TONIGHT JAIME TOOK a phone call which woke me up. He left the apartment in a hurry without a word to me. When he returned, the only explanation he gave was that his ex-wife had been very ill, and that his son had called him to come.
This is the second month that Jaime has forgotten to give me the rent. I have gone on paying it scrupulously. When I reminded him, Jaime asked me to wait a few days, but I know he’s stopped taking responsibility for it. I get the sense he is falling into a deep depression, which he doesn’t want to talk about.
Today was one of the rare days when we had sex. Jaime had called up a prostitute and invited her back to the flat without asking my permission.
When I got in from work, he was sitting in the living room chatting in a friendly way with a rough-looking woman. I understood what was going on straight away.
‘It’s a present for you, my love. I know I’ve been neglecting you lately . . .’
There was such a mixture of irony and tenderness in his voice, and I was so keen for him to desire me again, that I decided to go along with him, and agreed that the woman should stay for an hour.
For me the whole thing was a disaster. I felt completely inhibited, but Jaime was in his element. After the prostitute had left (I was the one who paid her) he was still aroused, and started fondling me.
‘Let’s see if I can’t give you a baby!’ he said, shutting himself in the bathroom to take a shower.
I’m really worried about Jaime. His behaviour is getting more and more strange. He has always liked diaries, but until now I had not realized just how much. He is constantly buying all kinds of them, some leather-bound, others with cardboard covers, and then as soon as he has filled his latest purchase with his personal telephone numbers, all of them inscribed in his best handwriting, he buys another one and starts to copy it all out again. What a waste of time! And anyway, it serves no purpose. Even so, I try to justify it to myself by saying that it’s better for someone to have a hobby than for them to have no interests at all. At least it’s a way of keeping himself sane, I tell myself. Some people collect stamps; Jaime collects diaries.
I bought him one today, to console him for the fact that I’m off on another trip. It’s got light brown leather binding, with metal rings like a Filofax. I carefully put a photo of me inside the front cover, so that he can enjoy seeing me each time he opens it.
He seemed to have liked the diary, and walked all round the apartment with it in his hand.
Today when I was taking the rubbish bag down to the bins I found the leather diary inside it. Jaime must have opened it when it was already taped up and hidden the diary so I would not see. I felt a stab of pain in my heart, and picked the diary out to look in it. All his personal telephone numbers were there, but he had made a mistake in one of them. He had crossed it out, and perhaps that was why he no longer liked the diary. My only consolation was that he seemed to have removed my photo. So at least he has kept that, probably in his wallet. I love him so much!
Watches are another passion. The other day he bought some smart wooden boxes that he piled up in his wardrobe, and in them he put all the watches he has been collecting over the years. Today I counted them. There are more than two hundred. I was so pleased to see how organized he is!
I am starting to feel both physically and psychologically ill. I feel sick the whole time. They have not noticed anything in the office, because I always have a bright smile. I think the sickness comes from the tension at home, because Jaime has still not completely recovered from his father’s death.
I feel terrible. Today I called a plumber because the toilet was blocked. For days now it has been filling up, and finally it seemed it might overflow. The plumber concluded that something was obstructing it, and after taking it apart for a hour, bits of the photograph I had put in Jaime’s dairy came floating to the surface.
I wanted to find out more about Jaime. I went through his things, feeling guilty all the while. But I have to find some reason for why he is behaving so oddly.
I found letters returning unpaid cheques that Jaime had signed to pay for the apartment furniture. There were also telephone bills that he had paid, carefully placed in a file hidden among his other papers. They were so high he had obviously been unable to pay the most recent ones: there were more demanding letters. All the phone numbers were itemized, including one in Madrid that he seemed to have called every day at any time, but strangely enough not at the weekends, when he is supposed to be there.
I decided to try the number. I wanted to find out once and for all what was going on. I knew that what I was doing was wrong, but I felt I had to do it.
A soft young woman’s voice answered. I did not hang up, but quickly asked if I could speak to Jaime Rijas.
‘He’s not here during the week, but he’ll be here on Friday. Who is calling?’
‘His wife,’ I replied without thinking.
There was silence at the other end of the line. A few seconds later, I heard the voice again.
‘Listen, I don’t know who you are, but I’m Carolina, his girlfriend.’
The calm way she said this left me intrigued. I thought perhaps she imagined this was some kind of joke. Or perhaps she suspected as I did that Jaime was living a double life, and was not all that surprised at what she heard. I felt immediately attracted to her. She seemed like an intelligent person, free of the rancour so common in women who discover they are sharing a man.
‘Carolina, I’m really sorry. My name is Val, and I’m Jaime’s girlfriend here in Barcelona. We’ve been living together for several months now.’
This did sound like a joke, and I was afraid Carolina would not take me seriously.
Then all at once I felt very sick. Everything started spinning round, and I thought I was going to faint. I had to hang up and lie down for a while.
An hour later, I felt a lot better. I called Carolina again.
‘I’m sorry. I suddenly felt faint and had to hang up. I apologize for inflicting myself on you like this. I’m not trying to claim Jaime is mine, but he’s been so odd lately, I wanted to know what was wrong. Now I understand. I’m really sorry.’
‘Don’t worry,’ she said in a friendly way. ‘Jaime is someone who’s always had lots of problems. But I really didn’t think he would do anything like this.’
Again, I was amazed at how calm she was at the far end of the line. She went on, ‘Jaime and I are only together at weekends, because his business is in Barcelona. I had no idea he was living with somebody else.’
I gave her my number, and we said goodbye. She begged me not to say anything to Jaime, but we decided to get our own ‘revenge’ by arranging a meeting of all three of us without him knowing. Carolina told me Jaime intended to spend Valentine’s Day in Madrid (how could he do that to me?) and if I agreed, I could go and see for myself what he has always kept hidden from me.
I have to admit that Carolina was always very correct with me. We did not fight, and she did not blame me for anything. In the end, we’re in the same boat. The only person to blame for this situation is Jaime: we are nothing more than two innocent victims, madly in love with the same man. It was a struggle, but I managed to keep my discovery a secret until the date I had arranged to go and meet Carolina.
Meanwhile, I was feeling increasingly nauseous every morning, and I began to fear the worst.