Nowhere People

by Paulo Scott

  * * *

  Another day. Maína’s sisters cannot guess who the man is who’s getting out of the car with those plastic bags in his hands. He tries to talk to the older one, but she doesn’t understand what he’s saying. Maína recognises his voice, she comes out of the tent and, making no attempt to hide her happiness at seeing him, says she had only been expecting him in two days’ time. Paulo hands over the bags with packets of biscuits, cornflower snacks and soft drinks for her. ‘I’ve brought some junk food,’ he says. Maína wants to know what junk means. Without waiting for a reply she goes back to the tent. Paulo follows her. He goes into the tent and sees the straw mats covering the floor, the wooden crates with cleaning products, clothes, pans, everything improvised, a table with a stack of six Duralex plates, a can of cooking oil, a few opaque plastic tubs and a pot of cutlery on it. Maína arranges the soft drinks on the table, puts the plastic bags away in one of the wooden crates. She takes Paulo by the hand, leads him to the little wicker bench at the entrance to the tent, asks him to sit down for a moment, then she takes two aluminium mugs, opens one of the soft drinks, pours it, passes him the drink. She purses her lips tight showing her interest in knowing what has brought him here. He takes a sip of the drink. ‘I quit my job today. It’s a good place, I stayed to help and to learn. The bosses are good to me. They do me good. You understand? It’s just I’m not doing what I want to be doing. When I’m there I have to help people, people I don’t want to help. The bosses are going to give me some money, money that’s mine, and I was thinking of taking some of it and helping you. Except I don’t know how to help you. It’s not much,’ he says. Maína gets up, takes the mug from his hands, puts it down beside the wicker bench, calls her sisters over, tells them to give him a big hug. When it’s her turn to hug him, she lets slip, ‘We are together, and happy.’ (Paulo has had an argument in the office because, after some days, the lawyers told him that they were indeed going to halve the amount he received from the estate agency’s legal activities. This decision, which he felt was unfair, made him stand up and say he wasn’t going to work with them any longer, and demand that, within the new rules with the decreased percentage, they deposit an amount approximating what he would be receiving from the suits that are filed.) The smallest child sat on his lap without his noticing. He had headed over here out of sheer rage (in order to lessen his rage); gradually he realises what caused it. And – out of context – he replies to Maína: ‘Junk is a word for stuff that isn’t healthy, that has no value.’ Maína puts her arms around him, saying he can come back as often as he likes. ‘Things that have no value,’ she repeats, talking to herself this time.

  In Porto Alegre there’s a traffic jam on Lucas de Oliveira. He’s nearly fifty minutes late. He goes into the hall, where there must be about a hundred people. A fellow party member from São Paulo who has come especially to contribute to the discussions around public policy in the multi-year plan (the city’s main piece of budgetary planning, which is due to be passed through to the Council Chamber shortly) gestures for him to come sit next to her, as she’s alone on a cushion for two. ‘Did I miss much?’ Paulo asks. ‘They’ve been rehashing that crazy argument about which journalist will take over the communications office … and’ – she whispers even more quietly – ‘they talked about the net that’s starting to close around the mayor.’ He settles as best he can, listens to the introductory remarks and, as soon as the opportunity arises, he asks to speak. The chair of the meeting replies that as soon as comrade Zezinho has finished reading the new framework for assigning senior roles between the different movements and the group of independents, he will have three minutes to do so. It’s the independents who are the real headache in this process of forming a government: they are militants who aren’t part of any party movement and as a result, when they get together, it takes them longer than any of the other groups to deliberate (on top of this, there’s the fact that the candidates they name are not accountable to anyone, since they don’t really have anyone above them). Twenty minutes go by, Paulo’s turn comes. He gets up, walks over to the table, hands the chair of the meeting a three-page document. He runs his hand over his head. ‘Comrades, the document I have just handed to comrade Alfredo is my statement of separation from the movement. Out of respect for some of you, I would like to take two minutes here to present its contents and the reasons for my leaving.’ Some were surprised but most already knew that Paulo was there to leave the organisation. ‘I am alarmed and … ’ – he takes on an expression of ecclesiastical seriousness – ‘even as an atypical militant, who has always needed the understanding of those who work with me, because I’m vain, I’ll admit, and hasty, I’ll admit, because I’m not the best example of determination and discipline, I’m truly concerned about the irrational ways in which the factions that dominate the party leadership have shown contempt for democratic debate, replicating the most odious practices of Stalinism. I want to make it absolutely clear to you: I don’t intend to repeat today that old lament of someone who has no idea of how difficult it is, the argument with the right, with the social democrats, with the media bosses, bankers, contractors, ruralists … I do know, however, that we can take a wrong turn at any moment, just as we’ve gone wrong before, and I think we need to acknowledge these mistakes … If we speak so much about freedom and the internationalisation of socialism and the emancipation of mankind, about the dignity of humanity, we should be guaranteeing the inclusion, the participation of all those who work, who make sacrifices for this, in our own decision-making processes. These decisions, the decisions we make that are the party’s decisions, have taken place behind closed doors, they have come about through manipulation, through intimidation, by patrolling the party conventions at voting time. I don’t see any sign of democracy, of the democracy that ought to be the foundation of what we do, at the root of everything. I’m troubled, ashamed, by our alliances, by the concessions, by all the turning a blind eye, that we’re establishing as standard practices of the Workers’ Party. And this is only one of the eight points in my document. Is this the politics of party building that we wanted? I say again: I’m ashamed of what we are becoming. Honestly, I do believe that some of us, some comrades who are in this room, feel like they own this party, they think they’re the enlightened masters of the party, behaving like great feudal overlords, like proper gang leaders. Our party wasn’t born to be like this. I’ve seen resentment, vindictiveness. I don’t like it, I don’t want to be a part of this process of division that is excluding the best in the militant movement, the most critical, those who are technically the most able, just the way Stalin did. Those who are in charge in the movement, and I’m fortunate that you are all here today, you ought to be behaving very differently from São Paulo, where those guys ram whatever they want down people’s throats; you ought to be behaving differently from the groups who do nothing but cheapen our arguments.’ He looks at his watch, concerned for his two allotted minutes. ‘To bring about revolution in the world we need to bring about a revolution in ourselves. It sounds naive, I know.’ He takes a deep breath, readying himself for his conclusion (and loses his thread just a little). ‘I say again. I look around me and I see people who should never have been part of the Workers’ Party, and not only are they in the Party but they’ve been calling the shots here ever since our win in the municipal elections. We were better off four years ago. I’m sorry, but that’s the way I see it. I hesitated about coming today, about being here, standing in front of you. I was afraid of being taken for a coward and even that I myself might judge myself weak, incapable of understanding the big picture, or history, weak for giving up on the struggle, but I want you to know, I’m not giving up, just the opposite … I wish you all luck.’ One of the two state deputies gets to his feet and suggests that Paulo, ‘as a vital partner in the strengthening of the Workers’ Party,’ might reconsider his position and first have a discussion with the members of his unit. Paulo thanks the chair, tells the deputy he has made his d
ecision and sits back down next to the militant who’s come from São Paulo. The interventions continue as though the meeting had never been interrupted by Paulo’s speech. He feels relieved, believing he has spoken some truth, something that can move everyone present. After the excitement, they get caught up in a discussion of the agenda, and as the debates and speeches progress he is overtaken by a devastating feeling of not having the stomach to argue with them. Before the final decision is voted upon, without any gesture of goodbye to the woman sitting next to him, he stands up, and with his head lowered, his voice almost silent, he excuses himself again to anyone who might happen to be able to hear him and leaves the room with a strong sensation of having been discarded.

