The Foreign Girls. Sergio Olguin
good taste and clearly likes showing it off.
I already know what you’re thinking: run a mile from exhibitionists! You’d equate his artworks, the big house where he has his gallery and his Japanese pickup with the kind of man who flashes at the entrance of a girls’ school. But the only time that ever happened to me I had a good look. I was shocked, but I still looked.
Evidently some methods of seduction don’t work with foreign girls – or perhaps contemporary Argentine art is the problem – because Petra and Frida seemed bored as they listened to Ramiro. I tried to arrange something for that night because I didn’t feel like only being with the girls. Ramiro said he was busy, that he had a lot on. It came across a bit like an excuse. I know what you’re going to say: he sounds like a dick.
Kolynos asked for my phone number, asked if I used WhatsApp – obviously, I said no – and looked at me as though I’d landed from another planet. “I’m an old-fashioned girl,” I added, with a quiet pride.
I could already see myself spending the evening eating tamales with Petra and Frida, then going to get drunk in their 19room or mine. But get this: an hour after we left the gallery, Kolynos called me. He said that there was a party that night at a house on the outskirts of Yacanto, and did the three of us want to go. Obviously I said we did, without even running it by the girls.
Petra and Frida were both happy when I said we’d been invited to a party. I’d almost say I was mildly offended that they were so keen to spend the night with someone other than me. And so…
That evening Ramiro came to fetch the three of us in his pickup and off we went. Why didn’t we walk, since it was only six or seven blocks away? More exhibitionism. It’s true that the house was on the outskirts of town, but that’s because Yacanto is only five blocks long.
We arrived. A big-ass country house with music blaring out and people dancing and holding glasses. It looked like a beer ad.
To start with the girls stuck by me, something I wasn’t thrilled about. Kolynos was very gallant. We danced, we chatted, we strolled around the garden. All very proper.
He introduced me to the owner of the property, a certain Nicolás. Also single. I marvelled at the size of his house and the idiot started boasting about the huge estate that surrounded it. As Mili would say: good game, terrible result.
We were still with Nicolás when a group of offensively young twenty-somethings turned up. One was a dreamboat – bronzed, sub-twenty-five. You’d have loved him. “My little brother, Nahuel,” Kolynos said by way of introduction. Well, that was a surprise. Immediately I thought of Leti, who had recommended the older brother without mentioning the younger one. Either she hadn’t met him, or she considered me far too old for such a morsel. Anyway, full disclosure: Nahuelito barely registered me and didn’t have much time 20for his brother either. He started talking to Nicolás and we moved away from the group.
At one point it seemed to me that Petra was annoyed about how Frida was treating me, or about something, anyway. For some reason the Italian kept freaking out at Ramiro or any other man who came her way (and a lot did).
A lot of alcohol later, I ran into Frida coming out of the bathroom (was she waiting for me?) and she told me that she wasn’t enjoying the party at all. I asked where Petra was and she pointed at the dance floor. That was when I realized that these two were a couple of drama queens who got off on making each other jealous and wanted to stick me in the middle. She didn’t like Ramiro either, she said. I laughed and she got annoyed. I made it clear that I was planning to leave with Ramiro and that she should go and have fun with other people. Before she had a chance to answer, I was already walking away.
Soon afterwards, Ramiro took me upstairs. He kissed me and suggested we go to his house. I told him that I was with the girls and couldn’t leave them alone. He said that I shouldn’t worry, that they could walk back to the hotel if they couldn’t find anyone to take them back, but that he suspected they wouldn’t be leaving alone. They could even sleep over here, at the house.
Long story short, I went home with Señor Kolynos. We had a good time. The next morning I felt a bit awkward. Not about him, but about the girls. I felt as though I had betrayed them. A stupid reaction, because the last thing I needed was to be giving them chapter and verse on everything I did or didn’t do. I got angry with myself. I went to the hotel, packed my case, paid the bill and left. I was going to leave a note for the girls but that felt like giving explanations, something I wanted to avoid.21
At 8 a.m. I set off for Cafayate. I’ve just arrived. I’m in a really pretty hotel. The owner, yet again, comes from Buenos Aires. Have I really travelled eight hundred miles to meet people from Buenos Aires?
This place is beautiful. I’m going to enjoy the provincial peace. I’m sorry about leaving the girls, but I needed some space. I’ll write them an email. Perhaps we can meet up in Salta, or in Jujuy itself. Yes, I know, I’m impossible to please. It’s only half a day since I saw them and already I miss them. I’m going to wait for them here.
Kolynos? He was a summer storm. Not even that. I don’t think we’ll see each other again.
V.
*
from: Verónica Rosenthal
to: Paula Locatti
re: Re: Kolynos and the party
The girls are dead. Petra and Frida. They killed them, raped them, treated them like animals. It was after the party. I’m to blame for all of it, everything that happened to them. If I hadn’t left them there, they’d be alive. Yesterday the bodies were found lying in some undergrowth. Why the fuck did I leave them alone? I’m going back to Yacanto del Valle. I’m going to find out who the bastards were. I swear if I find them first I’ll kill them. I’ll tear them apart.22
23
I
Flying made her sleepy. Any time she had to take a long flight, she slept for a large part of the journey and only woke up to eat or go to the bathroom. People must think she took sleeping pills, but it was just the way she was. She couldn’t even stay awake on a two-hour flight like the one she was on now to Tucumán. Only the shudder of the plane as it touched down at Benjamín Matienzo airport made her open her eyes. Verónica stretched and looked out of the window at the other planes on the ground, the trailers stacked with suitcases and the airport workers moving around.
After collecting her luggage, she went to the car rental office. She had reserved a Volkswagen Gol to take her as far as Jujuy. A small and practical car. In Buenos Aires she made do with borrowing her sister Leticia’s car every now and then, because she didn’t like driving in the city, but the prospect of a journey through Argentina’s north without having to rely on buses and timetables, taking back roads and stopping whenever she liked, was appealing enough to persuade her to hire a car.
The rental company employee asked her name. 24
“Verónica. Verónica Rosenthal.”
Together they walked to the parking lot. The employee made a note in the file of a couple of scratches on the body-work, showed her where the spare wheel was and how to remove it, reminded her that she must return the car with a full tank and finally handed over the keys and relevant documents.
Verónica switched on the GPS she had rented along with the car and entered the address of her cousin Severo’s house in the centre of San Miguel de Tucumán. She lowered the window and felt the breeze on her face, in her tousled hair. A kind of peace swept through her body.
She hadn’t felt like this for a long time. During the last few difficult months there had been only one objective: to get through the day. She had been like a patient in a coma, except that she walked, she talked, she got on with her job. She didn’t want anything, seek out anything, need anything. She tried not even thinking.