The One That Got Away: A Novel

by Halle, Karina

  Three

  Ruby

  “You’re back late,” Elena says to me the minute I step inside the dorm room.

  The two of us are the only ones who’ve stayed in this dorm for over a week, everyone else seems to stay for three nights or so and moves on. At the moment, there are a pair of twins from Switzerland taking over one of the bunks and settling into their sleeping bags. They’re looking at me with curiosity, since I told them earlier I was going to go interview a famous footballer.

  They’re also looking at me with annoyance, since it’s ten thirty at night and they’re obviously ready for sleep. The last thing they want is for me to blabber to Elena about how everything went, and believe me, I’m about to blabber.

  “Want to grab a glass of wine on the patio?” I ask her.

  She nods and we close the door to the dorm room behind us, leaving the Swiss twins in peace. Stopping by the communal kitchen, I grab a bottle of white wine from the fridge while Elena grabs plastic wine glasses, smiling politely at the couple from Canada who are making late night sandwiches, then we head out to the patio that lines the living area.

  There’re a few people down at one end smoking, so Elena and I grab a table at the other end, and I unscrew the wine. Unlike the dorm room, the patio has a bit of a view, and the lights from the buildings and streets of Lisbon below glitter in the darkness.

  “So,” Elena says, after I’ve poured her a glass. “I take it things went well? I hope so. You’ve been working more than you’ve been enjoying Lisbon.”

  Ever since I told Elena my plan, she’s been watching me do nothing but research over the past week. Occasionally I’ll go out with her to a bar or a club for drinks, but honestly most of what I’ve seen of Lisbon has been internet cafes within a few blocks radius of the hostel. I’ve been watching old games online and reading up on everything I could find about Luciano Ribeiro.

  Then I did a long song and dance trying to find a way to contact him. Not speaking Portuguese or understanding a word of it definitely hindered me, until I was able to surmise that his younger brother Marco was his new agent. Once I figured that out, then it was a whole bunch of Googling and calling every Marco Ribeiro my search results could find.

  When I finally did get the real Marco on the phone, it took a lot of convincing that I was an actual journalist and not some super fan. He told me he’d check out my work and then call me back, and it was probably only three minutes before my cell was ringing again. The interview was on.

  This afternoon I’d met Marco outside the Alcochete Training Centre, which was about 30km outside of Lisbon in the middle of nowhere, and a very expensive cab ride. I was excited and I was ready.

  “It went very well. I went on a date,” I tell Elena, sipping from my glass, my eyes gazing over the city lights. Good wine is cheap here and, suffice to say, I’m addicted.

  “A date?” Elena exclaims. “With the football player?”

  “With his brother,” I say with a cheeky grin.

  “His brother? How…”

  “I told you, his brother is his agent and I met with him before the interview and we hit it off, and after the interview was over, he asked me out for dinner. He wanted to bring me to some fancy gourmet place but,” I gesture at my clothes, “I didn’t feel like I’d fit in. So we went to some cool bar somewhere and shared some plates. Like tapas, but they call them something else. Petiscos.”

  “Wow,” she comments. “Look at you. Killing two birds with one stone.”

  I laugh. “Not quite. I didn’t get the interview I wanted.” She gives me a quizzical look over her glass and I continue. “I mean, I interviewed Luciano but it got cut short. I suppose that was my fault, I should have gotten to the most important questions first. You know, about the game, the sport.”

  Instead I started asking him all about himself. I couldn’t help it. The more research I did about Luciano Ribeiro, the more infatuated with him I became, the more I felt I could relate to him in a weird way. Perhaps it’s not the same when your mother goes to prison, leaving you with your father, but the way my father handled me was the same way his stepfather handled him. I too was sent away. My father didn’t know what to do with me on his own, especially as he traveled so much. Soccer became my babysitter.

  Anyway, I wanted to know more about that side of him. It was discussed online in such a shallow way, no depth, that I thought maybe I could be the one to get him to open up. I could write about him and the game and what he means to Lisbon and his fans, but what I really wanted was to go where no other journalist had gone before, deep into his psyche.

