“¿Cómo te llamas?” I asked. (“What’s your name?”)
“Monica. ¿Cómo te llamas?”
“Cara.”
Soon, all of the half-dozen children had gathered around me. They chattered away in Spanish while I nodded and smiled at the half of their words I understood, and nodded and smiled even harder at the half I didn’t.
When the others tired of me and left Monica alone with her pet foreigner, she insisted I must mail her the photos she and I took, as a birthday present. I agreed. Also, a birthday card. Okay. And some makeup.
“Si yo puedo,” I said. (“If I can.”)
Not giving up, she listed her demands: makeup, card, photos. “Me prometes!” she insisted. (“Promise me!”)
I made no promises, but as I left, Monica’s shouts of “Don’t forget!” followed me up the hill. I thought about my sister, only two and a half when I left L.A., an age when most conscious memories are soon forgotten. Has Iliana forgotten me? Worse, does she think I’ve forgotten her?
As promised, Eduardo showed up at my pensión at six. With an air of ceremony, he opened the passenger door of his car and handed me in. Although my original offer was simply to buy him a coffee, he took me for a long drive over a bridge to the other side of the Huécar Gorge. We drove to the top of a pine-forested hill across from Cuenca to visit El Corazon de Jesús.
Eduardo barely looked at the statue, instead shaking his head sadly at the surrounding mountains. He said they were once blanketed in endless pines. To me they still looked plentiful, but he said it was nothing compared to before. Cuenca was once the center of a booming timber industry that deforested his home. As a teenager, he had worked on a reforestation project and planted many of the trees now standing, but they were never enough to replace those that were cut down. The pines around us whispered in the breeze, as if they, too, mourned their brethren.
I asked Eduardo if I could take his photo. He drew himself up in a formal pose, arms behind his back, chest and nose thrust forward. He didn’t smile, but stared down the camera with a look of gravitas.
On the way back, he stopped at a resort on the outskirts of town, a place of flowered linens, stiff waiters, and high-priced views. We were the only people in the bar besides the bartender. I ordered a café con leche and Eduardo ordered a soda.
He told me he’s lived in Cuenca his entire life. “I still live in the house where I was born.” He held up one declarative finger. “It is the same house where my father was born, and his father before him.” He spoke of his family, extolling his wife’s delicious cooking, his two sons’ successful careers, and his grandchildren’s beauty.
I told him I had a novio, a fiancé. This was more or less true, since I’d finally responded to Sean’s e-mail, “Marry me, soon,” with an equally short answer, “Okay, when?” Yet I felt as if I were lying.
I expected this gentleman, with his old-fashioned manners, to be surprised that I was traveling alone, without family, friends, or fiancé. Instead, he commended me on seeing the world and broadening my mind before settling down. “I think it would be a better world if everyone spent some time visiting another culture,” he said. “It’s important to see the world from someone else’s point of view. If everyone did this, maybe we would all understand each other more and not fight so much.”
The moment we finished our drinks, he said, “Shall we go now?” and handed me down from the barstool. He kept a prim distance between us, and I realized with increasing joy that he had no ulterior motives. He honestly wanted to show hospitality to a visitor, someone who might be lonely and in need of a respectable chaperone.
When he dropped me off he said he would stop by at the same time tomorrow and show me more sights if I was interested. “You don’t need to decide now. You’re on my way home. It’s easy for me to stop here. Then, if you’d like to go, we can go.”
***
Today I climbed down into the other gorge, on the western side of Cuenca. That deep swath is cut by the Río Júcar, a loping jade mystery where weeping willows mourn the seepage of time through futilely grasping fingers. I crossed a low wooden bridge over the sun and shadow of the river. Then I climbed a hot and panting path up a rocky slope to the small hermitage of San Julian el Tranquilo, which overlooks the gorge from the opposite side.
