The bed was shaking with laughter.
You were lying on the closed suitcase. Outside was dark. Electronics, yes. Toiletries, yes. Documents, yes. Hot weather clothes, airplane clothes, sleep clothes, yes. Beach clothes? Funeral clothes? You had to call your mum and ask what people wore at funerals in Brazil. You zipped the case up. You must remember to put your toothbrush in your hand luggage in the morning. Outside was dark. You laid on the suitcase.
The others were lying on the bed. Elena said—I still wouldn’t get married for sixty years.
Would you get married at all?
Elena paused. I don’t know.
There was quiet.
But you know, I wouldn’t blame my mother if she left. Elena said.
What do you mean?
Like I look at my mother and I wouldn’t blame her if she left my dad, or had left us ages ago.
Pause. Gee said quietly—Me neither.
You lay on the suitcase.
Jade said—When my mum left my dad, I did used to blame her. Obviously not anymore. He used to go through her phone, asking her, who’s this? Who’s this? Why did you text them? And other things too but
Your stepdad is good though.
Yeah. She looked at you. Andy is alright. I don’t think he’s anything special but he treats her with respect, and it meant we lived in a nicer house and got to go to see my cousins nearly every year. And now my mum’s done her masters. She has a job she loves. It’s alright. It is good.
You looked at Jade.
Elena shook her head. She said—I don’t think my mum would ever leave. My dad works and actually my mum works too, but she does all the housework and all the cooking. That isn’t even the bad bit. He’s angry too. After my mum does all that for him my dad is still an angry man. He has this thing that he would never hit any of us because his dad used to hit him. So instead he’s like do not talk to me like that! I will not have my daughter talk to me like that!
Gee put on a deep dad voice and knelt on the bed, waving a finger—Who do you think you are? I will not be spoken to like that!
He’s like I am your father, I put food on your table! But it’s like, actually Mum does that, so.
Elena laughed.
Yes!
So true.
But they’re close, they’re friends, they have sex—I hear it sometimes and they’re always touching each other. When it’s good, it’s good. She gave up her life in Italy for him, you know, she was a nurse there, he was on holiday—Elena laughed again—they fell in love, she came here. Now she works in a doctor’s surgery as a receptionist.
Elena shrugged.
I don’t know if I would do that for someone. I don’t want to. But if I was married or had someone’s baby, then how could I say no? So no, I wouldn’t blame her if she left him. But I would be surprised.
Hm.
There was a pause.
Yeah. Gee was frowning. I never thought about it. My parents don’t talk about their feelings to me and probably not to each other either. She laughed. Mum spends a lot of time gardening, looking after the house, she talks to her sister on the phone a lot. I don’t think they have sex. My mum doesn’t even like to wear clothes that show her upper arms. Or like maybe they have sex just on birthdays. Or maybe my dad has sex with other people. Gee paused. I wouldn’t blame her if she left. But she won’t.
They looked at you
I don’t know. I don’t know. You felt awkward. Actually, actually I’d be more worried about my dad.
Jade laughed at this—Poor Richard!
My mum is the centre of his life. He has his GP practice, he likes his work. But not like she loves her work. And she has all her reproductive medicine friends here and back in Brazil too and she could live anywhere, she’s made it on two fucking continents you know? She would leave such an emptiness in my dad’s life. He talks about her all the time, when she’s travelling they talk every day.
That’s sweet.
Well
That is sweet.
No. Yes. I don’t mean to seem ungrateful
Gee cocked her head, listening. Elena and Jade were looking at you.
You sat up.
But but, what I’m saying is she would never leave him because he could never ever leave her. Who would he cook dinner for? Who would he tell things to? Like we always say that he’s incapable of keeping a secret from her because of that time he told her about her surprise birthday party.
Gee said—They always look like they have a perfect marriage.
You pause.
Yeah. But also no. I don’t know. When I was little they used to argue, they used to argue all the time. And she would shout and cry, say I’m leaving. I’m leaving!
Elena joined in—I’m leaving this family!
And Jade—I’m leaving this family for good, and you will see how you cope without me!
And Gee—My mum used to say that too.
Yeah
Yep.
Yeah. She said she would go back to Italy. And she would storm out and we would find her in McDonald’s eating chicken nuggets.
You lay on the suitcase. Outside was dark. Gee leant back on the bed and Jade and Elena were quiet.
And there was a pause as each of you ask yourselves—
Are these the words that circle in every mother’s mouth?
I will leave this family
I am leaving this family
At night you lie next to Elena and Jade in the bed.
You have never asked your mum whether she has had an abortion
or been raped
or abused
or had sex with a woman
or whether she climaxes through penetrative sex
Fit your husband around your life, don’t fit your life around your husband.
Love your child and give them everything, but build a life that is your own first.
This is what your mum had told you, telepathically, all your life.
