Free Divorce Is in the Air: A Novel by Gonzalo Torné Page A

Helen’s features could make. It was exciting not to know what face awaited me at the end of a kiss, or after she turned over, half asleep, or when, with one move in that game of bodies that settled us as a couple, her nose would come to rest a few centimeters from my eyes. She liked to order more food and drink than we could consume, and if I had to rush off, I’d let her stay draped over the unbound swan-skins, surrounded by the scent of bodies and the steam from the shower, dunking the succulent thighs of something like chicken into chemical sauces. We went back to the hotel from our first night, and we even visited the place that charged by the hour, though I regretted bringing her there. She was so lovely in the white shirt we’d bought at the market, the stockings with claret-colored thread that she wore to add a risqué touch. Girls in love can also be blank pages to paint upon.

    It’s hard for me to visualize Helen without adding filters that belong to the future of that couple who used to seek each other out under the welcoming Madrid skies. I’m learning to adjust the viewfinder so it only lets in enough light to show the Helen that fits this part of the story. And so I discover again, among clumps of insignificant phrases and lovebird idiocies, that she was living in a poorly ventilated dump with three other students (Peter, Mark, and the amazing Ali), that they had revoked her scholarship, that she was supposed to go back to Montana in one month but she didn’t have the strength to write to her parents and tell them, or to buy a ticket (and I never did figure out how she managed to stay afloat in Madrid without any money). Ultimately, if for a few weeks she’d nursed the dream of a reckless life in a Spanish paradise of tapas and bullfights, it was time to start bidding it farewell. So for her, our first night must have been like the lucid hangover of her dream state: here was a guy to sink her teeth into, a southern specimen, not too dark-skinned, who appreciated the touch of her splendid body, which was the only thing Helen had to offer. We were two naked and confused kids (because things weren’t actually going so swimmingly for me, either: bonds, shares, letters of credit, benefits, preferred stocks, property, contracts, and loans…all orbiting the flame that was gradually cooking my family) who found themselves at the end of their teenage boredom marked by plans gone awry, discovering that the greed they have for each other can occupy their minds for hours on end. That together, they can compress their worries into something that fits inside a fist.
    So when Helen showed up at my apartment in a green wool dress, wearing rain boots and dragging a suitcase with tags from suspicious airports, I thought about throwing her out—enough was enough. The impulse flashed into my mind the same way you realize you’ve cut your fingertip with a knife before you even see the wound or the blood. Helen stood stock-still with her feet together and her stomach sucked in, wheedling, with that lower lip of hers too thick to be taken for a sign of intelligence. She was quiet, she swallowed, she was solicitous. She told me that something beautiful depended on me, and I discovered I would have been a magnanimous god: I sent her out for bread and ham and half a liter of wine. I went into the bathroom and splashed water on my face. I understood fully, I knew perfectly well what that “you can stay here” really meant, but when I tried to make out the implications for my future, my sight grew dim. My gray matter has never been good at calculating the medium term, and for me the word “future” meant next Wednesday.

    It wasn’t hard to force the little lock and open her suitcase, though it was slightly harder to convince her it had already been broken. In one week I’d seen three-quarters of her wardrobe: there was the suit skirt, the striped T-shirts, the jacket that was too big for her, the red blouse with shoulder