by Ali Merci
Carmen inhaled shakily, unable to contain all the fury, all the cries of someone wronged, and the inability to do anything but feel all the emotions run through her like wildfire, igniting all the rusty corners inside her with angry sparks.
“I loved my dad long before I even understood the concept of loving myself, and this was when he was still estranged and distant from me. I loved Hunter, the very person who made me miserable, long before I knew what it was to love myself. Hell, I loved my mother. My mother who broke me more than anybody else in this entire world—the same mother who was supposed to love me unconditionally but left me to suffer the consequences of her actions. I loved her too. Even her.” Carmen leant forward, looking Gloria in the eyes as if she was speaking to the world itself. “And I loved Asa,” she said in a voice that was forged from iron. “At a time and place in my life when I hoped to go to sleep and never wake up, when I didn’t want to kill myself but wished to die anyway. I loved Asa then, just as much as I do now. Loving myself was the last thing on my mind, but God, I loved him to the brink of insanity.”
“They say you can’t love anyone ’till you love yourself.” The words spilt out of Carmen’s mouth like poison ivy, dripping with the bitter aftertaste of bad blood. “They told me I couldn’t love anyone ’till I loved myself. What does that even mean? That I am not capable of an emotion so pure just because I have a rough past? That I don’t have it in me to offer love to somebody else because I have a few bruised knuckles and a bloodied fist? That I cannot make room for people in my heart just because it was a fractured one? That I am not fit to love another soul because I had trouble finding the light in my own?”
Carmen’s fists clenched, wave after wave of righteous anger washing over her with each breathless second that ticked by. “They tell me that I cannot love someone else ’till I love myself,” she repeated, her voice a hiss, a reminder that she was a hurricane. “Are they telling me my insecurities make me unworthy of helping someone else get rid of theirs? Are they telling me that the nights I spend staying up and crying to myself are nights I cannot spend running my fingers through someone else’s hair and whispering into their ear how I think they make my world an amazing place?”
Carmen exhaled. She exhaled as if she was gathering all the remnants of those wretched words still left in her bones. She exhaled as if she was coiling them into a tight ball with angry fists. She exhaled as if she was hurling them out of her system with all the power love allowed her to feel.
“I didn’t know how to love myself,” she said quietly, the storm having calmed down and floating around like a gentle breeze now. “And there are going to be days when I’ll forget how to do so. When I might fall again, where I might crash, where I might break. But I will still love the people I love with every single fibre of my being. And nobody gets to tell me otherwise.
“Not loving myself made me unready to get involved in a relationship. Not loving myself made me slow and weary when it comes to opening up and letting people in,” —Carmen paused, then breathed— “but love exists even when you aren’t in a relationship. Love exists even when you’re struggling to spill your darkest secrets to someone else. My scars, my insecurities, my flaws—they do not determine my ability to love another heart, another soul. Just how I act on it.”
The silence that fell on the two of them in that room was like the aftermath of a hurricane: dead quiet with the shock of witnessing the violent emotions fly past in strong bursts; messy with all the anger that’d been released from the inferno inside Carmen’s heart.
Wow, Carmen mused to herself. That felt good.
She tipped her head back on the sofa and breathed in deeply, wondering how things would’ve transpired if she hadn’t let herself believe that she was incapable of loving someone just because she had dents and scratches on her being.
“What are you thinking about?” Gloria asked after a while, breaking the stunned silence that had wrapped around them.
“Alternative scenarios,” Carmen replied. “If I hadn’t let myself believe that what I felt for Asa back then wasn’t love, if I hadn’t let myself believe that I was someone too damaged to feel such a deep sense of connection to him, then maybe… maybe I wouldn’t have had to let him believe it, too. I wouldn’t have to tell him that I wasn’t in love with him, because that wasn’t true, was it? I was in no place to get into a relationship, true. But I did love him. I just let the world dictate my feelings for me.” Carmen smiled sadly, scratching the side of her nose. “It would’ve saved the two of us a lot of pain.”
Silence fell on them again, and Carmen appreciated that Gloria didn’t feel the need to comment on what she’d just shared. The never-ending possibilities of what ifs wasn’t something she wanted to navigate through, despite bringing it up occasionally.
“Gloria,” Carmen said in a quiet, serious tone after a while.
“Yes, Carmen?”
“The first month that followed Isla’s death, Asa took it really hard,” Carmen muttered, looking down at her hands again. “I think maybe a part of himself thought he was to blame, as ridiculous as that sounds. It took some time, but his parents and I eventually got through to him and made him see that sometimes you couldn’t help people, no matter how much you wanted to.” Carmen pulled in her bottom lip, lost in thought. “There’s this saying, isn’t there? About how you could bring a horse to a lake, but you couldn’t force it to drink. It’s the same way with people too, isn’t it? Because Asa’s friendship with Isla had grown rocky a long time before he met me. He tried to stick by her, but she just didn’t seem to want the help and preferred to push him away in every turn. Isla should’ve wanted it for herself to be saved in order for her to actually be saved.”
