[This was an English assignment meant to parody Hemingway’s writing style. I apologize for any blatant Spanish grammatical errors-I’m nowhere near fluent.]
It’s the middle of the day, and the bar is mostly empty. The Spaniards are just finishing off their siestas and preparing to go back to work or school. I like the Spaniards. They’re good people. They know how to party. They stay up late. Still, they work hard during the day. I admire that.
I am alone. The bartender wipes glasses. No one else sits at the bar. There are a few other people in the building, seated at tables. I wave at the bartender. He gets me another brandy. “Gracias,” I say to him. He eyes me. I pay him for the drink. He moves away and continues to clean the glasses.
A man comes in and walks up to the bar. He orders a sherry and sits two stools away from me. He gets his drink. Then he turns to me.
“Hello.”
I pretend I do not speak English. I am tired and impatient. I do not feel like talking. “Hola.”
He grins. “Como estas?”
“Estoy cansada.”
“Por que no hablas ingles?”
“Es una idioma fea.”
He waves at the bartender and asks for a bottle of wine. “Dos vasos, por favor.”
“I don’t want wine,” I tell him in English.
“You are in Spain. You’ll have wine.”
I can’t deny that. We drink the wine. It’s good wine. I have never liked wine much, but this one is good and sweet.
“You’re American,” he says.
“Si.”
“What brings you to Spain?”
“El deseo de viajar.”
He waited for me to ask him. I did not. I sipped my wine. It was good wine.
“I’m just stopping by,” he says. “On to Italy after this.”
“How very interesting.”
“No need to be rude.”
“I’m not being rude.”
“I didn’t have to buy you wine.”
“You certainly did not.”
The bottle was nearly empty now. The man asked the bartender for another.
“What’s your name, anyway?”
“Me llamo Carmelita.”
“Your skin is too fair.”
“Alice. But I like Carmelita better. I like Spain better.”
“I’m Bryan.”
“Mucho gusto.”
“Would you quit it?”
I smiled at him. Maybe I did like wine. It was a Wednesday afternoon in a small Spanish bar and I was drinking wine with a man I did not know. The sun was coming in through the window and reflecting off the glasses lined up behind the bar, glinting off the bottles of wine and brandy. The dark wood bar was marred by glass rings and burns of forgotten cigarettes. The man beside me is not so unwelcome now; perhaps it is the wine. I swirled the glass in my hand.
“Te dijo. No me gusta ingles.”
“Me gusta ingles.”
“Y porque te gusto?”
He stared at me for a moment. “No se,” he answered, before pouring me another glass of wine.
