Chapter 23
A mellow light seeps out of the farmhouse’s windows, filtered by old fashioned curtains.
“Who’s in there?”, I ask and all of a sudden the greyness of the sky closes in on us with unexpected heaviness.
The door opens before we ring the bell.
“Right on time”, says the man who opened the door with a slight accent I cannot place, and a voice calm and penetrating at once.
He can be about 50, but I am not too sure. Tall and supple, with dark slick hair and charcoal eyes, beard unshaved from two weeks.
“Did the trip go smoothly?”, he asks Ronny, and then, addressing me, “I’ve been expecting you, Iris”
“All went as planned”, Ronny replies
I stare at the man a moment longer, trying to define him.
“You must wonder who I am”, he says
I nod, without taking my eyes off him.
“I’m Antonio”, he tells me and gives me his hand, looking at me just as intensely as I look at him
“Let me get you a cup of tea”, he adds after a moment, and disappears into a room I assume is the kitchen
I look around. In a corner there’s a stove I’ve only seen in museums, and that seems the only heating device around here. The place is almost cold now that it’s summer, and I wonder how this house could be inhabited during the winter. The paint has puffed in different spots, and yet there’s no feeling of shabbiness. There are large beams on the ceiling, who knows how many generations the nodulous wood has seen. Such an old place…
Ronny puts down his bags in a corner and follows Antonio.
“Come”, he tells me, swinging himself as he clings onto the kitchen door, and all of a sudden it all feels so homely and familiar, for that one gest I did not expect.
I smile and head to the kitchen, letting myself fall on a chair.
Antonio sets a red mug in front of me, and I automatically cup my hands around it, bending slightly, as I inhale the sweet rose-smelling flavours exuding from tea.
“When you and your sister were kidnapped the relationship between your father and your mother Laura fell apart. Your mother was with you when you were kidnapped and your father could never forgive her for letting this happen. Your mother blamed the loss on your father, accused him of being absent all the time”, Antonio tells me
I hold on to the cup, as if its warmth could heal me.
“Your father was a businessman, he travelled all the time leaving your mother alone for extended time periods during her pregnancy and when you and your sister were born his presence remained elusive. Your mother felt abandoned. I never understood how she fell in love with your father, the two of them were so different…”, Antonio continues, and then pauses again
There are so many questions burning on my tongue, and yet I don’t speak a word. Antonio’s account is painful to follow, it’s not even what he says but the way he says it, the hesitation in his voice, his expression. I feel that if I interrupted him now he would not be able to continue.
“But then I too am different from your mother, and I loved her. We knew each other since we were born, you know? Our houses were close, in Barcelona…I always felt for her, but she was unobtainable, cheerfully elusive, in part on purpose in part without even noticing. I found her lightness irresistible. But I digress. Laura was an independent woman, but after your birth we became quite close…”, Antonio tells me, and stops again
“You were her lover”, I say
“Yes. I wished you were my kid”, he admits, laying the words plain in front of me
“But I am not”, I reply, suddenly defensive
Antonio smiles sadly.
“I am not trying to lay claims on you”, Antonio replies, his eyes clinging onto mine
Then he bows his head, plunging back in his own personal memories, and continues, “Laura withdrew too when she felt trapped…I suppose she loved your father because of the same reasons that hurt her. It was his elusiveness that charmed her”
“What happened to my father?”, I ask, realizing that at this moment it is him I want to know about the most
“He disappeared and, I am sorry to say, I never cared to investigate where he ended up”, Antonio tells me
I nod.
“I am a journalist and when you and your sister were kidnapped I tried to do what I could to run my own investigations in parallel with the official ones. I discovered…”, he starts, but then his face goes blank, before twisting into a startled expression
I’m about to turn around when a noise, incredibly loud, stops me short. The lights go off and something falls on me. It’s awfully heavy, and it hurts, but then…