Intensive training

By: Luis Augusto Quimper

Illustration: Fernanda Vegas

Nicole is pregnant and leaving the Bank. She told me that today. I’ll need to take something to sleep tonight. We agreed on meeting at the eleventh floor for the afternoon coffee break. The people from the Finance division used to work on that very same floor, but they were moved to the second a couple of years ago and the eleventh became the Marketplace. The Marketplace, I don’t really know why they picked that name for it: two hundred and fifty square meters of the building dedicated exclusively to the employees’ healthy recreation: armchairs, sofas, tables, microwaves, coffee machines, a shelf with newspapers and magazines; no work modules, nor offices or meeting rooms. A relaxation area, a stress-free zone right in the middle of the building. We are only missing a minibar and a big screen to watch football; but it’s fine, we can’t complain about it, you can actually go and make yourself comfortable with coffee in one hand and your cellphone in the other, get to know about the latest affairs, talk shit about your boss, your colleagues; and all of that with a straight view to the Brussels canal, the trains coming in and out of the Gare du Nord, and the colored lights from the Red Light district. The Red Light district: another relaxation area, another “healthy recreation” zone.

At the center of the Marketplace there are two fishbowls. We sat next to them. «Fish makes me relax», said Nicole, and tapped the glass with her fingers a couple of times. We hadn’t talked in a long time, probably a couple of years. She served hot water in a mug, pulled out a little plastic bag with bits of ginger —or kion, as we say in Peru— from her handbag. I looked at her for a few seconds: the wide forehead, almost white eyebrows, just like the hair, the eyes… those eyes. And then she shot: «En fait, I’m pregnant, Luciano… I wanted to tell you myself, so you wouldn’t hear it from third parties». Yes, she said “third parties” and smiled: she was teasing me while, tackling me at the same time, a punch straight into my tummy’s mouth, a flying kick to my chest with the very same Uma Thurman style from Kill Bill. That’s how Nicole is; that’s how we love her. I tried to pull out a congratulatory expression, to express happiness, my best wishes, but I couldn’t; of course not. I can be cynical, but not that much. I asked her the silly things supposed to be asked in those situations: how many months she was due, if it was a boy or a girl, what would be his or her name. «Milan, like Milan Kundera, the Czech writer», she answered. I didn’t give a damn about any of that, to be honest, but I needed some time to catch my breath back, come out of the grey cloud I was pulled in by the news. Yes, I’d have liked to know about the child’s father, but I didn’t ask her. I have my own things, my contradictions. Raise your hand if you have never contradicted yourself. I know that Nicole is currently living with someone: I saw them buying a Christmas tree together at Place Flagey. A hardworking Belgian man, strict with his kids, loyal to his woman. The adjectives that came into my mind as soon as I saw him was “innocuous”, “tasteless”, “boring”. What is Nicole doing with that geezer!

She did want to know how things were going for me. «Then, the storm has passed», she said after I answered. Did she feel relieved? Yes, that’s how it seemed, as if she took some weight off her back; I know her very well: she always felt guilty about the problem I got stuck into for her. And I mean for her, not because of her; it is different. She is not guilty, I made it clear a million times: you can’t destroy what’s already destroyed, what happened did nothing but accelerate what was going to happen anyway, I explained that in every way possible, but she couldn’t understand it… Or didn’t want to, and she stopped being part of my life, disappeared as fast as she came in.

«You look relaxed, Nicole, more calm», I told her, as I tried to change the subject; I’m tired of talking about the “subject”. Everyone asks me the same stuff: if I'm well settled, if I see my children, if the divorce is over, if I have another woman. They also want to know if she has another man. If there are "third parties" in our lives. That's what they ask at the end, but it's what interests them the most. It’s the morbid curiosity. “She” is Dorothée, my ex-wife, the mother of my children. "The mother of my children"; I hate the formula, but I can't find another either. «Yes, I feel good in my skin —confirmed Nicole—; I have found balance, inner peace: The crazy years are over, Luciano».

