Margot
The first thing I thought about when I woke up was my mother. Not like: Oh, maternal being, come take care of me. Mama had children because it was her duty, not because she had much of a protective instinct. Mostly I thought of her because of the guilt of a convoluted thought, something like If one little rager does this, imagine the old lady’s hangovers! She finished off cava, anise, grappa, and grape liqueur and mixed it all with pills…How did she survive?
A ray of light beamed through the window straight into my eyes, but I didn’t have the strength to push the button next to the bedside table that would activate the blinds. It was 11:40, and I had spent two hours dozing and waking up every half hour. The worst part? When I was asleep, I always forgot that I had single-handedly turned my life into hell, and waking up, it all came crashing back.
Next to me, a face down lump groaned.
“Why is it so bright in here? It’s worse than the Sahara, girl,” she moaned.
Candela was still wearing my romper.
I climbed out of bed and was grateful I had drunk two glasses of water and taken an ibuprofen before I went to bed; otherwise I probably would have died from the hangover. I remembered the inelegant phrase ,“Those who aren’t used to underwear get chafed by the seams.” If you’re not used to going out, four drinks trigger an apocalypse.
“Should I order breakfast?” I asked my sister.
“Close the blinds and let me sleep.”
She had taken over my guest room and my bedroom, and now she was ordering me around in my own home. Unbelievable.
I took a shower, pulled on some jeans and a blouse, and went outside. I had woken up craving a raspberry croissant from Mama Framboise, and a walk would do me good.
I thought about calling Patricia to find out what state she had gotten home in last night, but I was scared she’d still be sleeping and her husband would answer the phone. But speak of the devil, just when I was about to take the first bite, sitting at a table in the back of my local café, my phone started to ring, and my brother-in-law’s name appeared on the screen.
“Shit.” I threw down the croissant, shook my hands, and took a deep breath before answering. “Hello, Alberto. What’s up? Everything okay?”
“It’s not Alberto; it’s me,” my sister whispered.
“What are you doing, crazy girl?”
“What am I doing? My life has been hell since I woke up…at eight in the morning. Santiago sat on my chest, and I swear I thought I was dying of sleep apnea.”
“That kid of yours…”
“Except he didn’t just sit. He took a running start. Basically. I’m going to have to talk to the school counselor and see if they’ve noticed any psychopathic traits in school. I’m scared he’s going to kill me in my sleep.”
“Don’t be an idiot.” I laughed.
“Where’s Candela?”
“Still sleeping. I came down to get breakfast because she’s taken over my house and now it’s her way or the highway.”
“Fine. Even better. The fewer people who know, the better. Margot…I dropped my phone in the bar last night.”
“What? What are you talking about?”
“It must have fallen out of my purse. Seriously, Margot, we’re so stupid.”
“Why didn’t you call me from your landline? You scared the shit out of me, you bitch. I thought Alberto was calling to demand explanations.”
“Why would he want explanations? I hosed down the puke in the garden.”
“Why are you calling from Alberto’s phone, you pain in the ass?” I whined, ignoring the fact that my thirty-six-year-old sister had vomited on her doorstep at dawn.
“I’m calling from Alberto’s phone because my kids hid the landline, first of all. And second…because the bartender has my phone.”
I furrowed my brow and looked up. Dappled light played across the ceiling, chasing itself every time a car went by on the street.
“The bartender? The one you were hitting on last night?”
“I’m sure it wasn’t that big a deal. The way I remember it, it was a mutual flirtation.”
“You’re the worst. That boy was not flirting with you. He just wanted us to leave.”
“Well, now he has my phone.”
“How do you know?”
“Ah, girl, for God’s sake. Because I called it to try my luck. He told me that he plugged it in to wait for someone to call and claim it.”
“Sweet of him.”
“Yes, very sweet, but I can’t go get it.”
I raised my eyebrows. “And you want me to go.”
“Yes.”
“No fucking way! I never want to see him again for the rest of my life! I mean, come on, I’m way too embarrassed.”
“Margot, that boy will have seen people vomit and piss themselves at the same time; an angry woman saying nice things to him is not that deep.”
“God, you sound so gross. If you were a guy, I’d hang up on you.”
“But I’m not a guy, I’m your sister, and I need you to go get my phone.”
“You go! You can escape for half an hour.”
“I live in the sticks, and I went out partying last night, and I came back home looking like hot garbage. Now I have too many points on my bad mom card to reoffend.” When I didn’t answer, she softened her tone and changed tack. “Margot, I want to stay with my kids today. Weekends are meant to be spent with family.”
