Chapter 4

What were the chances!

He skipped onto the deck and landed, oh! so very lightly, right at the exact moment that Carly Simon’s voice was softly crooning, “You walked into the party, Like you were walking onto a yacht...” At that precise moment, Sasha Bamwele turned around from the bar across the room and caught sight of him in midstride. Her perfectly shaped eyebrows knitted quickly together, and just as quickly resumed their position and smoothed themselves out. She ran her fingers across her temple and pushed some hair behind her ear, turned around again and emptied her glass. One of the bartenders refilled it without missing a beat.

Well, he was, in fact, walking into a party, she mused. And the party was being held on a yacht. So, as far as that went, he was perfectly in theme. But it was her party, and she had not invited him. She didn’t own the yacht, exactly, but she had leased it for a month, so for the time being, as far as she was concerned, it was hers, to all intents and purposes.

She was irritated by the presence of this man; she was always irritated by him. She had never actually met him in person – unless she were to count the one video conference – but she had spoken with him on several occasions, though not at all in the last few months, and she had continued to hear about him from time to time, from Dandan. Every time she looked up into the bar mirror and saw him, she felt another jolt of irritation. Somehow, she never noticed the woman who had walked onto the yacht with him.

She watched in the mirror behind the bar as he made his way around the room, imperiously she thought, as if he were host and king. When she saw him reach out and hug one of her employees who had flown in from New York for the event, her annoyance was rendered unbearable. She turned away so sharply that her drink sloshed itself right out of its glass onto her newly manicured fingers and the ruby and diamond ring she had bought herself to celebrate the success of her latest project, the same one she was celebrating tonight. It had all been going so very well – until now.

She shook the liquid off her hands and got to her feet. The bartender handed her a white cloth napkin and placed a fresh drink on the counter in front of her. She dried her hands slowly, finger by finger, inspecting each nail and admiring the coordination with the emerald cut ruby stone and her deep red nails with a thin, white line at the tip of each. Sasha Bamwele did not do long nails. Not on herself, at any rate. She kept her fingernails short and square, quite the opposite of the look she sold every day to women all around the world. She had an aversion to long nails on human beings; she thought them tacky, actually, but her customers found them glamourous and paid handsomely for the privilege of having theirs created, built up and manicured by SasSha’s Salons.

Talons and claws were good and necessary on beasts and birds, was Sasha’s position, but human beings are neither, and so had no need for them. Of course, she never said that to anyone, and to her customers and fans, she explained her short nails – and her sometimes very short hair – with the reassurance that it meant less time spent on herself and more time available for her to take care of them, her highly-prized and deeply-loved devotees. Once, a man with whom she had gone out on a third date, had suggested she have her two indoor cats declawed to protect the furniture in her twenty-third floor New York apartment. She had shortened their dinner and had never gone out with him again.

Sasha picked up the glass of sparkling water from the bar, leaving the coaster where it lay and grabbing a napkin from the tray on the ledge just inside the bar. She slipped away through the door almost hidden off to one side of the bar, went through the glass sliding doors on starboard, the side facing the sea because of the way the yacht was docked, and walked around out onto the bow of her yacht. She was alone here and delighted to be so. The seemingly unending spate of traveling that had been her life for the last year or so had been hectic and draining. It had left her worn down and desperately craving quiet, solitude and a few good nights’ rest, and some days just lazing in bed. She wanted to spend time with people she knew, not the constant train of acquaintances and potential business partners with whom she had spent so many hours, days and nights these last couple of years. It was not time yet, though. There was still so very much she had to do before she could take any time off. She’d need weeks then, she figured, but knew she would probably have to settle for mere days; a week, if that. And only if she got extraordinarily lucky.

She curled her legs under her and settled into a seating space in a seating well in the bow. She leaned all the way back into the cushions, wriggling in to make herself comfortable. She lifted her face to the skies, all the better to watch the stars. There was no moon tonight but the Caribbean air was warm and the breeze was light. Out to sea, there was nothing but water, sparkling softly with the light of a million, million stars barely visible in galaxies far, far away. She thought how different this was to the skies in New York City, or Miami or Shanghai. In Shanghai, you sometimes could not even see the sun in the daytime, except as a brighter spot glowing behind clouds of exhaust fumes and coal-fired plants. She remembered when Los Angeles was just as bad. She remembered flying in to LAX from Vancouver early one morning some years before when she was in college, and seeing the dirty brown dome in the distance that the flight captain informed them was the City of Angels. She had worried how she would breathe in that city, and afterwards, she swore that she had not taken a full breath the entire week she had spent there.

