The Butterfly Effect

by Luis A. Santamaría

  He had told the truth about his identity.

  In the lower left corner of the card, the close-up of a very young Mike, smiling and with bright eyes. Most likely, he was fresh out of college. The heading occupied the center of the document.

  So ingratiated was she wondering that she almost didn’t realize that her companion was already returning from the bathroom, and if he had been attentive, he would have caught her red handed with his wallet where he had left it.

  She barely escaped from getting caught.

  "Well." Sara Mora resumed the conversation as Mike sat down, shifting the subject to another that interested her more. "You owe me a story."

  They both smiled, surprised at how quickly they were beginning to get involved.

  "Indeed, I owe you," he said, clapping his hand. “What do you want to know?”

  "Your relationship with Charley."

  “Agreed. Where to begin...” Mike hesitated thoughtfully for a few moments, as if to recompose a long story in his brain. “My brother has never been very normal, that's the truth. Since he was a small kid, he entertained himself by breaking my toys or by burning anything he was given. Then, being older, he always missed class; he was belligerent to the teachers and also to our mother. I never got along with him, even though we were identical brothers. At least in the physical, fortunately I didn’t behave like him. I felt ashamed of my own brother. And fear.” It seemed to her that Lennard's eyes glazed as his voice sounded more broken. “As we became teenagers, he started becoming violent. You couldn’t say anything to him, and at the least reproach he threatened us or he would bruise us sometimes.”

  “Us?” Sara frowned. “Who else did he bully besides you?”

  “My mother. She was a very good woman, she gave us everything but she never knew how to straighten Charley. Things got worse and worse.”

  "What about your father?"

  “My father?” Mike said, as if the question was stupid. “He is the reason my brother was like that! He was an unscrupulous man, aggressive and ruthless. And that's how he became mayor, of course.”

  "Did he hit you?" Sara asked, more and more intrigued.

  "Charley or my father?"

  "Your father," she agreed.

  "He never touched me, but my mother..." The twin waved and paused to swallow. “My mother, he beat her almost every day, always at night. He made sure that Charley and I were laying down, and then he untied his belt and hit her with it.” Lennard made a subtle gesture with his hand, as if waving an invisible whip. “I know because I never slept until the beatings ended, although my mother did everything possible not to scream. She didn’t want to scare us.”

  “And your brother? Was he aware?”

  "Charlie and I slept in the same bunk. He could hear me crying every time the attacks took place, but I can’t say the same about him.” Mike Lennard's voice had turned into a murmur. “My brother never showed the minimum feeling of sadness towards our mother, nor fear towards our father.”

  Sara had run out of questions. Or, rather, she was too moved to formulate them.

  "It turned out all right, after all," Mike said with a sorry expression. “My dear mother, aware that it was a matter of time before Rubial went overboard and ended her life, decided to escape without saying anything. She explained her intentions and I, as it could not be otherwise, accompanied her. Until the last moment, she intended to take my brother with us, against my will. Luckily, he had just entered a reform school for hitting a teacher and it was impossible to get him out of there.” He took a sip of his espresso macchiato, and his voice rose. “So we left Ámber without him, and we lost sight of them forever. Thank God.”

  "Wow, what an incredible story," said Sara, still in shock. “So you came to live in Oxford?”

  "We settled in London, in a little house on the banks of the river, just outside the city," Mike explained, a nostalgic smile on his face. “My mother remarried, this time with a decent man, the typical Englishman of extraordinary principles. I lived with them until she died, five years ago. Then I was offered work in Oxford and I didn’t hesitate.”

  "Had you heard from Charley or your father?"

  "No, except for a gift my brother sent me some years ago. A music box.”

  "A music box?"

  “Yes, one of those simple boxes that generates an uncomfortable melody when you open them. Next to it I found a brief note of brotherly love that sounded like a goodbye. It said to consider that box as a symbol of family union, and insisted that I never throw it away.” He clenched his fists as if he held back some grudge. “Now I use the box as a place for my watch. I really don’t know why I keep it.”

