Ana Sofia

“Let's play Who Wants to Be a Millionaire for €250,000!”

The host’s voice echoed across the room as the final question appeared on the screen before Martim.

What was Charles Darwin's primary area of study at Cambridge University?

A) Theology

B) Natural history

C) Mathematics

D) Law

Martim wriggled nervously in his chair. He didn’t know. But he knew it to be a trick question — you just don’t ask a question with an obvious answer for €250,000.

So it certainly wasn’t B.

Martim glanced at his watch. He knew the stakes were high, but he was running out of time. Sweating, he pressed A. The bubble went yellow.

And then it turned green.

As applause filled the room, Martim sprang from his desk and leapt into the air.

“I’m the best, I’m the best!” he shouted.

Grabbing a basketball, he aimed for the hoop on his bedroom door. The ball ricocheted off the doorknob and flew across the room, knocking his Iron Man figurine off the cupboard.

Unperturbed by his lousy shot, Martim sat back down behind the computer, closed Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, and opened WhatsApp.

The message had been ready — he just had to send it. But pressing Enter was now even harder than clicking A a minute ago.

C’mon, you won the Millionaire three times in a row without googling. It’s now or never.

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and pressed Enter. Then he quickly put on his shoes and left the room without a single glance at the screen, on which it read:

Hi, Margarida. It’s Martim from the lab. Would you like to join me and my team for the pub quiz in Maldita tomorrow night? We’re one person short. 🙂

As soon as he was outside, he took out his phone and sent an invitation for tomorrow’s quiz to all his contacts, excluding only his immediate family and his dentist. Then he changed his mind and sent one to the dentist as well.

Desperate times, desperate measures.

Martim’s pocket vibrated as he ran down Avenida da Universidade. He was late for tonight’s quiz at Galeria Multifunções but stopped to check his phone anyway.

Her reply was short. Yeah, sure. See you there!

Incredulous, he broke into a run once more, his heart filling with his love for Margarida and his brain with all the reasons for it:

1. Her magical wavy hair, which she constantly brushed out of her eyes as she spoke to him.

2. Her shiny green eyes, twinkling behind her eyeglasses. (Margarida wore glasses, but wasn’t a nerd. Just like him.)

3. Her brilliant mind—Margarida studied chemistry, a real science, like math, which he studied.

4. Her sense of adventure—Margarida loved to travel and had seen the world. She wore Native American bracelets, which the real Indians gifted her for good luck. Just like he went to San Diego Comic-Con to buy a limited edition Spider-Man.

He couldn’t get enough of her beautiful name. Margarida, Margarida, Margarida.

Unlike the name Ana Sofia, whose owner he spotted sitting in the corner as he breathlessly entered the pub. She was a petite girl in a leather jacket and torn trousers. Her tousled blue hair echoed the color of her eyes, and her nose and cheeks were dotted with freckles. The pub was already packed to the rafters, with the only free chair at Ana Sofia’s table.

No wonder, he thought bitterly, I bet some people left rather than sit next to her.

He claimed his answer sheet at the bar and then scanned the entire place, making sure there was no single free chair before approaching Ana Sofia and asking for hers.

“Sure”, she said, and removed her tiny Batman figurine occupying it.

Weirdo!

He thanked her and turned the chair away from her, trying to use the radiator as a writing surface. Then, as he dug through his bag, Martim was faced with two dark truths:

1. He had forgotten to take his Iron Man, having knocked it with the basketball.

2. The tip of his pencil had broken while he was running, leaving him with nothing to write with.

His stomach sank. Everyone around him was already solving the quiz, and he didn’t want to interrupt them. Swallowing his pride, he turned once more to Miss Two-Name and asked her for a spare pen. She handed it to him wordlessly. He thanked her, then turned back and started solving the quiz.

When time was up, Martim and Ana Sofia swapped the sheets to check each other’s answers. He was furious to see that she beat him by a single point, all because she knew the name of the play Lincoln was watching when he was assassinated.

Who cares about such stuff? Martim seethed silently.

Then he thought about the reasons he disliked Ana Sofia.

1. She always used two names, as if she were twice as good as the rest of the world. (Even if you are born with two names, you pick one and don’t introduce yourself as Ana Sofia, asking everyone to pronounce the whole thing whenever they need you.)

2. She studied literature, not a real science.

3. She wore contacts instead of glasses, as if that could disguise how nerdy she was. (And Martim was super allergic to people pretending they’re someone they’re not.)

4. She always drank pear juice. Not that he’d ever tried it, but pear juice?

Besides, this only happened because I forgot to take my Iron Man, he mused. And I couldn’t drink my usual apple juice since I had no table to put it on.

“GG,” she said, reclaiming her pen on her way out.

“GG,” he mumbled in return.

Seriously. Girl. Get. A. Life.

Before he went to bed that evening, he revised the details of Lincoln’s assassination and all the American Presidents in general, just in case.

