‘You know that Tony loves you very much, don’t you?’ she asked one night. They were preparing a feast: salted bread and chillis and peppers dark as cherries. Lori was chopping red onion and its sting caught her in the eye, but if Corazón thought it was tears she didn’t say so.
‘It has been difficult for him,’ her grandmother went on.
‘I know.’
‘He remarried quickly because he believed it was best. He wanted you to feel secure.’
Lori couldn’t help herself. ‘He thought he’d better replace Mama, you mean?’
Corazón stopped what she was doing. ‘Oh, Loriana, that is not true. Tony struggled. He did not know how to be both a mother and a father to you.’
‘So he stopped being either?’ Lori wished she could let go of her bitterness. It was ugly, it ate her up, but she couldn’t help it.
‘When Maria got sick, it tore his heart out, right from his chest. I saw it,
querida
, spooling to the floor like a ribbon and gathering at his feet, and I knew I could never fold it back in. You cannot judge a man’s behaviour because of his grief.’
A long silence followed. Lori returned to the board but there was nothing else to do, she’d cut everything, so she drove the point of her knife into the wood and twisted.
‘He had to keep you safe,’ Corazón said.
‘Safe from what? My own decisions?’
Corazón put her head to one side. ‘Perhaps.’
‘But I don’t
want
to be safe!’ Lori found her hands were shaking. She thought about how reckless she had felt that afternoon at
Tres Hermanas
. How until that moment she had lived her safe, miserable life and no one had been there to show her there was more; a different way of feeling. Until him. ‘That’s the point! I want to be more than just the poor kid whose mama died.’
Corazón shook her head with infinite sadness. ‘No,
querida
. That is not how it is.’
‘I hate Angélica.’ She threw the vegetables into a waiting pan. Blue heat licked up the sides. ‘And I hate her daughters. If it weren’t for them—’
‘The blame cannot rest with Angélica. Tony changed after your mother died, and he did that all by himself … Maria was the love of his life.’
Lori nodded, biting her lip to stop the tears.
‘I cannot know what has been in his mind,’ continued Corazón, ‘the places he has gone to. But I
can
understand his decision to be with Angélica. She is strong, she takes control—’
‘She is unkind, she is hurtful … she has spent all our money—’
‘She is your father’s wife.’ Corazón watched her. ‘Whether you like it or not.’
Eventually her grandmother put a brittle arm round her shoulders. ‘Come,’ she said. ‘Didn’t I promise good things would happen to you here? You don’t get to my age without learning to trust your instincts.’ She kissed Lori’s head. ‘Wait and see, Loriana. Wait and see.’
Lori took the bus into Murcia twice a week. She hadn’t seen it after dark before, so, the following evening, Corazón encouraged her to venture into the city.
‘Are you sure?’ Lori had asked. She was nearing the end of her stay. ‘What about you?’
Her grandmother had smiled. ‘Go, have fun,’ she said, settling into her favourite chair with the radio by her side. Her eyes closed. ‘Watch the river for me.’
There was a fiesta happening in Murcia, a vibrant band of colour pouring through the streets. Locals in costume sang and blew fire into the night, the air was alive and the atmosphere infectious. Lori had worn her hair loose, an abundance of thick curls tumbling past her shoulders, and a simple yellow dress. The tan she had acquired in Spain was rich and deep, a burned amber—the sun was different here, more intense. Two small hoops glinted at her ears. She crossed the
Puente de los Peligros
, stopping to look out at the black and gold rush of the Segura. Beyond the rooftops and the spire of the gothic cathedral, mountain ranges soared into the sky. Lori imagined he was standing next to her. He would feel for her hand and hold it, his touch on her pulse, the engine of her blood.
She settled in a café in the
Glorieta
, the city square, and did not notice the woman staring at her from the bar, checking a small leatherbound book and then making her way over. Lori ordered a glass of red wine that was so sticky and viscous it clung to the sides like syrup.
‘Excuse me?’ a voice asked in Spanish.
Lori glanced up to see a striking woman, older than her, with a long sheet of glimmering dark hair. She had an unusual face with fine, high cheekbones and a large beauty spot in the middle of her cheek. ‘Could I use your ashtray?’
Lori didn’t smoke. She offered it to the woman. ‘Sure.’
Uninvited, the woman pulled out a chair. ‘I’m Desideria Gomez,’ she said, extending her hand. ‘I caught sight of you earlier, from the bar. I hope you don’t mind me joining you.’
Tentatively, Lori shook it.
‘Que linda.’
She lit her cigarette with a flourish. ‘You are very beautiful.’ With a questioning expression, she slid the pack across the table.
