Chapter 14 Ignacio
Ignacio
“What are you doing?!” His voice had risen to a prepubescent pitch.
The ostrich, a massive, beastly thing with tufts of frizzy hair on its head, lunged out of the open cage door, snapping its beak at the shiny whistles in Ignacio’s hand. He leapt back right before the bird, more like a dinosaur, ripped off his limb.
“Throw the whistles, you fool! Or Estefan will get you!” Esmeralda shouted.
“Estefan?”
“The ostrich!”
Something like a growl emanated from the bird’s outrageously long neck.
With a horrified gasp, Ignacio flung the whistles into the main alleyway to his right.
Esmeralda grabbed him by the collar and yanked him to her as Estefan bolted forward.
Ignacio crashed into her and tripped over her skirts.
They tumbled onto the dirt. He caught himself as best he could so he wouldn’t squish her with his full weight.
He hovered over her. That mass of black curls he’d always thought were so pretty fanned out on the grass.
Her blouse hung down one shoulder. Ignacio tried his very best not to look at her soft bronze skin.
Or the constellation of beauty marks he once traced with his lips down to her stomach.
He tried not to breathe in her familiar scent.
Oranges. Mangoes. Vanilla. And jasmine. Always jasmine.
She winced. “I bumped my head on a rock. Way to clobber me, you goof.”
He frowned. “It’s what you deserve for trying to feed me to a monster bird.”
A group of trapeze artists sporting shimmering costumes that clung to their lithe bodies walked by, speaking about what sort of new stunts they might try during the parade to impress ángel for their first challenge.
One of them gasped. “Estefan got out!”
The infamous ostrich opened his wings and did a strange sort of dance. They tried to calm him down, but instead, the beast barreled after them.
“Run!” the eldest girl in the bunch yelled.
The trapeze artists whirled around and bolted away, their shiny leotards refracting rainbows of light in their wake. Estefan chomped his beak as he took chase after them.
“Hurry!” Esmeralda ordered, shoving at Ignacio’s chest. “Help me.”
She scooted from underneath him and crawled on her knees toward the bottom of the enclosure. With steady fingers, she began releasing the fasteners holding the wheels in place.
“What are you doing?” Ignacio whisper-yelled.
Voices rang out. People were cursing and yelling Estefan’s name.
“I’m stealing this cage.” Esmeralda jumped to her feet. “Help me push it to the parade floats. They’re getting ready at the front gate.” The voices grew quieter. Estefan must have gotten away. Yelps of surprise rang out from the direction of the meal tent.
Esmeralda tried to push, but the grass made the massive cage hard to move.
“Help me,” she grunted, her lovely cheeks spotting with red.
“Why should I?”
“We made a deal. I told you I’d assist you, didn’t I? But you must come through for me first,” she said through clenched jaws.
Cowboys ran past swinging lassos over their heads. They’d catch the wayward ostrich and bring him directly back. This was Ignacio’s chance to get the answers he needed from his first love.
Something loud crashed nearby. That ostrich was a terror.
Ignacio wrapped his fingers around the bars of the cage and shoved. They cut left, passing by a tent that rumbled and flashed bright light from inside. The marquee above the entrance warned of shifting weather patterns and sudden storms.
They moved through the inner ring and then toward the entrance to the carnival.
He watched her from the corner of his eyes as they gained speed.
Watched her nose scrunch up as she focused.
There were so many questions he wanted to ask her.
Mostly he wanted to know if she was happy.
Happy without him. But he decided to start with something simple.
Esmeralda clammed up when things got too hard.
The girl had always been quick to cut a person off if they pushed to know her too fast. She deflected emotions like it was a sport.
“How long have you been part of the carnival?” he asked.
“I joined just over two months after you left.”
You mean after you left, he wanted to volley back. But he held his tongue.
“What were you doing during the months before you joined?”
Her knuckles turned white as she squeezed the metal rungs. “Are you trying to make me angry?”
“No. Why?”
They shoved the cage through an empty alley at a steady speed.
“Ask your daddy what I was doing.”
“What did he do?” he questioned. But he could tell by the bitter snap in her tone she was ready to end this conversation. He led them into a safer one. “How did you come to be a fortune teller? I don’t remember you speaking to spirits before. Only to yourself.”
