What Can I Do When Everything's On Fire?: A Novel (22 page)

—Do you love me Carlos?

and my father a man, I swear a man

—I love you

and

—I love you

and

—I missed you

no café owner, no electrician, no pine cones on the windows, my aunt really my aunt and your fellow worker doesn’t understand, the boob

—You call that an actress?

just like the waiter and the orderly they don’t understand either, the actress my aunt, besides being an actress a dancer, a singer, there she is Gabriela

I called you Gabriela did you notice, I can call you Gabriela now

waiting for you in the bedroom, before watching you linger, first the satin sheets, the tunic in the breeze from the window whispering good-bye to you, the throat may be too thick but still feminine Gabriela, the hands too broad but there are women like that, don’t believe your fellow worker, the waiter, the orderly

—You call that an actress?

I painted his mouth, cheeks, forehead, put the soup cup out on the balcony, changed his men’s pajamas, those of a sick man, an old man

an almost old man

for a red nightgown, I announced her entrance into the room

—Gabriela my aunt

and it’s too bad the rain in Príncipe Real had carried off the cedar sprigs

or the laurel leaves, the poplar leaves and no name on the tombstone

a lie, a phrase on the stone that I paid for, I’m going to pay for when I get the money and I’m bound to get some money, Dona Helena will lend me some, write beloved husband, beloved father, my mother drawing the hopscotch square on the stone

—Why Carlos?

and forgetting about him while throwing the pebble onto number six, onto number eight

—I win

while I’m with you in the bedroom where the velvet garlands that I soaked with perfume and where the actress, a little pale from last night’s show looks to you as though she’s sleeping but she’s not sleeping, she’s awake, interested, she asks thinking you’re

—Rui

and it isn’t Rui, you made a mistake, it’s

—Paulo

it’s

—Gabriela

those are our two names, she recognized you, be happy, she’s thanking you for the visit and we can leave before the rain starts up again, loaded down with cedar sprigs

or laurel leaves or poplar leaves

she prevents us from looking at her as she says good-bye to us because she likes

it’s not right to go against the superstitions of actresses

getting to the theater early.

or maybe just a handful

I was in the hospital, the psychologist if you don’t draw a house and a family and a tree I’ll tell the doctor and you’ll never get out of here and all of a sudden

with no transition at all

there I was in the laundry room in Anjos pushing the plunger of the syringe into my skin, as the plunger gets closer to the needle I change into a gas balloon up against the ceiling with its cord hanging down

the same one I used to find the vein as I tightened it around my arm

except that two hours from now the gas starts escaping and I come down to find Dona Helena ironing, Mr. Couceiro in the easy chair and the psychologist studying the house, the family, and the tree, I tried to draw the one at Bico da Areia and what I got was waves and a girl on a tricycle, I made the swans bigger, the psychologist what’s that and me swans asking nobody knows what, the psychologist handing me another sheet of paper we’re not in some art museum fellow, when I said a house I meant a house, period, just like when I say a family it’s a family and that’s the way it is and when I say a tree it’s a tree so okay, there’s no room in the test for marigolds or swans so pick up the pencil and make me a nice little house quick, with me remembering Avenida Almirante Reis and giving him a five-story building without an elevator, the puff of sparrows that the church belfry flings at us along with the time and I was flying on the ceiling of the laundry room with the help of the syringe, the psychologist what’s that there, me explaining that it’s me flying on the ceiling of the laundry room with the little strap for enlarging veins hanging from my sleeve, the psychologist what strap, me if you’d come to Chelas with me and lend me some money we could both fly over the plane trees and mix in with the pigeons, the psychologist complaining to the doctor this guy’s sure he’s flying today and the doctor if he’s flying I’ll trim his wings pretty quick don’t you worry, he called the orderly get over here Vivaldo, and as soon as Mr. Vivaldo you calling me doctor, the doctor our friend here’s got the idea he’s flying can you beat that, and while I was watching the faucet in the washbasin as it gave off rusty drops that were turning the porcelain brown Mr. Vivaldo, who was in the habit of setting himself up in the bandage room with the other maid from the dining room, the redheaded one, sounds of falling metal objects coming through the door and she oh keep that little hand to yourself Mr. Vivaldo, that sneaky little hand, more than likely the same one he placed on my shoulder asking the doctor if he wanted him to bring him down to earth or not, the drops from the faucet growing round again, going back to stretching out when they decided to fall and they became completely spherical and with the ceiling light inside in miniature, the orderly took his sneaky little hand off my shoulder, disappeared into the cavern of the corridor where a maid was washing the floor and imploring wait till it dries wait till it dries, the doctor with a pensive little hmm not looking at me, tapping his pen against his thumbnail, so we’re birds then fine fine, when one drop slower than the rest stretched out and drew back, the psychologist showed him my drawing of the house, the doctor do you think I’ve got time for games Teixeira, he kept on repeating fine fine and perfecting whatever it was on his thumbnail until the orderly came back with a pill on a saucer

