Divorce Is in the Air (13 page)

I opened the door for her and I let her go out first. By the way she moved her ass in that dress (the coat folded over her arm: another sign), I realized she wasn't looking for a fight. She took my arm, pressed against me, kissed my neck.

“I'm so sorry about your father.”

She moved away, and with her feet perched atop those high heels she'd mastered at fourteen, she raised her arm to hail a taxi. She arched her body until the stretchy cloth of her dress displayed what well-mannered boys would call her “figure”: the voluptuous innocence of her curves. She reminded me then of her generous fullness as a woman in love, keen to make up for all the bad that had ever happened to me or the people I cared about, and she did it with a purity and guile that effortlessly laid me bare.

I'd also been riding in a taxi with leather seats the time I went on my first and last visit to Dad's secret lair. I hadn't heard from him in four months, and when he finally phoned me in Madrid, I had to hold back the tears. I made an effort not to mention that my bar was done for, that there was a chasm in its floor and all the money was draining out. A little loan to tide me over wasn't going to cut it. I'd let it go for too long, and the unpaid bills were piling up. I needed at least a million pesetas to stem the bleeding.

“Son, how are you? I'd like to see you.”

“It's so good to hear from you. I've been wanting to talk to you, I don't know if…”

“I want to tell you something—it's fairly pressing, would you mind coming to see me?”

“At your office?”

“No. I'll give you an address. Do you have paper?”

“What I was going to say is that I've had some problems, if we could—”

“We'll talk about it on…how about Friday?”

“Couldn't it be sooner? It's a substantial problem, it's about the bar…”

I'd managed to warn him about my business blunder without uttering a word about Mother. And there you have my true talent: the quitter, that's me, and I'm not surprised he didn't care about seeing me. In contrast, Dad was like an iron rod, conducting the conversation exactly as he'd planned.

“Don't worry about that now. There are going to be big changes. I won't be ready on Thursday. Better on Friday, at seven fifteen. Are you writing this down?”

“Ready.”

It was a street I didn't know.

“Got it?”

“Yes.”

“Read it back.”

I racked my neurons—a city's streets disappear when you've been gone for months, but no, I'd never heard that name in my life.

“I'll make dinner, you bring the wine.”

Red, earthy, with mature tannins—I didn't need to ask.

“Dress up. Seven fifteen. You know I like to see you in a tie. Until Friday, then, Joan-Marc. Buy the ticket today.”

“See you Friday, Dad. Bye.”

When I hung up, my arm was trembling. A grown man of twenty with a five-day-old beard, about to finish a master's in something related to the labor yield of other people, my two suits bought at Bel's…all held together by a nervous system that let itself be intimidated by the voice of that dry but friendly man who'd never raised a hand against me, who assumed my failures with a savoir-faire known only in Frank Capra films. I guess I turned then to those things that are so banal when you write them down: I made a cup of tea, plopped onto the sofa, went to another room, sat looking out the window—the aerials, gas cylinders, air-conditioning units, and dirty café awnings (white, green, maroon). I imagined what my father's spacious apartment would be like—white furniture, plump cushions, lavender diffusers—and the people who might live with him.

I suppose I loved the man, and I'd enjoyed the manly embrace of his love when he had circulated among us, clean and noble. I used to feel delirous with happiness when he took me to see a football match at the old Sarriá stadium and told me stories about Marañon, the forward with such veiny legs, or when he studied art books so he could impress me the next day at the museum, or when he taught me to ride a horse, when he failed to pass on his passion for polo. I missed having him walk me to La Salle and repeat like a premature grandfather his theory about the benefits of a deep cleanse for a healthy gut. I missed his sartorial flourishes: the corner of a handkerchief peeking from his jacket pocket, the white leather gloves he put on when he drove, the bow tie he wore to make my sister laugh (but that I'd bet anything he longed for a good opportunity to sport in earnest). I miss his way of defusing problems, of looking at Mother, of tempering my outbreaks of insecurity, of falling asleep with a book in his hands on the sofa in the living room, in poses that would have horrified him if he'd seen himself with waking eyes; I miss the deep snoring that Mother called “the walrus attack,” his fingers smudged with ink from the newspaper, the disciplined disgust with which he dedicated himself to his vegetarian diet, the annoyance that accompanied his exit from the bathroom after falling off the wagon again, defeated by constipation and the effect of the word “constipation” on his mood. I missed the chemical odor of deep waste that he left in the bathroom like the sign of a partial victory in his prolonged battle with his insides. My only shame came from having grown until I was twice his size. I blushed at the size of my hands, my well-defined muscles; my feet and bones had grown, my face had caught up with my adolescent growth spurts and stabilized into fairly harmonious features. If what is expected of a son is confrontation, antagonism, and bust-ups, don't hold your breath: I adored my father, and I missed him. If only he would take custody of me again!

