What was she doing? She’s going to tell him about some song lyrics about a monster, and what a grief-stricken old woman told her in El Rubí, an area she wasn’t supposed to be walking through.
No way. That would be a disaster. He’d lock her in her room for the rest of the summer or send her to a shrink.
But there were too many connections, she just couldn’t string them together. She looked back at the images of Papi Gringo. Maybe if she talked to him. He wrote the song; there must be more to it. Yes.
She pulled up Tere’s contact.
Hey prima! I’m in PR! Any chance you can meet for coffee today?
Too late Lupe realized it wasn’t even five A.M. yet. But the answer came right away.
Lupe! Hey chica! I heard u were coming! I have a break at 11:00.
Cafeteria Mallorca in OSJ?
What or who is OSJ?
LOL! Old San Juan. U need a ride?
Nah I can get tía to drop me. C U soon!
Lupe lay back down and smiled. Now she just needed some kind of excuse.
* * *
Lupe sat across from Tere for breakfast later that morning sipping dark, rich coffee. Tere was a second cousin, really, but it was hard to follow the complicated tree of her Puerto Rican family, since the branches seemed to go on forever. They were ten years apart in age and totally different in pretty much every aspect. Lupe was always spilling food on her clothes and forgetting to run a brush through her hair before leaving the house, while Tere looked put-together from the minute she stepped out the door in her vintage kitten heels. Lupe’s skin color was like something that lived in a cave, while her cousin’s coloring was rich and warm and filled with sun. Tere was full-blooded Puerto Rican with almost the same figure as Lupe, but on her it looked fabulous. She wore fifties-style dresses that emphasized her tiny waist and curvy hips and when she walked, everything swayed back and forth as if there were music playing only for her.
Lupe had to keep herself from babbling too fast since the strong, dark coffee and powdered sugar mallorcas were making the blood buzz in her skull like a hive of bees.
“So, what have you been doing since you got in?” Tere asked, her lipstick miraculously unmarred by the powdery pastry.
Oh, visiting the scene of a murder, which freaked out Aunt Maria, waiting for our uncle to get back from a second crime scene, you know, typical teen stuff. On second thought, best not to fill in all the details. “Tío has been pretty busy with these murders going on—”
“¡Ay! So horrible! I can’t believe this is happening. Poor Esteban having to do such dangerous work. This is why I chose entertainment law, Lupe. No dead bodies.”
Lupe laughed. Then she realized that was a perfect segue. “The two boys who were killed were friends, did you know that?” Did Tere know that cousin Izzy was friends with them? Damned if she was going to be the one to tell her if she didn’t know already. “I read in the paper today that even that singer Papi Gringo ran with them.”
Tere looked up at that. “Yes, but he doesn’t really travel in those circles anymore. Those boys took a different path. Carlos lives pretty clean. He’s a vegan, for heaven’s sake.”
“I get the sense he’s a big star down here.”
Tere laughed. “Not just down here, pretty much everywhere, chica. Where have you been?”
“Vermont. Trust me, no one’s heard of reggaeton there.”
“He’s a good kid. I represent him, you know.”
Lupe feigned surprise. “You know him?”
“Seguro. It’s a small island.”
Lupe tried to keep her voice even. “Do you think you could, maybe, arrange for me to talk to him?”
“Papi Gringo? Why do you want to talk to him?”
Lupe pulled up the excuse she’d made up earlier that morning. “I sometimes write for Seven Days, a statewide newspaper in Vermont, and an article on Papi Gringo would be cool.” She made sure her voice sounded conversational, light. “You know, exposing New England to our musica?” Yeah, it was thin, but it was the best she could come up with. Did she feel good that she’d lied to two of her relatives in twenty-four hours? No. But that didn’t stop her. It was all for the greater good.
She watched as Tere fished in her handbag. “If you want to talk to him, I can arrange it. Papi Gringo’s in town this week. He’s having a big block party in his old neighborhood on Saturday. It’s a big deal, bringing some attention to Amapola. Lord knows they need it. Poor place is going downhill like it’s being shoved.”
