They lifted their glasses high and drank together. The wine didn’t disappoint, though what Alex wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting. Bobal? Rioja? Merlot? Wine was wine to him, and it usually came watered down with a lot of ice and fruit.
“That’s delicious,” he said, mostly out of politeness.
“Damn. I thought I was unloading the cheap stuff on you.”
Alex furrowed his brow.
“Still joking.”
“Ah.”
For all Jago’s jokes, his dark brown eyes radiated an unspoken kindness Alex couldn’t ignore. “Thank you,” he said. “I mean, you really didn’t have to do this.”
“I was not going to just leave you there on the street. You’re not some bird that flew into a window.”
“No, but…” Alex wondered how many others had been hurt during the protest. How bad had it gotten? He’d read horror stories of protestors being denied treatment at hospitals or dumped in ditches by the police, and there was no telling if these were true or holdovers from the Franco years. “I’m okay, I think?”
Jago crossed to the window sill and, setting his wine down, lit a cigarette, blowing smoke gingerly into the fresh air. “I think so. I’m not trained, if that’s what you’re asking. But you were lucid enough as we were walking here. Nothing broken, as far as I can tell. Do you feel okay? No nausea? No pain?”
Alex nodded. In fact, he felt better than okay. Perhaps it was the wine.
“I don’t trust hospitals,” Jago continued. “My mother in all her life only went inside one. She never came out again.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Can I ask, when did she pass?”
“I did not say she died.” Jago blew another long stream of smoke and stubbed out his cigarette, seemingly bored with it. “But without the mind… Anyway, there are benefits to being alone, just as there are benefits to making new friends.”
They lifted their glasses again, though it seemed to Alex a macabre sort of toast.
“Andalusia,” Jago continued.
“I’m sorry, what?”
“You asked, in your own roundabout way, where I was from? Andalusia. And now, I’m here.”
“Nobody in Madrid is from Madrid. Not these days.”
“I promise you, that’s not true.” Jago straightened his shirt, then poured them each more wine. “Thegatos—that’s what they call themselves, the true Madrileños—are still around, and they are quite pleased to let you know it.”
The observation made Alex wonder how few true Madrileños he knew. “I thought you saidoneglass of wine?”
“It is a very small glass. You think I’m made of money?” Jago defused this question with another smile as he refreshed Alex’s glass.
“Okay. What do you do, then?”
Jago sighed as if the question annoyed him. “Work? The great failing of thegatos. Everyone wants to talk about what you do for work, not just in Madrid, but in every big city, everywhere. As if your most interesting feature were what fattened your bank account.”
“Not everyone is like that.”
“You mean people like you? Like us?” Jago put a hand on Alex’s shoulder, and for the first time, Alex was struck by the warmth of his touch. “No, thank the gods. Some music?”
Alex watched Jago pluck a record from a small shelf under what he now realised was a record player, and slide it from itssleeve. He recognised the monochrome image of the American woman pouting at him from between the stern faces of two men from Vicente’s collection. “Blondie?”
“I hope you like them?” Jago placed the needle down with a grin, letting the first pulsing drumbeats fill the tiny room. Dreaming,indeed. “I try to buy local music, but until Alaska puts something on a record... I mean, you seemed to like her? Alaska, I mean.”
Alex hadn’t been conscious of dancing along or even showing much enthusiasm when the punk group had taken the stage. Maybe he had. He seldom had money to buy records. He mostly knew Alaska by reputation and gigs he’d caught here and there. He only vaguely recognised the Blondie song, even as he involuntarily tapped his foot. He stilled it as soon as he noticed.
Jago nodded at his foot. “Are you hurt?”
