The Supposedly Magical Spanish Tradition That Almost Ruined My Summer
It all started with a shameful haircut and the forbidden glimpse of a flat male stomach
It was Noche de San Juan (Saint John’s Eve) in Málaga, Spain, and anything could happen to a sixteen-year-old girl.
Who knows? Maybe even love.
For a successful Noche de San Juan, you needed three things: alcohol, a bonfire with a júa—a life-sized doll representing whatever you wanted to leave behind—and food. As teenagers, though, we would burn a bunch of driftwood, buy a couple bags of Doritos, and allocate ninety percent of our resources to getting wasted.
I had spent my junior year of high school doing two things: trying to clip the residual mullet into submission after an ill-advised pixie cut, and pursuing—let’s call him Physically Unattractive But Interesting Guy.
Reader, I went to improv classes for him.
I thought that, after years of utter indifference from the opposite sex, I had found what marketers called my niche.
It turns out unattractive-but-interesting guys don’t look for unattractive-but-interesting girls. They want pretty girls, too, and he ended up making out with the beautiful lead dancer in the school’s annual musical.
By summer, my focus had switched to Understated Hot Guy, who was hot but not too much, and friendly enough to make me think I had possibilities.
Let’s call him Álvaro.
I’d fallen for him earlier that year when I saw him lying under the spring midday sun. His shirt had ridden up just a bit, and I got a peek at his perfect, flat teenage abdomen: nothing too blatant, no eight-pack or even six-pack—just a taut, horizontal surface of smooth skin peppered by exactly the right amount of dark fuzz.
I didn’t know about his hopes or dreams. I’d never exchanged more than five words with the guy. I just wanted to bury my face in his stomach, inhale deeply, and have my heart explode into a thousand blissful pieces.
Álvaro was there that Noche de San Juan, ignoring me as if it were his job. We all drank, ate, and watched the fireworks at midnight. The fireworks were a bit like my teenage life: surprisingly underwhelming and always watched from the wrong location.
Then, we went into the water to purify the bad energies, because that’s San Juan’s thing: The fire purifies, the water renews, like confession minus the guilt trip.
The water was colder than expected, and the night breeze, warm and inviting before I went in, suddenly became hostile. I burrowed into my towel, watching the beach lit up by a hundred bonfires, the black sea broken by the glaring lights of the sardine boats.
And then, Álvaro talked to me.
He. Talked. To. Me.
“Wanna jump over the fire?” he said, shirtless, his gorgeous stomach on full display.
I would have jumped over a crocodile-infested moat for that stomach.
Flustered, I dropped my towel and took his hand, walking the few steps that separated me from the bonfire, every sensory neuron in my brain focused on those inches of skin. Then, I released him, got into position, breathed deeply, and jumped.
I immediately knew something was wrong. The sand offered no traction. My five-foot-two-girl legs were too short and not powerful enough. Mid-jump, I wished I could request a do-over, but it was too late, and my right foot landed on top of a burning coal.
“Oh my God,” Álvaro said, “did you burn yourself?”
“No, I didn’t,” I answered, smiling valiantly.
Had I known hurt-comfort was a well-known fanfiction trope, I’d have told the truth, but I’ve always preferred to be right rather than to be helped—no wonder I didn’t get a boyfriend until senior year.
He gave me a weird look. I guess there was only one thing worse than a girl clumsy enough to burn her foot in a San Juan bonfire: a girl stupid enough to think that pretending she didn’t would make it go away.
Álvaro shrugged and moved on with his night and away from me.
Pain holds a unique form of loneliness. I stood there, my foot stinging, while my friends hung out by the bonfire, laughing and drinking. I sidled into the sea, as if I simply felt like submerging my feet in the water. The pain subsided and, for a minute, I allowed myself to live in a universe where I wouldn’t have to leave that party ASAP to deal with the results of my awkwardness.
Eventually, a friend dragged me to one of the beach emergency stations, where a handsome first responder asked, “Fire or jellyfish?” in a tone that might have made me feel better if I was the type of person who thinks that making the same mistake as a lot of others is, somehow, a consolation.
For me, the lack of originality only added insult to injury, and I held back tears while he bandaged my foot, the instant relief not enough to soothe the fire of humiliation.
Soon after San Juan’s night, my burn got infected, and I had to treat it with ointment and bandage it once a day. I couldn’t swim in the sea or walk more than a couple of blocks.
Understated Hot Guy’s appeal went away once I exchanged more than one sentence with him and realized he was not the brightest bulb in the chandelier. I should omit the fact that he wasn’t interested in me anyway, so you won’t think it was just sour grapes.
My burnt foot ended up working as a conversation starter with a cute short guy—my kind of niche—named Darío, whom I met at a volunteer summer camp. We ended up getting cozy under the bleachers one time and never talking to each other again.
And, who knows? Maybe the fire was magic.
Because it turns out, anything can happen to a sixteen-year-old girl. Even pain. Even friendship. Even a sweet meet-cute with an unconventionally attractive guy and a silly story that, decades later, will remind her of warm summer nights when everything seemed possible.
Before you go, I’d love to hear from you…
Did you ever have a catastrophic summer as a teenager?
What’s the worst haircut mistake you’ve ever made?
What’s a cool summer tradition from your hometown?
My worst haircuts have always been the ones I've given myself. So, unfortunately, I can't blame hairdressers. Worst of all, I still haven't learned from it and continue to do it. And to top it all off: I cut my own children's hair!
I never had a worst haircut, but definitely had a worst hair colour! My sister tried to dye my hair blonde one New Year's Eve afternoon, and I ended up with bright orange hair (like traffic cone orange). What a fabulous way to start the new year!