Never Leave Again

señor ivorra

We decide, quite logically, on a starting point. Manuel's information is useless – except for how it shrouds the mystery in more darkness than I had anticipated and has, in fact, spurred me on.

I bring her back to my apartment, though she somewhat leads the way seeing as she visits her mentor often enough to have the location memorised. I tell her about the box of letters, and how it is physically quite flimsy but somehow the heaviest thing in the world to me. Of course, her first question is about my failure to read them. My hesitance to answer, which mirrors exactly how I feel about the actual box, explains it all.

Hand-in-hand, we climb the flight of stairs to my door. Marta is out – her exact whereabouts were not revealed to me when she hurried past me this morning – and the apartment has been left in its usual state: her mess collected in heaps in the corners, only marginally getting past the hygiene rule. Clàudia is amused by it. This place is very different to the home she lives in.

"I've never been here before," she says as I fill up a glass of water for her, gesturing for her to make herself comfortable somewhere. She pushes a dirty plate to the side, leaning on the worktop.

"You can see why." I laugh. "It's not too bad. She cleans up." At her sceptical eyebrow raise, I add, "eventually."

"I have to meet Marta properly. She seems great."

The thought of that makes me shudder, though I am not entirely sure why. Clàudia drinks her water, gulping it down as if the walk was really a hike through the mountains, and I decide that I cannot stand looking at the kitchen any longer and lead her to my bedroom.

She laughs again, this time at how bare it is.

"We definitely cannot have sex on this," she says, plopping down onto the mattress with a giggle. The springs groan under her weight, and my sheets are beginning to pull off the edges already. "Looks like Patri will have to find some reasons to leave our apartment. Maybe she can walk her birds."

"Can you even walk birds?"

It is the most stupid thing I have ever heard.

She thinks about it for a moment. "I don't know, but she could try. It would give us the place to ourselves."

"You're planning activities that you haven't yet invited me to." She smirks, which is her way of asking. The blush that she annoyingly incites is her answer. "Alright, pack it in. Just moments ago you were raving about always wanting to have been a detective."

Reminded of the reason she is even here in the first place, she sits up straighter, eyes wide with excitement.

"Is that it?" she asks, nodding towards the box I had pushed to the edge of my room. I like to stare at it before I go to sleep, imagining that it holds the key to everything in the world. Or I am simply Pandora in a Greek myth, and I am going to unleash chaos. Perhaps either is welcome, because life would be boring without a little bit of drama (and that drama is not going to be about my sexuality anytime soon).

I gulp at the thought of having to try to lift the lid once more, slightly embarrassed that Clàudia will see such a pathetic display of mental strength. Slowly and with much apprehension, she gets off my bed, walking towards the box with a determination akin to crossing the finish line of an important race. A walking race.

She brings it to me, only letting go when she is certain I will not drop it. "You should open it, Talia," she says. Her reassurance is conveyed through the way she looks as if she wants to kiss me, and I am still unsure so she does it, too. My head whirls like a tornado, caught up in the feeling of her soft lips and the box in my hands and the fact that she is going to pull away any moment now and I will actually have to follow through with my decision to find my father.