‘Religion is a drug for the masses,’ Bogdan said, nodding sagely.
‘You mean opium,’ Darya murmured, remembering the maxim.
‘Yeah, you got some of that?’
‘Bogdan!’ Darya yelped. ‘You’ve got to do something about your sense of humour, man.’
Week 12: The Present Day
‘So, I don’t understand,’ Ana-Maria said. ‘Are we still talking about Alina and Oleg?’
Darya knew she had digressed, and she was telling the story haphazardly, not quite how Ana-Maria wanted to hear it. But it was important to give her the context—the full picture—before Darya could reveal to her the most important parts. One story had set off another; some of it was in her head, and some she voiced. This meant she hadn’t been able to help the uncoordinated sequence that emerged.
But Ana-Maria was getting impatient. ‘I know the scandals you talk about,’ she said. ‘They were big news at one point but associating them with each other and to the young nun who died in Sighișoara is a load of overactive imagination at work. A conspiracy theory.’ She paused and looked at Darya. ‘Tell me about Brian. Was Alina involved in some way? To what extent was Oleg involved? What happened from the time Brian disappeared?’ She huffed in a sharp breath. ‘I want to know how you found out what you did. In the order that you did.’
‘You’ll have to bear with me,’ Darya replied, her demeanour pacifying. ‘Everything I’m saying will make sense to you in the end. Just be patient and hear me out.’
Week 7: The week Brian goes missing
Brian goes missing. Ana-Maria asks Darya to investigate. Darya learns more about Oleg, Irina, and Alina’s relationship with Brian.
Fortuitously for Darya, when the receptionist from Brian’s hostel called to tell Ana-Maria he had gone missing, Ana-Maria had been on the phone with Alina, discussing the café’s expansion plans, and Darya had been around. After they finished their call, Alina asked Darya to take half the day off and go to meet Ana-Maria. An important task awaited her. Alina had known all about Darya’s past misadventures—just as Alina had told Darya about herself, her family, and about Sibiu, Darya had told her about herself, too—and she’d been admiring of Darya’s exploits. Therefore, it was on top of Alina’s mind when Ana-Maria told her.
After Darya’s meeting with Ana-Maria—an hour-and-a-half long interview where she had to go into excruciating details of her past encounters—Darya was brimming with excitement at the prospect of solving yet another mystery. She hadn’t been too worried about Brian at that point, assuming he’d been fine, and this was only routine. He’d probably gone gallivanting someplace for a day or two, and she’d find him soon enough ... or so she’d thought.
But when she got back to the café, anxiety overtook her. What if something had happened to Brian? Could she bear it? And was she even in the appropriate mental frame to take this on right now? She’d come to Romania for a break, after all; would getting involved with something murky disturb her current, carefully upheld equilibrium? She knew what it could do to her if she didn’t handle it well.
Like much of the previous decade of her life.
Her early twenties were a difficult period for Darya. She struggled with her impulsiveness, bad relationships, plus her fixation with drugs and alcohol. Darya was almost glad when she turned thirty, and grew calmer, as if the shadows weighing her down had lifted (The planets had realigned, her mother said). She felt cheery and hopeful, even if life didn’t always go her way. She sought freedom instead of depression. Even now, she’d escaped to Romania because she didn’t want to be sucked into the drama unfolding back at home.
It was good to be thirty. No more pretence. Zero fucks to give.
It was also only recently that Darya had learnt she enjoyed solving mysteries. The more she realised she was good at it, the more she wanted to stay calm and sober enough to be able to do it. She had an instinct for it; she liked to delve into secret lives, sordid histories, digging through parts overlooked by law enforcement. She’d googled the possibility of opening up a private detective agency in India, finding to her surprise there were several already in existence. Some were run by women too. She’d have credentials to back her work. After all, hadn’t she single-handedly solved the serial deaths on Heliconia Lane in Goa, and later, on Mumbai’s Chapel Road? She couldn’t wait to tell Aaron about her new idea …
Aaron.
