Lives Undone

by Aitana Moore

"Psychology 101, is it?"

  "Does it need to be more advanced psychology with you? You’re like a teenager pretending nothing ever gets to him, that everything's water off a duck's back. Pretending that you're some alpha male getting all righteous and angry, when you just throw temper tantrums like a little boy."

  His eyes went to the window. The lights from the party next door moved across his still face.

  "Why are you here?" she insisted. "Did you want me to tell you that I didn't lie to you?"

  "You did lie to me."

  "That it wasn't all lies?"

  He took a deep breath. "It doesn't really matter, does it?"

  "No. Some people don't hold honesty in high regard as you do. Sometimes you'll be fooled by them, and that's life."

  "True. That's life."

  "I've tried to say I'm sorry, but it isn't worth your getting so worked up about it. As you said, you got the diamonds back."

  "Also true.” He looked at her. “Losing gracefully must be one of the big differences between a man and a boy."

  "Exactly, and here's the thing: I'm doing a job for you, right?"

  "Correct."

  "And if you pull a stunt like you did today, everything I've done will go down the drain."

  Had his eyes flinched at the word "done”? She had stopped halfway across the room, and he tapped his fingers on the desk behind him as he listened to her, as if he might decide to become violent again, or as if he might decide not to care about anything she said or did. It was a funny thing to stand there, afraid of him — and not afraid.

  He was right, what did it matter? There was no way of getting his trust or his affection back, and that had been her decision.

  "When I have something bad enough on Diego, I'll let you know," she added. "Until then, go away and let me do my work."

  "Well ..." He looked toward the door. "This happens to be my room, but I'll let you tidy up. And I'll stay away from you. Just try to hurry things up, will you? I think we'll both be glad when this is over."

  He had fixed the fastening and set the necklace down on the desk before he left, as if he couldn’t even bear to hand it to her.

  NINE

  November was around the corner, and Diego and David would travel north for the Day of the Dead holiday. Lee hadn't been asked to their grandfather’s ranch and Luz had been crying all afternoon, which must mean she had also been snubbed.

  "I'm going to take that phone away," David told Luz as Diego and Lee joined them. The brothers wore the white Jai Alai outfit and were on the way to their club.

  As obsessed with her phone as any teen, Luz looked up with red eyes. "No!"

  "Deja de mirar estas pendejadas!" David said, sounding as if he were reaching the limits of his patience.

  Luz was looking at her Instagram account, but she ignored his plea to stop reading “stupid stuff” and kept scrolling.

  "What's upsetting you?" Lee asked.

  "What they say about me."

  "Who is 'they'?"

  Behind Luz, Diego grimaced and shook his head, urging Lee to change the subject.

  " 'Is David Aguirre so in need of a maid all the time so he needs to sleep with one?’ ” Luz read in Spanish. " 'What is she doing out of the kitchen?' 'She must make his bed nicely.' "

  Lee always pretended to understand less Spanish than she did, and the brothers didn't help with the translation; David only shrugged. "Let haters hate."

  What a stupid sentence, worthy of him and his indifference. He meant to convince Luz that she was envied by nobodies, while in fact she was suffering systemic and vitriolic discrimination.

  "Do you want to give people a reason to say this kind of crap?" David asked as Luz ran a sleeve over her nose. "And use a tissue, for God's sake."

  Lee couldn't help the furious look she shot at David. He looked embarrassed for a moment but jerked his chin in frustration. "Come on, Diego. Luz, if you don't stop looking through that thing and bawling, I'll close your cell phone account."

  A belated tear made its way down Luz's cheek after they left. She scrolled more slowly. "I have to get used to it." Dropping the phone on her lap, she turned a wet face to Lee. "Do you think it will ever stop?"

  "I don't know, sweetheart."

  The girl swallowed a sob. "Why are people so mean?"

  Lee shrugged. It was a question as old and as impossible to fathom as humanity itself.

  "When I marry David, there will always be someone saying something, no matter where we are," Luz said. "Even if we live abroad, a pendejo from here will write something."

