Girl in the Moonlight (3 page)

There were always picnics, expeditions to the ruins of a nearby castle sacked during the Peninsular War, and fishing trips for mackerel and bonito. Later, they would spend a few days in Barcelona. A visit to a favorite restaurant, where one of Ugo’s paintings hung on the wall. A tour of the galleries. Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia. Drinks along the Ramblas. Once, a bullfight, but never again because it made Aurelio throw up, and Kitty forbade it. Late nights with the children in tow, Carmen asleep on Cesca’s lap in a nightclub while their parents danced.

Ugo knew people everywhere. Once he led them up in the hills above Nice to visit friends who owned a restaurant in Saint Paul-de-Vence where another of his paintings hung next to a Léger. Trips to Paris, where they would stay with other friends of his who lived in the Marais. Another time they visited London, where he took them to the Tate to look at the Turners. Many trips to the Prado, the Louvre, the Uffizi. They all agreed Spanish painters were the best, followed by the Italians. Miró, also a Catalan, was the greatest of them all.

Every winter Kitty took the children skiing in Gstaad while Ugo, who did not ski and had no interest in learning, remained in the house on Perry Street to paint. He continued to use the studio even after the marriage was over. It was a relationship that may have puzzled other people in a similar situation, but there was very little that was conventional about any of their lives. They enjoyed the kind of freedom that only the very rich, very creative, or very selfish can ever know.

A
FTER THE DIVORCE UGO CONTINUED TO TAKE HIS CHILDREN
on trips, but, as they were growing older, he took only one at a time. Cesca went first because she was the eldest. She was fifteen but looked older, ripe for experience. She had an irresistible face, a rock against which ships would be dashed, drowning all who came too close.

Ugo took her to the Costa Brava. It was summer. They stayed for a month with a woman he knew who had a villa overlooking the bay in Cadaqués. The woman was one of his many lovers. Cesca could hear them behind the door, where they often slept in past noon.

She was free to wander about the town. Exploring Cap de Creus and its rock pools, walking to the lighthouse, watching the hippies who congregated along the waterfront. She wanted to meet Dalí at his home in Port Lligat, but he was never there. Every morning she fetched the bread and in the evening wine from the local shops, often eating alone. After breakfast she took her scooter to the beach and spread her towel out over the
smooth white pebbles and lay in her bikini in the sun. Her skin became the color of caramel, darker. In her bag she carried a bottle of water, money, a copy of Rodoreda’s
The Time of the Doves,
and a pack of cigarettes.

Staring out at the water, she became aware of a group of local teenagers, a little older than she, that she had seen before. She sat there and lit a cigarette—she had recently started smoking—and tried not to notice them, pretending to read. Their presence, their camaraderie, underscored her solitude. Like all teenagers, she craved the reassuring company of her peers, was afraid of being singled out or laughed at. She missed her brothers and sister. With them she never felt lonely. She wondered where they were. Did they miss her too? She worried about Aurelio. He was allergic to bees. Sometimes he would invite complete strangers back to the house for dinner. Last year a young man had come home from the beach with Aurelio and ended up stealing a string of Kitty’s pearls.

There were other concerns. Would Cosmo be nice to Carmen? Who was looking after them, without her there? In Amagansett they ran wild. Her mother would never be able to keep up with them. It was Cesca who made them breakfast most mornings or cooked pasta with butter and Kraft Parmesan cheese for lunch. What if Aurelio attempted to hitchhike to Montauk again? He had tried last summer. He was thirteen then. They had all taken the Volvo and gone searching for him, but he had only gotten as far as Hither Hills State Park. They found him walking by the side of the road, thumb trailing. Instead of punishing him, their mother kept on driving until they reached the lighthouse, now a state park, the farthest point east in the United States. Aurelio loved it, loved that the next landfall was Ireland, somewhere so far he couldn’t even see it but somehow knowing it was there. Then Kitty took them for hamburgers at the park’s cafeteria. There was a commotion at the cash
register because she only had hundred-dollar bills. There was no reason Aurelio wouldn’t try again.

Cesca had never been away from them for this long before. She heard laughter and looked over at the other teenagers. One of them had a transistor radio. They were playing in the surf. At school in New York she was popular and had many friends. Already there were parties, boys. She had been kissed. The older brother of one of her friends, home from college, had put his hand under her shirt. Down her pants. But that was as far as she would let him go.

She surveyed her knees, her legs, her trim stomach, where her thighs joined her body, at the scraps of material covering her breasts, her loins, thinking how flimsy they seemed, how little effort would be required to push them aside, to defile her; it would be like defending yourself with tissue paper.

