The Debutant's Luck

By Esteban Navarro Soriano

Simón, a teenager from a coastal town whose parents are sick, decides to commit petty thefts with the intention of helping them financially. In a few weeks he realizes that by stealing you can earn more money, and faster, than by working. When he finds out that a schoolmate and a girl from the neighborhood, older than them, do the same thing, the three decide to join forces. But in the first distributions of the profits, disagreements arise, when his colleagues realize that Simón has extraordinary luck in everything he does.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BadPress
• Release date: Apr 19, 2024
• ISBN: 9781667473208

Book preview

Chapter 1

Lack of money is the root of all evil .

Mark Twain

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Remain inside the car! shouted a man with a deep voice from the road. And place your hands where we can see them!

Through the flash of the headlights from the vehicle behind them, and the lights of the flashlights, Simón identified the shadow of at least two people. One of them approached cautiously from his side.

Remember what we've talked about, Magdalena's father whispered from the back seat. Nothing will happen to you if you do as I've told you.

The girl, sitting beside him in the passenger seat, didn't look at him; she was in shock, inert, her eyes lost on the dark road.

For God's sake! For God's sake! her father repeated several times.

As he did so, he punched the back of the seat. Simón's body rocked back and forth.

Calm down, Dad! admonished Magdalena. Shouting and hitting won't get us out of here.

In the distance, from the rear, they saw the reflection of two more headlights; The officers had requested reinforcements, and another police car arrived. And down the front road, they saw another one coming, probably from the Sinera police station. There were already three cars surrounding the Seat 124 Sport: two from the rear and one in front.

Roll down the windows and put your hands where we can see them! shouted one of the officers through a megaphone with such poor sound quality that his voice was barely distinguishable.

Simón turned the handle, and the glass began to descend. Magdalena did the same with hers, while her father remained still, as the rear window of that vehicle could not be lowered.

Hey, the one in the back seat! Roll down the window and put your hands out! the policeman insisted.

It can't be done in this model, one of the officers intervened, correcting his colleague.

Slowly! Slowly! he continued ordering Simón and Magdalena as they turned the handle.

Dimas had fallen silent. Never in his worst predictions did he think the police would catch them. How was it possible that Simón, in his first burglary, had brought them such bad luck? I have wondered.

It's your fault! exploded Magdalena.

Mine? asked Simón, as soon as he rolled down his window completely.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the policeman's revolver to his left. On the right, at the level of the rear window, the barrel of another weapon was visible. The car that arrived from the Sinera road had already stopped, and they distinguished the two shadows of the officers, who had positioned themselves in front, at a prudent distance; it seemed they still didn't have control of the interior of the Seat 124 Sport. One of them carried a long gun in his arms and swung it as if it were a small child.

Forks! exclaimed Magdalena. It's all your fault because no one is lucky in love and gambling at the same time.

What do you mean, Magda? her father asked.

That this idiot has brought us misfortune, she said, delivering a strong blow to the dashboard. He fell in love with Dorata, and she stole his good luck.

To hell with beginner's luck! Dimas shouted, just as the barrel of one of the police officer's guns was inserted through the driver's window, ordering Simón to get out of the car with his hands up.

At that moment, the boy was fourteen years old.

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Chapter 2

We live more by our desires than by our deeds.

-George Moore

The bar was called Parada, founded by an Iluronense in the late sixties on Rosellón Street, one of the most populous neighborhoods in the city. In its beginnings, it was a tapas bar, but Camilo soon realized that by serving tapas, beers, and wines, it would take a long time to recover the investment.

For several years, he made efforts to boost his business by offering low-priced menus and discounts on sandwich combos served in the mornings. But the big leap came when, almost at the end of the seventies, an entertainment area was built nearby, where there were a couple of discos and several entertainment venues.

One day, a young boy of no more than fifteen asked him if he had chocolate. Camilo immediately knew he was referring to hashish. He had worked in construction, in the first urbanizations built in the sixties boom, and had smoked joints. Just like the fishermen of Barcino and all the young people of his generation. The consumption of hashish and marijuana was as common as smoking cigarettes and drinking beer.