Lori smiled uncertainly. ‘No, thanks.’
‘Do you live here?’
‘I live in America. Los Angeles.’
The woman was surprised. ‘Really? That’s a coincidence. My company has a branch in LA.’ Desideria started talking English and Lori thought she was less attractive when she did. She blew out smoke in a thin, efficient stream. ‘I’m a talent scout, which means I get to do a lot of travelling—and hopefully, though rarely, come across girls like you.’
Lori wasn’t sure what her companion was getting at. There was a silence during which Desideria didn’t elaborate. Instead she continued to stare at Lori, so intently that
after a while Lori began to feel uncomfortable. For something to say, she volunteered, ‘I’m vacationing with my grandmother. She lives out of town.’
‘But you’ll be going back? To LA, I mean.’
‘Yes.’ Her face must have betrayed regret because Desideria leaned forward.
‘What’s your name?’ she asked in Spanish.
‘Loriana Garcia Torres.’
Desideria put her head to one side. ‘Lori Garcia. I can see it.’ She appraised her. ‘I work for La Lumière.’
Lori waited.
‘Modelling agency? Best in the world?’ She flicked ash on to the ground, making Lori wonder why she’d wanted the ashtray in the first place. ‘Though, I suppose I would say that.’
‘That sounds fun.’
Desideria grinned, as if she couldn’t quite work the younger woman out. ‘Would you be interested?’ she asked.
‘In what?’
‘Work.’
Hope soared. ‘Yes, yes, I would,’ Lori began. ‘As it goes I have a job in a beauty salon already—nothing impressive, but I have a lot of skills, with hair, make-up and clothes as well as treatments. And I’m a very fast learner so anything you show me how to do, I’ll be quick to pick it up …’ She trailed off when Desideria started laughing.
‘I meant on our
books
.’ She sat back, her face moving in and out of shadow as lights from the carnival seeped over.
‘What books?’
‘As one of our models?’
Lori was baffled. ‘Your models,’ she repeated blankly.
‘You’re very sweet,’ observed Desideria, nodding as though a previous notion had been confirmed. ‘Innocent.’
‘A model?’
‘But with a sexy edge.’
Lori was embarrassed at the compliment.
‘It was a lie,’ said Desideria, ‘when I said I’d spotted you from the bar. The truth is I’ve been following you all evening. If you’re working behind a salon counter now, sweetheart, I can guarantee you won’t be for much longer. You’re gorgeous.’ She eyed her keenly, licked her bottom lip. ‘I mean,’ she said huskily, ‘I take it you’re straight?’
‘Yes.’ Lori wasn’t sure what that had to do with anything.
‘Do me a favour,’ said Desideria, reaching into her purse for a smart black card. On it, a stylish spotlight illuminated her name and number. ‘Soon as you’re back in LA, call me. We’ll bring you in for a shoot, see if the camera likes you, and, if it does, we’ll sign you up.’
Lori was dumbfounded. She took the card.
Again, Desideria laughed. ‘Promise me you will?’
‘I promise.’
‘Good.’ But Desideria insisted on scribbling Lori’s details down all the same. ‘I’m going to tell my boss about you.’ She looked up. ‘He’s a very big deal. If I don’t bring you back, Lori, he’ll
never
forgive me.’
19
Aurora
Pascale Devereux was something else. Within days the two girls were inseparable. Never had Aurora met such an impressive, strong-minded person, so different from her so-called friends back in LA who thought only about cars and clothes. Pascale was cultured, she had travelled; she was intelligent and interesting; she told Aurora things about the world and taught her what she didn’t know. She was clever and spirited and defiant in the face of the St Agnes teachers—she was also someone who, for whatever reason, the other girls, including Eugenie Beaufort, didn’t want to mess with. Pascale’s parents were Gisele and Arnaud Devereux, French politicians who held high positions in their country’s government. She was from powerful stock.
At last, Aurora felt she had met her match.
The girls did everything together—they sat in a disgruntled pair in lessons, they bunked off when they felt
like it, they crept into each other’s dorms at night and lay in bed whispering secrets, they sneaked out of school after dark and smoked and drank miniatures that Pascale kept in a locked box under her bed. The nearest settlement was miles away, but somehow, with Pascale, it didn’t matter where they were. Aurora could talk to her new best friend for hours.
‘I suppose you’ll be sharing a tent with your
girlfriend
!’ crowed snotty Eugenie Beaufort ahead of a camping trip led by Mrs Durdon. ‘Everyone knows you’re lezzers.’
Aurora smiled sweetly as she shoved the last of the camping equipment into a bag. Screw Eugenie Beaufort and whatever she thought. She was just jealous because everyone wanted to be friends with Pascale and nobody was.
