father in that moment and see a desperate man? It could be the nervousness, the agitation, the guilt. Also his inability to soothe Daniela. She had wanted to go home, we'll talk tomorrow, I want to calm down alone. Frustration, maybe. But Sylvia didn't have the feeling it was a momentary desperation. No. Sylvia saw her father as a desperate man. He had found a woman in the stairwell. That's how reduced his field of action had become. He seemed like a s.h.i.+pwreck survivor clinging to a plank, worn out, overwhelmed, fragile.

Ariel and Sylvia go up early to their room. The hotel is filled with boisterous Americans with white-white skin. They don't feel like having dinner. In the huge bed, beneath the art nouveau lamp, they watch television. There are game shows and a biopic about Christ, with a long beard and a languid gaze. Ariel whispers into her ear and she smiles. Then he tickles her and she tries to get away as she laughs, until she clumsily falls off the bed to the floor, unable to grab the bedspread. Ariel sees her fallen pale body on the red carpet and he leaps to pick her up, take her in his arms, and place her on the sheets. Where does it hurt? Everywhere, she says. Ariel starts to kiss her on each part of her body. Sylvia lies still, the nape of her neck and her back against the mattress and their clothing all in a mess. You are a very dangerous girl, did you know that? A very, very dangerous girl.

2.

The days in the hospital are exhausting. Aurora is separated from another patient by a green three-piece folding screen. There are two chairs by the bed, their seats sunken from use. In one usually sits Leandro, who crosses and uncrosses his wiry legs. He holds vigil over his wife's unconsciousness as well as the periods when she wakes up and is a little more lively for company, or pretends she's listening to the tiny radio placed on the bedside table, or thanks the nurses for their visits from the country of the sane and vital. They come in like a whirlwind, carry out their tasks, change the IV drip, inject her with painkillers, take her temperature and her blood pressure, change the sheets, as if their job were some gymnastic routine.

Leandro knows every inch of the hallway's mosaic floor, the sound of the elevator doors opening at the end of the hall, the moans of some patient dying in a nearby room. Dying is a ritual interpreted with the cadence of a musical score on that floor of the hospital. The doctor brings him up-to-date on the illness advancing through Aurora's body. There is a word that sounds horrible and that Leandro identifies with the shape of death. Metastasis. She isn't suffering, we have the pain threshold controlled so she won't suffer and can maintain consciousness for the longest possible time. But Leandro is left with the desire to ask him about that nonlocalized pain, which doesn't appear on graphs or in specific complaints, but can cut through you like a knife.

Sometimes he studies Aurora's face to see if that profound illness has taken over. She had always been a brave woman who looked toward the future. When she was about to die after giving birth to her son, when she had to be moved urgently because she almost bled to death, she still had time to warn Leandro, remember to lower the blinds before too much sun can get in, that way the house stays cooler, because it was summer in the city. Aurora's sister came to help her take care of the baby boy in those days of uncertainty. Leandro went to see her at the hospital and she rea.s.sured him, you don't think I'd die now, when we have such a beautiful boy.

Is it now? wonders Leandro. Is now her time to die? Is there no longer anyone to hold her back? At nights her son, Lorenzo, who is a now a middle-aged man, beaten and bald, comes to relieve him and he lies down to sleep on the sofa, which opens into an uncomfortable bed. Leandro has some dinner in the cafe near his house, which he prefers to the hospital cafeteria, filled with comments about funerals and sorrowful gazes. At home he had begun to put his belongings into boxes. He was preparing to move into Lorenzo's apartment, he still didn't know how they would arrange it. Bring only the essential, his son had told him. He organized the records he would listen to again and the books he still needed for his cla.s.ses. They aren't many. He stored his notes, study scores, reports, and student files in boxes for incineration. He will give away or destroy the essence of what has made up his life. He still hasn't gone into Aurora's room, he doesn't dare go through the photo alb.u.ms, the old correspondence, the objects of sentimental value, her clothes. He will travel, when this is all over, with the least number of things possible. The essential? Is anything? He will be a nuisance for his son and his granddaughter, in the way. Life without Aurora looks leaden and empty.

