1

@ALeo90

I still can’t believe it. I’m off, off, off!

My journey around the world in 182 days

is finally starting.

8 January 2011 at 16:12

Leo went through the security archway with far too much insecurity in her feet and restless pumping in her heart. That may be why the civil guard ordered her to take off her boots and passed the metal detector over her nervous body. Had it been able to measure her heartbeat, that little device would most probably have exploded as soon as it reached her chest. But it didn’t explode, possibly because such instruments know nothing about the comings and goings of the soul. Meanwhile, the X-ray machine was closely examining the contents of her rucksack. The rucksack didn’t seem exactly comfortable with its contents. It had gone from carrying sheets, folders, books and notes to holding lists of Internet addresses, descriptions in different languages, a passport, a brand-new debit card, some socks and a scarf.

‘No jeans, make sure you put on some comfortable leggings, because long journeys require you to be particularly comfortable. And watch out for the air conditioning! Always have a scarf ready to protect your throat.’

Aunt Cris’ words clashed violently in her head with her mother’s advice:

‘Call whenever you can. And if you ever wish you hadn’t left, catch the first flight home. The first flight, understand?’

Not the second or the third, mother went on, but the first flight home. She still hadn’t made it through the security archway and her mother was insisting on the need to return.

But Leo didn’t turn back. Instead, she took a look around and sighed. Finally. She couldn’t believe the day had arrived. A tear appeared on one of her eyelids and she knew it was as a result of emotion, though whether it was down to enthusiasm at achieving her dream, or remorse, she still couldn’t say. She had six months in front of her to find out. Six months!

She went over the essential luggage in her mind – again, passport, debit card, student card – and admitted the last few months hadn’t been easy for anyone. All those around her seemed to have been touched by the magic wand of tragedy. Can you imagine! She thought most of the adventures would take place on her journey, but she learned that sometimes everything happens just before you leave. Her preparations had turned into a whirligig of meetings and mix-ups, and her monotonous, stable life furnished with family, friends and studies had suddenly decided to leap into a 55-litre backpack. She had felt the betrayals constantly bumping into her euphoria but, against all expectations and contrary to what the undoubted plot had set out to achieve, she hadn’t gone back on her obsession.

As was to be expected, her mother had reacted indifferently to begin with, then with amazement and finally with something that, if it wasn’t resentment, was remarkably similar:

‘I can’t believe you’re doing this to me. I can’t believe it, Leo. Not you. What are you going to find out there, tell me, what are you going to find?’

Just in case her words hadn’t sounded convincing, when they left for the airport, her mother announced her father and brother would be coming along to say goodbye. So the last thing she saw on the other side of the security area was her mother’s impassive face, Roi’s wheelchair and her father’s crutches. However hard she tried, Leo could think of few things crueller than bringing along the whole family to remind her of her supposed, constant selfishness. Her mother had always possessed the uncanny ability to poke around inside wounds.

‘Call whenever you can. And if you ever wish you hadn’t left, catch the first flight home. The first flight, understand?’

Leo saw through the blackmail and didn’t hesitate. She said to herself, ‘Come on, Leo, don’t give up now,’ and forced a smile. She’d borne the brunt of so many reproaches over the last few months that, if she hadn’t already repented, she wasn’t going to do so now. Not now. As the civil guard passed the cold metal detector over her body, Leo looked back at the airport lounge where her father, mother and Roi were slowly waving goodbye.

Roi winked and pretended to type in the air.

‘Yes, I know. I promise a tweet from every airport and bus or railway station. And if I don’t have time or can’t, at least a message from every city I visit. I promise, Roi.’

Of course, thought Leo, I’ll log into my email account and use Skype, but she swore she wouldn’t update her blog for all the gold in the world. Nor her profile on Facebook. If somebody wanted to follow her footsteps around the world, then they should go with her and not stay sitting at home. Her resentment at the way her friends had suddenly pulled out formed a lump in her throat. She would just hang a remnant on the clothes line of Twitter from every point on the globe she set foot on, she said to herself again. A kind of smoke signal. I’m alive. I’m fine. That’s all.

If she hadn’t counted on those presences at the airport, she certainly hadn’t expected the absences. She couldn’t believe they hadn’t turned up. She couldn’t believe they couldn’t even do this for her. Neither Inés nor Aldara, not even Martiño, had turned up to say goodbye. How could they be such cowards? Such stupidly selfish cowards. Not even this, however, the thorn of her best friends’ betrayal, caused her to change her mind. The scanner showed her the amusing image of her most treasured belongings and the civil guard’s gesture indicated she was free to carry on. She should carry on.

She looked back for the last time. She smiled and blew an enthusiastic kiss. Her father, mother and Roi essayed a similar pretence of happiness and continued waving goodbye in a farewell that threatened to last for ever. Leo looked back and saw nobody else to embrace in the distance. She marched up the escalator leading to the departure lounge.

As soon as they were out of sight, both parties tried to cover up their tears as best they could.

The escalator sucked up any final trace of remorse.

2

Everybody had accepted the finality of the farewell and continued silently on their way when a young man came running towards the airport’s security zone. The blasted local bus hadn’t arrived on time and he was afraid he would be too late by now. When he saw that blonde, middle-aged woman in the distance, pushing a wheelchair and accompanied by a man on crutches, heading towards the car park, he realized his final sprint had been in vain. Leo had already left. He stood surrounded by people, not knowing how to react. She’d finally gone. And despite the fact he seemed to be the only one who knew what Leo was capable of, he couldn’t help feeling surprised or something similar. He suddenly heard a message arriving on his mobile:

‘Am boarding at last. The great adventure is under way, am so excited! Big hugs to all three of you.’

Martiño quickly wrote an SMS and pressed the ‘send’ button without thinking twice:

‘Wasn’t it tomorrow? Sorry, my mistake. Am in bed, party last night was unbelievable. Still hung over. Have a good time.’

He stood there, in the middle of the airport, surrounded by suitcases on wheels, bunches of flowers, overcoats, police officers, forgotten newspapers on seats, vending machines and loudspeaker announcements. Each piece of luggage contained the life of somebody who, with greater or lesser skill, had managed to match the remnants of battle to their hopes for the future. People came and went, unaware of Martiño’s confusion and the stupid chasm that had suddenly opened at his feet.