***

As he grabbed his phone the next morning, Martim was greeted by better news than he could have hoped for. Not only did he have a team, he had the perfect team.

His invitation was answered by Pedro and Tiago, who both fit his needs perfectly. Pedro was his cousin and a real nerd — perfect to make Martim’s social skills seem better by comparison — while Tiago was his ex-classmate and a semiprofessional footballer, bound to leave an impression that Martim hung in the cool circles, and was therefore cool himself.

And on top of that, both were in relationships, posing no threat to him whatsoever.

Arriving ten minutes early at Maldita, Martim was certain he’d be the first from the team to get there. When he entered the bar, there were only Ana Sofia and two of her friends at one table, and another girl at—

He froze in his tracks.

It was her. She was here.

Her curly hair was loose, flowing freely down her black linen dress. She held a glass of wine in one hand and scrolled on her phone with the other.

Summoning all the courage he could muster, Martim adjusted his necktie and approached her.

“Hi, Margarida.”

She raised her eyes and smiled at him. “Oh, hi, Martim.”

He loved that voice. He loved that smile.

“What’s up?” He asked as he sat down.

“Nothing special. And with you?”

“I’ve been to San Diego for Comic-Con this weekend.”

In fact, he had been there a year ago. But they needed to talk about America — it was their thing. Indian bracelets and Spider-Man.

“Cool,” she said.

“I bought a limited edition Spider-Man. And a couple of things.”

“Wow, nice. Can I see it?”

“Sure.”

Excited, Martim took the figurine from the bag and put it on the desk.

Margarida chuckled. “I’m no expert, but that’s Iron-Man.”

Martim blushed. “Yeah, I know, I never take Spider-Man from home. He’s so valuable, I didn’t even unpack him. I meant to show you this as part of the other stuff, you know, how I said I bought Spider-Man and a couple of—”

He was interrupted by the waitress. “Hi, what would you like to drink?”

Martim hadn’t thought that through. He couldn’t order apple juice if she was drinking wine.

Real men drink beer.

But which beer should he take? He’d never ordered one before. Should he stick to local brands like Super Bock, Sagres, and Cristal? Or go for something fancier, like the World Cup winners? Did they even serve those? If he ordered something like the Neon butterfly or Dinosaur Stone Fruit, would he look impressive? Or just ridiculous?

Before he made up his mind, a voice behind him said: “I'll have a Sagres.”

It was his cousin Tiago. His baseball cap concealed his clean-shaven scalp, while his sleeveless jacket left his massive biceps on full display. The cool guy.

“I'll have the same”, Martim said boldly.

The waitress turned to leave but stopped as another man joined the table.

“And a peppermint tea for me”, said Pedro. His greasy, pimpled bedhead looked worse than ever, and he wore a checkered shirt and high-waist jeans. The nerdy guy.

After everyone had been introduced, the lights dimmed, and the quiz host took the stage. He introduced the rules and then read the first question: “Which of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World is the westernmost?”

“Easy.” Martim scribbled Statue of Zeus at Olympia on the sheet.

“Cool,” Margarida said, “I’ve never been there.”

“Me neither”, said Pedro, “I’ve only been to Alexandria.”

“No kidding!” she smiled, “Me too!”

“Did you stay at that Triomphe Hotel?” Pedro asked.

“Yeah, with the cockroaches.”

“And those dry falafel sandwiches. Haha, what are the odds?”

“Margarida was also in America”, Martim broke in. “That’s where she got those bracelets. From real Indians.”

He turned to his cousin. “Have you ever been to America?”

Before Pedro could answer, the waitress came with drinks, placing a massive pint of murky yellow liquid in front of Martim. Following Tiago’s example, Martim took a gulp from it.

And almost spit it out. It felt like drinking liquid bread. Stale and mouldy bread. Soaked in a barrel of vinegar.

But he boldly swallowed it. No pain, no gain.

“When I was in San Diego”, he continued, “we saw this big lizard—”

“Wait,” Tiago interrupted him, pointing to Margarida’s bracelet, “Was that made by the Zuni tribe?”

“Yeah, how did you know?”

“Our goalkeeper is from that tribe. He wears a similar talisman. Man, how that guy plays…”

As if he had overheard them, the host read the next question: “Which team shocked the football world by defeating Real Madrid 3-2 to claim their first European Cup title in 1960?”

It was a classical question — Eintracht Frankfurt. But instead of answering it, Martim said: “Tiago, you must know this one — that’s your area.”

Tiago shook his head. “Man, that was way before my time.”

“Before mine too”, said Margarida, glancing at her watch. “But speaking of football, how long does this quiz usually last?”

Tiago leaned toward her to get a better look at the time. “Whoa, it’s already half past eight. Arsenal-PSG starts in less than half an hour.”

Martim felt his insides boil, and not just from the beer. Gritting his teeth, he said, “I think the answer could be Frankfurt.”

“You guys wanna watch the game at the pub next door?” Tiago asked, ignoring him completely.

