in the city.”
“I’m sure there’s more than three,” Nita said, though she didn’t see anyone else in their immediate area.
Fabricio agreed. “There’s a whole Chinatown.”
Kovit looked around at the people walking on the street. “Yeah, not in this area.” He shifted uncomfortably. “I feel . . . conspicuous.”
No one seemed to be staring at Kovit, which was what usually happened to Nita when she went somewhere that wasn’t used to people who looked like her. Which probably didn’t make Kovit any more comfortable about standing out, but at least no one was being openly rude.
They continued walking, crossing a massive square. On one end, a large pink building surrounded by gates, and on the other, a wide road encircling a monument. In front of the building, dozens of protesters with large banners had camped out, yelling inaudible things into megaphones and banging something metal around, even as a song wafted from speakers. More came down the road, like this spot was the end of a march of some kind.
She looked at the banners, but she couldn’t quite read them through the mass of people, and the wind was blowing them at the wrong angle. She turned to Fabricio. “Are there a lot of protests here?”
He nodded. “Many people remember what it was like to not have a voice, so they use it whenever they can. We’re very politically active. We protest, we vote, we talk politics a lot.”
Someone walked by selling ice cream and water, and then they were across the plaza and into one of the smaller streets. From this angle, she had a clear view of one of the protest signs, but it was all catch phrases and talking points she didn’t have the cultural reference points to understand.
Nita found herself asking, “What are they protesting?”
Fabricio jerked away and continued walking. “What am I, your prisoner or your tour guide?”
Nita tilted her head. “Can’t you be both?”
He glared at her.
Kovit sighed. “It’s not important. Let’s just get to the apartment.”
They continued walking, and after a few moments Fabricio said, “They’re protesting the rules around claiming veteran’s benefits for soldiers of la Guerra de las Malvinas.”
Nita knew of the war. In the 1980s, Argentina invaded the British-occupied islands after negotiations to return them to Argentina broke down. Argentina was thoroughly routed.
“Guerra de las Malvinas?” Kovit repeated, mangling the Spanish.
“The Falklands War,” Nita translated.
Fabricio’s eyelid twitched, and his jaw clenched when he heard the F-word, and Nita immediately wished she hadn’t said anything. Her father once told her that the surest way to get in a fight with an Argentine was to claim the Islas Malvinas weren’t theirs. Nita had a rule about the Falklands—keep her mouth shut. She didn’t want to get in a fight over something she only had the barest understanding of, especially when most of what she knew was from her Chilean father who had little love for Argentina.
She needed to change the subject, and quickly.
“Nice weather today, right?”
Wow. She was really great at this.
Fabricio gave her a mildly exasperated but also a little amused look like he knew exactly what she was trying do. Kovit looked at her like she was speaking gibberish, since he had no idea what a minefield topic this was.
“You should try alfajores while you’re here,” Fabricio said, pointing at a display of white cookies in a bakery window. “They’re delicious.”
Nita’s shoulders loosened, relieved he was playing along.
“I will,” she promised. “I hear the gelato here is good too?”
They continued prattling on about innocuous dessert items as they strolled along the cobblestoned roads. The narrow streets were one way, closed off and small, a perfect little bubble that made her feel like she’d gone back in time. Small café tables cluttered the sidewalks, full of people reading books and drinking coffee. Nita saw a big sign for something called a submarino, which, if the sign was to be believed, involved putting a whole chocolate bar into hot milk and letting it dissolve to make hot chocolate. She made a mental note to try it while she was here.
Kovit was so busy staring at a building nearby with old-fashioned balconies that he nearly stepped in dog poop. Nita and Fabricio both kept one eye on the ground and neatly avoided it. Even this small similarity between them annoyed Nita.
It didn’t take long to find their Airbnb. Kovit had booked it with Fabricio’s money, money he’d gotten selling Nita on the black market. It was only fitting Nita used that money to advance