  But Luciano’s walls came and went as we talked, and just as I thought we might be making progress, his brother showed up and everything shut down. It was almost as if his personality changed the moment he stepped into the picture.

  “So you went on a date with his brother?” she asks.

  “He asked. And then Luciano left.”

  “What is the brother’s name again?”

  “Marco Ribeiro.”

  Elena takes out her phone and starts Googling. “Is this him?” she asks, showing me a photo of him in a suit. I nod. “He’s hot.”

  Marco is hot. He’s not as tall as his brother, but his skin is this dark tawny bronze, his hair black and close-cropped. He’s got a wide smile, dimples, one of those strong manly man chins. He’s definitely one of those guys that knows he’s hot, and while he’s borderline too neat and clean-cut for me, he’s easy to be around. Talks a lot, takes charge, is bold. I appreciate that.

  “And you came back here?” she asks.

  I chuckle and have a sip of wine. “What can I say, I like my little Finnish friend here.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Yeah, but you could have been sleeping with him right now instead of sitting here talking about it with me.”

  “It wasn’t like that,” I tell her. “I wasn’t trying to get laid.”

  Not really.

  I said yes to dinner with Marco for two reasons. One was that I know I need all the connections that I can get. Two is that this way I wouldn’t need to get a cab back to the city. We had some drinks, some different plates of food, we talked. It was all very superficial conversations, such a change from me and his brother (though I suppose an interview isn’t really a conversation), and then at the end of the night he said he’d drop me off at the hostel.

  I leaned over and kissed him on the cheek and that was that.

  I’m sure if I really wanted to I could have asked to see his place, but as much as a quick fuck with a hot Portuguese sports agent sounds like a lot of harmless fun, I am determined to be seen somewhat seriously in this business, and I want to finish that interview with Luciano. I think he thought he was getting off easy but I fully aim to call Marco tomorrow and see if I can set something else up.

  “Well, I would have gone for it, if I were you,” she says.

  “Maybe next time,” I muse. “You know, when I’ve done the interview. Female sports journalists are held on a different pedestal and there’s already a lot of stereotyping that we have to sleep around to get the job done. I want to get this done on my own terms. If I finish and post the interview, then maybe I’ll have a roll in the hay with the guy.”

  “A reward for a job well done,” she comments with a sly smile.

  “We will see about that. I’ve known plenty of charmers like Marco, and a lot of them think they don’t have to do shit to pleasure a woman except have a dick and look pretty.”

  “You’re forgetting he’s Portuguese, though,” Elena says knowingly. “My ex was an asshole, but he was good in bed. Believe me.”

  “It sounds like you’re the one who needs to get laid, Elena,” I tell her. “By someone other than your ex.”

  “I can cheers to that,” she says, lifting her glass to mine. “Kippis.”

  “Kippis,” I repeat, the only Finnish I know, and I clink my glass against hers.

  * * *

  I sleep in the next morning, having bee
n kept awake all night by a combination of racing thoughts and the Swiss twins snoring in unison. By the time I finally decide to open my eyes, sunshine is streaming through the windows and all the bunks are empty. I bring out my phone from under my pillow and glance at it.

  It’s eleven somehow, and I have a text from Marco.

  Ruby it’s Marco. Would you like to have dinner with me tonight? Luciano will be there, you can finish the interview. I was thinking I would pick you up at seven. Don’t worry, it’s not fancy.

  I smile. The man is forward. Back in the states, there are all those stupid old-fashioned rules that people like to follow. Don’t get back to someone right away, play hard to get, don’t ask them out soon after a first date. I like that Marco doesn’t care, that he goes for what he wants. That’s pretty much the way I am too.

  Besides, I get to see Luciano again. I know he probably won’t let me get all that deep and personal with his brother there, but at least I can finish the interview.

  I spend the day doing more research, not just about Luciano, but about blogging in general, trying to work on my SEO and plan for future content. I didn’t see Elena until around five pm. She went and did a tour with some Germans she met, so we managed to have some more wine on the patio and then she helped me get ready for the date. I didn’t pack a ton of clothes for this trip, but Elena picked out skinny jeans and a white tank top, lending me her statement necklace for interest.

