Missing Rose (9781101603864) (2 page)

Part One

1

Two are one . . .

Only one. Yes, of course! Of course, there is only one bottle.

No, that's not true—I
can
see two bottles.

But maybe, maybe I'm seeing double, maybe there's still a chance there's only the one bottle . . .

No, I can't be that drunk; I can't be seeing double. There must really be two bottles.

Yes, okay, there are two bottles. But
why
are there two? Why two?

Oh God, they look exactly the same. Their size, shape, color are exactly the same. Even their goddamned production date is the same! They're . . . yes, they're twin bottles!

But how? How could one bottle suddenly become two? How could this happen?

And why?

It's not fair . . .

I
N ONE OF
Rio de Janeiro's most spacious and beautiful homes, set on a hill overlooking the bay, the scene that had been played out almost every night for the last month was now being repeated again. Buried among the cushions of the black sofa in the narrowest corner of the huge living room, Diana, with her wine bottles, lay trying to understand how her life had turned upside down so suddenly.

Tonight, like every other night, the things she'd suppressed during the day weighed on her like a ton of bricks. Her body was as numb as it had been on those other nights, her chestnut hair as tousled and her green eyes as bloodshot. Those bloodshot eyes looked from the two bottles on the coffee table to her mother's photograph on the mantelpiece and then back again.

The only apparent difference from the other nights was the fire she'd lit especially to burn two letters. The shadows of the flames flickering on Diana's face this warm May night fanned the fire within her.

She drank down the last sip from the wineglass in her hand and dropped it on the rug. Before gathering her strength to reach for the second bottle, she turned her eyes for a moment toward the bottle she'd just finished.

“You know,” she said to the bottle, “you're just like me; even though you're finished, you're still standing up shamelessly.” She smiled wryly. “After all, we're goddesses, aren't we? What can knock us down?”

Then she turned to the second bottle. “As for you, you mother thief!” she said. “Mom says you and I are twins. But you're nothing to me, nothing but an illusion.”

Diana raised herself up from the cushions on the sofa and leaned toward the coffee table, but instead of reaching for the bottle, she picked up her mother's letter which lay next to it. The very same letter that, in a matter of minutes, had made one bottle become two.

Her mother had given this letter to her a month ago, the day before she passed away. She'd told Diana to read it only after her death, saying, “This is my last wish, darling. I want you to promise me you'll carry it out.”

Diana had asked what it was her mother wanted her to do, but her mother had not answered the question. Instead, she'd fixed her deep blue eyes on Diana, patiently waiting for her daughter's promise. It had been as if those eyes would never yield; so in the end, no longer able to withstand her mother's pleading gaze, Diana had given her word.

On hearing her promise, her mother's eyes had regained their old sparkle, and her pale face had come alive for a moment. She'd placed Diana's hand within her own and said, “I knew I could depend on you, darling. Please look after her, please take care of her. She's unique.”

Bending toward her mother, Diana had asked, “She? Who's
she
? Who are you talking about, Mom?” But her question had remained unanswered until after her mother's final departure from her the following day.

When Diana had opened and read the letter, she felt as if the ground had slipped from beneath her feet. Sinking slowly to her knees, she'd read the letter over and over again, feeling all her remaining strength drain from her.

Since then, little had changed.

Before placing her mother's letter into the fire, Diana read it one last time:

2 April

My dearest Diana,

I hope you're well, my darling. You must keep well. You mustn't ever believe you've lost me. I know it's not easy, but I beg you to try.

Please don't forget to let me know how you're doing once in a while. Scribble something to me in your diary, talk to my photograph, write stories to me . . .

As soon as the date of your graduation is fixed, let me know. And please don't give up your evening walks. You
are
going to your classes, aren't you? Any news from your job applications? Above all, please tell me as soon as you start writing beautiful stories again like you used to. Who knows, perhaps very soon you'll surprise me with the wonderful news that you've finally decided to become a writer. What is it really, darling, that's preventing you from pursuing your greatest dream? But, as always, it's for you to choose. All I want is your happiness.

I say “your happiness,” Diana, but what I have to tell you in this letter may cause you some despair. Please know that this isn't my intention. But I'm afraid I have no other choice. Forgive me . . .

I really wish I could discuss with you face-to-face what I'm about to tell you. But, as you can see from my scrawled handwriting, I no longer have the strength to confront you with this news, nor to give you all the details. My only hope now is that God will help me get to the end of this letter.

I don't know quite where to begin . . . And even if I did, I couldn't. Because in order to begin, I have to go back twenty-four years, to the day when you were one year old, the day on which you last saw your father.

Diana, my darling, the truth is, your father never died. But he left us. And he left us taking your twin sister, Mary, with him.

