Not Even All the Alcohol

March 20, 2008

Two weeks ago, I saved her, and today she started working at the bank as a receptionist. She is as young as she is persistent. She hasn’t left me alone since then, and when she found out —though I still don’t know how— where I work, she did everything she could to get that position. She knows nothing about numbers or dealing with clients, but her eyes shine brighter than the moon over the countryside and, apparently, I wasn’t the only one who noticed. Her name could only have been that of the girl who chases the White Rabbit.

March 28, 2008

Over the years I’ve picked up so many different accents and expressions that when people ask where I’m from, I don’t answer. Today I told Alicia that I’m from everywhere.

October 7, 2008

I’m surprised I’m only writing this now. I expected it not to happen immediately, but almost a year after meeting her? Alicia confessed her feelings to me. It wasn’t necessary, she has never been subtle. My ability to sense threats didn’t somehow exclude the hundreds of glances she’s given me since she started working for me. After I rejected her, she used her birthday as an argument that “now it’s okay for us to be together”. I neither had the time nor the desire to explain why she was wrong. And even if I had, life would take care of teaching her that lesson. A lesson about power imbalance wouldn't have mattered to her.

December 25, 2008

Alicia continues to surprise me. A few minutes ago she sent me a message. It was a simple Christmas Eve greeting wishing me well. I thanked her and chose to ignore the minor detail that I never gave her my personal number.

January 27, 2009

I found a box of energy bars on my desk. There was no note attached, but I know the only person bold enough to walk into my office and do something so... It’s a shame I don’t eat those things. They smelled like organic nuts.

April 9, 2013

Alicia is living with me. At the beginning of the month there was a storm that claimed around a hundred lives. Her house ended up underwater, and it feels hypocritical of me to grieve when I carry more deaths than years.

April 14, 2013

I decided to quit, at least for a while, and see how my body reacts. I can’t risk Alicia finding out now that we live together. If giving up blood means peace of mind for her —and for me— then so be it.

October 8, 2013

I didn’t have time to write yesterday. We spent the entire day celebrating Alicia’s birthday. I bought her a cake that I had to taste and am still vomiting. Sometimes I think Alicia knows what I am and simply enjoys tormenting me. We’ve lived together for seven months, and although I sit with her during lunch and dinner, I don’t eat. Until yesterday. She begged me not to insult her that way. I couldn’t say no.

April 16, 2014

I can no longer stand the way she looks at me, nor her cleavage, nor her short hair, nor her shoulders that serve as a lookout point to her neck.

April 17, 2014

Alicia no longer lives with me.

September 24, 2014

I received an invitation to her birthday party. I have no intention of going.

October 1, 2014

She sent me a message asking me, please, to come.

October 3, 2014

I went on a trip. I won’t be able to make it even if I change my mind. There won’t be enough time.

October 6, 2014

I should take vacations more often. The beach at night quiets my thoughts.

October 8, 2014

Alicia dyed her hair. It’s still just as short. The party was nice. There weren’t many people.

October 7, 2017

Today Alicia confessed her feelings to me. Again. This time she told me she understood my rejection back when we first met, and that now I had no more excuses since she was closer to thirty than twenty. She asked me out, but not in the way we usually go out. She meant the way couples do. I told her not to insist, that nothing romantic was ever going to happen between us. She got angry. She asked whether I liked women, and when I said yes, she got even angrier.

January 8, 2018

Alicia is in a relationship She has a boyfriend.

August 17, 2018

They’ve been living together for months now and going on dates.

September 20, 2018

She came to visit me. She was wearing a lot of makeup. Her eyelid was cut.

September 21, 2018

After five years without touching a drop of blood, this felt like coming back to life. Though it tasted disgusting, and not because I’d grown unaccustomed to it. Its owner was the reason I couldn’t enjoy it.

February 14, 2019

I received a box full of chocolates. Everything was heart-shaped. I ate every single one with my eyes closed.

February 19, 2019

Alicia was at my house helping me. She took care of me until I recovered. My body is still weak, but I regained the eyesight I lost for two whole days.

