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By Root 376 0

whatever distance had established itself between us the previous night had closed. Her breath smelled terrible and I told myself to commit that fact to memory, to remember it the next time I was intimidated by her unwavering grace. I told her I was going out for coffee. I got dressed, took my bag, and stumbled downstairs and out onto the street and walked until I found a café. Right as I was about to order, I realized I had no money; I left the café to find an ATM. Eventually the stone street widened into a modern avenue and I found a Deutsche Bank, where I withdrew the unreal currency. Still half-asleep, I put the cash in my wallet, and began to walk in what I thought was the direction I had come from, but after a few blocks I realized I was wrong. I retraced my steps and passed the bank but my confusion deepened; maybe I’d been right before. I asked a man, probably Roma, who was sitting in a doorway, where El Barrio Gótico was. He pointed and, although I headed in that direction for many minutes, I couldn’t find the ancient streets. I decided to have some coffee and entered the next café and ordered an espresso, asking the man who served me for directions. He drew me a confusing map on a napkin and I thanked him, deciding to take a cab.

Then I saw Isabel pass by. I had often thought I’d seen Isabel over the last month or two. This time I felt sure, despite the improbability, and I put down various large coins without finishing my coffee and set off after her. It wasn’t until I was in pursuit that I wondered why I wanted to catch her; I had nothing to say, though I had the indeterminate sense I owed her an apology. She crossed a busy street and by the time I got there the traffic was flowing and I had to wait. It took forever for the light to change and I wasn’t sure it was still her I was trailing but I pursued a woman with something in her hair; she ultimately disappeared around a curve. I stopped again and asked a woman selling cut flowers how to get to El Barrio Gótico and she gave me Metro directions. I thanked her and flagged a cab. When we arrived at the neighborhood’s edge, I went again in search of coffee. I found a café, bought two espressos to go, and walked deeper into the neighborhood, turning onto a street I thought I recognized. I did not know the name of the hotel. Soon I noticed the coffee was cold and I drank mine quickly and threw both cups away. I felt irritated and stupid and sat down on a bench to let my head clear. A blind man was selling lottery tickets nearby, shouting something about fate. I felt like a character in The Passenger, a movie I had never seen.

When I resumed my search I gradually realized I no longer remembered what the façade of the nameless hotel looked like exactly; I could have passed it many times already. I didn’t have Teresa’s phone number. I estimated an hour and a half had elapsed since I left. Hungry, I entered yet another café and ordered yet another coffee and also a piece of tortilla, which I hated before it arrived. I told the waiter I was looking for a hotel whose name I didn’t know on a street whose name I didn’t know and could he help me; we both laughed and he said: Aren’t we all. When I finished eating I tried again, feeling like an actor whose wanderings were being used as an excuse to shoot the scenery. After I don’t know how long, surely more than an hour, I found myself in a small plaza and sat down, defeated. My irritation turned to worry; it simply would not be believable to me if I were Teresa that I had left the hotel to get us coffee and had gotten lost for however many hours would have passed by the time I found her. And even if it were somehow believable, I didn’t like what such a story would do to her image of me, an image about which I was actively, maybe increasingly, concerned. I would fare better in her eyes, I thought, to disappear mysteriously for several days than to show up like a lost child, dirty and exhausted, as night fell. With something like desperation, I resumed my wanderings. I started to feel a little crazy, space curling around the