  "And apart from that?"

  "Apart from that, nothing. Until the other day I received the call informing me that my brother had taken his life. As for my father, it came to my ears that he had resigned from the post of mayor, disappearing from the map. I never knew if it was true or not, and I'm not interested either.”

  Mike Lennard leaned forward and took the girl's hands.

  "Sara, I'm so terribly sorry you had to suffer a monstrosity at the hands of my brother."

  She allowed herself to feel him caress her knuckles, and she realized that it had been a long time since a comforting warmth made her feel sheltered that way.

  They said goodbye in the street, under the Bridge of Sighs, promising to see each other again. Mike wanted to go further and invited Sara to dinner at his house the next day, but she was hesitant. "Tomorrow I have said I’ll stay with my foster family for the day in Cambridge," she lied, for she wasn’t yet convinced of his intentions, "although we should exchange telephone numbers!" By half, Mike had to accept. Once the numbers were noted by each, they kissed on the cheek and said goodbye. They both went their respective ways with a more lively expression than they had been a few hours before.

  Neither of them noticed that a police officer had been watching them. Standing, leaning against the wall of the Bodleian Library, Alfred Horner had the sudden presentiment that something bad was going to happen.

  Chapter 4

  "Tell me, is it because of that amazing love story that you’re locked in here? Did you commit some madness?”

  "I'm here because of a pummeling from Oli."

  "Who is this Oli?"

  “My grandson, it is all his fault.”

  Wednesday, November 8, 2006

  A wrinkled tongued licked Tallent's cheek and didn’t stop until it had accomplished its purpose: to awaken her.

  "Oh, Vader... Shit," the girl cursed between babbling with one eye still half closed.

  The morning light of that Wednesday was already traversing the fine pistachio-colored curtains in the bedroom. Tallent leaned toward the alarm clock that sat on a wooden bedside table, very vintage. It was 9:45. It was time to wake up, as Vader had reminded her as he jumped out of bed and in a flash went into the dining area, and saw his empty food bowl.

  The newly woken woman rubbed her face with both hands and stretched her arms until the muscles of her back creaked. Then she filled Vader's bowl with pellets, put a Paul Simon record in the living room’s record player, and went to look out the window. Oxford had dawned quiet and beautiful. The sun invaded Walton Street and bicycles circled the asphalt, autumn was already beginning to make its appearance falling from the trees. She yawned again, and a lovely moan, like a whimper, came out of her mouth.

  She had breakfast only with the company of Hearts and Bones of Simon. Vader, who had already quenched his hunger, had become a ball of sleeping fur on the sofa, and she prepared for a new day of work. Or whatever she did, since playing her favorite classicals for outdoor tourists could not be considered a job. And much less rehearsing with the Oxford Symphony Orchestra, which was what she devoted every morning. She liked it too much to qualify herself as a work slave.

  When she went to put on her leather boots, she felt the right ankle with her hand. As every morning, the old injury hurt her, and as every morning, she remember
ed her Brunet when she felt that pain. Four years had passed and the grief was still there, that her joint sent a reminder daily to her heart to avoid forgetting. As if it were routine, the young woman drew a smile of perfect nostalgia on her face.

  She had always been clear: life was not going to give her anything. When she was only fifteen years old, her father, David Tallent's all-terrain vehicle that he was driving in the Swiss Alps, fell downhill during the vacation he enjoyed with his wife, Mary. Both died instantly, leaving an orphaned child. Tallent was able to adapt to the circumstances and wore armor around her soul that forced her to mature. Far from deterrence, she decided to fulfill her dream to become a professional violinist. She found work, as a waitress first and cocktail waitress afterwards, in the Red Lion, one of the most important pubs in Oxford. For several years she had to work seven days a week in order to finance music lessons, and when she had any amount of free time, she would take the violin out to the street and practice her favorite songs in front of the pedestrians. No one ever remembered seeing her with a man, very occasionally she drank a drink of alcohol, and she hated the noise of the nightclubs. Instead she cultivated a taste for the small pleasures of life: scratching the sock mark on her ankles, lying between freshly washed sheets or being surprised by the smell of freshly baked bread. Despite her tragic adolescence, the young woman was one of those who left a mark: sweet, sensible and sure of herself, ultimately resplendent. She always had a kind word or advice for her friends, and especially when she played the violin, she radiated a joy of life that transferred to her melodies. No one played like her; she was a world in herself.