Nicole's “crazy years” were also a bit mine. I say just a bit, because for me it was not years, but a few weeks: the weeks of transgression, the weeks of hundred kilometers per hour with a head-on collision at the end, like a train wreck. We met at a Banking seminar, a staff training my boss sent me. I was still in the Risk division at that time; she was already a secretary in the Operations department. «Take the opportunity to do some networking, Luciano —my boss told me the day before the seminar—. Interacting with other colleagues is important for your career». Yes, dear boss, networking is essential for professional life, I appreciate the advice, but you forgot to tell me that it can also screw your personal life… or fix it. It depends on how you see things.

I had crossed paths with her a few times in the Bank’s building, with Nicole, I mean, but we had never spoken before. I thought about Stevie Nicks every time I saw her. A Stevie Nicks twenty years younger, twenty centimeters taller. A blonde mare, as they would say in Piura. She always wore camouflage pants, hiking boots, necklaces, colored bracelets, cowboy bandanas, zero makeup. As if she was going to do trekking instead of placing her ass in front of a desk eight hours a day. Her hips are a little thicker now, and it seems to me that her breasts, pink and with freckles —I know them well— are even bigger, but her belly is hardly noticeable. She still has the banana-shaped mouth and the flat ass: that hasn't changed, unfortunately.

Nowadays the staff trainings are given in the Board room. This is almost like going to another meeting in the office instead of a training, just another normal day at work. Who would be interested in burying themselves into a basement, two days in a row, to listen to someone talking? Not me! Before the crisis, when the Bank’s P&L was way more positive, those trainings were always held outside the Bank, in respectable five star hotels: all-inclusive staff trainings. You actually wanted to attend to those. The Banking seminar was in a petit château in the middle of a forest, near the battlefields of Waterloo. Right where Napoleon was bested. Two full days and a single night —we came in on a Thursday morning, and we left the next day in the afternoon—; twenty wage slaves eager to break the routine with all expenses paid. They gave us a double room with a private bathroom. My window overlooked the tennis courts and the gardens of the little castle; I could see the pine forest from there, the squirrels having fun among the branches. A couple of days without dirty dishes, or dirty diapers, without yelling or complaining, and without insults.

We also learned things over the course of those two days, of course: credit ratings, credit lines, loans, guarantees, treasury management, money transfers, credit assessment. Between talks, we left the "classroom" and went to the pool terrace to stretch out on the chaise lounges, for the sun to clash into our faces; some to laugh, some others to complain, also to have a coffee, a tea, some juice. There were also cupcakes to restore energy; very necessary after all the effort deployed.

The last topic of the first day was given by a guy with hairstyle split down the middle; a Zlatan Ibrahimovic with a photo badge on his chest: the nose, the look, the size; he walked as if a broomstick had been shoved up his ass; just like the annoying Swedish football player, but this one had not won anything, as far as I know. «Let's get started», he yelled while we were still on the terrace. We came in wishing we could stay at the pool, order a couple of bottles of Chardonnay, a Peruvian ceviche with a few cold beers to go with it instead of having to listen to that guy talk to us about rules and slogans. Life sucks, damn it! «I know that you are thinking more about the hotel bar than AML rules, but you have to stop salivating and listen to me for the time being: What I am here to tell you is of the utmost importance». Uhm-Hmm, a man with a professional future, an individual who takes himself seriously, a human being who has forgotten that he sits on the toilet every morning. «For those who are yet to know me, my name is Philippe, I'm the head of the Anti-Money Laundering department —he was striding around the room—, I report directly to our CRO, I have a team of nine persons reporting to me, and I'm looking for two more. I say this for information purposes, nothing more, just in case any of you are interested in working for me; ha, ha, ha». He stopped in the middle of the corridor, looked at us one by one in the eye: a pedagogical technique, an intimidation technique. «What are we here for this afternoon?» Is there really a need to yell like that, brother, to chase the serenity off our bodies? I'm sure even the squirrels in the woods heard him, but no one opened their mouths. «Is there no answer, no one dares to; are you afraid?, ha, ha, ha». He had the computers’ WIFI keyboard clutched with both hands behind his back. «Then I'm afraid I will have to choose someone», he said, and using the keyboard as a rifle he aimed at a skinny girl who worked in the Marketing department.

