Golden Earrings (25 page)

I
didn’t sleep the night after I met Manolo at the flamenco bar and he told me that la Rusa and Avi had been good friends. I thought of how Mamie had described my grandfather when he’d been a young man: with alert eyes ‘like a squirrel’. La Rusa’s eyes were different: dark and full of secrets. Try as I might, I couldn’t picture the two of them as friends.

I lay staring at my clock until it was time to get up and help Mamie prepare for the Saturday classes. When I walked into the studio, Mamie was already there, wearing a black dance skirt over her leotard and a pink scarf tied around her head. She had finished sweeping the floor and was wiping down the windowsills with a dusting cloth.

‘Ah, good morning,’ she said when she saw me. ‘How was your outing with Gaby?’

‘Mamie, I didn’t go out with Gaby last night.’

My grandmother’s eyes widened and she gave me a quizzical look. But she had too much faith in my sensible nature to think that I had done anything outrageous. A smile danced around the corners of her mouth.

‘Have you met someone?’ she asked. ‘I’ve been wondering … you’ve been so
mysterious
lately.’

On any other occasion I would have loved to talk about Jaime. But I’d been visited by a ghost — and one that had once
known Avi. It was hard to behave normally with that on my mind. If la Rusa had been friends with my grandfather, there was a chance she’d been friends with Mamie too.

‘I’ve been taking flamenco classes,’ I said. ‘To improve my character dancing.’

The first part was true; the second part was a ‘stretched truth’ intended to protect Mamie’s feelings.

‘Did Mademoiselle Louvet recommend you do that?’

It wasn’t a question I had been expecting and it stumped me. But I was tired of lying. It was as if flamenco was somehow shameful and should be hidden, like taking drugs.

‘No,’ I said. ‘It was something I wanted to do myself.’

Mamie regarded me incredulously, but she hadn’t reacted as negatively as I had anticipated. ‘Come on, Paloma. You are a ballerina at the highest level. I hope you have a quality teacher. What style of flamenco are you learning? Spanish or gypsy?’

‘Spanish,’ I said. ‘Probably something similar to the classical Spanish dances you were learning before you took up ballet.’

Mamie seemed relieved and went back to dusting — although there was something besides dust motes hanging in the air now. Mamie was acting nonchalant, but her shoulders were tensed; she looked like a cat that had been disturbed during a nap.

‘The name of a dancer from Barcelona keeps coming up,’ I said. ‘She was supposed to be one of the greatest dancers this century. I wondered if you knew her. Her name was la Rusa.’

Mamie spun around. Anger flashed in her eyes. ‘La Rusa wasn’t a dancer!’ she spat. ‘She was a whore!’

My jaw dropped. In all my life, I had never known Mamie to react to anything this way; had never seen her attractive face scrunched into such livid lines. It was clear now it wasn’t flamenco Mamie disliked. It was la Rusa.

Mamie glared at me. ‘Don’t ever mention her name again!’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said, berating myself inwardly. Hadn’t I promised not to ask any questions about Spain to spare Mamie anguish?

‘And how dare you go sneaking around my back?’ Mamie continued, as if I hadn’t spoken. ‘Lying that you are out with Gaby! After all I’ve done for you!’

That moment with my grandmother staring at me, enraged, was one of the loneliest of my life. I couldn’t bring myself to reply.

‘Get out!’ Mamie shouted, turning away from me. ‘Go practise for your audition. Or go to your flamenco classes — or whatever it is you do these days. But don’t come near me!’

I fled the studio and ran to my room. My heart ached so much that I could barely move my arms. Usually when I was distressed, I dealt with it by practising ballet. It was dance that had got me through my mother’s death and my father’s betrayal. But now the very idea of putting on my ballet shoes and standing at the barre filled me with revulsion. The degree of loathing I felt terrified me, as if I were a mother who has suddenly realised that she hates her child. I rushed to the bathroom and stood in the shower, but even the warm water running over my skin couldn’t calm me.

I dried myself and pulled on a pair of jeans and a shirt. I left the apartment with no idea of where I was going. I ran down the stairs, tugging on my scarf and coat as I went. The students for Mamie’s first class were arriving. ‘
Bonjour
, Paloma,’ they said as they passed me. I did my best to smile and pretend everything was normal, but something was very wrong. I couldn’t breathe.

