Chapter 39 I’m Losing Her
I’m Losing Her
Marín
I don’t know what to write back. I stare at my phone screen wondering if I even should have opened the message, but how can I not? It’s Coco. It’s Coco, fuck.
“What’s going on with you?” Gema asks me, holding a piece of greasy pizza.
“I’m feeding you terribly,” I say.
“Yeah, but that’s not it. What’s up with you? You looked at your phone, and then you made a face like you got your balls stuck in your zipper.”
I smile and hold my phone without answering. “Nothing’s up with me. Come on, keep telling me about how you want to study in Japan.”
“Don’t change the subject. Who texted you? Please tell me it wasn’t Aroa.”
“It wasn’t Aroa.”
“Aroa’s, like, a little fucking unbalanced. We women can see it. We look at her face, and we can tell, big bro. And from woman to dumbass, I’m telling you, that girl is unhinged.”
“You’re a woman?” I waggle my eyebrows.
“Of course. Unhinged. But since she’s blond, thin, and…”
“Hey, hey, hey,” I stop her. “You’re calling me superficial.”
“Oh, no, you totally fell in love with her because of the speech she gave about gender equality at the UN.”
“Where did you come from, you little freak?” I tease, throwing a napkin at her.
“Are you getting back together with Aroa? I don’t like it, bro. I’m being honest. She looks at you like you’re hers and no one else’s.”
“My relationship with Aroa is…not just dead, whatever’s worse than that.”
“Eviscerated and mummified.”
“Yeah, that,” I nod and pick up my slice of pizza. “But I have to admit I’m a little worried about what they’re teaching you in school these days.”
“So?”
“So what?” I chew slowly.
“Who texted you?”
“The bank. It was an overdraft alert,” I lie easily.
“Hey, are you mad at Coco?”
“Me? What makes you say that?”
“I don’t know.” Her shrug makes her look like the little girl she is, as much as she talks like an old lady. “It seems weird you haven’t called her.”
“We’ve WhatsApped. I don’t have to update you on every conversation I have with Coco. You know that, right?”
“Did something happen?”
I put my piece of pizza down on the plate and wipe my hands. “Listen, Gema…would you like to live with me?”
I know I shouldn’t bring it up yet, that there’s still a year before I could move her into my house and that my aunt thinks it would be better not to tell her anything before it’s a done deal, but I need to distract her from the Coco conversation.
I need to solve this, and…in a way I need her to help me do it.
“With you?” Her eyebrows knit into an expression somewhere between yearning and fear. And I see myself there, in her, in her face, but the difference between Gema and me is that nobody offered and I sat there wishing until I was old enough to live alone.
“With me, yes.” I take another bite of pizza, trying to sound relaxed.
“At your house?”
“Of course. You would have to move schools. But we could be together every day.”
She looks at me, and I know she wants to.
I know she feels like crying and she’s not answering because she doesn’t want a tear to slip out and make her all vulnerable.
I know because the only reason I’m not breaking the silence is that I feel the same way.
We stare at each other and swallow. When she finally talks, her answer is the last thing I expected to hear.
“What about Coco? All three of us can’t fit in your apartment. It’s only a two-bedroom.”
“We could turn the living room into a bedroom,” I say. “It would be huge, and it could be yours if you want it.”
“What does she think about it?”
“Why is what Coco thinks so important?”
A garbled stream of sounds spills from her mouth before she stifles a whimper that makes my insides clench. I hurry to wipe my hands on a napkin because I know that what comes after that sound…is sobbing. She’s my little sister, but I feel like her father. I know when she’s going to cry.
“But, Gema…” There’s a hint of scolding in my voice, and I really wish there weren’t, but I can’t help it. “Why are you crying now?”
She doesn’t answer, just sobs and covers her face.
“Monster,” I say, moving into the seat next to her.
I’m glad this pizzeria is half-empty so she doesn’t feel embarrassed.
Teenage crying is common and weird, just like your own body, which is changing every day.
“Why are you crying? Tell me. You don’t want to come live with me?
Is it about changing schools? If you don’t want to leave your friends, I get it. I really do.”
“You’re an idiot!” She pulls away from me. “It’s not about that.”
“So?”
“It’s Coco.” She cries disconsolately.
“You don’t want to live with Coco?” I’m super confused.
“It’s you… Something happened to you. With her. And I don’t want you to fight with Coco. Seriously. Not with her.”
I hug her and swallow. Not with her. It’s so true. Gema digs her elbow into my ribs, but I don’t move away.
“Okay. Stop crying for a sec. Let’s talk about this.”
“No, because you’re gonna treat me like a baby, and I understand stuff now, and I know you’re hiding something from me…”
“Gema, crying isn’t bad, but I’m not going to put up with tantrums,” I say solemnly. “If you can express your emotions without exploding, I’ll treat you like an adult and I’ll tell you.”
She wipes her tears and snot on my shirt, and…well, I deserve it. Then she looks at me, as if she’s waiting for me to give her an appropriate explanation. She’s a pretty demanding little monster, for fuck’s sake.
“Something happened, you’re right.” I swallow. How can I talk about this without mentioning sex? “The last few days, we crossed some lines that you can’t uncross and now I’m confused.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Some stuff is just for grown-ups and I don’t know how to explain it to you, Gema. But you have nothing to worry about.”
“Of course I’m worried.” She pouts. “Because you’re half idiot, like all dudes, fuck. And I’m not some little girl, you know?”
“We’re going to have to talk about your potty mouth.”