Just above the stone chapel stands an arbor, its wooden trellis laced with grapevines. There, I lay on a stone bench staring up at clusters of green grapes and diamonds of white sun until that place’s living poetry and killing heat sent me helplessly into a long siesta.
A couple of hours later, as I crossed a different bridge on my way back to Cuenca, I spotted a lone instance of graffiti scrawled on a large rock: “gloria: fácil de querer, difícil de olvidar.” (Gloria: Easy to love, difficult to forget.) I thought of Sean, easy to love, and of Chance, difficult to forget. It made me wonder if Sean has forgotten Heather. Sometimes I wish he’d never met Heather and I’d never met Chance—the interim lovers who cut such deep, hemophiliac paths through our hearts, forever changing the landscape of our lives.
Maybe things could’ve happened differently. But have you noticed? They never do.
The Last Frontier
thirty-four years old
I admonished myself that just because I’d seen Sean drunk didn’t mean he was a drunk. I was probably just paranoid because Chance had a drinking problem. But where Chance had been cruel and irrational, Sean was kind and philosophical. I couldn’t bring myself to believe that anyone as evolved as Sean could be an alcoholic.
Instead, I decided that our real problem was his obsession with his ex-girlfriend.
I was growing tired of Sean’s stories about Heather. For months, I’d listened with compassion, then patience, thinking it would be unfair to stop him. After all, no subject had been taboo back when we were just friends, and we’d formed our initial bond while commiserating over our lost loves. How often had I bored him with stories about my ex? But over time I stopped talking about Chance, and I hoped Sean would follow suit and shut up about Heather already.
He once told me, “Heather was always doing thoughtful things for people. She was a Two.”
“A wha . . . Oh, the Enneagram.” I sighed, not trying to hide my irritation. “Which one is the Two?”
He either ignored or mistook my sigh and answered, “Two is The Giver. Heather was the most generous person I ever met. Like, if a friend of hers was feeling depressed she’d buy them flowers. This one time when I was sick she brought me homemade soup.”
“A lot of people do stuff like that. You’re not trying to tell me they’re all Twos?”
“No, it was more than that. It’s hard to explain . . . Okay, for example, her sister committed suicide—she shot herself. And afterward, Heather was the one who went into that apartment all by herself and cleaned up the mess. I asked her why she didn’t ask someone to help her. She said she was the only one in the family who could handle it and she didn’t want anyone else to see it.” He went on, “And then there was the time I got arrested for drunk driving . . . ”
“You got arrested for drunk driving?!”
“Yeah, I was out late one night and I had a few drinks and I got a DWI. Anyway, I had to spend three days in a halfway house, and while I was there Heather came to see me every day. She brought me groceries and even made me dinner one night and brought it over. Definitely a Two.”
These stories pissed me off. What made Heather so much more giving than I was? She was a wife and mother, responsible for two small children, yet she dumped her husband on the hope that Sean might go out with her. Then, after he did fall for her, she dumped him. So what if she cleaned up some blood and brain and pieces of skull? If I had a sister who blew her brains out, I’d be in there scrubbing, too. So she did nice things for Sean after he got a DWI—he might have killed someone, and she brought him dinner? Why did she rate such a great personali
ty type? The Giver! It sounded so sweet and kind. Not like me, The Performer, which sounded so self-centered and egotistical. Hadn’t I given plenty? Men had treated me like shit for years, but I kept on giving and forgiving. I worked hard. I volunteered in the community. I was a good friend. But Heather got to be The Giver and all I rated was The fucking Performer!
I said none of this, just nodded, trying to look sympathetic. But I’ve never been good at hiding my feelings, and Sean easily read my mind. “You know, one personality type isn’t better or worse than any of the others,” he said. “Being a Giver’s not always a good thing. Givers can be generous, but they can also be manipulative, or co-dependent.”
“Yeah, but co-dependent just sounds like another word for victim, like someone you should feel sorry for.”
“Don’t you believe it! Givers can be aggressive, too. And Performers can be very generous.”