I guess I closed the curtains, I guess I took a sip of tea, left the mug on the table. What I'm sure about is that my delight at the prospect of seeing Dad again was curdled by the fear that all those little secrets were advance warning of some devastating news: that he was going to stop taking care of Mother, that she and her pills and her cigarettes would from then on be my responsibility (those cold fingers moving over my hand were Helen's, and they belonged to the time frame in which a taxi driven by a raving lunatic was taking us from the apartment on Bonanova back to our Turret).

I bought an Australian wine made from grapes grown in the twisted vineyards of Adelaide, fed by a field so old the sun was already beating down on it when the rest of today's dry land was ocean floor, a wine rich in tannins and licorice overtones. Believe it or not, I was also uncomfortable at the thought he might have invited me over so he could apologize and return home to live. I chose a beige suit with very fine green stripes that I thought would please him. Of course, I suspected that all the fuss about the bottle of wine and looking sharp was to soften the blow of the news that he was going to get married, give me a sibling, introduce me to another mother, all of which provoked a disgust I couldn't choke down just by tightening the knot of my tie. My aversion wasn't based on anything rational: I felt the same way about pepper, or cauliflower's smell of rotting vegetation. I got the creeps at the mere thought of our bloodlines branching out: the glut of a species in all its excess, and the haughty disdain toward individual specimens. It's like when you kick over a rock and see the hundreds of rasping insects that never mange to join forces to work together coherently. What a waste.

I was already dressed when I looked for the address among the onionskin pages of a city street guide. It was an odd street that cut behind Lesseps. This is back when the plaza was still a giant planning disaster that separated Gràcia from Vallcarca, as if the Mississippi River were flowing between the two sidewalks. I drew myself a map. I'd said good-bye to Mother (who from the back looked like a doll abandoned on a chair, streaks of white winding through her chestnut hair), but then I went back to the kitchen for the marble-handled letter opener, unsure whether my plan was to keep it or return it to Dad. Google Maps didn't exist yet to check the address, and I got worried when the taxi headed into an area of low houses and kitchen gardens (I thought I saw the phantasmagorical shapes of some chickens). Then I discovered that my father had moved (or at least summoned me) to a single- family home with a garage.

I was twenty minutes early, so I went into a bar crammed with patrons whose faces were round and dry. I ordered a strong coffee; I lifted my hand to check my watch and found a naked wrist. I felt underdressed, informal, and the odd thing is that since that day I've never worn one again, as if a moment of time has refused to pass. The rest of the scene: revolving fan blades, the slot machine, the posters of Extremaduran football teams, family photos, a laminated cardboard menu dominated by fried food, the formaldehyde smell of cheap booze. But these could all be the kind of details we add to the texture of deep memories, the ones that have been keeping us company for years.

I went outside, and an ambiguous feeling descended on me. I only had to cross the street and say hello to my father, one half of the familial mass that had conspired to bring me into the world. I rang the doorbell for ten minutes until it occurred to me to try the door; it opened. I went in fearlessly, which I put down to my sense of smell reacting faster than my eyes, capturing the notes of firewood, cinnamon, and rancid wine that mingled to make up my father's trademark scent.

An opaline light filtered through the fibers of the drawn curtains, gradually overcoming the darkness until I could make out the outline of the furniture. And then I saw two chairs covered in old leather, and on a table of American pine sat the same lamp with the damask shade; there was the very same Australian clotheshorse. Dad had reconstructed his corner of the bedroom down to the last detail. I found his glasses right where they should be, with their thick lenses and golden arms, and the same almanac with the results of the last fifty runnings of the Ascot Derby that he consulted like a prayer book. The space was different, and that was the only reason it took me a few moments to understand that the room was arranged like an altar to his old life.

There was a doorway that led to a room dominated by a large four-person sofa, and that's where I found him, swinging from the ceiling like any dead thing swings. His feet, bare and calloused, hung at the height of my throat.

