Almost Never: A Novel by Daniel Sada, Katherine Silver Page B

Sunday. Work tomorrow. His need to recuperate made him averse to hearing any nonsense. Please! The surprise came in stages, until it bored into his very core: certainly it was Mireya, though … ugh … Mi-re-ya?! the lady pronounced the name … How might his magnificent lover have discovered his domicile? In the meantime, to avoid second- and third-hand information, unlikely guesses, twists and turns—so many!: the lady attempted to accompany him (wordily) to his room, but halfway there Demetrio stopped her: Listen! I am exhausted. Maybe we can talk in a couple of days. Doña Rolanda was offended by her lodger’s scorn. Did that matter?: perhaps in the end it would. However, just as he was about to fall into bed like a rotten tree trunk, Demetrio muttered one final sentence: This has gone too far. The following day he did not go to that dive, nor did he eat breakfast at the lodging house. Work. Pending issues. Gnashing his teeth against whatever he happened to eat. He ate green tamales in the market of Oaxaca. Two breakfasts—do you hear?! Avoid Doña Rolanda—disgusting! a torrential problem, and—enough already! Not till Tuesday afternoon, relaxed and ready, go to face her he must … Mireya, of course!, though … first, enjoy her …
    After making love with fury and imagination, it would be unsuitable for Demetrio to unleash a barrage of questions, especially considering that Mireya hadn’t uttered a word about her visit to his rooming house. Spent after achieving an extraordinary orgasm, she began to effusively caress her man. Her caresses felt more like clumsy tickles: giggles or pure joyous nervousness that, oh! Wait a minute! A form of distraction—triumphant? What was coming could be brutal … and in fact it was …
    “You came by my place. How did you find me?”
    “Do you want me to tell you?”
    “Of course.”
    “Well, you see, the last time you left here I asked a friend to follow you. The next morning I went there, and the landlady told me you weren’t in Oaxaca.”
    “What gave you the idea to do that?”
    “Because I want to live with you. I’ve made up my mind.”
    “But I don’t … not now anyway.”
    Such things catch fire, then flicker. To each of Demetrio’s negatives there rose from Mireya a new and affable perspective. She exhibited a red-hot wit, despite her troubles and her panic; wit spiced up with nicknames such as: my peach, my melon, my plum, instead of my love or my life; fruits, it would seem, that do not ridicule. And though Demetrio tried to slither troutlike out of her grip, something, some sticky residue, remained on the thin skin of those palms, as it were, but so it was.
    Let’s offer some prime examples so that we can penetrate the very heart of this knot: what if she went to live with him at the rooming house … No, that’s impossible, Doña Rolanda rents rooms only to single people; so he could rent a small apartment … No, because I’m about to put the down payment on the house; so in the meantime they could go live in a hotel, even a run-down one … No, because it would be a foolish expense; so he would tell Doña Rolanda (it was to Mireya’s benefit that this name had been revealed) that it was a matter of extraordinary circumstances … No, because she has very strong opinions, she is way too obsessed with the rules she has made; so he could slip her some money that would change her attitude … No, but … maybe … I don’t know … it’s a matter of finding out how much she would want, though I’m sure she would agree for you to stay with me for a few days, two, three … I really don’t know; so she would go in person and ask her … No, not that, definitely not. The escalating propositions had surely reached their peak, whether out of exhaustion or the curtness of the agronomist’s replies, but what Mireya did manage to descry was the image of a narrow path and the course she had to take. Possibilities would pop up along the way … The