by Becky Blake
I went to the back of the shop and sat down at a computer. When I signed in to my email, there were three messages from Peter. I read them fast, almost without breathing. The first was an apology, the second a statement of concern, the third a warning that he was going to notify the police if he didn’t hear from me soon. He was definitely worried. I felt a dizzying pressure drop, and then an unstable relief wobbling wide and uncertain around a tiny pinprick of hope.
I wiped my palms against my leggings, and looked toward the cashier’s desk where Manu was filling out a form. If he and I hung out together much longer, we were going to start to feel responsible for each other, but so far we hadn’t crossed that line. I could still walk away and pretend that the last day had never happened. I could go back to the apartment and ring the intercom buzzer and Peter would let me in. I could look him straight in the face and find out if maybe he’d made a mistake, if he might lift me up and squeeze me close like a very precious thing he thought he’d lost. I hit Reply on the third message and began to type: I need to come and get my things.
I stopped. Everything I owned in the world was still travelling across the ocean by slow boat. I pictured the shipping crates I’d packed arriving in the weeks ahead, Peter separating our belongings into two piles, and then sending my things back. I bit at a loose piece of skin on my bottom lip, then tore it off between my teeth. There was a little burst of blood, and I sucked it into my mouth as I reread Peter’s emails. For two years he’d been signing-off with love and then his initial, but now there was only a blank line and then his name spelled out in full. He hadn’t made a mistake. He was worried about me, but that wasn’t the same as wanting me back. I didn’t need his charity. In just one day I’d made fifty euros. If I worked with Manu a while longer maybe I could earn enough to survive without ever going back to the apartment, without ever finding out what I might say or do to be allowed to stay there.
I deleted my first message and started over: I’m staying with a friend. Please don’t contact me again. I’ll email you when I’m ready to get my things. The staying with a friend part would bother him. He’d assume I’d met some guy, which I had, but not in the way he’d think. I left a blank line, then typed my name. Without an endearment, it looked like an island, a lost crate afloat in the middle of the ocean.
I hit the Send button before I could change my mind, then skimmed the other messages in my inbox. There was one from my old boss, and one from Brigid, asking if Peter and I had booked our appointment at the courthouse to get married. She and I had run into each other on the streetcar the day before I left, and we’d talked about what a coincidence it was that we were both engaged, and about how fast time had flown in the six years since I’d lived with her family. I could tell Brigid was impressed at how well I was doing – that she was happy to see we were on the same path. If I wrote and told her my wedding was cancelled, we’d have nothing in common again.
I logged off the computer and stood. The other Internet customers were all staring at their screens with their backs to me. It gave me the same invisible feeling I’d had while standing in the middle of the surging crowd on Portal de l’Àngel when only the beggars had returned my gaze. This time, it was Manu who was watching me.
I joined him at the cashier’s desk, and he pushed a few coins across the counter to pay for my time.
“Thank you,” I said.
He shrugged. “It’s nothing.”
He opened the door for me, and together we stepped into the street.
5
Over the next week, Manu taught me a lot of things, like how to distract a mark on the metro and how to dumpster dive outside of the Carrefour. He showed me where to exchange foreign money from the wallets we stole, and introduced me to Yaya, one of the illegal purse sellers who’d buy foreign coins from us that the exchange kiosks wouldn’t take.
Manu was giving me a portion of the money from each of the wallets, and I kept these funds in an empty bread bag, stashed in the bottom of our knapsack. Someday I would have enough money to start a new life here – to rent a small apartment, then buy some new clothes and a cell phone so I could find a job. In the meantime, it just made me feel better knowing the money was there, watching it accumulate day by day. I allowed myself to spend a small amount on basics – food, toiletries, underwear – but whenever I had the impulse to buy something non-essential, like a pillow or a sketchbook, I pushed the thought away. It wasn’t hard to do; I didn’t want to acquire belongings that I might get accustomed to having, and then lose. Living with Peter, I’d been completely surrounded by possessions. There were so many things to miss that sometimes I didn’t know where to start.
Walking empty-handed around the city, my biggest fear was running into Peter – bumping into him as we rounded a corner, or having him tap me on the shoulder from behind. I was dirtier than I’d ever been. My clothes were wrinkled, and there was a tear in the bottom of my skirt where I’d ripped it on the fence at the unfinished hotel. I was sure I must smell like the construction site or worse, despite washing off at the beach each morning. In the Gothic Quarter, I always found excuses to draw a wide circle around Peter’s street, and everywhere we went I scanned above the crowds at just his height.
Manu never asked me why I didn’t like the Gothic Quarter, or who I was trying to avoid. He often seemed nervous himself and was constantly on the lookout for Mossos. In the city centre we saw them everywhere, and more than once I’d observed them listening with bored expressions while a tourist complained about being robbed. The Mossos’ indifference had given me the impression they were slow-moving, but I was wrong.
One afternoon, two of them ran by us on La Rambla chasing a pickpocket. When they caught him, they threw him to the ground, pushed his face into the cobblestones, then yanked him up and shook him hard before forcing him into a police car. I recognized the awkward angle he was sitting at – I’d been forced to lean forward the same way when my hands were cuffed behind my back.
