She was the shout, he was the echo.
She would say jump, and he would always ask how high.
Olga looked up, saw me, and stood, putting an end to their conversation.
“Hey,” I greeted them.
“Hello, darling. Is everything good?” my grandfather asked.
“Yeah, I’m going to my room.”
He nodded and smiled. But he didn’t look especially happy. Istarted away, but turned back when I heard her clear her throat to get my attention.
“Have you thought about what you’re going to do?” she asked.
“About what?”
“About your life from now on, obviously.”
Once again, I felt like I could barely breathe, like I was still flailing with my head just above the surface of the water. No: I still hadn’t thought about what to do with my life. I shrugged and remembered what Matías had said.
“I might go back to school. Go to María de Ávila, become a teacher.”
She sighed, and I prepared myself for some nasty response.
“You need to get a job. As quickly as possible.”
I nodded and left, and once in my room, I made an appointment with my doctor. Then I lay back on my bed and remained there for hours, sometimes sleeping, other times awake, until my sense of time vanished.
My mind was empty.
I was thinking of nothing.
And of everything.
Waiting for an explosion that wouldn’t come.
For a crack.
For a collapse.
For the rubble to fall at my feet.
The rubble of myself.
But there was none of that. Just tears. Bitter, salty tears. Hot, painful. Leaving me empty and numb.
Tears that had no real reason to be, because when I thought of Antoine, all I could hear was a little voice telling me this was how things went: Relationships start and end, and that’s it. I looked around in myself for rage, wounded pride, pain, the sense of betrayal and rupture. But I didn’t find those feelings anywhere.
And that terrified me, because what did it say about me? About him? About us? Was there anus?
Those tears didn’t have a clear motive, but when I thought of my now-vanished career, all I could feel was anxiety, fear of my grandmother. Her rejecting me. Her indifference. Losing her, too. She had only ever loved me in exact proportion to the perfection of my pirouettes and sautés. Would she still love me now that I was just me?
I was scared because if the answer was no, what was left?
Just me.
And who was I?