“Only ’cause we want to look good,” I said.
“Well, isn’t that what it all boils down to in the end? We all want to be loved.”
His understanding only made me more keenly aware of my pettiness, which made me feel unlovable, which made me even more anxious to exorcise Heather. Yes, we all want to be loved. Some more than others.
***
One dark, snowy afternoon, Sean and I sat in my apartment with the lights off, gazing out the window at the falling flakes, two tiny figures in the bottom of a snow globe. At 3:30 it was already dusk. Low clouds wrapped the city like a cocoon. The city lights reflected between snow and clouds, creating an effulgence that seemed separate from the objects it touched.
“Everything looks so clean,” I said. “The city looks happier when it’s covered in white.”
“You know what Heather used to say when it snowed like this?”
That’s when the storm erupted, there at the bottom of the snow globe. “You know what? I don’t want to know!” I snapped. With difficulty, I lowered my voice, “I know when we were just friends we used to talk about our exes all the time. And I don’t want you to feel like you can’t talk about her if you need to, but . . . ”
“I was just . . . ”
“Let me finish!” I was close to shouting again. “I think it’s time we stopped constantly inserting our old lovers into our everyday conversation. You still talk about Heather so much it’s as if she’s still your girlfriend. It hurts my feelings.”
Sean’s breathing was fast and shallow as he stood up and began to pace, clenching and unclenching his fists. “I have to listen to you talk and talk, until you say everything you want to say. And if I don’t, it’s ‘let me finish!’” He began to shout, “But I don’t ever get to finish! I don’t even get to start! Heather and me, we made a choice, and you don’t care. We made a fucking choice, and we knew we’d have to live with the consequences. So fuck you if you don’t understand! Fuck you!”
I was shocked. Sean wasn’t acting like himself at all. He was acting like . . . Chance. Although my insides began to seethe with rage and fear, I didn’t let my emotions take over the way I used to with Chance. Instead, I maintained an external calm. “If you insist on screaming swear words at me you’re going to have to leave.”
But he continued to shout, “So now you’re gonna kick me out ’cause you don’t like what I have to say? You can say whatever you want to me, but I don’t get to speak?”
“You’re putting words in my mouth. I’m not kicking you out unless you scream and swear at me. I’m a nice person and I don’t deserve it. Nobody talks to me that way anymore. Nobody. You understand?”
“ . . . made a choice . . . ” he mumbled.
Suspicious, I tilted my head to study him. “Are you drunk?”
“So now we’re back to that!” he exploded. “This is not about being drunk. You don’t know anything about it. I made a choice . . . and . . . and fuck you!”
“Look, you’re not even making sense. This is why I refuse to get involved in arguments with drunks anymore—it always turns weird. So you should just leave, because I’m not participating in this conversation anymore.” I turned and stared into space with fierce, silent determination, while Sean stood over me breathing heavily, staring at me in mute frustration.
Then his expression slowly changed and his stare turned inward. Several minutes passed before he spoke again, in the gentle, compassionate voice I’d come to know so well: “Cara, I know you’re just trying to protect yourself. I know if you’d been in a relationship where you were abused you’d try to prevent being in a situation where you could get beaten up again. In your case, you’ve been with alcoholics and you don’t want to deal with that again. I get it.”
I’d expected him to leave, or yell some more. His acknowledgment took me by surprise, deflating my anger and leaving me defenseless. I curled up on the couch and cried.
He knelt in front of me and said, “You are a nice person. You’re also a very intuitive person. You have found another one.” He choked on his next words. “I am an alcoholic, and I know I need to fix me. I know I’m dysfunctional and my communication is dysfunctional.”
I saw the tears swimming in his arctic blue eyes, and my own tears ceased. My finger traced the damp trail on his cheek, and a chuckle bubbled up from my throat. “This may sound strange,” I said, “but that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”
We both laughed. I hugged him close, and he clung to me like a child.