Out on the street, I started to run with no destination in mind. If I could have stopped my mind racing, I might have considered that Mamie’s fury wasn’t directed at me. But I couldn’t think. I couldn’t stop.

I reached avenue Victor Hugo and headed in the direction of the Palais de Chaillot. I cut through the jardins du Trocadero and crossed the Seine at the pont d’Iéna. The Eiffel Tower loomed up ahead. ‘A Spaniard without a ghost is like Paris without the Eiffel Tower,’ Manuel had said. I passed the
tourists studying their maps in the parc du Champ de Mars, and the joggers, rollerskaters, lovers, and students listening to Black Sabbath on their portable radios. I walked through the fifteenth arrondissement, only stopping when I came to l’hôpital Saint Joseph and I realised that I’d been walking for over an hour.

It occurred to me that I wasn’t far from Carmen’s apartment so I turned in that direction. I tried to remember if Jaime had said he was doing something today or not. As it was for Mamie, Saturday would probably be Carmen’s busiest day for classes at the academy. Would Jaime be helping her there or studying at home?

I rang the bell to the apartment with little expectation that anyone would answer. But a moment later the door opened and Jaime stood before me wearing a turtleneck ski sweater and black corduroy pants.

‘
Bonjour!
’ he said, with a smile. ‘Or should that be “
Bon dia!
”?’

I tried to return his smile but tears poured down my cheeks instead.

‘What’s happened?’ he asked, guiding me inside the apartment. ‘Did you ask your grandmother about la Rusa?’

‘Mamie told me to get out of the studio. She’s never been so angry with me before.’

Jaime touched my arm. ‘Come up to my room,’ he said. ‘I found something I want you to hear.’

To reach Jaime’s room, we had to climb a foldaway ladder in the studio. The space was a partly enclosed mezzanine. The walls were lined with shelves of books, records and flamenco memorabilia. An autographed poster of the guitarist Sabicas hung above the bed, which was covered in a red chenille bedspread. The light from the triangular window was muted by a pair of rust-coloured curtains.

Jaime indicated an oversized velour beanbag. ‘Have a seat,’ he said. ‘Can I get you anything? A coffee?’

I shook my head and sank into the burgundy beanbag. The room smelled like sandalwood incense. I stretched out my legs on the shag rug and noticed the orange paper lantern hanging from the ceiling. There were so many shades of red in Jaime’s room that I had the sensation I was resting inside a giant heart.

Jaime picked up a record off his desk. ‘Do you know what this is?’ he asked, showing me the cover. ‘It’s a recording of your grandfather, Gaspar Olivero, playing with a jazz band at the Samovar Club in 1928. That’s about the time he met your grandmother, I think?’

Avi playing with a jazz band? Until a few days ago, I would not have believed such a thing.

‘Most likely it was recorded on a gramophone disc before being converted to vinyl,’ Jaime said. ‘The sound quality isn’t so good, but your grandfather’s playing is superb!’

He dropped the needle onto the record and sat down next to me on the beanbag. Time seemed to stop as we listened to Avi play. I wondered what my father might have said about his performance. Although the recording was crackly, Avi’s technique came across as clean with complex and profound improvisations.

My life has become so strange, I thought. It was as if the people in my family had been wearing masks and were suddenly revealing their true natures all at once — my father, Avi, and now Mamie. Why did my grandmother hate la Rusa so much? If they had been enemies, why had la Rusa visited me and given me the golden earrings?

The record finished and Jaime and I were quiet for a few minutes. Then Jaime turned to me. ‘You look better,’ he said. ‘The colour has come back to your face. When I saw you at the door, you looked as if you’d seen a ghost!’

The irony, I thought. I shook my head. ‘I had some sort of panic attack this morning,’ I told him. ‘Like the ones Mamie used to get when she was my age.’ I rubbed my eyes and allowed
myself to sink further into the beanbag. ‘Every day, for as long as I can remember, I have always practised my ballet. But today, the very idea of it made me want to be sick. I don’t know what’s happening to me. I think I’m going crazy.’

Jaime rolled on his side and put his arm around my shoulders. I liked the feeling of him being so close to me; the warmth that he emanated. I wanted him to hold me tighter, but I was scared of that too.

‘Sounds like burnout to me,’ he said. ‘Some people get it after ten hours, others after ten days, ten weeks or ten months. You’re a bit slower than most: it’s taken you ten years.’