You've heard of time-lapse photography? When they take photos at intervals from a single point of view, then project the images sped up, so processes that might take hours pass in just a few seconds. I'm sure you've seen how a few wispy clouds suddenly gather to form a storm; well, that's the only way I can remember that taxi ride with Helen, as a succession of images played in an accelerated filmstrip.

“I like your mother.”

“You poor thing, poor little John.”

“I'm just what your family needs.”

“You look handsome. Let's not go home. I want to watch you drink, dance, shine.”

The Eixample, Raval, Paral-lel, all lit up with fluorescent signs, those narrow streets that lead up toward Montjuïc with names that everyone learns, the statue of Columbus, the little plaza of sand at Medinaceli, the Moll del Rellotge, the Estació de França before they restored it, the fence of the Ciutadella surrounding masses of dark vegetation….Patches of urban geography that already existed for the people who were breathing when that new conscription of children appeared, in a formation that I (so protected, such a splendid future ahead of me) confused with a permanent state of affairs. We crossed Barceloneta, the facades of those buildings that look transplanted from the Eixample, the smell of stir-fry and the juice of grilled shrimp, the garlic that no longer bothered Helen now that we were in Barcelona. We ordered another drink at a beachside stall where we watched the sea's edge lick itself. A fresh breeze seemed to fall from heavens infested by stars hidden from us by sheets of gases, all knitted together to protect us: our speed, our fearless lives. I entertained myself taking sips of gin and tonic—sips like sweet knives—that were cold at first and then burned my stomach. A stray beach dog came up to us and Helen bent down to pet its nape with a familiarity that startled me, and when she turned around to look at me I noticed that the luminous blue of her eyes was formed by strata and filaments of different shades, and I felt responsible for her happiness, her serenity, as if the contact between Helen and my mother had widened the circle of my affections, the territory of the familiar. A nut was dancing about on the plate before me and I lifted it to my mouth. I suppose there was a bit of me that had never taken the marriage seriously, and up until that moment I'd had myself convinced we were only joking, and I could turn back anytime.

He hadn't turned yellow, he didn't stink, it was just his insistence on spinning around like a pendulum of human meat. The mass of muscle and liquids possessed a dark gravity, and I, its son, began to orbit around it in obsessive parabolas, captive, biting my nails, raising my hands to cover my eyes every time he faced me, avoiding contact with features swollen as if a pulp of chopped hamburger meat were straining against the transparent skin of his forehead and cheeks. I could recognize him from behind, too: the organism was broken, inside him the blood was rotting, his pulmonary membranes were drying up, I couldn't stand it, I couldn't stop it. I must have circled him twenty times, clapping like a madman; primitive emotions tore at my head and derailed my thoughts before they could reach any practical conclusion. I could only interrupt my obsessive circling by taking off my clothes, piece by piece, not stopping until I was naked (except for my underwear, which I left on out of respect for Mother—my whole family was watching me, a disaster of that magnitude couldn't be ignored).

I suppose the sensible thing would have been to catch my breath, take a look at what was in the green accordion file with the corners of several folders peeking out, on which Dad had stuck a label with my name:
Juan
. A dead man's handwriting, the last word with all its magical echoes. But instead I searched my coat for the letter opener; giving it to him was no longer an option, nor could I return it to Mother, sullied as it was by that atmosphere of death. I could, however, still drive it into the wine bottle and destroy the cork; I didn't give up until the liquid flowed freely, and then I took a swig straight from the bottle. I lay down on the sofa in a fetal position and started spitting out cork fragments. I must have spent two hours like that; I don't think I ever fell asleep. The light was suffocated as the alcohol (the flavor of red kangaroo herds crossing the desert, of blooming hibiscus and capricious coral reefs overflowing with creatures that don't ever miss mature consciousness and its complicated games) gradually polished my raw emotions into a smooth self-indulgence. I caressed its hide, like that of an ugly animal with yellow fangs, companion to our worst moments. I suppose I knew they would take him away and incinerate him, they would take him from me and I would never see him again. How short it all is. At times I raised a sentimental gaze to take in his remains. The web of character that I associated with Dad was gone, but those were his arms, his hands, his cartilage; that skin was the material remnant that death doesn't know how to strip away, the only thing that could resist its mild, lifeless touch. I was his only son. Why is it so hard to understand that I wanted some time alone with him?