But you weren’t sure you wanted a husband
Or a child
Or to wrap your life around another person’s life
2015
Christmas
The plane flew in, and because the landing was smooth and flat (and because outside of the windows was warm and big leafed and green), the passengers clapped.
This is what it means to wake up rolling onto the tarmac outside São Paulo three days before Christmas. Bumbum bump. When you were a child it had meant stepping off the plane into the hot wet air thick with the juicy smell of petroleum. Later it meant moving through the air-conditioned glass walkway from the plane to the terminal, the first touch smell of Brazil delayed until the big wide room divided by the passport checking booths where you could show your blue passport and respond to the officer in Portuguese like a migrant coming home for Christmas.
And after baggage claim, which was, as you remember it, always quick (apart from times when your bags never came), and after walking along the walls made from opaque glass, shoes clack clacking on the shiny stone floor, the automatic doors opened onto the concourse.
Two figures who shrink greyed every year waved at you, holding an empty trolley for you.
Querida!
Netinha!
Kiss kiss kiss kiss.
And you would cross the vast open multi-floored room past the Christmas tree which reached to the top of the escalator, and they would buy you a pão de queijo and an ice cream, even though you had thrown these up in the car on the way to the house on the beach in both 1996 and 1998.
This year, one thin figure met you, holding no trolley. She was wearing bootleg trousers and a light blue blouse, her black hair straight and neat. She was reading something on her phone until she saw you. She was almost your height. She held her arms out to you—
Querida!
kiss
Tia!
kiss
How are you?
Good!
Are you okay taking the case?
Yes, yes. How are you?
Oh you know, you know.
Good?
Good.
She smiled at you, looking at you.
You looked around the airport.
Before we get in the car, can I grab something to eat?
Yeah sure what do you want?
Just something from the padaria.
Do you have cash?
Pause.
No. Sorry!
No no don’t be silly.
You joined the queue. What do you want? Pão de queijo? Suco de manga?
Oh yes actually suco and a pão de queijo.
You stood together and she ordered for you.
You were quiet and you looked around the airport room.
Ana Paula paid and handed you the food and drink.
Thank you!
No no.
Ana Paula watched you as you stood and ate.
Do you want to sit?
No (chew) no (swallow) it’s ok
Ok.
You finished off the pão de queijo and stuffed the greasy paper in your pocket.
Ana Paula frowned and held her hand out. At first you pretended to be puzzled but then you handed over the wrapper.
How was the flight?
Yeah fine, you know.
You began to walk. Ana Paula put the wrapper in the bin. Did they clap when your plane landed?
Less this year actually.
Good. It’s so annoying!
Yeah?
Only Brazilians. Only Brazilians.
Again you walked through automatic glass doors, into the hot summer daytime. Under your shirt sweat collected in your armpits and ran down the arm pulling the suitcase. You walked into the carpark.
Your mother and your father are already at the beach.
Oh yes, she sent me a picture.
Of them?
Of my dad. Swimming.
Yes. He swims long distances every day. He brings his goggles to the beach.
Sounds about right.
I’m parked over here—Ana Paula said, indicating a large black SUV.
Oh wow. Your car.
I know, it’s too big but.
Ana Paula shrugged.
You got in the big car.
She reversed. The car moved out and onto the big road with brown red mud and big bladed grass and Marriotts and big airport hotels on either side.
Ana Paula said—You see those building works? There was meant to be a train line by now.
You looked out of the window. Oh really? To the city centre?
Yes. It was promised, you know, you know how this country is
Delays?
Delays delays, corruption.
Corruption.
I wouldn’t need a car like this if I could get a train direct, but as it is . . .
Yeah. There is a bus service though, right?
Sure. But what major cities do not have rail links to their airports? I mean with the traffic the way it is.
You think? I mean yeah, sure.
But anyway. How are you? What have you been working on? Still their insider Brazilian?
You cringed.
Well I work in the ideas department you know it takes a while for the ideas to become programmes and often they don’t even get that far and so not much has come out that I’ve worked on, which is not to say I haven’t been working, if you know what I mean. If you know what I mean.
With Ana Paula the Portuguese words always lodge like big Lego bricks in your mouth. Uh huh.
You looked at her and she looked at the road.
I did pitch to them a story about police brutality in Brazil, you know because of all the stuff in the USA
What?
You know tia like police violence? Because of the five you know the five black boys
Well—said Ana Paula, overtaking a truck—yeah there is a lot of poverty and criminality it is a big problem in Brazil.
They didn’t go for it in the end.
Oh well.
Ana Paula turned the car down a slip road off the main road, away from the city.
They, you know, they kept trying to get me onto sports or to do something sporty Brazilian you know like football or—
Or girls in bikinis playing vôlei.
Yeah, yeah! Anyway I said no, or I didn’t say no but I didn’t have any ideas.
Yes. Sometimes that is wisest.
Yes.
Ana Paula waited at the traffic lights.