introibo ad altare Dei

white, large, with a slit in the middle, he winked at the doctor, invited me to stick out your tongue canary, precisely the trill that followed the sound of metal objects and the redhead’s protests about the sneaky little hand, the doctor interrupted him fine fine looking at the pill with benevolent approval, the sneaky little hand popped it into my mouth, the rascally hand gave me a cup of water and closed it, the world

you start thinking about it and life gets so strange

began to grow smaller take a look, the universe a drop from a faucet that contained everything, house, marigolds, the girl with the tricycle who wasn’t Dália after all, she was her cousins pedaling along at the same time whispering to each other, calling to each other, pretending not to see me

—We don’t see you we don’t know who you are

from time to time a look of indifference and under the indifference the joy of having an audience, circling close to me chin held high and on one occasion, I’m sure

I’m sure

—Be well

the house, the family that is me alone, the tree I wanted to be a cedar but was just a tangle of lines although it hadn’t been done all that bad since we’re not in an art museum boy, the orderly the walks outdoors are over you’re a slug now, the woman in the hallway was starting to clean the floor again while they dragged me out of the office to my bed couldn’t you have waited until the tiles dried, the doctor satisfied that the canary was still there, I was still waving my arms it seems, I wasn’t even shaking on the mattress, the redhead to the orderly you killed him didn’t you Mr. Vivaldo, a plane tree came to spy on me from the window and ran off

life is so strange

before falling asleep it seemed to me that my father

—Dance Paulo

so I executed a step to the right, the floor gave way on me and I crashed into the wall, the redhead with a squeal of surprise he didn’t die Mr. Vivaldo, I remember asking on the other side of the Tagus

—Was that what it was like with wine mother was that what it was like with wine?

my mother answering yes hugging the empty bottle against her knitted jacket, the doctor with a wrinkled brow studying his fingernail comparing it to the other fingers he was holding out, the pen was far, far away fine fine, Dona Helena

—Hi there Dona Helena did you see how I’m flying?

leaving her flatiron and coming up to me on the ceiling among the stains of time, they’re only aging photographs, the frames too, when I arrived here as a child the windowsill was up there and the balcony is worn away today, the tiles are as dingy as the clothes and the faces

yellow, yellow, my father yellow

—Hand me my wig before Rui gets here

not a clown, a scarecrow, a skeleton of beanpoles and a head of cloth with eyes and mouth of red lead, what happened to his teeth so real, so well defined, I put them in my pocket with that sneaky little hand, oh that little hand Mr. Paulo

—He doesn’t need them anymore

and since the Mulattoes still chew, sell them in Chelas, just like the dark glasses in the shadows by the peephole fumbling in the pocket, showing his gums and his lewd little hand, didn’t they teach you how to be quiet Mr. Vivaldo eh and right after that the metallic objects in the bandage room, the window latch closing and you in the dark, right? if my boss finds out, furniture knocked about, a weakening protest don’t squeeze me like that you’re crushing my ribs, whatever I imagined

fine fine

an uproar of pigeons scraping with their wings, the orderly breathing along with the staggering breath of someone carrying a piano and asking the piano what kind of a mania have you got stop laughing wait, a pause in the middle of the carrying and after the pause an intriguing slowness, what’s the matter Mr. Vivaldo do you want me to open the window, the psychologist showing the page what the hell kind of a tree is this and I said a cedar

the cedar from the nights when it was raining at Príncipe Real with me on the bench waiting for my father to call me

—Step outside for a moment because I have to take care of some business with my friend here

the orderly or the piano or irritated footsteps can’t you keep your mouth shut dammit, resentment, disappointment

fine fine

feet back and forth on the linoleum if you talk about what happened I’ll kill you, with every drop from the faucet a puff of sparrows in the doctor’s office, a Mulatto in dark glasses examined the teeth that in Chelas, I don’t know why, weren’t smiling, no bolero, no greeting to the audience

