A Handbook to Luck (11 page)

“
Mi hijo, ¿qué tal?
And who is this ravishing beauty at your side?” he crooned, dropping his many acquired accents and reverting to his original Cuban one. Papi held out his hand and took Leila's, planting a languorous kiss on her knuckles. “I haven't seen you around here,
mi amor.
It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

“I thought you said you were Cuban,” Leila accused Enrique.

“We are. This is just his costume. I mean, my father's a magician and this is his stage persona.” Enrique shot his father a desperate look. “Dad, help me out here.”

“
Sí, preciosa.
Beneath the sophisticated veneer of the Great Court Conjurer to the Empress of China lies someone—believe it or not—even more intriguing. Here,” Fernando said, pressing Leila's hand over his brocade-upholstered chest, “lies a heartbroken man, a man of exile, a man whose adventures throughout the uncivilized worlds could fill many volumes. Did I tell you, my jewel, that I have the hearing of a desert hare?”

This was too much for Enrique. His father's hearing had returned to normal years ago, even before he'd left the hospital. In fact, he was probably half deaf by now. No matter that Papi was obese or that his scars were visible through his thick stage makeup. When it came to women, he was one hundred percent Cuban.

“I'm driving Leila back to L.A. today,” Enrique said tightly. “She's getting
married
in two weeks.”

“But you are much too young!
Ay,
I was married once to a wonderful woman. My son's mother, in fact. Everything I do is in her memory.”

Enrique wanted to say: including putting the moves on other women. But he kept his mouth shut. Maybe if he stayed quiet, this would all be over sooner.

“My darling dove!” his father began to sob. “My rivulet of honey! How I miss her so!” His tears left tiny tracks in his makeup.

“You poor thing,” Leila said, patting him on the shoulder with her free hand.

“She was my mother, too,” Enrique chimed in pathetically. He couldn't believe that he was competing with his father for this woman's sympathy. They were both sinking to new lows. “We need to leave. Dad, please let go of Leila's hand.”

His father looked up forlornly. “Perhaps I could accompany you? I have some business to attend to in Los Angeles.”

“No fucking way!” Enrique blurted out. “I mean, no. No, Dad. You need to stay here. Remember the ballroom competition tonight?”

“Yes, of course.” Papi straightened up. “Many people are counting on me.”

“Do gamblers bet on dancing, too?” Leila asked.

“Everyone bets on everything here,” Enrique said glumly. “Even the number of sugar packets in a bowl.”

“I am favored to win third place,” Papi offered modestly.

“But he'll probably place first. He usually does.” Enrique was feeling more charitable now that his father had backed off from the trip.

“It requires gyrations of the utmost finesse,” Papi added, trilling his
r
's and winking at Leila. “But I must be inspired. And you, bright light of the Orient, feast for my tired eyes, have provided it for me. Are you a Gemini?”

“Why, yes.”

“I knew it! Just like my son. June twentieth?”

Leila looked surprised. “Are you an astrologer, too?”

“Well, my dear—”

“Pure coincidence,” Enrique interrupted.

“Would you do me the honor of attending the competition?” Papi ventured. “With you in the audience, my nightingale, how could I not dance my best?”

Enrique began to protest, but Leila interrupted him.

“I would love to,” she said.

“What about your fiancé?” Enrique stammered.

“He can wait one more day.”

“How delightful! You know, my goddess, you are in the best of hands with my son,” Papi threw in generously. “He is a man of character, an exemplary man. Above all, he is sincere. Trustworthy, kind, to be cherished—”

“No need to overdo it, Dad.”

“You float over everything! Son of my soul!”

“Okay, we're out of here,” Enrique said, quickly steering Leila into the bright shock of the afternoon.

“Be gentle with him, my beauty!” Papi called out after them. “He is my greatest treasure!”

“He's cute,” Leila said once they were outside.

“Cute?”

“No, I mean it. He looks just like that—”

“Please don't say Ricky Ricardo.”

After dinner at the Flamingo's penthouse restaurant, Enrique escorted Leila to the ballroom dance competition at the Tropicana Hotel. His father had arranged a ringside table for them. Enrique was used to glitzy events in Las Vegas but the jungle decor and the sequined-and-feathered contestants far exceeded his expectations. Papi looked more elegant than most in his white tuxedo with the plum-colored lapels. His shoes were black and blindingly shiny, the better to show off his intricate steps. His partner was a Brazilian woman four inches taller than him. Her stage name was La Víbora, and Enrique soon saw why. At the climax of their routine, she had a gyrating Papi suspended horizontally between her powerful thighs.

In the heat of a competition, his father's health ailments evaporated entirely and he moved like a man decades younger. He spun La Víbora across the dance floor, then lifted her high above his head as he executed a series of dizzying pirouettes. When they finally came to a stop—Papi was balanced sculpturally in the palms of La Víbora's hands—the crowd went wild, jumping on tabletops and roaring their approval.