Darya sighed as her thoughts went to him. Yes, she missed his quiet counsel, his steady presence, but she’d realised that having him as a friend was better than being in a relationship with him. In romantic relationships, Darya had discovered, her impulsiveness thwarted her good intentions. She envied and admired couples who stayed committed for years, doing things together, travelling, making children, and building lives. But when it came to her own self, she thrived on danger, pain, and change. She couldn’t shake off this innate craving, and she wondered, more often now than before, if this destructive impulse came from her family; it might be ingrained into her genes.
Darya sighed. Could she ever forgive her family? What about her mother, who was the victim in what had happened back in Mumbai? Why did Darya feel such anger towards her?
Darya had received an email from her that morning. She’d used her break hour to read it, standing in the alleyway next to the café.
Dear Darya
I am still struggling to use email on the computer. But I have to write to you. I miss you. I do not understand why you left so suddenly. What do you need to think about? Why the 3-month break? Your number is off and I can only email you. I know that’s also what you told me to do and you told me not to tell Pa anything. Why? I’m worried about your safety. Are you well?
Please call us. Your Pa is so worried. He doesn’t eat or drink. Keeps asking where you are. I can’t tell him. Because I don’t know. Luckily, he has stopped asking now.
Please call us.
Love
Ma
She felt bad for her mom but was also furious with her. How had she not known what was going on under her own roof? How many times had Darya watched victims of abuse, or those married to serial killers on television, claiming their innocence, crying copious tears repeating they had no idea what a monster their spouse was. Darya had always wanted to laugh out aloud. You had to have an idea, honey; it was impossible not to know.
She decided not to respond to her mother.
Click delete.
Now back to Brian. Should she do it?
She sighed and lifted her face to soak in the trickle of sun filtering through the grey clouds, hoping to clear the fog in her head. As she did so, her eyes caught a movement.
Someone familiar had moved past the small opening of the alleyway. A jaunty bend of his legs, a jolly lurch, a whistle on his lips.
It was Oleg.
While Brian made her curious, Oleg gave her the creeps. They were quite unlike each other, but both got the cogs in her head turning. They intrigued her, and she wanted to know more.
Darya hurried to the end of the alleyway.
Oleg had stopped by an ice-cream cart. Hands in his pocket, he shifted his weight from one foot to another and looked pensive, as if contemplating getting a cone for himself. As he flashed a quick backward glance at the road, Darya ducked behind a kissing couple, but it appeared he was looking in the direction of the café.
He turned again and resumed walking, then disappeared around the next bend.
Darya debated whether to follow him. He looked shifty, and she was curious. It was obvious he’d been waiting for someone to join him, but who?
Darya glanced back at the café. She had fifteen more minutes left of her break and Bogdan would cover for her if she took longer. Should she …?
The doors opened.
Darya gaped, unable to believe her eyes.
A portly figure had emerged, adjusting her blouse, clutching her bag close.
Irina.
Darya walked a few steps and slunk behind the ice-cream sta
nd where Oleg had been a few minutes before. A father was buying cones for his children, and behind them were four other families. Darya hoped she wouldn’t be noticed by Irina amidst all of them.
She needn’t have worried.
Purposefully, and without a glance at anyone, Irina coursed the same path as Oleg had a few minutes earlier, her cotton green ankle-length skirt swirling around her body.
A nervous trickle passed through Darya’s spine. She was having déjà vu; it was just like the day she’d watched Irina follow Brian, and now she was more certain than ever that the two had met afterwards.
Just as Darya was certain Irina was going to meet Oleg now.
Her heart beating double time, Darya walked behind her, dodging the post-lunch afternoon crowd that had swelled around her over the past hour.
She turned around the corner, as Oleg and Irina had done a few minutes ago, but once there, she saw neither of them. There were a lot of people in front of her, but not them.