A hint of a smile fluttered over her pretty face. She steered them to the right. Then to the left.
“It was Gabriel’s idea,” she said. “We arrived at Carnival Fantástico together. The ringmaster was excited to have someone like Gabriel added to the team. He’s so smart.
He can fix just about anything.” Ignacio ignored the stab of jealousy piercing his heart.
“Me, on the other hand, I didn’t exactly have a skill to offer, unless sneaking around to find out intel or running top-secret missives counted.
Luckily for me, I’ve always been good with cards, and I’m decent at reading people.
Gabriel mentioned that to the ringmaster, and ángel said his previous fortune teller had recently met the end of her term, so it worked out. ”
Ignacio had seen her playing cards with tourists perusing the markets a time or two growing up. Locals didn’t dare try their hand with her. She was a masterful cheat.
“And Gabriel? Is he your—”
“Stop,” Esmeralda ordered. They dug their heels into the ground and halted the cage. And not a moment too soon. A shrieking clown with sparkles in his wig ran past, followed by a frenzied Estefan, and lastly, a pack of lasso-toting carnival hands.
Esmeralda had the decency to appear mortified.
But then, she giggled. She whooped and laughed so hard that tears fell down her cheeks.
He liked her like this. Liked her free from all the angry burdens of life.
And her laugh was always so infectious. His own lips pulled into a grin, and he couldn’t help but chuckle.
She’d been the only person to ever truly make him laugh after his mother died.
Before Dovie barreled into his life, he’d been a quiet and sad boy with no one to talk to.
Sure, he’d had his nanny, but she didn’t really care.
Not like Esmeralda. Whenever they were able to talk face to face, she’d look up at him with those big brown eyes as he spoke about the most ridiculous things, and she’d listen.
She’d laugh and then tease him and then make him smile through his sorrows.
And he’d loved her desperately for being a true friend.
Merry bells began to clang near the carnival gates. She cursed.
“The parade is about to start. We must go faster!”
Together, they shoved and grunted and cursed as they pushed the heavy birdcage through the gates. The parade floats were like nothing Ignacio had ever seen. They were massive and each made up with their own unique theme.
The tiger’s enclosure, which wasn’t an enclosure at all—it was more like a stage—was painted to look like a vibrant forest. Ignacio spotted the tiny mirrors situated within the falsified trees.
Gabriel had mentioned that the mirrors inside the menagerie tent kept the animals in place.
They must be working there as well. Isadora the tigress didn’t seem too pleased.
She paced back and forth, without her cubs, huffing a dangerous sort of growl.
They passed a float shaped like a volcano.
A banner bearing the name Paco the Fire Breather hung from the side.
Foam fizzled from the vent before an angry burst of flame exploded from the top.
A young man, wearing nothing but a cloth to cover his bits, greased himself down with something that smelled of old musty books.
“Why did you think it was me?” Esmeralda asked.
An enormous bull elephant stood behind the volcano float. A dozen smaller elephants flicked their ears and sniffed at the ground with their trunks. Dogs dressed up like tiny elephants ran around their long legs.
“What was you?” he asked, thoroughly distracted.
“Why did you assume it was me who wrote to your father? Honestly, I should bop you in your nether region for even suggesting such a thing.”
The last time they had seen each other, she had made it very clear what she thought of Ignacio’s father. She’d used words like bastard and villain and good-for-nothing monster.
“Because of the ink that was used. I’ve seen it once before,” he said. He waited for her reaction, to see if she’d flinch, realizing she’d been caught, but no such reaction came. Still, he didn’t completely believe she wasn’t in communication with his father.
They shuffled by a float that literally floated in the sky.
It was in the shape of a kite with ribbons twirling down like tails.
Below it stretched the aerialists Ignacio had seen just after the ostrich was let loose.
Half of their costumes were torn to shreds.
One man had a black eye. Another was missing a chunk of hair.
Ignacio tilted his body away before they recognized him as one of the contributors to their clothing loss. Though, hauling Estefan’s cage might raise some suspicions.
Two heads popped up from within a float that was built to look like a warrior’s colosseum. Ignacio recognized them both. Gabriel and the taller of the Sánchez sisters.
“What in the world are you up to, Esmeralda?” shouted the young woman.
