~Tricky love~

I stood on the beach, looking out at the sunset. The sky was illuminated with flashes of red, orange and purple. I glanced down, squishing the sand between my toes. The sand was soft and golden, walking on it felt like walking on a cloud. The sand was cold because the sun had not been shining on it for a few hours, it had become reasonably cloudy around three-ish. It was so quiet on Sitges Beach. The only thing that interrupted my train of thought was the sound of the soft waves crashing across the rocks, and the occasional seagull. I walked further up the beach and sat back down on my faded baby blue towel. It’s always been my favourite towel. Even though Damita, my maid that had always lived with us ever since my birth, was always hounding me to get a new one, I would just turn my head away and tell her to mind her own business. It was my last present from Mom before she died. My mother was a busy woman, but she always had been able to find time for me. She died in a car accident when I was six. She was a beautiful woman, lovely full lips, like me, and her hair was always perfect. Suddenly a cool breeze came in, and I shuddered. I looked down at my cell. It was dinnertime. Damita would probably freak out when she finds out I’ve been on the beach. She thinks I’m in the library. She just wants to protect me. You see, my Dad’s missing, my Mom’s dead, I have no siblings or relatives. She thinks I’m the last Horenta alive. She would be right there.

I ran up the beach and up the sandy steps that lead to our 1800’s old Spanish villa. The garden is full of beach plants Damita has picked from around the cliff. It’s a light green, with the occasional orange window dotted around the walls. The paint is so old that it had been flaking for ages. Damita wanted to repaint it to match the other modernized villas on the coast. I keep telling her not to. She reluctantly agreed.
“Okay, miha, whatever you want…”
I opened the old, faded, orange double French doors, and stepped onto the dark blue tile floor. Tombi, our dog was snoozing peacefully in her little bed next to the door into the living room. I walked through the door across the foyer, into the living room, trying to be as quiet as possible. If Damita saw me coming in, she would scold me more than last time. The library is on the other side of the house. To get to the library, you have to go through the kitchen. Damita was in the kitchen. This happened to pose a slight problem. I stepped as lightly as I could across the floor. I reached the kitchen. Damita was stirring something brown and lumpy in a pot, facing the wrong way to me. She was humming an old Spanish lullaby, the one my mother used to sing to me. I carefully treaded across the tile floor. I had just reached the other side of the kitchen when Damita turned around. I quickly ducked down behind the other side of the counter. She kept on humming and adding strong and weird smelling spices to the pot. One thing suddenly took my attention away from the spices; there was a trail of sand leading through the kitchen. Why hasn’t Damita cleaned it up? She’s not one to make a mess and not clean it up. But what would Damita be doing on the beach? I looked towards the double French doors. It seemed to go through the foyer, through the living room, and through the kitchen. I followed this mysterious trail all the way up to my feet. My sandy feet. Crap. My perfect plan became my almost perfect plan. I ran up to the green bathroom, my favourite bathroom out of the three. I quickly cleaned my feet and stashed my towel in my room. I would have to take it down to the laundry later, because any minute now, Damita would come toddling up the stairs to the library to fetch me, her short brown hair flapping on her chubby neck. I ran up the stairs, to the library, and randomly grabbed some book of the shelf. I settled down on the chair, and took out my ponytail. My blonde hair, unfortunately smelt strongly of salt, as I had been swimming earlier. I hoped she didn’t notice. I quickly placed my reading glassed over my green eyes, pretending to be completely immersed in a book that looked like it was written in Latin. Damita stumbled through the door. She looked at me suspiciously, and then at the book.
“I didn’t realise you were interested in Greek Literature…” She looked at me with her eyebrow raised.
“Oh, yeah, um, it’s really interesting.” I replied, looking completely serious as though she had insulted me.
“Well, okay. Dinner’s ready when you are, miha.” She looked at me, then at the Greek book, and then down at my feet.
“Okay, let me finish my page.” She left the room, muttering to herself that one day I would ‘learn a lesson’ and to ‘clean up evidence’. Oh yeah. I had forgotten about my footprints. I threw the book back onto the shelf, and put my glasses on the table.