Darya could’ve kicked herself. She should’ve walked faster. Or ran. But there had been so many people around ...
Where could they have gone?
After walking helter-skelter for ten more minutes, she arrived at the street that led to the Old Church. People swilled up and down alongside her: couples linking arms, all smiles; children balancing ice-creams or balloons in their chubby fingers; tourists sweeping cameras in circles, trying to get the best angles. Darya was slowed down. And perhaps that was the very reason Oleg and Irina had chosen that time of the day and place: to avoid being followed or found.
Darya was having a gut feeling. She thought she knew what was going on. Perhaps Brian had only met Irina to talk, about what she did not know. But that was all there was to it. But between Oleg and Irina, Darya had sensed something more, despite their discords; something electric and heavy. It could only mean one thing.
She walked to the end of the road and turned right. She had no idea where she was going, but she had to do something. This time she wasn’t going to let go.
Coming to a dead end, she retreated and took a left. Took a right again. For the next fifteen minutes or so, she walked without aim, hoping by some miracle to catch the two.
Perhaps inside the church?
Her eyes scanned the tall towers of Biserica Vechi, the 600-year-old church, presently under reconstruction.
Darya’s nerves were tingling madly. The church’s 200-feet-tall spires loomed over her like dark beasts. Because of a disagreement between the local union and the City Council, work had halted in the past weeks and the church lay unfinished and deserted.
The two were inside. They were here for sure.
Darya crossed the street, exchanging glances with a red-haired woman leaning out of her second-floor window. ‘Bună,’ she shouted in greeting. The woman waved a hand and withdrew.
Five minutes later, Darya was inside the church.
The perimeter of the church had been cordoned off with orange construction tape. Blocks of wood and builders’ equipment lay piled up in front of the main door, which was, at the moment, bolted shut.
Darya knew the church well; she’d lounged in its lawns a couple of times to read, and prayed at the altar too, albeit less frequently. A fire had ravaged the church three centuries ago, turning its walls to a sooty black colour, but if anything, the tragedy had made the structure appear even grander. It seemed almost alive; the tarred edges gleamed in the dark.
Darya walked to the rear of the church.
She knew the portion at the back was being used by the workers as a temporary space for meals and to rest, and thus was cleaned often; it was in good shape. It was also away from prying eyes.
Darya had an inkling Oleg and Irina might be there.
Yes!
She heard their muffled moans even before she’d caught a glimpse of them. She hurried towards them.
She’d planned to leave as soon as she’d confirmed it was indeed them, but when she looked in through the crevice in the wall—at the cavernous room and rubble-ridden platform that held the two of them—surrounded by faded murals and broken stained glass windows—she was transfixed.
At first, she had trouble discerning who was who. In time, her eyes separated the two naked bodies—Irina’s pale one on top, Oleg’s tan one below—lying on a yellow blanket, crumpled and dirty. As the two writhed—next to the blackened gritstone, the mess of hammers, drills, chisels, and paint cans—it struck her. These were not two bodies unfamiliar with each other.
In morbid fascination, Darya watched as Irina’s head fell back and she bit her lips in an attempt to subdue her cries. Oleg pursed his lips as well—as if in concentration—and brushed away strands of hair from Irina’s face. He did that several times as they moved together in rhythm. A bust of St. John the Baptist looked down at them, the shocked expression carved on his face fitting for what was going on.
When they were finally done, Irina flopped over inelegantly to one side, adjusted her body, and lay down next to Oleg. She threw her hand carelessly over his clean-shaven chest and pushed closer, her tiny breasts squashing against his body. Oleg used one hand to make a pillow under his head and threw the other over his forehead. Irina stretched a hand to pull a sheet over themselves.
They were going to take a nap.
Click. Click. Click.
Darya whipped out her mobile phone, a reflexive action. Something told her she was going to need the evidence later. In any case, the two of them were covered and decent now. So, nothing wrong with this.
