The Best Thing That Can Happen to a Croissant

by Pablo Tusset

  Shit.

  I was that close to busting through the throng of concerned citizens and saying hello – ‘Man, Berri, it’s been a long time, can I call you an ambulance?’ – but I stopped myself. Still, the coincidence changed my interest level considerably. Someone had already called an ambulance from a mobile phone and I decided to stay there until it arrived, even though Roadrunner and Coyote, the unfortunate nickname of the police duo that generally refuels at Luigi’s bar, were already on the scene. The ambulance turned up a few minutes later: two men dressed in white opened the back door, went over to Berri to check him out and in a flash had a stretcher at his side. Before moving him they placed a stiff brace around his neck just in case something major had happened to his neck. When they closed the back door of the ambulance, I raised my thumb, as a reflex, and a ‘Hang tough, Berri’ escaped my lips. Luckily I was the only one who heard that.

  I resumed my journey to Luigi’s bar, profoundly affected by the whole thing.

  ‘Roberto. Pull out that bottle of whisky from the freezer, will you?’

  Roberto whistled hard.

  ‘Starting heavy, huh, man?’

  ‘I just saw my old school chum smashed against a garbage truck.’

  ‘The accident out there? They came looking for Coyote and Roadrunner. Was it serious?’

  ‘I don’t think so … But I’ve had kind of an off day, and that was about as much as I could take. Come on, out with the bottle.’

  He went toward the kitchen for the booze, but halfway in his mobile rang and he stopped to answer the call. The bar was still pretty packed; they had brought the outside tables in, but there was still a healthy crowd inside, as well: a couple, two taxi drivers going at the slot machine, etc. The clock on the wall read two-thirty. I waited for Roberto to finish up his phone chat and return with the Moskoskaya.

  ‘Shot of fire water for the gentleman,’ he said, serving me an icy dram. I downed it in one go.

  ‘Hit me again.’

  Down the hatch.

  ‘Again.’

  I even had a fourth and then asked for a beer to chase it down, as well as a newspaper – for appearance’s sake – and then I went over to a table. MTV was on the telly, with that Jamiroquai video they always play, and so I turned to the front page of the paper: the minister of godknowswhat had issued a warning about something related to whoknowswhat. On the editorial pages, eloquent odes to the Truest Truths and bitter denunciations of Mediocre Mediocrity. I had done a damn good thing withdrawing from the real world. But the real world has a way of coming down around your ears whether you like it or not. Either the money in your wallet runs dry or a garbage truck appears out of nowhere in the middle of the street and bashes into your childhood schoolmate. My Magnificent Brother had mysteriously disappeared and my Father’s Highness had gotten his leg smashed up. No et fiis mai de la calma. Not the calmness around you, not anything, and most of all not Lady First. She, I said to myself, is not to be trusted. You can’t trust someone just because one day they don’t seem half-bad. If you start thinking someone is all right, that’s when you’re really in for it. It’s best to project all your positive energy upon those who have the least involvement in your life: a regular at the bar or a hooker in the red-light district, that sort of thing. But never, I repeat, never allow your sister-in-law Gloria to seem ‘all right.’ You shouldn’t even call her Gloria; she is Lady First, a potential enemy.

  ‘Roberto, gimme another beer.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Hey, Roberto. You think I’m an all right kind of a guy?’

  ‘Well, that depends …’

  ‘Oh, yeah? On what?’

  ‘On what is convenient given the situation.’

  More beer. I was already drunk. Again. Drunk and brooding. Thinking for long periods of time isn’t very cinematic, is it? Ellipses. That’s what I need, ellipses. Show the clock on the wall, the star with his newspaper and beer, fade to black, back to the clock, the ashtray, the collection of empty beer bottles. Unfortunately real life requires a lot more work than the movies, plus you actually have to live it, in real time. But then again, you get a lot more done in real life, too. As such, by the time the clock read three-thirty I had already drafted an initial plan of action for tackling The First’s case. Once I had completed this homework, I sat around thinking about how the hell I was going to spend the rest of the night. You only get out of life what you pump into it, I thought to myself. But I was broke and Luigi, my only potential money-lender at that hour, was nowhere near the bar. Sometimes he goes home and leaves Roberto to close up, but sometimes he just stays and hangs out, chasing cats on the patio or meddling in the private affairs of some regular customer. I asked Roberto.