Tonight, however, she breathed in deep and long. She inhaled the smell of the sea, the sand, the land – a blend of desert, cactus, tropics and salt. It was a sharp, bright smell. Almost spicy. The Turks and Caicos smell did not have the rounded tones she associated with the more mountainous islands. It kind of prickled her nose and she liked the feel of it. In a matter of days, she thought, she’d be back on the US mainland, walking the canyons of New York City, in the blistering winter cold. Los Angeles had been mild and lovely last week, and she had avoided New York by routing her flight to Providenciales, through Miami. She wouldn’t be in New York for long, though, and much as she loved this truly amazing city, she was grateful for that. Two weeks, perhaps. Three, tops. Then she’d be heading back to the warmth of TCI for a full month. Away from the cold for a while.

The work was going well in preparation for the opening of her new spa in the Royal Hotel Providenciales on Grace Bay. It was her first. It had taken everything she had in her to negotiate the terms and make the preparations, and it was the reason for these trips back and forth to China and India and Europe and home to the US, and out again that had her now feeling so worn out and yet so filled with anticipation and excitement. She uncurled her legs and propped them up on the coffee table nearby, revelling in the moment. She heard a click, the sound of a door being shut. You’re disturbing my peace, she said inside her head. Go back inside, whoever you are. She hoped they wouldn’t see her lying here, or if they did, they would just turn and walk away. No such luck.

“There you are!” she heard someone say. It was Peggy, her assistant. “The new general manager from Royal Hotel Providenciales is here. I thought you might want to come say hello.”

“So late?” she asked, “I thought he wasn’t coming again.”

“Not a he,” said Peggy. “A she. Apparently, they’ve changed management very suddenly and the new manager is a Ms. Antonella Menarello. Just recently arrived from the United States. Will you come? She hasn’t asked for you or anything, but it would not be a bad idea to come meet her now.”

“Yes, of course. I’ll come. Just give me a few minutes to enjoy this peace and quiet for little bit more.”

The first person Sasha saw when she returned to the party, was the man she had left it to avoid. Well, not to avoid exactly, just not to see. She had thought about that while she was sitting outside alone under the stars. Why did she have this reaction to this man? She had felt it the very first time she had spoken with him, and that was via a conference call, no video or anything, so she had had no idea what he even looked like. Then, when she did finally see him on the news in the city, something to do with Fashion Week New York – and nothing negative, either – it had only solidified, for some reason that she just could not discern. She didn’t warm up to him, and she still couldn’t say why. She had heard him speak in the breakfast club a few times since then, but she had stopped calling in to the meetings quite a while ago. Not because of him or anything; just that she had become so very busy with her project. It had occurred to her on occasion, that she ought to check back into the club sometime, and let the members know how far she had come with the bold, ambitious plan she had told them about.

She wondered, in a disinterested sort of way, if he still participated in the business group, Lionel Errivo, and if his project in China had come to fruition. She hoped, for his sake, that it had.

Across the room from Sasha as she entered, there he was, standing next to a woman she had never seen before, but there were quite a few other people here tonight that she had never seen before. She looked around for Peggy and saw her at the bar. A group of three women and one man, none of whom she had ever seen before either, stopped her on her way across the room to tell her how excited and happy they were that SasSha’s Salon was coming to Providenciales, and to wish her well with the new endeavour. Would she be thinking of opening a SasSha’s Salon in the town, though, for people who didn’t get out to the hotels much or who were looking just for a manicure or pedicure, they wanted to know. Over the women’s shoulders, she could see Peggy still standing at the bar, deep in conversation with someone – another person she had never seen before. She did manage to make her way across to the bar and reach Peggy, eventually.

“Oh! So sorry, Sasha. I didn’t see you come in,” said Peggy. “I’ll go bring her here.”

“No, no,” said Sasha, “It’s okay. I’ll come with you to meet her.”

“Uhmm!” Peggy murmured as she looked around the room, trying to locate the new hotel manager. “Ah! There she is. I see her.” Sasha rested her glass on the bar and turned to follow her assistant.