One of the boys came up to her.

“Who are you?” he asked in Spanish. “I thought I knew all the pretty girls who lived around here.”

She had seen him before. He was the one she would have picked. Bold. Tall, dark-haired, calf-eyed. Seventeen, maybe eighteen. A thin gold chain around his neck, a broad, taut chest.

“I am from America. We are staying there,” she replied with a smile, pointing up in the direction of the villa where her father and his mistress Teresa lay in bed. Her Spanish was as perfect as her Catalan, and she even knew some of the local dialect.

He raised his eyebrows, impressed. “From where in America?”

“New York City.”

“Ah. You must be very rich.”

“My father is Catalan. From Amposta.”

“I know it. I like here better.”

“I wouldn’t know,” she replied. “I have not been here long enough.”

“What do you think of it?”

“It is very beautiful.”

“But not as big as New York, eh? Maybe one day I will go there.” He smiled. “Maybe you will invite me?”

She smiled back. “Why would I do that? I don’t know you.”

“But I would like to know you.”

“I don’t think so. Anyway, I have to get home now. My father will be waiting.”

He nodded his head. “I understand. Maybe I will see you again?”

“Maybe.”

“Maybe you will let me show you around? I know some special places. Places tourists don’t know about.”

“Maybe.”

“Say yes. Come tomorrow. At eleven. I will take you on my scooter.”

She said nothing but could already feel his hands on her. Having dinner with her father and Teresa that night, she could think of nothing but the boy. Every time she convinced herself that she would not go she changed her mind.

“How was your day?” asked her father, dipping his bread in the soup. The hair on his head and deeply tanned chest was shot with gray. He was still handsome but no longer as thin as he had once been.

“Fine.”

“Did you do anything?”

“Not really. I went to the beach as usual.”

“I am sorry there are no friends here for you. Have you met anyone?”

“No.”

He nodded. “Are you having a bad time? I am sorry if I have not been able to see more of you. Maybe tomorrow we’ll go for
a drive, mmh? Go up into the hills. Teresa, what do you say? Shall we make a picnic of it?”

“Yes, of course,” answered Teresa. “I know just the spot.” She was a handsome blonde in her forties with a voluptuous figure.

“Excellent! What do you say,
nuvi
?” he asked, using the pet name he had always called Cesca, the Catalan for sweetheart.

Cesca stared down at her plate, resigned, her stomach sinking. It would be easier this way, taking the decision out of her hands. It was fate, a sign. God did not want her to see the boy tomorrow. This made her want to go all the more. She knew if the boy appeared at the door at that moment, she would run away with him, become his slave.

“Yes, fine, Pare,” she said.

She hated the thought of sitting in the back of the car like a child while she watched Teresa in the front with her father, laughing at his jokes. The thought that she would never see the boy again. Standing up, she reached for her father’s bowl and stacked it in hers. Then Teresa’s. Her father was already smoking. Teresa had given him a gold lighter. A Dunhill engraved with his initials. Her first husband had lost millions to her in the divorce. Cesca walked into the kitchen and washed the bowls and utensils in the sink and placed them in the drying rack by the window. It was dark. The stars shone, their light reflected in the sea.

“We’re going out,” called her father. In Cadaqués the night didn’t start until after ten o’clock. There were discotheques and bars crammed with wealthy visitors from Barcelona who owned homes nearby. French and British tourists taking advantage of the exchange rate. There were few Americans. Teresa liked to dance. They would be home around four and stay in bed past noon.

Outside, the car door slammed, and Cesca heard the crunch of tires on the driveway. She finished cleaning up and then went back out to the terrace overlooking the bay and lit a cigarette. Most nights she would just get in bed and read until she fell asleep. But not tonight. There was some wine left, and she filled a glass and drank it. The bottle was empty so she opened up another. She did not drink often. She had friends who did, boys who would sneak vodka into parties. Some of the kids also smoked pot. She had tried it a few times and liked it. Tonight she needed to get a little drunk and try to forget the boy. She poured first one glass of wine and then another. The ends of cigarettes piled up in the ashtray. For the first time she was glad her brothers or sister were not there. They would have told her she was being silly and that was not what she wanted to hear.

There was only one thing to do. Tipsy now but feeling sure of herself, she went up to her room and changed, slipping off her jeans and T-shirt and putting on a halter top and short skirt. It was an outfit she had been saving for a special occasion. She added some mascara to her eyes and a swipe of red lipstick. A few dabs of the Shalimar she had stolen from her mother before leaving. More wine, more courage. She looked at herself in the mirror, liking what she saw. The long legs, the bare shoulders and midriff, the lift of her breasts. It was the person she wanted to be. Someone older, more experienced. Herself in five years.

