Zaida smiled. Montse lit a cigarette. Jordi began counting the cracks in the ceiling.
Nobody knew his real name. He was seventeen, skinny as a fishing rod, with eyes that looked like two olives floating in vinegar. They called him el niño polla because he had the swagger of a rooster but the luck of a plucked chicken. He sold counterfeit perfume, broken watches, and dreams with no refunds. His greatest trick? Making you feel smart while robbing you blind.
was the florist. Except she hated flowers. She sold them, but each rose was a small betrayal, each lily a funeral she hadn't been invited to. Montse wore black every day, not out of mourning but because it matched her soul. She spoke in proverbs that made no sense. “A knife doesn't argue with the tomato,” she’d say, handing you a wilted daisy. Zaida- Montse- Jordi -el ni o polla
In the dusty outskirts of L’Hospitalet, three names were whispered in the same breath: Zaida, Montse, and Jordi. But the fourth— el niño polla —was the one that made the old ladies cross themselves and the stray dogs bark at noon.
was the mechanic. She could take apart a Renault 12 with her eyes closed and rebuild it before the tortilla de patatas finished curdling. Her hands were always stained with grease and bad decisions. She had a heart that clanked like a loose piston, and she loved only one thing: speed. Not in cars—in endings. She liked to finish fights, friendships, and affairs before they got boring. Zaida smiled
And the world, for one stupid, glorious moment, made perfect, rotten sense.
— "So," he said, flicking a toothpick across the table. "Who’s gonna betray whom first?" Nobody knew his real name
Zaida needed a getaway driver for a heist she’d invented just to feel alive. Montse needed a corpse—she’d always wanted to arrange funeral flowers around a real dead body. Jordi needed a problem to solve, and el niño polla needed a way out of a debt with a man who collected teeth.