Doubt Me Not

“You didn’t read the letter, stop pretending that you did!”

“I did, oh for fuck’s sake, I’m not talking in circles anymore, just spit it out already,” Sergio exasperatedly insisted for what felt like the thousandth time.

“You know what, Sergio? I don’t feel like I’m obligated to tell you jack shit at this point if you’re just going to keep lying to me!” Ximena decided and stopped her brisk walk under the glaring light of a lamppost, “You give me something true, and I’ll give you mine.”

“See, this is exactly what I mean, if you’re as bothered about what happened you have a sincerely fucked way of showing it,” Sergio ranted as he stopped alongside her.

“It hurts too much to try to deal with too much too quickly,” Ximena cried, crossing and uncrossing her arms across her chest as she vainly tried to grab for excuses to not delve into the past, “I’m not saying I never want to talk about it, I just need to focus on one thing at a time, and for me right now it’s finding Fiona in Madrid together.”

“It hurts you? You had disappeared on me! I’m the one left alone and hurting! You did it; you started all of this when you left!” He shouted, “You don’t get a choice anymore.”

Sergio was indignant and furious, here he was trying so hard to put their relationship at least somewhat on track, and she still tried to find him at fault when she was the one that had turned into a ghost on him.

“I had disappeared!?” She screamed back and pointed a finger at herself, “I had disappeared?! That’s all you have to say? Really, that’s all you’re going with? Well did you ever stop to think why I had to disappear? Did you stop to think that maybe this girl’s life went beyond sleeping around with some footballer in the summertime?”

Sergio looked hurt for a brief few seconds, but the expression snapped apart as he snarled, “Some footballer, that’s all that that summer comes down to for you, sleeping around? I told you I loved you, I would take care of you. I told you to come to Madrid with me. You told me you would and you didn’t!”

“And the very next day when I’m gone you tell Fiona you were going to dump me because you didn’t want to be young and tied down in a new city, and it hurt but what hurt worse was holding the ripped up pieces of the letter I wrote you explaining my situation. So let me just reiterate that I am not obligated to tell you shit because I tried once already and you just ripped it apart,” Mena yelled, breathing heavily as she watched Sergio’s eyes going wide.

“Look, I’m going to say this for the last time, I don’t know who the hell sent you what damn, ripped up letter, but I didn’t rip it up and sure as hell did not give it back to Fiona!”

He forced his voice to drop to a more reasonable level, “When you come to Madrid, I’ll show you the letter you wrote me.”

“I don’t want to talk about this, I made a mistake,” Mena relented even though she still didn’t see how it was possible for him to have the letter because she had last seen that letter ripped up in the trash in Miami, Florida ten years ago. She pressed on with their walk, taking slow, uncertain steps until she heard Sergio step up beside her.

“You may not need it, but I do. I do need to talk about this because obviously there’s been some huge miscommunication, Mena, so start from the beginning… tell me what happened before I completely lose my mind,” Sergio’s words tumbled out as he stared straight ahead, his tone perfectly reflecting the exhausted expression Ximena could not see.

A heavy silence lingered in the air as Sergio waited and Ximena struggled against obliging the man that had broken her heart then and was attempting to underplay it now. There was something reassuring to standing in the dark and catching Sergio’s stark expression lit by the glow of the nearing lamppost light she understood how childish she was being. She knew she was fighting a losing battle, and so with a final intake of breath, she recounted the night where her whole world stopped.

“Stefan died,” She blurted and stared straight ahead seeing nothing but memories dance before her. Ten years and still saying the words out loud sprung tears in her eyes, tears that she didn’t want Sergio to feel like he was obligated to deal with so she cleared her throat and feigned a nonchalance that was as transparent as glass, “That’s where it all started.”

It only took a second for Sergio to recall that Stefan was Ximena’s older brother’s name. He knew the pair never quite saw eye-to-eye. As far as he knew Ximena hadn’t been on the best of terms with any of her family members while she had been in Spain.

