‘I said I did. We were in the shade, but the air was still hot and beyond the sidewalk the sun was still beating down on the cobblestones. Behind Zarco, the Gerona bar was heaving. People kept arriving in the district. So there’s no job, Zarco decided. Mates are mates. I’ll tell Guille and the rest. They’ll understand. And if they don’t understand, fuck them: I’m the leader of this pack. Thanks, I said. Don’t thank me, said Zarco. You do owe me one, though. He took his right hand out of his pocket and pointed the long, dirty nail of his index finger at me while moving it up and down and adding: I scratch your back, you scratch mine. That said we went back to La Font. A while later, when I was going to leave the district without any further mention of the subject, Zarco grabbed me by the wrist and pointed at me again while Tere watched us. Don’t forget you owe me one, Gafitas, he said. And he repeated: I scratch your back, you scratch mine.
‘That night I made the decision not to return to La Font. I’d had enough: my two incursions into the district had entailed an enormous risk and had been about to lead to a calamity for Señor Tomàs; but most of all they’d been enough to convince me that Tere wasn’t the girl for me and that what happened between us in the washrooms at the arcade could never happen again. Although I’m not so sure of the last bit; I mean I’m not so sure that I was sure of that. Whatever the case, my impression was that I had nothing to show for my walk on the wild side, except the certainty that, on the other side of the river, there was a world that bore no relation to the one that I knew.
‘I spent the weekend between my house and the Vilaró arcade, reading and watching TV and playing the free games I’d accumulated on account of the help I gave Señor Tomàs, help I knew Señor Tomàs no longer needed, or rather that I hoped he didn’t need. On Monday I continued my new routine. In the afternoon I was at the arcade and at dusk I helped Señor Tomàs close up and said goodbye to him. Then, on my way home, just after I’d passed one of the columns that supported the railway overpass, somebody made a sound behind me. A cold shiver ran down my spine. I turned around; it wasn’t Batista: it was Tere. She was leaning against the overpass column smoking a cigarette. Hiya, Gafitas, she said. In two strides she was in front of me; she was wearing her usual sneakers and jeans, but it seemed like her handbag strap across her white T-shirt accentuated her chest more than ever. How are you? she asked. Fine, I said. She nodded and rubbed the mole beside her nose and asked: Aren’t you coming back to La Font? Of course I’m coming back, I lied. Tere looked at me inquisitively. I explained: It’s just that this weekend I was tied up. At the arcade? she asked. I said yes. Tere nodded again and took a drag of her cigarette; as she blew out the smoke she gestured behind her: How’s the old man? I understood that she meant Señor Tomàs and I said he was fine. That’s good, said Tere. I didn’t know you were friends. Zarco told me. She paused and then added: Does he know he owes you one? She meant Señor Tomàs again, but this time I didn’t say anything. Well he does, said Tere. You better believe he owes you one. You should have seen the stink Guille made. He wanted to do the arcade job whether anybody else wanted to or not. Luckily Zarco stopped him. If not for him, the old man would have had a rough time. Thanks to him and to you, of course. At that moment a train started to pass over our heads; the noise was deafening, and we kept quiet for a few seconds. When the sound of the train began to fade into the distance, Tere took a last drag of her cigarette; then she threw the butt on the ground, stepped on it and asked: What were we talking about? You lied to me, I improvised. What? asked Tere. You lied, I insisted. You told me you guys weren’t planning on hitting the arcade and you were planning it. Tere looked like she was thinking it over; then she made a gesture of indifference; then her expression brightened. Oh, yeah, she said. Now I remember what we were talking about: about how the old man owes you one. She paused. And that you owe Zarco one, she said. Remember? She pointed at me with her index finger the same way Zarco had pointed when we said goodbye at La Font on Friday and said: He scratched your back now you scratch his.
‘We looked at each other for a moment. Tere leaned on the hood of a car parked next to us and explained that Guille had been talking for some time about a housing development in Lloret, that it was the perfect place to rob because it was really isolated and the owners were rich people, and it was the perfect moment too because June wasn’t over yet and lots of houses were still empty, waiting for their owners to come and stay for July and August. Finally she said that Zarco was going to do a job there and needed me to help him. Then she changed the singular for the pluraclass="underline" You’ll help us, right? I had no intention of helping them and, to gain time, for a moment I thought of asking her why Zarco didn’t ask me himself, why he sent her to ask me; instead of beating about the bush I said: I’m sorry. I can’t. Tere opened her arms and looked at me with astonishment that struck me as genuine. Why? she asked. The only thing that occurred to me was to answer the same way I’d answered Zarco. Because I’m not like you guys, I said. I’ve never done that. You’ve never done what? she asked. Stolen anything, I answered. Nobody’s asking you to steal, she said. We’re the ones who’re going to do the stealing. What you have to do is something else. And it’s dead easy, so easy that it’s almost nothing. So why doesn’t somebody else do it then? I asked. Because we need someone like you, she answered. Someone who speaks Catalan and looks like a good kid. Come on, Gafitas, for fuck’s sake: are you going to leave us high and dry after what Zarco did for you? Pay us what you owe and we’ll be even. She fell quiet. The streetlamps of Bonastruc de Porta had been on for a while and they tinged Tere’s dark hair, her green eyes, her red, full lips with their golden light. What do you say? she asked. I looked behind her at the closed blinds of the Vilaró arcade and thought that, if I said no, I’d never see Tere again; I felt my legs go weak as I said: What do I have to do?
‘I don’t remember exactly what Tere’s reply was; only that she assured me that the next day Zarco would explain what I had to do and that she said goodbye with two sentences. Be on time. Tomorrow at La Font at three. I spent a horrible night wondering whether to go or not, deciding not to go and then a minute later deciding to go. In the end I went, and before three in the afternoon I was already at La Font. A little while later Zarco arrived and Tere, wearing a pair of shorts that revealed her long, tanned legs; Guille was the last to show up. Zarco wasn’t surprised by my presence there, didn’t explain what it was we were going to do, and I didn’t ask him either; I was too worried. As we left the district, Zarco, Tere and Guille started checking out the cars parked along the streets and, when we came up to a Seat 124 parked in a solitary alley that led out onto Pedret Avenue, Tere took a small sawblade with a hook on one end out of her bag and handed it to Zarco while Guille took off running up to the next sidestreet; then Tere ran to the one behind us. I stayed with Zarco and saw him stick the sawblade into the slot between the Seat 124’s door and window and, after feeling around for a couple of seconds with the blade, I heard a click and the door opened. Zarco sat in the driver’s seat, yanked the steering wheel around, reached underneath it and brought out a handful of wires, connected one wire to another, touched another wire to them and the engine immediately started. The whole operation lasted a minute, maybe less than a minute. A little while later we were on our way out of the other side of the city riding in the 124.