Damita was staring intensely at me from across the other side of the table, her ice blue eyes staring at me so hard; I didn’t really feel like eating. The red walls of the dining room smelt of lavender, the incense she had always insisted on burning on the table. They were draped with tapestries from everywhere on earth. Down the edge of the room, was a large family portrait, or my great great grandfather, Ambrosio Horenta. The big chandelier hung precariously on the hook in the roof, like a man standing on the edge on a cliff, unaware of the fact he is about to fall. The carpet boasted lovely rugs of all shapes and sizes. Eventually, she stopped staring at me, and finished the casserole she had made. She started staring at me, again.
“You gonna eat that, miha? Because if you don’t eat that, Tombi will. And she’s not gonna make sure you want it before she eats it.”
“No, I’ll eat it.” I looked down at my plate, only just realising how much food was there.
“Okay, miha. Well, I’m going to go wash up.” She got her plate and walked out of the big dining room. I ate half of the casserole, leaving out as much meat as I could, and them tipped it into Tombi’s bowl. Tombi shuddered a bit in her little bed. Must be chasing rabbits in her doggy dreams. I hoped she caught one.

I jumped onto my pink quilt, on my bed. I moved Snuggles down to the end of my bed. Snuggles is my teddy bear. Damita bought it for me when I was seven. I pulled my old, hard, leather journal out from underneath my soft feather pillow. I took my pen and opened my journal. I breathed deeply, taking in the smell of something other than the overpowering stench that situates itself in the dining room. The smell of the ocean. That was my favourite smell. I took my pen in my hand, and turned to a new page in my journal. But, Damita suddenly came bursting through my door.
“Miha! Miha! Come quick! Come quick!” Damita looked so out of breath that she could not move any more. “Quickly, quickly!” I wondered what would have Damita so exited. Nothing interesting ever happens here.
We ran down the stairs, faster than I thought was humanly possible. Damita stopped at the foyer.
“Miha! Look!” There was a mother cat, looking more exhausted than Damita did when she burst into my room. Next to her, were three precious little kittens, all tabbies like their mother, except one. One was gray, and it was sitting all alone by itself. I quickly pushed it back over to its mother, who turned away from it. It meowed loudly. So loudly, I was quite impressed. I felt so sorry for it. But Damita had already gotten a little baby bottle and filled it with milk. The little kitten would not let go after it had finished its meal. I decided to call it Dejando, meaning scruffy, for no matter how hard I tried, there was one patch of fur on his back would not go down. The larger tabby kitten was called Duraznos, meaning peaches, and the smaller one Damita named, and called it Bibiana the second, after me.
 
I awoke to the sound of my hated alarm clock. It was six o’clock. I would have time to go down to the beach for at least half an hour before Damita got up. I threw my bikini on, grabbed my surfboard, and headed for the door. Just as I got to the front door, Tombi woke up. She looked at me.
“Go back to sleep, Tombi. Come on, shhh.” I whispered. She stared at me. She then proceeded to stand up, turn around, and lie back down. She was asleep in seconds. Thank God.
I treaded down the soft, sandy steps towards the beach. Suddenly, something caught my attention. There was another figure on the beach. I hesitated, stepping even lighter. I closed on the unknown figure. As I got closer, I realised this was NOT Damita, or one of her spies from other villas. I strolled up to him, much more relaxed.
“Erm, hello. I’m Bibiana. You surf here too?” That sounded so much smoother in my head, I thought.
“Hi, Bibiana. I’m Amador. Actually, no. This is my first time on Sitges. We just moved over from Valencia.” He sounded so relaxed, like he had lived here forever.
“Wow. That’s a long way to come.” I replied
“Yeah, but my Mom has always wanted to live in Barcelona, so when my Dad got a job here, she was ecstatic.”
“Cool. So what does your Dad do?” I said, trying to look completely natural, but the truth was, I was totally rigid.
“He’s an auto repair man. He’s been offered better jobs, but he likes that one, so yeah. Anyway, how long have you been here? You look like a local.”
“I’ve lived here since I was five, when my Dad went missing.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
“Nah, it’s not as big a deal as it was when I was five, but, you know…”
“Yeah. So, you wanna catch some waves?” He said, smiling.
“Okay.” We ran down to the cold, sparkly ocean. I dived in, and paddled out to my favourite spot, just above a little hole in the seabed. Suddenly, an enormous wave appeared out of no-where. This wave was bigger than anything I had ever ridden. I started paddling. I stood up on the board, looking around for Amador. He was a few meters away from me. Suddenly, the enormous wave crashed right on top of me. I was too fixated on Amador, I didn’t realise the wave had broken. I quickly admitted to myself that that was not some of my best work. I got up and looked around for Amador. He was still riding that wave. I was so jealous. That was the best wave I had ever sort of ridden.

