Bitter Memories. Margaret Mayo
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was all new and exciting, and she did not want to miss a thing. Charlene had recently moved in with a family whose daughter worked in the same hotel as Charlene, and they had become good friends. The girl’s mother had agreed to Tanya’s spending her holiday with them as well. Tanya found it difficult to believe the woman’s generosity to a complete stranger.
They soon left the motorway and headed up into the hills, the road curving and climbing, bushes of white daisy-like flowers and clumps of spiny cactus adorning the roadside. They passed through a dusty village where old men sat outside bars and children kicked balls or rode BMXs, and passed several isolated houses on the outskirts; square, box-like dwellings built out of blocks. Some had been whitewashed, some were still bare concrete, looking, to Tanya’s English eyes, as though they were not finished. One or two had pantiled roofs and looked more attractive, but when Charlene turned off the road and pulled up beside one of the unpainted buildings Tanya looked at her with a frown. ‘Is this where you’re living?’
Charlene smiled and nodded. ‘It’s not like it looks, I assure you. It’s heavenly inside; most of them are. You can’t go by external appearances. I was once told that it was because the Canarians didn’t care what a house looked like on the outside, as we do—but I later learned that the real reason is that they don’t have to pay taxes on unfinished buildings. The government run campaigns sometimes to try to get people to paint their walls white, but they’re always a failure.’
Still looking doubtful, Tanya followed her sister. The single-storey building was an odd shape, as though it had had further rooms built on as and when the need arose. There was a wall, built yet again out of grey blocks, denoting the boundary of the property, but there was no garden as such, just a few straggly plants growing and a dog foraging. Coming from her smart semi-detached house on the outskirts of Sheffield, with its tidy green and abundant garden, Tanya found it difficult to feel happy about spending a month here.
All the windows were shuttered—wooden, varnished shutters—and the front door was wooden too. In fact it was an ornately carved, expensive-looking door which looked oddly out of place with its surroundings. And once inside Tanya could see what Charlene meant. The cool, clean hallway boasted a tiled floor, a polished chair in the corner and a profusion of healthy plants which hung and sat and filled every corner. It was like an oasis m the desert.
In the shadowy living-room Charlene’s friend’s mother waited to greet her. The tiny woman was dressed all in black, her greying hair secured in a neat bun. She smiled warmly as Charlene made the introductions in fluent Spanish and held out her hand. Tanya smiled back. ‘It’s very kind of you to let me stay here.’ she said.
Through her sister she established that Señora Guerra was very pleased to welcome her into their-house and she was to treat it as her home and come and go as she pleased and not to worry about disturbing them.
Tanya was grateful her sister spoke the language—it had actually been a prerequisite of her job at the hotel. In fact Charlene spoke several languages. Tanya, on the other hand, spoke no more than schoolgirl French.
‘She’s a wonderful lady,’ Charlene told her. ‘Señor Guerra died a few years ago, but she has coped admirably. Maribel is her only child left at home. She has three sons, but they are all married now, though they frequently visit. She’s delighted about it. The house almost bursts at the seams when they all come.’
‘I hope I won’t be in the way,’ said Tanya worriedly.
‘Of course not. It was Señora Guerra’s idea that you stay here.’ She turned and said something to the older woman, who instantly smiled, speaking rapidly, gesturing eloquently, reassuring Tanya that she was not putting them out in the least.
The room they were in amazed Tanya. It was like going back a hundred years; it was like photographs she had seen of days gone by. The furniture looked like oak, big and solid, and the dresser packed with plates and cups and saucers. There was a settee and rocking-chairs with hand-embroidered cushions, pieces of pottery, photographs and pictures on the walls and more plants standing in big pots on the tiled floor or hanging from the ceiling. Every inch of space was used. It was cluttered but beautiful, and Tanya loved it.
She suddenly realised that her host was watching her, and she gave an apologetic smile. ‘I was admiring your house. It’s lovely.’
Charlene translated and the woman beamed, and then Tanya was taken to her room, which was next to Charlene’s. Again, heavy oak furniture was dominant. The walls were painted a simple white, only the patch-work bedcover providing a bright splash of colour.
The first thing she did was open the windows and push back the shutters, allowing the bright sunlight to flood the room. The jagged outline of the mountains was up above them, the earlier mist having completely disappeared, the sky a clear, intense blue. Tanya was anxious to explore—so long as she did not bump into Alejandro! The thought of him being somewhere out there still festered in the back of her mind.
Her sister helped her unpack, and by the time she had freshened up and changed into a cotton sundress Señora Guerra had lunch waiting. A white cloth had been spread on the table in the living-room, and as soon as Tanya sat down her meal was set in front of her—white fish, potatoes cooked in their skins, carrots and peas.
‘Bacalao,’ confirmed Charlene with a smile, ‘or codfish to you and me, and these——’ indicating the potatoes, ‘—are papas arrugadas, which, translated literally, means wrinkled potatoes. They’re cooked in very salty water and allowed to boil dry, leaving a salty coating on their skins. The Canarians always cook them this way. I love them.’
Tanya’s verdict later was one of approval too. It was a simple meal, yet filling and tasty, and when she was offered fresh fruit for dessert she had to refuse. They drank wine also, a sweet, local wine that was not really to Tanya’s taste, though she was too polite to say so. Señora Guerra was a marvellous hostess, even with the language barrier, her actions and expressions when she was trying to get something across making Tanya laugh wholeheartedly.
After lunch Charlene took her for a short drive; once back she met Señora Guerra’s daughter, ate another excellent meal—thinking she would be as fat as a pig when she went home if she went on like this—and now she lay in bed, her head sunk into a soft, sweet-smelling pillow. One way and another it had been quite a day, and she was desperately tired, yet thoughts of Alejandro kept her wide awake.
He had duped her all right. She had never dreamt that he was using her, that it was an affair he was after, a passionate fling before he went back to Tenerife to marry his childhood sweetheart. What a gullible fool she had been. He had even talked about bringing her here, had spoken of the pleasure he would get in showing her his beloved country—and she had believed him! What a silver-tongued swine he was. All the anger she had felt nine years ago came back with a vengeance, boiling, enraging, making her wish desperately and deeply that she had not let Charlene persuade her to come.
And why should he want to talk to her? What was there to say? Nothing! Not a thing. He had hurt her feelings immeasurably; she had given him all of her love, and for what? He was the last person she wanted to talk to now, and she hoped and prayed that she would never see him again.
Inevitably her thoughts went back to their first meeting. She had been eighteen at the time, and they had met at a friend’s wedding. He had been working as a waiter in the hotel restaurant in which the reception was held, and there had been an instant mutual attraction. They had not spoken, Alejandro refusing to put his job in jeopardy by chatting to one of the guests, but the suggestion had been there in his eyes that he would like to see her again.
How he had found out where she worked Tanya did not know, but two days later he had been waiting outside the office block when she finished at five. For a few seconds all she could do was stare in amazement.
‘Do forgive me,’ he said, in heavily accented English, ‘but I wanted to see you.’ His teeth were white and even, his smile cautious.
‘How did you know where to find me?’ Her heart began to hammer and her blue eyes were wide as she looked at him. He was dressed in jeans and a black leather jacket with