A few yards away, Leo read the message on the screen of her mobile and couldn’t hide her disappointment. A stewardess asked for her boarding pass and kindly indicated she should turn off her phone. As she descended the ramp to the aircraft, the feelings of guilt, disappointment and blackmail still swirled around inside her head. She removed her coat, sat down, fastened her seat belt, listened to the explanations about the emergency exits and life jackets, stretched her legs, grabbed the in-flight magazine from the pocket in front of her and sighed again. She had thought once the plane took off, the guilt, disappointment and blackmail would all disappear and give way to unbridled enthusiasm. But she was wrong.

A trip can never take you away from yourself. What it can do is make you hear yourself more loudly. More violently. More sharply. It sometimes even makes you feel unbearable. Completely unbearable. Contrary to popular opinion, the hardest part about a trip is not the change of country, food, currency, timetable, friends, family. The worst part is listening to the ruminations of your conscience. When the familiar markers disappear, that voice rises loud and clear and turns into your worst enemy. The defects, fears, doubts you’re always disguising with routine excuses have nowhere to hide and are revealed. You turn into an utterly vulnerable creature.

Leo still didn’t know this as she descended the ramp to the door of the aircraft. She’d find this out later on. Like so many other things. First of all, never give in to blackmail. Not even your own.

The noise became deafening and the runway was left behind. When the wheels of the plane stopped scratching the cement, Leo had already discovered why the seats by the wings of the aircraft are cheaper and always available when it comes to printing out your boarding pass.

Outside, it was bucketing down; inside, a baby didn’t stop crying.

3

After the initial hustle and bustle of flight attendants, drinks and duty-free, they turned out the cabin lights and the world descended into absolute silence. Leo imagined she was travelling on a spaceship to another galaxy and tried to put the burden she’d been carrying out of her mind. She promised herself she wouldn’t think any more about what she was leaving behind. She said to herself, ‘Leo, it’s over. Leo, look ahead. Make the most of this, Leo, you’ve earned it.’ She said this six or seven times, like a mantra. ‘Leo, you’ve earned it, without anybody’s help, just you.’

It was true, she had earned it without anybody’s help, and the price she’d had to pay was very high. Life in the last few months had not been easy at all. To tell the truth, she thought her life had never been that easy but, after what had happened recently, she’d completely changed her mind. Up until that point, all decisions had been taken for her, with no right of reply, and no opposition either. She’d finished primary and secondary with excellent marks that allowed her to choose the university degree she most wanted to study. Well, almost. For years, she’d dreamed of the possibility of studying Journalism or Audiovisual Communication, but by the time she reached the end of secondary she’d taken a different decision. Her parents were right, there didn’t seem to be many job opportunities for such degrees and she could always opt to do an intermediate course. Anybody, they’d often said to her ironically, can appear on television, the important thing is to know something. This is why she chose Business Studies. For this reason, and because her father owned an important company with investments in the construction and housing markets, where she would always be welcome.

The most important thing is for decisions is to appear natural, not forced. This is what her parents must have thought when they joyfully celebrated the day Leo signed up for Business Studies. The faculty was only three miles from their house, so the cost of university was peanuts compared with the balance in their current accounts. What really mattered, however, was not that she would be studying close to home, but that in four years she would be working for the family business. A company that was guaranteed to last for ever. Well, almost.

‘You don’t have to, right? But you could always go to the office in the summer with papa to get some work experience. It’s your decision, OK? I’m just saying it for your own good.’

Perhaps it had been for her own good, but long-term projects don’t always work out as planned. Not even those that seem to offer a certain future in the short term. Roi, her younger brother, had always been quick off the mark and warned her:

‘Don’t go, Leo, don’t work for the family business. It’s a trap. They’ll never let you go.’

But Leo, not really knowing why, whether it was to avoid an argument with her mother or because she felt it was her obligation, went.

Not everything was given to her on a plate. One windy March morning, when the clocks still hadn’t gone forwards and winter seemed as if it would never end, Leo decided to join the theatre group. She didn’t let on to anybody in class or at home. She auditioned for the university drama society and, to her surprise, soon received an email of acceptance. This is how she entered a whirligig of rehearsals, tests, apprenticeships and loss of the little modesty she had left. This is how Martiño, Inés and Aldara turned up in her beautifully organized life.

Suddenly, in barely a year and without realizing, her timetable had turned upside down, her hours of study, food and classes danced a noisy hip hop in her diary, and her head was permanently in the clouds. Her mother sighed at something – there was nothing else it could be – she ascribed to a sudden, youthful infatuation. Her marks didn’t suffer and her mother had faith in Leo’s strict scale of priorities. It would soon pass, she was sure. But it didn’t.

Martiño was studying Physics, Inés had opted for Mathematics and Aldara for Translation Studies. But the only desire all three of them harboured was to triumph on the stage. They had dreamed of becoming actors when they were older but, in the face of their families’ stupefaction and horror, had chosen cover-up degrees that pointed to a more promising future. Their parents no longer had to shoo them away from the world of theatre, and the children went through the hoops of the exams every February and September. Leo would do the same.

One drunken night in a dive full of grime and dampness, they played truth, dare or kiss. Since she would rather have died than give Martiño a kiss in public and there was no way she could drink any more beer – the option ‘dare’ would inevitably have led to the same result as ‘kiss’ – she chose to stammer out ‘truth’. Inés asked what she would do when she finished her degree and Leo didn’t hesitate: ‘Go travelling.’ She said it with such conviction, though the alcohol may have been talking for her, that the others quickly pulled on the thread.

‘What can I say? I have this thorn in my flesh… I didn’t go away on Erasmus and now I’m sorry. They say the experience abroad is amazing, you make friends, learn languages… They say it’s often hard as well, because of the distance from home and the difficulty of studying, but… I want to find out for myself. What it’s like to go away, I mean. I’m not going to put it off any longer. As soon as I finish my degree, I’m going to head out into the world.’

