Learning to Lose

by David Trueba

  Water? asks Sylvia as she fills the pitcher from the tap. Okay, he says. The television shows the charred corpses of the passengers on a Russian plane brought down by Chechen terrorists. Fuck, how horrible. Lorenzo watches Dani, who has started eating. You guys in the same class? No, I’m in the grade above. He’s in Mai’s class, explains Sylvia.

  Dani accepts Lorenzo’s curious looks. But he’s not completely sure how to interpret them. Two days earlier, Lorenzo was coming out of the shower when Sylvia called him on the phone. She hadn’t slept at home. I fell asleep at Mai’s, she lied, and then I didn’t want to call you so late. When she came back from school at lunchtime, Lorenzo meet her. He found her with messy hair, a forced smile, and sleepy body language. Lorenzo didn’t exert his authority, avoided getting irritated. Come on, let’s eat.

  You were with a boy and you spent the night with him, obviously, said Lorenzo before she decided to speak. At his house? He lives alone? His parents weren’t there, lied Sylvia. Can I meet him? I have a right … Papá … I’m not going to interrogate him or anything like that, just see his face, I just want to meet him face-to-face.

  She thought he would forget all about it in the following days. Ariel was playing a game in London and Sylvia took that time to spend the afternoons at home, go to bed early, study. But her father insisted. When are you going to bring him over? Sylvia wanted to get out of it, but Lorenzo was serious. Look, Sylvia, I am not going to let you be out all night with someone I don’t know. I imagine you are taking precautions and not doing anything stupid, but I’ll feel better about it if I’ve met him. Sylvia imagined, with amusement, her father’s surprise if she introduced him to Ariel. Would he ask him for an autograph? Would he tell him he needs to help the defense more? Or would he be furious at him?

  I’m not going to start laying some embarrassing father shit on him, Sylvia, I just want to meet him. Is that so weird? Would you rather I just tell you to be home at a certain time and that’s it? Come on, I just want to have a look at him, I’m sure he’s a great kid, knowing your good taste.

  Sylvia smiled. Worried about my daughter? No, no, what I’m worried about is that you’re not going to make it to Champions’ League final. She was still imagining the scene with her father. My father wants to meet you, she would tell Ariel, you’re lucky, he roots for your team.

  Which is why, when at lunchtime recess that morning she was walking with Mai toward their usual corner at the back of the schoolyard, against the cement wall, and Dani joined them to chat, Sylvia forced the situation. Do you guys wanna come over for lunch today?

  Mai shook her head, I can’t. In exchange for Vienna I promised my mother I’d go to the dentist, and the appointment is this afternoon. After six years, it’s about time, right? If he threatens to put braces on me, I swear I’ll strangle him. In her class there were three boys who wore braces and Mai jokingly called them the metalworkers. Dani tells them that his dentist is a woman and when she leans over to fill his cavities he looks down her shirt. One day she got me right in the eye with the silver crucifix she wears around her neck, almost took my eye out. Divine punishment, said Mai.

  And you? You coming? Sylvia looked into Dani’s eyes. He let a few seconds pass. Okay, he said. Mai opened her eyes super-wide, to comic effect. The look was just for Sylvia, who stifled her laughter.

  On the way to her house, Sylvia felt she was being cruel to Dani. He was walking with a spring in his step while talking a blue streak about music and Web sites. He had a half-empty backpack hanging over one shoulder and both hands in his pockets. If my father starts to ask you ridiculous questions, said Sylvia with a smile, just play along, you know how they can be. Deep down she was enjoying this game.

  Sylvia interrupts her father’s attempts to strike up a conversation. When he mentions something about international terrorism, she says, what an entertaining topic for the lunch table. When he asks about school, she responds, after spending the morning in that hellhole you don’t expect us to want to chat about it, do you? When he questions Dani about his future schooling, Papá, let him eat in peace. Lorenzo is in a rush and finally has to leave. A pleasure to meet you, he says, and extends his hand to Dani with surprising virility. He kisses Sylvia on each cheek.

  I think he thought I was your boyfriend, says Dani when they are left alone. Did you see the way he shook my hand? Like he was thinking, I trust you with my daughter, the girl I love most in this world.