  The young British woman met Brunet at the Red Lion bar on a night in September 2001. That evening they exchanged looks and amusing wordplay, and from then on, Brunet began to go to the Red Lion quite often until she invited her to go to the movies.

  Tallent was aware that Brunet barely understood her English, having arrived in the city from Spain through an Erasmus scholarship. But that made it even more exciting: they had fun trying to understand each other, and when they didn’t, they played with their imagination, which was exciting. The couple spent almost half a year sinking into what became a kind of prolonged summer romance.

  Basically, she was the best, Tallent recalled from her room. They went on picnics, went out for beer, and, on a couple of occasions, escaped to Liverpool and Bath all weekend. In short, they had a great time. When they drove through the streets of Oxford, in an old green Peugeot that the natives call Minifalcon, they talked about everything except what they would do with their relationship in the future. Tallent's music encompassed everything surrounding the couple. If the violinist liked a genre, she would bring it up over and over again. On one occasion, remembered the British woman, she interpreted the classic of the sixties, Eleanor Rigby, for her love during a whole month. Brunet was fascinated by her music. Once, the snow began to fall hard as they drove through the Headington neighborhood. Then a local radio station punched out a ballad of Roy Orbison, and Brunet, aware of her predilection for the singer, stepped on the brakes in the middle of the storm, took her lover by the hand and dragged her tenderly toward the street. There she danced with her, singing in her ear You Got It, while the snow fell through the streetlights. It was as if the world belonged to them.

  It was the best months of her life.

  Four long years later, the violinist continued to revive her romance. Since she left without being able to say goodbye because of the untimely ankle injury suffered during the last morning, she had never heard from Brunet again. Nevertheless, she had set fire to her soul. It was as if she had the dark suspicion that she would never love anyone as purely as Brunet. Her thoughts discouraged her every morning, making her a prey to a fleeting love that was doomed from the beginning.

  It was the drop of a tear from her cheek to the parquet, which made her stop daydreaming and finished with her boots. She wiped her eyes with her palms, wished her cat good morning, and went out the door of the apartment with her inseparable violin on her back.

  At one-quarter past noon, in Ámber, police chief Julian Barreneche and his young companion, Marcos Tena, entered through the door of the Sensations bar. They had visited Charley’s house just before, not without a certain stupor, even though it didn’t seem worthy of such denomination. The dust made it almost impossible to breathe, and the mess of the place, even though it barely had furniture, was absolute. Both police officers agreed that it met all the requirements of an abandoned place. And yet it was where Charley lived. "That crazy suicidal must have been an absolute character," were the exact words of Barreneche, who showed in his tone that he still couldn’t understand what the hell he was doing there.

  Apart from confirming the peculiarity of the deceased, they didn’t find in the house any clue that could be useful to them. They also went back to reviewing his Land Rover though it was the first thing the police found next to the cliff on the day of the incident, and again unsuccessfully: only the dry patches of some cheap whiskey scattered on the hood. The Sensations, that dump that Rubial had in his name, was their last option to discover any connecting thread. Barreneche hoped for the same success. He wished he could find nothing of interest, go home, and that Judge Callejo would file the case once and for all.