Darya looked away and realised her face was flushed hot.
She waited for a few minutes, then leaning against the wall, got to her feet. She waited for the blood to flow back to her legs again and tried to bring her breathing back to normal.
So, not only did the two know each other well, they were lovers. Irina’s display of displeasure at his show and later, the tiff with him at the café, was borne out of familiarity and expectations.
Then again, how did Alina and Brian feature in this rigmarole? Helenka was convinced Alina and Oleg had something going between them, and Darya was certain Alina had something going with Brian. Alina possibly also knew where he was at the moment, although she firmly denied it each time Darya brought it up.
Ah, well, better to just ask her. All the speculation was making her head reel.
Darya took a tentative step away, then recalled something else.
The tattoo on Oleg’s naked belly. The bandage was off, and she’s seen it clearly this time. It was made up of two black arches, one above and one below his navel, forming a gigantic eye. Could it be that at the café, Irina had been upset at Oleg for getting this tattoo? ‘Stomach’ as Bogdan had translated must have meant exactly this, the tattoo on his stomach. But why had she been that upset?
Everything was going to make sense a few days later.
Darya called Helenka first. ‘Meet me now,’ she instructed. She called Alina next.
A stubborn frost had settled between Alina and Helenka in the past week. Darya had not seen Helenka at the café and Alina looked sullen and preoccupied. It was not hard to guess the problems were personal—the two had fought—over Oleg or Brian. Or maybe over some other issue Darya was not aware of. Today she was going to find out.
And, of course, she had exciting news for them.
She’d asked them to come to Cibin Market. Darya’s feet had found their way to it from the Old Church, and through the cobbled labyrinthine lanes of the colourful and crumbling Lower Town. Dusk was closing and when she arrived, Darya found the shopkeepers stacking their unsold goods onto vans, folding tables, chattering loudly amongst themselves. There was only a smattering of buyers now in the daily outdoor market. An hour more and the market would close, to resume the next day, going back to its characteristic cacophony and busyness.
Darya rested her back against a wall and waited, sucking on a piece of lozenge.
Helenka arrived first, wearing a long brown smock, her face arranged i
n a scowl.
Alina arrived right after, her dark cotton jacket flapping behind her, her long legs impressive in boot-cut ripped jeans.
‘Bogdan was not happy to be left alone,’ she informed Darya. She ignored Helenka who’d twisted away to ostensibly light a cigarette. ‘What was so urgent?’
Breathlessly, Darya told them what she’d seen. Both their bodies veered to face her as she spoke, and the look on their faces changed from crossness to amazement in minutes.
When she finished, her audience exhaled.
‘Nu. That’s not possible,’ Alina whispered.
‘Are you sure?’ Helenka asked, her cigarette forgotten.
Darya unlatched her backpack and took out the photos. She’d taken a quick detour to a convenience store to take printouts from a kiosk.
Alina took the photos from her. She took her time, the expression on her face congealing as she moved from one to the next. ‘It’s impossible,’ she repeated. ‘De ce? Why would she do it?’
At long last, she handed the photos to Helenka and told Darya, ‘I thought they hated each other.’
‘I thought so too,’ said Darya. ‘But …’ she chuckled, ‘… to put it cornily, that was hate borne out of love.’
Helenka went through the photos faster than Alina had and handed them back to Darya. ‘Fantastic. Who would’ve thought?’ she muttered.
‘And now that you two know …’ Darya paused meaningfully.
‘What?’ Helenka asked, eyebrows arching. Alina stared in the far distance.
‘Stop fighting.’
‘Who …?’
‘What …?’
‘Oh, come on!’ Darya cried, throwing her arms in the air.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Helenka sulked.
‘Well, it’s obvious that Alina is NOT seeing Oleg,’ Darya told her.
Alina rolled her eyes. ‘I’ve no idea how she got that into her head.’
The Darya Nandkarni Misadventures Omnibus: Books 1-3 Page 59