by Karina Halle
“How are you, Vera?” A silken voice interrupted my evil musings.
I turned to see Mateo standing right behind me. He looked great, fresh even. It was a novelty to see him for the second time, the second day. A new look, a new Mateo. Today, he was wearing a full on suit; dark blue pants and blazer, light blue shirt, no tie. It fit him perfectly and looked very smooth, very expensive, silk and wool. His hair was still skirting the line between groomed and messy and I still wanted nothing more than to tug at the ends of it to feel how soft and strong it was. His strong jaw and lean cheeks had a darker shade of stubble going on, a ten o’clock shadow.
I ignored the pulse of heat between my legs and managed to give him a smile. “Oh, hello. Good morning. I am fine, how are you?”
I know I sounded completely formal but I was trying to err on the side of the fact that we weren’t really friends per se and I did need to speak proper English. Or maybe I was trying to save face over the fact that the last time I’d seen him I had the words Marilyn Monroe stuck to my forehead.
“I am well. I missed you last night,” he said, his words causing my stomach to tumble momentarily. I needed to eat something. “Where were you?”
I tried to speak but he squeezed against me, the air filling with his bracing ocean scent, as he reached past to scoop up a mound of ham with the tongs. He plopped some of the ham on my empty plate before putting the rest on his.
I licked my lips, watching as he put a few slices of cheese on our plates as well. Either he was really chivalrous and wanted to feed me, or he wanted me to hurry my ass along so everyone else in line could eat.
“I didn’t mean to miss dinner,” I said, scooting over to give him room. “I don’t know what happened. I just fell asleep.”
“Oh yes,” he said. His eyes glittered like golden brown topaz. “I heard you had some grappa and then never woke up again.”
My mouth dropped and I angled my neck around him so I could see Dave and Beatriz at their table. “I had one shot and then I went back to unpack. I was tired to begin with.”
He shook two pieces of toast at me before he put them in the toaster. “If you knew how to take siestas, then you wouldn’t be so tired that you miss dinner,” he lectured teasingly.
“Hey,” I said in a faux-authoritative voice. “Siesta is Spanish for little sleep. No Spanish allowed. I just saw a bunch of guys get in trouble for speaking it.”
Mateo raised a brow. “Well, I am not a fool. I came here to learn, not to waste time or money. You, Vera, you need to have a little sleep today so that you can stay up tonight. Tonight there is a party.”
“Oh? There wasn’t a party last night?” I asked, hinting around for clues as to what happened when I was dreaming away. “Everyone seems really close this morning,” I added.
He studied me for a moment before he said. “No party. We all had dinner, lots of wine and then Dave and Beatriz brought everyone into their house for more drinks. I had one and then left, so I don’t know anything else. I had to call my wife. She speaks fluent English you know, so we didn’t speak Spanish, don’t worry.”
The W word. Wife. There it was. There, he said it. Proof that the ring wasn’t a stylistic choice, proof that he wasn’t separated. Wife. She existed. And I had to stop caring what he thought about me. I looked down at a pot of steaming scrambled eggs that a cook just placed down and entertained the thought of turning it over on my head. That would be a good start.
The toast popped out of the toaster and I nearly jumped out of my boots.
“It’s funny,” he mused, putting the slices of toast on our plates. He nudged my arm gently with his elbow, getting me to move along. “You say that everyone seemed really close. I have known Beatriz before.”
I resisted the urge to look at her sitting at the table. I remembered what she looked like: long sheet of black hair, poker straight, tanned, glowing skin, perfect white teeth and a model body clad in a buttercream shift.
“How so?” I asked, not really caring.
“She is a reporter, on television. She used to cover some of our games. She interviewed me, many times. When you’re on the national team, you get to know every…personality.”
I had no idea what that meant and I wasn’t about to ask. I was at the end of the line anyway and finished my plate with a churro that I picked up with my hands. I waved it at Mateo. “See you later,” I said, trying to sound cool and cheery and all that jazz, even though the churro was still hot and the sugared grease was burning a hole into my fingers.
He frowned at my sudden departure, but nodded.
