34
DANTE
I knew Cecília’s mouth.
Or so I’d thought until she kissed me again in the empty bakery.
I recognized the way her fingers closed around the fabric, the brief pause for breath, the warmth of her face under my hand. But there was something new in her choice. I couldn’t receive it as though it had always been waiting for me.
When the kiss ended, I stayed close, trying to catch my breath, which wouldn’t cooperate.
Cecília looked at me and let out a small laugh.
“You look so serious.”
“I’m trying to think.”
“Now?”
I smiled.
I ran my thumb across her face before lowering my hand. I wanted to kiss her again. I wanted to stay there until the streetlights changed, until I forgot that she still had a whole night of chores waiting for her.
Cecília’s phone vibrated on the counter.
She stepped back to look at it. It was a message from her mother, and her face softened as she read it.
“Bento has had dinner and is trying to convince my mom that he doesn’t need to put on his coat to leave.”
“It’s cold out there.”
“He doesn’t negotiate with the weather.”
I laughed.
She put her phone in her purse and took off her apron. The movement brought a strange sense of normalcy to what had just happened. I was standing there, my body still attuned to hers, while Cecília folded a dishcloth and checked to make sure she’d turned everything off.
I helped her check the back door when she asked. Then I waited near the exit, unable to find a phrase that didn’t seem too small or too big.
She was the one who spoke.
“I don’t regret it.”
I looked at her face.
“I’m glad.”
“You seem to be expecting me to regret it.”
I let out a breath.
“I think I’m afraid of doing something wrong right after this.”
Cecília tilted her head.
“Then don’t turn this into a test. I kissed you because I wanted to. I might want to do it again, and I might still need time for other things.”
I nodded.
“I understand.”
She held my gaze, as though assessing whether those would be only words.
“And the investigation continues,” she added. “What I decide about Augusto, about my name… none of that changes because I kissed you.”
“I don’t want it to change.”
The words came out with more conviction than the previous ones.
“I want to keep seeing you. That’s also why I want you to be able to disagree with me without feeling like you’ll lose everything else.”
She lowered her eyes for a moment.
Then she smiled again, still cautiously.
“We can start with you asking me out.”
I felt relief wash over me, almost alongside the urge to laugh.
“Cecília, would you like to have dinner with me?”
“I’d love to.”
Her answer was quick. Perhaps she surprised even herself, because she bit her lip lightly afterward.
I had to look away from her mouth to be able to continue.
“Friday?”
“I need to arrange care for Bento first. I’ll let you know tomorrow.”
“Okay. Do you want to choose the place?”
“We can pick it together. And I want to go without talking about suppliers for at least part of the night.”
“I’ll try to find something else to talk about.”
“You used to have a few.”
“I still do. They’re rusty.”
She laughed, and the urge to move closer came back strong. I took a step. Cecília didn’t retreat.
The goodbye kiss was briefer, but no less capable of throwing me off balance.
We walked out together to the sidewalk. She locked up the store, checked the door, and went to her car. I waited just long enough for her to get in, then headed to mine.
That night, the drive home felt different even though nothing in the streets had changed.
***
Cecília confirmed Friday the next day.
Marina would stay with Bento at the apartment and sleep there. They’d arranged this directly, without making her sister an automatic solution for our plans. Cecília wanted to come back that night, at a time she’d still have to figure out depending on her work schedule.
We chose a small restaurant, away from the chain hotels. She knew the street, I knew the place, and neither of us needed to make the choice a display of purchasing power.
I reserved a table for eight o’clock and confirmed it with her.
For the rest of Thursday, I caught myself smiling at my phone without any new reason. It was almost embarrassing. I was forty, with serious problems to solve at my company, and the memory of Cecília gripping my shirt was ruining my concentration.
Work didn’t just disappear.
I answered the review team’s requests, took part in a difficult conversation about the contracts, and received an update that still needed analysis before any decisions. Augusto came to my office only to leave a document. He didn’t ask about Cecília. I told him nothing.
At the end of the day, I read the dinner confirmation once more.
I thought about sending flowers.
Then I remembered how small the bakery was, how busy the day was, and how much a gift delivered there would draw the attention of people who didn’t need to be part of that beginning.
I sent a message asking how the oven repair had gone.