Leila got caught up in the excitement and twisted an ankle trying to clamber onto a chair in her high-heeled gold sandals. Papi blew kisses in her direction, which she avidly returned. Enrique was impressed with his father, of course—how could he not be?—but he was flooded with a growing sense of resentment. When would
he
ever be the star of the show? Why was it so impossible to escape his father's shadow? What woman had ever jumped on a chair for him?

Enrique didn't want to wait until the end of the competition but Leila insisted on staying. Unsurprisingly, Fernando Florit and La Víbora won first prize with a special citation for their “extravagant creativity.”

When Papi approached their table, still holding his trophy, Leila threw her arms around him and gave him a kiss.

“You were great, as always.” Enrique tried to muster up some enthusiasm. Whatever his feelings, there was no denying his father's talent.

“
Gracias, hijo.
I couldn't have done it without you. And I was doubly inspired by the presence of our lovely desert rose from Arabia!”

“Leila's from Iran, Dad. It's not the same thing.”

“
Bueno,
what are you two going to do now?”

Enrique hesitated. It was nearly three in the morning. Would Papi try to horn in on his date?

“Why don't you go swimming?”

“Swimming?” Enrique asked.

“To refresh yourselves before the long drive back.”

“That's a great idea,” Leila said. “I'm not sleepy at all. Won't you join us, Fernando?”

“No, no, my dear. My exertions have been sufficient for one evening. But I wish you a safe journey, and”—he leaned over to kiss her hand, his forehead still shiny with sweat—“my enduring veneration.”

An hour later, after buying swimsuits in a twenty-four-hour gift shop, Enrique and Leila ventured into the Flamingo Hotel's swimming pool. It was closed but the guard, who'd known Enrique since he was a boy, unlocked the gate for them. Leila looked stunning in the remains of the moonlight, her face like mahogany, her dark eyes steady on his. Why did she make him so nervous? Why couldn't he be as easy with her as his father?

“Will you have to return home for good?” Enrique asked. They'd been talking about the revolution in her country.

“Maybe.” Leila said her worst fear was that everyone would be forced to swim in a divided sea again, like in the old days: men on one side; women on the other, dressed in yards of black nylon. More than anything, she wanted to swim freely in the Caspian Sea. Her family had spent a happy summer there when she was nine. The best caviar came from the sturgeon in those waters, she said, and they'd eaten it daily for weeks.

“Caviar every day?” Enrique was incredulous, although he knew some high rollers in Las Vegas who boasted the same. He noticed the tan lines along Leila's neck and wrists and fought the urge to lick them. “Do you scuba dive?”

“How did you know?”

Enrique pointed to her wrists.

“I can see why you're good at poker.”

“Where do you dive?”

“San Diego, mostly. Once in Baja. Everyone there spoke to me in Spanish.” Leila shrugged. Then she told him about the time she'd seen a baby leopard shark off the coast of Rosarito. A huge school of baitfish also spotted the shark and turned together, as if on cue. “Do you think they take turns being leader?”

“Baitfish: democracy or dictatorship?” Enrique said in his best newscaster voice, but Leila didn't laugh. She seemed preoccupied. He would give up a year of his life to read her mind.

Enrique watched her swim back and forth along the length of the pool. She favored the breaststroke but she also swam on her back and side. She was more graceful than any human had a right to be. He could have watched her for the rest of his life. If only he felt confident enough to kiss her. But he couldn't get past the fact of her impending marriage. This was just the kind of wavering that Papi would have deemed defeatist, even unpatriotic. Every Cuban man, no matter his looks or his station in life, believed that even the most unattainable woman was within his reach.

At dawn, they finally got on the road. Enrique opened the car door for Leila (he was relieved that he'd cleaned his Maverick the day before) and waited until she was settled before closing it. American girls made a point of commenting on his good manners—Papi said that it was the one thing that never failed a man—but Leila seemed accustomed to the royal treatment. They picked up cigarettes, beer, and some spicy tortilla chips at a nearby convenience store.

On the outskirts of town, Enrique was tempted to stop at Sol's Tattoo Parlor. He wanted to have Leila's name seared onto his shoulder in Persian lettering but he didn't want to scare her off. Would the Texans have risked it? Hell, yeah. So what did this say about him? Instead Enrique talked to Leila about mechanical engineering. It turned out she was majoring in it, specializing in factory robots. Leila was a junior at UCLA, where her fiancé was getting a double Ph.D. in nuclear and accelerator physics.

Enrique tried not to feel too wretched. Fact: Leila was sitting next to
him
right now. Anything could happen in five hours. He'd also managed to keep his father from coming along and ruining everything. That was a victory in itself. Enrique needed to concentrate on maximizing his possibilities. The rest he would figure out later. He suspected, though, that even the most accurate predictive systems could be wrecked by love.