Chapter 6
For the first time in her life, she was living the glamorous life of a tourist, sitting on an expensive ship in the middle of the ocean. She had lived her entire life on an island, surrounded by water, but this was her first time on a boat, and now that she felt the undulations of the waves, she realized their journey would be anything but glamorous—for her at least.
André didn’t get seasick. While she clung to the side of the ship, he chatted with a group of men in the cabin. Once, he came out to stand beside her. “In a few hours, we’ll dock at the island of Santiago,” he said. “I’ll buy you some medicine there, before we change boats to go to the island of Sal. That way, you’ll feel better on the next boat.”
She couldn’t hear the word Santiago without thinking of Manny. Of course, André wouldn’t want to visit him or his family, but it couldn’t do any harm to talk to one of them if they passed by.
The island of Santiago was enormous, though, with more buildings crowded together than Celia had ever imagined. After they docked the ship, André went in search of her medicine, and she sat outside the terminal, watching as one well-dressed woman after another passed her on the street. These were the types of women that Manny saw every day. Was he dating one of them? She doubted any of them were good enough for him, but who was? What really mattered was whether he was happy.
After a few minutes of sitting beside the terminal, she began to feel better. She wandered down the road, looking for André. When she didn’t see him, she bought herself a soda at the café and asked the man who worked there if he knew Manny Oliveira. “No, but I can look him up.”
“Oh, no. I was just wondering.” What would André think if he knew she was asking after Manny? She’d better stop trying to find him.
“Manuel Oliveira.” The man was typing into his phone. “Is he a teacher?”
She took a sip of her soda, trying to steady her nerves. “Yes.”
“He works at a school over on the Avenue of Boavista.”
“Oh.”
“It’s actually pretty close by. I can show you where it is.”
She looked at the clock on the wall of the café. It was one o’clock, and the next boat left in an hour. “I’m not sure I have the time.” Besides that, André might not understand, but if she did go, she could apologize to Manny for the way André treated him on his last visit.
“It’s not far,” he said, “and I can give you a ride. I’m Victor, by the way. I suppose you should know my name before I give you a ride.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Victor. I’m Celia. Do you have a car?” she asked.
He grinned. “A motorcycle.” After placing a note on the door about how he’d only be gone a minute, he took her out the back door to show her the motorcycle, parked behind the café. He climbed on and put in the key.
She’d ridden a motorcycle once before—when a tourist gave her a ride—and she couldn’t resist getting on one again, especially if it meant she could see Manny. Despite her fears of André seeing her, she climbed onto the back and wrapped her arms around Victor’s middle. He twisted the key in the ignition and squeezed the clutch. Then, as they roared away from the café, she tucked her head down, hoping that André wouldn’t catch sight of them.
They weren’t the only ones on the road like they would have been on Fogo. Here, cars raced back and forth on the busy roads—more cars than she’d ever seen, and in more colors. The smell of exhaust surrounded them as they sped between rows of tall buildings.
She gulped for air, and her nausea returned. What was she doing, going to meet Manny when she was married to someone else? This wasn’t like the old days when they were kids and could sit on the porch for hours without anyone raising an eyebrow. He was a teacher. He probably had a classroom full of students. It had been three months since he’d visited Fogo Island. He could have a new girlfriend by now.
Still, she couldn’t let this opportunity pass. She might never get a chance to see him again.
The motorcycle turned up a hill. “We’re almost there,” Victor shouted.
That’s when she saw André, walking on the side of the road and heading toward them. She ducked, attempting to hide behind Victor, but André was staring straight at her, his mouth hanging open. How was she going to get out of this? Not knowing what else to do, she smiled and waved at André as they roared past. André turned and shouted something at her—probably something about her needing to be back in time for the boat.
She’d have to explain later.
They reached the top of the hill, and Victor turned onto a side street and then another and another until they came upon a large rectangular building, painted pink. “This is it, the school where he works.”
He stopped the bike in front of a short, cement wall. Beside the open doorway, flowering bushes burst forth with red blooms, and, from the open windows, she heard children reciting their lessons. It was a big enough school that she guessed there were four or five different classes. Surely, Manny wouldn’t mind if she interrupted his lesson. She only had so much time here on Santiago before she left forever.
She climbed off the bike. “Thank you, Victor.”
“No problem,” he said. “I can give you a ride back down if you’d like.”
She nodded. “Thank you. It won’t take long.” She pushed open the gate and walked toward one of the open windows. A woman was leading a classroom of teenage girls and boys in song as they stood behind their desks. They looked to be around twelve years old.
Walking back the other way, she peeked into the classroom on the other side of the front entrance. In this one, five teenage students stood at a blackboard, doing math problems while the other students watched. She couldn’t see their teacher from where she stood, so she inched forward, and sure enough, there was Manny, standing at the back of the room and beaming as he watched the children at work. He wore a button-down shirt, a pair of slacks, and a new pair of glasses that made him look like a TV star.
One of the students turned from the blackboard. “Teacher,” he called. “I need help.”
Manny hurried to the board and began to explain the standard procedure.
Deciding it would be best if she interrupted from the classroom door instead of the window, she turned toward the main entrance, but as she did, a voice called out. “Celia.”
It wasn’t Manny’s voice. He still stood at the blackboard, his face turned from hers.
“Celia,” she heard again, and pivoting, she saw André standing outside the cement wall. He had followed them. “Did you get lost? We need to go back to the docks.”