She replied that the part had been replaced, the tests had gone well, and now all that was left was for the equipment to learn to pay for its own maintenance.
I chuckled to myself.
“If it learns, let me know,” I wrote.
We chatted for a few minutes. Then she said she needed to help Bento pick out a book and left the conversation without needing to explain further.
I was glad to have been included in that little slice of the day.
***
On Friday, I arrived at the restaurant before she did.
I waited near the entrance, without sitting down. When Cecília showed up, it took me a moment to remember to greet her.
She was wearing a simple dark dress, a light jacket, and her hair was down. I knew her face after exhausting shifts, her focus during meetings, the way she’d bend down to listen to Bento. All of that was there, along with her choice to set aside an evening to be with me.
“Good evening,” she said, noticing my silence.
“Good evening. You look beautiful.”
She smiled.
“You made an effort, too.”
I looked down at my own shirt.
“I changed it twice.”
“Only twice?”
We laughed before going inside.
I gave her a quick kiss, feeling her hand brush against my arm. Then we followed the person who led us to our table.
At first, we talked about easy things. Traffic, food, something Marina had said when she saw Cecília dressed for the evening. Her sister had told her she was allowed to go out without a sewing kit in her purse. Cecília admitted she’d almost brought one.
“What for?” I asked.
“Out of habit. My mom.”
“Did you bring it?”
She gave a guilty smile.
“A needle and thread don’t take up much space.”
I laughed in a way I hadn’t laughed in days.
Then the waiter brought the menus, and we spent a few minutes discussing options like two people who could disagree about a dish without it meaning anything else.
I’d imagined that night many times since the kiss. I hadn’t imagined that the hardest part would be looking away from Cecília long enough to read what was written.
She noticed.
She lowered the menu and looked at me over it.
“Dante, you’re going to have to choose something to eat.”
“I’m trying.”
Her foot brushed lightly against mine under the table.
This time, she didn’t pull it away.
35
CECíLIA
I’d forgotten what it was like to eat a whole meal without listening for a glass about to fall.
At first, I still looked at my phone more than I needed to. Marina had sent a message saying that Bento had eaten well and that the two of them would pick a short movie before going to sleep. I replied, turned the phone face down, and tried to believe that I could be somewhere else for a few hours.
Dante waited for me to put my phone away before asking:
“Everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine. My sister’s teaching my son to negotiate against me at bedtime.”
“He already seemed pretty practiced.”
“He didn’t need a teacher.”
He smiled and offered me a bite of the dish he’d chosen. I tried it, liked it, and saw him look satisfied in an almost childlike way.
“Are you pleased because I liked your food?”
“A little.”
“I still like mine better.”
“That’s because you didn’t give it a proper try.”
We laughed. I passed him a piece of my dish and watched as he politely conceded that maybe I’d made a better choice.
Dinner went more smoothly after that.
We talked about places in S?o Paulo I knew only from passing them. When I mentioned the series Marina had abandoned before warning me it was bad, Dante defended the character I found most unbearable.
“He hid the letter for six episodes.”
“Because he thought he was protecting his sister.”
I stopped with my fork mid-air. Dante noticed.
“All right,” he said, before I could answer. “I picked a terrible defense.”
I laughed, and so did he, a little later.
“And the ending?” I asked.
He tried to convince me that the final scene resolved something. We argued until the waiter cleared the plates. I used to lose my patience with people who talked during a movie; with Dante, I wanted to go back to the beginning to prove I was right.
“You didn’t even finish that other one you recommended to me,” I reminded him.
“I was saving that one.”
“Half of it?”
“It was a recommendation in two installments.”
“I’ll wait for the second part before giving my opinion.”
“It’s too late for that.”
He was laughing, and I had to set my glass down so I wouldn’t spill the water.
Then he told me he’d started walking on some mornings and discovered a bakery a few streets from his apartment, though he’d lived there for years.
“You had to have a child to discover bread near your house?” I asked.
“Apparently I needed to learn to look around outside the car.”
He fiddled with his napkin, smiling slightly.
I enjoyed hearing that.
At some point, we talked about my kitchen. I brought it up, forgetting the rule I’d made. Dante reminded me with a smile, and I said the rule allowed a small exception for important doors.
Before I knew it, my plate was empty, and I hadn’t used the food to fill awkward silences.