Strangely enough, after that night I couldn't forget the poem. I won't say I thought about it constantly, but I thought about it a lot. I still thought it was bullshit, but I couldn't get it out of my head. One night when Arturo didn't come to La Sirena I went to Barcelona. Sometimes I get like that: I can't help myself. I came back the next day at ten in the morning, in terrible shape. When I got home he was in his room with the door shut. I got in bed and went to sleep listening to the sound of his typewriter. At noon he knocked on my door and when I didn't answer he came in and asked me whether I was all right. Aren't you going to work today? he said. Fuck work. I'll make you some tea, he said. Before he brought it to me I got up, got dressed, put on sunglasses, and went to sit in the living room. I thought I was going to throw up, but I didn't. I had a bruise on my cheek that there was no way to hide and I was waiting for him to ask me about it. But he didn't ask me anything. It was a miracle I didn't get fired from La Sirena that time. That night I wanted to go out for drinks with some friends and Arturo came too. We were at a pub on the Paseo Marítimo and then I met some other friends and we partied some more in Blanes and Lloret. At some point during the night I told Arturo to stop fooling around and devote himself to the things he really loved, which were his son and his novels. If that's what you care about most, devote yourself to them, I said. He both liked and didn't like to talk about his son. He showed me a picture of the kid, who must have been about five and looked just like his father. You're such a lucky bastard, I said. Yes, I'm very lucky, he said. Then why leave, you dumbass? Why risk your health, when you know it isn't good? Why don't you settle down and work and be happy with your son and find yourself a woman who'll really love you? It's a funny thing: he wasn't drunk, but he was acting like he was. He said other people's drunkenness had a psychological effect on him. Or maybe I was so drunk that I couldn't tell the difference between someone who was drunk and someone who wasn't.
Did you used to get drunk? I asked him one morning. Of course I did, he said, like everybody else, although usually I preferred being sober. I could have guessed that, I said.
One night I got in a fight with a guy who came on to me. It was at La Sirena. The guy was rude and I asked him whether he wanted to come outside and repeat what he'd said. I didn't notice that there were people with him. The guy followed me out and I got him in an armlock and threw him. His friends came after me, but my manager and Arturo talked them out of it. Until then I hadn't been noticing anything, but when I saw Arturo and my manager, I don't know what it was but I felt free, that was the main thing, and I also felt loved, embraced, protected, I felt like I was a worthwhile person and that made me happy. And then Pepe just happened to show up a little later that same night, and by five in the morning we were making love, and that really was the best. Total happiness. While we were in bed, I closed my eyes and thought about everything that had happened that night, all the violent things and then all the nice things and how the nice things had overcome the violent things, and without having to get too violent, the nice things, I mean, and I was thinking about all of that and whispering other things in Pepe's ear, and suddenly, bam, I started to think about Arturo, I heard the sound of his typewriter and instead of including that image, instead of saying to myself "Arturo is fine too," instead of saying to myself "we're all fine, the world's still turning," instead of that, as I was saying, I started to think about my roommate and his state of mind and I made a decision that I would help him. And the next morning, as Pepe and I were doing stretches and Arturo was watching us, sitting in the same place he always sat, I went on the attack. I don't know what I said to him. Maybe that he should take the day off, since he was his own boss, and go spend the day with his son. And if I said that I must have been so insistent that in the end Arturo let himself be convinced and Pepe said Arturo could come with him, that he'd give him a ride to Arenys.
That night Arturo didn't show up at La Sirena.
