morning only a small cluster remained, drinking beers in the living room, leaving us the balcony as our kingdom. And I did feel like royalty, strangely exalted, poised up on my perch over the city, watching people walk the streets of San Telmo, leaving bars or friends’ apartments with their arms around each other. Perched up there I felt for the first time that I could own the city, and it could own me back.
“I love your apartment,” I said. “It’s the best in Buenos Aires.”
He laughed. “How do you know?”
“I know things,” I said, with mock imperiousness.
“Ah! So do I.”
“Oh really? Like what?”
That’s when he kissed me. He tasted of cigarettes and eucalyptus and beer. I had only kissed high school boys before, never a grown man, and everything about his kiss took me by surprise: its skill; its supple confidence; the measured pleasure his tongue took in my mouth, the hints it gave of skills and pleasures yet to come; and my own response to the kiss, the places that opened widely to receive it, not only my lips but my thighs (and this alarmed me, I rushed to close them but his hand was there and so they stayed half-parted, listening to his light touch) and hidden places in my being where I’d long stashed parts of myself that could not be allowed into the light. I’d never guessed a kiss could do that. I should have stopped but I could not, we kissed for a long time and I could have kept on longer. I didn’t want it to end. I could have toppled over the rail and continued as we crashed together down the streets of Buenos Aires, limbs entangled, joined at the mouth, tumbling blindly through alleys and boulevards, knocking down kiosks and café tables on our way to the sea.
He took me out to dinner the following week. We sat in a warm Italian restaurant, the kind with dim lights and dark red walls and black-and-white photographs of other eras crowding every corner. I felt far from the suburbs, transported to a Buenos Aires that, though only a train ride away from where I had grown up, still felt somewhatforeign. I had determined that I would not talk about my family yet, and had devised various strategies for avoiding the topic, but as it turned out, it was shockingly easy. Though, I thought as the meal progressed, perhaps I should not be so shocked: he was a man, after all, accustomed to filling the air with his voice and being listened to, all the way from the reading of menus to the last spoonfuls of dessert. With just a few prompting questions from me, he told me about his father, who was from Mar del Plata, and his mother, who was Uruguayan, and how they had met on vacation in Piriápolis, a little town on the Uruguayan coast. His father was in medical school at the time, though he had hidden this fact from the girl he was pursuing to make sure that, if she returned his attentions, it would be for the right reasons, as he did not want to marry a social climber who would try to keep him from his dream of ministering to the poor. When he finally told her, at the end of an idyllic seaside week, he expected her to light up with delight, All this in a man and he’ll be a doctor!, but she looked at him without expression for a long time and then said, So you’re a medical student.
He nodded.
And a liar.
No, he said quickly, of course not, I don’t lie.
And that story, she said, about dropping out of school?
He stopped cold, or so it was always told to Gabriel throughout his childhood, by both tellers; they agreed on the fact that he stopped cold in that moment and had no idea what to say. It was a test, he finally confessed.
She said, And you failed.
He thought of protesting this, pointing out that he had not been the one being tested, but then he gave up and nodded. I’m sorry, he said, I’ll never lie to you again.
And therein, they told their son years later, lay the secret to their long and happy marriage.
They moved to Buenos Aires, where Gabriel’s father worked fora clinic
“I love your apartment,” I said. “It’s the best in Buenos Aires.”
He laughed. “How do you know?”
“I know things,” I said, with mock imperiousness.
“Ah! So do I.”
“Oh really? Like what?”
That’s when he kissed me. He tasted of cigarettes and eucalyptus and beer. I had only kissed high school boys before, never a grown man, and everything about his kiss took me by surprise: its skill; its supple confidence; the measured pleasure his tongue took in my mouth, the hints it gave of skills and pleasures yet to come; and my own response to the kiss, the places that opened widely to receive it, not only my lips but my thighs (and this alarmed me, I rushed to close them but his hand was there and so they stayed half-parted, listening to his light touch) and hidden places in my being where I’d long stashed parts of myself that could not be allowed into the light. I’d never guessed a kiss could do that. I should have stopped but I could not, we kissed for a long time and I could have kept on longer. I didn’t want it to end. I could have toppled over the rail and continued as we crashed together down the streets of Buenos Aires, limbs entangled, joined at the mouth, tumbling blindly through alleys and boulevards, knocking down kiosks and café tables on our way to the sea.
He took me out to dinner the following week. We sat in a warm Italian restaurant, the kind with dim lights and dark red walls and black-and-white photographs of other eras crowding every corner. I felt far from the suburbs, transported to a Buenos Aires that, though only a train ride away from where I had grown up, still felt somewhatforeign. I had determined that I would not talk about my family yet, and had devised various strategies for avoiding the topic, but as it turned out, it was shockingly easy. Though, I thought as the meal progressed, perhaps I should not be so shocked: he was a man, after all, accustomed to filling the air with his voice and being listened to, all the way from the reading of menus to the last spoonfuls of dessert. With just a few prompting questions from me, he told me about his father, who was from Mar del Plata, and his mother, who was Uruguayan, and how they had met on vacation in Piriápolis, a little town on the Uruguayan coast. His father was in medical school at the time, though he had hidden this fact from the girl he was pursuing to make sure that, if she returned his attentions, it would be for the right reasons, as he did not want to marry a social climber who would try to keep him from his dream of ministering to the poor. When he finally told her, at the end of an idyllic seaside week, he expected her to light up with delight, All this in a man and he’ll be a doctor!, but she looked at him without expression for a long time and then said, So you’re a medical student.
He nodded.
And a liar.
No, he said quickly, of course not, I don’t lie.
And that story, she said, about dropping out of school?
He stopped cold, or so it was always told to Gabriel throughout his childhood, by both tellers; they agreed on the fact that he stopped cold in that moment and had no idea what to say. It was a test, he finally confessed.
She said, And you failed.
He thought of protesting this, pointing out that he had not been the one being tested, but then he gave up and nodded. I’m sorry, he said, I’ll never lie to you again.
And therein, they told their son years later, lay the secret to their long and happy marriage.
They moved to Buenos Aires, where Gabriel’s father worked fora clinic
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