“So stupid,” She sniffled and shook her head, “He was called to New York for a last minute business meeting to sign some stupid paper for some stupid deal. They had chartered one of those stupid, small jets, the jet had a faulty engine, and it crashed.”

“That’s horrible, I’m sorry,” Sergio offered quietly.

“Can you imagine? I’m eighteen years old, getting ready for my date with you, we’re both excited about a move to Madrid, the possibilities were endless for us then. Just completely out of nowhere I get this call from my brother’s mother-in-law telling me my brother is dead and her daughter, Stefan’s wife, had to be hospitalized for overdosing on sleeping pills – with their freaking eight year old daughter in the house,” She recalled with a distant look in her eyes, she had tried so hard not to think about that first year in Miami, and now that she was, the tears were freely flowing down her cheeks at the awful nightmarish memories.

Ximena had spent so much energy into distancing herself mentally and emotionally from that first year, it had begun to almost feel as if those memories no longer belonged to her, and owning up to them now for Sergio’s sake was akin to opening the floodgates of all sorts of emotional backlash she wasn’t sure she could handle.

“I broke my phone, I completely lost it for a minute, I broke my stupid phone, and I didn’t have your number memorized so I decided to write you a letter,” Ximena remembered sullenly, “I wasn’t thinking coherently, and I didn’t want to waste time. I didn’t even pack my bags. I left everything and went to the airport. I gave Fiona the letter to give to you,” She pressed on as she glimpses of that night flashed before her eyes. She had been alone with Fiona in the dance studio, she hurled her phone towards the wall that held up a floor-to-ceiling window, and they both shattered.

“My own parents, even in all that awful grief, they still wouldn’t speak to me normally, wouldn’t even look at me,” Ximena continued unblinking, “They wouldn’t forgive me for choosing to live in Spain and becoming a dance instructor – and especially for not being as ambitious as my brother.”

Ximena noticed a deserted bench and walked towards it. She had grown tired of walking in her heels, and took a seat with Sergio joining her.

Sergio had the letter she had written memorized, each word, each punctuation mark was stamped in black and white in his mind, and none of this was mentioned. Instead, it was written about the arrival of a mysterious man that she had thought she would never see again. He had come to take her away and she would be gone by the time he got her letter. It said she was never coming back and that she never wanted to see him again.

But he couldn’t ignore the tears that glistened on her cheeks; he couldn’t pretend not to hear the distinct wobble in her voice as she spoke about the death of her older brother and the estrangement she had to deal with.

“And when I show up in Miami, there’s this precocious, highly manipulative eight year old that has never heard the word ‘no’ her entire life awaiting me. She’s been spoiled, absolutely rotten to the core, and absolutely no one was able to deal with her. She wouldn’t eat, wouldn’t drink, and she just kept screaming for her daddy, while her mother was getting checked into rehab for popping a few too many prescription pills. I am not exaggerating one bit when I say all I wanted to do was sit down and cry out for Stefan with her,” She continued with a mirthless, distancing smile, completely unaware of Sergio’s confused thoughts completely contradicting her memories.

“Sasha became your responsibility,” Sergio observed as it clicked that the eight year old was the now eighteen year old that Mena kept a constant, sharp eye on.

Mena nodded, “That’s what I mean when I say she’s my kid. I don’t trust her mother to take care of her. I don’t trust her grandparents not to spoil her. I couldn’t leave her in Miami, and I couldn’t very well take her away from her friends and family either.”

Mena leaned forward, balancing her elbows on her knees, and her chin in her hands as she continued, “So I stayed put, went to school while Sasha was at school, and helped keep my brother’s real-estate business from going under. I finally got the ambition instilled in me that my parents were so desperate for me to have.”
Sergio rubbed his hand against her bare back in an effort to comfort her, “I didn’t know, I swear, I had no idea.”

“I thought you didn’t care, I thought you wanted to move on and away from me,” Mena whispered with a dazed pout as she dropped her hands and turned her head to face him. She knew he hadn’t read her letter, and she took his words as an admittance of his past mistake.

