El blog de Érika

— Do you miss him?
— Yes, especially now…
— Why?
— Because it’s Oscar season.

The Shape of Water — Guillermo del Toro, 2017 | Image: elmulticine.com

January 2018. The harshest winter I’ve ever experienced since moving to this country — and the best excuse to seek his warmth. He wasn’t just a great lover; he prided himself on being a true cinephile, a great connoisseur — and he really was. It became an addiction to debate films and make love in front of the TV screen in that tiny room where scents and sweat blended with the intensity of nicotine that had seeped into the walls. If I close my eyes and take a deep breath, I can still recall the memories of cigarettes and wine, even now, despite all the time that’s passed. The memory is so strong that nostalgia hits me every time I ride in a smoker’s car. It was something I liked — toxic, I know. Toxic, like everything that had to do with him.

It snowed a lot back then. I remember it well because I nearly had a thousand accidents while driving. My stubbornness for refusing to take public transport, and the snow’s own stubbornness for showing up uninvited with its deceitful beauty. Every time it snowed, I wanted to sleep with him. But you don’t understand — you can’t imagine it. We could lose ourselves completely in caresses and critiques, biting comments about performances, plot explanations, or simple notes of admiration for directors of every nationality.

And there I go again, justifying us…

We made love watching The Shape of Water, before and after Coco, and I must confess that I fell asleep during Phantom Thread — even though I adore Daniel Day-Lewis — and I swear I really tried. The days that followed were perfect in complicity and magic because he never missed the chance to throw in one of those comments only we understood: a line, a song, a reference that made me smile and transported me back to those delicious moments when I melted in his arms and nothing made sense — or maybe everything did, I’m not sure anymore. Ambiguity was always there, as constant as my fear of losing him, as his inconsistency, as my desperate need for those moments to never end — clinging, dragging myself into an abyss of dependency and lack of awareness that usually ended in weeks of tears and frustration that no tea nor escape could fix.

Because I ran. I lost count of how many times I ran. But to escape from him, I would first have had to escape from myself — from my twisted loneliness and my pathetic habit of begging for scraps of love. He didn’t love me. He was a good lover, a good friend, a great movie companion, and if you must know, a good cook and even a decent barista — but not a good prospect for the kind of stable relationship I thought I needed or wanted. He never sought the same thing, and even though I always knew that, the toxic charm of attachment made me believe that maybe he did — that somehow I had to save him, rescue him from his personal hell because, according to me, that’s where the problem lay: he needed a woman to teach him how to love, and that woman could be me. I wanted it to be me.

Today, I don’t know if I was right or terribly wrong, but he looks fine, just as he is. It doesn’t seem to affect him, and of course, I doubt he misses me the way I miss him. A few days ago, I dared to look him in the face again and exchange a few words. If only he knew how beautiful his eyes are when they reflect in mine — if he had ever tried to understand the way I saw him: like a huge soulless animal, a wounded brown bear, a lion —dangerous and lethal— with that hypnotic voice and that smooth hiss that could disarm in three different languages.

And I cursed him. I hated him so much that it took me a long time to want to watch Roma, despite loving Cuarón with all my soul —and it being right there on Netflix. I hated him because my mind had built a scenario where I was naked and tangled in his arms while those black-and-white scenes of that Mexican neighborhood played on the screen. I remember texting him once, saying something like, “You’re going to sleep with me, and we’re going to watch Roma, because Cuarón…”

He didn’t reply. But that was his reply. I just refused to see it —blinded by this toxic attachment and the contradiction of his mixed signals. But the truth is, being kind was simply his way of being —not because of me, or because he loved or cared for me— that’s just who he is, a kind guy, period. It should’ve been clear the day we went to see Bohemian Rhapsody together. We did it in the coldness of a movie theater, and he barely turned his head to look at me, much less tried to brush his hand against mine. We enjoyed it, sure —but who couldn’t? Rami Malek is a walking work of art— but something between us had been broken long before. And I still refused to believe it.

After therapy, spiritual retreats, habit and mindset changes, and countless hours of meditation and reasoning, I’m finally at that point of understanding where I know I’ll never truly hate him, no matter how hard I’ve tried, and that no matter how much I loved him (or thought I did), I should have always been my own priority. I should have recognized the harm of clinging to toxic bonds full of emptiness and mixed signals. If someone wants to be with you, they will be. If not, they won’t — no matter how much we push or force things. It’s simply an elastic cord that will eventually snap and hurt us deeply.

I finally watched Roma, and a few other Oscar nominees too. Alone, in the comfort of my bed, with little Homero by my side. My cat falls asleep within five minutes, probably because none of them are Shrek, his favorite and the only one he watches sitting upright and alert. I watch and discuss them with friends over chat, and it’s fine that way. I’m fine that way, no longer pretending that the sun can be covered with a thumb or that the moon is made of cheese. I’m healing, little by little, recovering and detoxing at my own pace.

And as for him, I wish him the best.