A monkey-faced Spaniard with skin the colour of Dolce de Leche rings on the doorbell and carries my bag out to his Mercedes.
‘Ees your husband che no coming?’ he asks as I settle myself into the back and slam the door. My ex took cabs the way John Wayne rode horses and the local Portuguese, Spanish and Moroccan taxi drivers, constituted most of his social life.
‘No,’ I tell him, imagining that the assumption is historical and not merely because of the weight of my big enough for a small family vacation suitcase.
‘How ees che? I no see cheem for a while, a long while…’
‘Actually, he doesn’t live with me any more, he left about a year ago.’
‘Oh, what a shame, what a shame, dahleeng, I sorry, but sometimes eets better to end these things if they not working. Better now that when you are seexty or seexty five… You still young henough to find new man.’
I mumble something that’s supposed to be agreement, and say that he still lives locally and that we’re on cordial speaking terms, then to change the subject quickly as he seems intent on feeling sorry for me in my role as abandoned wife, I asked him which part of Spain he comes from.
‘Galicia,’ He answers, going on to tell me about the wonderful beaches and the shortcoming of the climate. ‘You get very good feesh, dahleeng’ he says. ‘In these country you don’t find very good feesh. Between us, I prefher the frozen feesh to the feesh you get een shops. At least you know what you getting. Een shop smell so bad. You need to find the eyes bright like these.’ He looks back at me through the rear view mirror and opens his eyes wide like he's demented. ‘If they small and dull it means the feesh is already hold a day or two, not fresh. You unnershtand?’
I nod ‘Mmm’.
‘For twenty years high worked at Scotts, cooking the feesh. I was the oyster man. You unnershtand? High hopened the oysters at the oyster bar.’
I nod and ‘mmm’.
‘Hand when I left I was the youngest person there, no one want to leave as the work was good. High work only three hand a chalf days, long hours, but then was feeneshed… So no one want to leave. You unnershtand? It was too good for us to be working there.’
I nod again.
‘We used to get everything fresh, heverything… live crabs, lobster, wonderful, wonderful feesh. But then the company was taken over by someone else and everything arrived already done. No more live crabs. Ees bad, you unnershtand, but they trying to save money, eets the way things are now. You see?’
By now I’m nodding like one of those dogs you used to put on the back window ledge of cars in the sixties. We had a beagle. I remember picking off the felt skin until ours was covered in white plastic patches like vitiligo.
‘One day we got crabs in for service at heleven o’clock and the customers sent every one back, they were all bad. Eets, no good. You unnershtand? They arrive at heleven and all throw away!’
His voice is going on and on and on without a breath, talking, I think, about fish but his accent is so pronounced that most of what I hear is a gargling shh shh shh sound appended with consonants, but every time I try to tune him out he looks in the rear view mirror and catches my eye, waiting for me to agree with him.
Eventually I can bear it no more and get out my mobile phone and pretend to make a call, then while he is quiet, I close my eyes tightly and turn my head to the window.
Finally there is silence which lasts all the way to Terminal 4.
He parks and jumps out to get me a trolley then, without even flinching, yanks the dead body of my suitcase out of the trunk and loads it up on the wheels. I pay him and as he gives me my change, he suddenly pulls me towards him by the shoulders, kisses me soundly on both cheeks and gives me a hug as though I were his daughter going off on a long trip and he my father driving me to the airport.
And then another hug and smacker on the cheek that is a tad less paternal.
‘Take care of yourself choney. You call me when you come back – High bring you chome. You have ha good holiday, no worry about your husband, there ees plenty more feesh in the see.’ He says, waving until I’m inside the terminal building.
I'm hoping he doesn't think he's one of them.
