1. The First Lunch

On this Friday, the 1st of December 1995

It was quarter past two in the afternoon.  He'd left P_____ late and had arrived late in B_____.  Everyone had already gone home and in the office all that could be heard was the "tick tock" of the quartz wall clock.  He could see a pile of unopened letters on the tray and another one of phonecalls still to be made.  He went to the small office at the end of the passage, where he normally went on such occasions, and sat down behind the table with the letters and pink message slips.

By three fifteen he'd only made two calls.  As he was always in one place or another but never in his office (people often said his office was his car), when others did manage to speak to him (which essentially was when he phoned them) he would take full advantage of the situation to tell them absolutely everything.  This fact presupposed a distortion of and excessively emotional approach to reality, as well as his own perception of it - and even though it was clear to everyone who knew him that he was a highly observant person, he never actually understood such situations for what they were.  He was unable to take them seriously and instead of understand, he simply chose to put up with them.  He assumed they were the result of an evermore crazy and busy world, never stopping to think whether everyone experienced it in the same way.

He opened the letters as he spoke - and thus, whilst on the one hand, through unpaid bill after unpaid bill, the slow and yet certain bankruptcy of his company began to puncture his wavering vision, on the other hand, through what he could begin to hear over the telephone line, there appeared a quite different kind of bankruptcy which began to unsettle his soul: the bankruptcy of that overwhelming faith which his people - in previous times - had expressed in him.

"Look mate, don't you realise?" murmured the voice on the phone.  "I mean, of course, I can run with what you say - problems, well, we've all got them sometimes.  But Salvador - hey, it's been four months."

"I know.  I know.  But we've always done it like that and it's always turned out OK," he said, without too much conviction.  And then, suddenly, he was tired and thought to himself that instead of speaking on the phone with a man who considered himself his friend, he should be having lunch with another man who also considered himself his friend, and with whom he had agreed this morning to visit the restaurant La G_____.  "Look, Ángel, what are you going to do now?  Have you had lunch?"

"Actually, I was on the point of leaving the office," answered Ángel.  "No, had lunch, I've not had lunch.  Why?  You paying?"

"If we play our cards right, someone else will pay!"

"OK, you're on.  Where?"

"La G_____, in fifteen minutes.  I'm off right now - just got to make another call, and I'll be off."

"OK.  But don't be late.  Please don't be late.  I'll be ordering, right?"

"Sure.  You go order.  I won't be long.  See you later, Ángel."

"See you later, Salvador."

In his mind's eye, Salvador could see Ángel's face: the face of a decent man who was also impatient - as well as, in some way or other, mediocre; a man who believed he was of value, a man who would always end up dragging you down, a man - as they might argue - of little importance.

He made the last phonecall he had to make that morning.

"Is Chus there?  Yep.  It's Salvador Domingo, calling from I_____.  Sure.  I'll wait."  He took a Winston and lit it.  "Chus?  Hey, gal!  We'd agreed to meet today, right?  Great.  La G_____ in fifteen minutes.  Of course, gal.  Of course we'll talk business.  No.  Of course I'm not selling porkies.  Come on!  See you there ..."

He got up, still a little tired - a little tired, in fact, of a little of everything; but the prospect of lunch was already helping him - as it almost always did - to put up, once more, with whatever life would choose to throw his way.


La G_____

When he arrived at La G_____ half an hour later, it was already twenty to four.  He was the last to get there and so it was that everyone believed it would be a day like any other, without surprises, without unhappy shocks, of any kind whatsoever.  It is, in fact, a truism of our laborious day-to-day existences that events of a most disagreeable nature - when they choose to take place - are never perceived in their entirety.

And so it was, at twenty to four in the afternoon, on a day like any other, in a family-run restaurant with a most appropriate fame, large round tables, generous white tablecloths, stylish coats hung temporarily like weapons put to one side in a moment of festive confidence; and below the ever-present smell of roasting B_____ lamb, the smoke of a Cuban cigar in the all-knowing hands of the president of some important football club or another, the confidential glances of the waitresses directed at their most beloved clients, the punctuating "ring ring" of mobile phones (tastelessly, not yet switched off), the energetic laughter of those men who in that moment could see everything to play for in the future ... so it was, exactly in this way, that everything began to happen on that 1st of December, 1995 - a day which started out like absolutely any other but in the end truly refused to confirm everyone's expectations.

