Sea Loves Me

by Mia Couto

  —What was it that lady threw on top of the coffin?

  My father gazed at the mutilated swan and smiled. Then he ran his hand through my hair and for a short while seemed to forget his existence. He asked for my patience so that he could tell me a story. My father had never told me a story before. He was the opposite of his late brother, who had any number of tales to tell. And so I devoted all my attention to what he had to say.

  The story began at a dance held at the Railwaymen’s Club, sometime in the middle of the century. It was there that whites, mulatos, and one or two assimilated Blacks from the town would mingle. Dance nights were a well-known ritual around here. Many a love affair began at those parties. That particular night, the couples swapped partners and gyrated in a lively rainbow of colours.

  Suddenly, an order was given for the dancing to stop.

  —Stop the dance! boomed the emphatic command. Everyone paused in a climate of great expectation. Meanwhile, the master of ceremonies climbed onto the stage with a pompous, determined air. His voice rang out as he clung to the lapels of his white tuxedo:

  —We ask anyone who finds a lady’s bra on the dance floor to hand it in to the management.

  Everyone stood still, dumbfounded, their spirits confused. Until a voice in the crowd cried:

  —A lady’s bra? Is there any other type?

  There was laughter. At first timid and then noisy, like rain falling on a tin roof. People began to comment: many things were lost in the midst of a knees-up, but no one had ever allowed such an intimate item to escape them. While the raucous laughter spread, Uncle Albano came up to my father. He was horrified, shaking wildly.

  They had to do something, for that bra must belong to the great love of his life, Maria Prudência. But the most important revelation—a discovery that came as a shock to my ears—was this: Albano had never had a girlfriend of any description. All he had was this obsessive, unsubstantiated passion, an affair that was doomed never to happen. For the girl was given to adventures, her body receiving more visitors than the Namaacha Falls. She took no notice at all of Uncle Albano because he was timid, better-behaved than a sacristan.

  —What if the bra is hers?

  If it was indeed hers, it would be the end for the girl, for her father was a bad-tempered brute, capable of pulling out his belt and delivering a beating. The big fellow couldn’t stand such vexation. We had to do something.

  —But what’s it got to do with you, brother? Forget it, end of story.

  But Albano was no longer there. He walked off, though not to his usual solitary corner. Until, not long afterwards, to everyone’s bewilderment, he was seen climbing onto the stage and asking to speak. He half-squinted at the microphone. The sound of his shaking voice echoed through the room as he asked:

  —Is this metrophone switched on?

  There was general laughter. What was that skinny little fellow doing there, incapable of producing a shadow, lacking the gift of the gab or any presence whatsoever? The guy couldn’t do anything right, he didn’t dance, and he got all muddled up when he spoke to anyone.

  —I climbed onto this stage to announce the following …

  There he stopped. Blocked, his valves clogged. Their surprise was such that curiosity began to grow. They were waiting for what was to come: what was this “following”? And they egged him on.

  —Speak, lad!

  Then, after stuttering blankly, he eventually said:

  —It’s mine!

  There was general agitation and incomprehension—what was his? And as people were already well and truly tanked up, they started booing, trying to hasten the outcome of his vagueness. The guy should get a move on, he was holding up the party. Albano held up his hands, asking for silence. His talking became a bit clearer. And the lad returned to the fray with this astonishing declaration:

  —The bra’s mine!

  Not a hoot could be heard, not even the buzz of a fly. So the boy was confessing he was a pansy, camouflaging himself with womanliness? The humiliation was just too much. How could he subject himself to eternal badmouthing, condemning his name to the filth of tongue-wagging?

  Only my father knew his brother’s motive. He had sacrificed his honour to save the damsel he secretly loved. This was his secret, which was now being buried in the shape of an item of women’s clothing next to his final wooden resting place.

