Read Online This Too Shall Pass by Milena Busquets - Free Book Online
Authors: Milena Busquets
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only thing that alleviates me is physical contact, however fleeting or casual or light. I’ve had to close all my books since I’m incapable of reading, of finding consolation in them now; they bring me back to you, your house lined with bookshelves, your meticulous annual library cleaning, vacuum cleaner in hand, our expeditions to London to find yet another treasure of children’s illustrations, the hours sitting together on the bed in the hotel poring over them, I more distracted, coming and going and doing other things, you completely absorbed like a little girl.
“You can tell if someone really loves books by the way they look at them, how they open and close them, how they turn the pages,” you used to say.
Same as with men, I thought, and sometimes said. And you would look at me, half shocked, half amused, half grande dame, half woman who lost no opportunity to enjoy herself in life, and you’d laugh. We were never the type of mother and daughter who confided absolutely everything to each other, we were never friends, we never shared intimacies; I think we always tried to be a more decent version of ourselves to each other. I remember how amazed you were the day you told me that maybe you’d have to take me to see a doctor if I didn’t get my period soon, and I told you nonchalantly that I’d had my period for two years now, and that I didn’t say anything because I didn’t think it was your business. We were in the car and you slammed on the brakes, looked at me open-mouthed for a few seconds, and finally accelerated when the people behind us started honking angrily. And we never brought up the subject ever again.
I can’t open a book now without thinking of you, but with men it’s different. I knew from a very young age, instinctively, that I needed to keep this part of my life from you, or you might invade it too, with your ego, your generosity, your insight, and your love. You watched me from afar when I fell in and out of love, take a good licking and get back on my feet. You enjoyed my happiness and let me suffer in peace, without too much of a fuss or giving too much advice. I guess you were partly aware that you were the love of my life, and no other stormy love affair would ever come close to outdoing ours. After all, we love the way we were loved in childhood, and all the love that comes afterward is only ever a replica of that first love. I owe you, then, all my later loves, even the blind, wild love I feel for my boys. I’ll never be able to open a book without wanting to see your calm, concentrated face, without knowing that I’ll never see it ever again, and what is perhaps even worse is that it won’t ever see me again, either. I will never be seen through your eyes again. When the world begins to depopulate of the people who love us, we become, little by little and following the rhythm of death, strangers. My place in the world was in your gaze and it was so unquestionable and perpetual that I never bothered to find out what was there. Not bad—I was able to remain a little girl until I was forty years old, with two children, two marriages, a slew of relationships, several apartments, several jobs, and now I hope I’ll be able to make the transition into becoming an adult and not go straight on to old-ladyhood. I don’t like being an orphan; I’m not made for this depth of sadness. Or maybe I am, maybe it’s the precise size of pain, maybe it’s the only dress left that can fit me.
—I can feel that you have a knot inside. There’s a lot of tension here, the beautician-witch tells me. —Can I place my hands on your heart?
I reluctantly say yes. To begin with, my chest is not a place for strange middle-aged women to place their hands, I don’t care if she is a witch. She places them gently, and I can feel her heat through the silk of my dress. But I can’t relax, I’m too self-conscious of the intimate nature of the gesture. Thirty seconds later, she removes
“You can tell if someone really loves books by the way they look at them, how they open and close them, how they turn the pages,” you used to say.
Same as with men, I thought, and sometimes said. And you would look at me, half shocked, half amused, half grande dame, half woman who lost no opportunity to enjoy herself in life, and you’d laugh. We were never the type of mother and daughter who confided absolutely everything to each other, we were never friends, we never shared intimacies; I think we always tried to be a more decent version of ourselves to each other. I remember how amazed you were the day you told me that maybe you’d have to take me to see a doctor if I didn’t get my period soon, and I told you nonchalantly that I’d had my period for two years now, and that I didn’t say anything because I didn’t think it was your business. We were in the car and you slammed on the brakes, looked at me open-mouthed for a few seconds, and finally accelerated when the people behind us started honking angrily. And we never brought up the subject ever again.
I can’t open a book now without thinking of you, but with men it’s different. I knew from a very young age, instinctively, that I needed to keep this part of my life from you, or you might invade it too, with your ego, your generosity, your insight, and your love. You watched me from afar when I fell in and out of love, take a good licking and get back on my feet. You enjoyed my happiness and let me suffer in peace, without too much of a fuss or giving too much advice. I guess you were partly aware that you were the love of my life, and no other stormy love affair would ever come close to outdoing ours. After all, we love the way we were loved in childhood, and all the love that comes afterward is only ever a replica of that first love. I owe you, then, all my later loves, even the blind, wild love I feel for my boys. I’ll never be able to open a book without wanting to see your calm, concentrated face, without knowing that I’ll never see it ever again, and what is perhaps even worse is that it won’t ever see me again, either. I will never be seen through your eyes again. When the world begins to depopulate of the people who love us, we become, little by little and following the rhythm of death, strangers. My place in the world was in your gaze and it was so unquestionable and perpetual that I never bothered to find out what was there. Not bad—I was able to remain a little girl until I was forty years old, with two children, two marriages, a slew of relationships, several apartments, several jobs, and now I hope I’ll be able to make the transition into becoming an adult and not go straight on to old-ladyhood. I don’t like being an orphan; I’m not made for this depth of sadness. Or maybe I am, maybe it’s the precise size of pain, maybe it’s the only dress left that can fit me.
—I can feel that you have a knot inside. There’s a lot of tension here, the beautician-witch tells me. —Can I place my hands on your heart?
I reluctantly say yes. To begin with, my chest is not a place for strange middle-aged women to place their hands, I don’t care if she is a witch. She places them gently, and I can feel her heat through the silk of my dress. But I can’t relax, I’m too self-conscious of the intimate nature of the gesture. Thirty seconds later, she removes
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