You should pitch them something about corruption.
Yeah?
You know this government is so corrupt meu deus I mean it’s so tiring, it makes you want to hide your taxes under your mattress. You know everyone is stealing money, money, money.
Yeah.
But anyway you can read about it anywhere in the Brazilian press. The international press—the English-language press—does not cover these problems like they should, they don’t write about the corruption or the way that things don’t work and the way that this country is moving backwards . . . And of course in Brazil most people also think like this because they are fooled you know, because they just aren’t educated. There is so much ignorância—she hit the steering wheel—ignorância is ruining this country.
Pause.
I haven’t seen you since before the election. The election was . . . you followed the election? It was just terrible, she is terrible, an embarrassment like a little pathetic puppet you know?
Oh right.
Presidenta
Yeah.
You know she calls herself presiden-tah
Yes. I did know that.
You know it’s like it’s not even grammatically real, she’s just made up a feminised—
Yes, I know.
Pause
Yes I did know that.
I mean the polling was also so precarious before, it was showing her not doing well, I wonder, well you know everything is so corrupt I wonder
You turned to look at your aunt and, collapsing into English, said—You think the polling was rigged?
Well how could it have been so wrong? I just find that . . . you know I mean polling is a science—
Tia, you know there was a polling crisis in the UK as well this year?
But the UK is different.
You looked at her and took care not to speak too quickly—Also also the history of polling is very young in Brazil, I was reading about it in FT, you know, The Financial Times newspaper, people some people think that because of the success of polling in the US that polling is always very accurate, but actually the history of polling you know the backlog of data—
Ana Paula wasn’t listening—Anyway most people are outraged but you don’t read about it anyway in English.
The car moved past billboards and piled unsymmetrical houses.
You wanted to ask your aunt which English news sources she was reading, but instead you said—The thing is, tia, lots of governments are corrupt. There was a government corruption scandal in England only a few years ago. It’s not news.
Ah. Ana Paula waved her hand before changing gear—I will never understand what is news and what isn’t. That Brazilian man who was shot in Stockwell when I was living there. Why was that such an outrage? He was much more likely to have been shot if he had stayed in Rio and they wouldn’t have reported on that.
You stayed silent.
You moved along the motorway through thinning houses into mountains, into the forest.
You and your parents—Richard and Isadora and baby, the three from England—had started spending Christmas in this house behind the gates only recently after Vovó Cecília’s little yellow house by the beach had been sold. After that happened one of Marcos’ brothers-in-law, who was the son of someone to do with sugar, had bought this house in the new condo with guards by the beach.
You and Ana Paula arrived just in time for lunch. About ten of them were around the table, which was on the veranda and looked out to the sand and the sea, eating rice and beans and farofa and fish and some
leftover pieces of beef and onions. It was not a proper lunch, you know, just something that Dona Elisabete had thrown together. Leftovers. Isadora and Richard both burnt looking and beaming rose immediately to greet their only child.
You hugged Isadora, and then you hugged Richard.
And then the rest of them rose, Lucas, kiss kiss! Marcos! Tia Celina, kiss kiss! Vovózinha! Prima Sônia, que saudade! Her boyfriend João, kiss kiss! Marcos’ nephew João Pedro, kiss kiss! Paulinho, you remember Paulinho? His wife, their friend who was recently divorced and had no one to stay with—Kiss, kiss hug. Hug. Kiss, kiss hug. Oi! Tudo bom? Hug hug kiss! But you’ve grown so much! Hug beijo beijo beijo
Marcos’ family was like the huge Latin American family that people always thought you had. He had five sisters and they had husbands (apart from the one who did not have a husband) and they had children of all ages and they uploaded pictures of each other together to Facebook and ran into each other in shopping malls and had loud conversations on speakerphone with their sons or nieces who had moved to Brasília or Recife or Belo Horizonte.
One of the cousins, a small pale guy with big curly hair and glasses, resumed his seat next to Richard quickly. He was speaking slowly and seriously in English. Richard turned to his wife and daughter, and said—You remember Guilherme, José’s son, and his sister Gabi.
A woman in her twenties with brown eyes smiled and said nice to meet you in English and unable to stop yourself you interrupt—I speak Portuguese I speak Portuguese
Gabi laughed—Prazer.
Guilherme cleared his throat. He was facing Richard. I was saying to you—
Yes. Richard paused. So tell me again the topic of your thesis?
Guilherme cleared his throat. It is about the military dictatorship’s relationship with student movements in the seventies and eighties—
Isadora interrupted—You see Richard! How time has passed and I am history now!
Isadora put her hand on Richard’s neck and squeezed her daughter’s shoulders.
Oh really? Guilherme turned to face Isadora for the first time. When were you studying?
In the eighties.
And where?
At USP.
And what did you study?
Medicina
And when did you leave?
Eighty-six.
And who funded your study?
The UK and Brazilian governments—joint.
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