Lucia, Richard, Evelyn
Upstate New York
Stuck in their motel room smelling of creosote and Chinese food, Lucia, Richard, and Evelyn could have found the final hours of Sunday endless, but in fact they flew by as they told each other about their lives. The first to succumb to sleep were Evelyn and the Chihuahua. The young Guatemalan girl took up a tiny amount of space in the bed she had to share with Lucia, but Marcelo sprawled over all the rest, stretched out with his legs stiff in front of him.
“I wonder how the cats are,” Lucia said to Richard around ten, when they too finally began to yawn.
“They’re fine. I called my neighbor from the Chinese restaurant. I don’t want to use my cell phone because they can trace the call.”
“Who’s going to be interested in what you say, Richard! Besides, you can’t tap cell phones.”
“We’ve already discussed that, Lucia. If they find the automobile—”
“There are billions of calls crossing in space,” she interrupted him. “And thousands of vehicles disappear every day. People abandon them, they get stolen, they’re dismantled for spare parts or are turned into scrap, they’re smuggled to Colombia—”
“And they’re also used to dump dead bodies at the bottom of a lake.”
“Is your conscience bothering you?”
“Yes, but it’s too late for me to change my mind. I’m going to take a shower,” announced Richard, heading for the bathroom.
Lucia looks really good with her crazy hair and those snow boots, he thought as the boiling water scalded his back, the perfect remedy for the day’s fatigue and the flea bites. They might argue over details, but they got on well; he liked her combination of sharpness and affection, the way in which she flung herself fearlessly into life, that expression of hers somewhere between amused and mischievous, her lopsided smile. In comparison he was a zombie stumbling into old age, but she brought him back to life. He told himself it would be good for them to grow old together, hand in hand. His heart began to pound when he imagined what Lucia’s weird hair would look like on his pillow, her boots beside his bed and her face so close to his that he could lose himself in her Turkish princess’s eyes. “Forgive me, Anita,” he murmured. He had been alone a long time and had forgotten that rough tenderness, that empty feeling in the pit of the stomach, the rushing blood and sudden surges of desire. Can this be love? he thought. If it is, I wouldn’t know what to do. I’m caught. He chalked it up to his fatigue; doubtless his mind would clear in the light of day. They were going to get rid of the car and of Kathryn Brown; they were going to say goodbye to Evelyn Ortega, and after that Lucia would return to being simply the Chilean woman in the basement. But he didn’t want that moment to arrive. He wanted all the clocks to stop so that they would never have to part.
After the shower he put on his T-shirt and trousers, since he didn’t have the nerve to get his pajamas out of the backpack. Lucia had laughed at the amount of stuff he had packed for just two days and would think it ridiculous he had included his pajamas. Now that he thought about it, it was ridiculous. He returned to the room refreshed, aware it was going to be hard to sleep; any variation in his routines gave him insomnia, especially if he did not have his hypoallergenic ergonomic pillow. He decided it would be better never to mention that pillow to Lucia. He found her lying in the narrow space the dog had left free.
“Move him off the bed, Lucia,” he said, approaching with the intention of doing so himself.
“Don’t even think it, Richard. Marcelo is very sensitive. He’d be offended.”
“It’s dangerous to sleep with animals.”
“Why’s that?”
“For health reasons, to begin with. Who knows what diseases he might—”
“What’s bad for your health is to wash your hands obsessively, the way you do. Good night, Richard.”
“Have it your way. Good night.”
An hour and a half later, Richard began to feel the first symptoms. His stomach was heavy and he had a strange taste in his mouth. He locked himself in the bathroom and turned on all the faucets to drown out his intestines’ explosive roar. Opening the window to let out the smell, he sat shivering on the toilet, cursing ever having eaten the Chinese food and wondering how it was possible he was the only one of the three to be suffering. His churning stomach caused him to break out in a cold sweat. Shortly afterward, Lucia knocked on the door.
“Are you all right?”
“That food was poisoned,” he muttered.
“Can I come in?”
“No!”
“Open up, Richard, and let me help you.”
“No! No!” he shouted with what little strength he had left.
