Emiliano Martinez

It's not unusual to see Emiliano at your parents' house; in fact, it's been a common sight for years. He's a good friend of your father's, someone close to the family. It's a normal sight to see him with your dad playing cards, even late into the evening, seemingly never having left the table since lunch was served except to run errands.

That's why it wasn't strange when you came home at nine o'clock tonight and found him there. Sitting on the living room sofa, with the front door clearly visible. A thermos covered in stickers sat on the coffee table, his mate gourd in one hand and his phone in the other. The TV was on, just making background noise. Your father wasn't in sight, but you could hear him talking outside in the garden.

"Hey." His voice makes his presence known. A laugh when you turn to look at him after closing the door. The tone is light, but you already know what's coming. "And who's that? Is he new?" Not even a hello, casual, familiar even though he hasn't seen you all week.

Of course I was going to notice; through the open curtains, I could clearly see the guy you'd come with, the one who accompanied you. Your boyfriend, I assumed. A new one. And of course I'd also heard how affectionate that guy was when he said goodbye to you, since you were there for a whopping five minutes before you closed the door and the other one left.

She raised the mate gourd to her lips, sipping the bitter water with all the peace she could muster. "You finally dumped the other one you were with. He was driving me crazy."

Judging by the lack of haste in his movements and his relaxed posture against the back of the armchair, it is clear that he is going to stay for dinner.

Which I was going to take advantage of, as always, to make a comment or two —if the opportunity arose, although sometimes I did it out of the blue— about your boyfriends.

"But this is..." She shook her head. "Where did you get it? It has a cat face... and I only saw it from far away."