The Disappearance of Irene Dos Santos (26 page)

Luz was happiest after Lily joined her at the convent boarding school as the penalty for sticking her tongue in a boy’s mouth
while in the elevator. Not only because she had Lily mostly to herself for two whole years, not even because it meant separation
from Irene Dos Santos, but because she felt it made them equals. Except during the holidays, when they returned to Lily’s
home, and she slept in the maid’s room with her mother, where they resided at the pleasure of Lily’s parents. Sometimes Luz
pretended Lily’s parents were her own and that her own mother was her maid.

“The maid will sign for it,” she would say disdainfully to the postman whenever a registered letter arrived.

The first time Luz and Lily returned from the boarding school in Valencia was for Semana Santa. They were both fourteen. Consuelo
embraced them both warmly at the door, took them by the arm, and pulled them into the kitchen, where Ismael, who had just
returned from Maquiritare with fresh, handmade paintbrushes for his wife, was having his merienda. Ismael offered his face
to Lily’s kiss, a face that reflected pure joy at the sight of her, with eyes alight in a way that made Luz momentarily queasy
with envy. Until he turned to her and said, “How beautiful you look, Luz, almost a woman. Soon we will have to contend with
suitors beating at your door.”

Luz blushed. Ever since she was little, Ismael had made her feel like the prettiest girl in the world.

“Can you keep a secret, Lucecita?” Lily asked, when they were alone in her room.

“Of course I can, don’t be silly,” said Luz with a forced laugh that thinly disguised her irritation.

“Okay,” said Lily, “tomorrow morning, I’m going to tell Mami that we’re going to the Hotel Macuto to sunbathe. Papi can drive
us there.”

“Right, so what’s the secret?”

“Bueno, the thing is, I’m supposed to be meeting Irene, and my parents don’t know. I haven’t seen her since I changed schools,
and I really want to see her. If you come with me, I won’t have to lie—Mami always knows if I’m lying, don’t ask me how, but
she does. This way, it’ll look normal if I say I’m going to the Macuto with you.”

So that was the reason Lily had been so jittery! Luz was torn between feeling flattered and feeling abused at being made complicit
in such a scheme. But in the end, the allure of partnership trumped her fear of collusion in a plan that could surely ignite
the wrath of her mother and Lily’s parents.

“Do you have a tanga?” Lily asked.

“No,” said Luz, embarrassed. Her mother didn’t allow her to wear the skimpy Brazilian bathing suits all the young city girls
wore.
But Lily wears them,
she had complained.
Well, you’re not Lily and you’re not going to, punto final,
Marta had said. Luz had thrown her own unfashionable suit in the trash, preferring to own no bathing suit at all to making
a fool of herself in front of other girls her age.

“That’s okay,” said Lily, “you can borrow one of mine.”

The next morning, Ismael drove the girls to the Macuto. “Have a good time, muchachas, and call me when you’re ready to come
home,” he said, pressing several hundred-bolívar notes into each of their hands.

“Gracias, Papi,” said Lily, kissing her father on the cheek, before he drove away.

They found Irene waiting by the pool in her bathing suit, a fluorescent peach-colored tanga that enhanced her tan and showcased
her streamlined torso, the perfect flat plane of her stomach, the sensuous curve of her full traffic-stopping breasts. Her
long, straight hair was caught up in a simple but elegant twist and clipped nonchalantly in a way that Luz had often tried
but which never worked because her neck was too short. The only physical feature Luz shared with Irene was a large and shapely
bosom. Unlike Luz, who had been programmed by nine years of convent school to keep them under wraps, Irene flaunted hers,
rubbing them with suntan oil repeatedly while three young, goggle-eyed waiters swirled about her.

As soon as Irene caught sight of Lily, she ran to embrace her with a squeal and kissed her four times on each cheek, making
exaggerated smacking noises each time. “I’ve got a room, courtesy of the manager, who’s a friend of my mother. Here’s the
key. Hurry up and change, Lily, the boys will be here any minute.” Then, “Luz! How nice that you were able to make it.” But
Luz didn’t believe that Irene was any happier to see
her
than she was to see Irene.

While Lily and Luz changed into their bathing suits, Luz said, “What did Irene mean by ‘the boys’?”

