Oneiron

  ROSA IMACULADA (alarmed): Mr. Santoro! You must understand.

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO (collects himself and then speaks with emphatic calmness): This liquid is safe. It will help reveal the truth. (He unscrews the cap all the way, takes a small swig himself, and grins.) There. I didn’t die. What if we continue our investigation now?

  ROSA IMACULADA (hesitantly): Well, I imagine—

  Rosa!

  Shhhhhhhhh!!!

  —Rosa takes the bottle and empties it. Only with effort does she hold down the vomit. After she’s heaved and retched enough, after she’s wiped her mouth on the rust-red handkerchief Estêvão Santoro kindly handed her, she straightens up and casts him a grim gaze.

  ROSA IMACULADA: Are you satisfied now?

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO (appeased): Thank you, Rosa. You can’t know how much this means to me. I’ll compensate your sacrifice handsomely. If we get to the end of this today, I’ll pack my bags and go home.

  ROSA IMACULADA (formally, a little mechanically): Do we proceed as before? Do you want to start with questions?

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO: I propose that I start by describing a certain situation. Something happened between Murilo and me a little before the accident. You chime in as soon as you know what I’m talking about.

  ROSA IMACULADA: OK.

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO: Close your eyes.

  Rosa closes her eyes. Mr. Santoro also closes his eyes. They take each other by the hand.

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO (pausing for a moment to gather his thoughts before beginning): I’m sitting at home on the terrace. It’s early evening, and I’ve had a few drinks. During the day I made some good deals. A large bridge is going up over the Rio Negro. A line of pylons is visible in the distance to the left. I turn my wicker chair and move it right next to the terrace railing so I can see the construction site on the water. Sometimes I look at the bridge through binoculars: the pylons look a little like air-traffic control towers, or an oil-drilling platform. Either way, looking at them is calming. Something is happening, you know, and that feels so damn good! (With a little chuckle) The opening ceremonies will be next year. There’ll be fireworks and champagne. I contributed a small amount of the financing for the bridge (brief pause), so in a way the bridge feels like my own. I’m feeling so good that I get the cigar box from the cabinet in the bedroom . . .

  Suddenly Rosa squeezes Mr. Santoro’s hands tightly.

  ROSA IMACULADA (shouting): A bang!—

  Help!

  What on . . .

  —Startled, Estêvão Santoro instinctively opens his eyes. However, he closes them immediately, reluctantly; he can’t let the connection break. Something is coming. Rosa is obviously finding something!

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO (unable to conceal his excitement): Yes! (Lowering his voice) And what is the bang from?

  ROSA IMACULADA (cautiously): The downstairs door . . . ?

  Estêvão Santoro swallows and clears his throat. He extracts his hands from Rosa’s, wipes the sweat on his trousers, and then reaches for Rosa again.

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO: An exhaust pipe. From a motorcycle.

  Rosa is untroubled. Door or exhaust pipe, it’s irrelevant. She again squeezes Mr. Santoro’s hands, which are slippery with sweat. She feels as Murilo walks through the door. His walking is noisy, his heels pounding on the floor—he’s been drinking more than just water too. Rosa reels. The bed she’s sitting on begins to sway. Murilo grabs the railing of the winding staircase in the living room and heads upstairs. Murilo opens his mouth . . .

  ROSA IMACULADA: Roses . . . Roses, so many roses . . .

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO: Where?

  ROSA IMACULADA: On the windowsill. In the hall. The curtains are red, scarlet red. An enormous number of white roses are on the windowsill in three different vases.

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO (taken aback): My wife loves flowers . . . I buy them for her nearly every day . . . And the curtains really are red—

  What did I say! What did I say!

  —ROSA IMACULADA (drowsily): Murilo opens his mouth and shouts, “Is anyone home?” He looks for his mother, assuming he’ll find her in the kitchen . . . But your wife isn’t in the kitchen. Murilo walks out onto the terrace . . . and sees you. You’re sitting in a wicker chair with your face toward the evening sun.

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO (squeezing Rosa’s hands): I stand up and greet Murilo. “Hello, son. Where have you been?”

  ROSA IMACULADA (speech slightly unclear): “I was handling some things.”

