Letters to a Stranger

  Brandon wasn’t a man to pry and he never asked more than was absolutely necessary. His was the classic English mentality – restraint above all else. But this time he couldn’t hold back and asked if there was anything wrong, to which I answered nothing that didn’t have a solution, although not very convincingly.

  When I’d put down the phone, I lay on the bed with Neca and Aris at my feet, and continued my journey through space and time.

  Olympic National Park

  2 June 2003

  Dear Yolanda,

  How’s it going over there? Sorry, I feel more and more ridiculous when I ask how you are. I hope you can understand that – it’s like trying to have a conversation with empty space.

  I’ve just come back to the cabin after spending all day searching for fresh landscapes to paint: new perspectives on the lake mostly. It was cloudy this morning, but then it cleared and the day gave me five hours of incredible light. Later, around three o’clock, it started raining so I went over to Dylan’s restaurant for a bit of a chat.

  It was a quiet afternoon for him, and we had such a long and interesting conversation. Dylan is a great guy. I’ll never have enough time or money to pay him back for everything he’s done for me.

  I think he was waiting for the right moment to talk to me about my situation, even though free time is exactly what he doesn’t have much of to spare. He says it’s about time for me to leave the past behind and start to build the future that I deserve as an artist, from scratch. He thinks I’ve got used to hiding away out of mere cowardice, but that there are other options for me and I just have to try. Dylan thinks my legal situation can be sorted, and has offered to hire a good lawyer. He’s convinced that as soon as my paintings become known, people will pay top dollar for my work and I can pay back everything he’s invested in me. His offer really touched me. I know he doesn’t have a lot of cash and that he’s always having trouble paying his bills. But what lawyer could defend me from the accusation of having entered this country on a fake passport, even if all the other charges do get dropped? I don’t think I realised at the time quite what a risk I was taking. Anyway, I’m starting to resign myself to it . . . What would I be going back for anyway? Judging by your silence, it’s obvious that there’s nothing waiting for me in Spain. I explained it all to him and . . . well, he thinks that it wasn’t you who made me lose my head, but what I felt when I was with you. To me those are one and the same, but he insisted that I’m confusing the two. He said that the emotions I felt when I was with you could have been possible, and in fact are still possible, with any other woman. He says I fell in love with love itself, and you just gave that love a name. I think he’s been speaking to Nadia. Ever since I introduced her to him and his girlfriend, they’ve been hanging out a lot and they’ve become good friends. I don’t know – this might be presumptuous on my part – but my guess is that Nadia’s trying to convince me through Dylan to forget about you and me. I don’t want to hurt her, if she feels the same way for me that I feel about you . . . But no, that can’t be possible.

  Dylan also told me that Martin Baker, the owner of the local art gallery, is very interested in showing my work, but that won’t be possible either until I get my legal situation resolved. Sometimes I think my friend is even more naive than I am – he’s not fully aware that I’m accused of murder and have fled from justice. If Mr Baker wants my paintings, he’ll have to buy them for his personal collection or find a way to sell them without his clients knowing who I am, maybe even accept that I’ll have to sign them with a pseudonym. As a painter, I am Yosa Degui. Get it? Yes, those are the first syllables of both of our first and last names.

  But I don’t want to get distracted with these matters that don’t yet have a solution. I’m just excited right this minute by trying to capture the light as it filters through the trees in the forest. It’s fantastic and I’m amazed by it. You can’t imagine how difficult it is to paint the spirit of these forests from within. Of course, you’re in these paintings too – you always are, or maybe, as Dylan says, it’s the love I felt at your side. It makes no difference.

  A kiss.

  Saúl

  I struggled to fall asleep, the wind raging outside the house, making all kinds of strange sounds . . . Sometimes I thought I heard ominous, threatening messages whispered in my ears, along with repeated, muffled thuds – which stopped when I closed the bathroom window.

  I dozed fitfully, tucked in tight with the covers pulled over my head.