"Hey," said José Mari, half getting up and reaching out with a firm handshake which nevertheless, curiously, managed to exude a certain spongy aspect to its grip.

"Worker!" added Ángel, seated to his right.

"Punctuality really not your forte, mate," spat Chus, seated to his left.

"Yeah, OK," answered Salvador, eyes half closed, another Winston already lit, "but what else can we do, eh?  What else can we do?"

"I dunno.  Get here when you say you will at least one fucking time in your life."

"Chus," said Ángel, "you know very well ..."

"Only too well, dear!"

"... that Salva is only punctual when he meets with bank managers."

"Well, yes.  And according to my latest info, lately not even then ..."

Salvador sat down opposite José Mari, looked at him, put out his Winston and picked up the napkin next to his plate.

"I figure you've all ordered."

"Well, yes, mate.  Surely we have," answered Ángel.  "Surely we have."

"And I figure you've ordered for me too, right?"

"Sure thing.  For you too."

"I dunno, Ángel," said Chus, rather pointedly.  "We're a mite nervous today, seems to me."

"She's a little silly is dear Chus this afternoon.  A little silly," said Salvador, looking straight at José Mari.

"Me?"

"Yup.  You."  Salvador continued looking at José Mari.  "Right?"

"I don't think silly, exactly.  No, I don't think silly," explained José Mari, just a little too quickly.  "What it is, I think, is her brand new boots.  And you ain't said nothing.  And, you know, dear Chus and her boots.  Come on, man.  Tell her she's stunning.  And then, all sorted all round.  You'll see.  All totally sorted."

"I dunno, José Mari.  What a charmer you are.  And there's me almost believing you," said Chus, in sardonic admiration.

"Well, there you go.  But when I have lunch with someone, I don't start by insulting them, you see?" started Salvador, calmly, without blinking.  "And as far as the banks are concerned - well, everything's totally under control, you know?  So, if that's what you're up to," he lit another Winston, "and if that's what you're looking for ... well, you're not going to find any shit for that shitty newspaper of yours - and if it is shit you're after, why don't you check out those brand new boots which your shit of a boyfriend has bought you?"  He offered the cigarette packet around.  No one moved a muscle.  "'Cos I really do have the sensation that maybe you've stepped where you really shouldn't have.  And if it ain't the case, something stinks for sure, but you can bet your bottom dollar it ain't going to be me.  Or is it your clown of a boss?  Is that what this is all about?"  He turned back to Ángel and José Mari.  "Thing is, you see, this guy is going round saying I haven't paid a shitty invoice for some damn fool advertising campaign he reckons I ran on his shitty local TV station, and if that's the issue," he turned back again to Chus, "well, I'm telling you we'll be seeing each other in court, 'cos my dear Chus ..." and, for such a short moment, he looked once more at José Mari and Ángel, "... and I wasn't going to say anything in front of such an august public, but since you've decided to spill the beans, I can prove that the bitch that you are, you signed that famous contract, that famous contract your boss goes around saying I signed in some damn fool moment, and that, my dear, my dearest Chus, that is fraud, absolutely and undeniably.  And if I want to pursue this, as perhaps I really should, you'll be finished, totally and utterly - and it won't make any difference however much new boot and tit you flash around, and you won't even be worth the shit you leave behind you.  And what's more, it's not even shit - just plain and simple lies is all you're spreading here.  Which is a helluva thing to do, right?  Helluva thing to do ..."

No one said anything - and suddenly everyone realised something truly curious had taken place because even the mobile telephones, for some strange reason, stopped their ringing.  And, deep down, Salvador knew in that moment that something life-changing had just gone and happened - even as in that very same moment he refused to properly recognise it.

Even though his own pride didn't allow him to contemplate its true extent. 

The truth of the matter is that there's a first time for everything - and when this first time happens, by definition we can never compare anything with anything.  In such a way, any first time remains something entirely visceral, impossible to analyse, impossible to repeat - and, essentially, something fixed and immovable in the changing and unpredictable lives we live.

In reality, Salvador's speech as described above was the first time in his thirty years of adulthood when he had allowed himself to be swept away by an impulse (an impulse, that is to say, not of a sexual origin).  And although in itself and in the life of any other man this would have been of very little significance, in that carefully laid-out and structured existence which was the life he so widely led, the impulse in question produced such an astonishing and confusing echo that even he was unable to listen to it correctly - or appropriately understand its implications.