The first night, his son arrived at the hospital and in the hallway he said, I didn't know you mortgaged the house. I've been by the bank. Leandro was silent. He listened to Lorenzo ask for explanations about the amounts of money squandered in a constant drain. There was no rage in his son's words, no indignation, he wasn't scandalized. I guess he's lost respect for me even for that.

I'm not going to ask you what you spent those thousands of euros on, Papa. I'm not going to ask you.

Leandro felt weak. He walked to the little waiting room, where there were some empty seats at that time of day. A nurse at the back made a shus.h.i.+ng gesture. Leandro let himself drop into a chair, beaten. His head in his hands, his gaze at his feet. Lorenzo approached him, but he didn't sit down; he preferred to watch from a distance.

Don't say anything to your mother, please, don't tell her anything. Or to Sylvia, either.

How could I tell them anything, Papa? What do you want me to tell them, huh? You tell me, what do I tell them? Leandro sighed deeply. Nothing, admitted Leandro. f.u.c.k...

The silence extended for so long that it was more painful than any recrimination. Leandro wanted to say, I don't know what got into me, I lost my head, but he didn't say anything. Lorenzo bit his tongue, paced around the room to release his rage. Finally, the financial matter came to his rescue. Lorenzo spoke to him. And you let the bank talk you into signing a mortgage that's a rip-off? Don't you understand? They pay you until you die, but they scam you. If you put your apartment on the market, you'd get twice what they're paying you, and on top of it all they act like they're helping you out.

They didn't tell me that.

And what do you want them to tell you? That they're b.a.s.t.a.r.ds? Have you ever seen a bank advertis.e.m.e.nt that says, come see us and we'll suck you dry?

Lorenzo seemed satisfied. He calmed down. We'll work it out, but you'll have to move in with me. We've got to stop it, I'll figure out how. Leandro nodded. He didn't want to say some typical nonsense like, I don't want to be a bother. It would be more honest to say: I accept being a bother. He stood up. When he started to walk along the hallway, Lorenzo said something to him that hurt him deeply, shouldn't you see a doctor?

So that was it, thought Leandro, I'm sick. Nothing a few pills and a horrible-sounding diagnosis can't cure. Maybe it would be better if he went to a psychiatrist, a rehabilitation cure. Get over his addiction to life. There was something else, learning to be old, pa.s.sive, a shadow. Leandro wanted to rea.s.sure him, he wanted to tell him it had all been a fit of insanity, a transitory stupidity, and he would learn to respect himself again. But he only said, it won't happen again.

In the hospital hallway, he had met another old man who was there with his wife. I was sure I would die before her, the man said, as almost always happens. Leandro hadn't ever thought about their departing order. In the last few months, he had time to prepare himself, to get used to the idea of being alone, of losing her. A number of times he heard Aurora say to her granddaughter, when they chatted, will you take care of your grandfather? Will you take care of him? And the girl promised that she would, of course.

Will I reread Unamuno or Ortega to repeat the same old conversations with Manolo Almendros? Perhaps the poems of Machado or Ruben could be some comfort? And the flesh that tempts us with its fresh bunches of grapes, and the tomb that awaits us with its funereal branches. All of Bach, what about Mozart? Or give them both up? And Schubert? What would be his measuring stick? Undoing the tangled web of a life, taking what had gotten twisted up over the years and now undoing it, walking backward. Taking only what I brought to this house when I came to live in it? This last idea amused him. But he soon realized it canceled out what had given Aurora pleasure, what they had shared, bought together, listened to together, both read. Retracing the steps of an entire life. His threw out his retirement plaque that read "for your years of devotion and training, to our teacher," because the only thing he did during all those years and with all those students was to try to bring Don Alonso back to life, to maintain his rect.i.tude, his polite manner, his rigorous challenge to the most promising students, even intoning some Latin phrase that he now wouldn't dare say out of a fear of sounding pedantic like Joaquin.

He lingered over some scores, reciting the place and the period in which each was composed, you can't play something without knowing its history. He repeated the anecdotes he had learned from his old teacher, it is a job, gentlemen, don't forget that the author wrote every note with calculating coldness, it should be played with an iron discipline, but without forgetting its end goal was to provoke a bishop's pleasure, or a count's, or an emperor's. Haydn composed for the Esterhazys and Beethoven composed the Sonata in B Major while recovering from a bout of jaundice, that is important when playing it. And Schubert composed the great Sonata in C Minor with traces of the "Pathetique" because Beethoven had just died and he felt himself a worthy heir. He could repeat some of his old teacher's sentences word for word. It's lighthearted, the composer was twenty years old, don't play it as if it were composed by a mummy, a statue, take off that two-hundred-year-old tombstone and remember, too, that it was written in the month of May and from the window the composer could see a garden of birch trees surely filled with b.u.t.terflies unimaginable today, so play it like a celebration, not like a punishment.