  ‌Rosita1

  It was five days ago. They came and told me: get out of here, because all this is going underwater. They said the river was going to go berserk. I didn’t know, but this river joined with another one and that one, in turn, joined with that part of the sky where the gods keep all the rain.

  —But what about this one here, do I leave him behind? I asked, pointing at my old companion.

  —You choose. If you want to live, leave by yourself, right now.

  I didn’t go. I talked to Makalatani while he was calmly eating. Both of us decided to wait. We couldn’t take it: during the war they had separated us. We had both lost everything such a short time before. How many times can we lose everything in one life? It wasn’t even ten years since we had fled the gunfire, each one of us fighting for our own survival. My companion, old Makalatani, where had he ended up during those years of war? I didn’t believe he had survived. But when I returned to Chokwé, there he was waiting for me. Loyal, right there where we had parted. The violence hadn’t made him bitter. He was as sweet-tempered as ever, ready to start again, as always with so little against a background of nothingness.

  Once again, the warnings to us to leave. Once again displaced? Were those people filling us with alarm so sure of the future? Do the poor abandon their poverty with such lightness of heart? But the truth is, it happened. Worse than happening, it followed pretty well immediately. And it was sudden: the sky became the colour of earth, like the Devil’s spittle. The clouds were heavy as if made of mud. The sky grew so dense it ceased to be the dwelling place of birds.

  We emerged from our houses. We looked at the sky. And we were suddenly afraid: because the sky was no longer wide. It was right there, at hand. The stars were countable, one family’s fingers were enough to point at them.

  Then came the rain, cascading to the earth. Huge, sluggish masses of water, each drop swollen and intense. On all sides, veins were born, every cranny turned into a stream. And the river filled, and burst its banks until it covered the vastness.

  On the first morning, the rain had already filleted the road, swallowed up the bridge, chewed up the fields. God had lost control of the waters. Sadness smiled within me: I had always wanted to see the ocean. Now the ocean had come to see me.

  Even so, old Makalatani only thought of eating, oblivious to the rain and to omens. But I wasn’t. I looked at time, sniffed the river. I knew what they were like—time and water. Both had taken away children of mine, dreams, prosperity. I sat down on the banks of time. I stopped my life right there, resting on the edge. Later, I discovered there is no bank. Everything flows, the bank only seems to be still. That current of time was what had taken my wife, my children, everything.

  The following night, the waters of the river rose. I was pushed to a shelter that I had thought exclusive to birds. I scaled the tree, climbed onto the roof of the storehouse. Makalatani climbed up with me. He seemed to be tottering, off balance. Then he lay down, as if there were nothing left to do. And there I was, quivering, gazing at the desolation all around. My belongings, my goats, the house: all were vanishing. My life flowing away. Just me and Makalatani on the roof.

  Looking further away, I surveyed our surroundings, but could see nothing except for water. And I thought of our neighbour, Sofia Pedro. She was pregnant, almost about to give birth. Had she managed to escape? I called out to her by name. But the noise of the waters drowned out my voice. Only Makalatani looked at me, with those eyes of a naked woman. I was losing my appearance as a person. My skin was baked and cracked. It wouldn’t be long before I turned into a fish, all covered with scales.


  The following day, all I did was drink. I cupped my hands in the very waters of the river. What I drank was sick water. Makalatani drank with me, but he was never fussy about drinking. Now, both of us were bent double like animals, sucking up mud and dirt, our only nourishment.

  I stopped drinking when I saw the bloated bodies of oxen and men float by on the current. I told Makalatani not to look. And I made a promise that I wouldn’t allow death to contaminate my insides. Death is another river: every now and then it leaps over the bank and floods us like a vast ocean.

  At night, I was mad with hunger. The water rose even higher, and the tin roof disappeared. My fingers were bleeding from clinging so hard to the wooden planks. I was witnessing my own death. I even got to thinking: I give up, I’ll throw myself into the current. It was Makalatani who stopped me. There he was, so placid, knowing how to wait. Or ignorant of time? My companion expected me to show the same tranquility. He was teaching me tactics for survival.

