– Ah did you know her? – joked Kenny. – She’s Melaine; she got married with James right there wherever he was.
– Do you know where I can find him? – asked Armando without hope.
– Hm, I didn’t see him about any month. Why don’t you go to the Congo Bar, he was always there and it was there I met him last time.
– Congo Bar? Does it still exist?
– Yeah, and you don’t know how much it changed – said Kenny saying goodbye to Armando who kept walking toward his house.
CHAPTER 07
It was already dark when Armando left home, his mom swore that she didn’t know anything about that James’ history and since he came back, she has met James once at the supermarket. He felt betrayed, even if he had good memories about his friend, it was not easy to imagine he became a danger person or something like it.
Walking on foot through the empty streets, he twas trying to imagine what happened to the sweet James, but it was getting harder to deal with the situation when the images that his mind created.
He didn’t understand the reason of doing that, but he has been planning to come back to his hometown to live with his mom’s love and his friend, he was right that it was his fate.
Armando has always wanted to have children, but this dream had never came true, they did many exams, and only in the last one Glória and him found this dream wouldn’t come true in the normal way. Armando couldn’t have children, because of it he gave up to become a dad because he thought Glória would never be a great mom for an adopted child.
It were something like it that made him to make the decision to meet his friend. Even it had spent so many years, there was something in his heart that said to him; that he would have to come back to his hometown one day to solve that sad farewell. Armando was twenty-eight, but he was tired to think in young things, he was a good structure, he had much money, he has already got married and separated, everything before he is thirty.
– Maybe a mystic had been in your life and you hadn’t noticed it – joked his father once.
But the only thing he did was thought in his friend James during this fourteen years, before to sleep and when he got up, and he was thinking again and walking through the streets he used to pass with or without his friend.
Congo Bar was fourteen years ago, a snack bar with 60s style and everyday all the teenagers went there, but nowadays it was only a bar for adults and because of what he saw in front of the bar, he noticed it became a club too. Stopped in front of the bar, he looked at the neon frontage and noticed he lost many things during the period he has been in Brazil.
A neon red signboard presented the bar. Many people with leather clothes and big necklaces were there. There were two doors with a metallic symbol, something like a phoenix, and he heard a bid noise, a heavy music. Armando wasn’t afraid of that situation, he wasn’t afraid of the violence he felt like nobody could hurt him, something or someone was protecting him and he knew it wasn’t only a spiritual strength.
When he got inside the bar, he looked for a place to sit down, there was a stool far from everyone, it was a dark place, and it seemed it was reserved or there was an invisible person there. Armanda didn’t feel himself intimidated while everyone was looking at him, he wore very simple T-shirt and blue jeans, he always had dressed like that because of the social meetings he had in Brazil.
Everybody looked at him when he sat down on the stool, they got on a brief silence, but soon they ignored him. A man who didn’t was like the old owner, welcome him. He remembered very well the old Boby, he was fifty years but, he made everyone to feel good. He made everything to his clients were more than just clients, everyone there must be friends, otherwise, there were banned from Congo Bar, but this one seemed it was Boby bad brother.
– What do you want? – said the old man.
– I want a beer, please – asked Armando analyzing the place.
– With or without alcohol? – joked the old man turning his back on Armando.
The place was crowded, but it were any fat men and few women with a lot make up, they were drinking and laugh with some men.
A small woman with a jumpsuit and red braiding; brought Armando’s beer.
– Here it is tourist – she smiled while let the beer on the table.
– Excuse me? – asked Armando who didn’t understand the joke.
– I said you don’t combine with this place – she was like a Japanese girl because her eyes and her skin seemed very white because of her red hair.
– When I lived here, this place was different – said him.
– Ah aren’t you a tourist? – She surprised.
– No, I only have spent a long time far from here.
– I have wanted to leave there – said her supporting her head on her arms.
– Were you born here? – asked Armando.
– Right here – answered with a boredom face.
– I don’t remember you in this place.
– Should do? – asked her. – Did you come here?
– It wasn’t this place – Armando got surprised with what he said. – Here was old Boby’s house and it wasn’t like it...
– Old Boby? Were you called my father like this? – she laugh so loud that some guys looked at her, but they didn’t care.
– Your dad? Wait, aren’t you little Andy, are you?
– Do you know me? – She stared at him and her little eyes almost closed.
– Oh my God, you are. Oh my, it’s me Armando Zie, do you remember?
She stopped for a moment and stared at him trying to see his face and the, she smiled.
– I don’t believe, Armando? The little James’ boyfriend? Oh my, where have you been?
Armando was ashamed with the joke “little boyfriend”, it was awful that even after a long time they remembered that.
– I have been on Brazil for a long time.
In a few minutes, Andy and Armando was outside where some guys greeted her with an admirable respect. Andy was now an adult pretty woman, but Armando remembered her when she was a smaller than the others girls with the same age, she had a beautiful body, too.