I smiled. ‘You always manage to make me laugh,’ I said.

‘I’m glad.’

Jaime’s eyes focused on my lips, but then we both suddenly felt shy and looked away from each other.

‘Seriously,’ Jaime said after a while, ‘you can’t be a great artist if you are too uptight. You have to let things flow naturally.’

‘Do you think I’m uptight?’ I asked him.

He grimaced. ‘Well … yes!’

If anyone else had said that to me, I would have been mortified. But I knew Jaime was right. I remembered Mamie’s description of Avi, how she’d said the piano was an extension of his arms. Jaime was like that with his guitar. The music simply poured out of him. Did I ever feel that way about dancing? That it wasn’t a strain? I realised that I did about flamenco — but not ballet. Not since I was a child anyway.

‘I’m so tired,’ I said, closing my eyes.

‘Why don’t you take the day off?’ said Jaime. ‘And not feel guilty for doing it?’

‘A day off,’ I said, grinning. ‘And what am I going to do on my day off?’

‘You are going to let me show you around Paris.’

I laughed. ‘I was born here. I know Paris very well.’

‘Do you? Well, I don’t believe you’ve seen Paris with
me
.
I think we should start with the view of the city from Sacré-Coeur.’

I sat up. ‘I didn’t bring my car.’

‘Did you come by Métro?’

I shook my head. ‘I walked.’

Jaime’s eyes widened. ‘You walked?’ He gave a chuckle. ‘Well, never mind. I have transport.’

I waited in front of the apartment building while Jaime went to the rear courtyard to get his ‘transport’. A few moments later I heard the hum of a motor scooter coming down the street and turned to see him heading towards me on a Vespa. He brought it to a stop in front of me.

‘Hop on,’ he said. ‘It will be a bit cold, but if you lean against me I’ll keep you warm.’

I don’t believe you’ve seen Paris with me.
Indeed, I had never experienced my own city with my arms around a young man’s waist, weaving in and out of the chaotic traffic with the wind in my hair. I felt as though it was
me
zipping around Paris rather than the scooter; I wasn’t closed off to everything as I was in Mamie’s car. I took it all in — the bare winter trees, the soft sunshine, the faces of the pedestrians. It was noisy and exhilarating. I hadn’t felt so free since I had ridden a bicycle as a child, before I became fearful of injuring myself. Some of the students at the ballet school had owned scooters but I’d always declined their offers of rides home, too cautious to tempt fate.

We turned into boulevard Saint-Michel and stopped at a set of lights. I saw Gaby walking along with several shopping bags on her arms. Our eyes met.

‘Paloma!’ she called out. Her glance went from me to Jaime and her face broke into a smile. I just had time to wave to her before we took off again.

I blinked my eyes. I felt like I was in a dream. We reached the cobblestoned streets of Montmartre and I thought how
wonderful it would be to live there: to open my window in the morning to see artists at their easels; the old matrons walking their dogs; the performers coming home from the clubs.

Jaime parked the Vespa and, arm in arm, we walked past the postcard and souvenir shops then up the steep slope to la Basilique du Sacré-Coeur. The beautiful Romanesque-Byzantine church was brilliant white against the soft blue sky.

‘There are more stairs than I remember,’ I told Jaime when we reached the top of the hill and the rooftops of Paris stretched out before us.

‘I thought dancers were supposed to be fit,’ he teased.

I squeezed his arm. It wasn’t because I was unfit that I was breathless.

We found a bench to sit on and Jaime put his arm around me. I loved the sensation of his warm breath against my neck.

‘So are you enjoying your day off?’ he asked me.

‘Very much!’

‘And are you enjoying seeing Paris with me?’

I turned and looked at him. ‘Yes.’

He leaned towards me. I closed my eyes when his lips touched mine. His kiss sent butterflies spinning in my stomach. We broke apart and smiled at each other. Then we kissed again, this time more passionately. We pressed our bodies together so tightly it was as if we were trying to melt into each other.

We stayed on the bench the rest of the afternoon, kissing and talking. Finally the winter light grew weaker and the air turned too cold to stay there.

‘Would you like something to eat?’ Jaime asked.

We walked down the steps holding hands. I felt different. The Paloma who had gone up to La Basilique du Sacré Coeur was not the same one coming down from it. I had been distressed that morning, but now my brain had turned to dough and I was blissfully peaceful.