  On the fourth day, my eyes could hardly make out anything. Everything was out of focus. That was when I heard a cloud descending noisily. It was a cloud with a motor. It hovered above us like an eagle. A white angel was lowered from the cloud and took hold of me. I was ready for anything. Except for leaving my companion behind. I shouted to the angel:

  —I’m only going if you take my Makalatani as well.

  The man shouted at me. The noise, the spattering of water, all suddenly woke me up. The angel was, in fact, a South African soldier who was opening his arms to me, hanging on the end of a rope. The cloud was a helicopter, its blade fanning us, over the shed where we were sheltering.

  Everything was suddenly clear. And I shouted:

  —Come on, Makalatani, these people have come to save us.

  He turned his head away, fearful of heights. I started to push him but his weight was too much for me. I shouted to the soldier:

  —My ox! Help me to load my ox!

  It wasn’t worth it. The soldier didn’t speak Portuguese. He only spoke the language of soldiers: orders, immediate obedience. But I couldn’t leave my old ox behind, my only treasure. Who would I have for company when I started my life over again? I shouted too, like soldiers do:

  —Hey, Makalatani, get into the helicopter, you lazy thing!

  The stubborn creature sat down on all four of its legs. And me, by now in despair: if you’re not going, then I’m not going either. Fair enough, we’ll both die, one without the other. And I sat down with the little strength left to me. At that point, the soldier’s patience wore out and he put his arms around me. And up I went into the air, spinning around like a butterfly, dancing without any floor other than the body of the South African.

  Taken by force, I was thrown into the helicopter.

  —What’s all this now? Is a person rescued whether he likes it or not? I spoke to the others, my brothers, who were huddled together in the belly of the aircraft.

  —Did you see that, folks? I was forced to leave behind my ox on the roof.

  —What ox? they asked.

  —My big old ox, Makalatani, that’s the name I baptized him with.

  But the others who had been rescued like me were astonished. There was no ox next to me. And another even pointed out that he had seen my horned friend swept away by the torrent. He had seen that more than two days ago. The animal must have been already nearly lifeless, because all he could see was a horn pointing towards the heavens. So there had never been an ox on my roof, I must have been hallucinating because of the dirty water I had drunk.

  I sat there as speechless as an orphan. I looked at my fellow travellers. They were all dripping with water, fear, fright. Until suddenly I caught sight of Sofia Pedro, my pregnant neighbour. She was holding a bundle in her arms, which made me wonder. She opened her capulana and showed me a baby girl, fresher than the dew.

  —Don’t tell me you gave birth to that little girl on top of the tree?!

  I had never seen so great a fatigue in one body. But Sofia still managed to smile, and murmured:

  —This is Rosita, my Rosita.

  I fell silent in thought. I looked at the child, my eyes focusing on her. The girl seemed to be crying. But she couldn’t be heard, everything was stifled by the engine. Sofia Pedro took the little girl and placed her on her breast. Rosita’s squealing voice began to grow louder, superimposing itself upon the helicopter’s engines. I assumed an inner calm, and my heart was flooded. And once again, I saw myself on a cloud, floating like a ship. I was travelling with my people, heading for those unseen fields where my ox was grazing the morning mist.

  Yes, wherever we were bound, there would be land. Once again, the infinite territory of life. And Rosita was being born within me.

  ‌The Falling Man

  When they came and called me, I couldn’t believe what they said.

  —It’s Joey! He’s falling from the building.

  And everyone there hurried to see what was going on. I joined the rush, the question buzzing all around: the man was falling? That gerund was a denial of the laws of gravity: whoever’s falling already fell.

  While I ran, my chest tightened. I foresaw my old friend lying smashed to pieces on the sidewalk. What had happened to make him commit suicide, fallen into the abyss? What lapse had brought his life tumbling down? It could be everything: present times are like bleach, leaving all the magic discoloured.

