My Soul Tells Me You Are Fucking Around
Let’s call her Sofia. This Sofia, our Sofia, used the spare key her lover Javier Manzur gave her to discreetly enter the third-floor studio apartment in Miami, FLA. After gently closing the door behind her, she stopped to gaze up at her lover hanging by his neck from the ceiling fan with the assistance of an orange extension cord. She looked down at the floor before her while covering her mouth like if she was about to throw up. After regaining her composure, she locked the door behind her. There was no time for sentimentality, she must hurry and collect all her belongings before the body was discovered.
She went to the bathroom first and opened a drawer on the right side of the cabinet which held many of her feminine hygiene products and threw them all into a linen grocery bag she found under the sink. She opened a second drawer and took out a hot comb and threw that into the bag. She left her shampoo in the bath and then went to the small closet next to the bed.
From the closet she grabbed panties, thongs and a Victoria’s Secret lingerie outfit and threw them all into a small pink suitcase that was next to the bed. She also grabbed a pair of jeans, a yellow dress with white polka dots and thick red high heels and it all went into the suitcase until it was so packed, she had to sit on it to close it. After making sure the suitcase could lock, she looked under the bed and grabbed yet another pair of high-heels—black this time--and noticed a gray cat with white spots trying to hide.
Sofia and the cat looked at each other. The cat had very expressive yellow eyes.
“Mimi,” she said, “Come out here baby. Do you want a snack?”
The cat meowed like if it was replying to the question. It was a sweet noise, like a child pretending to be a cat. It was high pitched, but adorable and endearing.
“Mimi,” she said again. “I’m sorry baby. Don’t worry okay; I will come back for you. You will come home with me and Simón Bolívar. Just give me some time honey, okay?”
The cat meowed again not moving an inch. But for a second, Sofia thought that it would come to her and if she did, she was ready to grab the cat but she didn’t. The cat stayed in its place under the bed scared and sad and confused why her daddy wasn’t responding.
Sofia stood up and put the high heel shoes she grabbed from under the bed in the linen bag.
The bedroom of this studio apartment had a partition with a hole in the center that looked into the living room and the low hanging legs of her dead lover Javi. She tried to ignore the body as she bit her thumbnail and canvassed the area of the living room to see if she’d forgotten anything. Her eyes were getting a little red. She looked at her right hand, and removed an engagement ring and put it in her pocket. She replaced it with another ring with a much bigger rock.
When she heard footsteps coming from the outside stairway, she stood still like a mannequin. She had an oval face with hazel eyes that were big and beautiful and her mouth was big too, almost like a clown. Her body was petite like a French ingénue and she was so proud of it, she welcomed the comparisons.
After waiting without hearing any further noise from the hallway, she opened the door and placed the linen bag and the small suitcase outside and right on top of ‘Welcome’ mat. She then gave Javi one more look that was full of love, anguish, and regret, and stepped outside, quietly closing and locking the door to the apartment. Before grabbing her things, she took out a handkerchief from another pocket and wiped the door knob of any fingerprints. She then almost quite literally flew down the three flights of stairs with linen bag and suitcase in each hand like a cute anime cartoon of a Japanese schoolgirl and got in her black car and left.
She was running late to meet her friend Maria for brunch in East Las Olas. She called her friend as she jumped on I95. Sofia knew she needed to touch base with her first, then after that quick call have a good long cry on the drive about Javier Manzur and all the improper things she keeps repeating in relationships since she was about 15. It was a 35-minute drive with traffic so she would have enough time to go through all the emotions with plenty of time to clean up if she had to.
When she arrived at the place, she redid her make up in the car under the shade of a big Royal Poinciana tree. After pursing her lips in the mirror, she went to meet her sometimes BFF.
As soon as Sofia sat down, Maria said she and her husband Toni Felipe, were getting a divorce.
Why, Sofia asked, what happened?
She caught Toni Felipe cheating with a colleague, an American woman named Samantha. A woman who had much bigger breasts than Maria. A woman they called “the Floater.” A woman that Toni Felipe always mentioned, and always tried to change the subject. They worked closely together so he had no choice but to mention the Floater from time to time and Maria had no choice but to ask about the Floater from time to time as well. It was a deeply confusing state of affairs in order to confuse Maria about the affair.
The happy hours Maria mentioned, well, Sofia was also familiar with.
Do you really want to get a divorce?
Sofia, of course. What would you do?
I am just playing a devil’s advocate. Antonio Felipe has a lot of money. You could make him suffer. You haven’t been married long enough, Sofia insisted.
Maria was confounded in spirit and expression of her face.
And you did sign that prenuptial agreement, which I advised against.
I love him, she said. I believed in it. I thought we were in love.
Sofia rolled her ghost eyes. Not her real eyes. Her real eyes, those pretty hazel eyes, she focused on her friend’s mouth. But her ghost eyes, which are kind of like your Third Eye, she rolled them all the way back to the back of her head.
A prenuptial is not true love, my friend. If a man really loves you, he will bare himself naked in body and spirit silly girl. When you marry, you transform into a new organism. They are the host and you must feed. If the man is worthy, this new being will flourish but if the man is weak and selfish it will all collapse and in order for you to survive the disaster the husband must be cannibalized until nothing is left of the previous person.
Maria’s own face was aghast, until her foggy eyes changed into a gaze of understanding.
Sofia grabbed both her hands and softly rubbed them with her own, squeezing them tight.
You’ll be okay, Sofia said, but you must listen to me.
Yes, she said. I will.
When Sofia got home to her own husband, she took a much-needed shower and went to bed.
She did not mention anything about Maria. Her husband was usually too disinterested in Sofia’s friends and their conversations. As a matter of fact, he didn’t even really like any of her friends or their husbands. He hated couple’s outings and being forced to befriend the husbands, pretending to be interested. He never thought marriage would be so boring but oh well.
Love you babe, he said. Love you, she said back to him and a pop-pop kiss and right to sleep.
At around 3:00am in the morning Sofia dreamt she was giving birth. She saw herself distraught, pushing and pushing. The doctors stood in their long, white coats like aliens surrounding her. When the baby came out it had an umbilical cord wrapped around its neck.
It wasn’t crying. It was a silent baby.
She awoke abruptly. After realizing it was just a bad dream, she turned on her side and away from her husband.
Then she held on to her stomach and curled into a ball.
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