Mission accomplished. “Oh!” She put her hand on Tere’s arm. “Don’t mention the Papi Gringo thing to Esteban, okay?”
“Are you kidding? Who do you think he’d be more angry with? The person who did it, or the older, ‘more responsible’ cousin who arranged it?” She winked at Lupe and opened her lip gloss wand.
One more question she had to ask. “Hey, how’s cousin Izzy?”
Tere froze for a second, lip gloss in mid-swipe. Then she started moving again as if someone had flicked a switch. “You know Izzy. He’s got his own life. I haven’t seen him since Juan’s wedding last year.” And more to herself than to Lupe: “And he wasn’t in very good shape then.”
“Not in good shape. In what way?”
Tere closed her vintage straw handbag with a sharp snap. “Nothing for you to worry about.” She motioned to the ancient waiter for the check.
* * *
As the car entered the old city the next morning her uncle gave her a lecture about staying on the main streets and not talking to strangers—as if she were five—but she just nodded and didn’t say a word. Since Lupe couldn’t tell him where she was really going she knew she’d better play it cool. If he found out, he’d ship her butt back to Vermont, and she’d never figure out what everything meant. Though they had often discussed his cases, this took it to an entirely different level. But with her cousin Izzy involved in some way no one was willing to explain, this case was personal. Family business. She knew Esteban wouldn’t buy that so she figured out the bus route to where the reggaeton singer lived. After all, she was sixteen, almost an adult. She could manage to travel a few towns over all by herself.
That was her story and she was sticking with it.
The bus to Isla Verde was waiting for her when she arrived at the station, belching exhaust into the open concrete building. It took her a few tries to understand the bus fare. Seventy-five cents? That couldn’t be right. Seventy-five cents didn’t buy you anything these days. She shrugged, put her three quarters in the till, and made her way back through the bus. It was an odd hour, so most of the seats were empty. She fell into one in the next-to-last row, scooching over so she could look out the window. As they pulled out, they passed by the huge luxury liner ships that were spewing red-faced, hungover tourists onto the wooden slats of the pier. The tourists shielded their eyes from the sun as if it were attacking them. Lupe supposed it was.
The buildings began to change as the bus wove through traffic. They were gradually getting less cared for and there were more and more abandoned buildings, green vines pushing from their hollow insides like giant Chia Pets. Her heart started to speed up with the movement of the bus as the old city was left behind. Lupe had never done anything like this before. When she came to the island she was always in arm’s reach of her father, never alone. And she’d certainly never lied to her uncle or her cousin. She swallowed hard, pushing the guilt further down into her belly.
The neighborhoods changed rapidly once they left the tourist area, the problems with the economy taking their toll on the island.
As the bus waited for a line of people to board on Calle Loíza, Lupe noticed the poster on the bus stop shelter. It was a huge ad for Papi Gringo’s new album. His neck was draped with gold chains as thick as ropes, his eyes covered with black sunglasses, “El Cuco” in ornate script below. The ad was riddled with what appeared to be bullet holes. She shivered, a bad feeling crawling across her skin.
Was this a good idea
?
Gradually the scenery changed again, becoming more colorful, with more people milling about the streets. Finally, she saw the first high-rise out of the windows on the other side, the winking turquoise ocean beyond. She remembered the Amigos supermarket up ahead from seeing it from the highway. Isla Verde. She rang the bell and made her way to the exit.
This was crazy. Here she was in a town she’d only seen from a distance, and she was going to saunter through and meet with a recording star?
Whose life was this, anyway?
The bus pulled away, leaving Lupe in a cloud of gray exhaust that contrasted with the electric blue of the sky. Across the avenue was a long line of high-end apartment buildings. When the light changed, she made her way across. Papi Gringo’s condo building was right across the street and she took deep breaths as she made her way up the driveway, smoothing her dress against her legs.
