A Crack in the Wall by Claudia Piñeiro

Author:Claudia Piñeiro
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781908524096
Publisher: Bitter Lemon Press

12

There are too many people on the corner of Rivadavia and Callao for a normal Saturday afternoon. And there’s too much noise. Why did he tell her to come here? Only he would think of asking a woman to meet him in a square where there are always people protesting with banners, flags, loudhailers and horns. He tries to see whether she is standing at one of the other corners, straining to see between the flags; there’s no sign of her. Could she be behind that tall man with the denim jacket? No, that’s not her. And it’s not the girl with black shades who’s crossing over from the square; it looks like her but Leonor is shorter, prettier, and her hair, even when it is tied in a ponytail, shines more. He turns again, pausing at each of the four possible directions. Lots of people, but not her, not Leonor. What should he do now? Just wait? Pablo toys with the zipper on his new cardigan, pulling it up and down a few inches, as if that movement makes up for his lack of action. He could call her to establish whether she has been and gone, or never came. He takes from his wallet the number that Leonor wrote down for him on a paper napkin. For the first time in his life he wishes that he had a mobile phone; today he feels that he needs one – if he had one she could have called him, then he would know what to do next and he wouldn’t feel so lost. He casts around him in search of a telephone booth then asks at a news stand, where they tell him that there is a call centre with phones half a block away. He checks his watch: fifteen minutes since the time they agreed to meet – more than fifteen, eighteen, nearly twenty. At the call centre, he dials Leonor’s number.

“Are you still coming?” Pablo Simó asks the girl.

“I’m standing on the corner. Where are you?”

He doesn’t answer but hangs up, leaves two pesos – more than enough to cover the call – and runs towards the corner of Rivadavia and Callao. From a little way off he sees her. She’s wearing a pink jacket – what could that mean? She still has the mobile in her hand, open, as though she were waiting for it to ring again. He runs as fast as he can.

“Hello,” Pablo says, trying to disguise his breathlessness, and while he’s wondering what to do next, she puts her hand on his shoulder, brings her face close to his and kisses his cheek.

“Hello,” she says. “Where were you?”

“In a call centre. I thought you weren’t coming.”

“I got here a while ago, and as I didn’t see you I went to buy some water,” Leonor says, indicating the bottle, from which she takes a sip before offering it to him:

“Do you want some?”

He looks at the girl’s hand on the bottle but says nothing, and Leonor, interpreting his silence as a “no”, takes another drink.

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