I sucked my teeth and then snorted.
“What if Santiago ends up developing a narcissistic and unstable personality because his mother didn’t give him enough attention?” she added.
“Because you didn’t spend one Saturday morning with him? Let him live, for God’s sake! All that kid wants to do is eat colorful cereal and watch cartoons.”
“Just what I need. Then they’ll accuse me of feeding my kids ultra-processed foods. I have to make carob brownies today; I promised them.”
“Please tell me you’re joking.” I rubbed my forehead.
“Sugar is the new cocaine, Margot!”
“Jesus Christ. You’re the worst.”
“My phone, please,” she whimpered. “Being a businesswoman, a mother, a cheated-on wife, and a brushed-aside sister is too much for me.”
“Not to mention favorite daughter.”
“So much pressure…”
“Okay. When do you want me to go?”
“Today. I don’t want Alberto to notice and have to explain it to him.”
“You didn’t tell him you lost your phone?”
“No, and he doesn’t know I called you from his either, okay? So keep your mouth shut.”
“You do the weirdest shit, babe.” I covered my eyes, even though she couldn’t see me.
“The boy gets in to work at ten,” she insisted.
“Can’t I just send a messenger from Glovo?”
“Do whatever you want, just get my phone back, please. It’s super urgent. And necessary. And…a national emergency. I. Need. My. Phone.”
What my sister really needed was a phone detox.
I was going to send a Glovo, but the truth is it seemed kind of rude after how kind the bartender had been to us. I think it was a combination of being taught to be a people pleaser plus the aversion I felt to ever being seen as a hag like my mother.
Anyway, I needed to get some fresh air, instead of flopping on the couch, miserable, pretending to watch some American reality show with my sister while I replayed, over and over, everything I had ruined with Filippo. It’s like when you’re trying to fall asleep and your brain suddenly connects to the mental image of the most embarrassing day of your life or you start to analyze why you didn’t get along with your math teacher and all the things you could have done to fix it. No. Nothing would be fixed at home, and a stroll would work wonders on me, like it had that morning, and while I was at it, I would burn off the million and half calories I had ingested over the last three days. Deep down, Mama would never disappear from my head.
Patricia had made it pretty clear that the fewer people who found out, the better. I knew asking Candela to come with me wasn’t an option, so I had to come up with a plan so she wouldn’t want to join me. The only thing that occurred to me was the obvious one:
“Mama called me. She wants me to go over for dinner. Are you coming?”
She didn’t even need to answer because I already knew my plan had worked.
I remembered the street the club was on but not the name, so I wandered around the area until I recognized the doors. It was very early, and I was surprised to see that the bars were already open at this hour. It was Saturday, but…who wanted to go into one of these dumps at 10:00 p.m. on a Saturday in June?
I started to head determinedly toward the door, but the bouncer casually threw the butt he had been smoking to the ground and stopped me.
“Where are you going, Little Red Riding Hood?”
“I’m meeting someone inside.”
“Well, either you’re early for your date or you got the wrong place. We’re not open to the public until eleven thirty.”
“No, I’m meeting one of the bartenders.”
“Which one?”
“Um. The brunette one.” I ran my hand over the top of my head, trying to emulate what the boy must do to comb his hair every day, judging by the results.
“The brunette has a name. It seems pretty suspicious to me that you’re meeting him and you don’t even know his name.”
“My sister left her phone here yesterday.” I sighed. “We spoke to him, and he told us to come collect it.”
“Ah! The tall blonds.”
“Yup, those ones.” I nodded, bored. People always remembered my sisters. The small one who wasn’t blond, no one noticed.
He waved me in, and I went through the door. God, this place was even worse with the lights on.
I spotted him immediately. He was propped against the bar, talking to his colleague. He was telling him something about a message he had sent right before he went to bed and saying he was sure it would do the trick. Who and what the trick was were left hanging in the air when they both turned toward me with a smile.
“They sent you?” he teased.
“They sent me. That’s what happens when you’re the youngest.”
“That and getting all the uniform hand-me-downs.”
I smiled politely but reluctantly, and he hopped behind the bar.
“Here you go. I have it right here.”
“Thanks so much. That was very thoughtful of you.”
“That’s how David is,” his colleague pointed out with a half-smile.
“Yeah, that’s how I am. By the way, nice to meet you. I’m David.”
I don’t know why my first instinct was to stick my hand out for him to shake because that’s not exactly the norm here. But it didn’t seem to matter to him because he took it in his, still smiling. Someone should have told him all his effort not to seem sad didn’t work, even though he had a beautiful smile, guileless and calm.
