I find myself thinking again about the Hanged Man, card number 12, thinking about fate, indecision, self-denial, sacrifice, the possibility of changing one’s life.
How pretty she is. I run my hand lightly over her hair, and she doesn’t move away. I’m about to kiss her, but then she goes back to the table and begins putting away the deck of cards.
“I’ve thought a lot about you too,” she says, her eyes averted. “But we have to give things time, everything’s happening too quickly. I think it’s best for you to leave now, and we’ll agree to meet again soon. There are so many things in my personal life that I have to resolve, so many things.”
“Will you call me? I’d love for you to call me,” I say.
I give her my cell phone number and, on my way down, float in the elevator like a young boy. I’m coming back for a reading as soon as possible. I’d come back tomorrow if I could. I’d come back in half an hour.
* * *
Self-denial, sacrifice, indecision. That night I make love to my wife thinking furiously about Renata. Rather, I don’t make love at all, I try to identify love in the act but after twelve years our love has become a digression. Marriage Inc., for the sake of the children. Exactly when is it that we sign on the dotted line? Or is it that we don’t necessarily sign, that the agreement is by default, one more decision something else makes for us?
My situation is the most common in the world, and I know it. I’m a man in his fifties who’s fed up with life and his family, dying to experience something different. But I ask myself, is it possible my wife is fed up too? She must be. Impossible for her not to be.
I think about the tarot cards again when I awaken—imminent moment when it will be necessary to knock down old structures, said the Tower card. It all makes sense. I need to see Renata right away.
Three days later she calls me in the afternoon and asks if I have a minute. I close the door to my office.
“Of course, we can talk.”
“I’ve been thinking about the two of us. I think we need to see each other again,” she says.
I imagine Renata in my arms. I want to get to know her, find out everything about her, but we can begin like that, with her in my arms. I remember the T-shirt clinging to her body. I think about my hands touching her breasts, lingering there. Over the shirt, under the shirt, and the rest, calmly. I imagine the cloth grazing her nipples. Afterward we can decide what comes next.
“Can you come next week?” she asks.
“Of course,” I answer. “Of course I can.”
“On Tuesday I have clients until seven. Come right after that, we’ll have time. Is that possible?”
* * *
I make up an excuse at home and arrive at Largo do Machado almost an hour early on the appointed day. It’s hard to calculate the time it takes to travel around Rio de Janeiro, even more so when you have to cross the entire city. And I can’t afford to be late.
Unlike my last two visits, today’s weather is good. Largo do Machado is back to normal. The game tables are all occupied, a dozen people take turns on the exercise equipment, others sit on the edge of the dry fountain. Hordes of pigeons on the Portuguese mosaic stones. I don’t remember who once told me that the name Largo do Machado came from a butcher shop with a large ax, or machado, on its façade that used to be there, at the beginning of the nineteenth century. I remember that a street kid once assaulted Simone with a piece of broken glass as she was leaving the ATM beside the supermarket.
I kill time by walking around the square, think once again about visiting my old building only to once again decide against doing so: my past holds no appeal. Especially today. I prefer to stop for a few moments and watch a young man play the saxophone. You didn’t see that when I lived here. Largo do Machado is much more together than in my time, even with the beggar sleeping by the fountain. In certain parts of Rio you’re used to beggars sleeping in the street, and what can you do? I buy flowers for Renata at one of the kiosks.
I wait until a bit past seven and go up.
“How good that you came,” she says when she opens the door.
“It was great that you called,” I answer.
I hand her the flowers and embrace her, smell her perfume, but I know I have to proceed slowly. I sense that it must be that way with Renata.
Today there’s no tarot deck between us. By now, however, I have begun to think of the cards as accomplices. I’m ready to change my life. I could be an adolescent with a backpack, clutching a one-way ticket to somewhere.
Renata offers me the usual tea, bringing the teapot with hot water and the small box with tea bags for me to select. We sit at the table, the tarot silent in its packaging—the deck is wrapped in a silk cloth inside a wooden box, just like before.
