Red: A Love Story

by Nicole Collet

  Valentina stepped in, assuring her it was a misunderstanding. The mother’s thin eyebrows joined in a scowl and she hissed: “And you. You’re a lost cause too!”

  “Will you stop it already? I can’t stand your criticism anymore.” Marisa flushed as much as her mother, whereas Valentina paled. “What if I am involved with an older man, what’s the big deal?”

  “What’s the big deal? I want to know who’s this man you’re seeing.”

  “It’s none of your business. You’re gonna drive him away like you did with Louis.”

  “You bet!”

  The mother stamped on the rug flowers and rolled her hands into fists. The speech Marisa knew by heart began. The mother talked about the ex-fiancée who had cheated on her and practically abandoned her at the altar. She reviewed the stab on the back, the humiliation, the shattered heart. How could Marisa be so naïve she couldn’t see an older man would only want to take advantage of her?

  “When are you going to forget the senator once and for all? It’s not like that.” Marisa coiled with a knot in the pit of her stomach… nausea, nausea, nausea… “The way you talk, it’s like I’m incapable of winning someone’s affection. Well, you’re wrong. He loves me.”

  The mother vacillated but wouldn’t take defeat.

  “Oh really? And what does a pipsqueak like you have to offer to an older man besides easy fun? He’ll soon leave you for another woman, that is, if he hasn’t already found himself one.”

  “I bet you’re crossing your fingers for that to happen. Just to prove yourself right. You’re trying to live my life rather than taking care of yours. And you’ve always got to have things your way. That’s what happened after Dad passed, right? Everything needed to be neat and over with because you hate to wait. How could you exclude me from my own father’s funeral?”

  Marisa’s eyes clouded with tears. She saw the father for the last time right before her trip on Easter. If a mosquito ever bites you, my dear, do not kill it or else ten more will show up for the burial, he had said as he kissed her goodbye.

  Her dad was like that, a born comedian, and his own life ended with the irony of a joke: struck by an ambulance. It was Holy Thursday and he died on his way to the hospital. The crossword magazine he had just bought flew from his hands in the moment of the accident. It landed next to a trash can.

  During that extended weekend, Marisa went camping in a forest reservation with Valentina and her uncles, who lived in the countryside. There, in the paradise where they had burrowed, the cell phones were dead and Marisa forgot to turn hers off. She came back one day before Valentina, with the discharged phone in her backpack. Marisa arrived home content. Then the mother told her. In shock, Marisa asked why she hadn’t waited for her to bury the father. There was no answer. The mother simply took her to the cemetery…

  Now the mother cried and yelled. Her voice changed, as if she had a wounded animal trapped in her throat: “I called a million times to tell you about your dad and was unable to reach you. I had to bury him because I couldn’t stand to look at him and imagine the accident. How do you think it was for me, waiting for him to come back home for dinner and receiving the news of his death? You weren’t the only one in shock. And I wanted to spare you—”

  “Spare me?” Marisa trembled. “You didn’t even allow me to say goodbye to him. How do you think I felt? I go on a trip and when I return Dad’s no longer here, just like a ghost, no closure. All I wanted was to touch his face for the last time, and you robbed me of that.”

  “I did my best… Now you’re out of control and I can’t deal with the situation. I can’t!” She sniffled before continuing in a plaintiff tone: “I know you’ve always loved your father more than me. But if he were still alive, things would be quite different.”

  They stared at each other in sudden silence, their breathing ragged by an avalanche of resentment. To the mother, it was a shock that Marisa couldn’t understand how she tried to protect her. To Marisa, it was a melancholic relief that the situation had reached the confrontation she feared—at least now there was no longer doubt. Each remained on the opposite margin of the road, each with her own hurt and incomprehension. And as they exchanged that look, they begin to lose sight of each other. On the surface simmered indignation. In the deep, great pain.

  “You’re right. Things would be quite different if my father was alive,” Marisa said. “He accepted me instead of criticizing me all the time.”

