"Yes.
“With a big window?”
Maribel smiled.
With large window. As you always wanted for me.
Martin took a hand to his chest.
“I thought you didn’t remember that nonsense anymore.
“It wasn’t nonsense,” she said. They were poor dreams, but dreams at last.
The next day, Martin did not go to the factory.
He asked for leave without pay, although before it would have hurt him to lose that day.
He accompanied Maribel to Tecámac.
They took combi, then another truck, then walked several dirt streets.
The ground was fenced with rusty mesh.
There was no grass.
There was no shadow.
Only dry dirt, stones and a sign twisted with white paint.
But when Maribel opened the lock, Martin came in as one steps on a miracle.
He squatted down, took a fist of dirt and cried again.
“Here’s the bugambilia,” she said, pointing to the entrance.
Martin smiled with red eyes.
“And here I’m going to put a chair to see you cook out the window.
“Don’t invent, dude,” Maribel said, laughing in tears. First we have to raise walls.
He laughed too.
That laugh came different.
Less heavy.
Cleaner.
They signed the last payment with Don Ernesto, a gentleman with a hat, a graying mustache and field hands.
There was no music.
There were no balloons.
There was no party.
Just a signature, a handshake and an old key that didn’t open any doors yet, but opened a future.
That night, Martin went back to the factory.
His companions soon bothered him.
What happened, compa? Now they let you go of wool?
“No,” he replied, calmly.
“Then?
Martin smiled.
I was released a new life.
They all let go of laughs.
“This one has already become a poet.
Before, those taunts would have made him burn.
Not that time.
Because now I knew that there were shames that one carries because one looks good with people who do not pay your bills, does not dry your tears and does not sleep with you under a dripping ceiling.
When he left, he bought a rose at the traffic light.
It cost 25 pesos.
It was not fine.
He had a broken spine and the petals a little abused.
But Martin wore it like it was a jewel.
When she gave it to Maribel, she received her without saying anything.
Then she looked at the flower, looked at her husband and asked:
Did you come out of the budget?
Martin was 1 second serious.
Then the 2 laughed.
Not because poverty was funny.
But because, for the first time in years, they were facing it on the same side.
Weeks later, they left the house rented.
The wall with moisture was left behind.
There were also the fights for 100 pesos, long silences and suspicions that almost rot love.
The new house was still just 2 rooms, a bathroom without tile and a kitchen with cement floor.
But I had something the other one never had.
Peace.
Martin learned that not all “no” are lack of love.
Sometimes a “no” is a woman swallowing her own desire to save a dream.
Sometimes the person who seems tougher is the one who is breaking the most inside.
And sometimes, before calling someone stingy, it is advisable to look closely if you are not silently keeping the future that you asked for and then forgot