  The weatherman talks about a drop in temperature. The weather depresses me, says Sylvia, laughing. Don’t you find it depressing? The way the world is, we don’t really need to worry about whether it’ll be sunny or windy tomorrow, but if we’ll be alive, right? Sylvia flips through channels. The African baby recently adopted by a famous Hollywood couple is going to have a wax figure in the London museum. Can you think of anything more depressing than a wax museum? asks Dani. It’s like a morgue of people who are alive. She turns off the TV.

  In Sylvia’s room, Dani has a hard time getting comfortable. He looks over CD covers while Sylvia puts one on. I have to burn some discs for you, a friend of mine went to Valencia this summer, to the Campus Party technology fair, and he spent the week downloading movies and music. This year I might go with him, even though I’m not really into all those computer nerds. You and Mai could come, now that your father’s met me. They both laugh.

  Actually it’s my fault, confesses Sylvia, I promised my father that one day I’d introduce him to the guy I’m seeing and he thought that you were him. Sylvia brings her desk chair over so he can sit down.

  I hope he liked me. I think so. Imagine if now he makes a big scene, like I forbid you to see that punk again … I don’t think so, says Sylvia. He probably wouldn’t have liked the other guy as much … Is he that bad? It’s not that. He’s older. Older than your father? No, come on. So? But he’s twenty … Motherfucker, fucking cradle robber … I’m just kidding. Dani smiled.

  Soon they change the topic. And how’s school going? she asks Dani. I don’t know, I’m so out of it. I hope I don’t fuck up too bad. I have to pass somehow. Dani swivels the chair. The stupidest fuckup ever is getting left back … spending another year there.

  Sylvia’s cell rings. It’s Ariel. I’ll call you in a little while, okay? she says. I’m in the middle of something. She hangs up and for a little while they don’t say anything.

  I guess that’s every girl’s dream, says Dani, going out with someone your father wouldn’t like.

  Sylvia laughs. For a second, she’s about to tell Dani everything, tell him the truth about Ariel. But then it seems like unnecessary torture. Sylvia looks at Dani and feels the strangeness in his expression; she knows he has fallen in love with her. And that makes Sylvia feel good and bad at the same time. Powerful and fragile.

  I must have bad luck, confesses Dani, fathers like me. Except my own, of course. Last year for my birthday he gave me tickets for the Formula 1, all excited, a fantastic plan according to him, a weekend in Barcelona. Bah, I got pissed off, and I told him he could shove them up his ass, that I wasn’t going to waste a weekend on that stupid shit. Boy, did he lose it then … One day you have to come to my house, I have good music. I don’t know if your father will like me, replies Sylvia. Sure, he’ll start hitting on you. Soon as he sees some tits …

  And he doesn’t finish his sentence. Sylvia shrank into her T-shirt. She’s still smiling. Suddenly, Dani takes a step toward her and puts a hand on her shoulder. His hand is shaking. Her skin glows at the height of her collarbone.

  Sylvia offers Dani a beer. She goes to the kitchen to get it. She calls Ariel. She explains that she’s with her father and can’t talk. From her room, Dani listens to the distant murmur of Sylvia talking on the phone. She makes a date with Ariel for an hour later, on the corner of her street.

  When she comes back from the kitchen, Sylvia is light-years away from the conversation with Dani. She steals a sip of his beer and he drinks quickly. As if he wants to vanish after his failed advance. I
could fall in love with him, Sylvia thinks, maybe in another life.

  Ariel brought Sylvia a gift. A T-shirt that says LONDON inside a bull’s eye. I think you have an idealized image of me, she jokes. No way is this going to fit, I’m fat. You’re not fat, don’t be silly. Try it on.

  He drives. She takes off her sweatshirt, is wearing only her bra for a moment, and then puts on the T-shirt Ariel bought in the airport store. It fits Sylvia’s body like a glove. It’s perfect, he says. If someone can manage to talk to me for five minutes with this T-shirt on and not look at my boobs, they deserve to win a free trip for two to the Caribbean.

