25. Ofelia
Ofelia
“Ofelia! Finally, you answer.” Seline sounds typically impatient, and I smile.
“I was practicing.”
“And of course, this is good. But I am at Los Italianos Heladería, and the ice cream here, it is incroyable. Spaniards are mostly peasants, but their ice cream is out of this world.”
I laugh. “You almost sound like an American, Seline.”
“Never insult me like this again.” Suddenly her accent is thicker than ever.
No French person enjoys being mistaken for an American, but Seline is almost pathological about it.
“But you must leave your practice and come to eat ice cream with me,” she goes on.
“It is a beautiful day, and how many times will we be together in southern Spain, in the summer? Perhaps we will even take a walk. Have a little wine, eat some tapas.”
I give Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 30, a guilty look. Known with dread by pianists as the “Rach 3,” it’s possibly the most difficult piano solo ever created.
After my performance at the Patio de los Arrayanes, Dittorio sent it to me by email, with a one-line instruction: Now it is time to learn this.
I’ve been battling the fucking thing ever since.
And the reality is that in between notes, all I can think about is when the secure line will ring and I can hear Alexei’s voice again.
You need to get out of this house, Ofelia.
“You know what?” I close my piano decisively. “You’re absolutely right, Seline. I will meet you at Los Italianos in”—I check my watch—“twenty minutes.”
“Très bien!” She claps her hands excitedly in the background. “And I will order for you. I know the best things,” she says imperiously.
“Fine.” I smile as I strip off my practice clothes and pull on white shorts and a floaty chiffon top. “I’m on my way.”
Less than five minutes later, I knock on the dragons’ door. Teresa opens it, and I explain where I’m headed.
“Sounds good.” She ducks inside for a brief conversation with Julia, then closes the door behind her. She smiles as she opens the outer door to the alleyway. “I love Los Italianos. I swear I’ve put on two kilos in ice cream since I got this job.”
“I know, right?” I roll my eyes. “I literally have to ration myself.” We head down the cobblestoned alleyway together.
Grinning, she says, “I’m impressed that you managed to tear yourself away from that secure room.”
I color. “I do have a life,” I say primly.
“Sure, if you count piano practice and tarot reading.”
“I thought you weren’t supposed to be spying on me.”
“It’s quite literally my job, Ofelia.” She gives me an amused look. “Although I will admit that apart from that one week on the missing list, you make it easy for us.”
“I am sorry about that,” I say as we cross through the plaza before the final downhill slope that leads to the main town. “I know it must have been stressful for you.”
“I wouldn’t call it stressful, exactly.” The joking note leaves Teresa’s voice. “But your friend is dangerous—or rather, the life he lives is dangerous. I hope you understand that.”
I laugh hollowly. “Danger finds families like mine, Teresa, no matter how well we understand it.”
“Then you should at least start taking self-defense lessons.”
I look at her, startled.
“You don’t want to feel helpless for the rest of your life, do you?” She meets my eyes as we walk. “You will always have security, Ofelia. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t learn how to defend yourself, too.”
“I would love that.”
She gives me a rather surprised look. “You would?”
“Absolutely. I asked if I could learn once, years ago, when Papa Mikhail was still alive, but he just laughed at me. When Bryce and Luis started training Mickey, I was so jealous. But by then I was serious about piano, and so I was worried about hurting my hands. Which is crazy when you think about it, since Mickey uses his hands too, on his laptop. It hasn’t stopped him from practicing jujitsu almost as many hours per day as he codes. ”
“Then it’s settled.” Teresa grins at me. “Starting tomorrow, your ass is mine, Borovsky.”
“Wow.” I roll my eyes. “So much respect.”
“Wait until I start throwing you to the floor.” Her phone rings. To be continued, she mouths as she answers it. “Hello?” She frowns. “Hello?” Holding the phone out in front of her, she squints at the bars on the top of the screen.