All the guys who went to the snack bar; wanted the little Andy. Most of times her father Boby, didn’t let her get together with the guys, he knew that everyone wanted his daughter and, sometimes the other girls criticized her because of jealousy, and that’s why the girls rejected Andy.
Armando was sure about one thing, the little Andy was the reason of the profit of Boby’s bar during the adolescence.
Once at school; James and Armando was behind the place that the Nerds liked a lot, an unforgettable scene marked the desire to get Andy. Under a tree near the school’s wall, were Andy and another older girl, first, James and Armando thought that girl was just a Andy’s friend, but soon they noticed that the girls were kissing each other like they were a heterosexual couple.
Because of that scene, James and Armando didn’t want to date the little Andy anymore and it was clear that she didn’t like boys.
– So, why did you come back to Three Forks? – asked her looking at her short steps.
– I think that here is my place – Armando looked at somewhere in the sky and continued to speak. – My dad always wanted that I were like him, so I graduated, I had some well-accepted projects, I got married, I don’t have children and I separated and came back here.
– That’s a great biography and everything before thirty?
– Yeah, and I still don’t know why I acted like my father.
– Parents always influence a lot... – said Andy stopping to light a cigarette.
– And what about the old Boby? Where is he? – asked Armando with a strange tone.
– Dad passed away. He died two years ago.
– Oh My, I’m sorry Andy.
– Okay, he didn’t stand de idea to lie to himself, and he wasn’t healthy anymore – Andy gave a forced smile.
– Well, I imagine.
– An
d I know that James and you knew my childhood – she said.
– Did you... Know?
– After you left, James and I became best friends, it can’t be explained the similarity we had.
– James? – Are you James’ friend? – Armando didn’t notice that his voice sounded very anxious.
– You don’t imagine how big our friendship was.
– Why are you talking about this friendship like it was in the past? – asked Armando without mind with the question.
– Didn’t you mind with him, did you?
– Excuse me?
– You were the only friend he had in Three Forks, and you left because of your parents, but when you were eighteen or twenty, you didn’t come back to visit him.
– Had he spent some time far from here, hadn’t he? – Armando was trying to get rid of his mistakes.
– What about before? And after?
– Okay, I know I made some mistakes because I haven’t given news, I know that I should have kept in touch when my mom came back to Three Forks, but I had many problems and I didn’t care about what would happen to my friend.
– This is the reason you came back? – asked Andy stubbing her cigarette out with her boots.
– Yeah, I decided to start everything again, now I’m free to live my life.
– Now? – How old are you? Twenty seven or thirty?
– I’m twenty eight, but what’s the problem?
– Armando, aren’t you understanding, are you? – It was the first time she said his name in loud voice. – Do you really think that you can come back and find James in the same way you left him when you were a child? James grew up and overcame many things; do you imagine what he had faced? Do you know how his days without a friend to defend him were?
– Wait, I do not understand. What was my fault? We were just children, what could we do in that situation? – Armando aren’t understanding why Andy was judging him in that way, he knew he made mistakes when he didn’t looked for his friend, but he didn’t think he was judged by Andy.
– Don’t you know, are you?
– What I don’t know?
– Armando, aren’t you really know? – Andy smiled because she was nervous and her face was strange.
– Please, Andy tell me what happened after I left, I’m looking for James, I have to meet him.
– Why, Armando? – Are you going to laugh at poor James?
– I’m here to reconstruct the only truth friendship I have ever had in my life, believe it.
– I don’t believe you don’t know – Andy laugh and shook her head.
– Please, tell me, tell me what happened, tell me where is James.
– He left here, Armando.
– Did he leave?
– He left, and unfortunately, I can’t say the reason.
– Why not? – Armando was more confused.
– If you don’t know, it stays that way.
– You must help me.
– Okay, it’s the only thing I’m going to say. James went to Brazil.
– Brazil? – Armando got a shock to listen what Andy said.
– He wanted to see you before to realize his dream, he wanted you saw him like the old James, before everything change.
– I don’t understand. Where is he, what would he do?
I can’t say Armando, you took a long time to come back and James was very distressed, he always said to me that it was his dream and he wanted to meet you before to realize it, he wanted to see you to tell something, but I think he will not be able because, you never gave news.
Armando wasn’t thinking the words Andy said, why did James go to Brazil to see him? And why couldn’t he know what James will do? There was something wrong in that history, Armando gave up of everything to look for his friend and now he finds that his friend went to meet him.
– Andy, tells me where did he go? – begged Armando.
– The only right thing is that he would spend a long time in São Paulo, after he found you and be sure, he would find you.
– São Paulo, what he exactly will do?
– At this time Armando.
– What?
– I can’t say, I promised it and I can’t make the same mistake of yours.