  You’re such an idiot …

  Behind the Gran Vía there is a little café where they fix him a maté. She tries it again and burns her tongue for the millionth time. Está recaliente, she says, it’s super-hot, in her fake Argentinian slang. Honestly, the shirt is a bit much. I told you, she says. It’s too tight around your lolas. Sylvia likes that word for tits.

  While they’re there, Sylvia doesn’t know where to put her arms. She crosses them, puts them around her neck, hugs herself with her hands on her shoulders, unable to find a position she feels comfortable in. He smiles. Sylvia tells him that her father was insisting she introduce him to her boyfriend. Today I brought a friend home for lunch and he thought he was my boyfriend, you can’t imagine how ridiculous it was. And what friend is that? Are you jealous? she asks, amused. I don’t know, should I be?

  Sylvia smiles. He does seem jealous. What am I going to do? she says, my father wants to meet the boy that is keeping me out so late at night. I thought about sitting him in front of the TV for the next game and saying that’s him, number ten.

  And what do you think your father would say? asks Ariel.

  He’d start jumping up and down, he’d put on the team scarf and do the wave. I don’t know, I guess he’d take you to the nearest police station. Ariel goes silent. Then he brings his face up to Sylvia’s and kisses her by the ear, delicately brushing aside her hair. Don’t be afraid, he whispers. I can’t help it, she says, backing away a little. Every time we’re apart for a couple of days I think I’m never going to see you again, that you’re never going to call. Yeah, says Ariel, but he doesn’t say anything more.

  You don’t have to feel tied to me, you know, when you get tired, just tell me and no hard feelings, says Sylvia, stringing her sentences together. I’ll go back to the real world and that’s it. And I’ll stop charbroiling my tongue every fucking time you make me try that shit, she says, moving away from the metal maté straw with a comic expression.

  So this isn’t the real world to you? he asks.

  Being with you, well, honestly, I don’t know. It’s definitely not the normal world. But I like it, you know. It’s more like a dream.

  Did I tell you that tomorrow I’m signing for the apartment? They’ll give me the keys.

  Really? That fast? You already got all the money together?

  You’re gonna laugh. Last week the president paid me the bonuses he owed me. He opened a drawer and told me, here, and he handed me an envelope filled with five-hundred-euro bills. My bonuses are outside of my contract, all under the table. And then he starts chatting with me. He asked me, how are things in Argentina? I have a partner who wants us to start buying up land in Patagonia, down there in penguin land where everything is really cheap.

  Sylvia shakes her head. They’ll fill it up with housing developments, like here.

  That night she wants to go home early. At ten they are parked in front of her door. They kiss. Sylvia’s cell phone rings. It’s her mother. Sylvia answers. Ariel is silent. Then he looks out the window. When she hangs up, Sylvia says that was my mother, my father called to tell her that he met my boyfriend and he’s a very nice boy.

  This kid is starting to get under my skin, jokes Ariel. I might have to go wait for him at the school door and beat his head in.

  Sylvia thinks about her father, who for once thinks he has more privileged information than Pilar. My God, she says to Ariel, my parents are crazy, now they’re happy I have a boyfriend.

  A great kid, by the way, he says sarcastically. Good-looking, polite, nice eyes. He wears glasses, corrects Sylvia. Ah, he’s an intellectual to boot. Probably wears flannel shirts buttoned all the way up to the top …

  They kiss quickly. Suddenly it seems that Ariel is in a rush, it makes him uncomfortable to be in the car idling for so long. A minute before a gang of kids looked at the model and made loud comments. She realizes he’s uncomfortable and says, I’m leaving, I’m leaving. See you tomorrow? To celebrate your new place? Ariel nods vaguely.

  Sylvia takes the elevator up to her apartment. She opens the door. She’s expecting to find her father there, but he’s not back yet. The place is dark and Sylvia doesn’t turn on the light on the way to her room. She takes off her sweatshirt and looks at herself in the mirror with the London T-shirt on. A bit much, she remembers. She sighs and lets all her hair fall in front of her face. It seems absurd to get into bed and set the alarm for school. Her teenage bed seems ridiculous, and the schoolgirl’s desk with her computer. Dani’s beer can is still there. Suddenly she is filled with a fear of the empty house, as if it might collapse around her.