“You see?” Manu said. “That’s why we work in the metro. The Mossos almost never go down there.”
The thief in the police car was bleeding from his forehead. He peered out from the back-seat window, searching for someone. I surveyed the group of onlookers who’d gathered. If his partner was in the crowd, he was putting on a good show. More likely he’d run off, or maybe she’d run off. Manu had told me there were lots of female thieves, but so far I’d only seen one example: a gang of women in head scarves swarming around a tourist at a bank machine. Their approach had seemed crude and aggressive compared to the technique Manu used. He had a delicate touch that no one ever seemed to feel. I guessed he was more skilled than the thief in the police car, but maybe it was only a matter of time before we got caught. If that ever happened, it was Manu who would have the stolen goods in his hands, his hands in the pockets. I could just deny my involvement, and the police would have no proof. That was assuming they would listen to me, of course.
When the car moved off down La Rambla, Manu and I walked up to Ronda Sant Pere, a street that curved around the top edge of the Gothic Quarter. Outside of a tobacco shop, Manu shaded his eyes and looked through the window at the clock behind the counter. “Quarter past six.” Most of Barcelona would be heading home from work now, which meant it was time for our second shift to begin.
We entered the metro at Arc de Triomf, feeding our tickets through the machines at the turnstiles. On the platform below we stood separately, waiting for the train. After a few days of practice with the escalator routine, we’d come up with a new plan for working together underground. Twice a day at rush hour, we stepped onto a crowded train pretending not to know each other. If we had the knapsack with us, I wore it to look like a tourist. I also carried a map, or a large shopping bag from El Corte Inglés. Both items worked well to camouflage Manu’s fingers as they slipped into a purse or a pocket and slid out a wallet.
The train pulled into the statio
n with a gust of hot air and my pulse quickened; each moment needed my attention now. I stepped aside for the throng of people getting off, most of them wearing business suits, or skirts and heels. The Catalans dressed conservatively for work. That was one of the ways to guess who the locals were and avoid targeting them.
I boarded the train and squeezed into a central position in the middle of the car where I could look in all directions. Even though there weren’t usually Mossos underground, we still had to watch out for metro security. I scanned the car for their bright orange vests, then began to assess the passengers around me. All of Manu’s tips about picking out a mark on the metro were based on circumstantial details: positioning, clothing, timing. Now that it was my job to choose, I tried to select marks who also caught my attention because of a flaw, a mistake or a misstep. Each time I picked out a deserving target, it felt like I was righting something that had tipped over in me. It was such an intense feeling that it blocked out most of my guilt. To get rid of the rest, all I had to do was remind myself that I wasn’t actually stealing. I was only assisting Manu with something he was going to do anyway, a petty crime he needed to commit so he could send money back home to help his family: his mother and three younger brothers, and his older sister who had twins and no husband.
I counted the stops as they went by, biding my time. Manu was superstitious about robbing anyone before we’d travelled at least five stops, and he had another rule about not robbing anyone near Plaça Catalunya. He wouldn’t tell me why, but I figured it must be because there was a police station inside the metro there. Manu had a lot of superstitions. Aboveground he always pulled me off the sidewalk and into the street if he could feel the metro rumbling underneath his feet. He wouldn’t tell me the reason for that either.
After six stops had passed, I checked to make sure Manu was in place. There was a tourist with a sunburn and an expensive polo shirt standing close to me. I’d selected him because he was smug-looking and seemed bloated with good fortune, the type of guy who always ate before he was hungry and never thought about feeding anyone else.
I studied his body language, waiting for him to pat or cradle a pocket, pointing out the most valuable thing he was carrying. Manu had taught me to watch for this movement, and the predictability of the behaviour always gave me a brief pang of empathy. I felt it now as the guy clutched and released at something in the side pocket of his jacket. It was almost as if he was expecting to be robbed. As if he wanted, or needed, it to happen.
“Excuse me,” I said. “Do you speak English?”
“I’m British,” the guy said.
“Oh good!” I smiled, but he didn’t smile back. The train entered the next station and the people around us jostled into different positions. I knew Manu was behind me.
“I’m just trying to get to the Sagrada Família.” I unfolded a city map, positioning myself so that the side pocket of the guy’s jacket was concealed from view by the cascading sections. “Do you happen to know how to get there? I’m not even sure if I’m on the right line!” I smiled again, blinking. Lost blond. Bewildered.
The guy squinted at me. Something was wrong. Maybe he’d been robbed before and was extra suspicious of strangers. I dipped my head lower so I was looking up at him. “Sorry, I’m really terrible with maps.”
He pointed with a stubby finger at a little picture of the church. Then he gave me a scornful look and walked away.
I got off the train at the next stop, glancing back along the platform to make sure no one was following me. As usual, Manu was walking toward the opposite exit. The stairs at my end of the tunnel seemed to take forever to reach. Outside, I let out a long breath.
When I arrived back at the courtyard, I found Manu already there, stretched out on his back in the grass, one arm shading his eyes from the sun. I stood looking down at him.
“How much?” I asked.
He uncovered his eyes. “Forty.”