“Reception is terrible down here,” I say as her screen goes blank. “Just wait until we’re at Los Italianos, then you can take it out onto the main road. It’s clearer there.”
“It’s from a hidden number,” Teresa says, frowning at the phone as we approach the heladería. She rolls her eyes. “It’d better not be your boyfriend,” she says dryly, “getting all upset because he’s missing his daily smut call.”
“Teresa!” I slap her arm.
“What?” She laughs. “Are you going to try to tell me that isn’t what you two are doing, locked up for hours in that steamy little room? Oh, wow. You should see how red you’ve gone.”
I’m laughing despite myself. It’s so much fun to have female security guards. I can never remember laughing like this with Bryce and Luis, certainly not about anything to do with men.
“Here we are.” I push open the heavy glass door of the heladería. Seline waves from her seat to my left, in the corner.
“That looks gorgeous.” I look at the single scoop of gelato with a mint leaf carefully arranged atop it set in my place. “But I’m pretty sure I’m going to need another three scoops.”
“This is just the first tasting.” She hands me a spoon. “Then we walk a little, then we take wine and tapas, and maybe later we take a little more ice cream, no?” She shrugs. “It is a day of small luxuries.” She smiles at Teresa. “I ordered one for you, too.”
“You are going to kill my waistline, Seline.” Teresa returns her smile.
“That’s the second time you’ve bought me ice cream—the next one is definitely on me.
I’m just going to make that call,” she says, waving her phone at me as she heads toward the opposite end of the shop, where the other entrance opens onto the main road.
“Only one keeper today?” Seline frowns as she watches Teresa leave. “Don’t they usually travel in pairs?”
“I don’t need two every time I go out in public, especially when I’m just meeting my friend for ice cream.”
“You should be more careful, Ofelia.” She glances around the crowded heladería. “Take it from a Gypsy: places like this are hunting grounds for pickpockets.”
“Speaking of that.” I put my spoon down. “I’m sorry about what my grandfather said to you at my performance, Seline. It was very rude. Even if he didn’t mean to offend you, I know you were hurt by his words.”
“Ah.” She lifts a shoulder, though she doesn’t quite meet my eyes. “Gypsies have a bad reputation. Sometimes well deserved, if I am honest. Much like Russians, no?”
I can’t help but laugh at that.
“Is this pistachio?” I change the topic, and Seline smiles, touching my hand briefly in understanding.
“Yes, it is. Delicious, no? And afterward, I think we should go to that tapas place up at the top of the Albaicín. You know, the expensive one with the view of the Alhambra.”
“Really?” I wrinkle my nose. “They charge so much for drinks, and you have to actually pay for the tapas.” Most bars in Granada offer free tapas with each drink. I don’t mind paying for the more gourmet varieties, but the tourist bars overlooking the Alhambra are a blatant rip-off.
“Sometimes we should all be tourists in our own city. It is how we keep a sense of wonder. And like I said, today is a day of small luxuries.” She glances around the heladería, frowning. “Where is your Teresa?”
“She’ll be back, don’t worry.” I look regretfully at my fast-dwindling ice cream. “Can’t we stay here and order more? I just walked down that hill, and now you want me to walk all the way back up, just for an overpriced drink and the same view I get from my terrace.”
“The walk will take away the calories you just ate, and such adventures are exactly what life is made of,” Seline reprimands me. “Oh, fine,” she says, when I give her a skeptical look. “If you come with me for an overpriced drink at my favorite tourist bar, I will read your cards. Deal?”
“Sold.” I close my eyes, savoring the last mouthful of ice cream.
“But only just.” When I open my eyes, Teresa’s gelato is slowly melting by the third seat.
“You should eat that.” I nod at it as I glance around.
“She must be caught up on the phone. Let me just find her so I can tell her where we’re headed.
We can always buy another gelato for her to take with.
” I wink at Seline. “And maybe one for me, too. You French ladies might like one delicate scoop, but I am made of stronger stuff.”
