“No,” Rebeca interrupts her. “It’s okay.”
They look at each other for a moment. And Rebeca doesn’t know if it’s because of the rain, or because of the way Martina tucks several strands of hair behind her ear, but she lets a confession slip out:
“You know? Sometimes I think I never stopped missing you.”
Martina swallows, remains silent for a few seconds, and looks away.
“Me too.”
Rebeca leans toward her slightly. And Martina stares at her. Her eyes trace Rebeca’s face with deliberate slowness: herlips, her cheeks, her eyes… They hear another clap of thunder, and she snaps back to reality.
“Do you feel like grabbing a few beers?”
Chapter 11
The sound of glass clinking sets the rhythm of the afternoon as it begins to turn into night. The six beers they’ve shared between the two of them haven’t been enough to get them drunk, but they’ve been enough to ease that invisible tension that’s been with them since the moment Martina walked through the door of Rebeca’s apartment, soaked by the rain. Now the atmosphere in the living room seems different: warmer, more intimate, almost suspended in a kind of truce between the past and the present.
The storm has gradually lost its strength. You can still hear the rain falling, but it no longer beats down with the same violence as before. Through the large window, the sky appears a lighter gray, as if the clouds were slowly beginning to dissipate after the battle they waged throughout the afternoon. The light outside has become soft and diffuse, typical of those moments when the day refuses to fade away.
Martina Valcárcel leans back slightly against the sofa’s backrest, the small bottle between her fingers. Rebeca’s black sweatshirt is too big for her, and the long sleeves partially cover her hands every time she lifts the bottle to drink. That detail—so ordinary and yet so intimate—gives her a strange sensation she can’t quite put her finger on. It’s as if time had gone back several years and, at the same time, as if every gesture were a completely new experience. The fabric smells faintly of fabric softener andof her, of Rebeca, and Martina has to force herself not to close her eyes and breathe it in more deeply.
“As you can see, the years go by and I’m still a mess,” says Martina with a wry smile, setting the small bottle down on the coffee table. “Although at work, I promise you I’m much more organized.”
Rebeca watches her from the other end of the sofa with a slight look of disbelief. She doesn’t buy it for a second.
“I still remember how you used to leave everything scattered all over the house,” she replies, resting her elbow on the back of the sofa as she tilts her head slightly. “And the number of times you lost my manuscripts.”
Martina widens her eyes, feigning exaggerated indignation. She even puts her hand to her chest.
“That’s not true!”
The protest comes out almost automatically, accompanied by a laugh that escapes her before she can keep up the act.
“It’s just that you didn’t leave them where they usually were,” she adds, trying to defend herself. “You moved things around without warning. And I had my system.”
Rebeca shakes her head slowly, as if she’s been used to that kind of excuse for a long time.
“Sure. It was always my fault.”
She lifts the bottle and holds it in the air, inviting her to a toast.
“To our work,” says Rebeca. “And to the fact that we’re so much more professional than we were back then.”
Martina raises her beer to clink bottles with hers.
“That’s for sure.”
The two drink without taking their eyes off each other. During that brief moment, Martina feels something run through her body. It’s not just the effect of the alcohol. It’s a sensation she recognizes all too well: the tingling at the nape of her neck, the heat spreading through her limbs, the way her skin prickles when Rebeca looks at her like that, without blinking.
Every time a flash of lightning lit up the sky during the storm, her gaze had ended up resting in the same place: on Rebeca’s neck, on the line of her jaw, on the way the white light traced the skin of her face for a fraction of a second. And now, in the warm twilight of the living room, that image remains in her memory with unsettling clarity.
Rebeca sets the bottle down on the table and leans forward slightly.
“In the end,” she says, returning to the conversation, “you’re going to make me believe that you’re organized.”
Martina puts a hand to her chest with a theatrical gesture.
“I swear. I have planners and everything, reminders on my phone, even to-do lists.”