Half an hour, six beers and a shot of coffee liqueur later, all four had sworn on top of the marble table that, as soon as they had their degree certificate in their hands, they would embark on a great journey. Martiño said Lisbon. Inés opted for Marrakesh, Aldara for Rome and Leo for Machu Picchu.

‘Where was that? Machu what?’

‘Machu Picchu. In Peru. The capital of the Inca empire. Don’t tell me you don’t know where Machu Picchu is!’

‘Ha, Machu Picchu!’

‘Well, I couldn’t say Rome is…’

‘It’s better than Lisbon.’

‘What made you say Marrakesh?’

On the infinite map of that marble surface, the only borders were the stains left by the empty bottles. The cigarette ash and dirty serviettes formed mountains and other geographical features. The names of cities poured out on unmapped routes and their suggestions travelled as far as the fuel of ingested alcohol would allow.

‘What was that song again? The one from Sés’ concert the other day…’ asked Leo suddenly.

‘Which one? The one about salt storms?’ muttered Aldara.

‘No. “Four by Four”…’

‘Oh, yes,’ hummed Martiño. ‘Now how did it go?’

‘“Four kings, four horses, four generations. Four friends, four cats, four hearts”…’ tapped Inés on the table.

Then everybody joined in:

‘“Four wheels leading me, a thousand places to visit. Four old sailors rowing any which way!”’

‘That’ll be the anthem for our journey,’ shouted Leo euphorically as a result of the liqueur, her sleepiness, or just the emotion of suitcases starting to inhabit her dreams.

They probably didn’t all open their eyes at the same time the day after the spree that left them drunk inside and out. Martiño and Leo did (open their eyes at the same time, with the same smell of damp trapped in their hair), though they would have strenuously denied this in front of anyone who dared suggest there was something between the two of them. There had to be something. When they met again, five classes and a rehearsal later, they all reaffirmed their promise without clinging on to the easy excuse of having been intoxicated.

‘When we finish our degrees, the four of us will go on a great journey. For a year at least.’

There was no need for a blood pact or a written document. Their eyes were as good as oaths, and no judge would ever have doubted the legal validity of their expressed will.

They were in their first year. They had another three years to save the money they thought they would need.

The four of them together. On a great journey. For a year at least.

‘“Four wheels leading me, a thousand places to visit. Four old sailors rowing any which way!”…’

4

‘Leonor!’

‘What?’

‘Oh, Leonor!’

‘What is it?’

‘You’ve lost your mind. How can you think about going away? What about your family? Look at your father and brother. As if we hadn’t suffered enough. OK, do whatever you want. You’re selfish, Leonor, you only ever think about yourself and avoid all responsibility. When will you grow up? When? It’s all because of the theatre, that blasted theatre… Can’t you see I won’t be able to cope on my own? It’s all too much for me!’ her mother had roared one September evening when the birds were wilting on account of the heat.

Four months later, just after Christmas, and Leo was doing whatever she wanted. What she’d always wanted. For more than three years, she’d waited at tables and washed dishes in order to collect the money she needed. She’d studied and worked non-stop in order to pass her degree and at the same time save six thousand euros. She’d refused clothes, parties, drinks and even a 3G mobile in order to earn, euro by euro, the boarding pass for her dream. ‘No,’ said Leo to herself when the crew announced they should fasten their seat belts as they were about to land, ‘I won’t think about that any more.’

‘Come on, open your presents!’

On Christmas morning, their mother was always more nervous than they were.

‘Come on, Leo, open it.’

‘Well, let’s see,’ muttered Roi, ‘what can it be with a shape like that? Little sister, your presents are always so boring! Just books. Don’t you have any other interests?’

‘I bet it has something to do with travelling…’ whispered Leo as she nervously unwrapped the present. ‘The Book of Imaginary Journeys by Xabier P. DoCampo and Xosé Cobas, how lovely!’

‘Open it up then,’ suggested mother. ‘See how nice the illustrations are.’

‘Thanks so much. I’ll just read the beginning to get a taste: “All journeys are a return. Any traveller returns home the moment he sets foot outside the house. You have to come back in order to tell what’s happened, to turn the journey into a story.”’

There was a long silence until the girl finally burst out:

‘Mother, I haven’t even left yet, and you’re trying to get at me already. You’re impossible. I haven’t even set foot outside the house…’

‘That’s not what the book’s about, Leo. It also talks about inner journeys, things you learn along the way…’

‘The book may do that, but you don’t, mother. You only know how to talk about coming back.’

She’d hated her. How was it possible to try to blackmail her until the last minute? Even with her Christmas presents!

‘No,’ said Leo to herself when the crew announced they should fasten their seat belts as they were about to land, ‘I won’t think about that any more.’

The night lights of Lisbon glowed beneath her feet.

The sky remained absolutely grey. It seemed it hadn’t stopped raining under the aircraft’s belly during the whole route over the Atlantic. As they were about to land, Leo closed her eyes because she thought the plane was going to end up sticking its nose into the buildings around the runway.

‘Now I know why Rubén said the airport was very central,’ murmured Leo, ‘any more, and we’d be playing dodgems.’

She lazily descended the steps and waited at the belt for the rucksack she’d checked in to appear. No more and no less than 55 litres of volume to pack everything she needed. The direct flight of less than two hours still hadn’t managed to wipe away the mould of routine from her shoulders. As she left the baggage reclaim area, she anxiously searched for a familiar face. Ten minutes went by, and nobody came forwards. She couldn’t help feeling alarmed. This is ridiculous, she thought, this was the only place in her itinerary where someone was supposed to be waiting for her! With an attitude like this, she wasn’t going to get very far. She fumed for another twenty minutes, going round and round her two rucksacks. The large one and the small one. She soon reached the conclusion she should do something before the clock showed midnight, in case all the systems of public transport chose that moment to turn into pumpkins. She then realized she’d been so confident she would be met at the airport she hadn’t checked the city’s bus and metro network. She hadn’t even brought with her the address of the house that was supposed to shelter her on her first night in Lisbon. Or Rubén’s telephone number either. There was no way she was going to call Inés to beg for help…

She was thinking about these things when a boy with chestnut curls slowly approached her:

‘Leo?’

‘Rubén?’