“My whole world stopped, and you weren’t there to help me to get it to spin again. I still don’t know how I got through that first year without hearing your voice promising me that things would be alright,” Ximena added with the realization that for her the past no longer mattered. She was willing to be held culpable for it as long as they could finally move on and maybe try to be together, but she had an inkling that would be a long shot.

“I’m sorry that I made you rehash all of that. When we go to Madrid, I’ll show the letter, and you’ll see for yourself what’s written in it. I’ve seen your hand, and I need to show you mine,” Sergio persisted.

Ximena stared, forcing her expression to go blank. She wanted to be understanding, but she found it difficult when he brought up the duplicate letter that she was certain did not exist.

“You want to see if we can make the last dance?” Sergio suggested with a sudden zeal in his voice that Ximena knew was more than a little forced.

Ximena’s smile spread before she could think to decline his abrupt invitation, “Sure, let’s see if we can end this night on a decent note.”

Sergio was relieved to see the unsteady smile appear. He didn’t realize what sort of darkness he was pushing her into drudging up, and he hated himself for not being able to completely quell the voice of doubt at the back his head. He allowed the sharp little voice to continue to poke holes in her story that he knew she would need to address once they were in Madrid and facing Fiona.

Ximena shot Sasha a quick text with Sergio’s phone as they walked back to the apartment building where Sergio had parked his car. She assured Sasha that she was fine, and she wouldn’t be back for a little while longer. Sergio, ever the gentleman, opened the car door for Ximena before sprinting over to the driver’s side. They didn’t find a reason to speak during the brief ride to the outdoor party, but her hand found his over the center console. Ximena had no idea what to anticipate in the morning, but she chose not to dwell on the unknown. Instead she gripped onto Sergio’s hand and focused on hoping that the night would end better than it had begun.

Upon arriving at the outdoor location, they noticed that the party was definitely still in full swing. Neither person found themselves eager to join the upbeat tempo of the soiree after the conversation they had just had.

“Is it bad I was hoping for less people?” Sergio murmured upon noticing the dozens of people clumped together in semi-fancy dress.

“No, not at all,” Ximena shot back as her eyes went up the hill towards a neglected wooden gazebo perched at the very top.

“There,” She pointed, “Let’s go up there.”

Sergio grinned, “You think we can make it?”

“We’ve got a fighting chance.”

“That’s always been good enough for me,” Sergio surmised as he opened his door.

Somehow they found a way to skip the crowd, and trudge up the hill, undetected. Ximena had abandoned her shoes in the car and was easily matching Sergio’s quick strides. Sergio pulled out his phone from his pocket with the hand that wasn’t seemingly glued to Ximena’s as they drew closer to the old-fashioned, wooden gazebo that overlooked the party beneath them.

“Music,” He boasted, feeling clever with his use of modern technology, and settled the phone on the gazebo’s flat edge before turning to face Ximena and offering his hand.

The beginning melody lingered in the air, making Ximena’s words of agreement catch in her throat as they began to move to the music. The gentle start of the familiar beat sent goosebumps flying up Ximena’s arms, as her thoughts rerouted themselves around the music, “Ninna Nanna, wow, I have not heard this song since that summer.”

“I honestly wish I could say the same,” Sergio returned, choosing not to bring up the drunken nights he passed with the letter and Pink Martini as his company.

“I should have snuck away from Miami, I should have come to slap some sense into you,” Ximena murmured as her thoughts became too loud to keep in her head, “I should not have stayed away for this long. If I had just come then I would have known you never said those things, that it was impossible.”

“You should have,” Sergio agreed, as he rested his chin at the top of her head, lost in thoughts of guilt as he grappled with whether not he should make his own confession tonight.

“I’m here now,” Ximena whispered as she pulled back and looked up at Sergio, unaware of the little whirlwind of doubt and guilt spinning in his mind. All she saw before her was the boy she loved had become a man, and all she wondered was if the man standing before her would find a way to love the person she was now.