by Cherry Kay
“I only want what’s best for you.”
“Including Ana? Because you’re so chummy with her father? Has he given you any favors lately?”
“I just wanted to tell you that you could have been a better man to Ana Paula. You have no idea how much I’ve put in a good word for you, on what an upstanding man you are.”
“I didn’t need that. I’m not running for a political position. And I may have had my moments, but it doesn’t mean I wasn’t good to Ana Paula at all. You want to know the real reason why we broke up? We broke up because I found out that she cheated on me. She cheated on me with the guy she’s going to marry. Good riddance. I did everything for her. I did everything for her the way you do everything for mama—and she still cheated on me. Has it ever occurred to you that she could have been the problem too and not me alone? I never told anyone. I just let you all speculate about our breakup. I know you all thought negatively of me. I must’ve been the problem, right?
And guess what, I’m in love with a tourist I just met two months ago. How’s that for dedication? I took her to dinner because I wanted you to give her a chance. Then I realized that I don’t need your approval. All my life, I wanted to be as good as you, as amazing as you are—but you’re not the role model I needed, after all. You were and still are my biggest critic, and this will go on and on and on, even if I do well in life.”
“I was hard on you because I wanted you to learn, and I wanted you to become an upstanding man.”
“You were hard on me because you couldn’t achieve things when you were younger,” Alex seethed. He saw the look of distress in his mother’s eyes, but he had to say his peace. “I adored you, and I wanted to be you. But now, I no longer want to even please you. I’ve been doing it my whole life.”
He stood up and looked at his father. “I’m not going to do that anymore.”
“Alex,” Ines began, “please, take a seat, we can talk—”
“There’s no talking here with your husband,” Alex said acidly. “I saw the look of disapproval in his eyes when he saw Iesha.”
“It’s not like that at all, Alex,” Ines said, trying to placate him.
“Thank you for dinner,” Alex said stiffly. “I’ll see you some other time, mama.” He nodded at his mother, barely looking at his father. “Excuse me.”
“Alex…” his mother’s voice trailed off.
Alex walked out of the dining room, through the foyer, and out into the cold night. He quickly revved up his engine and left the estate as fast as he could. He could still feel the blood pounding in his ears. His heart was beating so fast, he could hear it. He turned on the stereo and let it blast aloud. It had taken years of pent up frustration to talk that way to his father. But, he had inadvertently hurt his mother in the process, and he felt god-awful about it.
He drove at breakneck speed, intent on getting back to Barcelona in under an hour, and he suddenly didn’t care if he crashed his car, just so he could let more rage out.
*
Alex blearily walked around his apartment, trying to make sense of things. He hadn’t answered any of the calls from his mother or sister, not even the texts. There was nothing from Iesha, and that made him feel even more agitated. Suddenly, his doorbell rang. It was past ten in the evening... then his heart leapt, hoping against hope that it was Iesha.
“Ie…” he stopped, as soon as he opened the door.
Ana Paula was standing in front of him, her eyes all puffy and red. “Alex—”
He shook his head and pushed the door to a close, but her hand shot out to stop him.
“What the hell… ” he muttered. “Ana, please, I’ve had a rough week,”
“Did that include me?”
She stepped inside his apartment, looking around. “I haven’t been here.”
“We broke up before I got this place, if you remember correctly.”
“Have you been drinking?”
“To help me sleep. Now, please, let me sleep.”
“You aren’t drunk enough to not talk,” she said. “I know you well.”
“You don’t know me anymore.”
“I still do. I know you want persistence.”
“Not from you. Not like this. And what are you doing here?” he couldn’t find it in himself to feel sorry for her, even if she looked like a sorry sight. Had he become this callous? He was civil a few days ago, even when she had invaded his personal space.
“I came here to ask for another chance?”
“Are you kidding me?” he groaned. “Leave, Ana.”
“I can’t live without you Alex.”
“You already said that, and yet here you are, still alive and kicking.”
“You were always sarcastic. I miss that.”
“From what I recall, you gave that as a reason, just one among hundreds more, why you could no longer see yourself with me. Haven’t you wreaked enough havoc, yet? Dinner was a snake of a move, Ana.”
“I was being earnest. I asked papa to ask your father, if they could be my godparents.”
“An even more treacherous move. What is this for? To make me feel miserable? You’ve already moved on; there’s this wedding, for god’s sake.”
“I want you to feel how much you need me,” she said shakily. “I want to feel like I’m part of your life—”
“But you are no longer a part of my life. You’re a stranger, begging for a chance. A chance at what? I don’t want to be the cause of your wedding cancellations.”
“I still want it canceled”
“And yet you invited my parents. Are you insane?”
“Just say the word, Alex. Say the word, and I’ll drop it all. I’ll stop the wedding. I’ll tell everyone right away that it was a mistake.”
“This is a mistake, Ana.”
“Why don’t you want us to be together? We’re perfect for each other.”
“We aren’t.”
“And you think she’s perfect for you? You’ve got to be kidding yourself.”
“Why? Because she’s no match for you?” Alex laughed acerbically. “You were never perfect. It just seemed like it. And I put you on a pedestal all those years. I was afraid of any chance we’d break up.”