She grabbed money and cigarettes and threw them in her bag, then ran down to her scooter. There was no stopping now. No time for second thoughts. The lights of the town were twinkling ahead as she negotiated her way down the hill and through the narrow back streets until she came to the waterfront. On the beach there were overturned fishing boats, their nets drying in the night air. There were a number of brightly lit cafés along the quay with plastic chairs and tables spilling out over the paving
stones. Every café was crowded. Umbrellas were emblazoned with logos: Anis del Toro. Heineken. Carlsberg. The languages of Catalonia, Spain, Germany, Britain. Busy waiters in white shirts and black pants. This was the high season. In a few months the same streets would be nearly empty.

Cesca parked her scooter and walked by several cafés, the sea to her back. Men started whistling at her. Women usually did not travel alone at night. It was important to keep moving.
What was she doing?
she asked herself, her nerve deserting her now. What would she do if she saw him? It was unlikely he would even be here. There were dozens of cafés all over the town, assuming he was even out. He might even be with another girl. He and his friends would all laugh at her. She would look like a fool. The only thing to do was go back to the villa before it was too late.

But that’s not what happened. The boy was there. As if by magic, he was standing in the square with friends, illuminated by the light from a café. He was wearing tight black pants and a reddish shirt. He was laughing, taller than the others, slim-hipped like a dancer. Even better-looking than she remembered. But she couldn’t bring herself to move. If he looked in her direction, he would see her, but he did not. Like an actor with stage fright, she stepped out of the light.

A hand grabbed her from behind. “Where you going, cutie?” asked a voice. She could smell garlic and wine and body odor. She turned and saw a crude-looking middle-aged man with a mustache and thick hair leering at her. His hand was now on her breast.

“Leave me alone!” she screamed in English, knocking the man’s hands away. She ran out of the shadows toward the boy and his friends. There was no other choice.

The boy saw her.

“You! What are you doing here?” he asked.

“That man,” she said, pointing, finding her Spanish again. The man had followed her.

“Pau,” said the boy, laughing. “The girl is with me.”

The man grinned, showing dirty teeth. “Then the
puteta
should have said so. She better watch her cute little ass.”

When the man was gone, the boy said to her, “He’s right, you know. It’s not a good idea for a pretty girl to wander around at night by herself. What are you doing here, anyway?”

She could not look him in the eye. “I was coming to find you. I had to tell you something.”

“Tell me something? What?”

“That I wouldn’t be able to meet you tomorrow. My father surprised me with plans for a picnic. I didn’t want you to think I didn’t want to come.”

He nodded his head. His friends had melted away. “Come with me,” he said. “I want to show you something.”

He led her to his scooter and helped her on. He stepped on and kicked it to life. She clasped her hands over his hard, flat belly. In silence, they drove out of town, along the coast. She rested his cheek against his shoulder blade, feeling the thin layer of muscle, smelling him, the mixture of sweat and scent.

“This is where I was going to bring you tomorrow,” he said when they stopped. It was a little cove, quiet, moonlit. The beach was sand and not the usual pebbles. “We don’t want the tourists to know about it.”

He smiled at her, white teeth visible even in the darkness. It was a nice smile, she decided. She hadn’t been wrong. It was time. Something she had been waiting for all her life but hadn’t realized until now. She stood still while he embraced her, pressing his lips to hers. It felt good to her. He was confident, a little rough. His breath tasted faintly of peppermint and tobacco.

It was obvious she was not his first. She grabbed his arms, encouraging him. She could feel him hardening, and for a
moment it frightened her, but in a good way, like the way she felt before diving off from a high board or skiing down a black diamond run. It was the precipice, the line in the sand. The Greeks had a word for it:
kairos,
the supreme moment.

He lowered her onto the ground and slipped off her underwear. She willed him on, saying nothing, closing her eyes, kissing him, waiting for the unexpected, the unknown, hoping it would not be painful, would not disappoint, gasping silently when he entered her, and then relaxing.

He was neither fast nor slow. He was liquid. Strong. The stars above his head became a blur, and she felt the turning of the world, the motion of the planets. She ignored the bite of the grit and pebbles beneath her back and held him tighter, trying to inflict on him the same pain. And when he sped up, she joined him, matching him thrust for thrust until they both collapsed, crying out into the night.