At the very bottom, there were three or four more pieces that, while made in the same way, expressed a different dynamic. It wasn’t easy to decipher them, either. The word that formed them was finally made clear by the curve of the c and the straight lines of the m. Li had written Carmen until she had cancelled out the name. It had been her attempt to prevent Carmen from returning, to ward off what she feared would happen. This was how she had meant to save us. These sheets of drawing paper, bought by the two of us, bore living witness to her silences.
When I closed the portfolio, I saw that Wen was watching me. He uttered phrases, laying his fragile hand on my shoulder. I kept nodding as if I understood and agreed, now that I understood that I wasn’t a victim of abandonment but of a war that had been lost.
After my visit to Wen, not only did the same questions remain unresolved, but I felt an even more urgent need to find some answers. It wasn’t enough to have seen Li’s torment expressed in her drawings. The fact that a woman shattered by men had decided, with much premeditation, to have a relationship with me remained a deep mystery. Why had I been chosen? Invoking random chance or accusing her of thoughtlessness resolved nothing. None of those explanations clarified our history together. Besides, why had she allowed me to penetrate her with devotion, passion, and delight, when Carmen Lindo was about to return and Li had decided to go back to her? Why was she sacrificing me? Why was she, as I was convinced, sacrificing herself? I had already glimpsed an explanation when I visited Wen at the Asian products store. Now I needed to know more, whether or not it would do me any good.
During the first days after she disappeared, when I went to the restaurant to look for Li, I had run into the imperturbable faces of the stressed-out boss and his wife, who shed no light on the subject and tried to keep me from talking with the employees. It was unlikely in any case that the cooks, who had been pretty friendly with me, would be able to clarify things, given how limited their Spanish was. But I didn’t even get a chance to find out. Then I remembered the Dominican woman who took orders on the side of the double restaurant with the cheap menu. She was a friend of Li and must know something.
Just an hour before they closed, I found myself in front of the shuttered entrance to a building across Avenida Muñoz Rivera. The windows on the expensive side of the restaurant, where Li had worked, were darkened and nothing inside could be seen, but the neon lights and plate-glass windows turned the other part of the restaurant into a sort of light box. Three lone diners and one couple sat in the booths. The Dominican woman sat reading behind the cash register. In front of me, at the traffic light, an addict mechanically begged, using a paper cup from the restaurant.
While I waited for closing time before crossing the street and walking in, I remembered how often I had ordered food from the Dominican woman, never imagining that someday I might be begging her to answer my questions. Li had mentioned her once or twice. Her name was Glenda and she studied at a beauty academy. She was my last resort.
Shortly before ten, when only one diner remained at a booth, I entered the restaurant. Resigned to waiting on one more customer just before closing, the Dominican looked up from her book. When she saw who it was, she stood.
— Li isn’t here, she said before I had a chance to ask anything.
— That’s not why I’m here. I’d like to talk with you, if I can. You’re Glenda, aren’t you? Li told me about you. I know you’re friends. I’d like to find out about a few things. That’s all. It’ll only take a minute.
— That’s OK, but not here. They fired Li and the boss won’t like seeing you in his restaurant. Wait for me in front of the fire station. I’ll be there in ten minutes.
It was late and the stores around there were closed. Since I hadn’t brought the car, I suggested to Glenda that we go to a park in the neighborhood. It was one of those spaces hardly anyone used now that people were accustomed to living indoors. At its center stood a gilded bust with a congested head, huge and horrendous, covered in pigeon shit. It was Rubén Darío.
We sat by the basketball court under the light of a lamp post.
— You must know, I have, or had, a relationship with Li? I asked.
Glenda’s smile convinced me that she didn’t mind talking with me. She was maybe a couple of years older than her friend and was very unlike her. She dressed very flashily, her long nails painted with a wing design and her straightened hair dyed red. It was clear that her dream was to work in a beauty salon.
— I’ve known all about it since before you guys started, she said.
— What do you mean?
— I mean Li told me all about you two. We’re friends.
— But what do you mean, before we started? I asked.
— How she met you, the little notes she left for you, how she’d hide to watch you…
— Tell me. Li hardly told me anything.
— That chinita’s crazy. She gobbled up a book by you, a real, real sad one, and went around mooning over your photo. Since she was going to the university then, she saw you over there and saw how you spent all your time walking around. Around Ponce de León, around Río Piedras, around Santurce. She got curious why you did it, why you wandered around with nowhere to go, always by yourself. Since she’d shown me your photo, I realized you came in sometimes for a fried rice from the restaurant, and I promised Li I’d let her know if I saw you. Sure enough, one night you came in and I ran out to tell her, but then the boss complained I’d left the customers waiting. Li came over and stood there eyeing you from the door between the two places.
“We spent a lot of break time imagining who you were and why you were alone. I guess you know Li doesn’t like men, well, before she was with you, she said she didn’t like them. That’s why when she told me she was writing stuff for you and leaving it where you could find it, I thought she’d gone crazy or she was in love. Everybody’s time comes. Even for women who don’t know they’re ambidextrous, apparently.
“I kept up to date about the hunt the whole time it was going on, and I went with Li more than once when she hid out and spied on you to watch your reaction when you opened the envelope or saw what she wrote on the ground. My being there was also good to throw you off the trail in case you saw us at it, since it meant Li wouldn’t be alone, and you couldn’t tell which of us was the one with the messages. But you never caught on to us — you’re so dumb — and we had lots of fun. Sometimes I told her: Li, stop bugging the poor guy, go introduce yourself to him already. What could go wrong? He’s weird, but so are you, and you like him.
“But Li kept on reading and rereading whole books, and writing little notes that she’d leave for you God knows where. And so on, till you guys met in San Patricio Plaza. My cousin loaned me his car so I could drive her there and back that night. When she told me she had left without saying good-bye, I gave her a good talking to — after disappearing like that, I thought you’d never give her the time of day. But that didn’t happen, you were too patient for that, and, well, you know the rest of the story.”