So that you wouldn't feel the pain that I felt and wouldn't grow up feeling like a child abandoned by her father, for all these years I've let you believe that he was dead. I even put up that gravestone which, while we were living in São Paulo, you visited every month thinking it was your father's. But, in any case, he was as good as dead to both of us.

When we moved to Rio, it was as if we'd left the past behind us. I never told anyone here that your father was alive, nor mentioned anything about Mary. I knew that your father, who'd separated us from Mary, would never let us see her again. He must have told her a story similar to the one I told you.

You must be asking, quite rightly, why I'm telling you all this now. Let me explain . . .

About a month and a half ago, your father was informed of my illness by a mutual friend and must have wanted to clear himself of blame by giving Mary my address. But I know he didn't tell her about you or about my illness.

From then on, I received a letter from Mary once a week—four letters in all—but never with a return address. She wrote that she was looking forward to coming to see me soon. A week ago, however, I got this note from her:
“Mother, I can't bear being without you any longer. If I can't be reunited with you, there's no point in living. Oh, Mom, I want to kill myself . . . Mary, 23 March.”

As far as I could tell from her letters, your sister seemed so full of life that I still can't believe she'd write such a thing. And since she has my address, I can't understand why she didn't come to see me.

As if that note weren't enough, yesterday your father phoned. It was the first time he'd called in twenty-four years. As soon as I heard his voice, I knew he was calling about Mary. Indeed his first words were, “Do you know where Mary is?” He went on to say that about two weeks earlier Mary had gone missing, leaving a farewell letter behind; you'll find it attached to this letter—your father faxed it after our conversation. He told me they'd searched everywhere for Mary and spoken to all her friends, but had found no clue as to where she might be.

Oh, Diana, in the little time I have left there's nothing I can do now. I'm so afraid . . . you are my only hope. So I have no choice but to ask you to please find your twin and take care of her.

I am so sorry to be adding more pain to your grief and burdening you with such a responsibility. But I feel even more sorry to be leaving behind another daughter who spent her whole life hoping to meet her mother.

Knowing how much you love me, I have no doubt that you'll do everything you can to fulfill this last wish of mine. But I know finding Mary won't be easy. There's absolutely no clue as to where she may be. Our only hope is the fact that, in her letters, she has left a half open door into the extraordinary world she's created for herself. Hers is a deep, secret world, one to be found in fairy tales; yet at the same time, it is so real. I'm sure she hasn't shared it even with her father or her closest friends; that's why I think you have a better chance of finding her than anyone else.

What I'd like you to do is to step into Mary's world and follow the footprints she's left behind. After all, who could do this better than her identical twin?

All the information we have are the three names Mary wrote in her letters: “Zeynep,” “Socrates” and the name of a palace. These names alone may not be enough to trace her. But, unfortunately, that's all we have.

Mary's letters are in the antique chest. You'll find the key to it in my jewelry box.

Diana, I hope you and Mary will soon be united, just like you once were within me.

And when that happens, please write to me.

Diana, my darling, this is not a time to say good-bye. No time is. Please never forget, I am always with you. And I love you very much.

Your Mother

2

D
IANA UNFOLDED
the farewell letter Mary had written to her father. It was now time for it to turn to smoke.

17 March

Dear Dad,

I have to leave home today.

You must be wondering why.

Yesterday, after so many years, I read Saint-Exupéry's
The Little Prince
again. The book seems to have changed completely! The only thing that hasn't changed is that the rose is still my favorite character. And the fox, of course; because it is he who teaches the little prince how to become responsible for his rose.

I think I'm beginning to understand at last what “being responsible for a rose” means. And that's the reason why I'm leaving.

At the end of the book, Saint-Exupéry urges us to ask ourselves, “Has the sheep eaten the rose, yes or no?” He says the answer to this question changes everything.

So I'm asking myself a similar question:

“Have Others stolen my rose, yes or no?”

Saint-Exupéry was right; the answer to this does change everything. But I know that no grown-up will ever understand why.

I'm leaving because my answer to this question is “Yes.”

I'm leaving to reclaim my rose . . .

Mary

Diana turned to the bottles once again.

“So tell me, bottles!” she said. “Tell me what on earth all this means . . . Doesn't it seem insane? To take off after reading a book? To go missing on account of a rose? What's all this about? Reclaiming your rose, being responsible for a rose . . .

“No, no, I'm not interested in knowing what the rose in
The
Little Prince
stands for, nor in what it means to that girl. I couldn't care less! All I want to know is why it's
me
who's being made to pay because some girl I've never even seen left home and then wanted to kill herself.”

She fell silent, angry with herself for appealing for help to the bottles she'd despised such a short while before. But who else was there? Who else except these bottles would listen to her?

