The Original 1982 by Lori Carson Read Free Book Online Page B

There’s a good explanation.”
    I wait for it, the big lie sure to follow. Does he even know how to tell the truth? But perhaps this is too big even for a champion liar like him.
    â€œIt has nothing to do with how much I love you, Pajarito,” he says. “It just happened. I met someone. It just happened.”
    â€œBut you said you didn’t want to get married,” I say to him. “How could you marry her instead of me? How could you just meet someone and marry her, just like that?”
    He covers his face with his hands. He’s actually crying.
    â€œI’m so sorry,” he says. “I didn’t want to hurt you. I feel terrible. You know I’ll always love you.”
    â€œBut you’re someone else’s husband now,” I say.
    That’s when I should get up and walk out the door, but that’s not what happens. Instead, we undress one another and make love for the rest of the afternoon. The whole time, we cry and cry.
    Later that week, he packs his overnight bag and leaves for L.A.
    I see the announcement in the New York Times . His wife is a leggy beauty, a former model. In one more blow, the paper refers to her as his longtime love. She has a name similar to my own and they mistake us for the same person. Reading it, I feel as if he’s taken everything that matters away from me, even the history we share.

Nineteen
    L ittle Fish, when you lose someone you love, the color drains out of the world. Sounds seem muffled and far away. Your reaction to things happens in slow motion.
    I feel Gabriel’s eyes on me the way some feel watched by God. I hear his opinions about every thought in my head. There are constant reminders: favorite songs and restaurants, baseball games, boxing matches, parking garages, lottery tickets, the scent of frying onions. His new record is being promoted, too, so there are pictures of him in magazines and an advertisement at the bus stop. He’s on TV being interviewed by Geraldo Rivera. It feels like the whole world has taken his side and left me behind to fill an unfillable emptiness.
    At first, he still calls at odd hours. He promises he’s coming back to see me. When finally he does, we meet at his apartment. Before the door is even completely closed, he’s pushing my head down trying to get me to give him a blow job, and I know it’s his way of being loyal to his wife. She’s the one who hears now, “This is only for you, Mami.”
    I refuse to do it and he gets mad.
    I try not to obsess about his wife. I’ve seen pictures of her. She’s a sultry blonde with wide-set eyes and long muscular legs. I keep seeing some part of her when I look at him, her long leg wrapped around his waist, her downturned mouth against his throat. I see her influence in the way he dresses. New words and expressions fall out of his mouth. As I listen to him talk, all I can hear is how I’ve lost him.
    It’s almost a relief when I leave Gabriel’s apartment and return to mine.
    After that, he stops calling.
    The nights are the hardest. I can’t sleep or I have bad dreams. In one, I beat his chest in a rage, but he can’t even feel me. I cry my eyes raw. I wake up at three or four, and remember all over again. I lie awake, waiting for the sky to get light.
    I’m afraid my misery will bleed into you, and I don’t want that to happen. I hope you’ll be stronger than I am, capable and brave, that you’ll feel a bit of the entitlement your father sees as his birthright. It’s an easier life for him.

Twenty
    W eeks later I’m under the covers at three in the afternoon when someone rings the bell. My heart starts to pound; I’m not expecting anyone. I pull the pillow over my head and try to ignore it, but it sounds again. So reluctantly I get out of bed and say into the intercom, “Who is it?” My voice comes out whispery and ragged.
    â€œYou sleeping?” Alan asks.
    I pull