Alejandro
The memory of holding her and tasting her is still prominent in my mind.
I went to bed thinking of Lucia Ferreira, and she was my first thought when I woke over an hour ago.
Now that I’m talking to Eric about her, she’s stuck in my head even more. Much more than I would like because yesterday was a mistake I can’t take back now that I’ve had a taste of her.
That six-month trial was something I added on as a safety net.
A sort of get-out-of-jail clause for me.
Unknown to her, she had that job the moment she walked through the door, but she hooked me the moment she bared her soul. It wasn’t when she told me about her father, or her mother’s death, although that enlightened me.
It was her confession of being in a relationship with her college professor.
The confession drew me to her because I recognized the pain in her eyes. I understood it came from that place inside that shatters you when you realize you’ve been tangled in a web of lies. It also stems from knowing you’re doing the wrong thing and feeling like you should have known better.
I understand because that’s exactly what happened to me.
I press the phone to my ear as Eric continues talking about his findings on Lucia.
He’s just given me the rundown on her previous employers, and everything so far seems legit. Last night, I asked him to do further checks. Part of me hoped he’d find something that would terminate this crazy idea; the other half of me wants her to be as clean as she appears to be because I want the distraction. Although I know never to drop my guard, after yesterday, I secretly want the chance to forget the shit in my outside world I can’t control.
“Stuff with her parents checked out, too,” Eric says with a sigh. “Her father is in a lot of debt, Alejandro, and there are signs of a gambling addiction. There’s not a bank statement over the last two years that doesn’t have something on there for a casino or something of that nature. Always just before a hospital bill or something medical, which I’m guessing is to do with her mother. The medical bills were sky high, ranging into the thousands nearly every month. The last bill sadly was paid after her funeral.”
“Do you know what her mother had?”
“Yeah, she had valvular stenosis in all valves of her heart,” he replies with sympathy.
Valvular stenosis is a type of heart valve disease. If she had problems with all her valves, that explains the high-cost medical treatment. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out Lucia’s father did everything he could to pay for it.
There are so many things about this girl that remind me of myself.
“You should see the bills. I’ve never seen anything like this,” Eric adds.
Having walked that road before, I can imagine what it must look like.
“Treatment can cost a lot for anything like that. Most insurance companies won’t even touch you if they know you have a history or anyone in your family has any kind of condition like that.”
“You know I’m going to ask you about your medical past at some point, right?” He chuckles.
“You wouldn’t be you if you didn’t.” I find myself smiling at his lightheartedness. I need lighthearted sometimes.
“I can’t see anything more for her parents that stands out other than her father was listed as working with the Department of Defense as a civil servant. There’s no job title, though. Sometimes, that’s done on purpose for obvious reasons. That was six-years ago. There are some steady payments in the years that follow which suggests some freelance work, but I can’t find any recent work history for him, which probably explains the level of debt. I figured he could have also been taking care of his wife.”
“All right. Looks like you dug deep enough.” Deeper than the basic check I got, which was already enough. Now I just have something more trustworthy.
“Yes, I did. Alejandro, the last thing is, she had an older brother. He killed himself nearly four years ago.”
That gives me pause, and I connect what Lucia told me about her college professor. That happened three years ago. Her brother died first. Did one event spur on the other?
Regardless, that’s a lot to happen to a person in such a short time span. Her brother and mother’s death and this college professor.
“Thanks for doing this for me. I think she’s clean.”
“But you don’t sound convinced,” he surmises.
“I just don’t want to fuck this up.” I left out the darker parts of my carefully construed contract with this new nanny of mine, but Eric is a man like me. Or he was before he got married.