Trying Not To Love You - Amabile Giusti Page 0,103

pink coat matching her pink hat, expressing her supreme happiness through all these colours. She even leaned over and kissed Igor on the cheek, dangerously close to his lips. The car moved off quickly, and she resisted the temptation to check the rear-view mirror.

Who knows when they’ll be leaving? she wondered in a fit of melancholy.

But then she told herself she didn’t want to know, didn’t have to know. She just had to live. Have fun with Igor that night, really have fun, and start all over again.

26

MARCUS

Francisca’s sleeping but I can’t. It’s almost dawn and I’ve been pacing around the apartment like a beast in a very small cage. I smoke and smoke and smoke some more, and a couple of times I stop at the door and think about going downstairs, but I don’t. I don’t have to do this. My woman is here, not somewhere else. I’ve been waiting for four years, and I’m not going to screw everything up for some random bitch. Sometimes I’d like to punch myself in the head to get Penny out of my thoughts. None of this makes sense; it’s total madness, it’s a disease. I’m here with the sexiest woman alive, and all I can think about is Penny. Can a man lose his mind in a few weeks? No. A man cannot lose himself in such a short time. And if that’s true, then this can’t be what I think it is, and it can’t last. It’s momentary madness, and if I refuse to give into it, it will pass.

I have beer in the fridge. I open one and drink it. Francisca gets out of bed and joins me. We smoke and drink and laugh and screw. This is the life I want. Tomorrow we’re leaving without telling anyone. We’ll be gone. Technically we’re not allowed – I’m on parole – but fuck the rules. OK, I’ve had four beers and some Johnnie Walker and I’m drunk, but if something is true when you’re sober, it’s also true when you’re drunk: it’s better to die on the run than live in a prison.

I finally fall asleep in a stupor of sex and alcohol. When I wake up it’s dark. Either it’s still night or it’s night again. I think we must have slept for hours. I get up and my head spins; I used to be able to hold my whiskey but now, after four years of sobriety, I admit I feel like shit. A cold shower is the best thing to clear my head. I need to go out and buy something to eat.

While I’m dressing, Francisca wakes up.

‘Wait for me, I’ll shower and go with you.’

We go downstairs and deliberately ignore Penny’s front door. I hold a cigarette between my fingers and take a deep drag and think Fuck you to whatever is behind that door. Luckily, we don’t see anyone; I don’t want to run into some decrepit old lady trying to make trouble.

It’s no longer raining outside but the air is freezing. The store is nearby and we walk. It’s strange to walk down this street with Francisca, strange to feel her next to me again. I thank Johnnie for the favour he has given me: I’m still too hungover to dwell on superfluous things, things that also include Penny.

But on our way back, each of us holding a paper bag full of gargantuan burgers and fries, my mission to stop thinking about Penny becomes impossible.

Because I see her in front of me, by the building, and she’s not alone. She’s getting into a car, and Igor is opening the door for her. She smiles, he smiles, and I stop smiling. The bitch is dressed like that day we went to the prison, and she’s wearing make-up, and she kisses him on the cheek and gets into his car, and he looks like some athlete who just won a race. Then they leave and I immediately want to know where they’re going and what they’re going to do – if he touches her, I think, I’ll tear off his arms. As this onslaught of thoughts hits me, I stop on the sidewalk and observe the car as it moves away. The whiskey is no longer enough, and I suddenly feel high, as if I’ve been drinking gallons of coffee, and yet suddenly foggy, all in the same infernal moment, but this is a different kind of fog, which has nothing to do with alcohol. It