– You don’t understand Andy, give me a chance to fix my friendship with James, tell me where he went.
– It last almost two months, I believe that before it he would went to another place, but at this time the old James aren’t with us anymore.
– What...
Andy didn’t say anything about that subject and after a long silence she just said to Armando to look for James in a place for a long rest in São Paulo, she didn’t have the address but she promised that even if she had she wouldn’t give it. Armando didn’t have another option and came back James’ house where he faced James’ wife again.
It was difficult for the pretty woman to open the door to understand what Armando would want to say.
He was, or tried to be more specific as they could, and when he entered in the room, he gave way some of his childhood memories. The shelf in the room’s corner, the plate on the wall, the stairs which needed a remaking. Everything was like in our childhood, nothing changed, only some new furniture that now is where weren’t anything before.
– Do you think if you came back to Brazil you will find James? – said her sitting at the couch without ask Armando to sit too.
– I hope so, I have a good feeling about it, I think it’s possible.
– He tell me something about you, yeah, he really said something about you – she stood up and take a cigarette near the shelf. – Armando... This name, he used to call you just “friend”, but in some of his statements he said this name.
– Sorry, but I’m not understanding.
– It’s simple, James who is a mother fucker, when he got out from this shit place, moved for Vaimea, and do you know where Vaimea is? – Armando noticed she wasn’t normal and he knew the reason when he looked around the room. Some capsules were empty on the telephone table and the rests of cocaine was spread on the table.
– Yeah, American Oceania – he answered.
– Oh, it’s good to know there is an anyone in this shit place who knows where is Vaimea. So, when things go wrong to James here, I just knew I came here, he had been like my angel – Armando didn’t say anything. – I’m not going to tell my history with him, the truth is that, you’re the reason that James had been this way.
– Me? Why I am not scared? – whispered Armando to himself.
– He was perfect, but when he knew the dealers left Three Forks, he showed himself for me. He spent hours and sometimes days talking about his wretched childhood, I couldn’t listen about his friend Armando who left Three Forks anymore – now she was laughing louder and repeated the same words, she acted like she wasn’t seeing Armando anymore. – My friend Armando, my dear friend, friend, friend, friend... – she repeated to herself.
– Mrs., can I take this picture for me? – Armando pointed a James’ photo out that it was on the shelf with some another couple’s photographs smiling at a park which Armando couldn’t recognize.
– Take what you want, you have already took James off me – she answered in a serious way like a young suffered woman.
– Sorry... – he stopped because he didn’t remember her name.
– Melanie – answered her looking at her nails.
– I’m sorry Mrs. Melanie. I still don’t know what happened to James, but when I found him, I’ll say you need him.
– Can you do a favor for me?
– Yeah.
– Take this picture and go to hell with that wretched – said her crying a lot and shouting to Armando to leave the house as soon as possible. He didn’t want to test her patience and took the picture and got out listening the woman shouting that James wasn’t a good person.
With the most recently picture of James, Armando walked toward his house, his mind was trying to looking fo
und the reason to make pleasant his curiosity about the reason that everybody was blaming him. He definitely didn’t know what he have done to his friend, but coming back to Brazil he could had the chance he needed, if he found James, he would discovery what really happened during this fourteen years he had been far from here.
CHAPTER 08
At home, Armando was trying to explain to his mom the reason to came back to Brazil try to find his friend that he hasn’t seen for a long time and he wasn’t sure about what happened with his friend.
His mom was scared; she was trying to make him give up that adventure, it didn’t make sense for her. For many times she acted like everybody, judging Armando’s return to Three Forks to find his friend who he haven’t seen for fourteen years and didn’t even know if he were alive, by a moment Armando felt guilty of is friend’s situation.
Armando was thinking in Kenny’s words yet, but his mind was affected by the search of answers, and if James was looking for me in Brazil to help him with a debt between him and the Three Forks’ dealers. If he was in debt or running away from someone, maybe he knew that his friend Armando never gave up him and after explain the reason he never came back to Three Forks, James could gave him a shelter in Brazil.
With many imaginations and explanations created for this situation, Armando had only one option: look for James in Brazil and try to understand why he got away and why everybody was blaming Armando in Three Forks.
– Mom, please, understands me.
– I can’t Armando, it’s a very big mistake to come back to Brazil to look for James – shouted his mom. – You don’t know what he is involved with.
– Oh mom, this is the reason to do this, everybody knows something about James but anybody tell me nothing.
– Maybe it’s better you don’t know.
– Mom, do you know anything? – Armando stopped and stare at the little woman and waited her answer.
– I think it was not a good idea you came back to Three Forks my son.
– How? Mom, what do want to say?
– You spent a long time far from here, and you became a wonderful man because of his dad kept you in Brazil – the little woman said it with her head down because she didn’t want to face his son. – I don’t want you become a bad person.
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