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO (suddenly irritated): “What things, may I ask?”

  This sentence is the beginning of Rosa’s death. Anger, not her own anger but the overflowing anger toward his father that has been building up in Murilo, wells within her after Estêvão Santoro’s annoyed question. The surge of anger is so strong that Polina, Shlomith, and Ulrike also feel it, even though they’re watching the scene from another time, another reality, by means of the fragile energy of thought radiated by the Rosa Imaculada floating in the air concentrating on the BOW TIE. However, that transplanted anger doesn’t take root in them. Rosa shakes off Mr. Santoro’s hands.

  ROSA IMACULADA (shouting): “Father, I have my own life! And besides, I need a car. I can’t haul all my stuff around on a motorcycle. And I’m sick of asking people for rides. And you know it. You’re intentionally humiliating me in front of my friends.”

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO (barely controlling his rage): “Are we going to start this again? Every goddamn time I see you, you pester me about a car. As if you didn’t remember we have an agreement! You get a car the same day you—”

  ROSA IMACULADA: “Father, why are you blackmailing me? Everyone has a car!”

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO: “YOU GET A CAR THE DAY YOU REGISTER AT THE UNIVERSITY!”

  ROSA IMACULADA (shrinking back on the bed): “I’m never doing that! (Waving her arm) Keep your stupid eucalyptus trees! Aren’t you ever going to listen to me? I’m going to make my own choices!”

  ESTÊVÃO SANTORO (face red): “Not with my money you aren’t! If you think I’m going to support you while you (his voice turns unctuous) loaf around at your little whore’s house (ends the falsely flattering tone, continues shouting), YOU’RE WRONG! You’re dead wrong!”

  ROSA IMACULADA (suddenly calm, speaks with an icy chill): “So keep your money. I don’t want it. I’m sick of arguing. You’ll be dead in five years from a heart attack anyway, unless you start taking it easier. The same thing will happen to you as Maximiliano and Manoel and Fernão. Do you really think I’m going to be a good little boy and get in line for that? What world are you living in?”

  Estêvão Santoro’s tolerance is finally shattered. His father and grandfather and great-grandfather, whom his son just so casually tossed aside, are his greatest heroes. Over decades their hard work, risk-taking, and constant effort created the Santoro fortune that this ungrateful brat now enjoys—and how! Before it was different. There was respect for previous generations, there was willpower as strong as iron. And above all, there were goals. The story of their family was practically textbook for entrepreneurship. Maximiliano brought massive quantities of raw rubber to the market, which vulcanization turned into gaskets for use between moving parts, like pistons and cylinders. When rubber production moved to Asia, his son, Manoel, bought a eucalyptus plantation and started producing charcoal. His grandson, Fernão, expanded the tree farms, made a foray into pulp production, got spanked, and returned to charcoal. And now the great-grandson, Estêvão himself, patron of the Rio Negro Bridge and the godfather of the mayor’s daughter, is doing as they did. He too is always trying something new. Like them, he studies nonstop and carefully follows goings-on in the world. He knows when to strike. Right now he’s more up with the times than ever. His bevy of engineers have started refining a metallurgical charcoal from eucalyptus that could solve the climate crisis. His charcoal will be a runaway success in countries participating in carbon emissions trading. He—no, they! All the Santoros!—will be remembered in history as people
who solved serious problems facing humanity. Small but extremely important rubber parts in steam engines, affordable paper pulp, and now the future of the planet . . . His son should be excited and filled to bursting with ambition. He is being handed a million-dollar shot and what is he doing? He isn’t interested! He wants to spend the rest of his life chasing women! At the expense of the reputation of his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather!

  Estêvão Santoro drags himself up out of the wicker chair. His son is mocking him. His son hit him in a tender spot, his health, as if he weren’t concerned enough about it himself. He takes medicine, which of course his son knows. He limits his fat intake, and his wife also keeps an eye on the situation. What else can he do? Estêvão Santoro takes a step. What? Is he supposed to start spending his days lolling about too? He slaps his son across the face. Should he abandon their family values too and start acting like money grows on trees? He picks his son up by the front of his shirt and slams him against the wall. A bang. His son’s head hits the metal socket of a balcony lamp—

  No! Stop!