I put my hand on Renata’s. She doesn’t draw away. She begins talking about her life, her gentle voice in harmony with her gentle eyes. She speaks of her work, then finally of her heart. She has someone, as I imagined, a boyfriend, of some years, but things aren’t going well between them. From the moment I came in for the initial reading, she says, she felt a special connection between us.
“But I was involved with a married man before and suffered greatly,” she warns.
Let’s go to bed first and then think about the rest, I feel like suggesting. We’re in Rio de Janeiro in the twenty-first century, we need to test-drive relationships before thinking about anything else, don’t we? Instead, I say I’ve been married for twelve years and it’s not a happy marriage. There’s almost no sex between me and my wife anymore. So often, people stay together only because of the children, I add. I feel like an idiot saying this, but she nods in agreement.
“It was like that with the other man I was involved with. I liked him a lot. Except that in the end he wanted to stay married. Most of them do.”
Another classic story, I think. I decide I’m going to rid myself of the classics once and for all, and it’s going to be now.
“I have to be very careful with men,” Renata says in a slightly more confrontational tone.
I smile. What an adorable girl. “No need to be careful with me,” I say.
“You’re married. It’s the same story.”
“Marriage isn’t forever. Who knows what tomorrow will bring?”
“Tell me about your wife.”
“I would rather talk about you.”
“No, no, tell me about her. What she does in life, for example.”
“She’s a beautician. She has a small salon in Recreio.”
“She must be pretty. Beauticians know how to take care of themselves.”
“She’s not ugly, but in any case that’s not important.”
“I think I’m very naïve around men,” she says. “I get involved too quickly and end up disappointed just as quickly.”
“But you can trust me. It’s different. I’m truly interested in you, I’m not like that other guy.”
She smiles and covers our hands with her other hand. I pat it. I caress her wrist. I feel her bones, the texture of her delicate skin.
“My mother,” she says. “My mother was also naïve with men. With you, for example, she was an idiot.”
I jolt back at that odd statement.
“She died because of you,” Renata says. “But you didn’t know, of course. She was pregnant when you disappeared.”
“Your mother was pregnant?”
“Yes, my mother, Simone, who liked to do tarot readings—isn’t that what you told me? Who died in a car accident many years ago.”
I take my hand away quickly. Suddenly, everything is wrong. A well-conceived plan that remains a theory. “I don’t know if I understand.”
“No? I’ll explain,” she says. “My mother was pregnant when you went away without even leaving a phone number.”
“Our relationship was on the rocks, I wasn’t—”
“But that’s not something you do. You knew she might be pregnant.”
Renata opens the tarot box, unwraps the
deck, then carefully folds the purple silk cloth. She shuffles the cards, takes one out, and places it on the table.
“The Fool,” she says. “The card with no number.”
“If she was pregnant like you say, was she pregnant . . . with you?”
“She died in a car accident, that’s what they say. The truth is she crashed on purpose. Because of you. And she died, but I didn’t. She was pregnant when she had the accident. The accident she caused to kill us both. Exactly twenty-eight years ago.”
There’s nowhere for me to look, so I stare at the card of the Fool on the table.
“I was raised by my aunt, who tried every way possible to get in contact with you, unsuccessfully. You had disappeared.”
“Simone was a very complicated person. I had tried to break up with her before, and it was always a drama, she would show up at my building, stalk me, and—”
“You knew she might be pregnant.”
I remain silent. Words have fled in disarray. What Renata says is true: Simone’s sister did call me once, as soon as she and I separated. She said Simone might be pregnant. The test still had to be done, but it was possible. At that moment, in desperation, I considered sticking with Simone for good. A child with her! That was when I accepted the job in Belo Horizonte. Years later, I was told that Simone had died in an accident, but I never found out the details, nor did I want to know. First came the shock, then I confess to feeling a certain relief. There must not have been a child at all, or I’d have known about it. Wouldn’t I? We always end up finding out about those things sooner or late, right? Sooner or later.
