What Can I Do When Everything's On Fire?: A Novel (13 page)

—Dona Judite

and my mother asleep beside me, somebody

—I’ve brought some money Dona Judite I can pay

I seemed to see Dona Helena with her hand cupped behind her ear to hear better and not getting to hear, Mr. Couceiro with the spoonful of syrup, intrigued

—I’m not like the others Dona Judite I won’t run off afterward

my fever or maybe what was waves or the tide coming in, what could be called pine trees and yet what pine trees in Lisbon and what east wind in September, nothing but an automobile horn, the loudspeaker for the lottery for the blind, my father with blonde hair holding out to me the candy that the woman went about selling in the club

—Hello nephew

the clown’s colleagues, with a rustle of feathers, were moving legs with lipstick guffaws over the hysteria of their mouths, a pause with no gulls or pine cones on the roof and during the pause

—Cecília

candies with the names of the performers in bleeding hearts Bárbara Alexandra Nini, dressing-room bustle over the customers and watch your tongues the little one might hear, changes of clothing and be careful Samanta a child

me?

pounding on the wardrobe, my mother in the yard

—Carlos

the fluttering of the herons on the bridge beams or in the next apartment and my father kissing me with repugnance

—Hello Paulo

—Hello nephew

—Hello cousin

trying to but I’m not sure

I’m not sure

candy, cigarettes, vials of perfume, Dona Helena sniffing the vial because of good manners, Mr. Couceiro declining the tobacco

—I don’t smoke

the man with the mustache startled by the little porcelain Dutch shoes that a cousin of Dona Helena’s had sent from Rotterdam and that were used to cover up a pipe in the wall

—just take a look at this horror Soraia

the haze of the flu, since I couldn’t speak, correcting him to myself

—He’s not Soraia he’s Carlos

the doorman was washing glasses at the bar, his braided jacket on the coatrack, at the small window by the ceiling a greasy afternoon, clotted, like Alto do Galo during the time when the swallows startle the woods and only afterward the breeze that would wake up my mother and make her drink, my father with apprehension of the thunderclaps

—Judite

putting the perfume and the cigarettes in his bag, moving his fingers toward me, thinking better of it, putting them into the pocket of his blouse, calling to the engineer who’d moved from the wooden shoes to the fringed cover of a candy box with a little donkey turning a well-wheel

—Good-bye Paulo

Mr. Couceiro’s cane in the hallway behind them now heavy now light, in the middle of the horses that lame mare, the mist of the flu

everything so difficult, so strange, the maid from the dining room after all that’s life, don’t ask me to explain it to you, I can’t explain it to you but I know

—Your father?

the woman in the gray smock in weary fatigue

and dusk through the small window, a change in the afternoon

—Have you come to fix the coffee machine?

the lights with cellophane leaves held by clothespins were abandoned in a corner in a tangle of wires, an overcoat on the cane stand was moving its lapels demanding that it be put on

—
isn’t it true that you’re flying isn’t it true that you’re flying?

—You’re Soraia’s nephew aren’t you, I’ve kept your aunt’s things in the office

give me whatever there is, a train ticket or a full syringe so I can get out of here, a door that said Restrooms and to the right of the door a boy peeing into a pot and on the left of the door a girl in braids on a second pot, the woman wiping her hands to get rid of little pieces of wax climbed up some steep steps and there at the top, waiting for me, God

no, and there at the top another door without any pots or children that said Manager, the last sky of the day

with clouds in pink makeup

its distant blue persisted on the balcony, I sensed trees nearby from the tint of the air, the picture of the manager’s children

one of them wearing glasses

the bag with my father’s toiletries soft at the bottom, the son in glasses, with the look of a manager already, getting interested in me, photographs of clowns that poured out of an album, the doorman pulling on his suspenders in the doorway

—That’s everything, check it if you want

and heat and cold and heat, this uncomfortable feeling, this thing in the chest so a little lemon friend, a needle friend, a match to heat the powder with, maybe Mr. Couceiro carrying my bag and resting at corners because of diabetes, urea

—All your aunt’s belongings are there, check it

me not there, me and the maid from the dining room in Chelas, me getting mad at the jackdaw’s teasing or the Mulatto with the jackknife opening and closing the blade looking for us in the neighborhood, the pictures of the clowns

Bárbara Alexandra Nini, another one more on in years who didn’t drink with the customers, didn’t talk would tie the little dog to the doorknob of the dressing room, go off in a car without makeup

Carole

a kinship with my mother as she looked at herself in the mirror on the wardrobe in Bico da Areia with the same incomprehension and the same rancor, one night she didn’t come to work and the people waiting for her, the boss, the doorman, me with the candy tray already, cigarettes, perfume, it was with me that she’d chat sometimes, not really chatting, my name

—Amélia

two or three words along with my name

—I’ll tell you someday Amélia

while she adjusted her clothes making faces and twitching, replaced a fingernail, lingered at the entrance indifferent to the music, the manager pushing her on stage

—Have you fallen asleep Carole?