Her mouth went dry. This wasn’t how she wanted to meet Manny again, with André right beside her. She walked toward André, her thoughts jangling in her head like coins in a jar. She could tell him she wanted to see some of the city and that the schools here were beautiful.
But just as she opened her mouth, Victor answered for her. “I brought her up here to find Manny Oliveira.”
A scowl flickered across André’s face, but it was gone so quickly Victor probably didn’t even notice it. André smiled. “Did you find him, dear?”
He was angry, but he was keeping his voice down. The last thing she wanted was for Manny to meet André again, or worse, cause a scene in front of Manny’s students. She had to keep him calm, even if it meant lying. “I’m afraid he’s not here today.”
“Are you certain?” Victor asked. “I can ask inside for you.”
“I’m certain,” Celia said, her voice as deep and flat as she could make it. “I already asked.” There were so many things she’d wanted to say to Manny, but she would just have to be satisfied with the little glimpse she got of his classroom. She’d seen that he was happy in his new career. That was what she wanted most of all.
André tilted his chin down and raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure you should be out in the sun after all you’ve been through today?”
“I’m much better.” She turned to Victor. “Thank you so much for helping me find the school. You can go on without me now. I’m going to walk back with my husband.”
Victor looked from her to André. Then, probably sensing the tension, he got back on his motorcycle and buzzed away.
She thought for sure André’s scowl would return and he would demand to know what she planned to say to Manny. Instead, he held out a bottle of water and a small box of medicine. “The pharmacist told me you should take this at least an hour before you get back on the boat again. Also, before we go on the plane tomorrow. The Cape Verdean woman’s stomach isn’t accustomed to high-speed transportation.”
“Thank you, André.” She smiled, hoping his concern marked a turning-point in their marriage. Moving far away meant that they would have to depend on each other more than they ever had before. They would have more time to just sit and talk, the way she’d always imagined a husband and wife should. No more drinking with his buddies late into the night.
He didn’t mention Manny again, and she hoped he would forget all about her little excursion.
The ferry ride to the island of Sal went much better than her first boat ride. Her shoulder rested in the crook of André’s arm as they sat at the back of the ship. He was all charm, just like he’d been when they first met, telling her how beautiful she looked and how he’d like to take her out to eat when the boat stopped. This was the André she’d married. “You just relax,” he told her, “I’ve got the tickets and our papers. All you’ve got to do is enjoy the ride.”
She soaked it all in—the wide expanse of water, the dry smell of salt in the air, the wisp of the breeze in her hair, and the warming rays of the sun. The medicine made her sleepy, so she napped on and off, resting her head on André’s shoulder.
When they arrived on Sal, André had the taxi take them to a hotel in town, a stone building with beautiful gardens. They laid their suitcases on a bed half the size of their old café and then ate lobster in the shadow of palm trees while a man played guitar. “Grandma tells me lobster is much more expensive in the States,” André said. “We should enjoy it while we’re here.”
André’s gaze trailed behind an attractive waitress that passed their table, and Celia was tempted to mention how nice Manny looked in his work clothes. But she knew that wouldn’t make her life any easier. Instead, she suggested a swim in the hotel’s freshwater pool. They only had this evening here, and she wanted to experience everything.
He kissed her. “I’m all yours. We can do whatever you want.” His soothing voice made her believe he would give her the world. Or America, anyway.
They strolled back to their hotel room, where she slipped into her old pink swimsuit. André wore his soccer shorts.
Neither one of them had ever swum in anything but the ocean before, but they’d seen enough TV to know that you jump right in, and that’s what they did. It was just the two of them in hundreds of liters of cool, fresh water. They swam and splashed like children, letting their bodies glide past each other until the sun sank into the sea, and the electric lights twinkled like jewels in the night.
∞∞∞
She woke in the protective cocoon of his arms, and it took her a second to remember where they were. The hotel. Sunshine peeked through the curtains, and she pushed them open to look out the glass. She had never stayed in a place with glass windows, where everything stayed clean and soft. But, from now on, it would always be this way.
She sat on the side of the bed, watching André breathe in and out, until she noticed the time. 9:25 a.m. Their flight left in just thirty minutes. “André, we’re late.” She slipped into the dress she’d picked to wear on the airplane, and made sure her toothbrush was back in her suitcase. “André, are you getting up?”
He groaned and rolled over. She’d never had to wake him before since he kept his own hours at the café. It had never mattered before whether he showed up late. But today, for the first time, it did. If he didn’t get up, they might miss their flight.
She touched his shoulder. “We need to get to the airport.”
He pushed her hand away. “Let me sleep.”
“Do you want to lose all the money we spent on plane tickets?”
He sat up and squinted at the clock. “Why didn’t you tell me we were late?” His words exploded out, grating with anger.
He threw on his clothes and grabbed his bags. Then they ran, dragging their suitcases to the front of the hotel and directing the taxi to drive at top speed to the airport.
When they arrived, an enormous white plane waited on the runway, and they hurried on board. A flight attendant helped them find their seats among tourists and businessmen. She sat down beside André and allowed her breathing to slow. They’d made it.
The air inside the plane smelled of coffee, and around them, people chattered in more than one language. This was what she’d always wanted, but for a moment, she worried that she might get kicked off. Surely someone would notice that she was sitting with the higher classes on an airplane. She was the girl from the Caldera, who ran barefoot on dirt roads and sold paper flowers.
They aren’t any better than we are, she told herself. She and André had worked hard for this opportunity, and so had his grandma, Teresa, who had sent a thousand dollars to help with their trip. It was paid for, so she might as well enjoy every minute.