“There she is, in the white pants and black top, over there,” said Peggy, pointing discreetly with her chin. Just then, somebody called out to Sasha. She turned in the direction of the voice and missed Peggy’s indication but she followed her lead across the room.

“Here we are, Sasha,” she heard Peggy say, coming to a stop in front of a woman whose hair was so thick and long and curly, it seemed to take up more space than the woman herself. “This is Antonella Menarello, the new manager of the Royal Hotel Providenciales. Ms. Menarello, this is Sasha Bamwele.”

The two women shook hands and said how pleased they were to meet each other.

“I’m happy that there is going to be a spa at the Royal Hotel Providenciales,” the manager said to Sasha, “especially one like yours – brand-new, great design, innovative concept – and we, at the Royal Hotel Providenciales will be the only one to have it. I especially like that it will be exclusive to us – at least for the time being. Then, afterwards, we can claim that we were the first. That works for me, too.”

Sasha laughed. “We are even happier that we get to place our very first spa in this particular hotel,” she replied. “We could not have entered the Caribbean resort market in a better position. I’m excited about getting the works completed and finally being able to receive our clients.”

“Yes, me, too,” said Ms. Menarello, “I am just getting settled into the new job, myself. I’ve been here less than a month, so I’m still very new. You and I will be learning the new place together, it seems. Ought to be fun.” Sasha smiled and nodded. She noticed that the man standing a little way off had come closer. She bristled and tried not to show it. The woman smiled and gestured toward him.

“Please allow me to introduce my brother,” she said to Sasha, “Lionel Errivo. Lionel, this is Sasha Bamwele.”

“Finally, we meet in person,” said Lionel Errivo, reaching to shake her hand. “It is a pleasure.”

“Pleased to meet you,” said Sasha, rather less enthusiastically than he, but shaking his hand with as much energy as she would have accorded any other person.

“So, you’re doing it!” he continued. “You are opening your branches around the world. Good for you. I knew you would do it.”

“Thank you,” Sasha replied, very politely. He was still holding her hand.

“I want to hear about it,” said Errivo. “How did things go in Shanghai?”

“Shanghai?” she asked “Yes! You were going to source some merch and materials out of China, and I saw you at the airport in Shanghai.”

“Shanghai?” she repeated, her mind, very strangely, unable to focus or to even remember that she had been in Shanghai recently. Or ever for the matter.

“Yeah!” he said. “You left Shanghai last Tuesday. You bumped into me at the airport, Literally.” Now, Sasha was totally confused.

“I bumped into you?!”

“She bumped into you?!” asked his sister. “You met before?” Neither Sasha nor Lionel answered. They seemed not to hear her. In fact, they seemed to be no longer aware that there were other people around – all around them.

“Yes!” he explained. “You got out of a car and bumped into me as you were going into the airport in Pudong. I was just getting out of my car. You were wearing red.”

“I was?” and then, “Yes. Yes. I was in Shanghai. I didn’t bump into you.”

“Well, not exactly,” he said. “I was embellishing a little, but only a very little. I stepped out of the way just in the nick of time to avoid the collision. I avoided it by, oh, maybe five millimetres. Hour hair almost blew me over.”

By this time, Sasha was feeling a very strange kind of uncomfortable. And was not at all sure why. She felt like she was spinning slowly around in space. She shook her head and retrieved her hand. She saw his lips moving, but she heard nothing he said. She shook her head again.

“Shall we?” He put his hand out as if to say, “After you.” Without a moment’s hesitation or thought, she turned to walk in the direction he was indicating, but the movement brought her back to her senses.

“I could do with a drink,” she said to him, trying to make her voice sound normal, “but I shall have to do that a little later, thanks. Antonella, I shall be at the hotel sometime during the day tomorrow. Would you have a few moments for us to talk for a bit?”

“Yes, of course,” Antonella said. “I shall be there all day. Just call me when you arrive and I will meet you. We can do lunch, perhaps? Or drinks. You let me know.”

“I shall,” Sasha replied, still trying to regain full control of her voice and her whole self. “Peggy will tell me what my schedule is like tomorrow, and I’ll give you a call.” Off to the side, Peggy nodded, her face slightly puckered up with bewilderment, as was Antonella’s. Lionel, for his part, was watching her with an expression that could only be described as lost in wonder, love and praise. Sasha avoided looking at him.