They were on the Games pitch and it had started to rain. Aurora caught her reflection in the glass of the main building and shuddered: her tan had faded entirely since being in England, and, without Ramon to see to her hair every few weeks, her blonde crop had grown out to her shoulders, still golden but without the shine the LA sun allowed. It majorly sucked.
‘Chop-chop, girls!’ bellowed Mrs Durdon, done up in a tragic flat cap and breeches. She was brandishing some sort of stick that she kept striking the ground with, as if she were rallying a herd of sheep. ‘The weather’s set to get worse and I want to make camp in three hours!’
Aurora groaned and caught Pascale’s eye. The French girl glanced away, uninterested. Aurora wished she could perfect that look of indifference: it was far more effective than bitching.
They hiked out of the school grounds in a trudging line.
Fran Harrington hadn’t caught the hint that Aurora was over needing a guide and glued herself to her at every opportunity. Today she was sneezing and complaining of a cold.
‘Can I camp with you two?’ she whinged, her waterproof trousers rustling maddeningly with every step.
‘I don’t know who I’m camping with yet,’ Aurora lied. God, if she’d never met Pascale an expedition like this would be nothing short of deadly. Tramping off into the hills with a lead-weight attached to her back—and, courtesy of Fran Harrington, to her side. It was like those lousy boot camps she’d heard about. Worse.
‘But I don’t know how to put my tent up!’ Fran cried pathetically.
‘And I do?’ snapped Aurora. ‘Someone will do it for us.’ The very idea of erecting a tent was laughable.
Hours later, shoulders aching and faces stinging from the driving rain, the dejected party arrived at a valley clearing. Mountains loomed all around; hostile clouds brooded overhead. It was barely four o’clock and yet dark as night. Didn’t this country ever see sunlight? Aurora had forgotten that the sky was meant to be blue.
As it was, Pascale put their tent up in a matter of minutes. The other girls struggled fruitlessly with theirs, Eugenie Beaufort bossing her self-appointed team about the best way to do it and ending up tangled in canvas and tent pegs. To get her off their backs, Aurora helped Fran untangle hers and said she could pitch next to her and Pascale. They made a mess of it and Fran ended up with a sagging construction that whipped and billowed in the bad weather. Pascale sat in her perfectly erected tent and painted her fingernails.
‘Who wants to orienteer tomorrow?’ asked Mrs Durdon, charging round the camp, such as it was, like an army general. The girls were sheltering in the tents, front zips open. ‘Aurora?’
Aurora resisted giving her the finger. ‘Fran wants to, don’t you, Fran?’
Fran poked her head out and looked around, never more like a twitchy-nosed mouse. ‘OK,’ she said, happy to have a job to do.
‘Fine,’ said Mrs Durdon. She scowled at Pascale, who met her gaze with a blank expression. ‘Pascale, you will organise the fire, and then we’ll make supper.’
Supper was a metal tin full of slimy orange pulses that Eugenie’s crew was inexplicably loving. ‘Ooh baked beans!’ they cried. Was this what their lives had come to?
Baked beans?
Aurora couldn’t think of anything less appetising. She had an acute craving for lobster—not likely, especially with Mrs Durdon off preparing some sloppy dessert. The redeeming feature was Pascale’s fire, which burned bright and hot and warmed their aching bones. As nighttime fell a dozen faces gathered round in the flickering glow.
‘Let’s tell ghost stories!’ Fran suggested, hugging her knees to her chest.
‘As if you’ve ever seen a ghost,’ snarled Eugenie. One of her cronies, a waify slip of a girl called Allegra, sniggered at her side.
‘I don’t have to see them to believe in them,’ said Fran.
Eugenie yawned. ‘Well,
I’ve
seen one,’ she said.
‘Ooh, tell us, tell us!’ Allegra chimed, braces glinting in the shivering light.
‘OK,’ said Eugenie, basking in her audience’s rapt attention.
‘Well, there was this one time, at school, last term, where I woke up in the middle of the night and there was this …
thing
at the end of my bed. I can’t describe what it was like, except it was this thing, like a black shape, like a misty black swirling cloud …’ Next to Aurora, Pascale snorted. Eugenie went on, unperturbed. ‘And it was short, like midget-sized, and it was wearing this cape that was flapping all over the place like wings. And it was
ugly
—I mean, what I could see of it was ugly. And then it started pulling back the covers, dragging the sheets off the end of my bed, and I tried to call out but my voice didn’t work, I was paralysed! And all the while my sheet was getting lower and then I saw the midget’s shoulders moving up and down, like it was laughing.’