  “I only want what’s best for you. You’ll stop seeing that man, do you hear me? As long as you live under my roof, you ought to abide by my rules. I will not allow you to be crushed like I was.”

  “That’s it. I can´t go on like this. You just won’t accept me for who I am. It’s beyond your control. Only you can’t decide for me. I’m no longer a child. If I’m wrong, I’ll face the consequences. But I know I’m not wrong. Maybe it’s best if I get a job and move out. I don’t want to leave you, but you give me no option.” Marisa turned to Valentina and took her by the arm. “C’mon, Val.”

  “Where are you going?” The mother was alarmed, her eyes red, dark, wide. “Come back here, Marisa! You’re the only thing I have left in the world now…”

  Marisa stormed out in tears. She headed for Valentina’s and the two locked themselves in the bedroom, where Marisa had a glass of sugary water for her nerves. Why did everything have to be so complicated? She couldn’t be away from Marco. He was her sun, painting a rainbow in the dull sky with his pranks and that boyish air he sometimes had, like the boy that still lived within him eating jabuticabas from the tree. She learned so much from Marco. He had given back laughter to her. Marisa wanted to erase from his heart the scab of bitterness that surfaced when he was distracted and the mask slipped off.

  If she must stand against her mother to be with Marco, it didn’t matter anymore. Marisa called him and the two had a long conversation. They would meet later as usual and decide the best course of action. When they hung up, Marisa was much calmer.

  Yet Marco vacillated.

  It was all happening again. The past. That predator whose eyes were two precise points with the gloss of a black mirror, positioned close together for better aiming at the prey. Its mouth accumulated several rows of teeth as sharp as blades and, when it opened, it shredded and laughed.

  The past had a peculiar sense of humor.

  A middle ground with Marisa was impossible. Even knowing the risks, he had allowed things to go too far. He jeopardized his reputation and plans for the future. But the worst was that now Marisa’s family life might crumble as a result of his irresponsibility. He wouldn’t be in peace with his own conscience if that happened—not again. None of it made any sense. He needed to be rational.

  Rational.

  He had been married and divorced once—Lorena had taught him the toughest lesson. At the time, he lived in the intoxication of his first love. Impulsive and inexperienced, he didn’t know contention. Or fear. Marisa was still too young to know what he knew today. Did he really want to drag her into that? Did he have the right to do it? He thought of Lorena at that age and the shattered dreams she made a point to throw in his face: You have destroyed my life. She apologized, then said it and apologized again. And again. And then apologizing lost meaning. You have destroyed my life.

  Scenes from the marriage pulsed in his memory. Forbidden fruit in the beginning, then conflicts, insecurity, lies and bitterness until the end. It was incredible, he thought, the myriad of small and big reasons that would destroy a relationship. Divergences. Jealousy. Unfaithfulness… Small and big sources of pain, which the law coldly labeled as irreconcilable differences. He had tried to overcome his remorse, he had tried to forgive her. To no avail. His heart was a piece of glass cracked by seven years of pain and mistakes. When he looked through its lens, the world emerged distorted. Shattered.

  Maybe it would be best if he and Marisa went their sepa
rate ways. He was no good for her. If they continued together, what were the prospects? Marisa already lived in a distressed relationship with her mother, which his presence only aggravated. This was the moment for them to consolidate a bond. The last thing he wanted was to cause a rupture between mother and daughter. Then Marisa wouldn’t bear the pressure and would feel compelled to move in with him—a bad start on itself, as he could attest from his own experience. Marisa ignored what had really happened in his marriage. He, on the other hand, couldn’t forget. Fairy tales did not survive frustration. With time, Marisa would miss her family and he would carry the blame. They would drink from the cup of estrangement and have accusations for dinner.

  And soon Marisa would be ready to fall into another man’s arms. It was always like that, right? The natural cycle of things. Flowers blossomed, their petals and leaves fell off, dried out, soaked in the rain, dried out again, until they brittled and turned into dust and into nothing. What remained were the fossils of nails and hair, pain and thorns. The ending of sunken romance did not change much, in literature or real life. It had been like that with Lorena, sooner or later it would be the same with Marisa. He had emptied his baggage of illusions long ago. The world was full of Madames Bovary.