“Luz,” said Lily, “don’t be a pendeja. What is the point of coming to the Macuto, putting on our bathing suits and lying around
like wallflowers for the benefit of the waiters? Do you realize I haven’t been near a boy for two whole years? I’m parched!
But don’t worry, I called ahead and asked Irene to arrange a boy for you too.” Luz still remembers thinking that if it weren’t
for the overpowering influence of Irene, Lily would never have spoken in this way. Pretending to be so grown up and boy crazy.
Parched.
¡Qué ridícula! Who did she think she was talking to?

As Lily hurriedly stuffed towels and suntan lotions into a tote, saying, “Let’s go, let’s go,” Luz’s heart began to hammer
in her chest. She felt fat. Unsophisticated. Boring. What if the boy Irene had chosen for her didn’t like her? And worse,
what if her mother ever found out that she’d been preening around the Macuto half-naked with a boy? It could happen; the Macuto
was a social center, hardly a place of discretion. How typical of Irene to choose a venue fraught with the danger of discovery.
Wasn’t it bad enough that Lily had been forced to change schools because of Irene? What was Lily thinking? They could all
get in trouble. But if she backed out now, Lily and Irene would say she was coward, a prude, a complete pajuda. They would
laugh at her behind her back and Lily would ignore her for the rest of Semana Santa. Maybe even for the rest of the year.
Her thoughts raced frantically from one ghastly scenario to another, all of which ended horribly.

When the girls returned to the poolside, the boys had already arrived. To Luz it was immediately apparent from his possessive
perch on Irene’s lounge chair that the one with the distinctive Guajiro cheekbones was taken. “This is Moriche Sanchez,” said
Irene, patting him on the head like a favored pet. “He used to love my mother, until he met me. We’re going to open a restaurant
together; I’ve decided I want to be a chef. Moriche, meet my best friend Lily Martinez. And this is Luz...what’s your last
name?”

“Galano,” mumbled Luz.

“Mucho gusto,” said Moriche, without offering his hand or taking his sly eyes off Irene. Luz guessed that he must be around
twenty-two years of age. He was not handsome, though by no means repulsive; he reminded her of a hawk with his long beak of
a nose. Luz recalled then that Lily had mentioned Irene’s peculiar taste in boys, she said that even though Irene could have
anyone she wanted with a snap of her fingers, she had always gone for odd-looking, sometimes even ugly, types. Boys who were
also quite a bit older than herself. Boys who were men. According to Lily, Irene had once tried to sell her on the idea of
men who were not in conformance with conventional good looks, but Lily’s sense of aesthetic had recoiled at the idea.

“That’s why we’re never in competition,” Lily had explained to Luz.

“And these two hombres,” said Irene, nodding in the direction of the other two young men, “are Elvis Crespo, who has been
caliente for Lily ever since he kissed her in the elevator of my building, and Elvis’s friend and boss, Miguel Rojas, who,
of course, is dying to meet you, Luz. He loves Cuban girls.”

Smiling briefly and shyly at Miguel Rojas, Luz turned her focus on Elvis Crespo. So this was the elevator kisser. Elvis appeared
much younger than the other two, and immediately Luz wished she were Lily so that she might claim this dark, compact boy with
the wild hair and rascally smile that ignited an insurrection in her belly. Besides, she was sure Irene was being sarcastic
when she said Miguel Rojas was dying to meet her.

Elvis grabbed Lily in his arms, raised her in the air, and swung her, laughing, in a circle. Tearing her gaze away from Elvis,
Luz smiled at Miguel Rojas and held out her hand politely. Miguel Rojas smiled back and shook her hand with mock gentlemanliness,
but not in a mean or depreciating way. He wasn’t at all bad-looking, though she wasn’t crazy about his hair, which was too
closely cropped for her taste. He was on the stocky side, but she did like the way his torso tapered smoothly from his broad
shoulders to his hips. And he was also better dressed than the other two. Expensively dressed. Even though she couldn’t see
his eyes through his Ray-Bans, Luz decided she could tolerate a day as Miguel Rojas’s date.

“Let’s order some drinks and snacks,” said Miguel Rojas, when the boys returned from the changing room, all wearing boxer-style
swim trunks. Signaling for the waiter, he said, “Three piña coladas for the girls, and three straight rums with lots of ice.
And bring three plates of French fries.” Luz thought it rather imperious of him to just order without asking anyone what they
wanted, but no one else seemed to mind, and as the day wore on and numerous orders were placed by Miguel Rojas and consumed
by all, she realized that the reason no one had an opinion about what to eat or drink was because Miguel Rojas always paid
for everything.