“Sounds good,” Antonella assured her. “We’ll get a chance to really talk then. We’ll leave you to get back to your other guests.” She nudged her brother as she reached to shake Sasha’s hand again before departing. He turned to look at his sister, and nodded quickly, several times. He looked at Sasha again and then around the room as if trying to orient himself and figure out where he was. He felt as if he was waking from a dream.

“Yes,” he said, “I will soon see you again, Sasha. Have a good night. Enjoy the rest of your evening.”

Sasha remained standing in her spot and watched them walk away, the woman with her hand on the man’s arm, almost as if guiding him, helping him to make his way through the room. They walked off the boat. Peggy looked sideways at her boss. Her boss finally turned and looked at her, shrugged slowly, shaking her head again, as if to clear it of something. Neither of them spoke. Eventually, they turned, in unison, and made their way back to the bar. The bartender poured Sasha a glass of water.

“I need something else,” she told her. “Something stronger. Cognac. Any Hardy?”

“Coming right up,” the bartender reassured her.

Sasha did not smell, sip or in any way linger over the expensive cognac. She did savour it, however. She took a drink, breathed deep and relished the heat as the liquid burnt its way down her throat and into her stomach, and its exquisite flavours and perfumes rose up into her sinuses and, it seemed, filled up some area of clear space in her head. In very short order, she took another drink. This time, she swallowed more slowly. She swivelled her barstool around again to face the room. She saw him, again. Coming down the ramp, back onto the boat. Obviously, he had only accompanied his sister to her car. Now, he was back. She swivelled around again to put her back to the room. She swirled the liquid in her glass, staring into the bottom as if there were something down there that she really needed to see. Finally, she picked it up, slid off the stool and without looking around, went out again onto the deck, into the warm, night air.

She leant against the side of the boat, closed her eyes and breathed deeply. She exhaled slowly, breathed in again and out several times before opening her eyes again. Her mind was reeling. The breathing didn’t calm it much. She raised her head to the stars and inhaled again, holding her breath for as long as she could and letting it out as slowly as she could manage. The technique was not working tonight. It had always worked; had never let her down before, but this time was different and that bothered Sasha immensely. She opened her eyes and sipped her cognac. Slowly. She let it rest in her mouth for a bit, savouring the burn on her palate and the vapours rising high up into her head. Then, she swallowed, slowly, feeling the warmth spread down her throat. She pushed herself off where she was leaning up and started walking, slowly, towards the bow of the boat, ‘away from land’, as she liked to put it, since the boat was docked with its bow pointing towards the open sea.

“I wondered where you were,” she heard someone say. Startled, she turned in the direction of the voice. “I don’t want to intrude,” he went on, “but I was hoping to speak with you just for a moment.” Irritation was not the feeling she was getting in this moment, but she couldn’t quite put a description to it.

She looked at him. “Mr. Errivo,” she said. “I thought you had left. Obviously, you’re enjoying my party.”

“Yes, I am,” he answered. “And it’s Lionel. Please.”

“And your sister? Is she still here,” she asked, although she had already figured this out.

“She must be home, by now, back at the hotel” he said, dragging the end of the word, she, until it sounded like “sheee”.

“You let her drive back alone.”

“She drove here alone.”

“I see. You wanted to talk to me, you said.”

“Yes. I really want to hear how you did in China.”

“Now?!”

“Yea…” he began, but thought again and shifted quickly, “or another day. Whenever it’s convenient for you. We could meet for lunch, maybe.”

“You’re going to be here for long?” she asked him.

“I’ll be here for a while. For at least another couple of weeks or so,” he answered.

“I see,” was all she said. He waited.

“Tonight is not the best time,” she finally managed to say.

“I understand. I’ll get in touch.” She said nothing. After some seconds, he went on, “Well, it has been a good party, and I am happy we finally got to actually meet each other. Have a pleasant evening, Sasha. I shall leave now.” He didn’t move. For another several seconds, she found herself unable to respond.

Then, “Yes. A pleasant evening.”

“Good night.”

“Good night.”

“I will call you.”

“Ok. Yes,” she said. He took a couple of steps backwards, bowing slightly, before he turned around and walked away.

“Good night,” he repeated, turning towards her again, just before he went back through the door. She said nothing. For several moments, she stood still and stared at the doorway through which he had just disappeared. Somewhere inside her, she found herself displeased that he had not remained and insisted she talk to him tonight.