- To learn about the laws of money laundering? —she said, while shrinking on her chair.

- No, no, no —Philippe made a tantrum, just like Zlatan does when he doesn’t score.

- To learn about how to protect the bank’s reputation —said someone.

- Yes, yes, very good, that’s what AML is —yelled Philippe, along with a couple of strides between the tables—. And do you all think that the Bank’s reputation is important?

That was, by far, the most stupid question of the entire Seminar. The second most stupid question immediately followed:

- Why is it important to protect the bank's reputation?

- To comply with the law —answered someone with the WIFI keyboard a few centimeters away from his nose.

- No, no; don’t tell me that, please; I'm sure you can do it better, my dear friend.

- To gain confidence from our customers —said another.

- Yes! —Philippe stopped in the middle of the room, took a chocolate out from the pocket of his jacket and threw it into the air— Here's your prize, buddy.

Forty minutes later, after his show ended, Philippe invited us to go to the hotel bar, to the relaxation area of the hotel, for an aperitif. When I arrived, Nicole was already there with her first glass of white wine in hand. We looked at each other and smiled. Networking time, Luciano, I remembered my boss's recommendation. I made my way to the bar between the distressed bodies of my colleagues and ordered a glass of red wine. I miscalculated: I fell right next to Philippe.

- What you just ordered, Luciano, is a food wine, excellent choice to eat along with a pork chop. A family oriented red wine —he said, or rather shouted, as if we were in the middle of a storm instead of ten centimeters away from each other.

- Uhm-Hmm, to drink with family, of course —that was my humble contribution to the stupid comments of the seminar—. However, Philippe wasn't listening to me; obviously, Zlatan only listens to himself.

- The bubble of a good cava must rise straight and be small; like this —he said with his finger pointed towards his raised glass, asking for silence in the bar with his eyes—; if it is large and rises in circles, I recommend not to drink it.

Somebody should bring this man the projector from the “classroom”, please, the laser pointer, and a microphone as well; it’s urgent. But, the truth is, it isn’t worth giving more space to Zlatan in this story: you can find characters like his even under the stones.

- Are you from Lima, Luciano? Nicole stood right next to me and ordered her third glass of Chardonnay.

- No, from Piura, from the north; have you ever been to Peru?

- Yes, but not the north; I was in Lima, I volunteered at the Pérez Araníbar; then I went to Cuzco for a week, but I stayed for two months —she showed off her pink gums, her embedded teeth—. Every afternoon I went up to Sacsayhuaman to watch the sunset. I was twenty years old. My father had to go and bring me back by force. Such good times!

A dîner de trois services were waiting for us at the restaurant of the petit château; with wine à volonté, of course. All you had to do was lift your index finger slightly for the cup to be filled immediately. We didn't deserve that much, honestly! «I want to practice my Spanish», Nicole said, and we sat together at one of the tables. Excusatio non petita, accusatio manifesta, I thought, and saw an opportunity window slightly open before my eyes. A little window that kept opening as the night progressed, as we poured more wine into our bodies; bodies eager for a change, for an unexpected turn, for something that would restore the sparkle to their eyes.

I had to talk about Dorothée when Nicole and my other table companions wanted to know what I was doing in Belgium, why I had committed the “madness” of switching “the country of the sun for that of the rain”. A superficial knowledge of my country’s situation, a gross simplification of reality, but this was not the time to philosophize about my country: a Piuran in a Waterloo castle was something exotic, a rare pearl; I had to take advantage of that circumstance to open up the window a bit more.

- Are you married too, Nicole?

- Yes… well; not anymore… I'm currently breaking up.