There followed a long introduction. He began to explain that the traffic in the city at that hour of the night was impossible, he’d had to ask his landlady for a copy of the key and there’d been a catfight about an inordinately large electricity bill, he’d almost lost his dog in a fight with a German shepherd in the Marquês de Pombal, there’d been a students’ strike on account of the increase in university fees and they had to attend a poetry recital in a bar in the Chiado because he’d arranged to meet his ex there. The same one who, in an act of revenge, had stolen all his keys.

‘I have to get them back any way I can. How about you?’

‘Oh, nothing.’

This was the only thing it occurred to Leo to say. Outside the bus, a flood was battering the city. Horns and traffic lights sent up plaintive laments amidst the roar of that furious battle between the rain and the will of life to carry on progressing as normal. People ran around, fluttering the pale plastic of their raincoats. The aluminium skeletons of broken umbrellas ended up in the most unlikely places. In bins, on pavements, in hearts.

Leo thought even Pessoa would have been unable to describe all the nostalgia, the disquiet.

This had been the first recommendation she received from Sebastián, the coordinator of the book group Read, Read, What You Reading?, which the girl had been a member of for the last two years. ‘Pessoa, Leo, Pessoa.’ He had said this during the last session she’d been to before her journey.

‘Yeah, I heard you haven’t decided on your itinerary, but you must know where you’ll be going first, right? Come on, don’t be so mysterious!’

‘Lisbon.’

‘Ah, Lisbon, how wonderful! Well, if you want to understand Lisbon, you have to read Pessoa. The city’s atmosphere, the music of its language, the scent of the estuary, the saudade…’

‘I’ll bear that in mind.’

‘You’ve just given me a great idea, Leo! Listen, the rest of you… Leo’s going on a trip and won’t be able to take part in any of our meetings for the next six months. I know, it’s a shame, there’ll be one less of us. But that doesn’t mean she can’t carry on reading with us… Don’t pull a face! As soon as we find out where she’s going, we’ll recommend books by authors who talk about those cities or recreate the atmosphere in them. This will be our literary journey to imaginary cities! She’ll tell us about the books she picks up along the way and we’ll share our feelings about places we’ve only read about. It’ll be an amazing adventure!’

His enthusiastic idea didn’t go down very well with the group. Or so the expressions of bewilderment and discomfort of the other participants appeared to indicate. Leo was a voracious reader and a good commentator of books, she knew how to get the best out of each word, each verse, and this made the meetings much more fruitful. The fact she wouldn’t be there would impoverish them all. Especially at the karaoke session after the end-of-year dinner, when she displayed her artistic vein and joined in with whatever song they played for her.

‘OK, I’m listening… In Lisbon, I have to read Pessoa.’

‘What will you do about books?’ asked a colleague.

‘I read on forums almost all the hostels have corners where travellers can swap books. I’ve also found lots of places where they practice bookcrossing, you know, when you leave a book somewhere and someone else can pick it up…’

‘Leo’s a smart one,’ exclaimed one member of the group.

‘She’ll go far,’ said another.

‘Lisbon… melancholy, rain, cod…’ Sebastián carried on sighing. ‘Pessoa, Leo, Pessoa.’

Leo had chosen Lisbon because of the light.

And because of Martiño.

Right now, though, she felt like sending them all to hell. Lisbon, the light and Martiño.

‘What do you mean, nothing? Are you still there, Leo?’ Rubén’s voice interrupted her thoughts. ‘My cousin Inés said you were going to travel for a whole year. That’s fantastic.’

‘I suppose so, but it’s not a year, six months.’

‘Keep on going like that, and I don’t think it’s going to work out very well. You don’t exactly look enthusiastic!’

‘You’re right. Maybe I’m just tired.’

‘Well, we’re almost there.’

Rubén had wrinkles over his eyes and skin as luminous as the night. An open smile, gleaming teeth and carefully groomed curls. He wore faded jeans and a Portuguese football shirt. On his feet, some bright yellow flip-flops. At the darkest stop of them all, the boy stood up and gestured to Leo to get off. January still hadn’t taken off, and the greys above their heads offered a heroic resistance to the gusts of rain. The street lights couldn’t even reach the pavement when the two of them rushed towards a dilapidated entrance.

‘Don’t be put off. The inside is much worse.’

They climbed four flights of stairs that had succumbed to the grip of mould and the creak of rotten wood. When Rubén finally managed to prise open the door, the smell of dampness and the crackle of woodworm beneath their feet only increased.

‘You’re lucky my flatmate is at a conference on Madeira and her room is free.’

‘Don’t worry, I’ll sleep on the sofa, I don’t want to be a bother. I suppose Inés told you I’d only be staying for the first night, it’s a bit late to go looking for a hostel.’

‘How long will you be in Lisbon?’

‘I don’t know, five days or something. I decided not to fix my itinerary and to pick up tickets on the Internet, using last-minute offers, so I’m not entirely sure.’

‘Well, you can stay here for the five days.’

‘No, really, that’s kind, but I prefer a hostel.’

‘Stay.’

‘I couldn’t. I don’t wish to be a burden.’

‘You won’t be. I prefer you to give me the money for the hostel, my need is greater. It’s a question of business, not politeness.’

‘Oh, I see.’

‘Don’t get upset, I was only joking. About the money, I mean. Come on, leave your rucksack here and let’s go. I’ve arranged to meet at the Gato Preto.’

The Gato Preto, or Black Cat, was both black and like a cat, keen to have skin contact. Before arriving, they wandered for half an hour under the rain. The streets were utterly deserted and only a few drunken silhouettes cast shadows on the stones. The city was Lisbon, but it could have been any other. All cities turn into the same liquid shade when the heavens open on top of their epidermis. Rubén pushed a barely visible door in a building with peeling walls. Unexpectedly, the door gave way without the need for a password. On the other side, they were met by a cloud of smoke in their faces and piercing music in their ears.

