This is Ada noticing on her tongue the translucence of the word escriure and the word novel·la, to write and novel, respectively. The coffee tinting them, melting them, like ice cubes. Ada who is ex-plaining that now that she’s returned from England, and while she looks for work, she wants to write.
Lluís who says: “Great” and “You’ve always been a marvelous writer, sweetheart.” They are in a restaurant. Lluís asks: “What do you want to write about?” And Ada responds: “The divorce.” And this is Lluís who says: 1. Between your mother and me? 4.
I’ll leave your names as is too. And I’ll ask permission from everyone who appears in it. I’ll change the names of anyone who wants me to.
It won’t only be about the divorce, it will be about everything. And it will be partly fictionalized and turned into a novel because it’s a story, but the gist is to make a novel out of us.” Lluís opens his eyes without looking anywhere. Ada adds: “I want to write about things I know.” And this is Lluís looking at the window, the sidewalk, the pregnant lady on the other side of the street.
And this is Ada who says: “So do I have your permission?” And Lluís who responds without directing his gaze at her: “Yes, of course, you always have my permission.” And this is Ada who drives home and thinks that it is a gigantic error to talk to anyone about something you want to write before you’ve written it. She thinks about Holden Caulfield at the end of Catcher in the Rye. If you do, you start missing everybody.” But it’s not the same.
And this is the unfinished opening of the novel. That went like this: Victòria put her fingers in front of her mouth, like thick bars through which she repeated: “It’s hard, it’s really hard.” She in-haled and drew her hand heavily along her chin, jaw, and neck. She said: “We’re getting divorced.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