Aha. I smiled on the inside, felt positive, but I put on a stupid face and said, «Too bad» or «I'm so sorry», or something just as fake as that, just as cynical. I asked if there were "third parties" involved. Yes, morbid curiosity, I also suffer from it, I am not immune to that disease, I have not been vaccinated against that. «Third parties, you say? —Nicole shouted and laughed with her whole body. «How hilarious you are, Luciano!». The people at the other tables looked at us. Was that woman laughing at me? Yes, I can confirm it, she was teasing me with all of her teeth and gums, and I did not know at the time if that was positive for my interests, or totally the opposite. «No; there are no third parties, or maybe there are —she said, leaving me adrift—, but that's not the reason for the separation. The truth is that we had become a version of my parents, a faithful copy of the original; of many originals, actually, and I refuse to spend my whole life in that modern form of slavery, playing roles, pretending to be something I'm not, feeling what I don't feel». Yes, I confirm it: she said “slavery”, and that was my turn to laugh with my whole body. But that thing about “slavery”, about “roles” remained stuck in my head forever.

We went back to the bar. Listen, gentlemen of HR: there is no better place for networking, for team building other than a pub with an open bar. No sideway glances, no "no time right now"; no "not my responsibility; no "not high priority". We all loved each other: “I’m here to serve you, brother”. “Whenever you want, Luciano”. Forget about bowling or wall climbing competitions, or virtual games; don't waste money on stupid things, spend it on wine, cava, beer. Also, stop giving us moral lessons like: "Don’t let your co-workers see you drunk". You all get drunk yourselves! Stop screwing up the party, please!

Beneath the bar my fingers brushed against Nicole's, entwined with hers, caressed each other. The opportunity window was wide open, the sun shone in the middle of that star-less night. A night that advanced exceeding expectations. The first session of the next day was at nine in the morning; after breakfast together, "as a team", of course. The serious, responsible people, the top of the class, started leaving the bar little by little. Neither Nicole nor I qualified in that category; our priorities were different at that time. We said goodbye to our colleagues with hugs and promises of eternal friendship; until the barman said goodbye to us too. «Nous allons fermer, Monsieur, Madame». Nicole called to the three or four "irresponsible" colleagues who were left, suggesting to go to a bar she knew in the center of Waterloo. The «last drink», she shouted —one of the three universal lies. «Too late for a night-cap, Nicole», said the few men standing. «I'll go with you, Nicole». That was me, of course.

I took her by the arm because she was staggering, she was staggering even more than me, and we walked in the direction of the little castle’s parking lot. We didn't get past the fitting rooms by the pool. I had to force the door open, vandalize it, actually, to get into one of them. There were parasols closed against the wall, stacked chaise longues, hills of mattresses. It smelled musty. Why didn't we go to one of the two rooms that each of us had, with king-size beds and fresh sheets, freshly laundered towels, and even a bathtub? I don't know, but it's better not to waste time trying to find an explanation for the instructions that an overheated, alcohol-soaked brain issues. I threw a couple of mats on the floor, they had moss on them, the clothes were stained green, but who cared about that at the time. The brain —that part of the brain that worked at cruising speed— instructed me to free the woman I held in my arms of all her clothing: I took off her jacket, her blouse, unfastened her bra. There wasn't much light, only the one that entered through the skylight in the roof —half covered by dry leaves—, but Nicole's two things stood out white, full, with freckles, as I already mentioned, with pink tips, very pink tips. They were soft, warm, endless. «Kiss them, Luciano, bite them, mais doucement», Nicole asked me.

If that wasn't happiness, then it was very much like it; I swear on my mother it was. I could have stayed there for the rest of the seminary, touching the sky with my two hands, with my ten fingers, I could have stayed to live there, in that damp dressing room, forever; I should have stayed to live there, never go back to reality. I shared a double bed with Dorothée, with my wife, of course, but that night marked three months and six days without action. I wrote down the dates, I kept statistics in my marriage diary, I counted the days: Yes, that night marked almost a hundred days that I didn't touch her skin, that I didn't breathe over it, that I didn't make it wet. I lived like Arthur and Luca, Nicole's cocker spaniels, with the difference that I wasn't castrated: I was complete, I wanted to, I could, but the rate of rejection, of humiliation in my own bed was close to one hundred out of one hundred. Those are the numbers, the numbers don't lie. Frustration. Frustration is a noun that is not enough as a definition. We had to progress, finish the job, take advantage of that open window that appeared to me in the changing room of a Waterloo swimming pool. Who knows how long it would last? Unfortunately, a problem arose, an unforeseen event, a damn obstacle. Why is there always something, or someone who insists on screwing up our lives? It was impossible to get Nicole's boots off, her damn hiking boots, and therefore —obviously, I'm not David Copperfield— I couldn't get her pants and underwear off either. The road was blocked by knots and strings, along with the low amount of light and all the wine I drank, it seemed more difficult than Mission: impossible.