March 1, 2019

Alicia came over and brought a bottle of wine. She opened it and was the only one who drank. When I returned from walking her back to her apartment, I drank the sip left in her glass. My body and my mind felt the same intoxication.

December 26, 2019

She has a boyfriend. Again.

March 27, 2020

The flu that killed millions more than a hundred years ago, took Antoine from me. I never thought I would feel a similar fear again.

July 30, 2020

The lockdown keeps getting extended. Alicia moved back in with me because she has no way of continuing to pay rent. She stopped working months ago and never had any interest in learning how to manage her savings or invest. She knows that whenever she needs it, she’ll always have a place in my home. She’s no longer in a relationship.

May 23, 2021

Alicia went back to her natural hair color.

January 4, 2024

The pandemic officially ended. Alicia dyed her hair once more. She also got a job as manager at a restaurant famous for its pasta and moved out on her own.

April 26, 2024

Last night I picked her up from work and we ended up going to a bar. She drank four cocktails and two glasses of beer. I joined her with a glass of Malbec. The moment I opened my front door I stained the entire floor with wine.

October 7, 2024

Alicia turned thirty-seven today. She asked me why I still look the same while expression lines are beginning to appear on her face. She didn’t accept “genetics” as an answer, and because her eyes were shining brighter than ever, I made the decision I should have made years ago. I told her the truth. I didn’t care if she got scared, although she didn’t. She did say she had always thought there was something strange about me but never imagined we were real. She begged me to turn her. She whimpered, dropped to her knees, pleaded with me, even slapped me across the face. She asked whether my rejection of her was really that strong and whether that was why I refused to turn her. Again, I thought of the time she tried to seduce me at nineteen. She is still so young and inexperienced. What pierced my heart was her next question. “Is this rejection why you never looked at me the way I’ve always looked at you?”. How could I keep my feelings to myself after that? I told her how things really were. How, over the years, the platonic affection between us has become romantic on my side as well. Oh, it was a mistake to tell her. Alicia wiped away the last of her tears with the sleeve of her blouse and smiled. She asked me to accept her, to stop going in circles because we both wanted the same thing. She said that even though she was getting older, she was still “good enough”. I felt as insulted as she should have been. If only she knew that I prefer her now, and that even now she is still younger than me by many, many years... She insisted that none of that mattered, that now that she knew how I felt, she would not stop until I turned her and proved my love. We argued until I made it clear that nothing was going to happen between us and that it was time for us to go our separate ways. Permanently. I cannot condemn her to an eternal life filled with suffering, a suffering she cannot even imagine.

October 8, 2024

I left my home. She was going to come back, and I was going to say yes and turn her be there. So, I left. It’s for the best. It is time to reinvent myself. Again.

February 14, 2025

I bought chocolates filled with liquor. I ate all of them. I threw up all over my new house.

April 17, 2025

I met someone. Her name is Fatima Fernanda. She has long, naturally red hair.

September 30, 2025

Marianela left me.

October 3, 2025

I adopted four dogs.

October 9, 2025

I slept for three days in a row straight. I should do it more often.

November 5, 2025

I discovered that I prefer Crabent Cabernet.

January 8, 2026

Alicia found me. I don’t understand how this woman does it. She never ceases to surprise me. I arrived home and there she was, sitting on the front steps. She stood up smiling when she saw me and hugged me. She smelled the same as always. She handed me a heavy envelope and told me it was in case I changed my mind, that inside I would find the keys and the address of her new house. As soon as she left, I burned it. Otherwise, this would turn into an endless cycle, and one of us had to put a stop to it. I know Alicia is never going to be the one to do it.

January 9, 2026

I received a message from an unknown number. I know whose it is. That’s why I ignored it.

January 10, 2026

The message Alicia sent me was a photo of one of her wrists with two fresh red cuts running along it. The accompanying message said that the only solution was to turn her right away.

January 11, 2026

I keep calling her, but she doesn’t answer. I don’t know where she lives lived.