  ‘He’s inside, doing the books.’

  I got up, walked over to the door at the back and tapped lightly. Luigi was sitting at his desk in the back room, in total accounting-chaos mode: a bank book, piles of bills and a tiny metal box overflowing with bills and handwritten notes.

  ‘Hey, Luigi. I need to ask a favour.’

  ‘As long as it isn’t money …’

  ‘I always pay you back, don’t I?’

  ‘Yeah, but I don’t see you until you do, and when I don’t see you, you’re not spending money here. Bad for business.’

  ‘I’ll pay you back tomorrow, I swear. Tomorrow morning I’m gonna get paid a bundle.’

  ‘Is it my imagination or have I heard that one before?’

  ‘Come on, Luigi. When have I ever lied to you?’

  ‘Every chance you get.’

  ‘OK, but never when money’s involved. I need seventy-five euros. Seventy-five. That’s all.’

  He was starting to soften. This was made apparent by his head, bent down in deep concentration as he studied a bunch of supermarket receipts from Caprabo.

  ‘And I suppose you want to owe me for tonight, too, right?’

  ‘Well, tomorrow I can give you half, I promise. Instalments.’

  ‘What do I look like, a La Caixa cash machine? Tomorrow you will pay me the full amount. No more, no less. And I’m serious about that. Tomorrow, understood?’

  I got it, and got out of there as fast as I could, heading up Jaume Guillamet. You could barely even tell that there had been an accident at all – all that remained were some tiny slivers of glass that twinkled under the streetlights and a pile of those round salty bits that had been sprinkled on the ground to soak up the blood. I continued walking up the street until I reached number fifteen. For a moment, I crouched down in front of the entrance to the garden, as if I were tying my shoe, and surveyed the lamppost. I was not at all surprised this time to see a red rag tied to the top. In fact, I was glad to see my expectations fulfilled. I had that astute, crafty, somewhat self-satisfied feeling that sometimes comes from the ingestion of alcohol: the world was, once again, an ordered system. After duly noting this minor detail, I continued up Travessera to Numancia and then began to walk down toward Plaza España. I arrived at the bar on Parallel with a half-hour’s worth of hunger. I tapped on the closed blinds. Light behind the peephole. I gave them the sign and they let me in through the side door. I ordered an esqueixada, octopus tapas, meatballs, and a giant spicy croquette otherwise known as a bomba. I ate slowly, savouring every bite, and little by little I began to feel better. The only thing left for full satisfaction was a good crap. The toilet was, however, every bit as filthy as one would expect from a semi-clandestine bar on the Parallel that was open all night for any random person that wanted to eat. I improvised a hygienic seat cover with a few bits of toilet paper, taking care that the tip of my prick didn’t touch the seat. When I finished, I performed a quick jerk-off against the sink, mentally conjuring up the image of a certain TV hostess with a truly commendable pair of tits; it wasn’t that I was desperate or anything, but I needed a little bodily discharge so as not to come prematurely later on. Then I scrupulously washed myself clean and took a sniff of the armpits: no problemo. By the time I hit the street
I wasn’t even drunk anymore, and filling up my stomach had helped erase the acrid taste of vodka and beer in my mouth.