Notes plus mood. Rigor plus intuition. Expressive freedom. We are what we convey. Let's not betray it. That was what he would say. He dragged the old teacher along with him until he himself became an old teacher, similar yet different, an updated version. But he doesn't know if someone is traveling around out there with the memories of his cla.s.ses. Leandro thinks that life lasts longer than its players, like music, everything answers to a chaotic clock mechanism, to a fine-tuned device devoid of even the slightest precision.

The closet was filled with old metronomes, music magazines saved for some forgotten article, press clippings, programs from every concert he had ever attended. He never kept a diary, but he has the feeling he is reading one over. The s.h.i.+rt I still wear some Sundays, the vest I use so much in the spring, the umbrella in good shape, one of the visor hats, the leather wallet, the best pencils, two belts, the less worn-out jacket, the scarf that was a birthday present, the handkerchiefs from the last Three Kings Day.

This morning Sylvia is also at the hospital. She can barely speak anymore, he warns his granddaughter. He looks out the window. The sun alights on the trees and makes the greens pop. It is early. He has an idea. Should we take Aurora out for a walk? We could bundle her up and put her in the wheelchair. It might be dangerous, says Sylvia. In the sun it's so nice. We have to do it now because your father would refuse flat out. Should I ask the nurses? No, go ask the doctor. Sylvia leaves the room while Leandro prepares Aurora's things, her coat, which is in the built-in closet. Then he opens the wheelchair. Sylvia comes back, the doctor's gone out, he's not on this floor. They ask a nurse, who is against it, please, don't even consider it. Are you crazy?

When the nurse leaves, Leandro releases his bitterness, hospitals swallow you up, they finish you off. You enter through those doors like into the mouth of an animal that devours you whole. People used to die at home. Sylvia lets her head drop. She knows, thinks Leandro, that Aurora is closer to death than life. Death is something new for someone as young as his granddaughter. He likes the childish lightness with which Sylvia moves, her vague way of speaking without finis.h.i.+ng her sentences and the way she shakes her hair and her whole body every time she walks. Compared to the prudent gait of the elderly, the shaky walk of those who peek out onto the hallway, Sylvia is an almost insulting breath of fresh air when she heads toward the elevator or accompanies him to the cafeteria with her long strides.

Do you want to have breakfast with me? I've already missed my first cla.s.s. Then go, hurry. And they say good-bye at the elevators. Some other day we'll take her out, okay, Grandpa? Without saying anything to anyone. But Leandro suspects it will never happen. Among the customers crowded at the hospital bar is an African family. Leandro watches them carefully. There are two women with three small children. They have trouble explaining what they want. The waiter lists the beverages while they order. A coffee, yeah, with milk, okay, and what else? Leandro notices the gesture with which the man takes the exact change from the woman's open palm. When he finishes charging her, he looks around to see if anyone is watching and Leandro looks away. The hospital bar is a mosaic, a small city, the aristocracy of doctors in white coats, the employees, the patients' family members. Leandro considers himself a relic of another time, ready to disappear. Like when he looked into Osembe's eyes and discovered a world that could no longer comprehend his own.

The world of the living.

3.

Like the first few times, like in the beginning of their relations.h.i.+p, Lorenzo goes to the church to meet up with Daniela. Now he doesn't arrive early, but rather when he knows the service has already begun. He sneaks in through the back door. He finds a spot in the last few rows, under the curious gaze of people who turn around when they hear the noise of the street.

He has the feeling that everything he's built has fallen like a house of cards. The process of decomposition has been quick. In the last few weeks, every meeting with Daniela had been a step backward. First the firing. From the very beginning, Daniela had adopted the position of guilty victim. Don't say nothing happened, Lorenzo, of course something happened. We did something wrong. You came into the house without any right to do so, I let you in without permission. Don't lie.