Idoia was beautiful, I have to admit it. She had put a lot of effort into it. She wanted the David who drooled at her feet, the lapdog, the one who had learned that even being beaten with a stick is better than being alone. I was wrong about that.
But I didn’t really care much about looks. She was wearing booty shorts and a white blouse knotted at the waist and hanging half open with a black bra peeking out. I was wearing a pair of super-torn jeans and a gray T-shirt with a huge hole where the label used to be.
Two months earlier, I would have crawled for her; now I just thought, as she kissed me on both cheeks (thinking she was so cool for not giving me one on the mouth), that I should take advantage of the sales to get a few clothes with no holes.
“Hey,” I greeted her. “How’s it going? Listen, I’m in a hurry. Do you mind if we just grab something right here?”
I pointed to a tapas place with a bar full of faithful regulars, all total characters.
“Here?”
“It’s just that I’m in a hurry,” I repeated.
I went inside for two bottles of beer while she waited for me, leaning against a wall, smoking a cigarette, and looking mortified. The waiter told me we couldn’t take the beers farther than the high table next to the door for smokers.
“Thanks, chief. I’m not planning on going very far,” I replied.
“Well, I’d go to the end of the world with that girl,” a dude at the bar let slip.
“You need to get to know people from the inside, sir, but I guess hoping not to judge a woman like that for her looks would be very hard work, so we’ll leave it there. Have a good one.”
Being polite doesn’t cost a thing.
“So,” Idoia said flirtatiously when I handed her the beer.
I took a sip of mine. I realized I wasn’t in the mood for it, and I left it on the high table, where she was leaning.
“How do you want to do this?” I asked her. “The easy way or the truth?”
“Can’t it be easy and the truth?”
“No, sorry.”
“Well…the truth.” She sighed slightly condescendingly, like I was a kid who wanted to show her a magic trick I had learned but that she was completely sure wouldn’t work.
“Okay. Well…” I leaned on the table, swallowed, looked her in the eyes, and smiled. “I don’t want to get back together with you. Our relationship was awful. Total garbage.”
She straightened up, surprised.
“I swear even on Friday I still had doubts; that’s why I said yes when you suggested meeting today. I thought I was probably wrong, that I should fight for this since up until recently it had been so important for me to get you back. I never meant to play you.”
“You couldn’t have even if you wanted to.”
I looked to the side and snorted. “I wanted to do this nicely.”
“That’s your problem, David, you have no balls. You always beat around the bush and…”
“Okay, cool. Look, I wanted you to love me. I was dying to get you to love me, since I love myself little and badly. I thought someone like you giving me your love would make up for it, but…to hell with it, Idoia. I don’t need you to give and take away your attention all the time to feel alive or important because I realized that you’re a girl with little to offer, not because you don’t have it, but because you don’t feel like sharing it.
“I fell in love with Margot, and I understand that I have to get my shit together to be able to enjoy that love. And I have to thank you for having been a true bitch to me because, in one of life’s lucky coincidences, you pushed me into her arms.”
“I don’t know where all this resentment is coming from,” she declared, taking another sip of her beer. “It wasn’t even that serious. A few months and…”
“It’s not resentment. I’m over that too. But you know how happy it makes me to see her laugh? It’s a whole other thing, like it’s from another planet. And I’m only telling you this because I think you’re throwing a huge amount of time and intense energy down the drain. I’m not one to give advice, but, my girl…what we had, for me it was serious; stop acting like you have to impress someone all the time. Embrace yourself. I’m sure you’re so much cooler than all this bullshit about being a cold heartbreaker girl. Tomorrow some wire might get crossed, a nuclear missile could be launched, and we’ll all be toast… Make your time worth your while. I’m going to.”
“Wow, that’ll be a change,” she said maliciously.
“Whatever you say. I’m out. I have an appointment to see a few apartments, and I don’t want to be late. Be happy.”
I smiled, did a kind of military salute, and turned away. I hadn’t taken more than ten steps away when she yelled, “Be happy? That’s it?”
I turned and laughed. I had spoken from my heart. I nodded.
“Yes. That’s it.”