I threw the churro down on my plate and hurried back to my table. It was empty now, with Sara, Antonio and Lauren all at the buffet, and there was a large carafe of hot coffee waiting. I poured myself some. While I took a deliciously rich sip, I told myself I’d never speak to anyone before I had my first cup. Mateo was just being nice, nice like a decent human being, and I got so weirded out by the idea of his wife and his relationship with Beatriz that I just said adios with a churro. I needed to get a grip. This wasn’t like me. Well, not when it came to guys, anyway.
Soon Antonio and Sara joined us and we started chatting away. I was suddenly eager to really prove myself, as if I just remembered why I was here. To meet new people and to help them with their English. Oh, and get a better understanding of the universe but I was pretty sure that Mateo was going to right about that one.
Lauren eventually came back, her cheeks blotchy red with anger from having apparently yelled at Jerry over the food. Turns out there was no specific menu, there was just a bowl of fruit. I would have felt bad for her but the way she was treating the rest of us—all the people who didn’t have anything to do with her lifestyle choice—I couldn’t.
When plates started being cleared and everyone was almost done, Jerry made an announcement that the schedule for the day was now at reception. Having wolfed down my meat and cheese and churro, much to the annoyance of my stomach, I bid farewell to my table and went straight to the schedule. I brought out my phone from my jean pocket and started writing my day down on a virtual notepad.
9:00 – 10:00 one-on-one with Jorge
10:00 – 11:00 one-on-one with Francisco
11:00 – 12:00 one-on-one with Jose Carlos (Froggy)
12:00 – 1:00 Lunch
Break (nap time?)
2:00 – 3:00 business session with Mateo (oh god)
3:00 – 4:00 business session with Antonio
4:00 – 5:00 business session with Nerea
Break
6:00 – 8:00 Dinner (two hours?)
8:00 – Evening festivities
And that was to be my first official day at Las Palabaras. Day one of thirty.
And that’s when it hit me: just what in the fuck did I sign up for?
Chapter Five
By the time lunch time rolled around, my head was spinning with a new kind of exhaustion. It felt tired, spent, rolling the squeaky, rusty wheels in my brain. My jaw was tired like I’d been giving a blow job for hours and my throat was hoarse and parched. Aside from the times that me and my brother would go to the park and get high, I don’t think I’d ever talked for three hours straight. Because that was the thing about the program so far—the Spaniards struggled with their words, they fought to be heard and understood, so you wanted to help them out. You wanted to supply words for them and you wanted to teach them and when you couldn’t, you had no choice but to just talk.
And so I talked like I’d never talked before. I told the kindly psychologist Jorge all about growing up in Vancouver and my tumultuous relationship with my sister, I told stoic, city worker Francisco (who insisted I call him Paco) all about my interest in the universe and what I was studying, and I told software designer Froggy about my tattoos and what most of them meant and how I felt like I never fit in. I talked about things I’d normally never ever talk about and all because they spoke another language. They both understood English and yet didn’t and in some weird, scary way,
it felt like I could tell them anything.
By the time I stumbled into the dining hall for lunch, my face greasy with sweat and my lips desert dry, I started wondering if this program was going to be my new therapy. I’d certainly said more about myself in the last three hours than I ever did to the shrink I used to see.
I looked around for a table and saw nothing but similarly dazed faces. I also saw Claudia who was waving me over. I staggered to the table and plunked myself down.
“You look tired,” she said. “I am tired as well. It hurts to think.” She tapped the side of her head.
I raised my face off of the table and saw her pour wine from a bottle into a glass nearest me. I tried to focus and noticed that every table had two bottles of red wine. Red wine? At lunch? What kind of sorcery was this?
“Here have some,” Claudia said. “You drink wine, yes?”
I shook my head. “Not really. I mean I have had it, but I prefer beer.”
She laughed in the way that Mateo had at the same answer and quickly poured some for herself. “You will love wine in a few days, I promise. This is good. You will like it.”
“Do you always drink wine during lunch?” I asked, mustering enough strength to bring the glass to my lips.
“Not that way.”