  Lee tried to hide her surprise. "Marry David? Has he asked you?"

  "Not yet."

  "But you think he will?"

  Luz nodded. "He talks about the babies we'll have all the time, and how beautiful they'll be. How their skin will be golden like mine but their eyes blue like his."

  "His family will make it hard for the two of you,” Lee said gently. “You know that, don’t you?”

  "Do you think he cares about what his family says? Then he wouldn't be with me at all, would he? He would be with an American girl like you, or some pinche fresa."

  Smiling at the slang for a stuck-up girl — a strawberry — Lee pointed out, "Diego wouldn't be able to marry me either, you know."

  "Then it's because he doesn't want to," Luz said stubbornly, a little angry that Lee should doubt her. "I think David wants to marry me. You got to meet his parents the other day, but I'm meeting his grandfather now, for the holidays."

  "You've been invited to the ranch?"

  “Yes! The old man's not a racist like that mother — she is the worst. I swear she is the one writing on Instagram that I’m just a maid. And the father, he does what the mother says. But the grandfather is different. He told David to invite me, because the stupid parents won’t be there."

  "That's nice. I hope it's fun."

  "The Day of the Dead is not as good up north, but why don't you come? I'm sure the old man would invite you."

  "I'm going to see a friend. The artist, Sol. She lives in Cuernavaca."

  "Oh, she introduced you to Diego, didn't she? I don't understand the stuff she does, but David says she is very good. And in Cuernavaca the fiesta is amazing, but I'm still glad I'm going to the ranch." Luz huddled closer and put her head on Lee's shoulder. "Sorry if I sounded upset. I'll call you from there, and I'll let you know how it's going."

  When Diego came back, just before midnight, Lee pretended to be asleep. He was already in his sweatpants and got into bed carefully. After a few moments, however, he reached out to take her hand. She left it in his, her eyes opening as his closed.

  Then, as if a shameful thought had only been waiting for the darkness to come out, it did. It was the same thought that had hounded her since she had seen James — of how it had felt to be kissed by him, even in anger. The memory made her ache and didn't leave her alone for most of the night.

  The next day was Halloween, and Diego said goodbye before dawn. "Don't get up. We're off to the airport. Julio will be ready for you whenever you want to go. I’ll call you."

  Lee waited to leap out of bed. There were no servants about yet, and she first ran to the safe: the iPad wasn’t there. But she was free, and she wanted to forget the Aguirres and their secrets for a few days; Sol would do her a world of good. Besides, by all accounts the Day of the Dead festivities were something to behold.

  After a quick fruit shake and a shower, she met Julio in the garage of the building. The road to Cuernavaca was good, and Lee enjoyed the meandering paths on the way: the changing vegetation, the people in old trucks or new cars, and the young moving in droves for the holiday. Their screaming, laughing and waving announced that the fiesta had already begun.

  She got hungry by nine o'clock and asked Julio to stop anywhere on the way. He glanced at her in the rearview mirror.

  "Anywhere?"

  "Somewhere you would eat."

  His shoulders shook as he laughed, and soon he parked outside a
cantina, where she sat at a rickety table with a plastic cover and had eggs, tortillas and a coffee. The place was already decorated with cut-out flags in the form of skulls and virgins, and a few paper skeletons hung from the ceiling. A woman sitting on a stool at the counter braided bright yellow marigolds into a crown.

  "Cempasúchil," Julio said, indicating the flowers. "How do you say in English?"

  "Marigold."

  "It's to attract the dead, so they find their way back to us. They put it all over the place.”

  The rest of the way was as pleasant; there was little traffic and Lee asked Julio to turn off the air conditioning and open the window. She wanted to smell the trees, the earth, the smoke and the baking coming from the towns they passed. Julio drove with his elbow sticking out, and the air stirred Lee's hair as the car moved under the sun towards Popocatepetl, the volcano with snowy peaks.

