I waited a few moments for the next text to come. By now Claudia had spotted me and joined my side, looking on curiously but not being nosy. She knew what was up.

He responded: Enjoy the museum, it is very important. See you when you get home. I love you.

I love you too, I texted back. I meant every single word of that. Despite that thought in my head, the one I didn’t want to touch, to feel, to look at, I knew without a doubt that I loved Mateo deeply and with every part of me. It was that love that made things hurt so much.

“What did he say?” Claudia asked.

I sighed. “Nothing really, just that he’s coming back home now.”

I stared at the grand entrance to the palace-like building. People of all ages were lining up to get in. Suddenly I knew that the last thing I wanted to be doing was staring at paintings and sculptures all while I was thinking about Mateo.

“Go,” Claudia said to me with a knowing smile. “We can always go to the museum another day. This will not take your mind off of Mateo if Mateo is in your home, waiting for you.”

“Are you sure?” I asked her.

She nodded. “I’ve lived in Madrid my whole life. I have seen the exhibits two times already this year. We will come back another day, maybe the four of us, like a double date. But believe me, you’re going to get a hatred for Goya if you go in there in this state.”

I smiled at her. “Well, I wouldn’t want to do that to Mr. Goya.”

She kissed me quickly on each cheek and waved as I walked away. “Good luck.”

Usually I got annoyed when people told me “good luck” because it sounded like I needed luck, needed help with something when I didn’t. But this time, I really did need it. I wanted to get back home and see Mateo and fall into his arms and have him bury that bad thought far, far away. I wanted him to take the burden away, to take everything away, and make me believe we had a way to get through this mess.

I decided not to tell him I was coming home early. In fact, I thought perhaps I could get home before him and make it a surprise, lay out some coffee and cookies and prepare for some soul-searching.

I took the Metro for a bit, trying to hurry, and walked quickly from the metro station to the apartment. I was about a block away, doing my best to ignore the little kicks of hurt that still swirled in my gut, that terrible feeling of dread I was convinced I could overcome.

And that’s when I saw Mateo.

He was across the street, getting out of a shiny red Audi. It wasn’t his car at all. Then I noticed the blond head of Isabel in the driver’s seat, and I realized that Mateo had driven Isabel home in her car last night.

I immediately retreated backward into the doorway of a shop, hoping the shadows would hide me, and watched the scene unfold. There was no way I wanted her to see me again; she’d probably leap out of the car and finish what she started.

Mateo walked around to her side of the car, with the same clothes on as last night, and she rolled down the window.

She said something to him. I couldn’t read her expression because she had sunglasses on.

Mateo put his right hand at her jaw, holding her intimately, like a husband would with a wife, nodding at whatever she was saying.

Then he kissed her.

Right on the lips.

A soft, sensual kiss.

And she kissed him back.

My lungs dropped to the floor, the fractures in my heart all blowing up at once, shattering every piece of me, shards slicing me from head to toe. All while my eyes stayed wide open, glued to the scene.

Finally he pulled away and smiled. But there was no time left in this universe to decipher what that smile meant, if it even meant anything.

Because I realized what that thought had meant, what it was trying to tell me, trying to get me to pay attention to.

I was watching Mateo and his wife, or soon-to-be-ex-wife, act affectionate with each other. I was watching them act like they’d been married for years, because of course they had been. I was watching this and I was dying inside, my heart stomped on and crushed, my veins full of black liquid jealousy, choking me from the inside out. I was feeling like I was never going to survive this.

And that was wrong.

Because they had a daughter together.

And me and my feelings, I was standing in the way.

I never wanted my father to leave my mother, not deep down. If there ever had been a way to spare me of all the pain I went through, I would have wanted it. Right now, I was the obstacle between Mateo and Isabel’s marriage. If there was ever a chance, even the smallest chance, that the two of them could ever get back together, I couldn’t be the one to get in the way of that.

They had a family together.

I needed to do the right thing, for everyone.

Fuck my own heart.

I had to leave Spain.

I managed to make it back to the apartment, hurrying along so that Mateo didn’t see me. I wasn’t sure how long he was spending at the car with Isabel, and I didn’t want to know. I felt as if I was going to die with each step, barely holding myself together as I got into our building. Once in the elevator, I started to keel over, holding onto the railing for dear life, trying to keep myself upright. The pain was so overwhelming I was seeing stars again.

As I fumbled with my keys and tried to stick them in the door, I kept dropping them. And then the tears started coming, streaming down my face, making me see through a watery filter. I tried to keep my sobs inside, tried to bury them deep in my chest, so determined not to lose it in the hallway. If I lost it, I would collapse right on the floor and I’d never make it inside.

Somehow the key went into the lock and the door handle turned. I burst through and immediately collapsed to my knees on the hardwood floors, not even feeling the pain that was shooting up through me. Physical pain was preferable; it could be handled. What I was feeling was being ripped apart right down the middle until there was nothing inside me but agony.

I leaned back against the door, shutting it with my back and letting the sobs tear through me. I couldn’t breathe.

I couldn’t breathe.

I was dying.

There was nothing.

My chest was being crushed and I was dying.

Breathe, I tried to tell myself. Please breathe.

But I couldn’t. I gasped for air and only cried out instead, overcome by the pain and the sorrow and the utter destruction of my new life.

I had to say goodbye to everything. I had to go back home. I had to leave Mateo. I had to do this to us to save us.

It was over.

I screamed, loud, shrill, bloody murder. My body shook, my hands and arms shaking, my chest still twisting and turning as I tried to breathe and cry and scream at the same time. I couldn’t take this, I couldn’t go on. This was the annihilation of every soft part of me; it was brutal and swift and gory, and I was being eaten alive, made to feel it all, every cut and slice and stab, and the wound in my chest was growing bigger and bigger.

Feeling swept away by the rage and the madness, I tore my purse off my shoulder and flung it across the room.

I screamed again and collapsed onto the ground, my fingers trying to dig into the floor, to give me something to hold on to.

“Please,” I cried out loud to no one. “Please make this stop, please make this stop.” I sobbed, my cries getting caught in my mouth, in my throat, in my lungs.

I barely heard the door opening behind me, barely felt it push against my backside.

“Vera?” Mateo asked from above me, his voice breaking. “Vera, my god. Are you okay?”

He shut the door behind him and put his arms under mine, pulling me up to my feet.

I gasped and stumbled away from him, holding on to the edge of the kitchen counter to keep me up.