Whisper (25 page)

I took a sip of the soup. The flavor was even better than the smell. I broke off a piece of the bread and dipped it into the soup. Curling my shoulders, arching my back over the table, I tried to relax, but at any moment this bowl of soup would be taken away from me, the steaming cup of cocoa would be tossed out, and I would be asked to leave or thrown out the door. I hoped he was not watching me eat, watching my careful placement of the food well into my mouth.

When I reached the bottom of the bowl, Solomon slid his bowl in front of me. His generosity increased my hunger—if he would be exacting a price from me, I had better eat as much as I could.

I held my spoon over the bowl, waiting, watching Solomon.

“You said you were hungry,” I said.

“I changed my mind.”

When I finished the second bowl and felt the weight of warmth and comfort in my stomach, I looked out the window for Candela. She was gone. It was too early for her to be done working. I knew what this meant—she believed I had joined Rosa and now would be working the night shift. She believed I wouldn't need her help anymore. My legs twitched beneath me. I'd had my soup, I was warmed, and now I should leave, save myself, apologize to Candela. But that would be stealing.

I sipped the cup of rich cocoa. My hands wrapped around the cup, and I breathed in the aroma. I could have sat there all day.

“Now,” said Solomon, and I jumped in my chair, choking on the cocoa. The drink dribbled out the slits between my nose and mouth and erupted from the holes that were an extension of my nostrils. The towel from the now empty bread basket was close at hand, and I dabbed at my face. My cheeks burned, my chest felt hot, my neck throbbed.

“I'm sorry,” he said to me. “I didn't mean to startle you.”

I looked down into the cocoa. Solomon's voice was low, soft and careful, as if he were talking to a rabbit, trying to coax it out from beneath a bush.

“I've been listening to your music for weeks. You are astonishing. I don't know where you live, or how you have lived until this point, but I want to offer you a proposition.”

My hands started to shake.

“I would like you to be my student. In return, I will find you a room at the university; I will find you a scholarship, and your tuition and housing will be paid for. All I ask is that you allow me to teach you.”

I wanted to stare down into my cocoa again, but my eyes betrayed me, showing my vulnerability, and I looked at him. He was watching me, his heavy brows pulled low over his eyes.

“I have gotten ahead of myself. I am Solomon Woodson. I am a professor of stringed instruments at the university, and I would be honored if you would agree to be my pupil.”

I looked closely at his face, searching for the truth in this inconceivable offer. Did he really think I would believe this?

“That's not a proposition,” I said. “That's a gift.”

“The university offers tuition remission to deserving musicians. You are such a pupil.”

His smile was so broad that I stared at his teeth. They were straight, white, big. No brown roots, yellow stains, gaping holes. This man had never lived in the forest with other rejects. He didn't know what my life was like. He couldn't possibly be offering me something that only those with unblemished faces received.

“Would I have to…” I paused, licked my lips and glanced around the café. Still no one had come to take away my cup of cocoa. Solomon's brows were no longer down but had jumped up like fuzzy caterpillars, making him appear to be listening intently.

“Would I have to…” I swallowed. “…work the night shift?”

“What does that mean, dear? What does one do when she works the night shift?”

“Give you sex,” I said, so low that he leaned forward in his chair to hear me. I instinctively leaned back in mine.

“Come again?” he said.

“Would I have to give you—or someone else—sex?”

He shook his head and then leaned away, his eyes hooded and dark. With one finger, he touched the back of my hand. I pulled my hand away and put it under the table.

“I'm sorry,” he said. “I don't know what your life is like, nor do I know what you have been through, but you will never, ever have to work the night shift at the university. You will be given your own room with a lock on the door. You may come and go as you wish. No police officers will chase you down or force you to run away. I am offering you a legitimate proposal and will write it up as such. You owe me nothing but some hard work as my student.”

Could this possibly be true? If it was, what would Belen think if I disappeared? What would Celso do when the money he wanted was not there? What would Candela believe? Would Rosa think I'd become like her?

And then I didn't care. I wanted to play the violin—I wanted to live the life he was offering.

“What about this?” I waved my hand in front of my face. Solomon's eyelids fluttered as he glanced at my face, and he quickly looked away.

“I don't care about that, but others might. The first day in the park, you wore something over your head, something light, mysterious.” He leaned forward again. This time I didn't back away. “Wear that again. Disguise yourself. Let them guess at the mystery that is Whisper. You are wonderful, a fabulous musician, a great talent. Wow them with your skills so they fall in love with you. Then, who cares?”

His chair creaked and groaned beneath him.

“So what do you say?” he asked.

I considered my options: hiding in Candela's room, going to jail, living on the streets. I didn't have to think long.

“I would like that,” I whispered.

“So would I,” he said.

And then I allowed myself a small smile—a twitch of the corners of my mouth—and rather than screaming in terror and running away from me, he smiled in return.

Seventeen

The next day I was to meet Solomon at the café and together we would go to the university, where he would show me my new home, introduce me to my classmates and elevate me to a new status—one I probably didn't deserve. I listened to his plans, nodded, inclined my head, but they were words, words, words and I couldn't bring pictures of this new life to my mind. That, in itself, should have been a warning.