I turned my head to see Mateo pulling out a chair. He looked to us in utter sincerity, brows raised. “May I?”
“Of course, yes,” Claudia said.
He looked at me and sat down. I raised the glass at him. “Not what way?” I asked, for some reason not surprised to see him here.
He quickly poured himself a glass of the garnet liquid then held it away from him. With the smooth twitch of his wrist, he moved the glass so that the wine swirled around and around.
“You take your time,” he said, eyes burning into me, as if I were the wine. “You give it time to breathe. You don’t rush it. Let it be what it is. Wine. Nothing else. Just wine. Let it interact with the world, with the air. Let it live. Just watch it, pay attention, appreciate.” He raised the glass to his face and stuck his nose in it. He breathed in sharply a few times before he pulled away. “Then you smell it. You take it in. Pay attention. Every wine is different, they are all trying to say different things, yes? This wine says it is calm. It is nice. It gets along with everyone.”
He got all that from the wine? I was kinda fascinated.
He then put the glass to his mouth and placed his full lips on either side of thin rim, wet and delicate. I swallowed hard, aware that I was watching him too intently and yet I couldn’t look away. He tilted the glass and the ruby streams slid toward his mouth. He opened his lips slightly and took it in. My god, I’d never seen something so mundane look so damn sexual. His cheeks moved in and out subtly as he let the wine sit in his mouth. He closed his eyes, lashes dark against his skin, and then slowly swallowed his Adam’s apple bobbing against his strong neck.
He kept his eyes closed even after he took the glass away. Then he opened them and grinned at me with a red-stained mouth. “This wine tastes like shit.”
If I had wine in my mouth, I would have spit it out. I laughed, loudly, like I was drunk but I was just drunk on him.
“Mateo,” Claudia scolded but she was giggling too. She took a sip. “It isn’t so bad. Vera, have some.”
“I don’t know,” I said warily, still smiling. I tried to do what Mateo did, albeit a speeded up version—swirl, smell, sip. It was very dry and a bit bitter, but then again that’s what most wine tasted like to me.
It also went straight to my head. I really should have waited but by the time the waiter put our lunch of rice and pork chops on the table (it wasn’t buffet-style this time), I’d had one glass and was grinning to myself. Shit, Spanish wine was strong.
“Are you buzzzzzed?” Mateo teased, leaning in close.
“No,” I said defensively and I picked up my knife and fork to cut into the pork chop. My eyes flitted across the table at Claudia and our new seatmate, Wayne. He was the man I’d first seen when I got on the bus, and though he wasn’t wearing a cowboy hat at the moment, he was an obvious Texan through and through. His bulbous nose was tinged with red and I wondered if he was feeling “buzzed” too or if he was just an alcoholic.
“You’ve got some interesting tattoos,” he said, eyeing my chest and arms. “I ain’t used to see a girl with so many.”
“You do happen to have a lot of tattoos,” Mateo mused, pretending to study me for the first time. “I am sure they all tell a story about you.”
“Do you have any?” I said, turning the question around on him.
He gave me a sheepish, adorable smile and shook his head. “I am not so good with needles.”
Claudia snorted. “Centre back for Atletico and you are afraid of needles?”
“What’s Atletico?” Wayne asked.
Mateo narrowed his eyes playfully at Claudia. “I did not say I was afraid, I said I am not good. We don’t…get along.” He looked to Wayne. “Atletico is a football—er, soccer, yes? A soccer team in Madrid.”
“He used to play for them,” Claudia said. “He was very good.”
“Was?” Wayne repeated. “What do you do now?”
“Me and my partner own a few restaurants.”
Wayne grinned. “No shit, Sherlock!” he said, pounding his fist on the table and making the wine splash around in the glasses. “I own bars in San Antonio and Austin. Texas.”
Mateo’s eyes lit up. “That is very intriguing. If we get a session together, I’m afraid I am going to—how do you say, pick your brain? Yes, pick your brain about that. I would like to expand the business overseas. I am very curious about the US market.”
“I look forward to it. How long have you been in the restaurant business?”
