The woman in the orange hat was standing by the chess table, opening her arms. Tony sat up and kissed her on the cheek. Then he let her have the seat. The chess table had only two seats, built of concrete. Next to the table was a small brick wall. Tony sat on it.
"Oh, Tony, you are the spitting image of your father when he was your age, how quickly time goes by!" said Aunt Mecha.
"Aunt, this is Hilda LaFeubrer. Hilda, this is my Aunt Mecha. She's my father's aunt, technically, but I consider her the aunt I never had. I've been expecting her, I wanted to introduce her to you."
"Pleased to meet you, my dear," Aunt Mecha held out her hand to Hilda. "LaFeubrer? Do you have anything to do with the fashion house?"
"Yes, it's owned by my family. In fact, I am the head designer of the maison. Teté LaFeubrer was my grandmother."
"Oh, what an incredible coincidence! I've been going to the presentation of your grandmother's collections for years! I used to go with my friends!" Aunt Mecha opened her arms.
"Really, Aunt?" asked Tony, "Were you in the fashion world?"
"Well, my friends and I were very close friends with Sebastian Komm, the journalist specializing in fashion and society news. He would pass us tickets to the fashion shows, we would go to the very exclusive parties. I always liked the LaFeubrer collection. Your grandmother was a woman of very good taste."
"Oh, thank you," said Hilda. "I remember Sebastian Komm. He was an acquaintance of my grandmother's."
"It's a pity that then that terrible misfortune happened. Her daughter and son-in-law died in..." Aunt Mecha looked at Hilda. "Oh, but... Was it your mother, the one who died in that terrible plane crash?"
"Yes, it was my parents," said Hilda.
Hilda's parents had died in a plane crash, Hilda had told Tony when they first met.
"Oh, you poor thing, how you must have suffered!" Aunt Mecha placed her hand on Hilda's hand on the table. "And I know very well what it's like to suddenly lose a loved one! That's how my second husband died! Because I was married four times," she said. "I don't know if I mentioned it."
"No," said Hilda, "Four times?"
"That's right. The first time was when I was very young, I was twenty years old. He was a sailor. We lived together for a while, but then he decided that his true love was the sea and he left. We divorced. Then I married an industrialist older than me, who died three years after we were married. He left me all his money, thanks to him I was able to live relatively well. But it was a shame, I loved him. Although he was a very quiet man, we would sit at the table and I would tell him the news of the day and he would just nod his head... Yes, yes, he would say. Anyway, now that I think about it all the men I was married to were of few words. I wonder why."
"Opposites attract," said Tony.
"It was painful when my husband died suddenly, so I understand what you went through, my dear. Oh... I don't mean..." she corrected herself, "Of course it's much harder to lose your parents as a child. I was widowed in my thirties. Then I married twice more, both times ending in divorce. My third husband played a lot of chess, now that we sit here I remember him. A grumpy old man, every time he lost he would start shrieking. He taught me how to play chess, but he didn't play much with me because he said I couldn't keep my mouth shut and he needed to concentrate. Anyway, men didn't last long in my life. The only one that did last was the woman who works in my house, Alice. She's been living with me for forty years!"
"Alice?" said Tony. "I remember her. Does she still live with you?"
"Of course she does, and she works like the first day."
"I didn't know you'd had four husbands, Aunt," said Tony.
"You don't know much about my life! The last time you came to my house you were eight years old! Remember, the time with the helicopter?"
Tony opened his eyes wide.
"Oh, no... Don't tell that please..." he said.
"Nonsense! You were a lovely boy."
"What happened?" Hilda was interested.
"Nothing! I visited my aunt," said Tony. "It was a normal visit."
"It was summer. Tony was eight years old. I was always asking his father to bring the kids to me because I had a small pool. My fourth husband was crazy about pools, so if he didn't build a pool in the back of the house he would die. Oh, it's so hot, he said, if only I could soak in a pool! You're hot because you're fat, I would say, but nothing, he wanted his pool. He built his pool and loved to dive in. It wasn't very big. Every time he went in, the water rose a lot, he was quite fat. Then he would call me. Come, my dear, to our personal pool! Where do you want me to go? I would say, your belly takes my place! I was never much of a pool person. I like to have my hair done, and pools are not good for one's hair. Anyway, I divorced my husband but the pool stayed at home. I would have filled it in with concrete, but Alice liked the pool, she always took a swim in the late afternoon. To this day, when it's hot. I told Alice: you can keep the pool, but you will have to take care of it, put chlorine in it and all that. And Alice said to me: Mrs. Mecha, I have always been the one who took care of the pool. She was right, that's what she was the housekeeper for. Well, then use it, I told her! She even bought one of those big black life preservers, which you could sit on and float on. Remember, Tony? That life preserver saved you from getting a good blow!"
Tony put his hand to his face. He covered his eyes.
"I remember," he said.