  The Sensations door was open, so they entered without knocking. The drawn curtains plunged the room in gloom, even though the sun shone outside. A huge mass of flesh and blubber snored grotesquely inside the bar, lying on the wooden bench. Barreneche gestured to his deputy, untied the button of his jean jacket and accessed the inside of the bar from one end to the other end. He picked up a pitcher of beer and then poured half a bottle of vodka into it, which he found among the shelves. When he had finished, he tossed the contents of the jug over the giant's head without the least bit of regard. He awoke between spasms and clumsily shoved his back against the cash register when he stepped back. The youngest of the policemen couldn’t suppress a timid laugh.

  “What... what do you want?” Asked the tallow ball, confused. “Beer?”

  "I'm a cop, you idiot," said Barreneche, scathingly, showing his plaque with an air of superiority.

  The fat man's eyes widened. His first reaction was to look toward the exit, and then he said,

  "No... no drugs here, guys," he said frightened. “You can check it out if you want!”

  The commissary drew a half circle with his right hand and gave the giant such a slap that left an imprint of his knuckles on the cheekbone. Visibly pissed, but not moving a single muscle in his face, he grabbed the ponytail and dragged the bartender's huge head up under the brew tap. Then he moved the crank, releasing the alcohol. Tena was alert. Why did his boss have to behave like that?

  "Maybe I'd like some beer," the superior said cruelly. “What's your name, chubby?”

  "Mahh..." The man could barely breathe with the beer all over his face. Barreneche released him.

  "Maximilian!" He cried out in gasps once more. “That’s my name. And I'm going to report you, you fucking sons of...!”

  The commissary interrupted him sardonically:

  "Don’t make me laugh, Maximilian. You won’t report this if you don’t want anyone to know that you use this rats nest to deal drugs.”

  Max hesitated. He certainly had him against a rock. Marcos Tena watched the scene intently.

  "Then what do you want, if it's not drugs?"

  "You're going to tell me everything you know about Carlos Rubial," Barreneche said.

  "Charley?"

  "Yes, Charley,” cried Marcos Tena. It was the first time he had opened his mouth since entering.

  "He hit the rocks a few days ago," said Max, who seemed about to pee his pants.

  Barreneche rolled his eyes.

  "Something we don’t know, stupid junkie?" He insisted impatiently.

  "Well... Charley didn’t tell me much," said the giant. “The weeks before he committed suicide, he came and went, but he almost never stayed. He unattended the bar
, as you can see. Something worried him. Charley was a very strange guy.”

  "Didn’t you see anything in particular? Any details, maybe?” Barreneche wanted to know.

  Max shrugged.

  "He brought a phone one day," he said.

  “A phone?” This time both cops spoke in unison.

  "Yes, inside a box. But he never used it,” Max said. “It’s no longer here, he took it.”

  The agents glanced at each other, wondering if any of them had anything more to add.

  "He had no family? Friends?” Asked Marcos Tena, anxious to bring something to the table. “I don’t know, what did he do when he wasn’t here?”

  "He had no one."

  Maximilian froze his repulsive expression for a few seconds, thoughtfully, then added:

  "Well, there was a girl," he asserted, and continued to ponder.

  The officers looked at each other again. Tena was filled with enthusiasm. His superior, on the other hand, seemed bored.

  “What girl?” Marcos wanted to know, eager for clues to follow.

  Max's eyes widened to look like two marbles. Apparently, he had just come up with the name.

  "Alyssa!" He exclaimed. “Alyssa Grifero I think it was her full name. Find it and you’ll get the answers you are looking for.”

  "Alyssa Grifero," Tena whispered as he scribbled it in his notebook. “What did she have to do with Charley?”

  "A whore?" Barreneche added, with marked rudeness. “Was she his girl?”

  "Alyssa was a child.” Max's face darkened as he shook his head. “But she had something with Charley that I never understood, guys. He wouldn’t allow her into the bar,” he said with a stern tone of voice. “I insist, she was just a girl.”

  The interrogation had ended for Julian Barreneche, and therefore also for his young assistant. After the policeman dried his hands with a dry cloth, they left Max caring for the inflammation on his cheekbone with an ice cube and left the Sensations.