The day he told me “without me you are nobody”

Part 2:

— You’re ruining my life! — Ramiro shouted, taking her arm. — Without me you are nobody! Without me you are lost! Without me you are completely alone!

Lucía let go easily, as if she were getting rid of a sticky spider web.

— I may get lost, but that will be my abyss, not your cage. — He grabbed his jacket and cell phone. — The movers arrive in ten minutes.

He took a step towards her, as if to snatch her phone, but stopped. Lucía’s gaze — cold, firm, like ice — stopped him in his tracks. Something strange crossed his body: pure helplessness. Before, with a scream she broke. Now nothing.

— You won’t be able to — he murmured almost under his breath. — It’s going to scare you. You’re going to cry at night. You’re going back. I’m going to wait for you.

— Don’t do it — she responded without raising her tone. — When you come across the empty space next to the bed, remember: you yourself took me out of your life.

He went out into the hallway.

You could hear the suitcases: closures, wheels dragging, soft knocks against the floor. Outside it was drizzling over Mexico City. At the entrance it smelled of a wet street, of clean air: the first drink of freedom.

Ramiro stood there, between the door and the living room, unable to believe it. Everything happened too calmly. When the door of the building on Narvarte closed, the silence fell heavily, like a hole in the head.

He was left alone.

The clock was the only thing still alive, ticking the seconds of his defeat.

He saw himself in the hall mirror: his face tense, his eyes empty. He wanted to scream, but his voice didn’t come out. He didn’t even realize when he fell to the floor.

Only one idea was spinning in his head: “he’s not going to leave”.

Always came back…

But now his keys were no longer on the table. The closet was empty.

Lucía was on the sidewalk in the rain in Coyoacán, Mexico City. The drops ran down his face as if they were erasing his previous life. A taxi stopped. The driver, an older man with a tired face, helped her with the suitcases.

— Where do I take her? — asked.

— To San Ángel, number nineteen.

His voice broke for just a second. Then he came out firmer.

— I’m going to start again.

The car started. Lucía saw through the window how the lights of Mexico City were turning gray.

For the first time in years he wasn’t thinking about what to say or how to explain himself.

There was calm.

Not emptiness, but lightness.

Like after surgery: it hurts, but you breathe better.

The new apartment smelled of humidity and fresh paint, in a quiet neighborhood in Mexico City. Small, with bare walls. The echo of his footsteps sounded different.

He left his suitcases and sat slowly in a chair. His body trembled, but inside there was a certainty growing: that’s where his life began.

Without him. Without the department. Without him “this is mine” all the time.

The cell phone vibrated: Ramiro.

Did not answer.

“Come back. We have to talk.”

“I forgive you.”

“You won’t be able to do it alone.”

The messages kept coming one after another.

Lucia turned off the sound.

He poured himself tea from a thermos that he still brought from his previous job, paid for with Mexican pesos that were barely enough.

Outside the rain became heavier over Mexico City.

With each drop the screams, the fear, the control went away.

And the silence remained.

But now it was his.

Free.

A week later.

Ramiro woke up in the empty apartment in Narvarte.

At first the silence bothered him. Then he started eating it inside.

Dust on furniture. Dirty dishes. Things that no one touched.

He found himself listening to nothingness, waiting for steps that did not come.

He called his friends. Wrote messages. Nobody answered.

And she understood something she didn’t want to accept: in a huge city, she simply disappeared.

And with it, its control.