“The Fool has no number,” Renata says after my long silence. “Sometimes they attribute the number zero to him. Zero is the number that alters no addition. In multiplication it transforms everything into itself. It absorbs the other numbers. Look, in the deck I use, the Fool is unwittingly walking toward a cliff. But it’s a good card. I like the Fool a lot. See how he’s carrying a flower in his left hand? That means he appreciates beauty. And his carefree walk is as happy as a child comfortable in the world. Notice that he also carries a staff, which can represent self-denial and wisdom. The Fool always operates outside of social norms and will usually say and do whatever comes into his head.”
She slides her finger along the edges of the card. Her nails are nicely manicured.
I think about the number 12 card, the Hanged Man, in an uncomfortable position, dangling upside down by one foot. A burst of noise comes from outside, and through the window I see pigeons taking flight. Suddenly a wave of intense nausea hits me, and only then, looking at my empty cup and Renata’s, still full to the brim, do I understand the severity of my mistake. I dash to the door, which is unlocked, and from there to the elevator, which takes a long time to arrive. When the doors open, it’s empty.
I press the button for the ground floor. Stabbing pains shoot through my stomach. I need someone to take me to the nearest emergency room. I stagger through the gallery, and when I make it to the sidewalk I see a boy distributing handbills: I buy gold, immediate payment. People look at me. Then Largo do Machado goes dark, and I see nothing more, not the pigeons, not the old men, not the flower kiosks, not the gypsies—but they left a long time ago.
Toned Cougars
by Tony Bellotto
Leme
1.
It was Ronald Biggs who popularized the legend of Rio as the preferred destination for gringo fugitives. It’s like the photo printed on the calendar hanging on the wall of the Black Cat: the smiling thief at the beach, a caipirinha in his hand, surrounded by mulatto women, signing autographs for tourists. Right. But when you screw up in Rio, where do you run to?
2.
Toned cougars are my favorite target. Married ones, of course. Married toned cougars, MTCs for short, are the goal. Separated toned cougars, or STCs, latch onto you and won’t let go. STCs are a problem. All you have to do is look at them and they come on to you. MTCs are foxes, STCs are ticks. The hard part is that when you approach them you have no way of knowing at first if the toned cougar is married or separated. Fox or tick, that is the question. Later you end up getting the hang of it. Today I can separate the wheat from the chaff. Toned widows (TWs), I’ve never approached. They exist but they’re hard to find. They’ve probably let themselves go in relief once they’ve lost their husbands. So I’ve never stung a TW. As a matter of fact, you could say I got stung by one, but that’s an unpleasant subject I’d rather not go into at present. Toned widows are spiders. Maybe when they become widows they stop going to the beach and the gym and start frequenting church, all-you-can-eat restaurants, and the van that chauffeurs old ladies to the theater. They can finally do what they always wanted, without having to worry about staying in shape for the deceased. Not all of them, unfortunately. Maybe I should have gone to church more and less to the beach. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Too late now.
3.
The beach is the natural habitat of toned cougars. And of all the beaches, Copacabana is the mother lode. Of all the mother lodes, Leme is the filet mignon. I don’t know exactly what a mother lode has to do with filets, but if you want to meet a top-of-the-line toned cougar, go to Leme Beach. I didn’t discover these things overnight. I developed a model, the fruit of observation and reflection. I’m a PhD, philanderer highly distinguished.
Or rather, I was.
4.
The story begins with me making a complete survey of the situation: I would kick off the day by jogging from the far end of Leblon to the hill at Leme. I would wear a tight Speedo to emphasize the size of my middle leg and trot along the sand like a wild horse. I would run from Leblon to Arpoador, turn around at Diabo Beach, make a pit stop to tone biceps and triceps, cross Garota de Ipanema Square, and continue trotting along the bike lane of Francisco Otaviano. Back on the beach, I would go from the Copacabana Fort to the end of Leme, alternating between soft and hard sand to stimulate different muscles in the thighs and calves. Arriving at the foot of the hill at Leme I would do two hundred push-ups. That gave me an incredible form: thick footballer legs, a swimmer’s pecs, a gym rat’s washboard abs, lung capacity like Anderson Silva, and a tan that would be the envy of Kelly Slater.
