What Can I Do When Everything's On Fire?: A Novel (49 page)

Judite uncomfortable with the package

—Carlos

her fingers on my face

—
You’ll never stop growing, boy

I’m thirty years old, I haven’t stopped growing, grandmother, you wouldn’t recognize me

and Dona Soraia under the shovel, she was living on a small square with a bronze general ordering around pots of geraniums along with stubborn balconies that were driving the French invaders into Spain, in the dressing-room mirror we saw that we weren’t ready to go down on stage when the music man called us

Micaela was putting on more lipstick to reduce her annoyance. but cats were cushioned all about except for the little lights in their eyes, the wounded war veteran who roasted chestnuts on a broken-down tricycle, a staircase that didn’t go up onto any stage, it went up to a small room where Dona Soraia in a paratrooper’s uniform stood out in profile alongside medicine bottles and a votive candle, her mother was pointing at her with a spoonful of syrup meant for her as Silvestre while out of the trunk he dug a uniform and a medal in a case, saying to Dona Soraia

—Mother

begging our pardon with a wave of pity, she’s half crazy, don’t pay any attention, get rid of these things, mother, my son works at night, he comes home to me smelling of perfume, sleeps on the little couch there where the girls sit

we were facing the mirror

the manager

—How long does it take you to go into the Burmese dance, Marlene?

watching us sitting on a sofa plucked clean by the tips of slippers that peeked out of the fringes, a rubber kangaroo on a tray, the shirtwaists on the line covering our faces

—Don’t look don’t look

and yet

obviously

we’re not looking

—
Be quiet, father

in the kangaroo was a tiny kangaroo you could pull out

—You can pull it out

and Micaela holds up the kangaroo, in a different frame the paratrooper in civilian clothes with a girl in a straw hat dead from typhus two months before they were to be married, just imagine the evil omen, girls, I remembered Judite, her silhouette, her bearing when I would meet her coming out of school

the fir trees at Almada, they were beginning to build the courthouse and a machine was laying down quivering cement, I almost didn’t notice that we were walking toward the river where her mouth was on my face and

evidently I said

—No

—
I already told you to be quiet, father

not out of fear but from revulsion, because it’s strange, I don’t know how to explain it any other way except that you were kissing me and it was strange, Judite’s smile turning off, turning off, two steps that maybe were

me with revulsion, fear

preventing the smile from turning off

—No

Dona Soraia’s mother forgetting about us

—What, son?

—
It can’t be, I don’t believe it, it makes no sense for my father to be this

with the spoon for the syrup not moving, getting the solution ready he adds some water right up to the edge of the label and shakes it, makes sure there are no dregs, even so the medicine takes on an orange color, he must, Dona Soraia in necktie and vest consenting to an engagement, consenting to getting married

—It wasn’t anything mother

the kangaroo, the other frame, a plastic doll with sketched-on features

the rosy right cheek was missing

on top of the wardrobe, it’s telling the old folks, it’s telling us that your son was working at night in a women’s clothing store, he’d come home smelling of perfume, he didn’t go back to making love out of respect for the dead woman in spite of your insisting

didn’t you insist, old girl?

—
Be quiet father, if you’re not quiet I’ll

when you came out, there was a colleague with him, he would bring you little items that warmed your heart, painted owls, little rings, sugar bunnies and you were glowing all over, old girl, the bunny was so pretty with this ribbon Silvestre, it’s a shame to eat it, one, two, three, eight, eleven bunnies as escorts for the kangaroo, when the paper was taken off there were fungus marks on the sugar or maybe, with the heat, a drop slipped down over its ear, the afternoon when your son’s fiancée wanted to talk to you on the edge of the sofa where we are now

Alcides pointing at my mother, the package with the sandwich, the apple, the grapes

—
Do you know that peasant-looking woman, Soraia?

when your son’s fiancée wanted to talk to you and your husband was in the hospital there wasn’t much time to remember, you kept twisting the catch on your purse

is it true?

the words that wouldn’t come out, the commiseration, your pity, the straw hat in the place where Marlene, a cup of linden tea to help the conversation and your old lady, whom you were born to serve

—
Father is a no-good a no-good

was warming up the teapot, leave it alone don’t bother about the gas jet I have to unplug, snapping the match, I had to light it by blowing on it, scrape the tea leaves from the tin with the scratched picture you inherited you don’t remember who from,
Souvenir de Toulouse,
your son’s fiancée saying it’s late, I’ll be back Dona Isidora, we’ll talk later, the steam from the tea spreading through the room, Marlene wiping the dressing-room mirror with a quick brush, the manager angry, telling them to start the music sometime today

—Will it be sometime today, Marlene?

and later on your son’s fiancée sick, little paper lips listless, unable to drink tea, visiting you, chatting with you, well-being that might not be well-being, the little flame on oil lamps when the oil is giving out, rising up for a minute and disappearing for good, the useless straw hat forgotten on the floor, the impression

and I can’t believe it, and I was fooling myself

that your son relieved, taking her by the fingers that weren’t fingers anymore, and you can’t believe it, you were fooling yourself, he doesn’t want