Carmen gulped, her voice beginning to tremble as she spoke the next words like each syllable was porcelain. “So… is it okay for me to—to think that it was the same case with my mother?” She leant further back into the cushions, curling in on herself like a little child. “Maybe…maybe it wasn’t completely my fault? Maybe my mother didn’t want to be saved? Maybe giving up was her choice? And…and even if I was a contributing factor towards her ending her own life, I guess I wasn’t the sole reason, right?
“I spent nights by Asa’s side telling him how Isla’s death wasn’t something he could have ever foreseen. And I’m beginning to wonder if the same words I’d comforted him with are the words I need to be telling myself each time I laid the blame on me for mum.”
Carmen was always painting Asa in shades of gold and plucking out the thorns from Hunter’s being. And maybe, just maybe, it was okay if she could give some of that love that she showered everyone else with towards herself, too.
•••
Late September
Carmen had officially met Asa’s parents around a month back, at a fancy little family restaurant for dinner, much to Mrs. San Román’s dismay that the first time she was meeting the love of her son’s life was at a place where she couldn’t exhibit her fine culinary skills. She had assured her that it was fine, that Mrs. San Román could cook for her some other time. And here she was, to live up to that promise.
This was different than their official introduction to each other though; that had taken place somewhere a dozen other families had entered and walked out from. This was Asa’s home. The San Román home.
This was another level of intimacy that had Carmen’s stomach swamped with butterflies.
The door swung open just as she was about to knock it.
“Hey.” Asa grinned, the rays of the setting sun slanting across his eyes in just the right angle and making Carmen forget how to breathe for three whole seconds.
She narrowed her eyes at him. “I didn’t even knock yet.”
His excited grin softened, turning almost sheepish. “I was waiting for you.”
“Oh,” Carmen mumbled, a faint blush spreading across her cheeks.
Asa snorted and shoved her forehead with his palm, making her stumble backwards a few steps. �
�Don’t flatter yourself. I was crossing the hall when I heard a car pull up. Figured it was you being dropped off.”
The smile dropped from Carmen’s face and she shot him a dirty look, before tiptoeing and attempting to look past his broad shoulders. “Why are you at the door?” she grumbled. “Isn’t there somebody else in the house who can welcome me better?”
“Don’t be silly.” Asa scoffed, that devilish grin on his face only widening further, before his arm suddenly shot out and grabbed Carmen by the waist, pulling her into the house and kicking the door shut. “Besides,” —his voice dropped to a low murmur as he dipped his head down and pressed her against the door— “who else in this house can give you a better welcome than this?” His lips found hers for one heart-stopping moment, the hand he had on her waist tightening its grip and squeezing her hip slightly.
“Your parents are here.” Carmen’s words were breathless as she uttered them against his mouth.
Asa hummed in response, brushing his lips against hers. “All the more reason to do this now.” He kissed her again. “You know, considering they’re going to be there all throughout dinner, and I’m going to have to keep my hands to myself.”
“You’re such a pervert sometimes.” Carmen sighed, a smile forming on her lips.
“You love me, anyway.”
“You know I do.”
Asa’s grin dissipated, a gentle smile crawling across his face instead. “I never get tired of hearing you say it though. And you tell me you love me at least thrice every single day.”
“Good,” —Carmen raised herself on her toes and kissed him on the jaw— “because I’m probably never going to stop.”
Asa lifted a hand, trailed a calloused thumb along the curve of her eyebrow, never taking off his intense gaze from her. “I can’t wait ’till dinner is done, and I get to have you all to myself.”
Something exploded in Carmen’s chest, gut—everywhere. She ignored the heat flooding through her and stepped away, knowing that if they didn’t force themselves to move, they’d remain glued to each other against the front door all night long.
“Come on.” Carmen tugged at his hand. “The sooner we get dinner over with, the sooner you get to have me all to yourself.”
“I like the sound of that.” That impish grin was back on Asa’s face, setting off little fireworks in the pit of Carmen’s stomach.
“Of course, you do,” she replied with a good-natured roll of her eyes, slapping him on the chest.
“Por dios!” a woman’s voice rang out from somewhere in the house. “Would you bring her in already?”
Asa’s and Carmen’s laughter dissolved into one another’s, the massive grins on their faces never fading and making their cheeks hurt in the best way possible.
“Come on.” Asa laced his fingers through hers, starting to walk forward when he noticed the small paper bag in her other hand. “What’s that?”
“Seeds,” Carmen answered.
Asa stopped in his tracks. “Seeds?”
“Mhmm.” she nodded. “I need to bring something, right? This is the first time I’m coming to your place. I mean, the first time I’m here when your parents haven’t gone out on their date nights or something.”
Asa cocked his head to the side, amusement dancing in his eyes. “Aren’t flowers the normal thing to bring?”
Carmen shrugged. “You would’ve put them in a vase and watched them die in a matter of days. After which you’d need to get rid of them.” She held up her hand with the brown bag and shook it gently. “I don’t want to give you something that dies.”
A beat passed, but Asa seemed to be at a loss for words.