We don't sell that stuff here, he replied sternly.

The boy looked at him with a disappointed expression, as if he had been let down by Camilo's response.

Do you know where I can buy some rock?

I neither know nor care to know.

The following weekend, on Saturday, three boys and a young girl sat at a table in the bar. The girl, dressed in party clothes, as if she were a cabaret dancer, approached the bar and asked Camilo for four beers, which she would serve herself. While she opened them and placed the four glasses on the counter, she saw the boys take out their tobacco pouches and distribute them on the table where they were sitting. One of them took out rolling paper and undid a cigarette. Camilo, realizing what he was about to do, left the bar and reprimanded him.

Guys, don't smoke joints here!

What's the matter? The girl intervened, approaching the table with two of the beers she had taken from the bar.

I don't want joints smoked in my bar, Camilo replied.

Come on, man, one of the boys addressed him, the one with the rolling paper in his hand, don't be such a prude. Joints are a source of wisdom.

Whatever you say, but if you smoke here, I'll have to throw you out.

You'll lose good customers, the girl said, bringing the other two beers she had taken from the bar. And it's a shame because we like this bar.

That girl couldn't have been more than seventeen years old and spoke as if she were much older. Camilo was surprised by her maturity and that she was the leader of that group of boys, some of whom were already in their thirties. But she was the one calling the shots there.

I don't mind if you smoke joints, Camilo continued. What matters to me is that you do it in my bar. I don't want any trouble with the police.

The police won't give you any trouble if you don't give them any, the girl said, puckering her lips coquettishly.

A few months later, Camilo realized that the business of selling hashish could provide him with extra income in the bar, and he became one of the biggest dealers in the area.

A contact from Barcino brought him the goods on Thursday afternoons, hidden in a canvas bag, and he stored it in the bar's cellar. Then, over the weekend, I sold it to customers who requested it. The sale of hashish was cash only, in five hundred or one thousand peseta bills, and Camilo couldn't deposit it in the bank without raising suspicions, so he stored all that money in a metal box

installed in the basement floor, between two freezers.

He had to hire a boy to attend the bar while he sold the drugs to the customers, and a girl to deliver the merchandise on the street once they had paid for it. That girl was the same one who told him that the police wouldn't give him any trouble if he didn't give them any trouble, being underage made her immune to punishment.

From Thursday afternoon, the bar became a procession of young people passing through before going to the discos in Iluro. They entered through the main door, went to the bar, and asked Camilo for the amount they wanted. I have collected the money and signaled to the girl waiting outside. The buyer left through the kitchen door, where the trash cans were, and the girl handed over the drugs, which she kept inside her bra. In those years, there were no women in the police force, and male officers couldn't search for a woman, so it was difficult to find drugs when they hid them in intimate areas.

On Sunday afternoon, before closing, Camilo paid the bar employee and that girl. The rest he kept in the basement box.

He accumulated so much money stored that it was said he would have to deposit it into the bank somehow, without arousing suspicion. For this, he hired an accountant who kept the bar's books and instructed him to manipulate the accounts as needed so that the proceeds from the sale of hashish could pass as money earned in the bar. The accountant said he would do so, but it would take several months to balance the books so that the Tax Agency wouldn't detect it.

By early summer 1979, he had accumulated nearly twelve million pesetas in that box.

Chapter 3

It's not enough to hear the music,

we have to see it .

Igor Stravinsky

Simon confessed for the first time a few weeks before his first communion. His mother had insisted to him that children had no sins. Sinning, she made it clear, was the province of adults. That idea, that children were not responsible for their actions, simmered in his fragile conscience and clothed him in an armor that protected him from any mischief he could do.

There, kneeling, he felt enormous shame, enclosed in that small wooden enclosure. In silence. With a gloomy darkness that prevented him from seeing the eyes of the priest. Santiago, a classmate, told him that it was about confessing to a man he did not know, things he should regret, but things he didn't really regret.