"Well, since I had the pool," Aunt Mecha continued, "I told my nephew, Tony's father: let's see when you bring your children to spend some time in my pool! Because they lived in a house where they didn't have a pool. But my nephew's family lived far away, they were never around this area. But one day Tony's dad called me and told me that they had to take the girl to the doctor. I don't remember what it was about. Was she sick?"
"She had a cast on her arm," said Tony. "She had fallen off her bicycle, she was a little girl."
"That's it! We have to take the girl to have the cast removed, it's near your house. Or to have a second cast put on the other arm, I don't remember the details. I'm not a doctor. I'll take Tony to spend the afternoon with you, he said. Oh, I was so happy! Because although I was married four times, I didn't have children, and I love being with children! Not too long, of course, then I have no patience with them," she explained. "I remember I sent Alice out for ice cream. Alice had a sweet tooth, she always did, she brought enough ice cream to last a week. Then your parents brought you in, you had your bathing suit on. You didn't look too happy about spending the afternoon with two older women, I could tell. But then you soaked in the pool and ate your ice cream, and you felt more at ease. And to play with you had a sort of plastic helicopter, which flew when you put a toothed belt on it and took it off fast. The propeller would make it fly for a minute or so. Oh, it's like I see it today! You started playing with the plastic helicopter. The helicopter would make a noise every time you launched it. Brzzzzz, brzzzzz, brzzzzz... And you were like that for quite a while. Brzzzzz, brzzzzz... The helicopter would go up. Then it would fall on the grass. You picked it up again and brzzzzz, brzzzzz... The helicopter would go up again. Then it would fall in the grass and everything would repeat itself. You were like that for about half an hour. Brzzzzz, brzzzzz... I was in the kitchen watching a soap opera me and Alice used to watch. Alice was keeping an eye on you in the garden. I had told her: Alice, the boy cannot stay alone in the garden, he needs an adult to watch him. He can fall in the pool. There are never children in this house, I don't want the first one who visits us to drown, you must take care of him. Alice kept an eye on you. Since I am a good person, I gave Alice a little mirror so she could watch a little of what was happening on the TV screen from the side. I didn't want her to miss an episode of the soap opera. I mean, it would have been a pain to have to tell her the whole chapter later... She couldn't hear the dialogues, of course, but she could imagine them. Soap operas are all alike! Until at one point you came into the kitchen crying. You had dropped the helicopter in the neighbors' backyard! Oh, how you were crying, it broke my heart."
Tony was still holding his hands over his face.
"Poor Tony," said Hilda.
"The problem was that the house next door was empty. The owner had moved into an apartment. We couldn't ask anyone to return the helicopter. Not that I cared that much, I mean, we had been listening to Brzzzzz, brzzzzz... for over half an hour. But you were heartbroken, so I said to Alice: Alice, the boy is very sad, we must get the helicopter back. Stop watching that soap opera and go to the garage and get the little ladder! Because Alice had gone into the kitchen to watch the soap opera. She went to the garage, but it took her a while to find the ladder because we never used it. Anyway, when she could find it she brought the little ladder and we put it against the dividing fence. It wasn't a very tall fence. It was a wall, actually. But obviously, it was difficult for us to cross over, you had to go. We managed to get you over the wall, then we set up the ladder on the other side, you climbed down into the garden of the house next door and retrieved your helicopter. Oh, how happy you looked! Then you climbed up the wall again. But when we were trying to retrieve the ladder... The tree! The tree branch."
"What tree?" asked Hilda.
At that moment the older man in a suit who was playing chess approached the table where Tony, Aunt Mecha, and Hilda were sitting.
"Madam, would you mind lowering your voice? We are trying to play chess," he said, with a straight face.
"What?" Aunt Mecha replied, a little shocked. "You want to shut me up in a public place? How dare you! In the middle of a story? Listen to me, you chess mummy...!"
Aunt Mecha had raised her index finger in an accusing manner. Tony put up his arm and lowered it.
"Excuse us, sir," said Tony. "We'll talk a little quieter."
The man went to sit down.
"Oh, I can assure you that those two seniors hear absolutely nothing. You could put a fire truck in their bedrooms with the siren howling and they wouldn't wake up. They do it to get my attention. I've always had that happen with men. I've never gone unnoticed."
"I believe that," said Tony.
"Where were we? Aunt Mecha said, putting her hand to her chin. "I've already forgotten what I was talking about."
"Don't start again, please," said Tony.
"Something about a branch," remembered Hilda.
"Oh yes, at my house we had a very big tree that had long branches. I don't know what kind of tree it is, I never understood anything about trees. A pine tree? No, I don't think it was a pine tree... Anyway, the point is that it was very windy that afternoon. That was the reason why you dropped the helicopter in the neighbor's garden, because of the wind. And the wind was moving the branches. There was a huge branch that reached close to the wall where you were standing, and in a moment the wind moved it and the branch hit you. But you were so lucky that instead of falling you got caught on the branch, with your bathing suit caught on it. That is, you were hanging on the branch, upside down. You started screaming."