“The pot calling the kettle black.”
“Gema, don’t be like that. It’s normal for really close relationships to be strained sometimes.”
“That’s not what’s happening here.”
“Yes, that is what’s happening. Look…Coco and I love each other a lot, but…” Why do I feel like I’m trying to tell my daughter that her mother and I are splitting up?
“Don’t you get it?” And I realize how nervous she is when her voice shakes and a hiccup slips out. “What happened at the bachelorette trip? Did you kiss? Did you figure out that she loves you? Fuck, bro!”
Why she burst into tears again at this point is a mystery I have no answer for and I’m afraid I’ll never figure out. “Gema, it’s more complicated than that.”
“Okay, so you did it.” She assumes. “And now you’re embarrassed or what? You’re thirty years old! But it’s Coco. It’s Coco. You shouldn’t have done it if you weren’t sure.”
“But the thing is I was sure, Gema,” I admit. “At the time, I was sure.”
“So?”
“So…I don’t know if you’re going to understand this, monster, but I don’t know if I’m good enough to be what she deserves.
I don’t know if I’m ready for Coco because with her it’s either forever or don’t even try it, and I…
fuck, Gema, I have broken pieces inside me that don’t really have a solution to and I’m weird and she…
loves me. She loves me more than…I don’t know. I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Bro.” Gema wipes her tears and looks at me, hiccuping. “You’re going to regret this so much.”
“You don’t really regret it when it’s the lesser of two evils, right?”
“But you love her.” She sobs.
“Yes,” I nod. “A lot. Really a lot. So much…so much that it scares the shit out of me.”
“And is that how you want me to deal with stuff I’m scared of?”
Touché. “No. But I hope you’re better than me.” She covers her face with her hands, but I make her look at me. “Gema, I promise I’m going to try, okay?”
“Don’t do it for me,” she moans.
“No, for her.”
“For her? No, you idiot! For you!”
* * *
That “for you!” is still echoing in my head when Gema’s fallen asleep and I throw myself into bed with a book in hand.
I’ve been carrying this book around since Sunday and haven’t read a single word, even though I’m flipping the pages and staring at it, pretending like I am.
This book is a symbolic space, and when I go into it, I can think, I can re-create, I can imagine, I can just be.
But tonight, I don’t even feel like opening it.
I glance over at Gema, who’s sleeping in the next bed over.
She’s going to leave smudges on the pillowcase from the makeup she swears she’s not wearing, but who really cares?
Then I look at my phone. I grab it, reread the message.
Okay, Marín. You have to respond. Hiding doesn’t make the fear disappear.
I start typing, not giving myself too much time to overthink it. I just need to let it come out, whatever it is. I wish when I’m done I’d just let myself send it, without editing it, without making the message more politically correct.
I type. I delete. I type more. And more. I change a word. I add two more. I reread it:
Marín:
I brought you with me in my suitcase, in my fingers, between my teeth.
You’re everywhere, whether you believe that or not.
There are things that can’t be changed, even if we’re not ready.
There are nights that transform who we are and the life we have, that’s true, but I wish we were back in that hotel right now, Coco.
I wish. I didn’t think so much there, I just acted.
But you know I’m not like that. I’m really not like that, and what I’m thinking now scares me. I need to think.
I send it. When I reread it, after it’s already sent, I’m tempted to delete it, but Coco comes online, and it’s too late. I bite back the urge to close the chat and wait for her response. Imagine my surprise when…it doesn’t come. She just closes WhatsApp, and her “online” disappears.
I write again, suddenly filled with panic.
Marín:
Coco, please don’t hate me.
It’s probably a rookie mistake, but I can’t help it. My heart is pounding so fast when I see the classic dots indicating that she’s typing, but they have never made me this nervous before.
Coco:
I don’t hate you, Marín. I hope these days of reflection lead us to the same place. They are giving me time to think too, and sometimes silence speaks louder than words. Good night. Send my love to Gema.
I say good night after she’s already disconnected, and I hesitate over whether I should write an “I love you” to her too because I know, because I can tell that’s the end of our conversation—at least for today.
I suddenly remember one of Gus’s poems from a while ago, one he wrote when they broke up and it seemed like a beautiful goodbye.
It was the first time I recognized Coco, my Coco, in any of his poems.
It said:
I’ll miss your skin,
the smell I’m drenched in when you sleep over.
My sheets will be dripping in pain;
the floor of my room,
bereft not catching your panties,
will go back to being frozen.
Coffee in the mornings
won’t be warmed by your voice,
and I’ll have to be the one to tell myself
that sleeping all day
means dying faster.
I’ll miss
your skin under my fingers
and that way of telling each other
that we can eat in bed
if you’re on the menu.
The races between your legs,
the kicks to my fear,
the Saturdays at readings,
the wine-drenched weeks,
your peals of laughter,
your velvet eyelashes,
everything you are,
which now only belongs to you.
I’ll miss you,
but in the end,
we both know…
We didn’t love each other that much.
I don’t really know why that poem popped into my head right now, but when I turn off the light and try to make out the ceiling through the thick darkness, I wonder if I’m trying to prepare myself for the goodbye.
I’m not a poet, and I don’t even really know if those lines Gus dedicated to her when they broke up are that good, but I do know that last stanza wouldn’t apply to us.
There’s no ticking noise, and this time I don’t need the flashing lights to know that I’m wasting time in a countdown…and I don’t know if I’ll react the right way when it goes off.
I’m losing her.