Lucho SSJ

The chat starts going crazy. I see out of the corner of my eye how the messages are flying across the screen at breakneck speed, filling up with question marks.
Some already suspect. Others don't understand anything.
But he did.
And so did we. She glances down for a second and settles back in her chair. I bite my lip instinctively, waiting for the impact.
And it says:
—Hey… you guys have known each other for a long time, haven't you?

As if months hadn't passed. As if we hadn't left everything up in the air.
As if there were no songs involved. As if there were no doubts. As if it didn't hurt.
My body goes half stiff, but I act like nothing's wrong. I say hello, sit down, crack a couple of jokes… but I can't stop glancing at her. When I give her a polite kiss on the cheek in front of everyone, I swear her perfume is exactly the same, and it blows my mind.
I try to focus on anything. The chat, the cameras, what the guys are saying… but I always end up coming back to her.
It's different.
Or maybe it's me.
Maybe both.
She seems more confident. Colder, even. Or maybe it's just a facade… I don't know. She used to be easier to read.
Not now. There's a barrier in place, transparent but thick.
And that kills me a little.
Our eyes meet for a second… and that's enough.
Nothing else is needed.
Everything comes back around. It's like someone threw a bucket of ice water on me.
The nights in Rio, the talks, what never happened… and all that could have been.
The things I didn't say. The things she didn't say either.
That's almost it.
That "almost."
And it hits me hard.
Because that's when I realize something I've been avoiding for months:
It wasn't something fleeting.
It never was.
And maybe… it's not over yet.
But I don't know if I'm late either. I swallow hard, trying to hide it, hoping the guys or the chat don't realize I'm about to tell her to get lost in the interview and take her away to talk.
And there, in the middle of the stream, amid laughter and comments, that question comes.
Spreen looks at both of us, with that shitty smile she has when she knows she's about to make someone uncomfortable.
As if he understood everything without anyone having explained anything to him.
As if he had read the tension in the air from the very first second.

It was that kind of silence where you're still watching. Where you see if anything gets posted. Where you know their schedule by heart without even realizing it. Where you play dumb… but you don't let go. It's a shitty ego game. To see who gives in first, to see who shows they care less. And in that game, we both lost.
I'd see things about her every now and then. Stories, songs… and then I started seeing comments. That she was with someone else. That she was with Dyan. I don't know if it was true, but I didn't ask either.
Although the truth is… I wanted to do it. My blood boiled every time I read his name next to someone else's, but my pride held me back.
I opened the chat a thousand times. I typed something a thousand times. I deleted it a thousand times.
Why?
Well, anyway… I hadn't done anything either.
And maybe that was the problem. I was a coward. Or I was too calculating. I don't know.
A week ago I released What Happened to Us? :(. I didn't write it thinking about her... or at least that's what I wanted to believe.
Lie.
Each part of that song has its own name.
Each “what happened to us?” was a question I never asked him.
Every line… was everything I kept to myself. When I was in the studio recording, I would close my eyes and see her in that VIP area, laughing at some stupid thing I said.
And when people started relating it to my life, I played dumb. I laughed. I said it was "just a song."
But I know the truth.
And today…
Today I am here.
Invited to Spreen and Carré's stream.
Before I even went in, I already felt kind of weird. That feeling in my chest that you don't know if it's anxiety or what the hell it is. Like something was about to happen. I hear the shouting from the hallway, the sound of keyboards in the background, the air conditioning blasting.
I enter.
Lights, cameras, people laughing, the usual chaos… and then I see her.
She.
There she is, sitting like nothing's wrong. She has that same relaxed vibe that blew my mind the first time.

I don't know when everything became so strange.
Maybe it happened little by little, so slowly that I didn't even notice.
A year ago, I was arriving in Brazil without imagining any of this. The show at Vasco's stadium, the packed São Januário Stadium, the people singing… but what stayed with me the most wasn't that.
It was her.
The VIP area, the noise from the Vasco da Gama Rowing Club match, the lights… the unbearable Rio de Janeiro heat beating down on my face, and amidst all that, there she was. Calm, as if she weren't in the middle of all that chaos. A singer, Brazilian, but with that Argentinian accent that threw me off from the very first “hello.”
And that wasn't all.
It was the way she looked at me, like she already knew me. Like I wasn't "Lucho SSJ," but just... another guy. And that, for someone like me, weighs heavily. Because it doesn't happen often. Most people look at you looking for something: a connection, a photo, a story to tell. She looked at me like she was reading who I really am when the cameras are off.
We grew closer without realizing it. Long conversations, glances that said more than either of us dared to say aloud. Nothing ever happened… but everything did.
And that's the worst part.
Because what doesn't happen... is what lingers the longest. Because if it had happened, if I had kissed her, maybe today it would just be another anecdote. A memory of one night, and that's it.
I remember silly details. How he laughed. How he mixed Portuguese with Spanish when he stumbled over his words. How he would say simple things that still left me thinking all night.
Then, silence.
Months without speaking. Four, to be exact. I returned to Buenos Aires and suddenly the distance felt real. We were no longer on the same emotional time zone.
But it wasn't a clean silence.