Barcelona Dreaming by Rupert Thomson

Author:Rupert Thomson [Thomson, Rupert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Other Press
Published: 2021-06-02T00:00:00+00:00

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RONNIE’S HOUSE didn’t disappoint me. Screened by a mature umbrella pine and a high stone wall topped with lavish sprays of bougainvillea, it wasn’t visible from the road. Once I’d been buzzed in through an electronic metal gate, I walked up a drive, past a row of gleaming cars. A maid in a black-and-white uniform was waiting for me. She led me through a series of cool dark rooms, the walls hung with folk art and musical instruments. Towards the rear, the house opened out into a living area that had the biggest sofas I had ever seen. Two people could lie facing each other, and their feet wouldn’t even touch. Beyond the living area were a paved terrace and a lawn. A blue pool glittered in the sun. Sprawled on a lounger, Ronnie had a phone pressed to his ear. As I stepped outside, he passed the phone to a man in a light-gray summer suit who was sitting beneath a huge white-and-orange beach umbrella. I recognized him from the sports pages. It was Ronnie’s brother, Roberto Assis, who also acted as his agent. Beyond the men, on the lush cropped grass, were two girls in micro-bikinis. They lay on their backs with their eyes closed, earbuds in their ears. Their oiled bodies shone like glass.

When Ronnie saw me, he grinned and told me to take a seat. His brother leaned over and shook my hand, just in case I was somebody who mattered, then he stood up and buttoned his jacket.

“Think it over, Ronnie,” he said. “I’ll call you later.”

They embraced quickly.

“You like the place?” Ronnie asked when his brother had gone.

“What’s not to like?” I let my gaze drift towards the trees at the back of the property. Their leaves stirred lazily. “Your family must be very happy here.”

Ronnie nodded. “Everyone’s happy.” But his dark eyes had misted over.

“Are you thinking about your father?”

“How did you guess?”

I shrugged.

Ronnie’s father used to work in the shipyard in Porto Alegre. He had died of a heart attack when Ronnie was just eight years old.

“I’ll never get over him passing away like that. It left a hole that can’t be filled.” He looked round at the house, the pool, the girls. “Not by this. Not by anything.”

“He’d be very proud of you.”

“You think?”

“I’m sure of it.”

Ronnie gave me a strange look, both his eyes half-closed. “Sometimes I get the feeling we’ve met before.”

“Really? Where?”

“I don’t know. Another life, maybe.”

“You believe in all that?”

“Why not?” And there was his grin again—natural, open, utterly infectious.

Growing up near Brazil’s southern border, Ronnie would probably have been exposed to Candomblé Ketu, a religion which, for me, bore more than a passing resemblance to voodoo, since it relied on ritual sacrifice, hypnotic drumming, and trance states. Among my friends, I’ve always been seen as a bit of a skeptic. They talk about my arching eyebrows and the jaundiced lines around my mouth. I even look like a skeptic. In the presence of Ronnie’s grin, though, my skepticism seemed out of place.

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