The little dog barking anxiously the whole time tied to the doorknob, the manager

—Will somebody do me the favor of killing that mutt?

and she to me as she came back from her number which no one applauded except for one or two old men who’d known her for years

—I’ll tell you someday Amélia

she would drop her plumes and I’d gather them up from the floor, leaving by the rear entrance dragging the animal along without paying any attention to it the way children do with a squashed doll they’ve become tired of, on the end of a leash, a voice without falsettos or trills, the voice of an exhausted man

—I’ll tell you someday Amélia

or not exhausted, in some place I wasn’t allowed to enter

—I’ll tell you someday Amélia

she had a daughter in France, had worked on ships, was a cousin of the manager who took her on out of charity, the boys would chase him on the street with the persistence of crows

Poor Carole

they’d imitate his walk, his gestures, he went from rooming house to rooming house unable to pay for them, they’d ask him for the money and his hands were empty

Take it

so that deeper and deeper into the outskirts and farther and farther from the river, four suitcases at first, one suitcase afterward, then a knapsack, the chain sold, the ring sold, afternoons at the window waiting for I don’t know what, a memory of packet boats, Amsterdam or Hamburg, but the ships were old and rotting away in Seixal, in Montijo, in Amora, sharing some leftover fish with the little dog and the manager

—You’ve lost weight Carole

how to disguise those wrinkles, cover that throat, hide those hips, she didn’t disguise, she didn’t cover, didn’t hide, looking like my mother looking at herself after some wine in the wardrobe at Bico da Areia with the same incomprehension and the same rancor, one night

—I’ll tell you someday Amélia

she didn’t show up at the club, didn’t answer the phone, didn’t answer a letter breaking her contract, we discovered her after a week of searching and asking, creditors who showed us receipts, bills, a postcard from France

Puteaux

where there was too little ink and too much contempt, after what she’d done to my mother she doesn’t dare write me, after a week in the slums to the north of the city, people afraid of the police, chickens on garbage heaps, information in broken Portuguese leading to nonexistent alleys and vacant lots with trash, another postcard from France

Creil

that increased the anger, and she still has the guts and a wave without a hand

—I’ll tell you someday Amélia

asking me for money and finally after an address in pencil on a page from a notebook

27, Jardins Boieldieu

covered by two marks of eye shadow, some construction on a slope in Pontinha, Bosnian immigrants roasting a rabbit

or a mole

the entrance to a building where there were stork nests and the bills of irritated storks could be seen through the planks, a rebuilt ground floor

Puteaux, Creil, Jardins Boieldieu maybe the same thing. maybe like here, Ukrainians, blacks, Romanians, a rabbit or a mole, after what she did to my mother and me she didn’t dare write me and then the smell, you understand sir, that I associated it with poverty pick me up Dona Helena, I don’t weigh much, pick me up now

the knapsack open, a French stamp in the handbag reminding her of her daughter as if it were a picture, a draft of a letter signed António, Carole in the only chair mocking us

my mother in front of the wardrobe in angry incomprehension

the little dog not barking for the first time, lying at her knees, both with wounds at the neck and not really much blood not really much blood, almost no blood at all, two little scratches, that was all, there must be pine trees around here, there must be pine cones around here in Alverca

or Massama or Loures

around here in Pontinha, horses and waves and gulls and pine cones, throwing them off toward the roof

—Dona Carole

or

—Dona Judite

—I have the money here Dona Carole

—I won’t run away like the others Dona Carole I’ll pay

Dona Carole getting up out of the chair and opening the door for me

Dona Carole without even looking at me, the letter for her daughter signed António

When you get this

which never reached Puteaux or Creil, 27 Jardins Boieldieu, after what she did to my mother and me, that father of mine rumpling the quilt and smoothing the quilt, didn’t justify himself, didn’t ask for forgiveness, took the bus, went away, preferred the horrible creature who sold candy at the club to us

—I’ll tell you someday Amélia

the candy on this side, the cigarettes in the middle, the perfume on the other side, candy filled with liqueur, American cigarettes, Spanish perfume more alcohol than perfume, one of the Bosnians at the door, hat in hand, the little dog on a spit or in a dark pot, a fallen brazier, a fan

When you get this, father

Carole in men’s pants, the feet of a man, no bottle of wine, no dwarf from Snow White, no refrigerator, the image of the wardrobe wounded before us and the people

—Why?

the hand that rubbed at the same time that the image

or before the image?

two identical hands in identical movements, the manager wiping them on his sleeve with surprise, no

—I’ll tell you someday Amélia

a nervous whisper

—Call the police Amélia

and the bills of the storks hitting the boards up above, a camellia on the bedstead and Carole caressing the camellia, only her mouth forming the words, not her voice

—Thank you

or not even her mouth, the closed curtain, a moment of darkness at the club, the disk jockey making a mistake with the next piece, the Bosnian asked for the little dog, sir, before the police

a coin for a cup of coffee friend

the police and hours of waiting and the doctor and hours of waiting and the ambulance and Carole calm, hours of waiting and the stretcher, no light on the streets, the little flames of wood fires at some point in the darkness, a train that was leaving for Spain without me, the ambulance orderly’s flashlight on the manager’s face, on mine, on the woman in the gray smock

not on Carole’s

the wound on the neck, the man’s pants, the man’s feet with one of the toenails painted, this isn’t carnival what’s going on here, the manager’s hands in the sweep of a bow a colleague gentlemen, a performer that is, the sheet over the stretcher enwrapping the performer

if I only could have told you Amélia, in Amsterdam, in La Coruña, in Hamburg, I never had a chance to go to France before dying, Puteaux, Creil, the Jardins Boieldieu, number twenty-seven and my daughter

—You

forgiving me, if there was a camellia she’d throw me a camellia, I’d go back on stage surprised, content, the disk jockey spinning the turntable backward and my number one more time, pretending that I’m singing, that I’m dancing while the stretcher off in the direction of Lisbon, a stone table where they undress me, weigh me, test my liver and after undressing me, weighing me, and testing my liver put me away down there in the freezer among frozen people, an item in the paper or not even an item, who cares about me even in Puteaux or in Creil, I didn’t drink with the customers, I left all by myself, no Mário, no Dino, no Rui, the car with faded paint going down the Praça das Flores on the way to São Bento and past São Bento if I could have told you Amélia, you who saw us arrive, helped us with the ashes, my daughter