“Six years,” he said automatically, as if were counting the days.
“I remember when you left the team,” Claudia said between bites of her food. “And no one could understand why you were opening a restaurant. But, it was very good food. Still is. Better than this.” She waved her fork in small circles.
As she was saying this, I watched Mateo closely. His body stiffened just enough for me to know that the subject was a delicate one. Once again I wondered what had happened to him but I didn’t want to ask.
Wayne, on the other hand, wasn’t so good at reading people. “Why did you leave the team?”
Mateo sucked on his lower lip for a moment before he spoke, his voice measured. “I became injured. Tore my ACL. My knee. I’m fine now, but it was time for me to leave the game and do something else.”
“How long ago was that?”
“Eight years.” Another automatic answer. “I was thirty when it happened.”
Thirty-eight? Did I just count that right? Mateo was thirty-eight?
“You do not look thirty-eight,” I couldn’t help but say.
He gave me a smile that looked borderline grateful and focused his bewitching eyes on me. “What do I look like to you, Vera?”
A gorgeous, sensual, Spanish god. That’s what he looked like to me.
I crammed some rice in my mouth—so ladylike—and hoped I wasn’t blushing. When I swallowed, he was still waiting for an answer, his eyes never having left my face.
I dabbed the corners of my mouth with the napkin, my leftover lipstick staining it coral, and said, “You just look very young. That’s all. Like, thirty-two, maybe.”
“And how old are you?”
“Twenty-three,” I said slowly and in that moment I was suddenly aware that I was probably the youngest person in the program. Even Lauren seemed a year or two older than me, maybe because her bitterness and glitter glasses aged her.
“You got all those tattoos in twenty-three years?” Wayne exclaimed, as if it just blew his damn mind. “That is dedication.”
“That is dedication,” Mateo repeated in agreement, his eyes now raking over my arms and chest before they slowly made their way up to my face. He gazed at me intently like I was one of life
’s greatest mysteries, as if I were utterly mesmerizing. I’d never seen anyone look at me that way and it glued me to my seat.
When I finally remembered to breathe, I poured myself another glass of wine and gulped it down. Luckily, Claudia had spoken up, telling us about a time she got a tattoo on her ass of her ex-boyfriend’s name and how she was trying to figure out how to into something funny, like Johnny Depp did with turning Winona Forever into Wino Forever.
While my brain got happily stuck on a tangent about Winona and Johnny and how weird it was that they dated and if it ever got awkward when they ran into each other, I finished my meal and another glass of wine. By the time we were all done, all the bottles at our table were empty and I was more than ready for a nap.
Seeing me yawn, Mateo pounced into action. “Come on, I’ll show you how to have a siesta. Sorry, little sleep. A nap.”
I looked at Claudia for her response but she just smiled coyly and shrugged before she got up with Wayne and said goodbye to us, leaving Mateo and I alone.
“Oh, don’t look so worried,” he said. He got out of his chair and held his hand out for me.
I eyed it with trepidation and gingerly placed my hand in his.
His fingers closed over mine, sealing us together with heat and heartbeat. He brought me up to my feet, flashed me a self-assuring smile, then gently let go of my hand. He pointed out the door. “Follow me.”
We walked out and as I passed by the reception I noted that one of the computers was free, though with the other four occupied by Anglos, it didn’t seem like it would stay free for long. This was the rare moment of the day where we could have free time and I really wanted to talk to Josh and let him know I was alright. And let’s be honest, I wanted to update my Facebook to say “Having a blast in Spain, bitchez! #notsohumblebrag”. But ex-soccer star turned restauranteur turned someone I wanted to keep being around was walking out the door and into the bright Spanish sun and my body was begging me to follow him and his fancy suit.
I’d made the right choice. The minute I stepped out onto the patio and was hit with the strength of the sun, my whole body tingled and relaxed. I fished a pair of sunglasses out of my purse and put them on while Mateo reached over two wicker chairs and plucked the cushions from them. Curiously, I followed him as he walked out onto the shorn lawn with the cushions in tow and threw them down near the shade of a small oak tree.