They spent hours holding stupid conversations with all the bustle of people around them. The music was so loud it would have been impossible to understand whether this one was called Joaquim, that one Filipa or another one Manuel. It didn’t really matter. They danced, smoked, drank Super Bock and laughed until the early hours of the morning. Their deafness and muteness didn’t prevent communication. What did, however, was the police when, at some ungodly hour, they opened the door of that thieves’ den and the music, charm and intoxication were spirited away. They turned on the lights and people started blinking at each other in surprise, as if they were zombies. What until then had been a bar with an impressive atmosphere suddenly turned into a sordid cave that stank of vomit, alcohol and rancid sweat. In silence, like lost souls, their feet headed for the exit and were swallowed up by the rain-spiked night. Cinderella’s carriage had definitively turned into a pumpkin.

Leo searched in the silent crowd for Rubén’s squalid silhouette. She found it intertwined with the body of a girl with excessively long dark hair and an excessively short skirt. Rubén gestured to her to come over and introduced her to Paula, his not-so-ex ex. After a few seconds in the rain, they decided to head home. The couple walked in front with a slowness bordering on despair. Leo followed them at a modest distance, partly because she wasn’t sure she remembered the way back to Rubén’s house. The couple was in no hurry to arrive, and the rain didn’t seem to bother them, because they stopped at each and every front door, bench, bin, to lick each other’s tonsils. When there wasn’t a centimetre of skin left to be kissed and the storm that morning was in full swing. When a cold current ran down Leo’s back and her feet, like canoes, forced a way between the rivers that poured down the pavement, overflowing from the drains. When the other two were kissing as if for the first time, and as if they would never be able to do so again. Then, and only then, did Leo think she had committed the most stupid act of her entire life.

Her leather jacket was completely ruined. Under her favourite indie T-shirt bubbled streams that had soaked her bra, knickers and socks even. Her jeans weighed a ton and her face looked like that of somebody in the shower. Drunk, tired, lost and alone, Leo decided again that this was the most stupid act she had ever committed in her entire life.

When they reached the right entrance, she galloped upstairs, removed her sodden clothes and got into bed. All she wanted was to erase that night with the same force with which the water had soaked her through.

She rummaged in the bottom of her rucksack for a change of clothes and came across an unexpected, hard object. She pulled it out and confirmed it was a book: Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino. She was so worn out she didn’t have the strength to wonder who had put it there. By this time, her head was rolling in a different dimension.

On top of that, the other two carried on smooching on the other side of the partition wall.

This was her first night away from home.

5

@ALeo90

First day away from home. Lisbon welcomes me

with water and longing.

9 January 2011 at 17:30

Leo didn’t do anything special the next day. Or the next, or the next, or even the one after the next. And despite not doing anything special, or perhaps because of this, the time passed slowly, heavily, inexhaustibly, eternally. She had the impression she’d spent half her life away from home. Everything that existed on the other side of the plane turned into a strange, distant fantasy, a kind of deformed, crude mirage that no longer hurt.

She’d promised not to access her email or turn on her mobile more than once a day.

The good news: she stuck to her promise.

The bad news: it cost her an arm and a leg. She’d never imagined it could be so hard.

And nor had she bought a plane ticket in order to leave, as she had said she would.

During those days, Lisbon and Rubén had become the only possible pairing. The boy had given himself over completely to the task of being a good host, the best chaperone in the world. Inés seemed to have entrusted him with this task and he behaved as if his life depended on it. No sooner said than done, he didn’t leave her alone for a single minute, come rain or shine.

So they walked together through the Bairro Alto and the Baixa. Through Belém. Through the Castle of São Jorge. Through the Chiado. Down to the Docks. Down the Avenue of Liberty. Through the Marquês de Pombal. Through the Rossio. The University. Prazeres. The Alfama. The Carmo. Their steps intertwined and moved apart on the pavements of Lisbon. But their eyes never met, and Leo clung to Rubén’s voice like the soundtrack to images that filed slowly past. Holding on to this invisible thread, it was easier not to feel dizzy. There wasn’t a corner of the city they didn’t visit, and yet Leo had the sensation the city was slipping through her fingers, eluding her grasp. And despite the fact she was never alone, not even for a minute, she’d never felt so alone in her whole life. Was this what travelling was about? Just this? She was overcome by a sense of frustration. It was true she had discovered places she would never have discovered on her own, that didn’t appear in any guidebook, that she would never have visited without Rubén’s help, but at the same time, at the same time… At the same time, not for a minute did she stop thinking about what people would be doing at home. Would her mother be preparing fish, as she did every Wednesday? Would Martiño be late for his rehearsal? Would Inés have passed her food-hygiene exam?

‘What’s up, Leo, don’t you like it?’

‘Well, bearing in mind fish isn’t my favourite dish, you must realize gills make me feel… well, a little nauseous. What did you say this was called, açorda? It’s awful!’

‘How can you say you find it repulsive? It’s absolutely delicious!’

‘I prefer these canapés, the codfish with cornbread crust and olives, the squid kebab, the grilled chicken…’

‘You should be happy, in a week you’ll have undergone an intensive course in Portuguese cuisine. But we still haven’t tried my salted pork with soy, apples and almonds… That’s enough to drive anyone crazy.’

In a tiny restaurant in the Bairro Alto, crammed behind a minuscule table with a chequered tablecloth and red-wine stains, the two youngsters raised their glasses in toasts and laughed, possibly as a result of the wine or the complicity they’d woven together over the last few days. Men and women in checked shirts and black skirts, Erasmus students, girls in two-piece suits and punks mixed in that atmosphere that stank of fish, with crumbs all over the floor.

‘We’re walking on fresh bread,’ murmured Rubén as they staggered towards the door.

The green wine danced in their eyes and pinched their sense of balance.

‘Or else on thorns,’ remarked Leo.

‘What?’

‘I said we may be walking on thorns.’

At that precise moment, no sooner had she spoken than Leo realized she had to leave as quickly as possible. That city, that state of mind. She’d been there for over a week, and the weight on her shoulders was starting to get too much.

This wasn’t what she’d planned for her trip, not this…

That same night, she went on the Internet and slowly surfed the pages of airlines. She clicked on the names of successive cities, allowed herself to be drawn in by possible aromas, confirmed prices and was horrified by the taxes, the misleading publicity, the prices for checking in luggage, the fact the hostels were full. On her eighth night in Lisbon, with the names of airports bouncing all over the screen, somebody wasn’t getting a wink of sleep in the next-door room. Just on the other side of the partition wall. Which is why Leo clicked on the button without thinking twice.