When we got back up on the beach, I checked my cell. It was nearly seven o’clock. Damita would be up any minute.
“I have to go. It was nice meeting you!” I yelled as I ran up the beach.
“Meet me here, tomorrow at noon, I have a surprise for you!” he yelled back. Oh great. I hated surprises. But I reluctantly agreed.
“Okay!”
“Wear something you can get dirty in!” But, unfortunately, I didn’t hear the last part; I was too far up the steps. Before I stepped in the door, I waved at him. He waved back. I was so in love with him, I didn’t realise Damita was making breakfast. I stepped right into the kitchen, only becoming aware of her presence when it was too late.
“Why you wet, miha?” Damita’s voice broke the comfortable silence I was far too happily strolling through.
“Oh.Um.., I’ve just come out of the shower.” What an awesome excuse. Bibiana 1, Damita 0. Yep. Totally.
“So why are you wearing wet clothes? Did you forget to dry yourself? Did you shower the clothes too, miha?”
Oh yay. Now I had to come up with more excuses, and fast.
“I saw it in some beauty article in the news paper. It gives you nice, moist skin.” Wow. Really fancy excuse.
“It’ll catch you a cold too. Get changed for breakfast, please, miha.” I ran upstairs in disbelief, actually believing she had bought that excuse. Well, she hadn’t.

I sat at the table, awaiting my punishment. Damita stood on the other side of the table. She was staring at me, with her uncomfortable stare. I knew she only got that stare out on certain occasions. It made me feel guilty, like I had let her down in some way. Then came the speech.
“Miha, were you on the beach? Because if you were you can tell me, so that know I can trust you, and then maybe we can drop this whole situation.” I just looked at her, staring right at her face. Why did she care if I was on the beach?
“Come on, were you on the beach? I will not be angry if you were… “But both of us knew she would be. I hesitated for a while. She had no evidence to say I was on the beach, so what could she do?
“No, Damita, I wasn’t on the beach. Can I go now?” I looked at her, extremely annoyed.
“Yes, miha, you can go, but if I see you like that again, don’t expect me to be so nice.”
“Okay, Damita.” But I don’t think she heard my reply, I was already halfway up the dark pine staircase. I looked at all the portraits up the staircase, the last two of my mother and father. I opened the big, brown doors and ran into the library, and picked a book out of the shelf. The History of the Train, by Arnold Farawitz. Why do we even own this book? I wondered to myself. I picked up another book. Life Cycle of a Butterfly, By Melanie Reagan.

