The North Down South - 6. 6. Losing my head over you

Pull the lever. Open the valve. Pump the gross brown fluid out. Close the valve. Release. Pull the lever. Open the valve. Pump the fluid out. Close the valve. Release.

I’ve always hated bleeding brakes.

“You know there are vacuums for this,” I said, facing away from Marian, who sat near behind, enjoying her hard-earned lunch break. “They’ll suck the fluid right out in a flash. Really cool stuff.”

Marian answered through a mouthful of milanesa sandwich: “If you don’t mind me using your paycheck money to buy one of those, be my guest. But it’ll be some three month’s worth of it, from what I’ve seen.”

I groaned into the bike.

Pull the brake lever. Open the valve. Pump the gross brown fluid out. Close the valve. Release.

Just as I was starting to miss the workshop, I got stuck with the gross brown brake fluid no one bothered to change in way too long. Seriously, how do people live with their bikes like this? You just know the brakes will get spongy if you don’t regularly bleed the fuckers.

Even the things you love will drive you insane from time to time.

Motorcycles.

University.

My boyfriend.

Like how a whole week had passed since that fight with his mom, and he still wouldn’t tell what it had been about. Not that I was pushing him, but it would’ve been nice to know what was making him upset. Because it was clearly making him upset still.

He was moody all the time. When he wasn’t angry, he was spacing out. I’d bent my schedules to see him as much as I could that week only to spend hours watching him stare at his phone with a pout on his face.

Lauti, of all people. The one who was always saying I needed to open up more and talk about my feelings. “Communication is important, Valen.” “We’re a team.” A meaner version of me would’ve thrown those words back at him.

Why couldn’t he trust me like I trusted him?

Pull the lever. Open the valve. Pump the gross fluid out.

Couldn’t he see how worried I was?

Close the valve. Release. Pull the lever—wait, when had I last checked the reservoir?

“Fucking motherfucker.”

“Ow, the reservoir drained?,” asked Marian disinterestedly, still busy with her stupid sandwich. “Well. Now that’s gonna be full of air.”

“Yes, Mariana, thank you,” I snapped back. “Could’ve used a little help over here, but don’t fucking mind me.”

I realized, perhaps a little too late, that I’d responded with a bit more aggressiveness than I would’ve liked.

Marian said nothing to that, but her silence was probably worse than any witty comeback she could’ve come up with.

Neither of us said a word while I finished bleeding the rest of the Yamaha’s brakes. Thankfully, at one point Marian turned up the volume on the radio, and the sound of early 2000’s rock nacional drew the curtain on the awkwardness between us. Or maybe only I felt awkward. Most likely.

When I was done with the final caliper, she handed me a wet rag and helped me wipe the last remaining bits of fluid on the bike.

I said: “Thanks.”

“No prob.”

She eyed me for a good moment.

“So are you going to tell me what’s up, or are you simply going to keep being a menace in my own workshop?”

I shrugged.

“It’s nothing.”

“Is it?”

She knew me too well for me to bullshit her.

“It’s… It’s Lauti.”

“No wonder.”

“Yeah. Well.”

I made my best attempt at summarizing what had happened and what the current situation was like. Why I believed Lauti was upset and why his being upset was making me upset. And worried. And sad. But mostly upset.

Throughout my explanation, I could see Marian slowly raise her eyebrows in quizzical fashion.

“Valen,” she said once I was done. She looked amused. “I can’t believe it. You and your boyfriend are literally the same person.”

I narrowed my eyes on her.

“I don’t need this from you right now.”

She chuckled to herself and shook her head. “Listen, kid. I honestly think you’re going about this the wrong way. This”—she gestured toward me—“isn’t about you.”

I blinked.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it just seems to me like you’re taking it personally that Lautaro is not talking about his feelings. And that just… doesn’t have anything to do with you. You’re a good partner. He’s just bad at talking about his feelings. That’s something you should sympathize with, in my opinion.”

I kept my eyes down.

“I guess.”

“You’re getting better at that, though.”

I allowed myself to draw a smile. I supposed I was.

“So what should I do?”

Marian put a firm hand on my shoulder. I almost didn’t mind that it was caked in brake fluid and grease.

“Just talk to him,” she said. “Frankly. With direct questions. Just like he would with you.”

I groaned.

“That’s always the answer for everything, isn’t it?”

“It is, young padawan. It really is.”

***

It might come across as a surprise, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t dedicate all of my time to thinking about what I was going to say to Lauti. The uncertainty did, however, meddle into my thoughts all the time, as if every second I spent not thinking about it was somehow time completely wasted. It was like driving a car when one of the doors is not properly closed and you keep hearing the annoying little beep.

I spent the entirety of my physics class fidgeting, unable to concentrate on what the professor was saying at all. I was barely paying attention—so much so that I didn’t realize the class had ended until the sound of chairs and desks moving and people standing up to their feet brought me back to reality.

“Hey,” Caffa greeted me from the seat next to mine. I somehow hadn’t realized he was there. “You okay? I called your name like three times during class but you looked pretty lost in thought.”

“Oh,” I said. “Yeah, sorry. It’s just…”

Caffa gave me a side smile. “Vectors, am I right?”

“Yeah. Vectors.”

Without realizing it, I was following him as he made his way to the campus buffet.

“You know, you never RSVP’d on that study group thing.”