When I returned to Purgatory Palace, I squeezed into the alleyway, stood on the overturned bucket and tapped on Candela's window. A few minutes later, the front door to the building opened, and Candela stood in front of me, her eyes watery, her nose red. I followed her into the building, past Ofelia's closed door. Candela didn't look at me. She climbed onto her bed and lay down with her face to the wall. I stood by the door and slowly closed it. My violin case rested in the corner of the room, and when I opened it, the coins I had earned that day still lay on the bottom. I placed my violin on top of the coins and closed the case.

“So, are you going to live with him?” she said. Her voice was low and hoarse.

“He's a professor of music at the university. He wants to teach me.”

Candela sat up straight on the bed. I hadn't seen this Candela before. Her face was scrunched around the nose, her mouth pursed tight, her eyes narrowed, her cheeks sucked in. I took a step back.

“And you believe him. I thought you were smarter than Rosa. I thought you had talent and goodness. I thought you would be the one friend who stayed, but you're just as moronic as she is. I hope this life you've chosen makes you miserable. I never want to see you again!” She screamed the words at me. Her fists were tight balls, and her face was the color of the blood stain on my mother's slip. She threw the rest of that day's money at me, the coins rolling around the room.

Panic flittered in my chest.

“It's not like that,” I said. “He's writing a contract…”

“Whisper. No one offers opportunities and hope to people like us. No one. We have to make opportunities for ourselves.

But you don't have to believe me—find out for yourself. Just don't expect me to be here, waiting to put you back together again when you realize what this guy wants from you.” She turned her head away, toward the wall, and wouldn't answer me even when I said her name three times.

I picked up the few coins that had landed by my feet and tucked them into my shoe. I took the picture off the wall that Candela had made for me and slipped it into my violin case along with my birth certificate, the only validation that I existed in this world. Now I had no home, no friends and a promise that might be empty.

I thought of what I could say to her, what I could murmur softly that would fix this, but words were hard for me and I couldn't think of anything. My throat felt closed and tight. I opened the door and shut it behind me.

Ofelia, in a lumpy purple robe and gray slippers, stood at the front door of the building, her back to me. She turned her head when I closed the door to Candela's room.

“Well, speak of the devil,” she said with a thin, watery smile.

When Ofelia stepped aside, I could see the two police officers standing outside the door.

“That's her,” said one of them. “She matches the description.” This officer was skinny, with pointed cheekbones, a pointed chin and a pointed nose—even his eyes looked sharp.

“She's the one,” said the other officer. He looked younger than the other, with rosy cheeks and a red-tipped nose. Both men wore green-and-white uniforms that reminded me of lizards and grass snakes.

“Now I've got to fill that damn room again,” Ofelia said.

“You're under arrest,” the older man said to me.

The police officers stepped aside, a narrow passageway opening between them. I stared at my feet, my brown shoes that would carry me to the next place. My options had disappeared like earthworms, sucked back into the ground where they had come from as if they'd never been there at all.

I walked down the hall and away from Purgatory Palace, a police officer on each side. They led me to the car. The younger man opened the door and waited for me to climb in.

The car smelled of dirty bodies, overripe fruit. A musky odor that reminded me of Astatla upset my stomach. I turned to the side, ready to run. The older police officer pushed against my back, and my head hit the frame of the car right above the door. He pushed me again and I found myself lying on the back seat, my violin beneath me, my belongings scattered on the floor. The two men slid into the front seat so quickly, so fluidly, that the car was rumbling and jerking before I understood that we were moving.

Blood dripped from a gash on my forehead. I wiped it away with the sleeve of my sweater. My insides were twisted into a tight fist, but no tears came to my eyes, no cry came from my throat. I thought about Jeremia's wolf sitting by his dying friend, how silent and forlorn she had seemed, and for the first time I understood that feeling. Nothing was sure in this world. The memorabilia on the floor of the car meant no more than Solomon's offer, a cloud of possibility that had dissipated.

I had cried in embarrassment when the hot cocoa had dripped out my nose, and I felt the sting of tears now as the loss overwhelmed me. But we drove away, and my tears didn't change anything.

We drove past the town square, where the fountain with angels was lit by lights from below. We arrived at the police station in minutes. The police station looked like the twin sister of Purgatory Palace, a low, squat, stone building covered in scrawled words. The older police officer grabbed my arm and pulled me out of the back of the car as if I were about to resist, as if I'd be able to run away and save myself, as if I had anywhere to go. Two women in short skirts and big hair were shouting horrid words through the entryway to the police station. An unwashed man in a sloppy gray coat that hung past his knees was chanting a song under his breath, a tuneless rhythm about a dog bite. These were the people I fit with. These were my new companions.

I blinked at the brightness inside the police station. The front room contained a few desks, people behind these desks and milling people, all ripe with odors that made me hold my breath. The walls were an empty, impersonal gray. Anyone could disappear into walls like that.

“Assault,” the older police officer said as he pushed me toward a hard wooden chair by the first desk. The woman behind the desk didn't look up. Her computer screen displayed words, numbers and strange images that disappeared, reappeared, changed and returned like flashes of lightning. She clicked at a row of letters under her fingertips.

The computer hummed, rumbled and emitted beeps and clicking chirps, a living entity with no softness. The woman asked me questions—name, age, date of birth, occupation—and typed my responses into the computer. I swallowed my whisper and spoke over the noises in the room. When I said “musician” for occupation, she coughed a dry laugh, and then her fingers tapped and the word appeared on the screen. When she asked about my address, my home, and I couldn't answer, she looked at me.