What Can I Do When Everything's On Fire?: A Novel (17 page)

whom she hasn’t seen for twenty years

—She’s an engineer Soraia

and she whispers

—I can still get into my clothes, I haven’t gotten fat at all in the coffee shop by the factory door, the performer is a middle-aged gentleman among middle-aged gentlemen blocking the window having forgotten his coffee cup, taken by a freckle-faced creature lacking in any beauty and my father who miraculously still had some pity left

—Quite beautiful

the creature waiting for a bus unable to see him, not an engineer why all the fibbing?

a factory girl more likely, the performer cleaning the window muttering proud remarks, I imagine like

—She’s an engineer Soraia

his glasses fogging up making it hard to define things, rain or something like that, I’d say rain, it might be raining on us, attempting a signal that no one answered, the bus hid the freckle-faced girl and as it disappeared around the corner no bus no freckle-face, the wave of a magician’s hand and an empty stage, cleaning them better in hopes that habit would scrub the lenses and nothing but buildings, a cat, other working girls

other engineers waiting, the coffee machine spouting steam, my father hiding his pity

—Let’s go Milá

and the performer and the middle-aged gentleman blending into the window, blowing his nose or his forehead, a line of mascara on his cheek, imploring

—Soraia

a kiss on the tip of his fingers that nobody received or a few hours later a customer in the first row would put into his pocket and the middle-aged gentleman

—It’s not yours

knocking over the champagne, looking for the kiss among datebooks and change, the chicken-like fluttering of the dancers, the manager

—Missy

the tatter of a kiss that didn’t get beyond the coffee shop dripping down the glass, gathering on the cigarette butts and the rinds on the floor that my father and the middle-aged gentleman stepped on as they went to the door while the customer in the first row was adjusting his lapel, accepting the apologies of the management, a bottle of champagne with the compliments of the manager, two clowns for free to finish out the night and even so indignation, date books and change on the table, the lining of his pockets exhibited all around

—But what kiss what kiss?

the kiss swept away with cigarette butts and rinds, the factory invisible at two in the morning, only its gullet of an entrance and a garage on the left, the horses were licking the salt on the bridge beams, the flamingos in a farewell circle off to the rivers of Tunisia, Milá resting in the dressing room with the help of the works inspector with whom she would wake up at the start of each month until the money ran out

the honking of the geese that I think I’m hearing

and a pill for the nerves that my father gave me, the honking of the geese that I hear as I sleep, Rui sneaking open the bag and stealing a cigarette as though my father were there

—They say your old man’s sick they say he’s going to die Paulo

and the flamingos and the geese swirling over the poplars, Dona Helena tottering with rheumatism incapable of helping me, my father isn’t sick, he’s going along the Rua da Palmeira with me, practicing a curtsy or a polka step, he may be leaning on my shoulder but it’s because of a loose paving stone you understand, he needs a cup of soup or to spend the afternoon talking to the ceiling and looking out the window at the park and all that, the cedar and all that, the café and all that, Mr. Couceiro would visit the cemetery with the angry expression of an asthmatic bothered by the air, needles pricking his lungs

—Oh! doctor when I breathe

—Shall we be going, lad?

diabetes, urea, not a body, pieces that were wasting away each by itself, the liquid my father injected into his breast exploding onto his skin, Dona Amélia without cigarettes or candy or perfume laying a camellia on the grave and that was what Rui didn’t want to see, refused to see, that must have been why he went to the beach in the afternoon with the syringe and the spoon, whistling to the mastiff with a bow who was off sniffing at trash, at the cemetery no flamingos or geese, sparrows, butterflies, one big one, emerald green, hopping about through the laurels, my mother playing hopscotch along the village graves

shelves with doilies, paper flowers, curtains

she would mark the gravestones with pieces of chalk, numbering them, toss a pebble, and leap onto them with one leg, the wind brought the smell of mimosas down from the mountains and now my mother not playing on the gravestones, not playing with anything, so far away and grown up

—Do you have a picture of when you were little, mother?

Mr. Couceiro waiting for me at the cemetery, impatient with me

—Shall we be going, lad?

his cane hanging from his wrist and a bouquet of gillyflowers forgotten in his hand, incapable of placing it on my father’s coffin, taking the bouquet to the maid from the dining room without knowing how to give it to her

—Take it

and her thanking me at the movies as soon as the lights went slowly down and I was fascinated by the world that ceases to exist, by my mother who disappears, maybe the smell of the mimosas fainter and more distant, the maid from the dining room happy with the gillyflowers squeezing my fingers, the breathing of a drowsy boat that rocks and calms me, Rui must have gone to the beach in the afternoon

there’s a bus at three o’clock

and after taking the train from Costa da Caparica to Fonte da Telha holding back the mastiff who was barking at the waves, touching the needles and the piece of newspaper afraid of losing them, finding the place near the rocks where Soraia and I, the mastiff as though he understood

he doesn’t understand

licking me on the ears, the wound on its haunch that the vet can’t cure, Paulo at the movies stroking a neck that doesn’t move away, accepts him, the gillyflowers sliding down from the lap of the maid from the dining room, muscles that stiffen, permit, relax, the look of recognition and all the gillyflowers on the floor, the hand over mine almost inert, wet, it seems to me that

—Paulo

in spite of the sound of the film, her mouth

—Paulo

sketching out the letters of my name one by one

—Paulo

asking her to repeat

—Paulo

and

—Paulo

and

—Paulo

and

—Paulo

my name changing when spoken by her, deeper, fuller

—Paulo

Mr. Couceiro with an asthmatic whistle

—Shall we be going, lad?

