I stand there in complete shock, I look at the man who has just called himself Iñaki. I try to get a good look at his features, at the way he carries himself. Could it be the same Iñaki I knew from our performing arts high school? What are the chances of running into him again? Like one in a million, especially at Mardi Gras, where there are tens of thousands of souls around us.
“Did you go to NOCYA?” I ask, feeling my insides flutter.
I hope this man is not that Iñaki Leblanc. Because if it is, I don’t think I will bear seeing him in this way. A sunken, desperate shell of the vibrant and soulful person who once existed inside of him.
“Yeah,” he says, stiffening as he crosses his arms against his chest. “Why are you asking?”
“Iñaki, it’s me, Corrie. We were in high school together. What happened to you?”
He turns away and says nothing. I notice that the way his face crumples up, that I have opened Pandora’s box. He stands there for what feels like a snail’s pace, then looks at me. Iñaki Roth was a brilliant pianist who could play with precise perfection whatever he heard, and who won the hearts of many a girl in our music classes. An all A-student with a mom who cheered him on at each one of his recitals.
Seeing him now, it’s like looking at a vacant body. No soul inside it at all. I know people change and do things they may not be proud of. I know that. But why Iñaki? Why him? Why did he have to be spun around so hard by life until there is nothing left of the person who once was?
“Corrie,” he says, frowning but glaring his eyes. “Seeing you here brings back memories. I didn’t recognize you at first, but now I see it.”
“You’re better than all of this,” I say, gesturing to the stranger, still holding his flute. “Why are you stealing? I thought you went to Juilliard.”
“Don’t talk to me about Juilliard,” he says to me, his voice sharp and tight as he glared at me. “I heard you went to Loyola. Got a full ride, too. Congrats, princess. You got it all.” He frowns.
“But you have a daughter now,” I say with a smile. “She looks a lot like you.”
“Yeah, she does,” he says with a smile. “My Mariposa.”
“Here,” the flutist says. “Take it.”
“No,” the man says, shaking his head. “I cannot take this from you.”
“Don’t need it. I’m going back to Spain in a week. I have enough.”
“But, sir, this is three-hundred dollars. Aren’t you going to press charges?”
The stranger shakes his head. “Take it, on one condition. You’ll go directly to your hija with this money and give her a birthday gift from us. Just say it’s friends who care very much about her. Give her a new instrument with that money. Will you do that?”
“Yes,” he says with a nod, tears flowing down his cheeks. “I will. Thank you.”
The thief walks away when an idea strikes me like a ton of bricks. I am going to make sure that I see this to fruition, even if it kills me in the process. If I let him go now, I’ll lose the opportunity for him to really better his life forever.
“Wait,” I yell out. “Iñaki, wait! Please!”
He turns around, furrowing his brow. “Yeah?”
“My dad’s number is on this card.” I hand him my dad’s card, feeling hopeful that this will change everything for him.
“Why do I need his digits?” He asks, shrugging.
“Dad will remember you. You were always playing Rachmaninov in the piano store when we used to hang out. He can train you to sell pianos, heck you can even apprentice him on restoring them. Do it for your daughter, Iñaki.”
“Like he’d hire me with my track record. I’ve got priors.”
“Just talk to him,” I say. “Will you do it?”
He glares at me and chuckles as he shakes his head. “You haven’t changed, Corrie. Still as insistent as ever. All right, all right, I’ll call him.”
Once the stranger and I are alone, I breathe a sigh of relief that everything went a way that ended in everyone staying alive, and that the stranger got his flute back. But I think of my old classmate.
We were never especially close, but he was a good friend of Mei, my best friend, who had the biggest crush on him. His parents were blue-collar laborers working hard to support their son at NOCYA.
“I can’t believe we found it,” I say. “I can’t believe he was here.”
He smiles at me and says. “Thank you for helping me find my flute. Mil gracias. How can I ever repay you?” He opens his arms and pulls me into an embrace.
All at once, something strange happens as he wraps his arms around, pulling me in, closer, tighter. I close my eyes and see myself standing at the edge of a river, nothing but trees and cabins behind me. I feel at peace, just for that moment, something I have not felt. He releases me from his embrace and I descend back to reality. What just happened to me? My mind is still swimming, and my body is betraying me by wanting to get closer and closer to him.
“You have saved me. I thought my life was over,” he says, putting his hands on my shoulders. I nearly collapse from his touch. He smiles at me and takes his flute case and puts the strap over his shoulder.
I see now how handsome he is.
I realize after all this time that the case is a Wiseman case and my green monster once again takes over, freely flowing through my veins, taking home in my body. No wonder why he tossed out one-hundred dollars like it was nothing. Wiseman cases are near the cost of a mid-level flute, around two-thousand dollars on average.
“It’s no problem at all, sir,” I say to him, smiling at the thought of a job well done and how easily everything resolved itself.
I am not sure if that thief will change his ways, but at least he got a little something out of the exchange we had. Something for his Mariposa, at least.
“No, do not call me sir. I’m only thirty-four. Nicolas is my name. Nicolas Moreno Llosa.”
“Your middle name is Moreno?” I ask.
He chuckles. “No, my is Moreno Llosa. My entire last name. I forget people in the United States do not work on the same system we do. What is your name?”
“Corinne Broussard, uh, Johnson.”
He laughs at my attempt to double-up my name like the Spanish does, and I quite like the sound of his laugh and the way his dark eyes light up. But then the silence between us courses through us, each of us unable to say any words at all. He brings his case tighter to the side of his rib and looks down, shuffling his feet and clears his throat.
Then my phone rings. I admit the ringtone is a little embarrassing, as I expertly chose Emmanuel Pahud’s version ofBach’s What can I say? I’m a fan.
“Aren’t you going to answer your phone?” Nicolas asks, stifling a smile. “Bach doesn’t like to wait.”
I reach into my pocket and stifle a gasp. Why on God’s green earth is Jeff calling me right now?
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