Broken Hearts On Boulevard Unirii novel Chapter 5

I looked at the girls as one by one, they introduced themselves.

Mihaela was the first. She was Angelo's girlfriend whom I had met on my previous visit to Bucharest. She was a third-year law student who hailed from a small village in northern Romania and lived in the student dormitory.

The second one was tall, blonde with an athletic build, who identified herself as Luciana. She refused to tell us where she was from. She did tell us that she loved horseback riding and worked in Bucharest as a certified kindergarten teacher. She had got to our retreat through a mutual friend.

The third girl, Roxana, was the most delightful of the group. She was busty and beautiful. Although she had a steady boyfriend, she had come to enjoy herself, and said that we should not judge her for that. She spoke English and Italian quite well as she studied languages at university. This was in contrast to the others who had great difficulty speaking English and whom we had to help complete sentences. She was a childhood friend of Mihaela, so we gathered that they hailed from the same village in the far north of the country.

The fourth one introduced herself as Mirella; she had come with her twin sister, Silvia, the fifth girl. They were both from Bucharest and worked as waitresses in a bar. They looked a bit older than the rest and actually ignored our presence.

The two girls silently sitting on the sidelines chain smoking showed no signs of getting up to introduce themselves. They were heavily made up, especially their eyes, and their hair seemed burnt from all the dye and looked like dry straw. The clothes they wore were skimpy and provocative giving them the look of prostitutes. Angelo had promised that he wouldn't bring prostitutes and we trusted him. Indeed, Angelo never referred to prostitutes as prostitutes; he just called them "girls in need."

The atmosphere warmed up a bit when somebody turned on the old radio that played loud Gypsy music. The two girls "in need" broke out into a wild dance, jumping and stamping their feet. Sebastian became suddenly enthusiastic watching them and joined them in the dancing.

We began opening the bottles of the cheap, locally produced wine that Angelo had brought.

Before long everyone knew each other and began feeling comfortable with one another. We had arranged to go on a hike the next morning and had reserved rooms in a hotel for three days.

The late hour, along with exhaustion from the flight and the wine that we consumed, began to take its toll on me. I left the noisy group and went looking for my cabin in which to spend the remaining night hours. Angelo and Mihaela went into a two-story cabin, climbed the wooden stairs and disappeared into the darkness. The only light available was moonlight, as the lights were switched off at a certain hour by an automatic timer.

It seems that the party didn't end until nearly dawn.

Roxana and Claudio were like a match made in heaven. They seemed so happy together that their smiles never left their faces.

The Gypsies looking, Simona and Carmen, got along well with Sebastian, who had introduced himself as Sabi Checker, a successful businessman from Australia.

Silvia hit it off with Elia, who didn't leave her side even for a moment lest she would be kidnapped.

What about Gert? He wandered around alone trying to capture one of the girls "in need" with his glance, but they didn't react. They looked at Sabi Checker like he was a cow they were going to milk.

The two cars we rented from Hertz could not hold the whole group, so Angelo had to take his own car as well. Mihaela sat next to him, bare-footed, resting her feet on the dashboard and her head against the side window with her hair fluttering in the summer wind.