8
While Indira was giving me a summary of what she had found in the first few pages of the diary, I spotted a row of cabs at the entrance to the airport.
“Indira, I have to let you go,” I excused myself, heading for the first car in line. “Could you scan the rest of that diary and email it to me?”
“Of course, no problem.”
“What would I do without you?”
I said goodbye to her as I waved to the driver of an ancient blue Mercedes that was undoubtedly older than me. As soon as I closed the door, the stink of tobacco and grimy upholstery nearly knocked me out.
“Park Hotel,” I told the cab driver. To my surprise, he understood me perfectly.
I leaned back in the back seat, and the car set off. The chauffeur turned on the radio at full volume. It began to emit a disturbing, high-pitched moaning sound, which I assumed was Balkan music.
I tried to ignore the singer”s wailing and instead thought of my grandmother, Carmen, and the notebook Indira had found. The hopeful eighteen-year-old girl in the diary didn”t sound at all like the woman I remembered. I tried to imagine her writing those lines, but it was impossible. She sounded so childlike, so dreamy... so different from the taciturn woman who spent her hours staring at the dining room wall. She had been a seamstress... I remembered that. But I doubted that a humble seamstress like her could have left me much. If there was an inheritance, it had to be from my father. He’d owned a successful gardening business before he died, though it collapsed soon after under my mother”s apathetic management. There was a remote possibility that he had set something aside for me, hiding it in his native country, far from his wife”s clutches.
The cab driver changed the radio station and switched to an even worse one. He turned up the volume to the maximum while humming the lyrics with half-closed eyes. I checked to see if I had fastened my seat belt and swallowed, concentrating on the beautiful green landscape that was passing by the window. It was so different from the Mediterranean coast or the great metropolis of Madrid.
My phone rang: it was Indira again. I picked up, but I couldn”t hear her over the loud music. I put my hand over the phone and gestured to the driver, pointing to the radio.
“Excuse me, can you turn down the volume?”
He frowned but didn’t turn down the music.
“The radio!” I shouted at him, starting to get annoyed. “Turn off the radio, please!”
“This is Josif Kiti?,” he grunted proudly, beating his chest.
“What? Who?”
“Josif Kiti?, the King. The best!”
He closed his eyes as he spoke, gesticulating grandiloquently.
“I don”t care if that’s Josif Kiti? or the Virgin Mary singing. If you don”t turn off the radio and keep your eyes on the road while driving, I”ll get out.”
The man slammed on his brakes in the middle of the lane. Luckily, there was no one behind us.
“You don”t like it?” he said, sounding insulted.
“No, I didn”t say I don”t like it, but I”m trying to talk on the phone, and I can”t hear anything. And on top of that, you’re driving with your eyes closed.”
“You not like Josif Kiti?? You out of my car!”
“What?” I repeated, hoping I had misunderstood him.
No further translation was needed. Five minutes later, I was on the hard shoulder with my luggage, hitchhiking.
I spotted a sign in the distance: “Ljubljana, 20 miles”. Promising.
The air smelled of fresh grass, and the early May light was soft and radiant: a wonderful day, as if the whole universe was mocking me and my crazy idea of flying to Slovenia without a plan. Doubt began to gnaw at me. I shouldn”t have wasted what little money I had left on this absurd trip to a place where no one understood me.
In the distance, a hideous bubblegum pink van appeared. It was barreling down the road, overtaking anyone who got in its way. The side of the van clearly read Transfer Ljubljana - Airport, so I waved my arms for it to stop. The driver saw me, and the van charged toward me. Startled, I jumped back into the wet grass to avoid being run over. It braked a few feet away from me, and a man with bushy eyebrows climbed out of it.
“Ljubljana?” I asked hopefully.
“Ljubljana,” he replied, nodding. I was glad that he spoke Tarzan dialect as well as I did.
“How much?” I asked, rubbing my index finger with my thumb and shaking my wallet in the air with my other hand.
He held up ten fingers, and I held out a bill.