  “It’s making a statement all right,” I tell her, eying myself in the mirror as she fastens the bold turquoise and orange stone necklace around my neck. “The statement is: here are my boobs, look at them.”

  She laughs as I dig inside my cleavage and pull out the end piece, a giant slab of turquoise, knowing it will get swallowed up again.

  “Your boobs say that all the time,” she says. “Do people ever ask you if they’re real?”

  “Yes and it’s so rude,” I tell her, rolling my eyes. “My boobs are real. My lips are real. There’s nothing about me that’s fake.” I pause. “Although there probably should be if I’m going to be taken seriously. You know, have a game face.”

  “Nah,” Elena says, stepping back. “Just continue being you. That’s how you’ll stand out.”

  I peer at myself in the mirror. Sometimes I’m not sure who the girl staring back at me is, but at least for tonight I know I look good.

  In general, I don’t get that nervous about things because I’m pretty confident in myself, or at least my persona, and I roll with most situations. If anything, I take those nerves and turn them into excitement.

  But right now, as I’m standing outside of the hostel, waiting for Marco to pick me up, I am nervous. Not the idea of being around Marco. The idea of being around Luciano. Honestly, I have no idea why. There’s something about him that puts me on edge. It’s not necessarily a bad thing but it’s…different.

  It’s not long before Marco’s Mercedes rolls down the cobblestone streets. I quickly go around to the passenger side and get in.

  “Ruby,” Marco greets me, leaning in to kiss me on both cheeks. He smells like strong cologne. “Sorry this was short notice. I suppose I should have put some space between our dates.”

  Ah, so this is a date. At least I know where we stand.

  “That’s okay,” I tell him, giving him a big smile. “I had nothing else to do.” I gesture to my outfit. “Is this okay for your non-fancy restaurant?”

  His eyes rest on my chest for a long time. Not so subtle, is he.

  “You’re perfect,” he says, eventually bringing his eyes up to mine, heat flashing in them.

  Okay. I can see what’s happening here. The shameless flirting, as if making up for a fairly tame date last night. I have to remind myself not to reciprocate too much until the interview is done.

  I give him a cheeky grin in response and then bring my attention to the window as the car starts down the narrow streets. “You know, I’m grateful you asked me out again. Not only because I want to finish interviewing your brother, but because I finally feel like I’m seeing the city.”

  “You haven’t been sightseeing?” he asks, incredulous.

  “I’ve been researching your brother,” I admit, glancing over at him.

  Briefly, a wash of annoyance comes over his eyes. Then he laughs. “Believe me, Luciano isn’t that interesting.”

  “You don’t think so? His father left when he was so young, then his mother quickly married your father.”

  “She’s my mother too,” he says quietly.

  “Yes. Of course she is. Alice Duarte. I’ve seen the pictures of her online, she’s stunning.”

  He nods, jaw firm. “It’s no wonder my father fell in love with her so fast.” He looks at me, forehead wrinkled. “But what happened to Luciano happens to a lot of kids, doesn’t it? The fathers leave. It’s not so special.”

  Sometimes the mothers leave, I think to myself. But while I had no problems sharing that information with Luciano, it doesn’t feel the same with Marco. With Luciano I feel a kinship. A kinship with a stranger, perhaps, but a kinship all the same.

  With Marco, with his slick suit and fast car and perfect smile, I feel like I need to be a better version of myself. Someone cool, hot, young and fun. Not the hot mess I know I am deep down, not the girl with all that pain buried in her dirty past.

  I can be Ruby Turner, sports journalist, a professional living in a foreign city, someone who is going places. Or at least I can try to be that person.

  The restaurant is down in Belém, where the Tagus River meets the Atlantic Ocean. We park nearby and head across the busy street. It’s quite warm and there’s a freshness in the air so close to the water. In the distance there’s a huge statue that looks like a ship’s bow facing the river.