“You’ve got this,” she said just before opening the glass front door. The guard had her name already, so he escorted her into the elevator, turned a key on the console, pressed the PH button, tipped his uniform hat at her, and left. And there she was, riding up in the mirrored elevator to the penthouse. She avoided looking at the seemingly hundred reflections that surrounded her. She had struggled with what to wear but finally settled on a simple blue sundress, thinking it was classier than her usual choices. Now here she was, riding up in an elevator to a star’s apartment, and she felt prissy.
As she watched the lighted floor numbers shift, she could almost hear her heartbeat, it was going so fast. It wasn’t every day that she talked to a celebrity. Who was she kidding? She’d never talked to a celebrity. She flipped her hair back, the multiple reflections mimicking the movement.
Papi Gringo’s song was playing in Lupe’s mind as the elevator opened directly into the apartment. So that was why you needed a key to press the button in the elevator. She found herself facing a wall of glass with an unobstructed view of the ocean, the progressing shades of turquoise glittering with reflected sunlight. It was decorated sparsely but super-elegantly, with all-white furniture, a grand piano, and splashes of color on canvassed art that hung around the room. She could see a sliver of a large, white and stainless kitchen that looked like the display model in an expensive appliance store. Papi Gringo wasn’t much older than she was, but this looked like an adult apartment. She’d read he bought it when he was just sixteen, plus the entire floor beneath it for his parents to live in.
Lupe pulled out her cell phone to take a selfie. As she touched the button a smiling face appeared above her shoulder.
“I see you found your way up, Señorita Dávila.”
Lupe’s cheeks turned red as she shoved the phone in her bag and whirled around. She found herself looking up into the face of a tall, hot … man. Seventeen or no, this was a man. “Z’at okay?” she stammered.
She hoped she took the photo in time so that he was in it.
“Of course, would you like to sit down?” he asked, gesturing to the white leather couches. Passing him, she caught the scent of limes and some kind of spice. Boy, he smelled good.
As she walked toward the living area, Lupe assessed him out of the corner of her eye. His skin was pale olive, impossibly smooth, his hair shiny black and cut tight to his head, and his lips were full and the color of ripe guavas. He was dressed in dark jeans, and a tight black T-shirt hugged his muscular chest and flat stomach. Just like Izzy, his forearms were covered with intricate black tattoos. As he sat down across from her she noticed the lack of expected bling around his neck. The rope chains must be just for performance. Instead, in the center of his chest lay a simple gold cross on a chain. She adjusted the fabric of her dress as she sat down like some prim Catholic middle schooler. Don’t be such a loser, she thought as she glanced up to find him looking her up and down, a small smile playing across his lips. She was embarrassed to feel warmth growing in her chest and spreading down to her stomach.
“Well, Lupe—may I call you Lupe?”
She nodded, numb. Her name sounded like silk on his lips. Smooth, sexy silk. The heat was spreading to her limbs.
“Lupe, what can I do for you?”
She coughed into her fist. “Papi Gringo—”
“Carlos.”
“Huh? I mean, excuse me?”
He looked up at her, his eyes softer and tired. “My real name is Carlos.”
“I know.” She smiled at him then. It was as if she were speaking to another person entirely, someone who really was her age. Well, if she was going to make this ruse work she’d better make with the interview. She consulted her phone for the filler questions she’d come up with that morning. She was going to tread carefully, though. Starting out with asking about his murdered friends was sure to make him call security.
“So, how did you get into the business? Were you always into music?”
“Ah, well that was one good thing that came out of living in my old neighborhood.”
She pretended to consult her notes. “Amapola?”
“Yes, exactly. You do your research.” And he smiled that smile. The one that was higher on one side, topped by a small dimple on his left cheek like an accent. The smile that gave her that tingly feeling.
“In the Amapola of my childhood, music was everywhere.”
“Of your childhood? What do you mean? How has Amapola changed?” Damn! She was good at this reporter thing.