  Chapter 12

  Sunday, 22 June 2014

  The wind was still whipping through the garden. Its heavy, laboured whistling was really getting to me; it had got inside my head and was giving me a mild headache. I remembered how much I liked the wind in London on those afternoons when I’d leave the restaurant and cross over Lambeth Bridge. Between five and six o’clock in the evening, macs and neckties would fly about wildly as people crossed the waters of the Thames. Everyone in a hurry to get home – maybe that was what made the breezes blow so fiercely. But no one was running about in my garden here, so what was causing this damn relentless wind?

  I had a big breakfast – it was almost lunchtime for me – then continued prying in Saúl’s life, annoyed that I couldn’t go out in the garden. The kitchen wasn’t the most comfortable place in which to read and it seemed too early to go back to bed – there was no way, of course, that I’d consider the rest of the house, particularly not the sitting room. Every time I passed it to go to my bedroom or the bathroom, an eerie chill ran through me, through every fibre of my being, just like people say when they talk about haunted houses. I tried to convince myself that it was all in my mind, but the fact is, it was real; it happened over and over again: first came the smell, then the cold chill . . .

  The kitchen was slowly turning into an office: my laptop, the files, the folder from the law firm, the letters, my notebook, the Kindle . . . Aris was curled up in the chair on my left and Neca was sitting in the one facing me, the two of them offering all the company I needed.

  It was almost half past twelve by the time I started reading, and I didn’t look up from the letters until seven o’clock in the evening, only taking breaks once in a while to go to the loo. I think I read around thirty letters, making careful notes based on insubstantial data in my little book. By six o’clock I was already travelling alongside Saúl through 2005.

  Burying myself in a year and a half of the life of the man from Lake Crescent, with no interruption, gave me the opportunity to see his personal and professional life from a broader, clearer perspective and, above all, it was like having a front-row seat to his blossoming relationship with Nadia. Before he ever realised it, I already knew that he’d get involved with her, or, to put it another way, that she would live out her love story and he would allow himself to be loved, more out of appreciation for her than on the advice of Dylan and his girlfriend Carol. Saúl hadn’t quite decided – he wasn’t yet ready to love again, but she was.

  He told Yolanda everything with perfect honesty, though reminding her again and again that his love and passion had stayed with her in Spain, and he was completely sincere in this. He was twenty-three years old now, and whenever he went out it was with Dylan, Carol and Nadia. Everyone who knew him assumed that Nadia was his girlfriend, and she didn’t bother to correct them. On the contrary, she approached Saúl in public with excessive familiarity, just in case anyone had any doubts. In one of his letters he said, ‘You know what, Yolanda? I’ve realised that most things that happen to us in life have little to do with our own decisions. I can’t have the one thing I desire, but something I never wanted or looked for flies right into my lap.’ He told her that he had been completely honest with Nadia – he’d warned her that he would never be able to love her as much as she deserved and that he was still in love with the woman he had left behind in Madrid; his muse, the one who inspired his art, the owner of his desires and sleepless nights. But she wanted to give it a go, sure that he would come to love
her. I envied Nadia for her confidence and because she was so very much closer to getting him than I was. The things that separated me from Saúl made it quite impossible for my dream to come true.

  The letter from 20 January 2005 pierced my heart.

  Olympic National Park

  20 January 2005

  Forgive me, my love.

  I’m sorry, Yolanda, but yesterday I was with Nadia. Her car wouldn’t start and Dylan and Carol weren’t home. I offered for her to spend the night in my cabin – what else could a gentleman do? It happened, that’s all I can say. Kisses led to holding each other and that led to . . . But I couldn’t – I just couldn’t do it! My mind flew far away; it crossed the ocean and anchored itself back in the first time with you. She swallowed her wounded pride, her desire, her passion and her grief, and I wanted to die – because of Nadia, because of you, and because of my damn bad luck.

