The Wind From the East (14 page)
Read The Wind From the East Online
Authors: Almudena Grandes
Tags: #Fiction, #Literary, #Contemporary Women
Her mother never let her go to bed without brushing her teeth, always made her have a bath before supper, and, even if she was going out for the evening, she always looked over Tamara’s homework before dragging her off to the bath. But she also had wonderful ideas, the kind of thing that never occurred to Tamara’s father, like coming to collect her from school as a surprise on the second day of term when she was five years old and didn’t yet have lessons in the afternoon because she was too young.“Papa called to say he wouldn’t be home for lunch,” her mother explained as she carried her to the car, “so I thought we could go into town and have a hamburger, and then maybe go to the cinema to see that film you’ve been talking about. How does that sound?”Tamara hugged her tightly and kissed her face repeatedly, because she couldn’t find words to express her joy. But although they went to the GranVía, their favorite area, for lunch, and Mama let her have two chocolate ice creams, and they had the best seats because the cinema was empty,Tamara ended up in tears that afternoon, because the film told the story of a little girl whose uncle and aunt sent her to a boarding school after her parents were killed in a car crash. It was a lovely story but also very sad.Tamara came out of the cinema with puffy eyes, and though her mother hugged her and comforted her and tried to cheer her up on the way back, reminding her that the film had a happy ending because the little girl found a new family in the teachers and girls at her school,Tamara was still tearful when they arrived home. This was why, when her mother sat on one of the chairs in the garden—the garden with its bare earth, simple trained vine and a few, huge trees, just like real gardens should be—Tamara climbed into her lap, looked her in the eye and asked what would happen if she died one day. “I’m not going to die, silly,” her mother said, smiling, but she must have taken the question seriously because she cradled Tamara as if she were a baby and gave her lots of kisses, the kind of special kisses that only she knew how to give, kisses that weren’t like any others, her lips imprinting themselves on Tamara’s forehead, cheeks, and hair; kisses that took an age to fade, kisses like tunnels, like bridges, like double bows—Mama’s kisses. “I’m not going to die,” she said over and over again,“I’m not going to die.” She was smiling, but Tamara cried anyway. “What’ll happen to me if you die? It could happen, couldn’t it? What’ll happen if you die?” Her mother suddenly became serious, put her hands on Tamara’s cheeks, looked into her eyes, and spoke very quietly. “If I die, Juan will take care of you,” she said.That was all.“Nothing bad will ever happen to you because Juan will take care of you.” She didn’t mention Tamara’s father, or her grandparents, or any school for orphans. Just that.“Juan will take care of you,” she said again, and kept on kissing her until, eventually,Tamara stopped crying.
Now, four years later, whenever she felt she was on the verge of the kind of tantrum she used to have in the old days,Tamara remembered that she had lost everything, that her mother had died despite her reassuring smiles, that her father had died too, but that Juan was taking care of her and that was enough.The generosity with which her uncle had kept her mother’s promise deserved blind, solid loyalty in return, whatever happened. Tamara was reminding herself of this as she wondered whether she’d be able to think of anything to tell Juan later that day, other than that the school smelled of overcooked vegetables. Suddenly she heard a familiar voice.
“What are you doing here?”
Andrés was peering at her with the slightly perplexed but serene look with which he viewed almost everything. Tamara was more pleased to see him than she’d expected, and immediately forgot the cautionary speech her uncle had made that morning at breakfast, advising her not to pester Andrés, not to stick to him like a limpet all day, to understand that he must have his own gang of friends, and that he’d be keen to spend time with them after the holidays.“Andrés is the only friend you’ve got here,” Juan said again as he left her at the school gates, “so be careful and don’t pester him.”
“I was waiting for you,” said Tamara as she stood up, telling herself that waiting for someone wasn’t the same thing as pestering them.
“Oh!” Andrés didn’t seem bothered. “Have you been inside to see what class they’ve put us in?”
“No, not yet.”
“Well, come with me. I think I know which one it’s going to be.”
Andrés stepped inside decisively, without turning to see if she was following, and Tamara noticed his rucksack: it was very clean but had been washed so many times that the lettering on the flap, what must once have been four large capital letters in red, was no longer legible. One of the straps had been sewn back on with thick black thread, and both straps were frayed.The rucksack was so tiny its owner had to carry a lot of his books in his arms.Tamara thought Andrés might do better with her old rucksack, which was a bit dirty but much bigger and newer than his, but the moment she opened her mouth to suggest this she shut it again, unsure of how her offer would be received.
“This is it,” he said, stopping before a door that was identical to all the others in a corridor decorated with large colorful pictures and collages. “Come on.”
He entered the classroom without glancing at anyone in particular, although he acknowledged a couple of other children with a nod and even responded with a laconic “hello” to some of his classmates’ more effusive greetings.Tamara clearly heard giggling from the back of the classroom. His hair neatly combed down with eau de cologne, Andrés tried to see where it was coming from, turning his head with a violent expression Tamara had never seen before.Two boys and a girl were whispering together, and pretended not to notice.Without a word, Andrés chose a desk on one of the central aisles and began taking his things out of his rucksack.Tamara sat beside him and did likewise.
“I’ll sit here with you,” she said, not looking at him.“Is that OK?”
“It’s OK.”