  She opens a book and reads in bed. She answers a message from Mai that she got hours ago. It said: “wot happened w/ Dani? He is way into U, he’d eat ur boogers, no complaints.” Sylvia had received it when Ariel was with her. She didn’t say anything to him, just a friend of mine, she’s crazy.

  To Sylvia, Dani and Ariel are two people she can’t even imagine comparing. There is no competition between them, although she noticed a slight pinch of jealousy in both of them at the vague presence of the other. Maybe when Ariel dumps me I’ll hook up with Dani, thinks Sylvia suddenly, not understanding how she comes up with these calculating reflections. Her idea surprises her. It would be out of spite, obviously.

  You are cold, girl, you need to loosen up, Mai tells her sometimes. But in her relationship with Ariel, she’d rather not let herself get completely caught up. She’d rather swim near the edge of the pool, like a child who’s just learned the stroke.

  Something Dani told her that afternoon comes into her mind, when he was parodying his father. He is a totally predictable guy, the only intelligent thing I ever heard him say in my life is every year the winters are shorter. How stupid. And yet that phrase now comes into Sylvia’s head. Every year the winters are shorter.

  Her father comes home, noisily. When he sees the light beneath Sylvia’s door, he knocks. He finds her lying in bed, with the book in her hands. Sylvia leans back. She had gotten into bed with the London T-shirt on. He’s a very nice kid, he says. Come on, Papá, I’m tired. They talk a bit more. Lorenzo notices the T-shirt when the sheets slide toward Sylvia’s lap. Isn’t that a little tight? I’m just wearing it around the house, she answers.

  Her father leaves. Sylvia places her hand on her stomach, stroking around her belly button. When Ariel takes off her clothes, she likes to feel the strength of his embrace. It’s one of the few moments when she feels beautiful.

  6

  The taxi arrives on time. The intercom buzzer rings and Leandro rushes to answer. He is finishing the knot on his burgundy tie. It’s here, he shouts. From Aurora’s bedroom comes the wheelchair. She is wearing a dress and some flats. On top she wears a shawl gathered in her lap. Lorenzo pushes his mother, who had combed her ash-gray hair in front of the mirror. Aurora’s smile as she advances along the hallway moves Leandro. Only the forced climb down the two flights of stairs carrying the wheelchair taints the delicacy of the moment. I’ll take the front wheels, you grab hold tight to the back, manages Lorenzo. Shit, goddamn it, hold on.

  The taxi, outfitted for wheelchairs, has its platform ready at sidewalk height. Leandro places his wife’s wheelchair on it and the mechanism lifts her up and places her safely in the back of the minivan. I feel like a crate of fruit, comments Aurora while she’s being lifted up. Lorenzo says good-bye t
o his parents through the window, as the driver closes the sliding door and runs back to the steering wheel. Have a good time. Are you sure you don’t mind waiting for us? his father asks him. No, no, I’m going to watch TV. Lorenzo points upward. I’ll wait for you to come back so I can help you with the chair. That morning his father had called, what a hassle, I don’t know how to do it, your mother wants to go out. Lorenzo had calmed him down, no problem, it’ll be good for her to do something.

  You look lovely, Mamá, Lorenzo had told her when he got to the house. His mother had just smiled. Leandro is tense. The chair makes everything harder and, as always, he feels gripped by his uselessness, his inability to deal with difficulties. Aurora’s expression turns pleasant when she sees the activity on the street. To the Auditorio? Are you going to a concert? asks the friendly taxi driver. A fine rain leaves streaks on the windows. To top it all off, it’s raining, thinks Leandro.

  When is Joaquín’s concert? Aurora had asked him that morning in the middle of his reading her an article about the private security guard strike. Eh? We had tickets, right? Yes, yes, but it doesn’t matter. Did it already happen? For a moment, the expression on her face clouds over. Aurora makes a real effort not to lose track of dates in spite of the fact that for her every day is the same.

  It’s today, this evening, he said.

  She was decided. Of course, let’s go. And that was the beginning of Leandro’s anxiety about organizing it. Calling his son, finding a handicapped-accessible taxi, planning the movements and the schedule. He knew Aurora wasn’t going to let him miss it, but he was surprised by her decision to go. I feel like getting out.