"Oh, what a danger!" said Hilda.
Tony put his hands to his face again.
"Alice and I got scared. Alice, we have to take him down! But how, Mrs. Mecha? The branch is moving a lot, Alice told me. Well, get under him, I told her because if he falls he will break his bones. His sister has gone to get a cast removed, we don't want him to get one. But Alice said to me, if he falls on top of me, he'll break my ribs. You get under him, he's your nephew, she said! I said: oh, no, you will do it, that's what you're paid for. She said: you pay me to work, not to have my bones broken. That darn ungrateful woman, with all I've done for her! Come to think of it, I should have filled the pool with concrete. Anyway, maybe she was right. So I went to the pool and grabbed that round black life preserver there. I gave it to Alice. I said, "You stay under him. I'll go call the fire department. So she stayed with the life preserver. The wind moved the branch to the right, Alice moved with the life preserver to the right. The wind moved the branch to the left, Alice moved to the left. I called the fire department. Luckily you were shouting loudly, so they believed me that it was an urgent matter. They told me they would come right away. Then I went to the powder room to put on some makeup."
"I was hanging upside down from a branch and you went to put on some makeup?" said Tony, incredulously.
"Well, Alice was underneath you with the life preserver, and men never came to my house! You know what I say, it's never too late to get a fifth husband. Anyway, the firemen arrived, but just as I was getting them into the garden, it happened. Your bathing suit ripped! Luckily you fell on Alice's life preserver, so you didn't get hurt. But you were left with your little butt in the air, it was so white! I had that picture on my fridge for years, I saw it every day."
"I was lying on the floor with my butt in the air and you took a picture of me?" said Tony, taking his hands away from his face.
"Oh yes, the first digital cameras had come out. I had one but we never used it, I had taken it out in the garden to have memories of that afternoon. We photographed the whole sequence. You in the pool, you eating ice cream, you playing with the helicopter, you crying about losing it, you up on the wall, you hanging from the branch and you with your little butt in the air on the life preserver. I emailed the photos to my friends. They got a lot of comments."
Tony covered his face with his hands again.
"And I thought when I moved here I thought no one knew me in this city."
"I'd love to see those pictures," Hilda laughed.
"Oh, I think I lost them, they were on a computer that broke! That's the bad thing about digital photos, photos developed on paper lasted longer," Aunt Mecha looked at her wristwatch. "Oh, but how late it's gotten! I must go back to my house. Alice must be preparing lunch."
"Say hello to Alice."
Tony, Hilda, and Aunt Mecha stood up.
"Oh, it was all so short after all, you haven't told me anything about your life," said Aunt Mecha.
"You didn't give us time to open our mouths!" said Tony.
"Oh, that's funny, that's what my husbands used to tell me!"
They passed by the men playing chess. The man in the shirt was playing with the black pieces. He was about to exchange his queen for that of the man in the suit.
"Mmm... I think..." muttered the man in the shirt, directing his hand to his queen.
Aunt Mecha stopped in front of them.
"Don't trade your queen for his, you old fool! Take his knight with the bishop! You'll check him, he'll be forced to take you with the pawn, and as the knight was defending the queen you'll take it without cost! It's called removing the defender!"
The two men looked at Mecha in surprise.
"Madam...!" said the man in the suit.
"Oh, shut up! My third husband had a lousy temper, but he was good as a chess teacher!" he told her. "You guys are terrible. Go play bocce!"
They walked a few more steps. Aunt Mecha kissed Tony and Hilda on the cheek and walked in the direction of the avenue that bordered the park.
Hilda was riding her bicycle through the park, at a slow speed. Tony walked beside her. It had been five minutes since they had said goodbye to Aunt Mecha.
"Your aunt is quite a character," commented Hilda.
"Oh, yes, I didn't remember her talking so much."
"It's funny that she knows Sebastian Komm, the fashion journalist. I haven't heard from him in a long time. He must be a bit old by now."
Tony paused.
"Well, that's my aunt. You know my family," said Tony. "At least the ones in this city."
"Well, you knew my uncle," Hilda replied. "He's in jail now. I think if I had a choice I'd rather have an aunt who talked a lot than an uncle who was a partner in crime."
At that moment they passed a group of children dressed in a light blue uniform. They were wearing caps. They were about twenty kids whose ages seemed to range from 5 to 13 years old. They were all walking together. A woman also dressed in light blue accompanied them. Tony stared at them.
"Where are these kids from, some club or something?" Tony wondered.
"No," said Hilda. "They are orphans. They live in an orphanage here in the park."
"Oh," said Tony.
"I sometimes help them, when they do charity events. If I hadn't had my Uncle Gustav and my grandmother I would have ended up living there with JK. I'm an orphan too."
"Wow," said Tony. "That's true."
They came to the corner of the park. Tony and Hilda looked at each other. Hilda kissed Tony on the cheek.
"Goodbye, Tony," said Hilda. "I had so much fun with you and your aunt."