Ana Oliveira Part 2

“I’m crying because I’m sure you’ve hated me all this time, you really hate me, and I’ve never hated you! I’ve always felt love, sadness, longing, and many things, but I’ve never truly hated you, even if the opposite came out of my mouth!” I confessed, making him flinch at the weight of my words.
Josiah let go of my face, turning red with anger, shaking his head as he paced in front of me. He was getting mad.
“And even if you make me moan like a ‘bitch,’ wasn’t that what you just said? Even if you do that… I know nothing I give you will make you forgive me,” I warned, drying my tears.
“Ana… I…” he stammered, seeming to hold back from jumping on me as he used to do when he was nervous. “I keep dreaming of moments that will never happen. I imagine scenarios where I wake up with you on one side of my chest and the Little One on the other. Worlds where you’re carrying another baby of ours in your belly, where we travel, where you say yes to me in church before God. I can’t fall in love with anyone else because you’re the only woman who floods my heart, leaving no room for anything else.” He was crying, with his arms open in front of me as if he were completely exposed, revealing something very deep about himself, looking at me with so much suffering that I hated myself, hated myself for everything wrong I had done. “I imagine parallel universes where everything I dreamed for us happens, but you know who else is in that scenario?”
Then he hit me in a way I hadn’t imagined he would, right after saying such beautiful things, exposing that he felt exactly the same as I did, that he had the same desires that could never be fulfilled. But he started that damn sentence, and I knew what was coming next. I knew what Josiah was thinking, and I was fragile from the day’s events. What he was about to say would finish me off. My heart pounded, literally aching, making me almost lose my breath.
“Shut up!” I pleaded, covering my ears, knowing exactly what Josiah would throw in my face. “Don’t talk about it, please!”
Josiah moved closer, forcing me to remove my hands from my ears, and I buried my head in his stomach, crying, bracing myself for the blow that was hearing that:
“I dream of worlds where you didn’t kill my best friend. Worlds where Bernardo didn’t end up in a damn hospital bed, lifeless, just a body vegetating because you were out of control!” he shouted, hugging me tightly. “And yes, I hate you with all the strength I can muster because I’m ashamed to still love the woman who promised to be mine, who promised to wait for me, the woman for whom I took up a career I hated, the woman for whom I gave up my dreams, and who still had the courage to be with the only person I asked her not to. The person who would hurt, the woman who screwed my brother.”
“Stop, please!” I begged, feeling like I would pass out with all those fucked-up memories in my head. “I can’t take it.”
“You will take it because I wake up every day knowing that I didn’t see my daughter take her first steps, that I don’t know the first word Julia said, that I didn’t see her face when she was born…” he yelled, crying, pulling my hair back with fury, making me face him. I was trembling under his angry touch, running out of breath. “I built this damn house to see scraps of my daughter, to see scraps of you. And when I can’t control the hate, like the day I threw eggs at your house, I go there, to the hospital where my best friend is vegetating, and I wish for him to wake up, to come back to life, by a miracle, so I can forgive you. So I can be happy again…”
I was simply overwhelmed by memories of what I had done. I remembered the night I had given birth and discovered that my best friend, the man who loved my daughter, who loved me, who loved the ungrateful brother he would do anything for, had died. The man with the most beautiful soul in the world died in a car accident because of me, because he was going to see the birth of my daughter. And two days later, I lost it… I lost it when I got home and Josiah was there. I lost it because I was alone with a baby, because Marta hadn’t been able to make it back in time from her European trip with her boyfriend, and I barely knew how to hold my daughter… I lost it because Julia’s father thought she was the result of an infidelity that never existed. I lost it because I was a bitch who destroyed everything. And it was all so noisy that I really wanted to make the noise stop.
And I only remember when I was trying to make the noise end. I don’t even remember seeing Ber. But Josiah says I did. That he saw me with Bernardo while he was unconscious. I only remember breaking the car with the damn speaker and what Jow did to me and destroyed my career, leaving me deformed.

“I don’t remember doing that…” I whispered very softly, feeling like I was going to faint.
“You don’t remember,” he repeated. “What don’t you remember, Ana?”
“Doing that to Bernardo.”
“But I saw you. You were there.”
“I only remember you leaving me and breaking me, letting me fall onto the hand I did everything with… Letting me fall while I was still recovering, reopening the stitches from my cesarean. The damn party you were throwing that drove me mad with rage. You let me go, let me fall, and didn’t even look back. Harry showed up with Isa, and they were the ones who helped me,” I accused, seeing him release me and stagger back, as if he was surprised and stunned. “I know it wasn’t your intention. I know it was unintentional, but I blamed you for it for a long time, for every moment I couldn’t hold my baby, for having to relearn how to do everything with my left hand, being right-handed. And I imagine worlds where none of this happened, but I don’t need them to forgive you…”