—
Don’t torment her, father

her to get better, be cured, close her eyes quickly, tie a handkerchief around her chin and he didn’t speak, didn’t speak

—
Don’t believe my father, he was fooling, it’s a lie ma’am

of course it’s a lie, the proof is in the fact that my son has taken charge of the funeral and the dinner, consoling everybody, a piece of cake, a drink, the dead woman’s virtues, he swore to me that he’d skip work that night and not reek of perfume, I’m so upset that I won’t get married, mother, after a year, after two years if I insisted to him, do you remember what I swore to you, do you want me to break a pledge, do you want me to suffer in hell, I’ve kept the straw hat in the trunk because it’ll always be a remembrance, girls, the girls don’t think so, and the medal and the uniform, the brim has been frayed by time but the top is perfect, it protected her from the sun because she was always frail, a child almost, and the child was coming to me through the door, picking up the kangaroo, deciding

—I want to talk to you

the skin was so delicate, so white, she didn’t need any whitening in the coffin, not just the lips, two bits of tissue paper, girls, the eyelids, the forehead, the little bracelet that my son gave her and she took along to the cemetery with her, one afternoon I asked her about the bracelet and her face suddenly grew hard, the only time it wasn’t paper, it was stone

—About the bracelet

she lowered her head, twirled it around her arm, fell silent and I asked

—So, what about the bracelet?

and there was a strange expression, a movement that wasn’t getting rid of me, was getting rid of something or other in her, a suspicion, a sureness almost, a sureness and at that point I got the feeling of a lashing of leaves on her face, the leaves that the wind suddenly picks up and hurls at me as she got rid of them with her handkerchief

—It was nothing

and for a second there were remains of moss in her hair, the bits from trees that blind us sometimes, my husband opening the umbrella in spite of the sun

—Be careful of the wind, Isidora

you were digging through garbage, old girl, digging through dust and perfect loves and veils against dampness, if you give me a moment there must be a picture where she looks better and in the picture it’s not the deceased, Judite with the mantilla that a fellow worker had lent her, clutching a small package where maybe there was a sandwich, a slice of apple, a bunch of grapes she didn’t know where to put, in the picture I was coming out with Alcides, running into that scarecrow

—
It’s the last time I’m warning you, father

—
Aren’t you coming home Carlos?

almost like an urchin in the village inventing the

—Can’t you smell the mimosas, tell me you smell the mimosas and I said to my wife

—The mimosas are finished Judite

I said to Alcides who was asking do you know that scarecrow, Soraia

—Some nut, I guess

a nut who hid the bottles in the washtub, taught in Almada

unless I’m mistaking her for a person I think taught in Almada

I met her in the coffee shop, we strolled along the wall by the Tagus, she’s living with somebody or other in a Gypsy settlement or a place with retirees or something like that, Alto do Galo, São João, Trafaria, they tell me she has a son

—
You can’t be my father, why?

who doesn’t know his father, gossip says the owner of the café, the electrician, a pack of pups among the leftovers on the beach who gave her money, there’s nothing to guarantee for me that it wasn’t one of the Gypsies camping in the woods, the government took the son away from her because of the wine and turned him over

they told me

to a couple in Anjos who’d lost a girl and were interested in him, I gave Alcides my arm and Judite was silent, if she said anything to me, whatever it was, I didn’t hear, it was the sea I was hearing

—Don’t take it to heart but I can’t hear you, all mixed up with the waves

not really the sea, the Tagus estuary, the sea was farther out, the lonely lighthouse that ran on diesel fuel moaning in the rain, the old woman settling Judite on the trunk

—She was a countess wasn’t she?

a countess begging for pints, accepting money, you fool me old girl, I was rumpling and smoothing the bedspread, she asked the wardrobe mirror

—Where have you been, Carlos?

and he was fooling me old girl, Micaela said to me

—Soraia

not

—Dona Soraia

Dona Soraia, like the dead woman, the old woman saying to Micaela, trying to figure it out

—Dona Soraia, miss?

and you didn’t catch on, old girl, it was impossible for you to catch on, for you to dream that your paratrooper who worked at night, not my Silvestre no

—Are you sure her name is Dona Soraia, miss?

or catching on and warming up the teapot in order to stop thinking, her husband’s crutch that had propped him up was propping me up, when I was in pain after doing the tests and it was hard for me to walk because of this thing in my bones, the doctor was sympathetic, accepting misfortunes that weren’t yours, suggesting to Rui

—A crutch would help

advising me to take some shots, pills, the steam from the teapot that stopped me from seeing, repeating not my Silvestre

—Not my Silvestre

and, still and all, I’m sure that her voice was hesitant looking for support, offering her the crutch

—Take the crutch, old girl

get your glasses, which must be on the tray with the kangaroo on top of the missal because you go to mass, Our Lady of the Ascension helped you with your erysipelas, after a novena she’ll look after you, have pity, Dona Amélia scolding me with little imbecilic signs that meant

—Shut up

in spite of Marlene

—Shut up

I have to hurt you, all I can do is hurt you

—Her name was Dona Soraia, ma’am

while Judite with her stupid little package and Alcides

—How awful

I said through the steam coming from the teakettle

—Her name’s Dona Soraia, ma’am