Furthermore, Nicole kept fidgeting and giggling, as she struggled with the zipper of my blue jeans. I managed to roll her underwear and pants down to her ankles, but I couldn't spread her legs wide enough. The attack angle was too narrow. We went around the floor several times and tried different things, but nothing worked. I was losing my mind, the opportunity window was closing before my very eyes. Use your creativity, Luciano, damn it! I thought about desperate solutions —some gardening shears I'd seen in the hall; a piece of broken glass; an ax to chop wood—, but I discarded those with what little sanity I had left. I asked the Heavens for help, I promised things to infinity. Some of it must have helped, or perhaps it was Nicole who became more cooperative: I finally managed to finish the task, cut both the tail and the ear, as they say in Piura, when she kneeled in front of a chaise longue which, without instructions or anything, I managed to put together in less than thirty seconds. Not even an Ikea expert would have done it faster. “Luciano performs better under stressful situations”, my boss had written in my Performance Review from the previous year. Confirmed!

Nicole had a Guatemalan hammock for two on the terrace of her apartment; of her “small flat”, of her duplex apartment of one hundred and eighty square meters, only for herself, with view of a lake, elevator and concierge at the entrance. A little wedding present from “Daddy”. Yes, well, Nicole was born with a silver spoon between her thick lips. We got to know each other better in that hammock during the weeks that followed the Banking seminar. Once or twice a week, after work, we'd settle in there with a little bottle of something in hand. I also got to know Arthur and Luca well: the beasts barked, jumped, tried to bite me every time the fireworks started in the hammock. Nicole howled, and so did the damned dogs. I thought about The Pups, Vargas Llosa’s novel, about Pichulita Cuéllar, I felt fear and my performance dropped. How can someone proclaim herself a pet lover, while at the same time mutilate a living being, remove one, or two, rather, of the pillars of their happiness! Selfishness, that's the right word. «They just want to protect me», she told me when I asked her to do something, to lock them in the kitchen, damn it. «You shouldn't have castrated them —I told her—, that's why they bother us, they don't understand what's going on».

The animals were annoying, yes, but, in reality, that was a minor detail, a trivial thing within all those hours of life that I accumulated, of that mix of new experiences, of new emotions, —or rediscovered old ones— which lined up to come into my head during the four or five weeks of that intensive training that my boss sent me to. But, cliché or not, there is no free lunch, or free sex in this case: everything is paid for in this life. I paid with more frictions in my house, frictions that increased intensively until ending with what little remained of that illusion, of that mirage, of that “slavery” by mutual consent made public, Dorothée and I had imposed ourselves fifteen years before. It was getting more and more difficult for me to explain the smell of Chardonnay, the red eyes, the stupid giggle with which I came home two or three times a week. I made up fake corporate events at the Bank, meetings at the Advisory Council of the Peruvian Consulate, meals with colleagues. But there is no human body that can resist that rhythm, or marriage that can support it... neither does the job. «What's going on, Luciano?», my boss asked me when, for the fifth time in a month, I asked for permission to leave early. «Problems at home», I replied; and somehow I wasn't lying.