On the way, I would check out the local scene. The bourgeois women of Leblon, the gays on Farme, the gringas of Copacabana, and the super-hot cougars of Leme. Not that there aren’t any hotties in Copacabana, ripped forty-year-olds in Ipanema, tourists in Leme, or gays in Leblon. At the beach there’s everything everywhere. But the highest incidence, let’s call it, of toned cougars is in Leme. Leme and Copacabana, but the ones in Leme are the pearl in the oyster, eleven on a scale of ten.
At the end of the day I would return through Leblon, pick up my clothes from the bro at the kiosk, and catch the 434 bus for Grajaú, where I shared an apartment with my old lady.
To tell the truth, I was tired of getting gringas drunk for a lousy handful of dollars. I was pushing forty and what I wanted was security, know what I mean? Tranquility.
5.
I’m a fan of toned cougars. I admire the way they refuse to give in to the passage of time or the force of gravity. They’re tough and spare no effort to stay in shape: fitness center, aquatic exercise, personal trainer, dermatologist, nutritionist, Botox, detox, massages, liposuction, meditation, yoga, acupuncture, stretching, Pilates, and in some cases neurotherapy. It’s not easy. Some do triathlons. There was one who even used Ben Wa balls to strengthen her vaginal muscles.
In time I learned to distinguish the tick from the fox. It’s something you can tell by how they look at you. Ticks look at you like a puppy at the window of a butcher shop, foxes like a pharaoh in a tomb. Deep down, what they all want is a cock, but that’s where discernment enters the picture. My dick, pardon the immodesty, has always been able to discern. A fundamental detail: married toned cougars don’t think of leaving their husbands. The topic is out of the question, never mentioned, not even in frank conversations after a few proseccos or strong caipirinhas. Mar
ried toned cougars are only looking for an available cock, affection, attention, the illusion of being young again, flirtation, the dirty stuff, sexting, the right mood, get it?
The right mood.
And that’s the basic difference between the fox and the tick: foxes want you as a lover, ticks as a husband. Exclusive.
Once you learn to separate fish from fowl, things move right along.
So, I was putting together a small nest egg. Because married toned cougars always have rich husbands. Just do the math: gym fees, massage therapy, personal trainer, regular dermatology procedures, frequent trips to the beauty parlor (nails, hair, facial massage, foot therapy, colorist), doctors, acupuncturists, etc.—in addition to what the guy pays his mistress. The husband of a married toned cougar always has a lover, of course, and that’s why they start working out. Deep down they love their husbands, and because they no longer have their attention they decide to make over their appearance. Out of need. And after working their asses off, when they realize that even then they don’t get the least bit of attention from their better halves, I come on the scene. Because the cougar who gets along with her husband is ugly and fat, right? Beyond help. She doesn’t need to work out. Really, that’s psychology, it’s not me saying it. There was one who wanted to set me up in a two-room apartment, but I thought it was a bit overboard. I preferred taking the money in cash.
6.
One day, during my morning run through Leme, I met Veronique.
Veronique Delamare was a blond grandma with wrinkled skin, thin but with well-defined musculature and the legs of a woman of thirty. She was easily pushing eighty. Her hands shook a bit, but her belly was a peeled tangerine, wedge upon wedge, impressive despite the chicken flesh. Her arm muscles were still taut, without that characteristic flap that usually hangs like fish gills from older women’s upper arms. And she had a pretty face in spite of the wrinkles. As soon as I laid eyes on her—and she pretended not to notice and I knew then that she was married—I saw she must have been beautiful when she was young. In the depths of those wrinkles glowed two blue eyes that, I confess, hooked me. Know when you lose your way for a second? Forget what you were doing? To complicate matters, she had a very charming French accent. But I’m a pro, and I approached her the way I always do—rational, pragmatic, asking what physical activities she participated in, saying I was a personal trainer and all that crap.
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