Read Online Losing Clementine by Ashley Ream - Free Book Online Page A

about it?
    He set my café con leche on the bathroom counter along with two packets of sweetener, gave my shoulder a quick peck, and then disappeared into the bedroom. I heard the television switch on and the unmistakable cadence of a soccer announcer’s voice.
    Great. What did that mean?
    I sneeze-dried my hair just until it was no longer dripping down my back, then parted it to the side and pulled it into a stub ponytail at the nape of my neck. People who are trying not to appear needy don’t spend too much time with their hair.
    The bellman directed us to a local breakfast place that looked much like an off-brand Denny’s and was located in a strip mall next to a nail salon.
    The waiter brought us a basket of room-temperature pastry with our menus. There were a couple of minibaguettes, what looked like a single-serving pumpkin pie but surely wasn’t, and a bit of folded dough that strongly resembled a British pasty. I bit into that one and was disappointed. The goo inside was from a fruit I couldn’t discern but was not unlike the gel that surrounds chunks of apple in a pie. I left most of it uneaten.
    We each ordered combo plates and orange juice. The juice came right away in old-fashioned fountain glasses with straws. Richard wasn’t talking much, and when he did, I felt like a visiting relative he hadn’t seen in several years. (“Hey, look at that. A lady cabdriver. Don’t see that too often, do you?”) We had officially entered the postsex twilight zone, where everything was off and potentially dangerous. It was a relief when silence settled in to stay.
    I watched a middle-aged married couple divide their food. She gave him her beans. He passed her extra tortillas.
    â€œWe never got there.”
    â€œWhat?” I looked over at Richard, who was looking at the same couple I was. “We never got where?”
    â€œNever mind.”
    Our food came. My breakfast was ham, tortilla, eggs, salsa, and bacon piled one on top of the other with a side of beans and tripe. The tripe had the texture of a fibrous vegetable combined with the undeniable flavor of meat. I left it on the plate.
    â€œWhat are we doing today?” Richard asked.
    I picked up a crumbled piece of bacon with my fingers and ate it.
    â€œI have some medicine to buy.”
    â€œWhere are we going to get it?”
    The orange juice had bits of pulp bigger than normal. It gave me the odd feeling of needing to chew what I sucked up through the straw.
    â€œI’d rather go alone.”
    He put his hand on my knee under the table. I’d put on shorts that morning, and his hand was hot on my bare skin. I wondered for a moment if he had a fever.
    â€œWould you stop trying to do everything by yourself?”
    My heartbeat started to pick up, and my skin felt cold and damp. What would I say? Yes, Richard, just step around that dog food while I ask about some large animal tranquilizers?
    â€œJust this part,” I said. And the part where I jam a needle into my vein while lying in the bathtub, you know, in case of fluids.
    â€œI want to come with you.”
    â€œYou are here with me.”
    â€œYou know what I mean.”
    â€œLet’s have carnitas for lunch.”
    â€œWe’re eating breakfast right now.”
    â€œIt’s never too early to plan.”
    After we paid the bill, we made our way out to the street to flag down a cab, which was turning out to be easier to do here than in New York, and offered another five-dollar bill to be taken across town to Avenida Revolucion.
    The heart of Tijuana sits in a bowl surrounded by hillside neighborhoods packed so tight there is not one bit of ground to be spotted between the houses. At sea level, we zipped around the traffic circles, which replaced every major intersection, and past billboard after billboard mostly advertising mobile phones.
    The air felt twenty degrees hotter than when we left the hotel. Even the sky looked bleached and