Forty euros was slightly better than average. Manu had been right about my luck on our first day working together. The 150 euros in the escalator guy’s wallet had been an extremely good take. Most days we were happy to get half that, even when we managed to swipe two wallets.
“That guy almost seemed like he knew what I was doing,” I said.
“I don’t think he was a tourist. Probably an expat.” Manu sat up and looked at my feet. “Can you run in those?” Now that the weather was starting to get warmer, I’d bought myself a pair of dollar-store flip-flops.
“Sure. I guess so.”
“Show me.” He pointed to a tree at the end of a pathway.
I didn’t feel like running.
“Come on,” he said.
I rolled my eyes, then started off in the direction he was pointing. The movement felt unnatural, like going for a first jog after a long winter indoors. I did a small loop and came back.
“That’s not running,” Manu said. “Imagine that someone’s chasing you.” He jumped up and hopped over the back of a bench, then ran with his whole body. He was even using his arms to move forward like he was swimming through air.
When I tried it again, I lost one of my flip-flops and stumbled, landing on my knees in the grass. I flipped over and brushed myself off, embarrassed.
Manu came over and held my bare foot against his palm. His fingers were warm, and they just capped my toes. “Sit here and rest for a bit,” he said. “I’ll be back.” He tossed me the British guy’s wallet and walked off.
I lay in the grass and thought about being chased, maybe being caught and punished. Until today, the passengers on the trains had always trusted me, even the first few times when my hands had been shaking so much I’d had trouble unfolding the map.
I opened the British guy’s wallet and took out an ID card; he was some kind of diplomat. Maybe that explained his caution: he’d been everywhere and seen everything. A world-weary cynic, he’d built up an immunity to bewildered blonds, or maybe he’d never been susceptible to begin with. I pictured him at home with a husband. Classical music on the stereo, sipping Scotch from a rock glass that reflected the light. On their walls, they’d have expensive artwork: two large abstract pieces that spoke to each other across a long dining-room table.
I pulled the stack of ID cards from my pocket. My collection was growing with each day that passed. I had flipped through the cards so many times I knew each mark’s details by heart – their names, birthdates and heights. I’d also invented a story for each of them, bios that stretched from the distant past right up until the moment our paths had crossed. Most of the IDs had pictures on them, but even for the ones that didn’t, I could still remember the person’s face, and also the reason I’d chosen them: obnoxiously large purse, loud voice, fake laugh, ignoring her kid, not giving up his seat, being too fit, too rich, too vain, too stupid, too smug. That last one was the diplomat. I added his ID to my pack. Maybe he’d been distrustful because I was too dirty to pass for a tourist. It was probably time to buy myself a new outfit, something clean and pressed.
When Manu returned a quarter of an hour later he handed me a pair of unfashionable white sneakers. “Try these.”
“Thanks.” I wondered if he’d stolen the shoes or bought them. He knew I didn’t like to buy things for myself. I pulled them on, then sat looking at my feet.
“What’s the problem?”
“No problem. They’re great.” I tied a double knot in one of the shoes’ laces, then the other. When I was finished, I looked up. I couldn’t wait any longer to ask. “What happened to the partner you had before?”
Manu sighed.
“Did he get caught?”
“It’s bad luck to talk about that.”
“Sorry,” I said. “I just want to know.” If I was going to keep us safe, I needed to have the threat confirmed.
“Yes,” Manu said. “He got caught.”
“At Plaça Catalunya?�
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“Yes.” Manu pulled me to my feet, then pointed at the tree again. “Now go.”
This time I ran as fast as I could, maybe faster than I ever had in my life. “He got caught.” I recalled how it felt to have a pair of strong hands grab me by the shoulders. It could easily happen again. I was not invisible. Not innocent.
“Better,” Manu said when I returned. “And if you act like you’re chasing someone instead of being chased, people will get out of your way. No one will try to stop you.” He was staring off into the distance, remembering something. “And don’t look back. It only slows you down.”
I nodded. If someone chased me now, I’d think of Manu’s partner and run like my life depended on it. I’d seen lots of people in Barcelona run that fast: the other thieves, the purse sellers and the beer sellers. Many of their lives really did depend on not getting caught. I had to learn to run as fast as them.
6
The knock-off purse sellers travelled in packs, always four or five of them together with another standing lookout. Yaya’s crew worked a high-traffic area on Passeig de Gràcia using a complicated system of whistles to warn each other when the Mossos were coming. At a high-pitched double signal, the whole group would move in unison, pulling on the drawstrings that closed their display blankets over the fake Prada and Gucci bags. Then they’d take off fast, sprinting out into traffic where the Mossos didn’t dare to follow.
Yaya had been in Barcelona for over a year, but he was still working to pay off the money he owed to the mob for transporting him to Spain. In Senegal, he’d studied to be an economics professor, but couldn’t find a teaching job. Some afternoons, Manu and I sat with him in the park, and he tried to explain complicated theories to us in a combination of French, Spanish and English. The Prisoner’s Dilemma seemed to be his favourite. As far as I could understand, it was about two criminals who were being asked to rat on each other for a chance at a lower jail sentence. According to Yaya, they almost always did it.