After two piña coladas Luz found herself warming to the boy and also to the idea that he was rich. She closed her eyes and
fantasized about dating Miguel Rojas, who would provide her, in the tradition of Cinderella stories, with everything her heart
desired, much to the envy of other girls. Not that Luz had ever been treated as anything less than a full family member in
the Martinez household, but the fantasy was too tempting to resist. After three piña coladas, she went into the pool, floated
on her back and smiled provocatively at Miguel Rojas. When Miguel Rojas took the bait, swam up behind her, put his arms around
her, and pulled her toward him, then turned and pressed her into a corner of the pool, she allowed his tongue to travel across
her lips, and thought she might agree to marry him. After four piña coladas, she felt dizzy and headachy, and when Miguel
Rojas offered to accompany her to the hotel room so she could lie down, she said yes.

Luz had no idea how long she had been asleep when she felt a sideways yanking at the crotch of her bathing suit bottom. She
thought she was dreaming. Cymbals crashed in her head each time she attempted to move it; her eyelids felt glued together
with cement. She lay still even when she felt little bursts of pleasure on her stomach and realized that Miguel Rojas was
kissing her there. Slowly, tantalizingly, he moved his lips lower, then lower. Her thighs tensed and Miguel Rojas repositioned
himself, above her, kissing her wetly on the mouth, rubbing her gently with his finger where his lips had been earlier. By
this time her pleasure was so intense, she could not have stopped Miguel Rojas from swirling his finger in her most private
place, even if she had wanted to. But when he suddenly withdrew his finger and arched above her, driving a hard rod against
that barred passage, pleasure turned into pain. Shrieking, she pushed at his chest.

“Coño, a virgin,” said Miguel Rojas in a thick voice. Groaning, he abruptly pulled away. Then he was kneeling, upright, rubbing
himself furiously with his hand, his neck arched back, his face towards the ceiling, his hips jerking, his knees digging into
her hips. A gush of liquid, hot, wet and thick, spurted on her stomach.

Luz was frightened. What if she got pregnant, was all she could think, as Miguel Rojas fell heavy and spent against her and
the throbbing between her legs gradually subsided. She might as well kill herself if she were pregnant or her mother would
do it for her.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Luz politely, wondering how many would come to her funeral.

“Sorry,” he said, wiping her stomach with the tail of his shirt, “you should have told me you were a virgin.” Then he lay
down against her, sex shrunken and soft against her side, his rum-infused breath blowing against her ear. Luz did not move
until he began to snore. Then, carefully moving his arm, which lay across her hips, aside, she stood up and went to the bathroom.
She peered fearfully into the toilet bowl through her legs at the urine that burned its way out of her. She wet a hand towel
and wiped her sticky stomach, with another she washed between her legs. Then she lay down flat on the bathroom floor with
her left cheek pressed against the cool tiles, her arms straight out in front of her.

Over an hour passed before she heard Irene banging at the bathroom door. “Open the door, Luz, te ruego,” Irene was shouting,
“I have to use the bathroom.”

When Luz opened the bathroom door, Irene was leaning on it so hard, she fell into Luz’s arms. Pulling back, Irene laughed
and said, “My god, Luz, what happened to you? We thought you’d passed out from the booze in here.” Luz looked over Irene’s
shoulder into the room. Miguel Rojas was gone.

“Where is he?” she said.

“Who?”

“Miguel Rojas.”

“He’s down at the pool.”

“He did it to me,” said Luz.

“What? Who did what?”

“Miguel Rojas. He did it while I was asleep.” She searched for the vocabulary to describe what Miguel Rojas had done. She
had seen dogs mating. She had seen lovers dissolving in one another in soft focus on the TV. What Miguel Rojas had done had
been nothing like either, but still she wanted to hold him accountable for something, for making her feel heavenly and filthy
at the same time. There must be a word for it. She began to shake uncontrollably and her nose began to run as if she were
having an allergic reaction.

Irene was standing in the frame of the bathroom door, the light behind her, her face blackened by a shadow.

“Luz, what did he do?” said Irene, wiping Luz’s nose with tissue, smoothening her hair, wrapping a towel around her shoulders,
as if she were a mother soothing her child after a bad dream. Her fingers fluttered nervously around Luz’s face and hair like
butterflies. Luz felt calmer when she focused on the feel of Irene’s fingers in her hair.