“Um, yeah, sorry,” I said, more of a mumble than actual spoken words. “I’ve just… I’ve had a lot on my plate.”

Somehow we were sitting down. When had we reached the buffet?

“I figured,” said Caffa. “You were zoning out pretty bad back there. Did you even take any notes?”

“Uh, not really. I lost track of the class like, ten minutes in.”

“Hm,” he narrowed his eyes, but the smile on his mouth never seemed to falter. “I’ll send you pics of my notes later. No need to thank me.”

“Well,” I said. “Thanks anyway.”

He gave me a thumbs up by way of answer. I was just now realizing he was once again dressed in all-black: black t-shirt, black jeans, black sneakers, black piercings. It must’ve been his thing.

I was just about to make a comment on it when he recognized someone behind me. Within seconds a group of at least six people had sat on the same table as us, engaged in a very loud, very intense conversation.

“Sorry,” Caffa said. “These are the guys. Guys, this is Valentín, he’s in my physics class.”

The Guys all proceeded to introduce themselves to me, one after the other. There were, to my surprise, two girls in the group. But that was about as much information as I managed to absorb by the time they’d finished their round of introductions.

One of them, a short girl wearing what appeared to be an anime t-shirt, asked: “Are we eating here or do we get something over there?”

One of the boys shook his head emphatically in return. “Are you out of your mind? Over in Recoleta they’re going to charge twice as much as here.”

Everyone seemed to have very strong opinions on this matter. I was, to say the least, very lost.

Caffa commanded the group to a halt and looked straight across the table at me.

“What do you think, Valen?”

There were now seven pairs of eyes on me.

“Um. Where are you guys going, again?”

Caffa blinked. The smile on his face gave way to a bemused expression.

He said: “The National Library. We’re going to revise, remember? Study group. Ring any bells?”

Wait. Fuck. That was today?

Today, like, now?

“You’re coming, right?”

“Uh…”

I thought about it. Part of me did want to go (and knew I needed all the help I could get if I wanted to pass this exam), but I also felt like if I didn’t deal with this whole Lauti situation I was never going to be able to concentrate on any goddamn math problems.

It was also, if I recalled correctly, halfway across the city.

“I don’t know…”

“C’mon,” Caffa said. “We’re probably going to go get drinks afterwards. It’ll be fun.”

I shook my head. “I brought my bike. No drinking for me.”

Something in Caffa’s bright blue eyes lit up right then.

“You ride a motorcycle?”

I raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah?”

“That settles it then. You’re definitely coming.”

And just like that, I was going.

***

I don’t usually take strangers with me on la Gorda. And by usually, I mean never. There’s a strange fear I’ve got, it’s an irrational thing. I know riding motorcycles is inherently dangerous, there’s never not going to be an element of imminent disaster to it. And I don’t mind riding bikes myself—I’ve been doing it since I was a kid, after all—but when it comes to other people?

What if they fall off? What if they get hurt?

What if they die because of me?

I never take strangers with me on the bike.

That’s exactly what I told Caffa when he asked me if he could come with me to the Library.

He’d simply said: “But I’m not a stranger.”

And next thing I knew, we were dashing through the 25 de Mayo, my helmet on his head, my hands gripping the handlebars like my life depended on it (I mean, it kinda did—and so did his.)

The guy had a talent for talking others into things, alright?

Or maybe it was just me.

When we eventually got to the library and found a decent parking spot for la Gorda, he hopped off with all the excitement of a little kid at Christmas. The helmet had made a mess out of his hair, but he didn’t seem to mind, as he exclaimed:

“That. Was. Fucking. Awesome.”

I guess he was just really into bikes.

The revising itself was actually pretty helpful. I suppose it made sense, but being in a place made specifically for studying with a bunch of people who were in the same position as you really put you in the mindspace to engage with the numbers and concepts and focus.

A certain methodology was laid out early on: we would work on our problem sheets on our own, try to solve as many problems as we could, and then after thirty minutes or so we would all exchange our sheets and try to see what we got right and what we got wrong.

Surprisingly, I found I was doing pretty well compared to the rest.

Before I realized, it was getting dark outside and the people on other tables around us were starting to leave. We decided to pack things up and the group began the (now characteristically intense) discussion on where to go for drinks, which I took as my cue to embark on my way back home.

Caffa was the only one to notice me trying to sneak out.

“Bailing already?”

“Yeah,” I said. “It’s a long way to Lugano, you know?”

“Tell me about it,” he said. “I’m from Mataderos.”

I smiled. “Ah, I see. So you get the struggle.”

We both nodded at each other in mutual understanding.

“Well,” I cleared my throat. “See you at the exam then.”

“Yes, Valentín, see you at the exam,” he said. “And may the odds be ever in your favor.”

Caffa was, I decided, an odd fellow.

But not necessarily in a bad way.

I made sure to check the time and any new messages I might’ve received throughout the evening before hopping back on the bike. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the last message I’d sent to Lauti, some good 24 hours before, remained unanswered. Two blue ticks: read and ignored.

Right.

I still had to take care of that, didn’t I?

I found myself wishing I had Caffa’s supernatural persuasive powers.

Or Marian’s no-nonsense attitude.

Or Tomi’s natural empathy.

Honestly, I would have settled for anyone’s anything.

Being Valentín, Lautaro Saez Li’s boyfriend, had never been such a daunting challenge.