I was on my way home at three in the morning when I ran into him at one of the public phones on the Paseo Marítimo. I spotted him from a distance. A group of drunk tourists were hanging around the phone next to his, which didn't seem to be working. A car was parked at the curb, with the doors open and the music cranked up all the way. As I came closer (I was with Cristina), I got a better look at Arturo. Long before I could see his face (he was standing with his back to me, wedged into the booth) I knew that he was crying or about to cry. Could he possibly have gotten drunk? Could he be high? That's what I was wondering as I hurried toward him, ahead of Cristina. For a second, when I got to where he was and the tourists were giving me weird looks, I thought maybe it wasn't him after all. He was wearing a Hawaiian shirt I'd never seen before. I touched him on the shoulder. Arturo, I said, I thought you must be staying in Arenys tonight. He turned around and said hello. Then he hung up the phone and started to talk to me and Cristina, who'd caught up with me by now. I noticed that he had forgotten to take his change out of the slot. It was more than fifteen hundred pesetas. That night, when we were alone, I asked him how things had gone in Arenys. He said fine. His wife was living with a Basque guy and seemed happy, and his son was fine. So what else? I said. That's all, he said. So who were you calling? Arturo looked at me and smiled. That fucking Andalusian? I said. That bitch who's brainwashed you? Yes, he said. And did you talk to her? Only for a little while, he said, the English guys wouldn't shut up and it was annoying. So if you weren't talking to her anymore what the hell were you doing there, hanging on to the phone? I said. He shrugged his shoulders. He thought about it for a second, then he said he was getting ready to call her again. Call her from here, I said. No, he said, my calls are long and then you'll have a big phone bill. You pay your part and I'll pay mine, I told him gently. No, he said. By the time the bill comes I'll be in Africa. My God, you're such an idiot, I said, go on, just call, I'm going to take a bath, let me know when you're done.
I remember that I took a shower, then I put lotion on all over and I even had time to do a few exercises in front of the steamed-up bathroom mirror. When I came out Arturo was sitting at the table with chamo-mile tea and a cup of tea with milk for me, covered with a saucer so it wouldn't get cold. Did you call her? Yes, he said. And what happened? She hung up on me, he said. Her loss, I said. He snorted. To change the subject I asked him how his book was going. Fine, he said. Can I see it? Can I go in your room and look at it? He looked at me and said yes. His room wasn't clean, but it wasn't filthy either. Unmade bed, clothes on the floor, a few books scattered around. More or less like mine. He'd set up his typewriter next to the window, on a little table. I sat down and started to look through his papers. I didn't understand any of what he'd written, of course, but I wasn't expecting to. I know the secret of life isn't in books. But I also know that it's good to read, that it can be instructive, or relaxing: we agree about that. He read books, I read magazines like Muscle or Muscle & Fitness or Body fitness. Then we started to talk about his great love. That's what I called her, to make fun of him, your great love, a girl he'd known a long time ago, when she was eighteen, and who he'd seen again not long ago. His trips back to Catalonia had always been disastrous. The first time, he said, the train almost went off the tracks. The second time he came back sick with a temperature of a hundred and four, huddled sweating on the bunk, wrapped in blankets and his coat. And this girl let you get on the train knowing you were that sick? I said as I looked at his things, he really had so few things. She doesn't love you, Arturo, I thought. Forget her, I said. I had to leave, he said, I had to come see my son. I'd like to meet him, I said. I've already shown you his picture, he said. I just don't understand it, I said. What don't you understand? he said. I never would've let a sick friend get on a train with a temperature of a hundred and four, even if I didn't love him anymore, even if I wasn't in love with him, I said. First, I would've taken care of him and made sure he got better, at least a little bit better, and then I would've let him go. Sometimes I feel so guilty, I thought, but the strangest thing is I don't know why, I don't know what I've done wrong to make me feel that way. You're a good person, he said. So you like bad people? I said. The first time she was afraid to come and live with me, he said, she was only eighteen. Stop right there, I said, or you're going to piss me off. That girl is a coward, I thought, and you're an idiot. There's nothing left for me here, he said. Why are you being so melodramatic? I loved her, he said. Stop! I said, I can't keep listening to this ridiculousness. That night we talked some more about the fucking Andalusian and Arturo's son. Do you need money? I said. Are you leaving because you don't have money? Because you aren't making enough? I'll lend you money. Don't pay me this month's rent. Or next month's. Don't pay me until you have more than enough. Do you have money for medicine? Have you been going to the doctor? Do you have money to buy your son toys? I can give you a loan. I have a friend who works at a toy store. I have a friend who's an aide at an outpatient clinic. There's a solution for everything.