“I’m proving how versatile I am!” Esmeralda shouted back. “I’m joining the parade!”
“You’re what?” Ignacio asked, incredulous.
“I always get stuck in a float with all the lackluster acts. No one pays any attention to us. So, I’m making my own float.”
“Dressed like that?” Gabriel yelled down.
Esmeralda winced. “I didn’t have time to run back to my wagon…or to think things through.”
The two heads disappeared. Just as quickly, Gabriel and the young woman scurried out of the side of the colosseum.
They ran to meet Ignacio and Esmeralda. Gabriel was now dressed in all black and the young woman wore white robes.
Instead of pushing the cage, as Ignacio imagined they would, they got to work rouging Esmeralda’s cheeks and pinning up half of her wild hair.
“The horse opera float has a few extra costumes you can use,” Gabriel offered.
“They keep them around in case one of them falls into dung.” He said that part to Ignacio as if that fact might interest him.
It didn’t. Not in the slightest. In truth, he didn’t want to hear a word from this guy’s mouth.
Esmeralda had moved on to someone else. The mere thought made Ignacio feel hollow inside.
“We can use the feathers in the birdcage to jazz you both up to resemble doves,” the young woman added.
You both? They were speaking about putting on costumes and masks in a plural sense. As if Ignacio was part of this charade. No way. Nope. That wasn’t going to happen. “The deal was to help you get this cage to the parade, and that was it. I’m not joining you in any fashion.”
“Fine,” Esmeralda snapped. “Whatever. I don’t care.” She turned her attention to the girl and smiled. “That’s a brilliant idea, Camila.”
“Do we want to know how you got Estefan’s enclosure?” Camila asked.
“I’m sure you’d prefer not to be implicated in such an outrageous scandal.”
The three of them laughed as if unleashing a hell bird upon an unsuspecting crew were hysterical. It was diabolical. Unhinged. Only a little impressive.
“What’s the plan?” Gabriel asked.
“To cause a scene, of course.”
Gabriel chuckled.
Esmeralda’s face lit up. And Ignacio thought his heart might collapse in on itself. She liked Gabriel. He made her smile in this silly, comfortable sort of way.
Jealousy scorched Ignacio’s cheeks.
But as they pushed the cage to the very rear of the parade, he watched her laugh and tell the story of their harrowing adventure with Estefan. All the jealousy and hurt and anger he felt melted away. He found himself smiling too. He found himself laughing. Until Gabriel’s eyes met his.
Ignacio’s grin turned into a sneer.
Gabriel grimaced. “I’ll go get that costume,” he said to Esmeralda. He spun on his heels and ran toward the horse opera.
Using rope and chain, they hooked the cage up to a float that was as large and intricately fashioned as the carnival’s carousel.
Somehow, in the span of moments after Gabriel returned, Esmeralda had been transformed. Her hair was pinned up, loose curls falling around her face. She had on lip paint and rouge. And she wore a corseted leotard that showed off her thighs and arms.
A lump formed in Ignacio’s throat. He had seen the full beauty of her figure once before. On the night of his eighteenth birthday.
Camila started sticking the soft white feathers from Estefan’s underbelly that littered the bottom of the cage onto Esmeralda’s costume. She had also somehow procured a tiny white mask and handed it to Esmeralda.
The cage lurched forward. The procession was beginning.
“We better scram,” Camila said. “But first, take these. They’ll go perfectly with your look.
” Camila yanked off the clip-on earrings she wore before snapping the pearly clusters onto Esmeralda’s earlobes.
“You’re the bee’s knees.” She held out her hand to Esmeralda, who beamed.
Esmeralda licked her thumb and pressed it into Camila’s palm.
“And you’re the cat’s meow,” Esmeralda said breathily.
“Best of luck!” Gabriel yelled over the clatter of rumbling floats.
Esmeralda thanked her companions. She kissed their cheeks.
She disregarded Ignacio altogether and climbed into the cage. She started to close the door. But she hadn’t kept her part of the bargain. She’d offered to help him. Yet he was no closer to knowing who might have written to his father. They’d barely scratched the surface.
His hand shot out, and he took hold of the door before she could shut it.
Her nose scrunched. “What are you doing?”
“I’m coming with you.”