Maite’s mother recounted the candles and found a box of matches.
“Ask for a wish,” Manuela said.
Maite stared at the tiny flames and couldn’t think of a proper wish. The children began to complain, calling out for cake. Maite’s mother warned her she’d get wax all over the cake, and Maite finally blew out the candles without wishing for anything. Maite’s mother cut the cake, serving the children first, then Manuela.
“You know I’m watching my figure,” Manuela said, making a face. Her sister was skinny, but she liked to make a show of everything.
“Come on, you must have a little.”
Maite’s mother pleaded with Manuela, who finally agreed to have a thin slice of cake. Finally, Maite was handed a slice, almost as an afterthought. She was hungry, but toyed with the cherries on her plate, rolling them from one side of the plate to the other, unwilling to eat any of it.
Manuela liked chocolate-and-cherry cake. Maite should have known their mother would cater to her, even on this day. She wished she had waited for Diana and taken her up on her dinner offer. Now it was too late.
Maite thought of Jorge Luis, and she started to convince herself that his accident hadn’t really happened. Next episode there would be an explanation. Maybe it had been a bad dream. Yes, that was it. Beatriz would wake up, the sound of the drums playing in the distance…
The jungle, yes. How she loved the jungle they drew in Secret Romance. The flowers, unnaturally large and lush; monkeys and exotic birds taking refuge in the foliage. Jaguars, waiting in the dark, and the night made of cheap ink; pinpricks of stars and the round moon festooning the sky. Lovers holding hands, lovers swimming in a waterhole…
One of Manuela’s kids was walking around with his hands filled with cake. He placed his hands on Maite’s jacket, which was hanging from the back of her chair, smearing chocolate over it. Manuela chuckled, caught the kid, and wiped his hands clean with a napkin.
“I’ll have to dry clean that,” Maite said, staring at her sister pointedly.
“Scrub it with a bit of soap.”
“It’s not washable. You’re supposed to dry clean it.”
“Don’t be silly. Go wash it. It’ll take a minute. Go.”
Maite grabbed the jacket. She went into the bathroom and furiously scrubbed the stain, but it did no good. It was firmly set in place. When she came out, her mother and her sister were giddily talking about a cousin of theirs. Manuela had lit a cigarette. Her sister’s brand of cigarettes gave Maite a headache and Manuela knew it.
“Can you smoke somewhere else?” Maite asked.
“Maite, sit and eat your cake,” her mother said.
“I should get going,” she announced.
Neither her mother nor her sister replied. Manuela’s youngest child had started crying. Maite fetched her handbag and left without another word.
Back at her apartment, Maite turned on the lights and said hello to the green-and-yellow parakeet she kept in a cage by the living room window. Then she went into the kitchen and made herself a ham-and-cheese sandwich. She ate it quickly, then unrolled the magazine she had been carrying around all day and looked at the panels again.
There was a knock at the door. She ignored it, but then came another knock. Maite sighed and opened the door.
It was the art student from the apartment across the hallway. Sometimes Maite saw her walking up the stairs carrying a canvas under her arm. She didn’t know her, but she knew her type: modern, free, young, a member of a new generation who didn’t have to pay their respect to their fussy mothers and their irritating sisters, instead happily drinking, smoking, living it up.
“Sorry, I hope it’s not too late,” the girl said. She was wearing a poncho with exuberant floral designs. Maite was still dressed for the office, in her white blouse with the frilly high collar and her tan skirt, though she had taken off the soiled jacket. Next to this girl, she looked like a school matron.
“It’s fine.”
“I’m Leonora. I live across the hall from you.”
“Oh, yeah. I know,” Maite said. The girl had been in the building for six months. Maite had timed it. She kept good track of the tenants in the building.
“I’m sorry if I haven’t introduced myself, you know how it is. Anyway, I was talking with the building’s super, and she said you take care of pets sometimes.”
The building’s super, a tiny, gossipy old woman called Doña Elvira who lived on the first floor, was allergic to both cats and dogs. This turned out to be a small boon for Maite, since she offered her services to her neighbors when they needed a pet sitter, a job that might ordinarily have been filled by the super.
“I do. Do you need me to watch a pet for you?”
“Yes, my cat,” Leonora said. “It would be for a couple of days. I’m going to Cuernavaca tonight, and I’ll be back by…well, Sunday night. Monday morning, tops. Would you be able to do it? I know it’s last minute, but I’d appreciate it. The super says you are reliable”
The super had complained that the girl had men over and they were loud. She said it with a raised eyebrow that left no doubt about the source of the noise. Maite wondered if Leonora was going to meet with one of those men, preferably in a location where the neighbors didn’t mind the operatic lovemaking. She bet the girl had an impressive number of boyfriends. She was beautiful. She looked like the girls in the comic books, with her green eyes and her chestnut hair. But she wasn’t weeping. Many of the girls on the covers were either weeping or kissing a man.
“What do you say?” the girl asked. Her smile was both pleasant and nervous, like watching a butterfly flutter around. Maite shrugged.
“I’m usually booked for more than a handful of days. It’s hardly worth the effort if it’s anything less than a week, you know?” she lied, wondering how much she could charge without the girl bolting away. The earrings in Leonora’s lobes looked like real gold, not the fake stuff they hawked downtown and that turned green after a few days. Maite sniffed money.
“Oh, please, I don’t want to take off without knowing someone’s watching the cat. Animals might get into all sorts of trouble when you’re not around. I had a dog that ate a box of chocolates and died.”
“I know. No responsible pet owner leaves an animal without someone around, and I can see you’re in a hurry. Very well, let me think,” Maite said and quoted the girl a higher rate than usual, which Leonora agreed to, grateful for Maite’s kindness.
Leonora handed Maite her apartment keys.
“Would you mind if I get your phone number?” the girl asked. “I…in case…the cat, you know. In case I need to communicate with you about the cat.”