without, thank God, the maid from the dining room, wearing a blouse with fish and anchors which I’m not sure I like

I like it

wearing the necklace with a cross, it looks to me like the solemn communion picture back home in the living room, a childish appetite for lollipops and cake, they tell me I’m sick, they tell me I’m going to die

—Paulo

after the movies over the broken-down wall in Chelas, the impression of a wig, false fingernails, eyes suddenly open that run away from me, protest

—You’re pulling out my hair Paulo

sure of padding on the breasts and hips, a clown with me pretending to be you, pushing her up against the bricks, grabbing her head, breaking the chain

—You’re a man

tearing her skirt and underneath the skirt, where I’d expected something, no toy, emptiness, the jackdaw who won’t leave us alone, a damp heat that contracts and gets away from me, letting go of her blouse, her hair, a foolish smile instead of a bouquet of gillyflowers

—I’m sorry

and you not saying anything why, scared why, looking around for help why, kneeling and looking for the chain with the crucifix why, the glint of the little cross in the grass, your hand closed over the cross that you wore for me over the anchors and the fish, the desire to make love to me, for me to marry you, to live with you in Bico da Areia and then wine, right? and then your body swelling, right? and then why Paulo?

and then why Carlos?

the owner of the café with a bottle

—Judite

the smell of mimosas and the mountain wind, the crucifix that you wore for me and hide from me now, Paulo’s mother in the cemetery leaping on the gravestones and winning a game from the electrician, the pups, an insistent owl on the bedroom blind, there isn’t any Bico da Areia, only the mountains and the mimosas, shelves with doilies, paper flowers, curtains, the blacksmith’s forge dribbling sparks, everything so slow, everything so eternal, they’re eight years old and therefore they don’t call

—Dona Judite

they don’t appear on the step

—I’ve brought money I can pay

the schoolbooks that they leave on a gravestone, their pebbles for playing hopscotch

—Can I jump, Juditinha?

my grandmother’s brother

Grandmother Cora, she made pumpkin sweets in cardboard cups

he was a harbor pilot in the Azores, Corvo, Pico, Faial, I remember the names of the islands, even today I do a good job brushing my teeth, my brain goes along repeating Corvo Pico Faial, Corvo Pico Faial and the taste of pumpkin sweets on my tongue, heating the spoon more than once so the fix will melt and the syringe is full, the first vein showing up under the rubber band too dark, the second vein larger, the needle finding it swelling, tendons and this warmth in the chest, this acceptance of what, the mastiff nipping at my shirt with a strange whining and no pain, no discomfort in the kidneys, Paulo, Soraia’s nephew, Soraia’s cousin, Soraia’s son

Soraia’s son

repairing the gold chain in Chelas

—I’m sorry

Mr. Couceiro accompanied him from the cemetery to Anjos the way he’d accompanied his father at night to the show at the club, they say your old man’s sick, they say he’s going to die Paulo, Dona Helena going out to the doorway on a nutty impulse, the memory of Noémia where silence was growing in the dust of the corners, where bangs and skinny little legs, a stack of school notebooks, a broken pencil sharpener, when the sound of dishes stopped in the kitchen and the clock on the church forgot about the sparrows, the three of you

the three of us quiet in the living room waiting for what, thinking about what, wanting what, the Avenida Almirante Reis which never changed, furniture stores, lunchrooms, dentists, on Mr. Couceiro’s birthday a comrade from Timor with a decoration in his lapel and whose hand hung from ours like a dead hare, we grasped the hare

—Where shall I put this?

we stayed looking at the hand when the corpse disappeared into the sleeve reappearing in a kind of slipping, the little paws of his fingers wobbling trying to grasp the spoon, Dona Helena afraid that the hare would cling to her arm and stay there slowly decomposing, the rest of the comrade also a hare, maybe only moribund, gobbling potatoes, his grandson came to get him after dinner and led all of that, the decoration, the animals, far away from us and I got the feeling that pieces of gray fur were floating in the living room

my mother used to get the feeling that owl feathers were floating in the bedroom when she opened the window, the village cemetery, the graves of the soldiers gassed in France, flowerpots taller than the treetops glistening in the sun, autumn leaves spinning around the chapel the way voices spun around in Bico da Areia

—Dona Judite, I can pay

not from the pups, from the soldiers from the war without uniforms without skulls

—Dona Judite, I can pay

even today for example the owner of the café with me, and I repeating to myself Corvo Pico Faial, Corvo Pico Faial, a hint of mimosas, a taste of pumpkin pudding, the sideboard they’d painted red with a trim of roses, my grandmother

—Juditinha

the first rains of October scattering gulls, the month when they say my father’s going to die, mother, the month when Rui at Fonte da Telha not lying down yet, waiting, the distance that was growing between what for him was him and for the mastiff and for us

the cop

—
Do you know him?

and I don’t know, I don’t know this man

a stranger with a stolen cigarette in the dressing room putting it out with his fingers so that I to the cop

—I don’t know this man

similar to Rui with his loafers, his clothes, but not Rui, not Rui, Rui arriving at Príncipe Real, wrapped in mufflers, not like this, not undressed, one of his socks on, the other that the mastiff had pulled off and that high tide would carry off, Rui

make note of this

at Príncipe Real, bronchitis at the door, the clown who got up out of bed to insist on some tisane, soothing syrup, and a hateful arm, not listless, hateful

—Let go of me faggot

while what wasn’t an arm was folding up on the living-room couch among nickel-plated deer and mice on candlesticks, clowns’ treasures that didn’t make me sad, made me laugh, in Vânia’s room a velvet hippopotamus, in Micaela’s garret a theatrical pause