What do I have to confess? he asked his mother.

Tell him everything you think you do wrong, she said, And he will tell you that God forgives you.

Why can't I tell it directly to God?

Because the priest is his representative on earth, his mother concluded.

Simon detected that the priest seemed to feel some satisfaction with his whispered declarations, moved within that kind of ecclesiastical cage. It must have seemed exciting to him to hear how a twelve-year-old boy, who looked fifteen because of his height, was sincere with him and told him that he felt pleasure when he touched his penis.

Do you touch yourself a lot, boy? I have asked.

Simon had noticed that the parish priest had a very wide jaw. That detail, combined with the excessively short distance between his eyes, gave him an inexplicable distrust.

Several times a day, but I try to avoid it as much as I can. Especially, I touch myself at night, before falling asleep, he replied.

That's not right.

I know, Father. But believe me, I pray after doing it. Never, I swear, the boy commented with an excess of sincerity that drew a smile from the clergyman.

Pedro was the first to tell them that the priest also touched his leg when he confessed.

What are you saying, man! Santiago reproached him, inheriting the bravery of his father, a professional soldier. Does he touch your leg? If he does that to me, I'll knock his head off with a punch.

Pedro was so handsome that he looked like a girl. Some boys made fun of him and called him gay, but his friends defended him. For them, Pedro was not gay, but he did have certain effeminate gestures. One day he confessed to his father that he liked to crochet and announced his intention to become a dressmaker. Then, his father beat him up and told him that men had to do men's work, because if they did women's things, they would end up like them, useless.

You shouldn't tell your father what you want to be when you grow up, Santiago censored him. Believe me, the less our parents know about us, the better.

Well, I think he's doing the right thing, Andrés intervened. If we can't tell the truth to our parents, then... what are they for?

Andrés had moved to Roquesas with his mother - a single mother - four years earlier, when he was eight years old. Since it was a family with few economic resources, they rented an apartment in the port area, where housing was cheaper. In those years, a single mother was not looked upon favorably, especially in small towns, so she was constantly pointed out and treated like something she was not. But the bond between Andrés and his mother was so close that they practically hid nothing from each other. In the same block lived Dorata, a girl of her age, of Haitian origin, who had moved there the previous summer. Her father, Etienne, worked at the cement plant in Iluro, the same one where Jorge, Simón's father, had been employed for twenty years.

Would you tell your mother if you wanted to be a dressmaker? Santiago asked.

Of course, Andrés agreed.

And if you were a girl and wanted to be a prostitute, would you tell her? I have continued asking.

Enough already! Matías intervened, visibly annoyed.

No, really! Santiago insisted. We shouldn't tell our parents anything, because they don't understand us.

Well, I don't even tell my mother the time, Matías commented.

The others fell silent, because they knew what his mother did. Matías was known as the son of a bitch, and it wasn't because they insulted him, but because his mother was a prostitute. It was he, precisely, who told the boys that masturbating was natural.

It's so natural that even the priest does it, he affirmed.

Oh no! Santiago rejected. I can't agree with you there, because priests don't masturbate.

Yes, they do! Matías insisted. And I know because my mother told me one of her clients is a priest.

Matías's mother had been saying that among the clients of the brothel Marta there was a priest. And the priest turned out to be the one from Roquesas. They found out the day they kicked him out of town. And for a few months there was no priest in the town. There was even a joke that went around asking, How is Roquesas like cancer? The answer was obvious: neither of them has a cure.