“How true Mom's words are,” Diana murmured. “She said Mary was unique. Well, of course she's unique. The way she stole my mother from me makes her one of a kind.”

After a moment of silence, Diana crumpled Mary's letter in her hand and threw it into the fire. “Forgive me, Mom,” she whispered, watching with an expressionless face as the ball of paper slowly turned to ashes.

3

S
TARTLED,
Diana awoke to the sound of the doorbell which, despite its melodious chime, cut like a knife through her aching head.

“Senhora Lopez! Senhora Lopez! Please answer the door!”

Hearing no reply, she remembered that it was Senhora Lopez's day off. Holding on to the sofa, she dragged herself up. Then, hardly able to stand, she made her way to the door.

On looking at the security camera, she could see that the unwelcome caller was Gabriel, the courier who regularly delivered flowers and all kinds of beribboned packages to her.

When she opened the door, she found Gabriel standing with yet another festooned package, its top reaching almost to his chin. His brown face, brown overalls and brown hat were a perfect match for the color of the package.

“Good day, Miss,” Gabriel said. “I have yet another gift addressed to Rio's most beautiful girl. Would you know if she happens to live here or not?”

“Isn't it a bit early to be delivering parcels, Gabriel?”

“Well, this must be the right address, then. But maybe the wrong time?”

“What time is it?”

“It's already noon.”

“Is it really that late?”

Diana took the package and signed her name in the delivery book in a scrawl that resembled any signature but her own. And before Gabriel could say his usual, “Take care till the next time your admirers bring us together,” she shut the door.

Receiving prettily gift-wrapped packages always used to make her day. This time, however, she wasn't the least bit interested in knowing what was inside the package, nor who'd sent it. She left it there on the floor and headed back to the sofa.

As she walked past the mirror in the hall, she noticed wine stains on her shirt. She suddenly remembered her mother, as she'd become accustomed to these days. Somehow, any small or seemingly unrelated thing was enough to take Diana back to her life with her mother. A color, a smell, a word, and now this stained shirt. The memory of the day she'd bought this shirt and the conversation she'd had with her mother afterward came to life as if it were only yesterday . . .

F
OR
D
IANA,
it had been just another day spent shopping. At the boutique, she'd first debated whether she needed a new shirt or not, telling herself she'd done enough shopping that day already, but finally she'd ended up buying yet another yellow shirt.

When she showed it to her mother, Diana didn't bother to conceal the $2,200 price tag.

After glancing at the price, her mother asked, “Darling, did you read about the Paris auction in yesterday's paper?”

“No, Mom, why?”

“A waistcoat belonging to Descartes was auctioned for $250,000.”

“Oh, really? I'm glad we weren't there. You wouldn't have bought it and then the fact that you didn't buy it would have meant that it stuck in my mind. Anyway, look, my shirt is much smarter than Descartes's waistcoat, don't you think?”

“All of $250,000, Diana!”

“Oh, all right, I see what you're getting at. You're trying to tell me that $2,200 really isn't too much to pay for a shirt like this, aren't you, Mommy dearest?”

Diana knew perfectly well that wasn't what her mother had in mind, but she wanted to use her charm to pass off the incident lightly, so she could go and happily hang up her new shirt along with all the others.

“Well, you're right on one point, darling. Your shirt is certainly smarter than Descartes's waistcoat. His waistcoat wasn't made of silk or cashmere, nor was it from Donna Karan or Armani. In fact, it wouldn't cost more than $30 at the mall.”

“Still, the auction price makes sense, Mom. I mean, the waistcoat was worn by Descartes!”

“True. Being worn by a person like Descartes certainly increases the worth of a piece of clothing. But can you imagine the reverse?”

“What do you mean?”

“A piece of clothing increasing the worth of a person.”

Diana hung her head for a moment. She'd realized what her mother, in her own inimitable way, was once again trying to say: “The only thing you need in order to feel special is yourself.”

“I know what you mean, Mom, but people always want to see me wearing the best. As soon as they see me, they look me up and down from my shoes to my hair and only then do they say, ‘Hi.' If I wear the same clothes two days running, they look at me in horror.

“Do I like being judged by my appearance? Or seeing the insincere respect in people's eyes? Their whispers about my couture collection, my Cartier, my Maserati, my this, my that . . . No, Mom, I don't like it. But you know that it's because of who we are, that everyone, at every moment, expects the best of everything from me.”

“And you believe it's your duty to live up to their expectations, darling, is that it?”

“What can I do? We're not living in the jungle.” Smiling playfully, she added, “Admit it, Mom. Diana Oliveira has become a trademark. How can I disappoint my public, my fans who shower me with endless adulation?”

Five months ago, however, from the moment the doctor had uttered these few words, many things in Diana's life had changed.

“We're going to lose your mother,” the doctor had said.