“Qué?”
“Luis Velez, está aquí?”
“Por qué?” the woman asked.
That was a word—or words—Raymond didn’t know. He scrambled for the dictionary, which was in his backpack. While he was extricating it, the woman closed the door in his face.
He knocked again.
“I’m sorry to bother you,” he called through the door, not knowing if she understood a word he was saying. “I just need to ask him a question. One simple question.”
“Por qué quieres saber?” the woman asked through the door.
So there was that “por qué” thing again. And Raymond had not yet managed to look it up.
“Lo siento,” he called through the door. He felt more panicky than the situation likely warranted. “No entiendo.”
It was the most useful phrase he had taught himself. “I don’t understand.”
Silence on the other side of the door. Raymond took a step closer and leaned his fingertips against the wood of it. He wasn’t sure if that was the end of this visit. If he should go. If anybody inside ever planned on saying another word to him.
He decided he would open his dictionary and quickly teach himself to say “I want to ask Luis a question.” He wondered why he hadn’t done so right from the start.
Before he could, the door opened again, startling him backward a couple of steps. Again he found himself peering through an opening just inches wide. The chain lock was still solidly in place.
The face he saw this time was different. A younger woman, maybe in her twenties. She wore her amazingly thick, dark hair piled up onto her head, and full makeup. She chewed gum with a snapping sound on every motion of her jaw.
“My grandmother wants to know why you’re asking about Luis,” she said.
“I’m looking for a Luis Velez who used to help an old woman I know. But then he disappeared. She’s worried about him. So I just want to ask him if he’s the one.”
“When did he disappear?”
“Maybe three weeks ago.”
“He’s not the one.”
The door slammed shut.
Raymond moved in again. Leaned on it with his fingertips as he had before.
“I’m sorry to bother you again,” he called, his face close to the edge of the door. As if his voice, his breath, could blow it open. “But do you mind if I ask him? Just to be sure? Just so I can cross him off my list?”
Just so I can see his face when I ask.
The door opened again, and again the younger woman’s face appeared behind the chain.
“This is getting old,” she said.
“I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry to disturb you on a Sunday morning. Or any morning. Anytime, I mean. But it’ll only take a second. I just want to ask him if he knows this old woman.”
“He’s. Not. The. One.”
“But you can’t know that for a fact. Maybe he was helping her, and he didn’t tell you. Some people like to keep it a secret when they do stuff like that. They figure it means more that way.”
“I know for a fact,” she said, and started to swing the door closed.
Raymond almost raised a hand to stop it. But that would have been wrong. That would have been stepping over a line. It would almost have been forcing himself into their lives. Instead he tried to stop the door with his words.
“Wait. Please. Why won’t you just let me ask him?”
The door stopped moving.
“Because he’s not the one.”
“But how do you know?”
The door slammed shut. Raymond could hear a scraping sound on the other side, but he had no idea if she was locking or unlocking.
The door opened. Wide. No chain.
Raymond looked in and saw an older man sitting in a wheelchair, a blanket over his legs, smoking a cigarette. His hair was gray and thin, his eyes distant. He never looked up to see who was at the door. He didn’t seem to be the least bit curious as to what all the fuss was about. He never saw Raymond standing there, as far as Raymond could tell.
“This is Luis Velez,” the young woman said, clearly at the end of her patience with Raymond. “Nineteen years in that chair. Now do you get it?”
“Yeah,” Raymond said. “I get it. I’m sorry.”
She slammed the door hard.
“I’m really sorry,” he called, feeling something in his belly grow heavy. It was a sickening feeling, as though something metallic were forming in there. Sinking down under its own weight. “I’m sorry I upset you.”