  In spite of everything, even though I couldn’t do it then, I’m sorry. Because I’m going to keep on trying. Even though I know I’ll never love her in the same way I love you, in some ways I do love her, and that’s more than I could have hoped for a year ago. I wonder if a few paltry crumbs of love will be enough for her. We surrendered to my impotence and slept together, locked in embrace, after we’d both wept bitter tears for our thwarted loves: she for me, and me for you. Nadia says she’s in no hurry, that we’ll take it slow. I’m not in a hurry either.

  She’s a smart girl, talented, pretty and sweet, and, as Dylan says, I really don’t deserve such luck. I’m sure there are many men who would fall head over heels with just one look at her gorgeous green eyes. No, I don’t deserve her affection, but fate has presented it to me. Love is fickle like that, and no one knows that better than I do. If you fall under its spell but your love is not reciprocated, the resulting emotional damage can last your whole life long. How I envy Dylan and Carol . . . Loving and being loved in equal measure must be heaven on earth indeed.

  If you’re reading this letter I can imagine your distress, and I don’t even want to think about how I would feel if you told me something like this.

  I’ll stop for now. I’m having a bad day. And, besides, I’m meeting my friends for dinner.

  Despite everything, yours.

  Saúl

  What Saúl couldn’t imagine was that his words would make a woman who lived in the future fall in love with him. Yes, love is unpredictable. I felt conflicting emotions as I read: on the one hand, jealousy, rage, helplessness at not being able to stop it because it had already happened and because I was only a spectator; and, on the other, tremendous compassion for Nadia. How was it possible for me to feel so close to someone who simultaneously caused me so much frustration and envy? I was beginning to be a stranger to myself.

  My back hurt and my eyes stung. I needed to stop this, go outside and breathe some fresh air. A notification popped up on my laptop, telling me that Brandon had sent me a private message on Facebook: he was reminding me that his flight to Egypt was booked for 1 August. I didn’t feel like answering him; his problem seemed so trivial to me right now.

  I needed to get some exercise and clear my head, so I showered, then put on comfortable clothes and went for a walk through the neighbourhood. The wind was still raging, the gusts whipping me in the face and blowing my hair about violently. I walked for half an hour, thinking about him the whole way, imagining the scene a thousand times over of the two of us holding hands by the lake, my stomach full of butterflies like that of a teenager.

  A shock awaited me on my return home – on hearing me open the front gate, someone ran off through the garden behind the house, leaping over the bougainvillea to get away. I froze, petrified, under the arch of the gate. When I was finally able to react, my heart pounding, I wondered if I should call the police before going in, or check for myself first to see if they’d taken anything from inside. I thought about Alfonso, but he’d been very clear that I should never try to contact him. The screen always came up with ‘Unknown caller’ when he rang me, and it didn’t seem wise to ring the office of the detective agency to pass on a message like this, especially since they were almost certainly closed. I decided not to call the police either, and while I still stood there, indecisive and rooted to the spot between the pavement and the garden, a neighbour passed by with a bag, heading for the bins.

  ‘Evening – everything OK?’

  I must have looked pathetic. The man noticed that something was wrong straight away. I’m sure my shocked expression as I stood there under the lamppost was plain enough for anyone with eyes to see.

  ‘Yes, yes, I’m fine. Thank you. Good evening,’ I said, trying to end the conversation, because I wanted to be alone even more than I wanted to ask for help.

  ‘You must be Alberta’s daughter. I’m so sorry about your mother.’

  ‘Thanks – yes, I’m Berta.’

  ‘I’m Arturo – your next-door neighbour. If you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask,’ he offered kindly, putting his free hand in his trouser pocket and taking out a card. ‘Here, this has my number. There have been a lot of burglaries in the neighbourhood lately . . . Do call if you need anything, won’t you? Enjoy your evening then.’

  ‘Nice to meet you and thanks very much,’ I answered, taking the card with some misgivings.

  At that point I didn’t trust my own shadow.