Learning languages is overrated, Itold myself with satisfaction.
He grabbed my luggage and gestured for me to follow him. He climbed into the van and made his way to the back bench, where he pushed two tourists to make room for me between them.
“Thank you,” I said, happy to be on my way, even if it was in Barbie”s minibus. The tourists grunted, annoyed at having to share a seat with me.
“Hello again!” a familiar voice greeted me.
When I looked up, I saw the man who had helped me at the airport. He was perched on the seat in front of me and had turned to greet me. A sprinkle of golden hair covered his eyes, and he brushed them away with a snort.
“Behold! Fate brings us together again!” he exclaimed with a grin.
I shrugged and smiled, although the smile didn”t last long. The van resumed its journey as if the police were chasing us.
“What brings you here? You didn”t like the cab?” asked the stranger, offering me a mint.
“The driver kicked me out,” I replied, shrugging as I declined the candy. “It was so weird... All I did was ask him to turn down the radio... and not to sing with his eyes closed while driving.”
The stranger blinked, intrigued.
“What kind of music was it?”
“I don”t know. Josif Kiti?? He sounded like a cat in heat.”
The man stifled a laugh and shook his head.
“You have to be very bold to take on a Josif Kiti? fan. I’m telling you that from experience...”
He smiled in amusement but said no more. The rest of the way was punctuated with braking and sudden jerks. I gripped the seat tightly and tried hard not to throw up until we entered Ljubljana, and the van finally slowed down.
“Park Hotel!” shouted the wild driver, skidding along the sidewalk.
The two tourists sitting next to me pushed me along the seat, and I was practically catapulted to the hotel doors, along with my luggage. The disheveled man got off as well.
“So, we part ways again,” he said, helping me carry my bag to the door. “Goodbye, Vesna Br?ljan, enjoy your trip!”
I thanked him, and he walked down the sidewalk without looking back, leaving only the trail of his perfume, much more sophisticated than the rest of his person.
I made my way to the front desk and was relieved to find that they spoke Spanish.
“I have a reservation in the name of Vesna Br?ljan Exposito,” I said, tossing my passport on the counter.
The receptionist typed something into the computer and looked at me with a frown.
“You indeed have a reservation,” he replied, raising an eyebrow, “but it”s for May 13th.”
“May 13th? You”ve got to be kidding! You mean May 3rd?”
“No, no, it’s clearly written down. And, besides, we are full until next week.”
I looked at him, incredulous. “What do you mean by that?”
“I can”t offer you a room until Monday. “He avoided my eyes as if afraid of my reaction. “I”m very sorry, really.”
“My reservation was for May third!” I screeched and noticed that everyone in the reception was looking at me as if I were crazy. I lowered my voice. “Find me another room, please. Even if it”s the broom closet.”
“I don”t think you understood me, madam. Either you or your travel agency booked the wrong date, and there are no rooms left. You’ll have to look for another hotel. I can give you a list of alternative accommodations if you like...”
Damn José María.
As much as I tried to convince the receptionist, I ended up sitting on a planter outside the Park Hotel, holding a tourist brochure and a list of backpacker hostels.
A woman in bell bottoms approached me. I was already trying to put together a sentence in English to give her the runaround when I saw that it was my mother again, rejuvenated twenty-five years since our last meeting.
“This is impossible!” I exclaimed, incredulous. I was still recovering from identifying her dead body in the morgue.
I looked around nervously, but no one had noticed us. If the others could see my mother, they didn”t notice anything unusual about her.
“I managed to sneak away for a while to talk to you,” she whispered, “It’s obvious you can”t get anywhere without my help.”
I tutted, rolling my eyes.
“What do you want now? I listened to you, and look how I ended up here,” I mumbled, gesturing vaguely toward the hotel I”d just been kicked out of and the half of my luggage that hadn”t been lost.
“I wanted to continue with my story.”
“Well, as I don”t have lodging for several days, as far as I”m concerned, you can tell me The NeverEnding Story.”