  Help!

  No!

  Rosa!

  Rosa!!!

  Rosa Imaculada collapses on the bed, her face against the rosewood rail. Mr. Santoro’s vermilion BOW TIE has come undone and lies on the white bedspread next to the rust-colored handkerchief and on top of the glass bottle, which is lying on its side. Mr. Santoro screams. He crawls up next to Rosa, checking her pulse and then shouting even louder. Shlomith, Ulrike, and Polina have opened their eyes; Rosa, the Rosa in the air, is singing. The final lines come in a voice draped in sorrow, slowly and crackling like an old phonograph record: Musangolá quina quinê . . .

  Goodbye, friend!

  Forgive us for doubting, Rosa!

  Goodbye! Farewell!

  Adeus, Rosa Imaculada!

  Authorities are remaining tight-lipped about details surrounding the death of the woman known to readers as Rosa of the Imaculate Heart. In the meantime, rumors have been flying concerning the nature of the relationship between Imaculada and multimillionaire, Estêvão Santoro.

  A single mother living in Salvador de Bahia, Rosa Imaculada received a heart transplant six months ago. The organ donor has been revealed as Santoro’s son, who died in a motorcycle accident. “It was a sick obsession,” said a close friend of Rosa. “Rosa’s own father left when she was small. She was clearly looking for a father figure. Her relationships with men have always been catastrophes.”

  Super Noticía also interviewed Rosa’s grandmother, who firmly believes that black magic played a role in the events. Since Rosa’s death, her grandmother has been tormented by the same dream every night. In the dream, she prizes Estêvão Santoro’s fingers one by one from Rosa’s neck. “I always wake up to sinhó Santoro’s fingers flying away. It’s a sign. Sinhó Santoro didn’t recognize the evil forces raging in his soul.”

  Rosa Imaculada was found dead one week ago in a hotel room that Santoro had been renting for the past two months. Santoro’s family believed he was in Europe on a business trip. The hotel is located in Pelourinho, the old city of Salvador.

  “Since Rosa’s death, her grandmother has been tormented by the same dream every night.”

  Santoro was found badly injured at the base of a cliff in Pelourinho on the Ladeira da Montanha near the Lacerda Lift the day after Rosa’s death.

  He passed away en route to the hospital.

  AS BLUE AS BLUE: A LESSON IN LOVE

  Auf Wiedersehen, Ulrike!

  Once upon a time there was a small, sweet 159-centimeter girl, Ulrike of Salzburg, whom everyone loved. Everyone except the Big Bad Adelwolf. He only wanted one thing in the world, the magic ring that Ulrike of Salzburg happened to own. At the beginning of summer, before Ulrike left on a dangerous journey into the magical forests of Germany to seek the treasure of love, her old grandmother took the child’s milky-white hands in her own wrinkled grasp. “My dear,” the old woman said, “I give you this ring as a gift to mark your entrance into adulthood. It will guide you in difficult situations in your life by changing color. Keep close watch over it. No other ring like this exists. If you lose it, you too shall be lost.”

  Ulrike of Salzburg then set off. She wandered in the mountains, leaving no stone unturned, walking until her feet blistered and always checking the messages from the ring she had placed on her right ring finger. When the stones of the ring burned black, she knew she was ängstlich, anxious. Yellow told of a tense state of mind, gespannt, red of restlessness, unruhig. Light green meant that she wasn’t very stressed, nicht stressiert, and dark green revealed a light relaxation, ein wenig relax, and dark blue guaranteed that she was very relaxed, sehr relax. Ulrike of Salzburg saw all these colors on her ring as she wandered in the mountains, startling at the snaps of twigs, admiring butterflies, staring at wisps of cloud. There was only one color she didn’t see, the light blue that proclaimed deep bliss, sehr glücklich. But she learned her first lesson: she learned to trust her feelings.

  Halfway through her journey, Ulrike met another young girl, Anke-Marie of Berchtesgaden, who invited her into a small lean-to built of pine boughs. Anke-Marie was Ulrike’s age but much, much more experienced. “Ulrike of Salzburg, you come from the wide world, but now you have to learn the ways of the woods. I will teach you to make fire, and then together we will eat the hare I caught this morning.”