  The dawn light was still very weak, the traffic on the streets sparse. I like that hour of the day, around five-thirty, six in the morning. Around seven shit starts getting ugly again and the best thing you can do is let the day shift get to work, let the world continue to spin on its axis while you get some sleep. I walked for a while, smoking a cigarette, and then hailed a cab. This one smelled like La Toja shaving cream. Early-morning news on the radio. Friday, 20th of July, World Cup game in France, the Spain team having their pre-game meeting somewhere, blah, blah, blah. It was a pleasant-enough background drone, and mixed nicely with the breeze coming in through the open window and the noise of the diesel engine. I got out at the Boquería market and allowed myself a stroll amid the various stalls, so that I might admire some or other well-stacked lady fishmonger sitting high on her icy throne, like a Queen of the Seas amid gifts of lemon and clove and the aroma of live, quivering shellfish. I then directed my walking tour down various winding streets, paying little attention to the route I took and far more to the light-hearted glee that was now causing a strain on my zipper. Inevitably I arrived at the plaza with the hotel, almost without realising it. It always happens that way. What I saw lurking about on the streets was not terrifically stimulating and so I ducked in to one of the bars in the hope of finding something better inside. The owner was busy rummaging through the freezers behind the bar. He was a bald fellow, his forehead eaten away by psoriasis. The coffee machine was plugged in and seemed disposed to fulfil its electricity-related tasks. I ordered a coffee. Now, anyone who is unfamiliar with the hooker scene in this area should know that this is just about the exact opposite of Amsterdam. That is: the client waits behind the window of a bar, showing himself off as it were, and the hookers walk around in a sort of invisible carousel ride around the plaza. When you spot one that you like, you signal to her and then she enters to sort out the details. At this hour, the night shift had already turned in. The girls on duty now were the ones who generally catered to the men that have just gotten off their shifts supplying the stalls at the market. The pickings are generally better at the saunas in the Eixample, which is the territory of exorbitantly-priced female philology students who drink skim milk and say things like ‘fellatio.’ Anyway. The scene there that morning was pretty dodgy: only three chicks chirping and none of them was my type. The oldest of the three looked frightfully past her sixtieth birthday and stood there in front of the window, insisting and gesticulating to me as I shook my head no over and over again, trying nonetheless to retain an amiable expression on my face. My efforts, however, were not nearly insistent enough for her, because she came into the bar for me.

  ‘Hey, sweetheart. Wanna come with me for a bit?’

  ‘Another day.’

  ‘Come on, I’ll suck your balls nice and long.’

  ‘Thanks – but as it turns out I’ve already had them sucked – before I went out tonight.’

  She laughed at that one.

  ‘What a joker. Oh, we’ll have a good time, you and me. Come on, come to my room and you can heat up what I’ve got cooking.’

  She vaguely reminded me of Mrs Mitjans, one of the regulars at my mother’s canasta games, and this rendered her absolutely unserviceable. Naturally I had to say no about fifteen times before she finally gave up. I invited her to a drink and she ordered a coffee with milk and a croissant. As she breakfasted I tried to sidle away from her so that the girls on the street would see that I was still free, but it was tough going. As soon as she finished the croissant, she resumed her insistent attack, this time with caresses, the kind of caresses that only a hooker or a woman in love know how to administer – as if they’re dying to touch you, stroke you, feel you. It’s not easy to resist that kind of avid manhandling. Hookers know it and they push hard, touching and whispering all the while. After some time, this one eventually threw in the towel and returned to the plaza, though she continued to make little faces at me through the window. By now a new girl had joined the carousel, and she was pretty tasty-looking, at least from where I was standing. I waited for her to move a little closer so that I could check her out better. Thirtysomething, maybe even in her forties. She was all woman, with short hair, dark, nice ass, smallish tits, serene face. Serious. Very serious. I looked her in the eye. She didn’t make any faces, just walked in and over to the bar.

  ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Hi. You still working?’

  ‘I just started. What do you want?’

  ‘A fuck. Typical. Hard.’

  ‘Thirty. Extra if you want a room.’

  ‘Well, I was thinking around forty, but that includes the extra fifteen for a room over at the corner. It’s clean …’

  She didn’t have to think twice.

  ‘All right. Forty if we go to the hotel.’

  We entered the joint, her walking a few paces ahead of me. There’s something about hookers that reminds me of drug dealers: in public they both always act as if they have absolutely nothing to do with you, and it’s mutual. At the counter a kid with a face full of hardcore acne memories gave her a keychain with the number thrity-seven and charged me the hourly rate. Lift. Taking a cheap hooker into a by-the-hour hotel lift almost always means she’s gonna start sniffing your zipper to gain time on the way up, but this one didn’t seem keen on that, she just nibbled at her thumb a bit.

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Pablo. You?’

  ‘Gloria.’

  Shit.