“I’ll put that—Frankfurt. Does anyone mind?”

“Sure. As long as you’re not for PSG,” said Margarida teasingly.

“Eintracht Frankfurt, that’s the full name of the club.”

Tiago guffawed. “Man, I’d rather die than support the Parisians.”

“You guys agree?”

“Then you’ve got yourself a deal.”

Margarida and Tiago shook on it as the host came to collect their answer sheet.

When the answers were revealed, they figured that they had 43/50 right. More precisely, Martim had figured that he had 43/50 right.

“So, what happens now?” Pedro asked.

“They grade our answers, and then the best two teams go on stage to be questioned live. The best team wins the movie tickets and the pack of beer, and the second best gets a pizza.”

He knew this only in theory, never having been on a team quiz before.

“And how long does the grading take?” Margarida asked him.

“No idea,” Martim replied, finishing his beer.

“Then we’d better get going,” said Tiago, putting on his jacket.

“Thanks for the invite, it was fun,” Margarida told Martim.

And with that, they were gone. She was gone.

“She’s cool”, said Pedro.

Martim remained silent for a while, staring at the bottom of his empty glass as if petrified.

Then he burped loudly, stood up, and said, “I’ve gotta pee.”

As they met in the line for the toilet, Ana Sofia asked him, “How you doing?”

“Forty-three. You?”

“Forty-five.”

No wonder, since you didn’t have to do it all on your own.

Maybe she hadn’t, but when she met Martim and Pedro on the stage ten minutes later, she was as alone as a leaf in the wind.

Her whole team must have gone to watch the match, Martim thought. I even pity her, the way she clings to her lonely Batman…

Shit!

Martim dashed offstage and was back just in time, Iron Man in hand, as the host tossed the coin into the air.

The coin landed heads up; Martim and Pedro got to answer first.

“Who was the third American president?”

“Thomas Jefferson,” Martim said immediately, glad he had revised the U.S. Presidents the night before.

“What is Benin's official language?”

“French.”

“Who wrote Peter Pan?”

“J. M. Berry.”

“What was Charles Darwin's primary area of study at Cambridge?”

Not believing his luck, Martim reached for the mic again, but Pedro was faster this time.

“Biology.”

Noooooooo!

The host echoed Martim’s mental scream, but without the agony. “No.”

Then he turned to Ana Sofia, who said, “Theology.”

She went on to answer the remaining seven questions faultlessly, and her victory was greeted by weak applause from the few who didn’t leave for the game.

After congratulating the winner, Martim and Pedro returned to their table.

“Wait, but we still get the pizza,” Martim told Pedro, seeing him put on his jacket.

“I don’t like pizza.” Pedro shrugged and left.

While Martim waited for the food, depressively scrolling through Wikipedia, something landed on his table. His eyes left the phone, hoping to meet a warm pizza, but landed on a six-pack instead. As he raised them further, they encountered a cluster of freckles.

“You want this?” Ana Sofia asked him. “I hate beer.”

“No, I hate it too.”

He was surprised by how easily he admitted that. But it was Ana Sofia—who cared what she thought of him?

Also, he probably had too much beer to hide how much he hated beer.

“You only drink apple juice,” she said.

“Look who’s talking,” he scoffed, “And you only drink pears.”

“I wasn’t mocking you”, she said, sitting opposite him. “Just stating a fact.”

“Another fact for you: pencils are cooler than pens.”

“And Batman is cooler than Iron Man,” she retorted.

It had never occurred to him until then that she knew as much about him as he did about her—that he was also her archenemy.

Or something else just as important.

“No way, the whole of DC sucks,” he replied.

“Then you certainly wouldn’t care for these”, Ana Sofia threw something on the desk, “since they are double DC.”

It was the other part of her prize: Two tickets for the premiere of Zack Snyder’s Justice League. Director’s cut. In IMAX. 3D.

“Are you asking me out?” Martim asked incredulously.

“No, idiot, I’m asking you in”, she replied casually, though not without a blush. “All the theaters have had a roof ever since the Roman Empire. Which century are you in?”

“Are you asking me on a date?”

“Everyone since the Egyptians has had a calendar and knew that everything happened on some date. So I guess you are pre-Egyptian too.”

Martim couldn't help smiling. He hated being mocked, but this was something else. Something new.

“I'll think about it”, he said.

“So you can think”, Ana Sofia continued playfully. “You must be post-Neanderthal then. I wonder”— she scribbled something onto a piece of paper and passed it to him—”Can you write too?”

It was her phone number.

Without hesitation, Martim wrote his own number, tore the piece in two, and returned her half.

“That means you are post 3500 BC.” Ana Sofia concluded as she pocketed it. “Interesting.”

Martim spotted the waitress approaching. “You wanna half a pizza?”

“Sure.”

As the waitress laid the steaming pizza between them, Martim asked, “Could you bring us another plate? Also…” He pulled two cans from the six-pack. “Could we swap these for two pear juices?”