I'm reading the novel Caramelo by Sandra Cisneros and loving it! I have a few lines I want to pull out and share from a scene involving Celaya (Lala), a young Chicana and her aunt, Norma. The whole novel is beautifully poetic, but I felt drawn to a few lines about love and wanted to share them.
     Norma is telling Celaya about her relationship with her ex-husband. When talking of how the couple met she says, "...he looks back at me and smiles and winks. That wink that says, 'I know it's a lie, and you know it's a lie, but let's just keep it to ourselves, right?' I go back to being invisible to everyone but him. It's as if I was always invisible until that moment. Until he said, 'She's with me,' I didn't have a life, right?'"
     When telling Lala of the couple's separation, the Norma says, "'...I went a little crazy. Oh, I suffered, Lala, I was all right in the day. In the daytime it was easy to be brave. It was when I lay down to sleep, that's when I'd let myself cry.'
     'Why is it sadness always comes and gets you when you lie down?' [Lala asked]
     'Maybe it's because we talk too much in the day, and we can't hear what the heart is saying. And if you don't pay attention, then it talks to you through a dream...' [Norma]
      'Everyone knew how the story was going to end except me. Isn't that always the case with love?...So that after we broke up he still wanted to keep calling me, can you believe it? 'Can't we just be friends?' [Norma]
     I've always wondered about the "Let's be friends" thing. I'm with Norma. I don't think it works. I'd love to be friends with my ex, because he really was my best friend, but when I'm around him, it breaks my heart.
Back to the novel, Norma says:
     ..."'Because that's what I was, more alone than I'd ever been in my life. I was alone, and the person who loved me was a piece of red thread unraveling. Thank you, goodbye. And when I die, then you'll realize how how much I loved you, right? Yes, of course. That's how it always is, isn't it? I dreamt a dream; I opened my wallet, but instead of money, there was a row of starched handkerchiefs, and I knew I had a lot of tears to spend.
     'I just wish he would've said, 'I hurt you, Norma, and I'm sorry.' Just that, I don't know, I don't know. If only he'd said that. Maybe that's why I still hate him!
     ...'Look, I wouldn't hate him if I didn't love him. Only people you love drive you to hate, don't you know that yet, Lalita? The ones you don't give a cucumber for, who cares what they think, right? They're not worth the bother of being upset...'"