Quotes from The Time in Between

“My fear didn't want to be left behind, so it came with me.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“Y descubrí también, con la más inmensa desazón, que en cualquier momento y sin causa aparente, todo aquello que creemos estable puede desajustarse, desviarse, torcer su rumbo y empezar a cambiar.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“And yet for that, blood is thicker than water, even if the only thing you've shared with your people have been hardships and miseries.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“It was a relationship that ended because it couldn't go anywhere, because it never should have begun.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“When you undertake a change like that you have to do it with dreams and hopes, with illusions. To go without them is to merely run away ...”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“One of the effects of being crazily, obsessively in love is that it dulls your senses, your capacity for perception, till you no longer notice what is happening around you.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“sin abandonar jamás aquella capacidad suya para mil veces caer y otras mil levantarse, sacudiéndose el polvo del vestido y echando a andar de nuevo con paso resuelto, como si nada hubiera pasado. Por muy duros que fueran los tiempos, jamás se fue de su lado el optimismo con el que apuntaló todos los golpes y al que se acogió para ver siempre el mundo desde el lado por el que el sol luce con más claridad.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“Sometimes luck decides to make our decisions for us, no?”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“He spoke with complicity, familiarly, as though he knew me; as though his soul and mine had been waiting for each other since the beginning of time.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“... living a life filled with deprivation and working from sunrise to sunset from your earliest years isn't to anybody's taste.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“Nnadie va a quererte como yo”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“Hunger sharpens your ingenuity, she would always conclude with a laugh.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“My day had already had a good dose of bitterness, and I preferred to keep it from getting any sadder.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“Dudé mucho antes de convencerme a mí misma de que debía seguir con aquel cometido. Reflexioné, sopesé opciones y valoré alternativas. Sabía que la decisión estaba en mi mano: sólo yo tenía la capacidad de elegir entre seguir adelante con aquella vida turbia o dejarlo todo de lado y volver a la normalidad (…)

Dejarlo todo y volver a la normalidad: sí, aquélla sin duda era la mejor opción. El problema era que ya no sabía dónde encontrarla. ¿Estaba la normalidad en la calle de la Redondilla de mi juventud, entre las muchachas con las que crecí y que aún se peleaban por salir a flote tras perder la guerra? ¿Se la llevó Ignacio Montes el día en que se fue de mi plaza con una máquina de escribir a rastras y el corazón partido en dos, o quizás me la robó Ramiro Arribas cuando me dejó sola, embarazada y en la ruina entre las paredes del Continental? ¿Se encontraría la normalidad en Tetuán de los primeros meses, entre los huéspedes tristes de la pensión de Candelaria, o se disipó en los sórdidos trapicheos con los que ambas logramos salir adelante? ¿Me la dejé en la casa de Sidi Mandri, colgada de los hilos del taller que con tanto esfuerzo levanté? ¿Se la apropió tal vez Félix Aranda alguna noche de lluvia o se la llevó Rosalinda Fox cuando se marchó del almacén del Dean’s Bar para perderse como una sombra sigilosa por las calles de Tánger? ¿Estaría la normalidad junto a mi madre, en le trabajo callado de las tardes africanas? ¿Acabó con ella un ministro depuesto y arrestado, o la arrastró quizás consigo un periodista a quien no me atreví a querer por pura cobardía? ¿Dónde estaba, cuándo la perdí, qué fue de ella? La busqué por todas partes: en los bolsillos, por los armarios y en los cajones; entre los pliegues y las costuras. Aquella noche me dormí sin hallarla.