  Or was it?

  His brain said one thing—perfectly sober, sensible, centered. His heart—that same one dazzling his thoughts since he had noticed Marisa in the classroom, that unrestrained, unreasonable, unstoppable heart—said something else. And what had he noticed? At first, just a girl-woman with a pretty face and a braid, one small and pale hand raised. When she said omission was a form of action, a tremor hit him. Without knowing, Marisa no longer spoke of literature. She spoke of broken glass and a man who had retreated from life without realizing. She spoke of him, Marco. From then on, he began to observe Marisa. He captured on her face the fragmented impressions of a mosaic, which he assembled day after day: sweetness, sadness, amusement, irony, interest, apathy, life, death. All overflowing from within her. And then, as if a blindfold had slipped off his eyes, he recognized in Marisa fragments of himself…

  The brain. The heart. In a perverse logic, the more he resisted, the more entangled he became in that sortilege. Until the only thing left for him was surrender. Gosh, was he tired, so tired of feeling that way, fractured. The brain. The heart. In response to one and the other, Marco helped himself with a shot of whiskey. Soon a comforting warmth coursed through his veins, clearing his mind, making everything simpler. Dissolving the melodrama. Yes, that was it. Life shouldn’t be taken so seriously. What was again the title of that film by David Mamet?

  Things Change, he muttered to himself.

  Marco took another sip, hesitated, and emptied the glass. He glanced at the kitchen table in search of the pack of cigarettes—the companion for coffee, port wine and disquiet—and his gaze fell upon the ivory die sitting in a corner. He stared at it. Grabbed it. Rolled it.

  Three turned up.

  A coincidence?

  He looked at the orchid he’d left to air on the windowsill. A rare Selenipedium, Marisa’s gift for his birthday. She had brought him the flower on a Saturday, when they dined in the apartment and spent the night rolling the die. They didn’t sleep much because Marisa needed to go home to be with her mother and study. When he woke up in the morning, she was sobbing with her face hidden in the pillow.

  What is it, Mari?

  Happiness. Fear of losing him.

  Approaching the window, Marco touched the orchid’s red petals. The situation had reached a breaking point. He could no longer keep standing with water around his knees—he had to make a decision and take the plunge. Marco retrieved his cell phone from the table and searched for Marisa’s contacts. With no more hesitation, he selected the number.

  PART 2

  Black:

  A Plunge Into the Abyss

  Three months later

  Autumn, March

  1. A Well Stares at the Sky

  He waited for her in the living room. Sitting on the couch with a glass of scotch in his hand, Marco listened to a classical piece by composer Zoltán Kodály about the hussar who renounced everything to be with his sweetheart: The Fairy Tale Begins. An ironic title, he thought. Just out of the shower, Marco had wet hair and a black T-shirt clinging to his slightly damp torso. He took a long draft of the whiskey swimming in ice. Autumn arrived, bringing back the height of summer in one of those typical São Paulo mood swings. In normal temperature and pressure conditions, the thermometer would not be registering ninety degrees in the shade.

  Marco looked at the entrance door as the knob moved. She entered and tossed her purse onto a chair. Her beige top sported a low cut, and the bandage skirt highlighted the sway of her hips. Circling the coffee table, she leaned over to brush her lips on his and sat on the sofa. She asked what they would be doing that evening. Marco pointed to a white shopping bag at the feet of the couch, bathed in the dim light of the side lamp. With barely restrained curiosity, she picked up the bag, laid it on the table and studied the contents. She lifted the items one by one, examining them with a critical eye. Her interest faltered.

  “What’s this?” she asked in disconcert.

  “Didn’t you say you wanted to try new things? I bought it for you.”

  She evaluated the web of black leather strips and metal rings. After thinking for a moment, she returned it to the bag with a brusque motion. She didn’t like that. When he asked why, she grew irritated: “Why can’t we be like normal people?” Her breathing became fitful. “This is… this is wrong.”