I made a game out of this. I went through each shelf, taking out books like Computing mysteries, and Psychology for Beginners. I filled up three big bags, and took them downstairs. Damita was no-where to be found. Tombi saw me, and decided to follow; her little tail wagging like there was no tomorrow. I accidentally dropped one, but Tombi picked it up and carried on walking. I lugged the books to the garden, Damita was okay with me going there, and threw each book, one by one, into our pizza oven. I was halfway through my first bag when Damita came storming up to me.
“Miha, why is our library missing nearly a third of its books?” She was so red in the face with anger; I nearly mistook her for a red pot.
“Because I’m the only one who ever reads the books in the library, and I didn’t want these ones.” I said defiantly.
“I read those too, miha!”
“Well, how was I supposed to know?”
“You need to stop being selfish, and consider other people then, don’t you? I live here too, miha! I have as much right to the library as you do.” Suddenly her eyes darted to one of the books I had thrown into the fire.
“Oh no, no no no no! Miha! What have you done?” She reached in and grabbed the book, and swore when she saw the burn on her hand. “Miha! Why have you done this?” Damita started crying, “Oh, miha.”
“What? It’s a book.” I said, looking at her in disbelief. Damita never cries.
“This was the book your mother and I wrote,” She stuttered, “Oh, miha”
“Damita, I, I didn’t know, I’m so sorry.” I was shocked beyond belief.
“It’s okay miha. Why don’t we stop burning these books, and put these good ones back on the shelf.” Damita had stopped crying.
“Okay, Damita. But I don’t think we’re gonna get that one back,” I said giggling and pointing to the book Tombi had gripped in her little razor sharp teeth.
Damita laughed and picked Tombi up. Tombi whined because she wanted her book, but I picked it up and walked inside. Damita let Tombi go, and she pranced over to her bed, where her little book lay. She curled up inside her bed, and started gnawing on it.

At ten o’clock, I crawled into bed and turned my alarm clock off- for good.









The sun was gone, that today was the gloomiest day I could remember. I was sitting on the firewood pile, in the firewood shed, waiting for the sun to come out. In front of me was the vegetable patch that Damita said was alive and producing good vegetables, but really was dying. The only thing in this garden that was alive (except for me and Tombi) was the tomato, but that was hanging on by the skin on its teeth, I suppose. The clouds had just settled in. I hope this didn’t ruin Amador’s surprise. The grass in our garden was dry; it needed the rain the dark clouds were bringing. But I didn’t. My bag was packed and waiting next to me. There was twenty minutes till noon. I didn’t want to be early, that would make me look stupid. I didn’t want to be late, that would also make me look stupid. So I would get to the place where we were yesterday at exactly noon.

I darted down the cold, sandy steps, quickly scanning the beach for Amador. He was already there, one and a half minutes early. I ran down to him, and his boat.
“Hello, Bibiana. You’re right on time. So, shall we go?” His voice sounded so smooth, like he had practiced that all day.
“Erm, okay. I’m not too good with boats, so I am now apologizing in advance.”
“For what?”
“Throwing up in your boat.” He looked at me like I was joking. Well, I wasn’t.

We clambered into the old, faded, flaky red wooden boat.
“Are you sure this thing will hold both of us?” I said, an uneasy feeling rising in my stomach.
“Yes, it will, don’t worry.” His smile was so reassuring, that I forgot all about my stomach.
He pushed the boat out to waist depth, and then he climbed in.
“So, this is like a first date, then?” I realised I had met him once, and now he was taking me on a picnic. What if this guy wasn’t as good as e’d looked before?
“Yes, I suppose. Is that okay?” His soothing voice calmed all my nerves. I lay my head beck, soaking up the sun that wasn’t there.
We sailed for ages, past the rocks off the coast, past the buoy, but eventually we got to a little island I didn’t even know existed. It was so small, full of trees and plants.
“Thanks.” He said. I looked at him, slightly confused. What had I done?
“For what?”
“Not throwing up in my boat” he winked at me.

I then caught the imaginary kiss he blew to me. Unfortunately, a sudden lurch under the boat bought me out of my fantasy.

