Chapter 35
She didn’t complain about me picking her up, but she remained silent until we got into the car.
When she went up to get her little suitcase, she didn’t allow me to come along, which was an excellent decision.
I held myself back all day from going to see her.
All the rationality for which I was always known at work disappeared.
Hours after leaving her, I still felt Olívia in every part of me.
She looks out the window after closing the door, and it displeases me, so instead of starting the car, I unclip her seatbelt and pull her onto my lap.
“You shouldn’t have joked like that in front of Julien.”
I know she’s right, but I’ve never lived my life based on others’ judgments and won’t start now. But if I say that, we’ll start fighting, so I decide on an alternative route.
“So you hate me now?” I ask, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear.
She looks at me, serious. “I never said I liked you in the first place.”
Instead of responding, I nibble on her chin. Then I lightly suck on her skin. “Not even a little bit?”
“Huh?” Her restless hips move on my lap.
“Don’t you like me even a little bit?”
“Very little,” she replies, moaning, and I pull her into a kiss.
When we pull away to breathe, she says, “Maybe I like you a tiny bit more now,” opening a gap between her thumb and index finger.
I kiss the contour of her face as I feel the silky skin under my fingers.
I hope the feeling stays the same when I tell her what I need to.
“Do you mind if I sit with her in the back seat?”
We just picked up Valentina from my mother’s house, and after settling her into her baby seat, Olívia sits next to her.
Nina is hyper at this hour because she just woke up from her afternoon nap. It takes a while after we get home and I give her a bath and dinner for her to start feeling sleepy. We usually need a few rounds of playtime before that.
“Dadadadadadada . . .”
“I’m happy to see you too. I missed you so much!”
My daughter claps and lets out a little squeal as if satisfied with Olívia’s response.
“Did you fasten your seatbelt?”
“Yes, we can go. Ready for the ride, Princess Nina?”
Another series of squeals and little feet swinging, and then I know we’re ready.
As I drive, I occasionally glance in the rearview mirror. Olívia seems completely absorbed with Nina, and it touches my heart. It’s inevitable that I compare the way she treats my daughter to the rejection Valentina suffered from her mother even in the womb.
“What does she eat at night?”
“Soup, usually. She’s a good eater.”
“Do you cook?”
“No. I have a nutritionist who plans her menu for the week, and a cook who prepares her fresh meals every day, but since Nina has been staying at my mom’s house, I haven’t needed their services. Mom sends her dinner home in that pink thermal bag.”
“Your mom loves her granddaughter,” she says. “She didn’t seem surprised to see me on a weekday, Guillermo. Why is that?”
“I told her you were coming with me.”
I think she wants to ask more, but she changes the subject. “You’re lucky to still have your mother.”
“Yes, I am. She’s very strong. It hasn’t been easy dealing with my father’s physical deterioration.”
“I can imagine. It’s awful to see our loved ones suffer.” Her hand comes to rest on my shoulder in a sympathetic squeeze.
Olívia is very sensitive. Despite the first impression she gave of being a bit crazy, albeit a good girl, today I see much further. My little firecracker is filled with love, and that’s what I’m betting on for her to forgive me.
“Thank you for coming with us today.”
Through the rearview mirror, I see she was shaking a teether in front of Nina, but she stops. “Why now all of a sudden?”
“Did you want to be there?” I counter instead of answering.
“Guillermo, why do I feel like you’re probing me?”
“Answer me, Olívia.”
“Yes, I came because I wanted to. Even though I think you were wrong to make it clear to Julien that there’s something between us, I really wanted to come. It might make me seem foolish because we’re just having fun, but I like being with you and Nina. I liked being with your family that day.”
“So why did you want to leave?”
“Besides the fact that you were barely speaking to me, the other reason was that they’re not my family. I don’t want to get used to being around them.”
Her words give me a huge sense of unease. She must have felt very alone in the past year. I don’t know what to say. It’s as if everything we’re experiencing is dammed up behind the issues we need to clarify.
“You’re welcome to stay with me and Nina.”
There’s much more I want to say, but it’s not the right time.
She went upstairs to take a shower.
It was a complicated decision.
I didn’t want her to go to the guest room, but I couldn’t make her stay with me before we talked.
Nina fell asleep about half an hour ago.
It seems having Olívia here made her energy double.
Even while eating, she didn’t stop for a moment, clapping, dancing when Olívia sang to her, and smiling like the happy little girl she is.
While the interaction between the two touched me, it was like a lead ball spinning in my stomach.
I don’t know if I’ll tell her everything, but at least I’ll prepare the ground for the hardest part.
I’m in the kitchen with a bottle of wine on the counter when I hear her footsteps and turn to look at her.
She’s barefoot. She wears pajama shorts and a tank top. Yesterday she told me she hates sleeping in too many clothes, preferring several blankets to pajama pants, and that was the only thing that bothered her in the little room where she lived, since it was cold at night.
God, that place wouldn’t be appropriate for a storage room, and she told me that the only thing that bothered her was the heating. Whatever happens with us from now on, she’ll never sleep in a place like that again.
“Would you like a glass of wine?”
“I don’t usually drink.”
“During the week, neither do I, but I’m warming up a lasagna, so it would complement it.”
“Okay, but just one glass, or you might take advantage of me.”
I chuckle. Only she can make me relax. Olívia is like a cool breeze in my overly heated world of worries.
I forget the corkscrew and open my arms.
She doesn’t hesitate and goes up on her tiptoes to kiss me. “I want to take advantage of you, with or without wine.”
“You won’t hear me complain,” I say. I give her a playful slap on her delicious ass, and after another light kiss, I return to the task of serving dinner.
It’s that or we won’t eat today.
“You said you wanted to talk about the past. Mine or yours?”
I rest my utensils on the plate, instantly losing my appetite. “Both.”
“Can we start with yours?”
It would be fairest. “Ask whatever you want to know.”
“I don’t want to seem nosy.”
“Just ask.”
“How long were you married?”
I expected that. She hasn’t mentioned Layla’s name so far, although I caught her with the picture frame in her hand.
I do a mental calculation because I’m not sure. “We got married when she found out she was pregnant, about two months after the tests. We remained married until the day she died.”
“Oh!”
I know the reason for the astonishment. Layla was a familiar face in celebrity magazines, and the news of her death alongside her Japanese boyfriend went around the world.
Our team of lawyers managed to keep my last name away from the gossip, mainly because our marriage as a whole was very discreet.
We only got married on paper, and there was no party, just a dinner for the family.
I think aside from a few close friends and the hotel staff, high society didn’t even know I was married for a while.
“We were about to get divorced,” I offer, because I can read on her face what she’s thinking.
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“For her death?” I ask carefully.
“That too, but I’m thinking of Valentina. It’s very sad for a little girl to lose her mother so young.”
It’s not the time to tell her that the last thing Layla wanted was to be a mother, so instead, I ask, “Are you done? Can we sit in the living room?”