  By this time, I was approaching the building and I was already pushing my way through the crowd. It was a sight that beggared belief: everyone was looking upwards. When I glimpsed the sky, I was even more perturbed: there he was, hovering like a great eagle, Joey Neto. José Antunes Marques Neto himself, like an aero-angel. Was he falling? If he was, then he was moving slower than a planet gliding through the heavens.

  When had he thrown himself off? The previous night, but people had only noticed the following day. The whole world had then piled forwards and in a flash, explanations and epistemologies were being spouted. What had happened came from his having led an unblemished life: this was why he was given the necessary lightness. If he were a politician, he would have nosedived straightaway from the weight of his conscience. Others argued differently: in his pelican’s state, the citizen was escaping from his debts. No one demands payment in the air.

  There was even a subtly Christian version. One onlooker, as thin as a stick insect, dressed as if he could fit into a single sleeve, bellowed, pointing to the firmament:

  —That, gentlemen, is the new Christ.

  The skinny fellow continued to shout: What doors did Christ open for us? The doors to the sky, dear brothers. The sky. But now, the aforementioned Joey was showing us the way to the stars. And he was doing so without having to die, which was an acknowledged advantage.

  —That, gentlemen, is Christ decrucified.

  He was told to keep quiet. Other more practical bystanders were busy with what might follow. And they were predicting a final outcome.

  —That guy is going to hang around like that for days on end.

  —What’ll happen is that he’ll die of hunger and thirst.

  If you couldn’t even eat properly on earth in the present conditions, it would be even worse up in the clouds. What rattled me was that we had to act urgently. Someone should do the right thing. And I shouted amid the buzz of conversation:

  —Have you called the firefighters?

  Yes, but they were on strike. Even if they weren’t, it wouldn’t make much difference: they had no fire engines, or ladders, or any willingness. In fact, they were distinctly unfiery firefighters.

  It was getting late, people started heading for home. A scattering of onlookers stayed behind, in silence. I looked up at the sky again and focused better on my friend Joey. His face displayed such serenity that it was as if he were asleep. His legs were stretched out like a flamingo’s, crossing at his ankles, his arms cushioning his head. He looked as if he were sky-bathing. What was going through his mind?

  That was when I noticed a gir
l standing beside me, crying. She looked so young that I wondered whether she might be his daughter. I even asked her. Daughter? What daughter? She was his secret love, that’s what she was. This was turning into the plot of a romantic love story, a drama without any cloaks or daggers. It wasn’t even worth trying to find out. The girl had no explanation other than her tears.

  Gradually everyone withdrew. Only the girl and I were left. She leaned against my shoulder as if she were asleep, if it weren’t for the drip-drip-drip of her voice, mumbling away. Was she still crying? No. She was praying. She was praying for rain. At least he would drink a few drops from the sky rather than drying up like a shark pickling in brine. Whether the girl had invoked the right spirits or whether it was from natural forces, the truth is that in an instant, it began to rain. And it rained for the next two days.

  Where nothing happens, anything can occur. And the crowds turned up in shifts. The space was packed with umbrellas, and people began to give voice to concerns.

  —If it goes on raining like this, the guy’s going to get drenched, grow heavy, and come crashing down.

  Maybe the gods heard. It stopped raining. And over the next few days, it was as if the air itself had come to a standstill. Joey’s flight became a city attraction. Various businesses were set up. Tourists bought tickets, guides to fantastic phenomena explained novel versions of how Joey had been born with feathers in his armpits and was the descendant of a family of secret flyers. The fellow had the trappings of a born trapeze artist. His own uncle hired a megaphone so people could send him messages of goodwill and blessings. Even I paid to speak to my old friend. But when I found myself with the megaphone in my hand, I didn’t know what to say. And I returned the instrument.

  Then the appropriate authorities really did turn up, represented by the supreme chief of police, who made his voice heard by means of a loudspeaker.