  As soon as he turned away, I hurried through the gate, clicking it shut behind me. Even out in the garden, I had the feeling that my legs couldn’t support my weight. I searched clumsily, looking for the keys to the front door among the dozen or so on my key ring before realising that I didn’t need them: the door was standing wide open. I walked down the garden path as though propelled along by the wind, scarcely in control of my own limbs. Once inside the hallway, I peeked my head around the corner towards the kitchen and saw that the basket of letters was standing empty. Horrified, one hand flew to my chest and the other to cover the gaping O of my mouth. The door to the garden was also open, creaking as it swung in the wind. It could only be opened from the inside. Whoever had stolen the letters had come in through the front door with their own key, and then left via the kitchen and run all the way through to the bougainvillea hedge and the street behind. I followed the trail he’d left: the lawn was strewn with letters, dancing in the wind like mad white butterflies. Seeing ‘my’ letters scattered all over the garden, at the mercy of this macabre and jerky dance, threw me into immediate action. I grabbed the basket and started after them, catching them one by one, battling the wind, which mockingly swirled eddies of abandoned letters wherever it pleased.

  It took a while to gather them all. When I was done I searched every nook and cranny with the utmost care, especially those areas that were less well lit – it was dark by now and the light from the street lamps didn’t extend to the whole garden. I could hardly see a thing out there, so I fetched a torch from the kitchen and then headed back out to hunt under bushes and in the most shadowy corners. Once I was sure there were no more letters left to find, I went back in the house with the torch under my arm, the basket in one hand and a few letters that had threatened to drift out from the top in the other. I cursed myself then for not having counted how many there were before setting about reading them, because I wouldn’t now know if the thief had got away with any. Most of them had fallen out of their organised bundles, so I would need to spend some time reordering them. But that would have to wait, because right then I stumbled upon my second dreadful shock of the night.

  Seeing Neca with that knife in her chest, still sitting in the same spot where I’d left her . . . I could have sworn she was even bleeding. I dropped the basket on the floor, and quickly searched around for Aris. In all the confusion of collecting the letters I hadn’t even noticed if he was still in the house or not. I saw him down by my feet, looking up at me, feeling my grief along with me. I picked him up in my arms, sat down facing my childhood friend and cried like a little girl, my face buried in his furry back. He le
t me hug him as much as I wanted, until I felt calmer.

  I picked Neca up carefully as though she might shatter, as though she really were injured and I was afraid she would bleed out or die in my arms. My whole body shaking, I drew the weapon out slowly, one more tear plopping on to her nose. The intruder had coldly and calculatingly stabbed her in the chest for maximum effect – this was personal and they must somehow be aware of her importance to me. I went to fetch the sewing kit from the sideboard in the hall and, trembling, set myself to the delicate task of stitching up Neca’s chest and dress. The slash to her chest was so deep that the knife had nearly come out the other side through her back. I took my time, wanting her to be perfect, and, despite my heart pounding with emotion, I did a neat job. I checked every stitch, calculating where and how to place the next one, mending the single most beautiful thing from my past – Neca and what she represented in terms of friendship, warmth and forbearance, even in the hardest moments. It was a miracle she had survived until now, waiting in the attic for fifteen long years to tell me that it hadn’t all been so bad and that, if I clung to the good times, I could win through in the battle ahead. She was my icon, and when I looked at her I remembered why I was there – she gave me the confidence to face the difficult task that awaited me. Her little face seemed to say, We overcame so much suffering together when you were small, so we can do it again now. She was my lucky charm – one of those talismans in which people confide when we think all is lost. We talk to them, carry them with us at all times, protect them . . . convinced they can keep us from harm.

  Next I mended her dress with blue thread, taking the utmost care, passing the needle first from right to left, and then from left to right, securing the threads of the fabric one at a time, up and down, as Teresa had taught me. I don’t think anyone else could have done it so well. Pleased with my progress, I relaxed a little, and began to embroider her name over the stab wound. While I concentrated on this task, I couldn’t help thinking that whoever had hurt Neca and thrown my letters to the four winds, all around the garden, must be someone I knew, someone who knew how to hurt me. I think Aris had been spared because he’d belonged to my mother and that was why he hadn’t been the object of the break-in – or else he’d simply known where to hide from this unknown bastard.