Al día siguiente desperté con una lucidez distinta y apenas entreabrí los ojos, la percibí: cercana, conmigo, pegada a la piel. La normalidad no estaba en los días que quedaron atrás: tan sólo se encontraba en aquello que la suerte nos ponía delante cada mañana. En Marruecos, en España o Portugal, al mando de un taller de costura o al servicio de la inteligencia británica: en el lugar hacia el que yo quisiera dirigir el rumbo o clavar los puntales de mi vida, allí estaría ella, mi normalidad. Entre las sombras, bajo las palmeras de una plaza con olor a hierbabuena, en el fulgor de los salones iluminados por lámparas de araña o en las aguas revueltas de la guerra. La normalidad no era más que lo que mi propia voluntad, mi compromiso y mi palabra aceptaran que fuera y, por eso, siempre estaría conmigo. Buscarla en otro sitio o quererla recuperar del ayer no tenía el menor sentido.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“All those invisible presences ... began to transform themselves into companions that were more or less volatile, more or less intense, companions that I'd have to learn to live with. They invaded my mind when I was alone, in the silent evenings toiling away in the workshop between patterns and bastings, when I went to bed or in the gloom of the living room ...”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“con levantar el puño, odiar al que tienen por encima y cantar La Internacional van a arreglar poco; a ritmo de himnos no se cambia un país. Razones para rebelarse, desde luego, tienen de sobra, que aquí hay hambre de siglos y mucha injusticia también, pero eso no se arregla mordiendo la mano de quien te da de comer. Para eso, para modernizar este país, necesitaríamos emprendedores valientes y trabajadores cualificados, una educación en condiciones, y gobiernos serios que duraran en su puesto lo suficiente.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“... Full of old cockatoos who used to be rich and aren't any longer, but they cling to yesterday tooth and nail, preferring to live on bread and sardines rather than sell what little they have left of their faded glory.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“That was my story. Or at least the way I remember it. What happened to those characters and the places that had to do with those turbulent times, can be researched in libraries or the memories of the elderly. People like Beigbeder, Rosalinda, or Hillgarth went on to the history books.
People like Marcus and me didn't. 
But that doesn't mean our lives were less important. Because, in the end, we all play a part in the world's fate. And Marcus and I always stood on the other side of the story.
Actively invisible during that time we lived in between the seams.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“El vehículo se puso entonces en marcha, potente, alejándose veloz en la noche, llevando dentro a una mujer ilusionada y el vestido más fraudulento de toda la historia de la falsa alta costura”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“—musité acobardada. —Eso es lo que”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“Nuestros destinos pudieron ser éstos o pudieron ser otros del todo distintos porque lo que de nosotros fue en ningún sitio quedó recogido. Tal vez ni siquiera llegamos a existir. O quizá sí lo hicimos, pero nadie percibió nuestra presencia. Al fin y al cabo, nos mantuvimos siempre en el envés de la historia, activamente invisibles en aquel tiempo que vivimos entre costuras.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“Toc, toc, hora de regresar. Suspiré, me levanté y cerré la ventana. Había que volver al mundo.”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

“Quién es, preguntó. Se lo dije. A nuestro alrededor continuaban los ruidos de siempre: los niños, los perros y los timbres de las bicicletas; las campanas de San Andrés llamando a la última misa, las ruedas de los carros girando sobre los adoquines, los mulos cansados camino al fin del día. Ignacio tardó en volver a hablar. Tal determinación, tanta seguridad de intuir en mi decisión que ni siquiera dejó entrever su desconcierto. No dramatizó ni exigió explicaciones. No me increpó ni me pidió que reconsiderara mis sentimientos. Solo pronunció una frase más, lentamente, como dejándola escurrir. -Nunca va a quererte tanto como yo-”
― María Dueñas, quote from The Time in Between

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As he studied the screen, Bashir's bullish shoulders slumped. "People like me are America's best friends in the region," Bashir said at last shaking his head ruefully, "I'm a moderate Msulim, an educated man. But watching this, even I could become a jihadi. How can Americans say they are making themselves safer?" Bashir asked, struggling not to direct his anger toward the large American target on the other side of the desk. "Your president Bush had done a wonderful job of uniting one billion Muslims against America for the next two hundred years.”
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