Barcelona. In three days’ time, single ticket, 15 euros.

The following morning, it was still bucketing down. It had rained when she arrived, cleared up in the middle of the week and would rain again when she departed.

‘Rubén, I’m leaving on Tuesday,’ Leo blurted out before taking her first sip of juice. ‘You’ll finally get your life and house back!’

The curly-haired, brightly-skinned young man didn’t take his eyes off the saucepan of boiling milk. He didn’t lift his eyes for a single second and yet, despite everything, it still boiled over.

‘Shit. Shit and shit!’

He wiped the surface with a damp cloth and grabbed the saucepan very carefully. The smell of burned milk filled everything.

‘Move your fingers, I don’t want to scald you.’

That was all he said. Then and for the half hour the breakfast of milk, biscuits and stale bread lasted. Leo stirred the lumps of chocolate with a spoon, trying to eliminate each and every bubble so they wouldn’t burst on her tongue.

‘Aren’t you going to ask where I’m going?’

‘No.’

‘I’m going to Barcelona.’

‘See?’

‘What?’

‘There was no need to ask.’

‘Why?’

‘Because you were going to tell me anyway.’

‘So?’

‘Why did you tell me? I didn’t want to know. I hate knowing. Knowing you’re leaving and I’m staying behind.’

What a melodramatic fool, thought Leo, they’re the worst of all. And no, the girl wasn’t flattered in the slightest. On the contrary, she again felt the bitter weight of blackmail. Why did everybody insist on filling her pockets with stones? Why did everybody object to her wanting to fly on her own?

This may have been why she became even more determined to leave as quickly as possible.

Rubén stood up from the table, put his bowl in the sink and left behind the smell of freshly washed clothes, dried in the open, on a fourth floor in the Chiado in Lisbon. He didn’t come back home. Leo didn’t go out so she wouldn’t be so impolite as to leave without saying goodbye. For two days, she put up with the peeling walls, the whirr of the dehumidifier, the smell of bleach on the sheets on the clothes line, the mould in the bathroom, the condensation in the corridors, the crackle of the woodworm, the grey light outside the windows, the cries of porters, the muffled laughter in the night. For two days, she whispered the poems of Álvaro de Campos, Alberto Caeiro, Sophia de Mello, Eugénio de Andrade, Camões… She connected to the Internet and visited a couple of pages without much enthusiasm. She had been in Lisbon for over a week and had only written one public message on Twitter, on the first day, so she used this opportunity to emit a second feeble tweet and fulfil the promise she’d made to her brother:

@ALeo90

Who would have said in this corner of dampness

I would discover the true Lisbon?

The trams whistle outside.

It keeps on raining.

17 January 2011 at 17:30

During this time, she’d spoken to her family on the phone twice, which had been a little awkward, because they didn’t have much to say to each other.

When her brother behaved like an idiot and all her mother could do was complain, it really wasn’t worth the effort calling.

What she did enjoy, however, was sending an email to the book group. Since she couldn’t attend their sessions in the public library, she’d agreed to share books from a distance. She wasn’t going to follow the reading guide the others were using, since it would be difficult to get hold of all the books, but instead would share her opinion about texts she came across during her travels.

‘“Once again I see you – Lisbon, the Tagus, and all – Useless passerby of you and of me, Stranger in this place as in every other”… These verses by Álvaro de Campos are for Rita. She’ll like them, I’m sure,’ wrote Leo.

With nothing better to do, the girl had collapsed on the sofa and decided to take a look at the books dozing on the shelf in the sitting room. She slowly spelled out every word as if it were the most important thing in the world. And, without warning, these verses, the smell of damp, had given rise to the Lisbon she had been expecting, but that hadn’t arrived. Outside, militarily spread out on the tram cables, the pigeons cooed their weary lullaby. The frightened and precise beating of their wings whenever the whistle of the tramcar climbed or descended the slope, their swift escape to the rooftops, were the only sounds Leo wanted to pack in her suitcase. The voice of Rubén accompanying every step she took on the pavement, when they danced in the midst of the ochre paint of buildings, weighed too much. And she wasn’t going to pay a single euro for excess baggage.

Suddenly, Leo remembered something, dug her hand in her rucksack and came across the pages of that unexpected gift. There was the book by Italo Calvino, it hadn’t been a figment of her imagination because she’d been so tired the first night. She opened the book at random and read:

Your gaze scans the streets as if they were written pages: the city says everything you must think, makes you repeat her discourse, and while you believe you are visiting Tamara you are only recording the names with which she defines herself and all her parts.

However the city may really be, beneath this thick coating of signs, whatever it may contain or conceal, you leave Tamara without having discovered it.

Mmmm, there was no doubt this would make a good travelling companion. She immediately concluded that the hand of Aunt Cris was behind this choice, a book that brought back to her the magic of Marco Polo which had so impressed her as a child.

There was a reason Aunt Cris had always been her favourite.

‘Again, Aunt Cris, again.’

‘Then’ – hoarse voice – ‘then, my Marco Polo, my great traveller, said the Grand Khan, can you tell me everything your eyes have seen in my vast empire? I can, my lord’ – bold voice – ‘I shall recount the richness of its deep seas and verdant mountains. I shall talk of Lambri and of Fanfur. Of the kingdom of Dragoian and of Yachi. Of the river Brius, on the western border of the province of Kaindu, next to the province of Karaian.’

‘Again, Aunt Cris, again. Start The Travels of Marco Polo again!’

‘But, Leo, I’ve already read it to you a thousand times.’

‘Again, Aunt Cris, again. Please…’

‘Oh, all right then. “Ye emperors, kings, dukes, marquises, earls, and knights, and all other people desirous of knowing the diversities of the races of mankind, as well as the diversities of kingdoms, provinces, and regions of all parts of the East…”’

All the Christmases of her childhood could be summed up by the image of The Travels of Marco Polo lying on her pillow and the words, now warm, now pressing, often energetic, of her aunt Cris. Hers was the voice of the Venetian trader and explorer Marco Polo giving all the details of his amazing journeys through China, India and Persia, sometimes following the invisible thread of the Silk Road, others caressing new and mysterious paths.

