The North Down South - 8. 8. Screaming "I love you" into the wind

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So here’s the thing about learning your boyfriend has been struggling with depression and an eating disorder for months while you’ve been oblivious to it all: it really doesn’t let you think about anything else. At least, in my case, I found myself unable to concentrate on any of my readings or at the workshop in the days that followed that afternoon when Lauti told me all the things he needed to tell me.

I spent as much time as I could hanging out with Lauti, and whatever free time I could spare I’d research about ED, depression, anorexia, mental health counseling, suicide prevention…

You know when you google a symptom and no matter what it is the first results will always tell you it’s a terminal disease? That’s pretty much the feeling I ended up with.

When Wednesday rolled around again and I was about to sit for my first exam, I was sure I was going to fail. How could I not? I’d spent the past few days doing everything but revising.

I thought I wasn’t going to be nervous at all, but some 10 minutes before the exam was due to start, just as everyone was walking into the classroom and sitting at an arm’s length from each other, I felt my stomach fill up with butterflies and a knot forming at the base of my throat.

There it is.

I thought to myself: I’m totally going to fail.

I had to stare at the exam sheet once it was placed in front of me for a few minutes. The words and numbers kept jumping around, and I had to take a few deep breaths to actually read what was in front of me.

Then, my pencil hit the paper, and I began.

It all went down in a blur. I took most of the allotted two hours to finish, and even when I did, I still took a few minutes to stare at the resulting work.

Then, I thought to myself: I might actually pass.

Heading out once I’d turned it in, I fully expected to go home and rest. I’d been awake since 5 am and I kept thinking about the leftover pizza in the fridge. I could practically hear the siren call of my bed calling to me all the way from Lugano. Right as I was leaving the classroom, though, I was intercepted by a familiar pale face.

“You took your sweet time, didn’t you?”

Caffa was dressed in his usual all-black, with that perpetual smile on his face. He appeared to be alone.

I said: “Yeah, I had to check everything twice for mistakes, you know?”

He nodded. “How cautious of you.”

I shrugged.

I didn’t really feel like talking about the exam.

“Where’s the rest of the guys?”

“They just left for the buffet. I’m heading that way, too. Are you coming?”

For a brief instant, a small part of my conscious mind took notice that Caffa had stayed back and waited for me to hand in my exam while the others had gone ahead. I chose not to pursue that particular train of thought.

“I’m actually thinking of heading home now. Been up since early.”

“Oh,” Caffa’s smile faltered only slightly. “That’s okay! You know, the guys and I are thinking of doing something Friday night, to celebrate our first exam, you know? You should totally come.”

“Uh, sure. Yeah, I’d like that.”

“Cool!” Caffa’s smile beamed at full power again. “I’ll text you the deets later, then.”

I waited until he was gone to allow my palms to meet my forehead in a heavy thud.

Since when did I have this thing for agreeing to things before I could double-check if I really had time to go through with them?

***

“Well, it’s just—It’s not just about my body image. I mean, it’s really all about my body image. But it’s also about feeling in control, you know? It’s like, by controlling what I eat—or what I don’t eat, and when, and how—It’s like I’m actively doing something. An achievement. And the achievement is… I’m saving myself from something terrible. Like the food in my body will do something terrible.”

“And what terrible thing is that?”

“Um… well, the weight gain, of course. But it’s not just that. It’s… the guilt, I suppose. The guilt is pretty bad. It’s probably the worst part, actually. It’s like a vicious cycle, kind of. Does that make sense?”

“It does make sense, love. But that doesn’t mean it’s right. Food cannot be terrible. Your body needs food.”

Lauti went quiet for a minute.

Then, he said: “I wish you didn’t know just how messed up I am in the head.”

“I don’t think you’re messed up!” I said, perhaps with a little too much force. “You’ve got… a thing. Everybody’s got some sort of thing, or things. Some of our things just make life more complicated for ourselves. And right now, your thing is making your life sort of complicated.”

“It’s making your life complicated.”

“No!” I said. “It’s not.”

He rolled his eyes and gestured toward the kitchen table that separated us, occupied by a pot full of spaghetti that neither of us had touched in over twenty minutes.

“So this is not inconveniencing you at all?”

I shook my head.

“Nope. I’m happy to wait for as long as you need.”

“I’m just not sure this is… helpful.”

He looked like he was about to cry.

“Lauti, love, you have to eat something. I’m not asking you to eat a full plate. Just a bit. I can make you something different, if you want? Or we can order something. But you have to get some nutrients in your body, you know?”

He went silent again.

“Can I, um, can I just have some fruit?”

I sighed in relief

“Yes. Of course you can.”

Sometimes you just need to learn to take whatever victory you can take.