  Her hands trembled—Marco couldn’t tell if the reaction was triggered by indignation or by fear of herself and what she might do. He just held her hand. He offered her his glass of scotch and reassured her they would only do what she felt like. A bit calmer, she took a sip from the drink.

  “Don’t you enjoy our games?” Marco put his arm around her shoulders and held her chin, making her stare at him. She tried to avert his gaze but he insisted: “Don’t you like them?”

  She nodded, her own admission giving her a sting of humiliation.

  “Then trust me,” he said.

  “What if the situation gets out of hand? I don’t want to lose control, Marco…”

  That would never happen, he assured her. Didn’t she understand? Marco studied her face. He found a pair of inquisitive eyes as she moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue. That same tip devoid of answers.

  No, she didn’t understand.

  “This is a trick of mirrors.” Marco paused for his words to sink in. “But you need to look past the surface to capture its essence.”

  “You talk through riddles. I don’t get it.”

  “I’ll put it another way. Have I ever done anything you didn’t like?”

  Shaking her head, she brought the glass to her lips, hesitated and returned it to the table. Her fingerprints slowly blurred on the cold crystal.

  Marco gazed at her with a smile in his eyes. He ran his index finger across the curve of her shoulder, going up to the neck, tracing the jawline until it reached her mouth. There, it lingered in a caress. She couldn’t suppress the shiver that followed the gliding of Marco’s finger.

  “Things are relative. You arouse me and then satiate my desire. Now who’s the active and who’s the passive?” he asked, his voice as soft as his caress. “The game is ruled by your will and your boundaries. Now who’s the dominator and who’s the dominated?”

  She opened her mouth and closed it again, unable to respond.

  “Sometimes I think you’re a strange man, Marco,” she uttered.

  She stared at him and superimposed the image of the first time she saw Marco. That day, she had the sensation a serpent coiled around her and dragged her to him. She wanted Marco. His body, his smile, his words. She wanted him complete. In the beginning she thought they had affinity. But the truth was she couldn’t g
rasp him. It was like watching a coin flip: when you glimpsed head it was already tails, and the coin would continue the spin without revealing itself as a whole. She recalled when they went to the park, and Marco had the breezy taste of vanilla, playing with a dog that passed by, reciting haikais as they walked around the lake. Then, in the bedroom, he would darken and become strong, thick liquor that triggered dizziness. He dived into the game with furor as if he sought something, as if he wanted to investigate the bottom of the abyss—the bottom of himself? The die keeps things on track, he had said. Or maybe it was the opposite. Maybe he was running away. Marco carried the marks of his broken marriage, and she wanted to make him forget them. Yes, she could do it.

  “I may look strange to the people you call ‘normal,’” he countered. “Normality and abnormality, however, lie in different points of the same scale. Between them there’s no gap, but continuity. Like the color spectrum: on one end you have white and on the other black, with all the remaining palette in between. Colors are not separated, they keep changing into one another. There are normality gradients, the same way there are color gradients.”

  “What about you, Marco, where do you stand in the scale?” she asked, and curiosity made her quit the defensive attitude.

  Think of the gray color, he said. Sometimes it held more black; sometimes more white, albeit it still remained gray. He had an unconventional world view, that’s all. There was nothing wrong with exploring the instinctive side. Survival depended on it. Mankind had the arrogance of judging itself superior to animals, when in reality people were guided by instincts rather than by reason. The primitive part of the brain developed along 500 million years. And the rational part? Not even 300 thousand.

  “Don’t start with those theories,” she said, her body stiffening. She saw the coin flipping. Heads and tails, black and white. The gray that she couldn’t grasp.

  “I’m just stating the facts. Anthropologist Desmond Morris has an interesting definition for modern society. And if you thought of a concrete jungle, think again: jungle dwellers live free. We, on the other hand, are confined in our cubicles. No, this is not a concrete jungle. It’s a human zoo.”