  Sol's place was right outside the city proper, and Julio negotiated streets that were already full of people until he found it. Lee was glad to see the turquoise house; she opened the gate, hastened toward the door and knocked. Inside there was laughter, and high heels clacked before Sol opened the door. Her extravagant costume jewelry jangled when she embraced Lee.

  "You've made it!" she cried almost in triumph, as if Lee had had to cross oceans in an old ship to get there. She added to Julio, "Oh, just drop it all where you can."

  Julio put Lee's bag in the foyer, next to a table with a large vase of flowers.

  "Will you text me, Miss Ashley, when you want me to pick you up?” Julio asked.

  "I think it will be on the third — but I'll text you the night before, if that's all right."

  "You don't want a glass of lemonade, dear, some tequila, anything before you go off?" Sol offered the driver.

  He smiled, shook his head and walked back to the car as Sol closed the door.

  "I’m so glad to see you, Sol!” Lee said. “If you only knew ...”

  Sol embraced her again, and Lee closed her eyes for a moment. “I heard you laughing. You’re not alone?"

  Taking her arm, Sol patted it. "There is someone here."

  Lee's eyes flew to the half open door that led into another room. She couldn't see him, but she knew it was James. "You should have told me!"

  "He begged me not to say anything or you wouldn't come. Speak to him, sweetie, he is very contrite. And if you don't like what he says, I'm nearby."

  I don't want to, Lee thought, even as she moved toward the living room with Sol. He shouldn't be here.

  "Lee has arrived." Sol wagged her finger at James. "And you'll behave, like you said you would."

  He stood from the sofa, where he had been studying sketches laid out on a coffee table. Sol sized up the situation and seemed to think it safe to leave. "I will let you two talk things out while I make a pitcher of something that will get us all drunk as soon as possible."

  Lee opened her mouth to ask Sol not to leave them alone, but snapped it shut. She shouldn't be a coward, and, in any case, Sol was gone.

  "You promised to stay away," Lee said.

  "I couldn't," he said simply.

  So simply that it disarmed her. He looked ashamed, and suddenly young.

  "I had to apologize, and it had to be in person," he said. "I'm—I'm less than proud of what happened the other day, as you can imagine. I thought that necklace would open more easily, I guess."

  "You’re a bully if you use your physical strength—”

  He held up his hands. "I know. You could brain me with a lamp, and I would not touch you again, I swear."

  "I've told you before, I'm sorry for what I did.”

  "Lee, I don't want an apology from you."

  "What do you want, then?"

  James lowered his arms. "Tomorrow is the Day of the Innocents. Some people will be mourning their dead children, and that’s the serious stuff. There are more awful things in life than what happened between us." As she said nothing, he went on, more earnestly, "I feel bad, Lee. About giving myself so much importance. About how I treated you, what I asked you to do. I know it's hard to forgive, and I suppose it has been hard for me — but can you try?"

  She raised her face, wanting to say that she had piled her betrayal over Mia's, over Robert's and Imogen's because she had been afraid to tell him the truth and to stay with him; because she didn’t think she deserved him, not even now. But he might turn cruel again at any moment, and she was tired. It was hard to feel forgiven as well.

  "You've put up with a lot in your life, I think, and you were right to say that I acted like a child,” James continued. “I’m supposed to have learned not to have tantrums, yet I fail all the time. All I can say is that I'll try to do better."

  He stretched out his hand, and she took it. His touch was firm and dry, but her heart sank as he added, "There, we're friends now."

  They let go of each other and Lee stepped back a little awkwardly. "Thank you."

  The clinking of bracelets announced that Sol was returning. She carried a tray with glasses and a large jug of margaritas. "Well, are you on talking terms again?”

  "Of course." James took the tray from her and set it on the table. "We're civilized."

  Sol sat and lit a cigarette, watching them. "Wrong day for that. These aren't Christian feasts we're having, you know. They're pagan."

  "All Saint's Day?" Lee asked, also taking a seat. "I thought it was as Catholic as it got."