‘Aunt Cris, is everything Marco Polo talks about true?’

‘Let me give you the answer Marco Polo gave his relations in his old age, when they asked him the same question on the eve of his death: “I did not tell half of what I saw, for I knew I would not be believed!”’

‘In which case, if he only told a part of it, the world must be so big!’

‘You can’t imagine, Leo, you can’t imagine. But you’ll have to find this out for yourself. Good night. Dream as much as you can, my little explorer. Now sleep!’

Yes, there was no doubt Cris had always been her favourite aunt.

Leo drove away the thoughts that came in waves and sometimes crashed a little wildly against the quay of her head. When she left Rubén’s apartment on the steepest slope in all of Lisbon, she closed the door, having returned the keys on top of the kitchen table. She avoided leaving a farewell note so as not to encourage a feeling of sadness.

Given a choice, she would have said the taste of Lisbon was that of the salted pork with soy, apples and almonds she never got to try.

She was thinking about this, breathing a sigh of relief, as the plane finally rose over the river Tagus on its way to somewhere else.

6

@ALeo90

‘I cannot be in any single place. My

Country is where I’m not,’ wrote Pessoa.

I just hope Barcelona gives me something else.

I don’t know what I’m looking for,

but I’m looking.

18 January 2011 at 18:30

While feeling a deep sense of relief at having left, Leo couldn’t avoid the blasted itching of doubt. In the in-flight magazine, she came across an article about Lisbon in which the writer boasted about the top ten sights one simply had to visit during a weekend in the city. She had only been to three, and yet the place that came closest to her image of Lisbon was Rubén’s house. Barely forty square metres of dampness and mould that had given her a heavy cold. The recommendations of exclusive restaurants down in the Docks and select bars in the Chiado district that featured in the magazine had nothing to do with the city she’d come to know. She hadn’t even visited Sintra or Estoril with their dreamlike princesses and castles close to the capital, at the entrance to the estuary. Or any of those buildings with an ultramodern design. Let alone the oceanarium in the grounds of the 1998 Lisbon World Exhibition which she’d heard wonders about, but for which she’d refused to pay the price of an entrance ticket that was far too high for her humble pocket. The large fish and sharks racing through the tanks of salty water pressed hard on her heels and continually reminded her of her rejection. But she wasn’t sorry. In the busy streets of the Rossio, with a hint of cherry liqueur on her lips. In the café A Brasileira, embracing the statue of Pessoa on a sunny day. In the ruins of the Carmo Church with its large arches serving as a border to the grey sky. During the swaying from side to side of a tram entangling the roof of the city with its cables, where only worn tiles managed to reach. In Belém with the cream of its pastries sweetening the tower. On Augusta Street, where an unexpected downpour had ruined the pleasure of a codfish cake that was far too oily… In all these places and from the Elevator of Santa Justa, she had taken possession of a map that still oozed with the pustules of the old earthquake. She hadn’t thought about it then, as she scratched and scratched on the crust of peeling, decrepit façades with their faded tiles defying the passage of time. But, when the plane took off, all this Lisbon came knocking furiously with its knuckles of longing.

Normally it’s when you leave that a city reveals its inner essence. This was the first lesson of her journey.

Lisbon was the longing that beat repeatedly on Rubén’s noisy laughter.

And she began to feel nostalgia before the aircraft had finished climbing into the sky. Leo noticed she had cramp in her right calf and swore. Whenever she ruminated too much, a snake would coil up between her ankle and knee!

No, Leonor, not again. What a stupid sensation. She’d only been away from home for ten days and what had started out as something majorly exciting was threatening to turn into a melancholic soup. It may have been the city, Rubén, the rain or the shadow of Martiño. She hadn’t taken a step without wondering why he had chosen Lisbon on that night when the four of them had promised to travel together and to love each other for the rest of their lives. They hadn’t kept the first promise, and so Leo had decided on her own not to keep the second.

‘Oh, come on, Leo, you didn’t think we were serious, did you?’

Inés played the fool. She didn’t do it badly, she’d practised so many times for that play that was finally never staged. She’d rehearsed it so much it came naturally to her, as if she’d gulped the character down.

‘No, you couldn’t think we were serious,’ she insisted.

‘Inés, just tell me you’re not coming, and that’s it. Don’t claim we weren’t serious.’

‘No,’ the girl repeated, ‘we weren’t serious. Please, it was just a night out!’

‘Oh, really? And so that’s why I’ve spent the last three years breaking my back, with swollen fingers from having washed up so much? That’s why we all started working, so that we could save? Well, all of us except you, it seems. If it’s a question of money…’ Leo replied.

‘No, it’s not a question of money. I have every single euro. The six thousand we talked about. Though I think it’s far too much.’

‘Ah, so you do remember… That’s right, we talked about saving six thousand euros each. We worked it out, in three years we’d save six thousand euros so we could travel easily, without problems. What did you think it was for? If we weren’t serious about travelling, what was the money for? For buying a speedboat and becoming smugglers?’

‘Oh, come on, Leo, don’t be daft!’

‘I don’t understand, Inés, really I don’t. If you have all the money, why the hesitation?’

‘I need it.’

‘What for? You finished your degree with a distinction!’

‘For a Master’s.’

‘What Master’s?’

‘A Master’s. I’m going to do a Master’s and I need the cash. That’s all there is to it.’

‘But what’s more important, a Master’s or a promise? We’ve been saving for three years…’

‘Drop it, Leo, I’m just not going. My mind is made up.’

‘But listen, we can think about doing something shorter, not going so far…’

‘I said no.’

‘Come on, let’s play around with the idea. We’ll find a solution.’

‘Listen, Leo, I’ve had enough! You’re so loaded you never have to worry about anything. No problems buying clothes, getting to the end of the month, paying the rent or even finding work because your father has a company… To hell with the precious little princess! If you want to go travelling around the world to appear all interesting, go ahead and do it. But count me out. I’m not going.’