  The room was beige, I think I had been in there once before but it’s hard to say; they all look more or less the same. Gloria lowered the bedspread to reveal the whitest of sheets with crisp hospital corners, an extremely hygienic touch that had a rather soothing effect. She extracted a pair of condoms from her jeans pocket and left them on the bedside table. Then she sat down at the foot of the bed, undressed, and walked over to the tiny sink, with a sniff of disdain directed toward the bidet. She raised her leg and rested her thigh against the basin, positioning herself so that her cunt was just within reach of the water, and then she began to douse herself with little scoopfuls of water from the tap. The rite of ablution. That moment, when they wash their nether regions, has always seemed so sordid to me, but this time there was something unexpectedly lovely in that scene, bathed in the oblique early-morning light that filtered in through the window: her tiny tits with their conical nipples reflected in the mirror; her wide, full arse filling up the washbasin; the chap-chap of the water slapping against her protruding vulva. Venus at her Bath, or better yet, Maiden Watering her Flower. A good oil painting of that scene would have been worthy of some hall in the Louvre, and a good photograph would have most definitely been worthy of presiding over some mechanic’s garage. I undressed quickly, uncomfortable from the insistent erection trapped inside my pants, and I approached my Venus, who was now gently rubbing the space between her thighs with a pastel-pink towel. She had left the sky-blue one for me, in tacit acceptance of the gender-inspired colour conventions suggested by the hotel linen service. I approached her from behind and embraced her, slipping my hands under her arms in search of her breasts, which I took in my hands as two cornucopias of sheer abundance.

  ‘Wait … wash up first and then we’ll go to the bed,’ she said, extricating herself. I then approached the washbasin to fulfil the baptismal rite. First I placed my prick, hard as a cucumber, under the stream of water that flowed from the tap and then carelessly dried it off. The cold water and subsequent contact with the rough towel succeeded in relieving, if only partially, the tension that had built up in my cock. She, in the meantime, had flung herself onto the right side of the bed and waited for me there, watching me all the while, never once altering that serious expression on her face.

  ‘Move over to the other side, if you don’t mind,’ I said. She moved over and I stretched out on the bed, breathing harder now from the arousal.


  ‘Let me take it from here. Can I kiss you?’ I asked.

  ‘Anywhere but my lips.’ I began on her neck, briefly, and then quickly descended to her breasts. I entertained myself there for a while, savouring that smooth, creamy delight, and my pleasure grew as I began to feel her nipples grow hard, that puckering of the skin around her areolas. My cock, once again, was back in full force.

  ‘Are you comfortable?’ I asked. She nodded yes, as serious and focused as before, observing my journey across her breasts with a kind of relaxed curiosity. I slid my right hand down toward the centre of her sex. She separated her right leg, which was resting on her foot, allowing me to extend the full length of my finger across her mound, cold and damp from the prophylactic rinse she had just given herself. Little by little, my mouth still playing games with her spiky nipples, I tilted my index finger to the side and pressed deeper, hoping to shift open her lips. That was when I began to feel a much warmer mound, a delicious swelling down below. I selected one of the condoms on the night table at random, put it on (not without a certain predictable difficulty, which is overcome by ignoring the enclosed instructions) and began to mount her, rocking back and forth as she adjusted her position to accommodate me. I could feel my heart beating at the base of my prick and I tried to keep it from plunging directly into the crevice between her legs by raising up a bit and situating my balls in her little nest, simply enjoying the moment, the feeling of just being there, between her open legs. At moments like these I often feel an overwhelming urge to declare unconditional love, but I contained myself and kissed everything within reach of my lips – everything except the mouth, the mouth of a hooker who doesn’t want to get kissed by just anyone but who will have sucked at least five other cocks by the time her shift is over. Hooker issues. When I couldn’t hold back any longer and decided to award myself with the anticipated prize, I separated my thigh a bit with my hand and I moved forward, pressing hard with the tip of my cock, rudderless, until I felt myself hit it. I pressed on some more and felt that feeling, as if I had just passed through a silken scrim, and then I felt it once again, even more intensely, when I buried the full length of my little earthly representative inside her, and once I was in place I positioned myself firmly on my elbows, so that she could breathe beneath my 120 kilos. I would have stayed there forever, but that wouldn’t be possible – I knew that – and so I had to perform a repeated enter-and-exit motion to fool myself into feeling that I had been inside of her for ages. She let me do my thing, not bothering to put on any special effects show. From her side of the scene, all I heard her do was release one very controlled breath each time I lunged into her. I did this slowly but with increasing pressure, which forced her to tighten her muscles to resist the compression that I was subjecting her to with my shoulders. When I felt the imminence of orgasm I let her go, put my hands where my elbows were, so as not to hurt her in the final thrusts, and I came long and slow, with that Wookie-esque roar that comes out whenever I’m really satisfied. Next came that soft, slow, wet sensation and then my prick resumed its normal dimensions, all the more ridiculous-looking beneath that miniature raincoat, swimming in a puddle of white goo.