Luis shook his head as if Danny simply hadn’t understood the conversation.
‘Luis, listen to me. She wore irises in her hair. And she dressed up for dinner. She made us two stews. She laid the table with silver cutlery and embroidered napkins. She filled a vase with poppies. And she held my hand. The way she held it, it felt kind and curious. She’s nervous about coming to England. Nervous that everyone at the wedding will judge her. The same way my parents were scared when theymet you. As for your father, maybe she visits him because even though he was a bad husband, she’s a good wife. She’s a romantic, like you. She swore a vow to him no matter how badly he behaved.’
Luis stopped walking.
‘You like her?’
Danny nodded.
‘Very much.’
‘We were inseparable, once.’
Danny replied, ‘I can tell.’
‘I miss her.’
‘She misses you too.’
Weighing whether to go back, Luis sat on a park bench. Danny joined him, placing an arm across his back. The pair of them waited while a young couple on their first date wandered through the tropical plants and ancient trees hoping for a kiss.
Chapter Forty-TwoA Portrait of Luis
The next morning Danny and Luis woke early to watch the sunrise. After showering, Luis picked out a pair of linen trousers the colour of clay and a cotton shirt. There was a monastic simplicity to his clothes. Among the first to arrive at the hotel’s buffet breakfast, they helped themselves to glasses of pulpy orange juice and plates of sliced fruit. Acting on a whim Danny layered a slice of toast with hazelnut-chocolate spread, cream cheese and peach jam, laughing like a kid on holiday as he took a messy bite, not the least bit worried about the meeting with Isabella, the woman Luis had once been engaged to.
Located near the historic centre, Isabella’s gallery was nestled between a florist and a tobacco store with clay pots of red geraniums on one side and an array of handmade briarpipes on the other. Outside the front window there was a low backless bench where an older man happened to be resting in the morning sun, shopping bags filled with loose vegetables by his side. Danny and Luis said good morning to him as they entered the gallery where Isabella was waiting. They found her in a small office that looked out onto a plant-filled courtyard. She was brewing coffee and when she saw them, she paused and looked them up and down. She was slim with glossy auburn hair. Her eyes were bright blue. Luis mentioned that she loved to sail and it was easy to imagine her moving across the bow of a ship, tying ropes and securing sails. She and Luis hugged with cautious intimacy while Danny stood a few steps back, observing their interaction. Despite their complex history it seemed apparent that whatever heartache she’d once experienced, these wounds healed a long time ago. For Luis, it wasn’t so clear.
Isabella and Danny politely shook hands and he did his best with the Spanish greetings he had memorized. She made no attempt to hide her scrutiny. While serving three aromatic black coffees, the smell mingling with a back note of turpentine from the nearby studio, Isabella offered a tour. The paintings for sale were by a collective of local artists who co-owned the gallery. There were depictions of the city and the coastline including fishing boats, churches and town squares. Isabella’s paintings were the most unusual of the collection. She painted the salt flats on the outskirts.Danny admired them, sincere in his praise, growing less embarrassed by his efforts at Spanish. Luis seemed cooler in his response, saying little. Over breakfast he had mentioned her fascination with people’s bodies as they worked, the shapes they formed, in a shop or on the street. She caught Luis’s look and said, ‘It’s hard to make a living from painting people. No one wants to buy a painting of a stranger’s face. Mostly we sell to tourists, who want a memory of the city, or hotel owners who want a painting for their lobby.’
At the end of the tour Luis and Isabella caught up in the courtyard. Danny had offered to leave them alone but they insisted on him staying with them. The sound of their conversation in Spanish was comforting even if Danny was unable to follow most of it. He wondered why she had chosen the gallery as a venue for their meeting, uncertain about bringing Luis into her home with her two sons and husband, concerned that she would be presenting the life he could have lived. Luis had discussed the idea of inviting her to the wedding. Danny was supportive, particularly after he heard that Isabella had reached out many years ago and invited Luis to her wedding, an offer he had declined, and a fact Luis had never shared with him at the time. This was why he had proposed, Danny thought, to reveal all these unseen textures and incidents that he had sensed but never understood. Switching into English, Luis drew Danny into the conversation.
‘The hope is that we might marry this summer. If we do, we would like to invite you and your family to the wedding.’
Isabella congratulated them. But she seemed awkward at the invitation to the ceremony. Speaking in English she explained that it was difficult to travel with the children because of her work commitments. Danny interjected, to make his feelings clear.
‘We’d love for you to be there.’
Isabella looked at Danny, perceiving the deeper significance of the invitation.
‘I will try.’
She promised to talk to Luis’s mother about the arrangements and perhaps they could travel together.
Luis asked, ‘How do you know my mother wants to come?’
Isabella seemed surprised.
‘Of course she will come.’
And it was true. Last night, after Danny and Luis returned to the apartment, Cristina had served them dessert and changed her mind. She apologized for saying ‘no’ and promised to attend.
Isabella gestured for them to wait in the courtyard while she went into the gallery, returning a few minutes later with a painting carefully wrapped in unbleached canvas. It was a portrait she’d painted of Luis over thirty years ago. It depicted him as a handsome young man, bare-chested,his shoulders thrown back. The setting was a rural barn. He was holding a rooster. The sunset was lava red, as if the sky were on fire. His gaze was not directed at the artist but towards arid fields of ploughed earth. To Danny it was an honest rendering of the man he loved, capturing his strength along with his mystery. With deft ambiguity, it was hard to tell if Luis was caring for the rooster or about to slaughter it. Danny guessed from the painting that she knew the truth about Luis before being told. She handed the portrait to Danny as if entrusting him with a part of Luis’s heart.
Chapter Forty-ThreeWhere Now?
Nearing the end of their stay in Spain Luis rented a car, planning a trip to a mystery destination he claimed was inaccessible by public transport, refusing to say where they were going or why. Danny guessed that the location was connected to the many discussions Luis had enjoyed with his mother over recent days, sometimes the two of them on their own, mostly the three of them together, including a sunny afternoon on the beach where Luis had once worked as a lifeguard. Since it was warm Danny had suggested that they swim. Although Luis pointed out that many of the town residents were still wearing jackets and jumpers he eventually acquiesced. They stripped to their underwear, the only bathers on the long eastern stretch of Playa de la Victoria, while Cristina perched on a lounger shelteringunder a raffia hat. With the entire sea to themselves Luis and Danny splashed about with childish joyful abandon, an impressive feat considering they were both nearing fifty. In his hometown, in front of his mother, Luis lifted Danny into the air before they tumbled into the water.
They warmed up with carajillos – coffee fortified with a shot of brandy at a beachside café. Inspired by the sight of their physical interaction Cristina spoke openly about why she had married Luis’s father. She had believed it was possible to judge a man from the passion of their physical intimacy. And based on their kisses she had been sure that they were soulmates. She had spent a lifetime waiting for him to live up to the promise of their sexual connection. In love there were two types of tragedy: the good man with a bad kiss and the bad man with a good kiss. She was pleased Luis had found a kind man who kissed well. Hearing the translation, Danny blushed.