“Have you really moved on from me? I know you didn’t want to kiss me because you’re afraid you still have feelings for me.”
“I do still have feelings for you: feelings of distrust, feelings that shouldn’t have bordered on hate, but now I think I have a right to feel that way. You’re the master manipulator, and I let you drag me on for years. I didn’t wake up soon enough.”
“I was as crushed as you were when we broke up.”
“Crushed? Are you kidding yourself?”
“I just wanted you to change. It was a desperate move.”
“Oh, so the truth is coming out after two years? Now that you’re engaged to Mr. Governor’s son? An architect wasn’t enough for you. An architect without a name was nothing to you.”
“I knew you were going to be someone. I just wanted to push you in the right direction,”
she reasoned.
“I suppose I should thank you for it? Here I am, with a firm of my own, success at my behest. Not to mention women swooning over me for obvious reasons.” he told her sarcastically.
“I’m sorry I let you go,” she told him, her voice cracking again. “It was my mistake. I was too righteous. I wanted you to change for me, and I wanted you to change so you’d suit me better. I know now that I should have accepted you—”
“Why are you doing this? Why are you making things hard for yourself? Don’t you love the man you’re going to marry?” he was angry and confused. She was leading another man to self-destruction. He had only gotten out because of sheer will and family. Raul would be most unfortunate.
“I just can’t see myself with him. I said yes because the proposal was beautiful—”
“I don’t need to hear about this; it’s your problem and his,” he said. “Please go home, while I still h
ave the decency to say please.”
Ana Paula closed her eyes. “Why her?”
“Why not her?” he said heatedly. “I don’t care what your opinion is of her. She’s a beautiful person.”
“Inside and out?”
“Yes.”
“And you think I’m not?”
“What I think about you shouldn’t be your concern; what your fiancé thinks however, should be.”
She shook her head near violently. “I want to be with you, I don’t care how. You’ll love me again, just like before. You’ve always loved so easily—”
“What?” his eyes narrowed. Always loved so easily? Was this his reputation? The loser guy? A guy any girl could just parade around with for fun? “You think anyone can just make me fall in love?”
She shook her head. “It’s because you’re nice—”
“Cut the bull,” he said, “You want me back, but you want to insult me?”
She began to cry again, and it wasn’t even an ugly cry. It seemed like she could never look physically ugly. He had almost forgotten how she always took his breath away with her face and body alone. She was using this to her full advantage, coming into his apartment and crying, dressed in a plunging jumpsuit with a bomber jacket over it. Typical.
“Please, just go home,” he sighed, tired and feeling the effect of the liquor closing in on him.
“I’m sorry it had to end that way.”
“It was for us to learn. It had to end,” Alex told her, knowing that they had to break up so he could meet Iesha.
Without warning, Ana Paula lunged at him, grabbing his face, covering it with kisses. She was determined to kiss his mouth, and he tried to avoid it, tasting her tears in effect. He found himself losing balance, and he fell against the edge of the couch, his head luckily cushioned by a thick pillow.
“Damn it, Ana, stop, just stop—”
“Please, please just let this happen. Then you’ll see, then you’ll see how much we mean to each other, how perfect we are—”
“Alex?” a voice interrupted them.
Alex bolted up, his eyes wide open with shock. It was Iesha. She was here. Why was she here? The door was unlocked. He didn’t know she would be coming. Oh god, not this way, he didn’t want her to see him in such a position. A breath felt like an eternity, and Ana Paula quickly slipped off of him, staring at the newcomer by the door.
“You…” Iesha couldn’t say anything else. “You…” She was shaking her head, and she was shaking like a leaf.
What was he supposed to say? She would never believe him. She saw it with her own eyes. He looked at Ana Paula, who was breathing heavily, her eyes ablaze, staring at Iesha.
“Aren’t you supposed to get married?” Iesha suddenly uttered out, looking at Ana Paula.
It wasn’t accompanied by a look of murder; it was matter-of-factly said. In fact, she was too calm now. It unnerved him. He slowly stood up from the couch, afraid to take another step. He just wanted to take her in his arms, embrace her, and reassure her that it didn’t mean anything at all.
“I was,” Ana Paula replied, looking at Alex coolly.
Alex shot Ana a look of disgust. “Don’t you dare ruin what she and I have—”
“We have nothing,” Iesha said, staring at the two of them, back and forth. “We have nothing going on between us, but apparently, you two have something.”
“No,” Alex protested, “It’s not like that, please!”
He heard Iesha’s intake of breath, and it felt like a stab to the gut. She didn’t believe him. Of course she wouldn’t. He couldn’t move, even as Iesha left. He stood there for a few minutes, digesting what had happened. He slowly looked at Ana Paula, whose face was stoic.
“Get out of my house,” he said, “get out of my house before I call security.”
“You’re not going to do that,” she said. “I’ll leave.”
Alex was seething, and it took every ounce of his willpower to refrain from shouting at her. He had never shouted at her, even when they had fought before.
“Good bye, Ana,” he breathed out.