Agueda, Simón's mother, had been diagnosed with breast cancer a few months earlier. And his father, Jorge, began to have uncontrollable tremors that prevented him from moving naturally. His parents' illness instilled in the boy a religious feeling that inhibited him from doing anything that might displease them. That's why until he was thirteen he was the healthiest in the gang. He didn't smoke, he didn't drink, but he also didn't want to distance himself from those who had been his friends throughout elementary school. At that age, everyone's world consists of friendships. And Simon laughed when they laughed. And, on occasion, he took a sip from a beer can, but he quickly refused to keep drinking because its bitter taste was not to his liking. There were several occasions when Matías mocked him for his sanctimonious behavior and because, of all of them, he was the only one who went to church every Sunday. For a thirteen-year-old to go to church every Sunday, pray, and not smoke or drink was a sure target for the mockery of other children of his age. There began a distancing between what his parents professed and what his companions did. The time had come to choose between one side or the other. On one side were his mother, his father, and his grandfather, and the family history that whoever does good always gets a reward. And on the other side were his friends.

Two people marked him at that age: Dimas and his daughter, Magdalena. Simon met Dimas a few weeks after turning thirteen. He was originally from France and his appearance resembled the one portrayed in movies of medieval innkeepers. He was fifty years old and, at that time, he worked as a winemaker in the bar at the bowling alley. The boys sat on stone benches at the beginning of the park, under the iridescent reflection of the ash trees, and Santiago made trips to the bar, where Dimas gave him a package of fresh beers, taken from the fridge, and a pack of blond cigarettes. It was the French

man who decided that it would be Santiago who would take out the drinks and tobacco because, being the son of a soldier, he knew that no one would dare to hit him if they caught him stealing. In those years, hitting the sound of a soldier was something like a declaration of war. And it could cause serious problems for the perpetrator.

Don't let the Manco see you! Magdalena warned.

The boys watched his daughter with anticipation, especially when she took those prolonged sips from the beer can and puffed loudly on the cigarettes, which she smoked as if there were no tomorrow. And when tiny drops of sweat accumulated on her rocky belly, standing out against the toasted color of her skin. Magdalena stood out as a beauty with exuberant feminine attributes that couldn't be concealed by the tight short shirts she wore. She wasn't very tall and maintained a childish appearance, so she didn't look out of place when she joined the gang. And she wasn't just attractive because of her physical appearance, but because of the air of confident assurance she exuded and the ironic humor she infused into everything she said. The girl moved with a feline gesture that drove the boys wild. Someone in the town had commented that her father wasn't her real father because he didn't look like his daughter at all, and they said they were really lovers. But the boys didn't care what they said, because they saw her as a majestic beauty trapped in the body of a nymph. They all longed to be with her, to feel her company, to draw a smile from her with some absurd comments arising from the childish mentality of children beginning adolescence with clumsy steps.

The girl had turned eighteen and lived with her father in a caravan they had parked, since they arrived, in a corner of the land they had bought in the upper part of the stream, with the few savings they brought from France.

I don't like you hanging out with that girl, Simon's mother insisted.

Why, Mom? I like her.

Distrust people who cling to others with whom they have no affinity. An eighteen-year-old girl who likes to be in the company of thirteen-year-olds is not to be trusted. And besides, her father looks like a gypsy.

At the end of that summer, in 1977, the owner of the bowling alley fired Dimas when he caught him stealing from the cash register .

Chapter 4

In life there is something worse than failure:

not having tried anything.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

In Roquesas there was only one police officer , whom everyone knew with the Manco trailer. They said he lost his arm in the war, in the Blue Division. And those who had been in the Blue Division were something like earthly gods who could do and say whatever they wanted. Santiago's father was the one who told them that when someone lost a limb, the strength went to the limb that remained. So El Manco must have had Herculean strength in his right arm. Pedro found out the afternoon he caught him stealing a spicy magazine from the station kiosk and slapped him so hard that he turned his face away . The fingers of the Manco's right hand were drawn on his face for several days .

El Manco was the first fear of Simón's childhood and pre-adolescence. When she was eleven years old, she had to hide under the bed one day when she saw him walking through her neighborhood. He probably passed by there because he had to deliver a court summons, but it happened that Simón was on the balcony, looking out onto the street, and Manco entered through the corner of the two bridges. The fear that assailed him was such that he ran , in the face of his father's laughter, and took shelter under the double bed.