He sighed. “Let’s just say it’s suffering in the way much of the island is. But as I was saying, my parents love classic Puerto Rican music: danza, plena, salsa.” He paused. “You know this music, yes?”
Lupe felt the heat rush to her face. It felt like the How Puerto Rican are you? test she sometimes got down here. She hated tests. But salsa she knew, and from the word “danza” she assumed they were dances and a form of music. She could usually fake her way through. “Of course. However, I’ve never had the pleasure of dancing them.”
He smiled in that way again. “I hope to have the opportunity to dance them with you one day.”
Boy, it was getting hot in there.
“Reggaeton was all around me, at school, on the calle. I loved the traditional music, but this was part of our generation, tu sabes? I followed it even after we moved to the mainland.”
She stammered out a few more of the classic interview questions: whose music inspires you (Daddy Yankee, Don Omar, and Wisin y Yandel); what was it like being a star so young (great, but he still had the same responsibilities as other guys his age: college applications, helping his mother with grocery shopping … she didn’t buy a word of this); and what was he working on (a crossover album in English). When she thought she’d done enough fake interviewing, Lupe got down to the real reason for her visit. But she had to fish carefully.
“Can you tell me about your new song ‘El Cuco’?”
He paused and looked at her. After a minute he said, “Okay. What about it?”
The temperature in the room dropped. Lupe recited a stanza from the song. “‘It’s retribution that rules the night.’”
Carlos stared at her, his arms draped over the back of the couch. “It’s just something my mom used to tell me when I was little to scare me into behaving. I think every boy in PR has heard the story of El Cuco.”
“Well, it’s a metaphorical monster, right? I mean, there’s no such thing.”
“Oh Lupe, of course there is. I think some people have their own personal monsters.”
“I think real life is weird enough without believing in monsters.”
“Well, down here it’s everywhere. In every leaf, every stone. You just have to be open to it.”
Okay, that’s enough of that. “Yeah, okay. But I was wondering, retribution for what?”
“Señorita Dávila, it’s just a song.”
So he was suddenly formal. “Just a song,” she repeated. Her cover story suddenly left her as she stared at the man with his legs casually crossed, his whole demeanor cool, calm, and collected. Then she pict
ured him as he was on the poster, holes spread across his chest, blood splattered all over the white of the pristine apartment like some scene from DOA Newark. Suddenly she was tired of cover stories and flirting. She believed that he could be in danger. “I’m sure you’re aware that two of your childhood friends have been killed over the last few days?” She heard her voice, confident and strong, as if it were coming from a real detective.
He sat up straighter, his sultry look shifting to something more serious. “Yes, God rest their souls.” He absently fingered the cross on his chest.
“Don’t you think it’s odd that two guys from your old neighborhood died in such a short period of time?”
He uncrossed his legs then, all pretense of the sexy star act gone. “Yes, well, Amapola isn’t what it used to be. It’s turning into a dangerous place and those two got into some sketchy things over the last few years.”
He started to get to his feet, and Lupe got the sense she was about to be dismissed. Lupe the conversation killer. She rushed to speak. “I was thinking there might be some connection? I mean, these deaths seem like retribution for something, don’t you think? Just like your song.”
He sat back down, leaned forward, and looked her in the eye. He said nothing for a full minute. Lupe shifted uncomfortably under his gaze. “Señorita Dávila, I got away from that life when I was a kid. If you’re trying to say that I did something to get those guys—”
Crap. She was screwing this all up. Her heartbeat started pushing against the cotton front of her sundress. “No, no, not at all! That isn’t what I meant. It’s just that, what if someone is targeting your old friends from Amapola?” She had to get him to understand, she knew she was just a girl from Vermont, not a journalist or Detective Leah Carlson, but there was something about this case.
He relaxed a bit back into the cushions. “My mom would say that we reap what we sow. Luckily, we got out of there right after my thirteenth birthday. My parents moved us to Nueva York. I only saw those guys when I came down for vacaciones from then on.”
Five Midnights Page 7
