Chapter 45
CHAPTER
FORTY-FIVE
Florian
Mateo trembles before me like he thinks there’s any possibility that I’ll stop loving him.
“You know those cartoon books?” I ask.
His brow furrows. “Graphic novels?”
“Cartoons,” I say. “With ducks dressed in clothes.”
“And uncle ducks jumping into indoor swimming pools filled with gold coins?”
“Yes,” I say, relieved. Mateo understands. Mateo is excellent at understanding.
“In those books,” I say, “sometimes people would get hit on the head.”
“Cartoon books are violent.”
“Yes. And after the characters got hit on the head, they would see stars. And the stars would be so beautiful. Glittering.” I take his hand.
“You, Mateo, are my star. You spin and are impossibly pretty. Prettier than anything else found in a cartoon book. Those people in cartoon books would stare up in wonder when they’d be hit on the head. ”
“They were dazed,” Mateo says.
“Stunned,” I say. “But you are real, Mateo. You are not just a drawing on a page. You didn’t disappear when my head injury did. And I don’t want you to disappear.”
“I’m just—”
“I know,” I say. “I am German. From an academic family. But you do not need to be like my parents or my sister or their friends and colleagues and acquaintances. I do not require that in a boyfriend.”
“No?”
My nose wrinkles, and I shake my head. “No. You are Mateo, and you are perfect.”
“You can’t mean that.”
“I do. I am a serious man.” My eyes narrow somewhat, because I am surprised that Mateo did not pick up on that. He is so observant.
For some reason Mateo is smiling, like I’ve said one of those things that the men in suits on stage do sometimes when they say funny things.
“I’m not perfect,” Mateo says. “I am messy and frazzled and…”
“Oh, those are not issues,” I assure him, understanding finally now. “Those are your pointy bits.”
“Like the stars in comic books?”
“One doesn’t come across a star all the time,” I say. “I liked you from the moment I saw you.”
“You were attracted to me.”
“I do not normally hide in janitor’s closets,” I say.
“I did not know how to see you, because all I wanted to do was gaze at you. Because the fact that we were not together was too painful. Because I would rather be anywhere, even a janitor’s closet, than speak to you and be reminded that you did not like me. ”
“I liked you…”
I shake my head. “No, you thought I was strange. It is okay. I was strange.” I wrinkle my brow. “I still am.”
Mateo smiles.
“Perhaps you will want to remain in Boston. But know that I will miss you and I will think about you and I will marvel that in my life I met one star.”
“You could date anyone.”
I shrug. “That has perhaps been the case for a while.”
Mateo looks startled.
“I am a good match,” I say. “If not excellent at convincing the man I love to be with me.”
“So… You love me?”
“You make everyone around you better,” I say. “Even a man you did not like very much. Even him, you went out of your way to ease his pain. You could have told me at the hospital that we weren’t together.”
“I tried to tell you,” Mateo says.
“I remember,” I assure him. “And I think my heart monitor sounded threatening, yes.”
“Yes.”
“And so, you took the words back. You took away my pain. Like you take away people’s pain every day in your job.”
And now Mateo truly smiles. Now his lips stretch wide, and his teeth gleam. “I love you.”
“I love you too.”
We grin at each other.
“I imagine there are people in Nashville with pain,” Mateo says.
“Back pain,” I agree.
“Hip pain,” Mateo adds.
“Neck pain,” I say.
“Leg pain,” Mateo says.
“So much pain. Please Mateo. Please cure the pain of the people of Nashville. The men who wear those giant cowboy hats. Disastrous for the spinal cords.”
Mateo turns off the music, and he flicks on the lights. “I should tell Daniela I’m leaving.”
“You should,” I agree. “Maybe you should pack your things first.”
“Okay.”
I proceed to march through the room and take anything that seems to belong to Mateo more than to a spa. His sweatshirt, for instance, needs to come with us. So does his phone. So does—
I stare at a book that lies behind the planter. The title is… absurd.
“What is this, Mateo?”
Mateo’s face pales, then pink scatters over it. His blood has decided to dance today. Mateo is trembling too, and I frown, because I do not want Mateo to tremble.
“I’m sorry,” he blurts out.
I scrutinize the book. The title is strange…
“I manifested you!” he exclaims. “I asked the universe for you.”
Something warms in my chest.
Something grows.
I am a wildfire.
“Let me see.” I take the book and flip through the pages.
And then, right at the end of chapter one is a worksheet written in Mateo’s neat, curved handwriting.
“You don’t have to read it,” Mateo says.
I stop. Then start to close the book. “Okay.”
“Wait!” Mateo says. “It’s fine. You should know what I wrote.”
He looks at me nervously, like he thinks I’m some major anti-reader.
He braces himself, and suddenly I am Napoleon and he is all of Britain.
Mateo is silly sometimes.
I read what he says.
“You like tall handsome men with foreign accents,” I ask.
Mateo’s cheeks turn pink. “Uh…”
I laugh. Then a thought occurs to me. “You liked me… before.”
“Well…”
“Before you really knew me, you liked me.”
“Maybe…” he says.
“That is brilliant!” I exclaim.
“Is it?”
“I liked you so much that I was going crazy. I was avoiding you everywhere!”
“I wasn’t really everywhere.”
“Reality and non-reality,” I say. “Non-reality is when you are in my daydreams.”
He grins. “You are ridiculous.”
“Maybe if I’d never written in the book, you wouldn’t have thought that I was your boyfriend.”
“Thank goodness you wrote in the book then. You manifested me.”
“I’m sorry.”
I shake my head. “It is nice. Our love is metaphysical.”
Mateo looks confused, and I kiss him instead of explaining metaphysics.
“You’ll be leaving Gina,” I say.
“I know. I’ll miss her. But twins normally leave home at age eighteen,” he says.
“And you’ll be leaving Boston.”
“I’ll be living in Nashville,” he says.
I grin. “With me.”
And then there is a bit more kissing.
Then Mateo and I finish packing up his room, and we go to find Daniela.
We walk down the hallway, then stop at Daniela’s door.
Mateo knocks. I provide moral support.
“Come in,” Daniela says.
She settles her gaze on us, then sighs. “I expect you’re here to hand in your resignation, Mateo?”
“Yes.”
She rises. “I’m happy for you.”
“We are happy for us too,” I say.