—Are they yours?

a Mulatto girl came out of the shadows with an enamel teapot, put them in her mouth and disappeared into a deeper shadow where glasses, you call this scrawling a cedar, you stick a marigold on top and you call this triangle a house, we’re not going to release you, you’re not going to leave here Jorge

Paulo

Paulo or Jorge I don’t care you’re not going to leave here, the window of the bandage room open, the orderly in the hallway buttoning up the buttoned buttons, the redhead coming down the steps as though she didn’t know him, I to the Mulatto in the dark glasses your mother took my teeth and the Mulatto you gave them to her don’t you remember

fine fine

get out of my shop, the jackdaw behind me and a second Mulatto do you want to rob a lady you crook so I was coming down from the ceiling of the laundry room and Dona Helena

—Where’ve you been Paulo?

Paulo or Jorge whichever you want, where’ve you been Paulo, the redhead far off now you didn’t make it Mr. Vivaldo and the orderly whore, pushing the plunger of the syringe and no discomfort, no pain, so long Dona Helena I’ll be right back, when I was drawing the family I put my mother and my father together and their son flapping his wings flying, the redhead pointing out the orderly to the waiter, and the waiter to the orderly

—Is that true?

and the orderly

I’m so high up now, you can’t see Anjos

—Are you going to believe a slut like that?

maybe that church there, that little square of turf, that neighborhood and in the neighborhood Mr. Couceiro staring at the wall I’m not sleepy Helena, he asked her to turn out the light and he turned into a thing, a cupboard, a wardrobe interrupted by the creaking of wood, Noémia had been freed from the photograph and was flitting about the rooms, the orderly stopped questioning me you gobbled it up in a trill, canary, as soon as the redhead arrived with the food trays he would stumble toward the pigeons and lean against a tree trunk and unable to work his lighter with his flirty little hand, I bet the same one with which he tied the rope to the plane tree during the night shift, the one with which he set up the crate, the one with which he tested the knot, we didn’t hear the crate topple or maybe we heard a cat, it’s a well-known fact that cats, in the morning his socks were fallen showing his shins, the cigarette lighter in the grass that one of us picked up for the butt they might give me friend, Mr. Couceiro as a counterweight not even a coin, staring at the wall while a buffalo crossed the room in the May fog, the waiter climbed up on the crate with a pair of shears, he told us to hold him there

I got the notion that the redhead was hiding up his sleeve

and the smock and the sock in the grass where the lighter had been, I don’t know which patient

me?

bringing a sheet, when my father goes and Mr. Couceiro I’ll bring a sheet too, I’ll ask Rui and Dona Helena hold them there, draw me a tree, a house, the orderly who took Mr. Vivaldo’s place take it easy, the plunger was getting close to my skin and me so calm, so content, they brought

we brought

the sneaky little hand and the lewd little hand to the bandage room, a comb slipped out of his pants and one of us used it

I was straightening my part and combing my hair with it

we left him in the laundry room rolling his eyes and with his neck twisted, I locked the window, I scattered some metal objects here and there, I told the redhead who was being served a glass of red wine and what’s all this and take it easy

—Mr. Vivaldo’s waiting for you miss

with that a flurry of pigeons, the breathing of someone carrying a piano

—Don’t laugh now

and the day was back on track again, nothing had happened, this isn’t his comb, this isn’t his cigarette lighter, the fellow on crutches gave them to us when his son-in-law took him home, we were together in his room and this pen is for you, this shaving brush is for you, this brush is for you, don’t lose it, we watched him going off with his withered leg wobbling in a swirl of pigeons, he would toss it ahead of himself and meet up with it through a push of his body, he shook his arm in what I took to be a good-bye wave, got into a taxi bit by bit

his chest, his shoes, his crutches finally inside with the effort of an oarsman, the son-in-law with the haste of someone loading baggage

—Settle yourself in

and with the windows up he no longer existed, he held the chess board close to the mirror, he was challenging himself

—Do you think you’ve got me stumped?

and he was beating his reflection, if his daughter visited him he wouldn’t even answer her, then father and he mute, how do you feel and not a peep out of him, then the son-in-law

—Mr. Pompílio

a surprised sideways glance

—Do you know me from somewhere?

the daughter in tears with her back turned talking to the waiter and the waiter

—He doesn’t connect

Mr. Pompílio called us aside and explained, pointing at his own image

—That fool’s the father I can’t stand his relatives