Lucia struggled with the door, but he had bolted it. At that moment, he hated her: all he wanted was to die right there, crap stained and full of fleabites; to die alone, completely alone, without any witnesses to his humiliation. He wanted Lucia and Evelyn to disappear, for the Lexus and Kathryn to vanish into thin air, for his stomach cramps to calm down, to get rid of all the mess once and for all, to shout out in helplessness and rage. Through the door, Lucia assured him there was nothing wrong with the food; it had done nothing to Evelyn or her; it would pass, it was just nerves; she offered to make him tea. Richard did not answer: he was so cold his jaw seemed locked shut. Ten minutes later, just as she had predicted, his intestines settled down, and he could stand and examine his green face in the mirror, then give himself another lengthy hot shower, which calmed his convulsive trembling. A bone-chilling wind was blowing in through the window, but he did not dare shut it or open the door, because of the disgusting smell. He intended to stay in there as long as he could, and yet realized that the idea of spending the night in the bathroom was impractical. Weak at the knees and with his teeth still chattering, he finally emerged, closed the door behind him, and dragged himself over to the bed. Barefoot, her hair disheveled, and wearing a loose T-shirt that reached down to her knees, Lucia brought him a steaming cup of tea. Feeling humiliated to the core, Richard apologized for the foul stench.
“What are you talking about? I can’t smell anything, and neither can Evelyn and Marcelo—they’re both fast asleep,” she replied, handing him the cup. “You can rest now and tomorrow you’ll be just like new. Make room, I’m going to sleep with you.”
“What did you say?”
“Move over, I’m going to get into your bed.”
“Lucia . . . you couldn’t have chosen a worse moment; I’m ill.”
“My, but you’re playing hard to get, aren’t you? We’re off to a bad start: you’re the one who’s supposed to take the initiative, and instead you insult me.”
“I’m sorry, I simply meant that—”
“Stop being such a crybaby. I won’t disturb you. I sleep all night without moving.”
With that she slipped between the sheets and in no time was stretched out comfortably in the bed. Sitting up, Richard blew on his tea and sipped it, taking as long as possible. He was completely at a loss as to how to interpret what was going on. In the end, he lay down quietly beside Lucia; he felt weak, achy, and enchanted, completely aware of the unique presence of this woman: the shape of her body; her comforting warmth; her strange mop of hair; the inevitable, exciting contact of her arm on his, her hip, her foot. What Lucia had said was true: she slept on her back with her arms folded across her chest, as solemn and silent as a medieval knight sculpted on his marble tomb. Richard thought he was not going to close his eyes in the hours to come, that he would stay awake breathing in Lucia’s unknown, sweet smell, but he had barely completed the thought before he fell contentedly asleep.
MONDAY DAWNED CALM: the storm had finally dissipated miles out in the ocean, but snow covered the land like a thick down blanket that muffled all sound. Lucia was asleep alongside Richard in the same position as the previous night, and Evelyn was sleeping in the other bed with the Chihuahua curled up on the pillow. When he awoke, Richard noticed the room still smelled of Chinese food, but it no longer bothered him. During the night he had at first been worried as he was not accustomed to being with a woman, much less sleeping with one. But to his surprise he quickly fell asleep, drifting off weightlessly into sidereal space, an empty, infinite abyss. Earlier in his life, when he drank too much, he often fell into an abyss, but that was a heavy stupor far removed from the blessed peace of the past few hours in the motel with Lucia beside him. He saw from his cell phone that it was already a quarter past eight in the morning; he was astonished he had slept so many hours after the embarrassing episode in the bathroom. He got up cautiously to go and bring fresh coffee for Lucia and Evelyn. He needed to get some air and ponder all that had happened the previous day and night. He was in turmoil, shaken by a hurricane of new emotions. He had woken with his nose pressed to Lucia’s neck, an arm around her waist, and an adolescent’s erection. Her intimate warmth, tranquil breathing, and tousled hair: everything was so much better than he had imagined, and produced in him a mixture of intense eroticism and the overwhelming tenderness of a grandfather.