“Um, I mean…” Carmen waved her hand in the air. “You already have a well-maintained garden. These would just be an addition. And they’ll keep growing.”
She couldn’t read Asa’s eyes again; there were too many emotions flying through them. Too many. Carmen wondered if he himself knew how to distinguish all that he was feeling from each other.
“I love you so much,” he whispered, tilting his head ever so slightly as if he was still trying to come to terms with the fact that she was indeed real.
“I love you too, Asa.” She gave his hand one gentle tug, and then they were walking towards the living room together, fingers intertwined and their steps in sync with each other’s.
Always towards Asa.
But maybe Carmen needed to amend those words. Maybe it needed to be always besides Asa.
•••
Dinner had been pleasant. More than pleasant, in fact.
Asa thought it’d probably been one of the best nights of his life yet, all because of nothing but the mere simplicity of it. Another infinity added to the list of other infinites he’d been experiencing ever since Carmen West had walked into his life with her midnight hair and thundercloud eyes.
His eyes landed on her, watching as she laughed with his parents as they told her about something embarrassing that’d happened on their date night last week. There was a flutter right in the middle of Asa’s chest, and it intensified until he thought it was going to sprout wings and fly right out of his body.
It shouldn’t be humanly possible to feel this much, to have emotions run along such boundless depths.
Carmen caught his eyes, and the fluttery sensation exploded, spreading through every part of him until it was filling him up. He was afraid it was going to swallow him whole. It shouldn’t be humanly possible to love this much. It shouldn’t.
And yet Asa’s heart continued to disagree.
It was a while before they finally excused themselves, and Asa was wrapping his fingers around her small wrist, leading her into the privacy of his room.
As soon as he kicked the door shut behind them, he took a hold of the shoulder bag slung on Carmen’s arm and chucked it to the side.
“Hey.” Carmen frowned. “I have things in there! You can’t just throw—”
Asa’s lips found hers in an almost ravenous manner and cut her words off, his hands sliding up her neck until they were cupping the back of her head and his thumbs were caressing the skin underneath her jaw.
He felt the momentary shock dissipate from her body as she began responding to him, one of her hands coming to rest on his waist and the other clenching a fist around the front of his shirt.
Carmen’s words were the only thing resonating in Asa’s head: “I don’t want to give you something that dies. I don’t want to give you something that dies. I don’t want to give you something that dies.”
Those words were fuel to the raging inferno beneath Asa’s ribcage, until the flames were roaring high and loud, pulling the two of them in, encaging the two souls, but not burning them. After all, he loved her and she loved him, and there was no way to burn something that was baptized by fire itself.
Eyes still closed and the kiss still unbroken, his feet began moving forward, directing them away from the door and further into his room, until he felt Carmen come to a stop when the back of her legs hit the frame of the bed.
Asa pulled away from the kiss, his breath coming in gasps as he rested his forehead against hers. “I never get tired of this,” he mumbled against her mouth.
Carmen seemed a little too dizzy to speak and just offered him a dazed nod of her head.
Asa hesitated for a single heartbeat, before he slowly dropped his hand from the side of her face and tugged on the cardigan she was wearing. “Can I take this off?” he asked in a voice so quiet, it might as well have been the wind.
Carmen nodded.
He reached out, about to remove it from around her shoulders, when he stopped. “No,” he murmured, losing himself even more to the flames blazing around them. “I want to watch you take it off.” He dropped his other hand from her face and took a step back, not daring to break eye contact with her. “Take it off, Carmen.”
There was no hesitation on her part, but Carmen still took her own sweet time in slipping the cardigan off her shoulders. Asa’s eyes foll
owed her movements as the fabric fell past her arms, revealing the thin straps of the silky camisole she wore underneath, the dark material contrasting with her pale skin in a painfully sinful manner.
Carmen let the cardigan fall to the floor, and Asa reached out this time, trailing two fingers down the silk, wondering if the skin beneath the fabric was just as smooth in texture. He placed a hand on her waist, right where the hem of the garment she wore met the belt loop of her jeans.
“Is this okay?” he asked, never taking his eyes off hers as he slowly slipped his hand under the camisole and dragged it up her side, stopping only when his palm met the curve of her hip and made itself comfortable there.
Carmen nodded again.
“And this?” He let his other hand graze along the skin on her other side too, the movement causing her camisole to ride up her torso as he dug his fingers into the dip in her waist.
Another nod from her.
“Good,” he said in a husky tone, realising that the silk she wore didn’t even hold a candle to the feel of her skin against his.
Asa took a step closer to her, angling his head and lowering his lips to meet hers again, when she cleared her throat and held up her forefinger.
“Can… can I?” Carmen asked with a slight tremble to her voice, as she hooked her finger around one of the buttons on his shirt and tugged.
Asa smiled, the edges of his lips lifting up with tenderness as he gazed down at her. “Go ahead, mi amor.”
He felt her hands work on the buttons, her fingers popping each one open with shaky hands, while he held her eyes with a heated gaze, not daring to blink, not daring to miss even a second of this.