payment page
But what Cleófilas has been waiting for, has been whispering and sighing and giggling for, has been anticipating since she was old enough to lean against the window displays of gauze and butterflies and lace, is passion. . . . The kind the books and songs and telenovelas describe when one finds, finally, the great love of one's life, and does whatever one can, must do, at whatever the cost.
Cleófilas has a very naïve view of love at the beginning of the story. She “has been waiting” for the passion described in “the books and songs and telenovelas” since she was very young. Between then and now, her expectations have not matured. She has been childishly “whispering and sighing and giggling” about passion. Her dreams of love come with romantic ideas of “gauze and butterflies and lace.” She is sure that in Juan Pedro, she has found the love of her life. Her standard for true love comes from fiction. Her willingness to do “whatever [she] can, must do, at whatever cost” for love foreshadows the trouble she will find in her marriage.
In the morning sometimes before he opens his eyes. Or after they have finished loving. Or at times when he is simply across from her at the table putting pieces of food into his mouth and chewing. Cleófilas thinks, This is the man I have waited my whole life for.
The short time of Cleófilas’s and Juan Pedro’s wedded bliss is over. The early, enjoyable part of their marriage has passed, and Juan Pedro has shown himself to be an abuser. Cleófilas has dutifully followed him to the ice house, where she twists napkins into various shapes out of boredom while Juan Pedro drinks with his friends. Now the couple has settled into their everyday routine. She looks at him in the morning while he sleeps, after making love, or eating at the table, and expresses her great disappointment. Cleófilas no longer sees Juan Pedro as a romantic figure. Her disillusionment is plain when she says, “[t]his is the man I have waited my whole life for.”