The children of Roquesas had been scared of El Manco, whom they represented as if he were a kind of ogre. They even knew him in Iluro, the capital of the province, where they said that Manco was a municipal police officer when he still had both arms . They commented that the kids there protested because of its excessive harshness. He used to walk in front of the school and, when he saw some young boy smoking, he would grab him a wafer with his whole hand open and the boy would come home with a scar on his face. So, the father, when he saw him in that state, asked him if he had gotten into a fight at school. And when the boy responded that it was the municipal police who did it to him, the father replied that he deserved it , because surely he had done something . Santiago's father was the one who told them that when the civil war ended, more credit was given to authority than to a son. If a police officer said you were a thief, then it meant you were. And if a schoolteacher slapped a child a couple of times, then his parent would give him two more . Without asking.

Dimas caused sympathy among the gang, because in a way he represented the complete opposite of the parents of those children . He was a globetrotter who had nothing . And the little he had he shared . When he was fired from the bowling alley, he began to receive the boys at his farm. He liked that when they left school in the afternoons they met there . He provided them with cigarettes and let them shoot with two old BB guns. At that time there was not a tree in the upper part of the river that did not have a shot.

The fact that a fifty-year-old adult liked to hang out with thirteen-year-old boys was frowned upon. But at that time no one questioned it, because they did not know it . None of the parents knew where their children went when they left school . Probably, if they had known, one of those parents, like Simón's, who worked in the Iluro cement factory ; that of Santiago, who was a military man; that of Matías , who was a pastry chef; that of Andr é s, whose mother was single; or Pedro, whose father beat him up when he told him he wanted to be a dressmaker, they would disapprove.

Etienne was the only one who did not let his daughter join Dimas and Magdalena. Dorata was an attractive mulatto of the same age as those boys and her father did not want her to be made fun of or to become infatuated with any of those young men. He strictly prohibited him from going to the field. A black immigrant, who had not been born in the town, distrusted everything and everyone.

—People hate those who are different — he had repeated many times to his daughter.

Dimas trained them in two things that he believed were important enough for thirteen-year-olds to know. One was to shoot. And the other, driving.

You have to be self-sufficient so that you do not depend on anyone and so that no one is above you , he told them, with the marked French accent that characterized him . If you don't know how to drive a car, you wo n't go anywhere . And if you don't know how to shoot, I won't respect you anymore . And loss of respect is the first step to submission .

There , at that moment, was when Simón connected a series of scattered concepts, but together they made up what would be his future misfortune: driving, shooting, loss of respect and submission .

He taught them how to drive with a red Seat 1430, which roared like a Ferrari. On the front it had six headlights that protruded in front of the body , two of them with yellow lights. And Dimas had embedded a spoiler in the rear, between the window and the trunk door. That car, seen from the side, looked like an airplane . When evening fell , and it began to get dark, all the boys drove, in order, the 1430, from the upper part of the stream to the area of the first houses. They knew that above those houses El Manco never patrolled.

—Why do you have the yellow lights? — Simón asked him , when he noticed the Seat's headlights.

This way the road is better illuminated at night , said Dimas . In France it is the mandatory color for car headlights.

Chapter 5

He who goes too fast arrives so late

like the one who goes very slowly.

William Shakespeare

Simon was thirteen years old and Magdalena eighteen the first time the two sat together in a car, as if they were a couple. She took his hand and smiled sweetly at him.

—Accelerate ! — he encouraged as they went down the river aboard the 1430.

The car was sliding from behind , lurching from one side to the other, while Simón pressed the accelerator to the floor. The rear-wheel drive moved the wheels furiously while the engine roared , releasing streams of gray smoke from the exhaust pipe. There was a moment of lust when Magdalena took the shotgun out of the passenger window and began shooting at the trees .

- What are you doing?! Have you gone crazy?!

—Calm down, Clyde.

Simon looked at her without knowing what she was referring to .

Clyde?

— Yes , silly, like Bonnie and Clyde. —Seeing that Simón did not know what he was talking about, he explained— . Two fugitives from America in the 1930s . You are Clyde and I am Bonnie.