We went to Copenhagen in the middle of the week. A “two-day business trip to London”, I told Dorothée. It was summer and, by all means, Nicole wanted to go to Christiania. I couldn't let her go alone… or with anyone else, for that matter. Christiania, a former military headquarter at the center of the Danish capital, turned into the largest “healthy recreation” zone of Europe, where you can do whatever you want, without anyone busting your bowls. Seven hectares of peace and love, graffiti, and weed, hills of weed of all colors and intensities. «We can truly be free here, Luciano — Nicole told me when we entered—. Just like when I used to go up to Sacsayhuaman to see the sunset; that's why I wanted you to come with me: you are Peru, mon cher». Damn, such responsibility! And we hadn't gotten anything into our bodies yet. I felt like Manu Chao walking hand by hand with Stevie Nicks in a permanent cloud of patchouli. I had not smoked marijuana since I finished the University, in Piura, twenty years ago. Twenty years playing the responsible man, the professional with a future, the dedicated father, the faithful husband. All that went to hell in a couple of sighs, in a couple of puffs, rather. We bought the material in a tiny wooden kiosk, as easy as buying a couple of chicken empanadas. «All the cities of the world should have something like this, an escape valve, surely there would be less men beating their women; fewer women breaking their husbands' balls —I told Nicole—. I could put something like this in Piura, there’s space in my old man’s farm. It would be a nice project». «You're already hallucinating, Luciano», Nicole told me full of laughter. On that several-hour flight that we got into, walking through those streets of Rastafarians, bracelets and lice I lost my credit card. Calling the bank in Brussels to cancel it was like calling someone from the moon through WhatsApp.

That very same satellite call was the coup de grace, the final bayonet blow which ended both my marriage and the weeks of intensive training that had shaken my life. The Bank called home to confirm my credit card cancellation request made from Denmark. «Denmark? —asked Dorothee—; London, you mean, Monsieur». «No, Madame, Copenhagen». «Business trip to London? —my boss was surprised when my wife called her— No, no; Luciano took two free days due to family reasons».

The last time we went out together in Brussels —a few days before, in a rush, I had to find an Airbnb for myself and the suitcase that was waiting for me at the door of my house when I arrived from the airport—, the night before my birthday number forty, Nicole took me to a tapas bar near the Quartier European. Knee-length skirt, blue sack, tennis shoes; the first time I saw makeup on that skin.

- You look wonderful tonight, Nicole­ —I told her.

- C'est pour ton anniversaire, mon chéri.

Between the tortilla, the patatas bravas and the garlic prawns, Nicole handed me a small package, a book wrapped in gift paper: The unbearable lightness of being; the novel by Milan Kundera that she had told me about so many times. «Happy birthday, Luciano. Promise me you'll read it», she asked me while, under the table, comme d'habitude, she rubbed my thighs with her feet, her little feet. I told her yes, I was going to read it. And yes, I read the novel on the subway in the following days, when I went to and from work, so that Dorothée wouldn’t suspect; wouldn't suspect even more, I mean. And I read it again in the months that followed the atomic explosion which turned my life upside down, and I still have it on my nightstand —on my new nightstand, the one I had to buy at Ikea; in a rush also —with paragraphs underlined and some notes I made along the margins. How can someone tell you several times: "I don't want to destroy anything, Luciano, your family, your marriage", and, at the same time, give you a book as destructive as that one, an explosive device wrapped in gift paper? It’s like giving a rope, or a loaded gun to someone who is going through a major depressive disorder. Nicole wasn’t free of contradictions either; of course not.

On the way to the Montgomery roundabout, where Nicole was going to drop me off, so I could take the subway back home, I took advantage of the fact that it was the first time —and also the last time, although I didn't know it at the time— that I had her at arm’s length, in a skirt, to pass my left hand over those bare thighs, pink and hot. Hot from the two jugs of sangria that we’d drank, and that moved to the rhythm of the Mini Cooper's gearbox. I first explored both thighs, then moved north; where I verified that there were no panties. I went to explore that area with the middle finger firm, or erect as you can also say. “Fingering” is the verb used in English to describe that action. I don't know the equivalent in Spanish, but that activity exists, I'm sure about it. «Arrête, Luciano, arrête», Nicole repeated, but in those situations an order, an imperative in one direction can mean completely the opposite. You have to know how to read the actual message, the body language, the circumstances. «Stop now, otherwise I'm going to do the same, Luciano», Nicole threatened me, but she threatened me with a prize, with a reward. We were still in the field of contradictions, of apparent contradictions. We parked at the entry of the subway, right where the Embassy of Peru used to be. And right there, with the "glorious" Peruvian flag as witness, Nicole fulfilled her threat, she punished me as promised. Fellatio is the word used in those situations.

The End