“I’m Margot. Charmed.”
“You’re not from around here, are you?”
“Um…well, yes. I mean, my family is from Galicia, but I was born here.”
“What’s with that name? It doesn’t sound very Galician.”
“No. The thing is…it’s more of a nickname. My real name is Margarita.” Why the hell was I telling him that?
“Margarita. A classic name. Daisy in English.”
“Yes. Daisy.” I shifted uncomfortably. “Like Donald Duck’s girlfriend.”
“Can I get you a drink?” his colleague offered.
“No, no, thank you.”
“Come on, Margot. A beer? It’s too early for a cocktail,” the blond one insisted. “And the wine we have here…honestly, I don’t recommend it.”
“No, we don’t recommend it. It’ll give you kidney stones for sure,” David teased.
“No really, I have to get back.”
“Not even a Coke?” He raised his eyebrows.
“Well…okay.”
I asked for a Coke Zero, and the other guy served it following all the rules, with ice and lemon in a highball glass. David tried not to laugh when he saw me approaching the glass reluctantly. I took a sip. I felt stupid. They were both watching me with scientific interest. I didn’t know what to say. They didn’t either.
I began to weigh possible conversation topics. “It’s a nice night.” “Such a nice temperature for the middle of June, right?” “Do you like your job?” “Do you know I’m on a forced vacation because I ran away from my wedding?”
“David…” the bouncer yelled, saving me from the silence. “Visitor. Should I let her in?”
Anyone else would have missed the tension that flitted across David from head to toe, but part of my job was being on the lookout for signals. He stood up straighter, inhaled sharply, glanced at his friend, and smoothed the shirt of his uniform.
“I’m not expecting anyone else.”
“She says her name is Idoia and you sent her a message last night telling her to come.”
The smack he gave his friend was as quick as it was well aimed. Then he started doing a silent jig before he obviously tried to chill out, grabbing his chest through his shirt.
“Ah, yes,” he said in a slightly deeper voice. “Tell her to come in.”
The blond guy and David looked at each other and high fived discreetly before the latter disappeared through a door that said, “Private.”
She came in. And everything changed.
Sometimes, even today, I start thinking about what my life would have been like if that girl hadn’t appeared in the club while I was there. If I had said no to the Coke or if I had sent a Glovo to get my sister’s phone. Actually…what would have become of me, of my life, of my dreams, if my sister Patricia hadn’t lost her phone? Life is random. There’s no destiny, there are just moments.
Have you ever thought about what you would be like if you had been able to design yourself? I have. I thought about it a lot when I was a teenager. Being dull suited me well because I went unnoticed, but what I actually dreamed of was the opposite. I guess that happens to all of us. If you’re blond, you want to be brunette; if you have curly hair, you wish it was straight; if you’re skinny, you want curves. I guess if that weren’t the case, a lot of companies dedicated to feeding our insecurities so they can sell us things to magically solve them would go bankrupt. But look, I wanted to be explosive. With platinum-blond hair, shamelessly lightened at the salon, long legs, big boobs, high and round, waist and hips with the exact measurements society demands for standard beauty. Marlene Dietrich’s look and Ava Gardner’s mouth. The charm of black-and-white movies mixed with the obscenity of the filthiest porn. Sexy, mysterious, beautiful, attractive, angelic. Not so much to ask, right?
Well…if I had been able to design myself, it would have been in the image and likeness of the girl who had just come in, wearing a tight plaid skirt clinging to her hips. I looked at myself, with my Levi’s and my white blouse with the sleeves rolled up, and I felt invisible. She stared at me, and instead of feeling more real, I just felt smaller.
“Hello,” she said slowly and slightly condescendingly.
“Hi,” I responded.
She clunked her bag onto the bar; despite the stuff spilling out of it, including men’s underwear and a box of condoms, all I could look at were her red lips.
“Hello, Ivan,” she said lazily. “Because you must be Ivan.”
“Ivan. That’s me.” He pointed to his chest, dazed.
She winked, sure of herself and aware of the effect she had on men.
“David’s not here?”
Ivan looked toward the door he had disappeared through, but he didn’t add anything. The silence was killing me.
“He’ll be right out,” I heard myself say.
She looked at me like a stool had learned to talk.
“Sorry, and you are?”
“Margot.”
“Margot?” she said mockingly.
“Yes. What about you?”
“Idoia.”
“Charmed. David’ll be right out,” I parroted.
For the love of God, this felt like a scene in a Tarantino movie. Basically…someone should have been brandishing a machete.
David came out with a garment in hand and, without kisses or even a greeting, handed it to her with a cold smile.