When they returned to the booth, the others were waiting for them to drive in turns. There was no doubt that Simón was the one who drove with the most skill. It was even capable of spinning at 180 degrees without the engine stalling. Magdalena admired him for that and it was evident in the sparkle in her eyes when she sat next to him while he drove . His father also noticed that the two got along very well. Maybe too well, he thought .

As the afternoon fell, the rest went home, since dinner time for those who had a father and mother was sacred. The same did not happen for Andr é s, whose mother was single; or for Simon, whose parents were sick.

-Behold! — Dimas told them, opening a cloth bag that he had left on the wooden table that he used to place the tools in the shed.

Everyone was stunned looking at what looked like a gun.

—Is it real? — Andr é s asked .

Of course , Dimas replied . It's a US Army M1911 . A colleague brought it to me , " he added .

Simon was the first to reach out and grab her. It was a very heavy weapon for the hand of a thirteen-year- old boy , but his corpulence allowed him to lift it without too much effort. With that gun in his two hands he felt powerful.

—Can I shoot? - asked .

-Clear! —Dimas responded— .​ ​That's why I brought it .

At the back of the field they could shoot without anyone seeing them. And if someone passed by and heard the sound of gunshots, they might think they were hunters. Dimas's booth was so well located that if the police came up the river, they would see them early enough to get rid of the weapon before the agents arrived.

For several days in a row, when the other kids were going home, Dimas taught Andrés , Simón and his daughter how to shoot with that gun. The girl had nothing to envy of any of her companions and, although she held the weapon with both hands, it is also true that her temper when aiming made her hit the silhouette more accurately . of paper that his father hooked to one of the trees on the property.

Simón admired the complicity that the two had and even felt envious that Dimas was not his father.

Chapter 6

A rich person is different from one who is not:

Has more money .

Ernest Hemingway

One afternoon Simón and Magdalena were left alone in the field, because Andrés had to leave earlier. It was about to get dark and Dimas let them shoot with the M1911. They placed several empty cans of Skol brand beer on a brick wall and fired once each. At that distance, about twenty meters, it was very difficult for them to hit the target. Taking turns, they emptied the nine-shot magazine without either of them hitting the target. Dimas filled the magazines with projectiles that he took from a huge wooden box and the two emptied them in just a few seconds.

You can't shoot at the ball , he recommended . You have to aim, exhale and shoot with empty lungs . I've told you a million times, he admonished his daughter.

They continued shooting without paying attention to Dimas, because they looked at what they were doing as if it were a game.

—What do you give me if I hit the can on the right? —Simon asked the girl .

- Nothing. Because you can get it right by pure luck.

Simon was referring to was the one furthest to the right of the five they had placed . In the central part, in very large letters, and in capital letters , he had written SKOL in red. The O was no larger than a five peseta coin, so at that distance it was practically impossible for it to hit. Not even an experienced shooter could hit it, and even less so with that weapon that, being old, was not adjusted.

Bet whatever you want, Magda , Dimas smiled , because you will never be right .

The girl looked at Simon and said:

—If you hit the O with just one shot, right in the center, I'll suck it.

—Magdalena ! - the father was scandalized .

Simón grabbed the gun with both hands and cocked it .

-Wait! - the girl interrupted him when she saw him so determined - . You have to hit the middle of the letter, and in one shot. And it has to be right in the center, the distance of the hole has to be exact from any edge of the letter. Otherwise there is no bet.

You should n't play with that , Dimas said before Simón fired . If you want to shoot, do it as many times as you want. For that I leave you the gun. But it is not advisable to bet. An evil always plans on the game that brutalizes it. Listen to me, I don't bet é is.

—Come on, gunslinger! — Magdalena told him, ignoring her father's comment.

Simon got so nervous that he didn't even aim . He raised the gun and pulled the trigger. A metallic sound was heard and the beer can flew towards the back of the brick wall.

—I shit the bitch! — Dimas bellowed — . You have given.

The three ran towards where the