Leo could remember every single word. Every single one of them. Together with the steam of the tea misting up her glasses and the tinkle of the fruit machine in the bar. The worst thing wasn’t what she said, but what Aldara and Martiño kept quiet. They’d all arranged to meet her separately, in what was obviously an agreement they’d come to, in the same bar where they’d shared all the preparations for their journey, all the doubts about their rehearsals, all the nights of partying and afternoons of taking notes. And, as she pondered Inés’ words, she realized they must all be thinking the same. Aldara pulled out because she said she didn’t fancy it and the money she’d saved up would come in useful for buying a car. She may have been influenced by the fact she had a (second) boyfriend in Lugo and reckoned, if she disappeared for a year, she would lose the (second) love of her life. Martiño explained he’d given up the idea of travelling because he was going to start as an intern in an institution and of course it was a golden opportunity, you never knew the doors this could open. What he failed to explain was why he’d applied for the job when they’d already arranged to go travelling.

All these explanations, set out before her on successive afternoons in front of successive pots of tea, left her feeling bewildered to begin with. The itinerary had been meticulously planned, taking into account everybody’s personal wishes, routes, places they simply had to visit, websites where they could find anything from a cheap flight to a sofa to sleep on, addresses of time banks for the exchange of services, international student cards, contacts of people they’d met at performances put on by the theatre group, places for exchanging favours, the international network of youth hostels, discount cards for tourist services aimed at the under twenty-five, the advantages of interrailing, ridiculously priced hotels, squatting, beds in exchange for keeping old people company during therapy sessions, international medical insurance…

So what was all this conspiracy against her, Leo wondered. When she heard Inés, her doubts vanished and all the memory of the past started trembling like a house of cards. ‘Precious little princess’. She’d called her a ‘precious little princess’. ‘Because your father has a company,’ she’d said. ‘No problems buying clothes, getting to the end of the month, paying the rent,’ she’d declared. Now everything slotted into place. And all she could do was go red in the face and send them to blazes.

Even now, Leo blushed in shame at having been the innocent victim of such treachery. How could they think this about her? They had no idea about her home, her personal circumstances, or anything else. It wasn’t their fault, no, it was her own. She’d put up with the tears of one or the other with infinite patience. Because there were financial problems at home, my father’s gone off with somebody else, my brother refuses to study, my cousin is hooked on the Internet, I’m never going to pass Logic… she’d listened to them all without a peep, aware that her own problems were as nothing compared to the litany of their complaints.

She hadn’t even told them about the accident.

After this, everything struck her as ridiculous and she refused to share anything that didn’t happen in her presence. Anything except the excitement about the journey the four of them were supposed to make, but that never got off the ground. Sés’ song came back to her like a perverse boomerang. Not because of the lines they’d hummed on that night of broken promises, but because of the lines with which the song ended. The ones that said:

Four by four, I sail on seas of paper,

dream a couple of verses by that captain

with whom I loved freedom, going after expeditions.

And the sea the boat and we ended up alone.

That’s right, she’d ended up alone. No sea, no boat, not even a bagpipe tassel to go with.

The song had clearly been a sign. She should have realized so she wouldn’t be so disappointed when the others decided to pull out.

What they hadn’t expected was that she would continue on her own.

That may have been why they didn’t talk about it the last few days. They hadn’t even come to the airport. Her mother, father and Roi had. She wasn’t sure why, whether it was out of love or resentment, but they had. They’d come.

‘You dropped your coat.’

‘Oh, thank you.’

Leo gazed for the first time at that woman who’d been sitting next to her for quite some time. They’d knocked elbows on the ridiculous armrests on the plane, but escaped as if giving off electricity. And yet there they were, one next to the other. Grey eyes, slim body, dyed blonde hair, white angora jumper, the girl was unable to fathom her age. She was definitely over fifty. She can’t have been seventy, but in that intermediate range of two decades she could have been anything.

‘Are you OK?’ insisted the lady.

‘Yes, yes, yes,’ declared Leo three times, as if in an effort to convince herself she really was OK.

The woman handed her a tissue and looked out of the window to make the gesture seem less obvious. Leo blew her nose and dried the tears that showed she really wasn’t OK.

‘That’s better,’ smiled the lady. ‘You’re too young and pretty right now to be worrying about tears spoiling your make-up. But it all comes in the end, my dear, quicker than you think.’

‘I suppose so,’ said Leo.

‘Are you travelling then?’

‘Yes, no… I’m not exactly sure.’

‘And what does that mean?’

‘Well, I’d planned to go travelling with three friends, but it all turned sour, so I started out on my own, to show them I could… perhaps it was a mistake. Perhaps my mother was right and I should just go home.’

‘Ah, I see.’

‘Are you travelling?’

‘Well, I’m not sure.’

‘Oh, really?’

‘I’ve just buried my husband.’

Leo felt dizzy, as if the plane had entered an area of turbulence.

Suddenly the flight attendant’s voice announced they should fasten their seat belts and put their seats in the upright position because they were about to begin their descent into El Prat Airport. The noise of the engines drowned out the rest of their conversation.

When the plane had finally come to a halt, the air bridge had been attached and the doors had been opened, the woman in grey slowly stood up.

‘I wish you a good journey.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Just one thing…’

‘What’s that?’

‘If you’re going to travel, you first have to learn how to leave. How to leave behind everything that’s weighing down on you and enjoy what the present has to offer. I have the impression you’re carrying a burden on your shoulders that is stopping you getting away… Weigh anchor, girl, weigh anchor and spread your sails!’

The lady winked and left. Leo remained in her seat, waiting to open the overhead locker and remove her rucksack. She ended up being the last one and a flight attendant had to ask her to disembark.

Why was it sometimes so much easier and more liberating to tell your life story to a complete stranger?

Suddenly she felt a little afraid of leaving the plane because she didn’t know where she was going to go or what she was going to do.

Perhaps the woman was right and she still hadn’t managed to take up her anchor. Her body was travelling from one place to another on the map, but her head was still at home.

Text © Rosa Aneiros

Translation © Jonathan Dunne

This and other titles by Rosa Aneiros are available to read in English – see the pages “Novels” and “YA Novels”.