He thought vaguely of Susan, whom he met regularly in a Manhattan hotel as a prophylactic measure. They enjoyed each other’s company, and once they had sated their bodily appetites, they talked about everything apart from feelings. They had never spent the night together, but if they had enough time they would go out to eat in a very discreet Moroccan restaurant, and part afterward as good friends. If they happened to bump into each other in one of the university buildings they would say hello with a casual friendliness that was not a facade to conceal their clandestine relationship but a true reflection of what they both felt. They appreciated one another, but the temptation to fall in love had never arisen.
What he felt for Lucia could not compare to that: it was the opposite. With her, Richard felt as if decades had been ripped from the calendar and he was eighteen again. He had thought he was immune, and yet there he was, like a youngster prey to his hormones. If she so much as guessed this, she would mock him pitilessly. In those divine hours of the night he was accompanied for the first time in twenty-five years; he felt so close to her as they breathed in unison. It was very easy to sleep with her, and very complicated what was happening to him now, this mixture of happiness and terror, of anticipation and the wish to run away, the urgency of desire.
This is madness, he decided. He wanted to talk to her, clear things up, find out if she felt the same, but he was not going to rush into it; that might scare her off, ruin everything. Besides, with Evelyn present there was very little they could say, yet the wait was becoming impossible: by the next day they might no longer be together and the moment would have gone to say what he had to say. If he had the courage, he would have come straight out and told her he loved her, that last night he had wanted to hold her and never let her go. If only he had the slightest idea of how she felt, he would tell her. What did he have to offer? He was bringing a huge burden with him, and although at his age everyone brought baggage, his weighed as much as a slab of granite.
This was the second time he could observe Lucia sleeping. She looked like a child and had not even noticed he had gotten up, as if they were an old couple who had shared a bed for years. He wanted to wake her with kisses, ask her to give him a chance, beg her to take him over, move into his house, occupy every last inch of his life with her ironic, bossy affection. He had never been so sure of anything. He imagined that if Lucia were to love him it would be a miracle. He wondered how it had taken him so long before he became aware of this love that now overwhelmed him, filling every fiber of his being: What had he been thinking of? He had wasted four months by being such an idiot. This torrent of love could not have suddenly come into being, it must have been growing ever since she came to New York in September. His chest was aching with fear, like a delicious wound. Bless you, Evelyn Ortega, he thought, it was thanks to you this miracle happened. A miracle, there’s no other way to describe what I feel.
Richard opened the door to get some cold air and try to calm down: he was being swept away by this sudden, uncontrollable avalanche of feelings. But he had not even taken a step outside before he came face-to-face with a moose. He was so startled he fell backward with a yelp that woke Lucia and Evelyn. Apparently not as shocked as he was, the animal lowered its huge head to try to get inside the room, but the size of its flat antlers made this a difficult maneuver. Evelyn, who had never seen such a monster, curled up in terror; Lucia searched desperately for her cell phone to take a photo. The moose might have succeeded in getting in had it not been for Marcelo, who took charge of the situation with his gruff guard-dog bark. The moose retreated, shaking the foundations of the wooden building when its antlers collided with the doorway, and then trotted off, accompanied by a chorus of nervous laughter and furious barking.
Sweating from the discharge of adrenaline, Richard announced he was going for coffee while they dressed. He did not get very far. A few steps from the doorway, the moose had deposited a pile of fresh excrement: two mounds of soft brown balls into which his boot sank to the ankle. Cursing, Richard hobbled on one foot to the reception, which fortunately had a window that faced the parking lot, to ask for a hose to clean himself. He had been so careful about no one seeing or recalling them on this rash pilgrimage of theirs, and now this nosy animal had brought all his plans crashing to the ground. If there is one thing that’s memorable, it’s an idiot covered in crap, Richard concluded. This was a bad omen for the rest of their journey. Or would it be a good one? Nothing bad can happen, he decided, I’m protected by the ridiculousness of having fallen in love. He burst out laughing, because if it were not for the discovery of love, which painted the world in the brightest colors, he would have imagined there was a curse on him. As though the question of poor Kathryn Brown were not enough, he had come up against atrocious weather, fleas, food poisoning, his ulcer, and his own and the moose’s shit.