***

There was a circle on my chest. Lauti had drawn it there with his fingertips: over and over and over again, tracing the same circle, the same repeated motion. We’d been laying in bed for an hour or so.

I know he was trying his hardest not to let it show just how mortified he was about this whole thing. I knew he felt like telling me had been a bit of a mistake, and I wasn’t sure how to convince him it hadn’t been.

I wondered how long it would take before we got used to this new dynamic in our relationship. I wondered if we would ever get used to it.

“So,” he said, still not lifting his head from his spot between my chest and my arm. “Are you going to tell me how you did on your exam?”

I shook my head no.

“That’s confidential information, Mr. Saez Li.”

He hummed, and I swear I could feel the vibration of his voice resound in my chest.

I ran my hand through his hair. I decided that I liked the way his hair felt when it was this long. Soon, I thought, he would be able to start pulling it up in a little ponytail. I briefly entertained the image of what that would have looked like.

“Um,” he said. “I’m seeing the lady I told you about on Friday.”

‘The lady’ in question was a therapist one of Corina’s coworkers had recommended. Lauti had expressed mixed feelings about going back to therapy, but all of us (including him) agreed it was probably the healthiest option going forward.

I placed a kiss on the crown of his head.

“That’s amazing! Why didn’t you say that earlier?”

“Dunno.”

“I can go with you if you want. Give you a ride, you know.”

He said: “I’d like that.”

“And…” the words were practically coming out of my mouth before I’d properly thought about it. “You know, the guys from my study group are getting together on Friday night. If you’re feeling up to it…”

He made a face.

“Won’t it be weird? Bringing me along when it’s just people from your uni?”

“I don’t think so,” I said, even though I was not entirely sure that was true. “I want you there.”

That last part was true.

“Ugh, I don’t know, Valen…”

“Lautaro,” I brought him closer in my embrace. “You need to start leaving your house. You need to start doing things, meeting people. You can’t keep splitting your time between your apartment and mine.”

He didn’t say anything to that.

“Please?”

He groaned.

“You’re a terrorist, Valentín Gómez. You keep terrorizing me.”

“I terrorize you with love.”

“You’re a love terrorist.”

I brought his fingers to my lips, and I kissed them, and I held him close, and somehow the warmth of his body next to mine told me we would get by just fine.

***

It doesn’t take much digging to learn that eating disorders have very little to do with food. It sounds counterintuitive, but all the Google searches and all the websites will say a variation of the same thing on the second or third paragraph: “People with eating disorders use food to deal with uncomfortable or painful emotions.”

I can’t say I remember my mother ever skipping a meal (at least, not willingly), but I do remember her dealing with uncomfortable and painful emotions. It was an undeniable aspect of Fabiola Benítez Vera that she was not okay.

I remember her crying so loud I was sure the whole building could hear her, and I remember not knowing why. I remember her getting angry for no reason, lashing out at me or my dad and storming off only to return a few hours later acting as if nothing had happened.

I mostly remember her praying. She would pray all the time. Not necessarily at times when it was expected—saying grace before dinner or at night before going to bed—, she’d just randomly join her palms and start whispering to herself in the kitchen, in the middle of cooking food, or at the bus stop. Sometimes she would make me pray with her.

She would always ask for forgiveness.

I never really wondered what was wrong with her, exactly. She was simply weird. I also thought my dad was weird, in his own way. My mother loved me, and she made sure I felt that love, so why should I have dug deeper? Why should I have questioned what she had going on in her head? That was my reasoning, at least. And by the time I was old enough to rationalize her behavior she’d been dead for a long time.

Time and my boyfriend had made me come around. Here I was, reading more and more about eating disorders and about depression and then I was clicking, and clicking, and going down rabbit holes and reading about bipolar disorder, and OCD, and it was just impossible not to connect the dots. I couldn’t stop myself from going over the lists of symptoms and thinking about her, replaying the scarce memories of her I could save from the depths of my psyche.

It was 2 am and I was sitting in front of my laptop, and I only realized I was crying because of the tickle of tears trailing down my cheeks.

***

It was Friday and it was raining.

I didn’t particularly mind taking out La Gorda when it rained, but I knew Lauti wasn’t a fan of the idea of me riding my motorcycle on wet pavement, and I was only going out because of him, so we took the bus instead. I still went with him, because I’d promised I would, and because we both knew he needed me there.

I’m not sure he knew just how much I needed to be there, too.

I waited at a café conveniently placed across the therapist’s practice, and I made sure to order a coffee for him and time it so it would still be warm by the time he came out.

Forty-five minutes later, a red-eyed, puffy-faced Lautaro emerged from the building, sat down before me, and said:

“I really needed this.”

I let myself smile and held his hands across the table.

“I’m really happy to hear that.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I’m glad, too.”