“Your shirt.”
“I wasn’t in a rush to get it back,” she said.
“Right. Sorry about the rush, but…I did want my stuff back.”
She looked scathingly at the bag, as if it were the most pathetic excuse in the world to see an ex. Because that was clearly what was happening here. David had texted Idoia with the excuse of getting back the junk he had left at her house before the breakup just to see her. It was the most transparent plan in the world. I almost felt sorry for him. So young. So in love. So…devoured by a girl who had used him as a snack.
“Thanks a lot. Ah…” And here David was fast on his feet. “Idoia, have you met Margot?”
“Yes, we just introduced ourselves.”
“Should I go?” I asked like a dummy.
“Of course not.” He smiled at me when he caught his ex’s gaze on me. “Sorry, Idoia, it’s nice to see you, but we made a plan to grab some dinner before people start showing up.”
When he pointed to me, I looked around to see if he meant someone else, but there was no one but us.
“I’m in a hurry too,” she announced.
“Great. We won’t take up any more of your time then. Do you want to walk out with us?”
She nodded, looking me up and down, analyzing each and every one of the loose ends this story was leaving in its wake. I didn’t know how to do anything but smile and stand up.
“See you later, Ivan,” I said in a small voice as David slung his arm around my shoulder.
“Pizza?” David asked me, completely naturally.
“Uh…okay.”
Next to us, Idoia was walking slowly and her heels rang out, crunching the little dignity I had when I left the house, which was now floating in the half-drunk soda. I understood everything and didn’t quite understand anything. But I couldn’t help but find it strangely exciting, almost fun.
“Listen, David…” Idoia said when the neon sign of the club was shining on our backs.
“What’s up?”
The blond glared at me, and either through that glare or telepathically, I got the impression that she wanted to talk to him alone. In a flash, I weighed my options: if I stayed, it would make things difficult. If I left, it would probably make things easier for him. It was clear he wanted to get her back, even if his plan did have quite a few loose ends to tie up.
“I’ll leave you guys alone for a second,” I muttered as I walked off.
He grabbed my wrist, pretending it wasn’t necessary, but I smiled at him and took a few steps away.
What was I doing? Should I stay there a little ways off but watching them? Answer emails leaning against the wall? Leave?
I watched them talk. She was obviously annoyed. I don’t think she was jealous and possibly smelled that this was all a theatrical performance, but…there was still a glimmer of doubt, and I don’t know why, but I wanted that doubt to blossom into something enormous until she couldn’t think about anything else. I didn’t know him at all, but…I felt for him. You get it. Two completely different situations, two pairs of equally sad eyes.
He seemed sure of himself, but his gestures gave him away. His hands buried in his jean pockets, his bottom lip between his teeth, his gaze darting around, going from her to the street and from the street to me. I didn’t even think about it.
“Hey, David, don’t make me wolf my food down like always. You know it hurts my stomach.”
He raised his eyebrows for a second, surprised, but then played along.
“No, no. Come on.” He reached for my hand, and when I got closer, he grabbed it. “Let’s go.”
Damn. He was a good actor.
“I don’t get it.” She crossed her arms, making her perky, suggestive breasts rise even higher, and kept talking like I wasn’t there. “We broke up two weeks ago, and suddenly you text me asking me to return your stuff as soon as possible, in some big hurry…”
“Idoia, I left a couple of T-shirts at your house and my iPod and I need them for a trip. That’s all.”
“A trip?”
“Yes, a trip.”
“With who?”
“With Margot.” David pressed me against his side.
OMG. This was crazy.
“And where are you going?”
“Where was it again?” he asked me.
“Santorini.” I threw out the first thing that popped into my head. “You’re gonna love Greece.”
“But you’re always broke,” she retorted.
“I dunno.” He shrugged. “I guess it’s a priority thing.”
“Okay, fine. Well, then…great. I’m happy for you.” She faked a smile and pushed a lock of hair out of her face.
“I’m happy to see you too, Idoia. Take care.”
Without waiting for a response, David let go of my hand and wrapped his arm around my back, and we took off in the other direction. The street was full of people, almost all of them tourists. There was a pleasant breeze, noise and laughter were wafting out of the bars, and a man who I barely knew anything about had his arm around my shoulders and was leading me in an unknown direction.
“Damn, girl, you’re good at that,” he cracked up as we crossed the street.
And what do you think I said? Did I ask him if he was crazy? Did I ask for an explanation for why he got me involved in this mess? Did I demand he stop touching me? Did I threaten legal action? No.
“Are you seriously still using an iPod?”