He got out of the boat and pulled it onto shore. The clouds had gone away; the sun was sparkling down on us through the leaves. He pulled a picnic basket out from the boat, and lay out a white and red blanket on the ground. The whole island smelled like the ocean, the salty sea spray on my face smelt so good. We sat down on the soft red and white blanket. He unpacked the basket. He pulled out all kinds of things like berries, cookies but when he pulled out the chocolate milk, I objected.
“I have a dairy allergy, I’m sorry; I can’t imagine how much work you put into that.”
“It’s okay, my younger brother will skull it when I get home, and it’s not homemade, it’s from a carton,” He looked slightly ashamed. “Chocolate dipped strawberry? Oh, wait, strawberry?”
I smiled. “That would be awesome.”

We ate for a while, laughing at how many marshmallows he could stuff in his mouth without choking (which I was partially okay with, then I could give him the kiss of life), or at how much lemonade I could drink without needing to breathe. We sat there for a while and he had his arm around me, watching the sun go down. Suddenly I sat up. We were watching the sun go down. That means it was about six o’clock. Which means I had been away for six hours.
“Oh crap, I’m so, so sorry, but I have to go, I’m so sorry.” I said, trying to pack up the mugs, and plates, and grabbing this and that that had been blown out of reach before. Suddenly, he grabbed my arm.
“Why do you have to leave? You did this yesterday, too.”
“Because, I wasn’t technically allowed to come tonight, or yesterday, and I won’t be allowed any other day in the future, either. I have this massively over protective maid, Damita. I’m not allowed out of the house without her, but she would rather watch re-runs of soap operas from 1976 or something. So, yeah, I really shouldn’t be here”
“Well, okay then. Let’s get out of here.”
We got packed up and back onto that beach so quickly there was no way we didn’t set some new world record or something. I grabbed my bag, and ran up the steps. But before I could, he grabbed my hand, and wrote something on it. I looked down at his number
“Thanks.” I said. He hugged me.
“Call me, okay?” I nodded.
I burst through the old doors; there was no point in being quiet. Or maybe there was. In my rush to hide, or at least give it a good go, I woke Damita. If I had tried to be sneaky, I may have gotten away with it. But no. I didn’t.

“Miha? Is that you? I was looking everywhere, but then, I, erm, got…. tired so I took a rest.”
“Yeah, it’s me. I was down in the, “I tried to quickly think of some excuse that I just randomly said something “basement. Just looking, I’ve never thought of going there before, so I did.”
“Huh. I didn’t think of looking down there. Okay miha.” She was asleep in seconds.

I thrashed open my door, and jumped onto my bed and screamed. I couldn’t believe he hugged me! I was so happy I nearly broke the door. That was when my phone vibrated. I looked at it. He called me.
It took a while to sink in.
He called me. I snapped myself out of my trance, and picked up the phone.
“Hello? Bibiana?” His voice was so smooth, like he had practiced calling me for hours.
“Amador?” My voice was shaky.
“Yeah, it’s me.” I giggled quietly, he made me feel dizzy. “I was wondering if you were okay.” I remembered I told him about Damita.
“Yeah, but I don’t think she saw my excuse…”
“So, you’re really not alowed to go outside without her?” He sounded dissapointed.
“Yeah, I know.”
“Does she know about me? And, if she did, would she let you stay the night at my house?” I must have passed out from shock, as I forgot the last thing he said.
“Wait, what?” Did he really just invite me to his house?
“Would you come over to my house?” He seemed even more dissapointed now.
“Look, Amador, I would love to, but Damita...”
“That’s what I was afraid you’d say.”
“But, you could come over to my house...”
“I could?”
“Yeah! But it wouldn’t be very easy, unless you bring food, and stay in my room all day.”
“I’ll ask if I can.” His voice melted me, like butter on fresh toast.
“Great. See you at…”
“At 7:00?”
“Okay.” He hung up. The little irritating voice inside my head said, “You idiot. Damita is going to trust you less and less. Youre all she’s got and this will break her heart.” I then proceded to tie that voice up, put tape over its mouth, and put it in my draw. I just really hoped the little voice wasn’t right.