“I will wait for you here,” she says. She gives me a rather worried glance. “Be careful, Ofelia.”
I shake my head, smiling. “Aren’t you the one always telling me I should be more independent?
I won’t be a minute.” I go to the front entrance and push open the heavy glass door onto the main road.
The busy footpath and fast-moving buses and scooters are almost a shock after the peaceful pedestrian cobblestones of the Albaicín only one street away.
Sometimes I think Granada is like two separate cities, one a medieval labyrinth of old stone, gardens, and music and the other a modern cacophony of commerce and traffic.
I glance either way down the road, but there’s no sign of Teresa anywhere.
She must have gone back around to the rear alley to talk without all the noise.
A group of Gypsy woman approach me, waving sprigs of rosemary in my face, asking me to buy it to ward off evil. They’re always on this road, preying on tourists.
“No, gracias.” I hastily reopen the door to the heladería and move back through the throng at the counter to where Seline is standing by our table, peering anxiously through the crowd.
“Teresa must have come around the back,” I say as I approach. “I can’t see her.”
“We should stay here then, until she returns.”
“It’s fine.” I smile at her. “You shouldn’t worry so much, Seline. Teresa is probably just outside. It’s so crowded in here, let’s just wait out back for her.” I push open the door and step out onto the quiet cobblestones with a sense of relief. “I love that place,” I say, “but it’s so busy.”
“But worth it,” she says, slipping her arm through mine.
“So worth it.” We move away from the entrance, wandering down the quiet alley, the shops nearly all closed now for siesta.
“You didn’t need to apologize for your grandfather, you know.” Seline glances at me, her eyes softening. “It was wrong of me to take offense. I think that sometimes I feel a little jealous of you, Ofelia.”
“You do?” I glance at her in surprise.
“Oui.” For once her shrug has no hint of Gallic arrogance.
“You are lucky to have a family that cares so much for your well-being,” she says quietly as we move slowly from one shop window to another, lingering before each to look at the artisanal goods on display.
“My family is not like this.” Her eyes darken.
“But Duval women know how to take care of themselves. That is something we all learn early, if we are to survive.” She glances around the empty alleyway, frowning.
“Your Teresa still is not here. You should call her.”
I reach into my back pocket for my phone, then frown. “That’s odd.” I pat the other one. “I must have left my phone on the table.”
I turn back toward the heladería, my arm still through Seline’s.
“No.” She halts abruptly. “You didn’t leave your phone on the table. You never took it out of your pocket.”
She glances around nervously.
“I must have,” I say, smiling at her. “Let’s just check.”
“No,” she says again, and suddenly her grip on my arm is viselike.
“Teresa never lets you out of her sight,” she says, almost as if she’s talking to herself.
“And now she’s disappeared. You never took your phone out of your pocket, but now it’s gone.
Ofelia.” She turns to me, her eyes wide with alarm.
“We need to get you home. Now.” She pulls me forward, stumbling on a stone as she does, falling to the ground.
“Damn!” She scrambles to her feet, ignoring my outstretched hand as she stares around the alley. “We should hurry.”
“Seline!” I reach out a hand to steady her, surprised to find her trembling. “What’s wrong?” I glance around, but I can’t see anyone. “I’ve lost my phone, that’s all—”
“You didn’t lose it!” Her eyes dart around frantically. “Your pocket was picked, Ofelia. Please believe me.” Her words are almost a sob, and it might be my imagination, but her accent seems different, less obviously French.
“Just give me your phone.” I hold out my hand. “I will call Teresa—”
“There’s no time.” Seline’s eyes darken with fear as she stares over my shoulder. “I’m sorry, Ofelia. I realized too late—”
“You realized what?” I frown at her, confused.
“Too late,” she repeats dully.
“Da” comes a cold, masculine voice in Russian from behind me. “For once, little Gypsy blyat, your fortune telling is right.”