  "Not in Mexico. You should read about how it all started, ages and ages ago. The Spaniards just changed the dates, made it theirs and put a veneer on it, like they did to so many things here.” Sol blew out some smoke and added, “The dead will start returning at midnight, and the children will come first."

  Lee couldn't help shivering. She had always been impressionable.

  "It's two days of excess, like any festival," Sol added. "So be civilized some other time."

  "But we've just agreed," James said.

  His voice, deep and never without a little irony, increased the shivers running through Lee. James wasn't looking at her but at the flame of the match Sol used to light his cigarette.

  Did he really mean to be her friend? She already missed his eyes on her, all hot and cold. What an idiot she was.

  "We'll go to the graveyard in Ocotepec at midnight," Sol said. "It's not far, and it's something to see. Tomorrow you kids will be on your own — I have work to do."

  TEN

  Cuernavaca was like a piece of Spain that had broken off and drifted to Mexico, with its great cathedral and large square, the zócalo, its straight streets and the forbidding palace built for Cortés.

  There were round domes to some churches, which would have been difficult to find in Castile, that kingdom of hard lines. There was color too, since Mexico couldn't exist without it: buildings in faded red, dark pink, green and blue. There was exuberance in the roots of old trees lifting stones from the ground, and in the vines twisting around the front of houses and bursting into flower.

  It was said that Cuernavaca was the city of eternal spring, and the day was warm but not hot. The streets were filled with the smell of things being baked for the Day of the Dead: pan de muerto, or dead man's bread, sugar skulls and other cakes and sweets. It was a delicious smell.

  James glanced at Lee as she walked next to him in a dress of blue fabric with tiny pink flowers. She kept up with him in flat sandals, her long legs almost matching his strides. Her hair was tied by a scarf that floated down her back and she had her sunglasses on, but her eyes were green again. She was as beautiful as the day and smelled better than the baking.

  Lust was an indiscriminate instinct, an ancient beast barking in one’s ear; he had been able to deal with that beast. Desire was a different matter altogether. It persisted in the memory and in the imagination. It was a human thing.

  It tormented him now. He wasn't supposed to think of Lee naked in bed; wasn’t supposed to remember how absolute her abandon had been once she had lowered her defenses. He hadn’t
expected that a woman could give him everything and yet leave him wanting more — or that a woman could be so perfect in her contradictions.

  He wanted to slam Lee against one of those colorful walls, lift her dress and take her right there, under the surprised hollow-eyed stare of floating skeletons. He wanted to feel her breasts and kiss her lips so hard their teeth would crack. Instead, he looked at the churches on their way and prayed to be good.

  That was his first thought. The one that came after, a little while after, told him that he had been a brute. In that hotel room, he had suggested that she was nothing but a whore. His pride had insisted on the insult, but after leaving he had walked to a bar with the determination of drinking himself into amnesia, just so that the image of the pain on her face wouldn’t keep playing in his mind.

  Today, the first of November, was the Day of the Innocents. But, as Sol had warned them, in the center of Cuernavaca there was only celebration. There was the strong yellow of marigolds everywhere, adorning altars in the corner of streets and at the entrance of cafés and restaurants. There were paper cut-outs hanging between buildings, depicting skeletons, virgins and flowers.

  A group of young people wearing expensive costumes and elaborate ghoulish makeup walked the streets pretending to weep as they followed a fake coffin. Stands selling food, confetti and masks shaped like skulls, crows and devils did brisk business.

  As Lee and James went through side streets, farther from the zócalo and the center of town, there were more modest houses. Open doors revealed private altars.

  A lady saw them glance inside her house."Pasen, pasen," she invited.

  Taking James by the arm, she led him to her colorful altar. It was covered by a cloth with a dark red cross carefully embroidered and filled with offerings for a child: pan de muerto, chocolates, and sweets. There were toys as well, and a name spelled with bright marigolds: Hernán.

  The lady touched the marigolds tenderly. "It's so my boy can see the way. He has been walking around since midnight." She pointed to a photograph at the center of the altar. "This was Hernán."