  Hare?

  What kind of a place is this?

  It feels familiar but also strange.

  Wait . . . we’re in a fairytale!

  I’d started working my way down the hillside . . .

  Is this your subconscious, Ulrike?

  I took five mini bottles with me from the Eagle’s Nest . . . Spezialitäten aus den Bergen . . . And I drank them on the way . . . But I don’t know anything about this!

  Anke-Marie of Berchtesgaden took Ulrike to a birch grove and showed her how to gather tinder fungus. When they had enough of the fungus, they returned to the shelter. Anke-Marie began to dig the leathery hearts out from under the hard crust and pores of the fungi with a knife. Then she submerged the hearts in boiling water full of birch ash and mixed it all together. When the fungi had boiled long enough, she took them out and left them in the sun to dry. “But you can’t let the tinder get too dry or you have to wet it down again. It needs to be damp, slightly wet, or it won’t cooperate.”

  Anke-Marie began to club the wet tinder fungus. She clubbed so hard she began to sweat large beads of perspiration which rolled down and stung her eyes until she couldn’t see. Then Ulrike said, “Let me do it so you can rest.”

  Taking turns through the hottest part of the day, they beat the tinder fungus and bathed in sweat. They beat until the fungus gave up, stopped blistering, and became a flat, even disk. After this Anke-Marie took Ulrike by the hand and showed her how to strike a spark with the right amount of force on the right corner of a flint with a steel. Ulrike struck the stone with the steel. She struck many times and was beginning to lose patience because her strength was waning.

  Then Anke-Marie came behind her, right up close, took her by the arms, and they struck the stone together. They struck once, twice, three times, and then came the spark, which the tinder fungus trapped. Anke-Marie set the glowing tinder in an abandoned bird’s nest, which she had found in the forest, and the dry wood stacked above quickly burst into flames.

  This was how Ulrike of Salzburg learned to make fire.

  By the time they had dined heartily on the hare they had roasted over the fire and rolled over to sleep on their bed of pine boughs, she had learned her second lesson: she had learned to trust another person.

  Early in the morning, as the first rays of sun tickled the ends of the sleeping girls’ noses, Ulrike awoke in Anke-Marie’s arms and felt wondrously happy. In triumph she raised her right hand to her face and whispered, “Look, light blue!”

  The ring in her finger glowed blue, but Anke-Marie didn’t look happy. “Ulrike of Salzburg, it is blue, but not
light blue. You’re relaxed, and that does mean you’re happy, but deep bliss, which is also called love, is something you still haven’t experienced.”

  Ulrike turned her gaze to Anke-Marie and, in a slightly weepy voice, said, “I think it’s closer to light blue than dark.” But Anke-Marie of Berchtesgaden was unyielding. “Dear Ulrike, I know what you’re thinking,” she whispered to her new friend. “You want to stay here with me because we get along so well. But you have to continue your journey if you want to continue seeking the treasure of love. Otherwise you’ll begin to hate me eventually. Come back if you don’t find what you seek. I’ll be waiting for you here.”

  The girls cried and kissed each other. The stone on the ring had turned pitch black by the time Ulrike of Salzburg waved goodbye and turned to continue on her way. Her mind full of questions, she climbed the forest path until she finally reached the top of the mountain. There stood a large building made of concrete with a massive brass lion-head knocker bolted to the door.

  Ulrike took hold of the knocker: thunk, thunk, thunk. The ring burned yellow and red in turn. After only a few seconds, the door opened. Behind it stood a hunched, frightening-looking man, who said, “Good day, Ulrike of Salzburg. Please, come in.”

  Ulrike was shocked, but she stepped into the dimly lit room because she didn’t know what else to do. Elders were to be obeyed, her grandmother had taught her long ago, and the Adelwolf was obviously older than her. His ears were large and hairy, and his hands were enormous and completely covered in dark fur. His mouth was as immense as an ocean ship, and his eyes gaped like a giant’s dinner plates under his jagged bangs. His right pupil moved actively, while the left was glazed in place.

  “I have venison stew to offer, and I’m sure you’re hungry since you’ve walked such a long way. Might we share a meal?” the Adelwolf suggested. Ulrike agreed, because she was ravenously hungry.