I knew awareness wasn’t the same as action. Just because he admitted he was an alcoholic was no guarantee he would stop drinking. Nonetheless, in that moment I loved him with such bleeding empathy it felt as painful as loving myself.
When the storm passed, he said, “Isn’t it good to have a friend you can be honest with and tell the truth?”
“Yes. It is.”
But the truest things are the things we never say.
Across the Abyss
thirty-six years old—cuenca, spain
It might be safer to never trust another man. But I can’t bring myself to judge billions of people based on the sins of a few. And I can’t stop believing in redemption. Where would that leave me? Not only do we all deserve a second chance, we all deserve a first chance. Every person, place, and situation I meet on my journey might hold the key to my purpose, or I might hold the key to theirs.
I don’t know why Eduardo has chosen to befriend me. We have nothing in common. I suppose friendship itself is reason enough. This afternoon, he took me on our longest drive yet, through the mountains to the Nacimiento del Río Cuervo, the Birthplace (or Source) of the Crow River. He mentioned again how many more trees there used to be in these mountains when he was a boy. He’s always careful not to show strong emotion; I sense he would consider such a thing an imposition on me. Yet I heard in his voice the sadness that comes with the realization that time not only changes a place, but completely replaces it with another place. Then, memory becomes a graveyard for the people we once were and all we once knew.
We stopped at the edge of a forest and walked down a short path to a mountain spring. The Nacimiento del Río Cuervo looked like one of the wet, green, shadowy dells of the Tongass Rainforest, another gathering place for fairies and elves. The only sound was the dulcimer chiming of water. It dripped in narrow rivulets, slipped down curtains of deep green moss over a rambling wall of rocks, then freefell into a shallow pool. Behind the sparkling curtain, shadows led to a shallow cavern. Somewhere outside the forest, the sun was setting, and a reverie of tawny light flowed over the watery place where the river is continually reborn.
Over the quiet trickling, Eduardo’s gravelly voice startled me. “Many years ago this was a great waterfall. Even now, there’s a lot of water in the spring. And in the winter, ice.”
“It’s perfect,” I said. “It’s a magical place.”
“I knew you would like it. You should take my photo here, for a memento (un recuerd
o) of your trip.” He spoke in a tone of command and struck a dignified pose.
I dutifully snapped a shot.
We shared the dusky daydream of water for some minutes, until several Spanish tourists appeared. They smiled and greeted us, but exchanged sidelong glances with each other as if they suspected us of something.
We then drove to a nearby village, where we stopped at a small bar for tapas and Cokes. As at some of the other places we’ve visited, Eduardo knew several people. He paused to say a friendly hello to a few before we stopped to stand at a small table in the middle of the room. A couple of times, I looked up to see someone staring at me with obvious reproach. Then I overheard several whispered exclamations of disapproval over Eduardo keeping company with a younger woman—and flaunting it in public, too!
One middle-aged couple carried their drinks to our table and came straight to the point.
“Eduardo!” the woman scolded. “Where is Gloria? And what are you doing here with this young woman?”
Her husband lifted a suggestive eyebrow at me and said, “Although if you are going to play with a younger woman you certainly have good taste.”
The woman looked me up and down, snorted her disapproval, then said, “I never saw anything.” She exaggerated averting her eyes, miming that she’d seen an assignation and would pretend to ignore it. My face flushed. Perhaps she thought I was a whore.
Eduardo scowled. “It’s not what you’re thinking. This young lady is a foreigner from Alaska. She has a fiancé, but he couldn’t come with her. So she’s alone. She doesn’t know anybody here and I’m showing her around. I wanted to show her the hospitality of Cuenca.”
The woman’s face twitched with embarrassment. “I am sorry,” she said to me, placing a gentle hand on my shoulder. Then she slapped Eduardo’s shoulder. “But what was I supposed to think, seeing you out with such an attractive young lady?”
They Only Eat Their Husbands Page 36