C4 antho - Chamber Four

~138~ The Chamber Four Fiction Anthology
Castillo, I think. I would have spent far too much time wondering
about how it all worked. But Ricardo? Ricardo wondered
if the affliction gave Javier Castillo special knowledge
beyond that of travel, if somehow, when in that space between
disappearing and appearing, there were answers. But
this thought was too complicated and Ricardo, despite trying
to formulate the right questions, simply remained silent.
What he said to Javier Castillo, instead, was something about
dinner. In the dimly lit Italian restaurant, the backs of his
arms sticking to the fake leather booth, Ricardo stared at
Javier Castillo, smiled, but said nothing. Ricardo thought
about ordering pasta, the one that looked like little ears, but
he didn’t know what they were called. Javier Castillo ordered
that pasta for Ricardo without a single word passing between
them. Yes, somewhere in that space between disappearing
and appearing, there must have been answers, but Ricardo
had no idea how one reached such a place without the affliction.
Ricardo worried that one day Javier Castillo would go
in search of answers and never return.
Ricardo first met Javier Castillo while working his
evening shift at LAX. Ricardo worked a second job each
evening as a skycap. In the gray space of the baggage claim,
in the gray space of the check-in area, Ricardo had watched
face after gray face arriving and departing. Javier Castillo
was there to see his aunt off. Ricardo watched him the way
he watched all people who were at LAX but neither arriving
nor departing by plane. Accessories to travel, Ricardo had
thought, accessories. They were not really people but means
of transportation to or from the airport for these other people
who were traveling by plane. Even years later, Ricardo
could not explain why he continued to stare at Javier Castillo
that night. It was not that Javier Castillo was a handsome
man. He was, in many ways, rather ordinary in appearance.
Javier Castillo had looked at him and said “Buenas noches.”