The teacher’s name was Doña Maria. Tamara thought she must be about Sara’s age, and she was short, slight and chatty, and very smartly dressed. She seemed to know almost all the children, including Andrés, by name, and addressed a few pleasant words to each of them:“Don’t you look nice? Haven’t you grown?You look as if you’ve done a lot of swimming this summer. Long hair suits you.” Once she’d finished, she told them they all had to give a special welcome to two new classmates, and she asked Tamara and a fair-haired boy called Ivan to stand up.Tamara had been expecting something like this, but it didn’t make it any easier and she tried to hide her blushing by looking down, as if she were suddenly fascinated by her shoes.When the teacher got on to all the usual boring stuff—the plan for the year, the syllabus for each subject, the things they had to bring in the following week, the dates of exams, and the best way to plan their homework—she felt better, because she’d heard spiels like this so many times before that it was almost comforting, even if it was delivered with an unfamiliar Andalusian accent.
The bell rang at eleven o’clock. Andrés reacted slowly, which surprised Tamara, for she had expected to find herself alone at break time. She was already almost out of the classroom door when she realized he was still sitting at his desk.
“To get to the playground you have to turn left, the way we came in,” he said when at last he made up his mind to join her, taking small weary steps, like an old man.
“Aren’t you coming?”
“No, I . . . I have to do something.”
“Are you going to the toilet?”
He shook his head and set off slowly, turning right. He couldn’t have gone more than five steps when he turned round and saw that she was still standing in the corridor, by the classroom door.
“Where are you going?” she asked, taking his backward glance as an invitation.
“Somewhere.”
“Where?” He didn’t answer, so Tamara followed him.“I’ll come with you.”
“No.”
“Oh, go on, let me come with you. I don’t know anyone here and . . .”
“I said no.” Andrés shook his head firmly. “You can’t come with me, I mean it.”
“Why not?” she asked, stamping her foot.“And why won’t you tell me where you’re going?”
“I’m going to see my grandmother,”Andrés said at last, almost angrily. “She works here. Happy now?”
Tamara blushed for the second time that morning and didn’t even try to think of an answer, as if the fact that Andrés had a grandmother who worked at the school was reason enough for him to exclude her from his plans. Andrés disappeared through a door at the end of the corridor and she went out to the playground. She sat on a bench and watched the other children playing. A quarter of an hour later she caught sight of Andrés, heading towards her holding a large mortadella sandwich and looking apologetic.
“D’you want some?” he asked, sitting down beside her.“It’s very big.”
“Did your grandmother give it to you?” she asked, accepting some, even though she’d already eaten a doughnut.
“Yes. She’s the cook.”
“Do you have to go and see her every day?”
“Yes. But only to get my sandwich. She gets cross with me if I bring one in.Today was different, because she and my mum don’t talk to each other, so I haven’t seen her for at least a month, and that’s why I had to stay longer.” For a while Andrés ate his sandwich in silence and then offered Tamara the last piece. “Do you want it? I’m full. Anyway,” he added, as she finished it off, “you wouldn’t like her. She’s grumpy. She spends all day moaning and pretending to cry.”
Tamara didn’t ask anything else, but she could see that Andrés was now not only friendlier, he looked happier too, as if he was relieved his visit to the kitchens was over.And even he would have had to admit that his grandmother was a very good cook, because the rice with tomato sauce, roast chicken and crème caramel at lunch were all much better than the food Tamara had had at her school in Madrid. She even gave up trying to identify where the depressing smell of beans came from and scarcely noticed it now.After lunch, she and Andrés went out to the playground and joined in a game of tag, although it was called something else here and had slightly different rules. She didn’t run as much as Andrés, but she had a lot of fun, and when the bell went, sentencing them to an afternoon of classes, it sounded familiar, ordinary. The first lesson seemed to go unbearably slowly, as it always did, but the second hour simply flew by. Andrés said goodbye to her at the classroom door, because he had to go and meet two kids who lived next door to him. They were in the same year but another class.“We always go to school together,” he said, “they’re the two I was talking to in the playground, after lunch, remember?” She didn’t, but she said she did, and as she made her way out, she thought she’d been lucky that Andrés hadn’t left her to be with his friends until then, by which time her new school had started to seem less new, and more just like school.
She thought she’d walk home but as she ambled alongside the fence enclosing the school, a grey BMW with a Madrid number plate drew up beside her and honked its horn.Tamara recognized it immediately and already had her hand on the door handle by the time the tinted window rolled down and Sara offered her a lift home.
“How did it go?” she asked, after a kiss from Tamara, who was delighted to see her.“Today was your first day, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, it wasn’t too bad, actually. My teacher’s nice.Andrés says she’s really prissy, but she gives high marks, and that’s the important thing.”
“And what about Andrés? Did he introduce you to lots of kids?”
“Yes, well, after lunch we played tag, and that was fun. But a lot of the time I don’t understand what they’re saying to me, because they use weird words and everything they say sounds funny.They don’t say their ‘s’ on the end of words, and they always sound as if they’re singing.”
“You’ll get used to that.”
“That’s what my uncle says, and he thinks I’ll end up speaking like them, but I don’t know. Anyway, when I don’t understand something, Andrés explains it, so that’s lucky, isn’t it? Juan told me this morning that I should leave Andrés alone and not pester him, he’s got his own friends, but we spent most of the day together.Andrés’s best friends aren’t in our class, they’re in a different one, and he didn’t go and find them until the last bell went, just now.”
Sara smiled to herself remembering the advice she and Maribel had swamped poor Andrés with over the last few days, the exact opposite of the speech she could imagine Juan making: “Remember Tamara doesn’t know anyone apart from you,” they’d told him, “look after her, don’t leave her on her own, introduce her to the other kids.” She was relieved that he’d accepted the task, because the last time they’d talked about it she felt she’d pressed him too hard. She was thinking about this when her passenger asked her if she knew that Andrés’s grandmother was the school cook.
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