  “That’s Padrão dos Descobrimentos,” Marco points out. “A monument to Portuguese explorers. You may not realize it, but we Portuguese have influenced a lot of things. The ukulele, marmalade, Portuguese sausage. That last one is very famous. Wait until you have one.”

  From the look on his face, I laugh. I don’t have to guess his meaning.

  While we’ve been walking, we’ve been a few feet apart, but now that we’ve entered the restaurant, which seems a lot homelier than I imagined it would, he’s grabbed my hand as we are led over to the tables. I’m not a hand-holding type of person, my hands tend to get quite sweaty and I’ve always found it constricting, but it’s rather nice to hold his.

  We follow the waiter to our table by the window, where Luciano is already seated.

  His eyes drop to where his brother’s hand is holding mine, then he looks up and meets my eyes. “Nice to see you again,” he says. While his voice is warm, there’s a distance to his dark eyes. Perhaps because he knows I’m here to grill him.

  “You too,” I say, sitting down across from him. I glance over Luciano’s shoulder at the river in the distance and sailboats fighting the current. “This is a nice spot. I would have thought you would have been at some hot and trendy joint.”

  “Marco likes the trendy places so he can be seen,” Luciano says, giving his brother a wry smile. “I’m more fond of good food.”

  Marco scoffs. “You keep saying this is the best seafood in the city, but I know you’re wrong.”

  “Don’t you get harassed at places like this?” I ask him, looking around the restaurant. There’s a mix of people here, obvious tourists, old couples, families. Some people are looking his way with interest, but most are ignoring him, even though he’s one of the bigger stars on the Sporting team.

  “No one really harasses him,” Marco says. “I mean, perhaps when they’re losing he gets some drunk people yelling at him, but the celebrity culture here is very different than in America.”

  After the waiter comes by and Marco orders a bottle of white wine for us, Luciano says to me, “I never got a chance to ask you where you’re from.” He leans back in his chair, studying my face.

  “Houston, Texas,” I tell him.

 
; He nods. “Your accent was a giveaway. Though it’s not as strong as I’ve heard.”

  “Have y’all been to Houston?”

  I didn’t add that y’all on purpose, I swear.

  Another slow nod. “Yes. We’ve gone to a few cities in the US, I have a lot of friends in the leagues there.”

  “What did you think about Houston?”

  “Very different,” he says. “I was surprised at how multicultural it felt. And the food was amazing.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Actually, I enjoy the states very much.”

  “He almost met your President,” Marco says.

  “Obama?” I cry out. “How?”

  “I have a friend on the Colorado Rapids. They were the MLS champions last year and they all got to meet him in the White House. But the timing for me didn’t work out.”

  “You missed out,” Marco says, shaking his head.

  “So, how long are you planning to stay in Europe for?” Luciano asks me.

  I shrug. “As long as I can. I have no intention of going back.”

  “Why not?” Marco asks.

  Another shrug. “I’m young. There are more opportunities for me here.”

  I can be whoever I want here.

  As I’m thinking that, I catch Luciano watching me again. He does that often and I can feel his gaze every time, like it’s burning me. A part of me wants to be burned.

  Here’s the thing about Luciano—he’s handsome as hell. Maybe not the stereotypical “hot guy” looks of his younger brother, but he’s got something that I can’t quantify or put into words. I can only feel it. His nose is on the large size, and I think it’s been broken a few times, his eyes are heavy-lidded, alternating between a sexy and sleepy look. But they’re framed by dark brows that can make them look intense in an instant. His mouth is wide with a smile that comes easily, his teeth slightly crooked. His broad square jaw shows his relation to his brother, and seems perpetually covered in stubble, while his brother is clean-shaven. His hair is gorgeous, dark and wavy, long enough to tug and…

  I blink and look away, suddenly aware that I’ve been staring at him. I’m not usually one to get flustered over something like that, I’ll proudly own it and make a fool of myself if I have to, but for some reason it feels a bit more serious when it comes to him. Which is funny, because from all the interviews I’ve watched and read, he doesn’t seem to be that serious of a guy.