“Ana Lucia,” I begin. “There’s been a misunderstanding.”
“What do you mean?” she says. And the hope is still there, as if the misunderstanding is about a minor detail, like the hotel.
“Those tickets. They’re not for you. They’re for—”
She cuts me off. “It’s that other girl isn’t it? The one from Paris?”
Maybe I’m not so good an actor as I think. Because the way her expression has tectonically shifted from adoration to suspicion shows me that she’s probably always known. And I must be a terrible actor now, because even as my mouth starts to form a plausible explanation, my face must be giving it all away. I can tell it is by what’s happening to Ana Lucia’s face—her pretty features puckering into disbelief, and then into belief.
“Hijo de la gran puta! It’s the French girl? You’ve been with her all this time, haven’t you?” Ana Lucia screams. “That’s why you went to France?”
“It’s not what you think,” I say holding up my hands.
She flings open the sliding-glass door leading onto the quad. “It’s exactly what I think,” she says, shoving me out the door. I just stand there. She reaches for a candle and hurls it at me. It flies past me and lands on one of the throw pillow she keeps on the cement stoop. “You’ve been sneaking around all this time with that French whore!” Another candle whizzes by, landing in the shrubbery.
“You’re going to start a fire.”
“Good! I’ll burn the memory of you, culero!” She flings another candle at me.
The rain has stopped, and though it’s a chilly night, it seems as if half the college has now gathered around us. I try to bring her back inside, to calm her down. I am unsuccessful at both.
“I canceled my trip to Switzerland for you! My relatives arranged a party for you. And all along, you were sneaking off to see your French whore. In my land. Where my family lives.” She pounds on her bare chest, as if she’s claiming ownership not just of Spain but of all of Latin America.
She hurls another candle. I catch this one, and it explodes, spilling glass and hot wax down my hand. My skin bubbles to a blister. I wonder, vaguely, if it’ll scar. I suspect it won’t.
Sixteen
DECEMBER
Cancún
The height of the Mayan civilization was more than a thousand years ago, but it’s hard to imagine the holiest of temples back then were as well guarded as the Maya del Sol is now.
“Room number?” The guards ask Broodje and me as we approach the gate in the imposing carved wall that seems to stretch a kilometer in each direction.
“Four-oh-seven,” Broodje says before I have a chance to speak.
“Key card,” the guard says. There are sweat patches all down the side of his sweater vest.
“Um, I left it in the room,” Broodje replies.
The guard opens a binder and looks through a sheaf of papers. “Mr. and Mrs. Yoshimoto?” he asks.
“Uh-huh,” Broodje replies, linking arms with me.
The guard looks annoyed. “Guests only.” He snaps the binder shut and goes to close the little window.
“We’re not guests,” I say, smiling conspiratorially. “But we’re trying to find a guest.”
“Name?” He picks up the binder again.
“I don’t know, exactly.”
A black Mercedes with tinted windows glides up and barely stops before the guards lift the gate and wave it through. The guard turns back to us, weary, and for a second I think we’ve won. But then he says, “Go now, before I have to call the police.”
“The police?” Broodje exclaims. “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Let’s just all cool down a minute. Take off our sweater vests. Maybe have a drink. We can go to the bar; the hotel must have some nice bars. We’ll bring you back a beer.”
“This is not a hotel. It’s a vacation club.”