Chapter13
Well, she was certainly crying now. It hurt, and she didn’t know what was worse: the fact that she saw them together, about to get it on, on the couch or the fact that she was irrevocably in love with him and he didn’t give a damn.
We have nothing. We have nothing between us. She shouldn’t have said that. There was something between them, and maybe, just maybe, Ana Paula had gotten to him, ensnared him. Perhaps, he was never really infatuated with her, even if he said he was. There was that thin and fine line between a white lie and the truth.
She had walked home, walked all seven kilometers of it, her hoodie placed well over her head. How pitiful was this? How pathetic? That she walked home crying, alone, trying hard not to sniffle too loudly. Walking at that moment was better than sitting inside a cab, crying. She hadn’t made a scene earlier, which was important; she was as calm as she could be, even if she knew she was shaking already. How else would she have reacted? She didn’t even throw a hissy fit when her engagement party was interrupted by a pregnant stranger.
The scenes replayed in her head, and she desperately wanted to push them out. How? Drink liquor until I pass out? Call my mother and cry until my tears run dry? This was her doing, this was her choice, and she didn’t need to whine about it to anyone.
Stay strong, she told herself, shuddering. Was it the cold? Or was it from that emotional pain? A pain she wouldn’t have felt if she had stayed away from him. Would you have successfully stayed away from him? A voice inside her asked.
I was being greedy. I wanted to rake in all the happiness I could, she thought. Look where it got me.
She shouldn’t have gone there… or maybe it was a blessing in disguise that she had, just so she could see the depth of betrayal that people could be capable of—as if she hadn’t experienced that kind of emotional hell already.
Ana Paula was there first, and as much as she wanted to hate her, she couldn’t. Perhaps, she was still in love with him, far more in love with Alex than with the man she was supposed to marry. What was going to happen now? She could resign. She could resign right away and then go home. That was one option. Another option was to stay until her visa expired, but she knew that wasn’t feasible. They could run into each other on the street. The former proved to be the best option.
She would go home at the end of the week, she told herself. She would go home, and she would do what she did best; she would move on. I’ve been through worse. What makes anyone think I can’t pull through this? Why am I thinking I can get over this easily? Six months wasn’t enough; that was why she’d left home, and then to feel a fresh wave of pain … she didn’t deserve this. No one deserved to feel pain, but it happened anyway, and she just happened to fall in love at the moment she least expected it.
Ignoring it would do her no good; she knew she had to face it some time. She would give herself some breathing room. She would go on with her life, even if she cried every damn day—and it was the worst, and the best thing she could for herself.
*
He couldn’t find it in himself to run after her the night she left. He had felt defeated. He still felt defeated even if it had been two days since that incident. Life had a funny way of screwing things over, just when one thought things were under control. Ana Paula hadn’t contacted him since, but Anita had told him their invitations were sent to their parents’ house, his name included.
RSVP? He would RSVP, alright. He wasn’t going. Whatever Ana Paula was cooking up, he wouldn’t fall for that trap.
“I’m not going. Tell them I can’t make it,” he told her over his mobile phone.
“Alright,” Anita sighed. “If only you’d tell me what happened…”
“Iesha and I had a fight, because of Ana.”
“Because of dinner? Oh, Alex, I’m so sorry, if I had known—”
“We didn’t. It just happened. But yeah, we fought
, and I figure she probably wanted to talk about it, so she came over to my place… only Ana Paula was there, too.”
“What? Please don’t tell me she caught you with her in an uncompromising position?”
“It seemed like that. Ana Paula was hell bent on kissing me, just about the time Iesha walked in on us in the living room.”
“Oh no. Did you tell her?”
“Of course I did. Of course, she wouldn’t believe me. It didn’t look appealing.”
“And Ana? Wait, why was she there?”
“She wanted to call off her wedding. It seemed so unreal. Maybe a year ago, I would have taken that into consideration, risk a few death threats.”
“Where is Iesha now?”
“I don’t know,” he sighed. “I haven’t seen her since two nights ago. Maybe she’s at her place. I couldn’t. I don’t think I can go and face her.”
“You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“The fact that I entertained Ana Paula was wrong.”
“I’m guessing she was crying?”
“Yes.”
“Alex, you’re such a softie. It’s almost hopeless.”
“I don’t know what to do.”
“Do you love her?”
“Why the hell are you interviewing me now? I’m just telling you I don’t want to go to that woman’s wedding.”
“I saw you happy. That counts for something. And she was happy with you. I like her, Alex. I’d like you to be happy with her.”
“I don’t think I—”
“You should hear yourself, giving excuses. Why are you still in your house? Shouldn’t you be out there? Talking to her?”
He took a deep breath, and exhaled deeply as well. “Will she take me back? And that was a rhetorical question.”
“I’d say yes to your rhetorical question,” his sister said. “Well, what in the hell are you waiting for?”
*
She had just gotten back from doing groceries on a cold afternoon, when she heard an irate voice, an American, no doubt, arguing with the apartment staff and security guard. The staff was doing their best to placate the man, while the visitor demanded to be escorted to the same floor she was in.