  He goes into the club, Enigmas, having promised the bouncer (Gregório ‘the Grinder’, an old acquaintance from his skateboarding days in the Marinha do Brasil park) that he won’t touch the Domecq that he’s carrying and which is now suitably stored away in the law-trainee rucksack on his back. He’s come here to find Lugosi, the youngest of the place’s resident DJs; though there’s only three years’ difference between them (she is eighteen) and despite his friend’s complete alienation from politics, they have cultivated this friendship for the tough times, as they like to say to each other. The nightclub, an LGBT hangout of no great consequence, has in the last year been attracting rent boys (the rent boys who, thanks to an agreement between the club owners, are not allowed into Peter Pan Seven, Polio Garage or Silhouette Cocktail), models of both sexes who are already starting to lose their looks and their jobs and – this is the decisive factor – employees from other clubs on their nights off. Three factors which, in combination with other trends and rumours, meant that Enigmas had quickly gained a reputation as a place that promised a good time, attracting the attention of all kinds of punks and lovers of The Cure and The Smiths. Lugosi could take a lot of the credit for popularising the place, with her goth muse attitude and her ability to choose just the right tracks to play when everyone’s fed up having made a big difference. A lot of her friends who are regulars at the Taj Mahal, always up for blowing a load of cash on a night out, even if they don’t have all that much cash to blow in the first place, began to show up at Enigmas once she started there.

  It’s early. There’s no one on the dance floor. Lugosi is with her latest old-beautiful-perfect-boyfriend, Castro Two: both of them bored, they’ve just eaten a portion of chips at the table next to the decks. ‘Sweetie, go get us some cigarettes over at the petrol station, tell them I’ll settle up tomorrow,’ she orders her boyfriend as soon as she sees Paulo approaching, ‘and take as long as you like, ok?’ Castro Two (yes, there had been a Castro One, even if Castro Two didn’t know this) gets up, greets Paulo without a handshake and heads for the door. ‘These boys of yours are looking more and more like girls, Lugosi,’ he teases her even before saying hello. ‘I screw androgyny, you know,’ and she moves along so he can sit beside her. ‘Well, of all people … ’ she takes the initiative. ‘Yeah well, you’re always saying I never come to hear you doing your DJ thing. So I came. So here I am, girl … And, well … ’ he tries to disguise his haggard expression and his own drunkenness. ‘So what’s up?’ She knows he isn’t here just in passing. ‘I quit the internship and I quit the Party, all on the same day: today,’ and he takes a chip from the cardboard tray. ‘But there’s more … ’ Lugosi raises her index finger like a well-behaved schoolgirl asking permission to speak. ‘And could I guess what this “more” might be?’ she ventures. ‘Feel free. I’ve got all night,’ he says, and this time takes several chips. ‘Is it the Indian girl you took to the Baltimore?’ and she gives him an ironic look, her face a caricature of someone who’s just said something she oughtn’t. Paulo shows no sign of surprise, he gestures to the waiter to come over, calm in his drunkenness. ‘How do you know about the Indian girl?’ he asks. Lugosi takes a cigarette from her pocket. ‘I’m right, aren’t I?’ she says, and picks up a box of matches from the table and puts it in his hand. ‘It was your friend Titi, she told me. I asked her what you’d been up to and she said she met you at the entrance to the cinema with a frightened little Indian girl.’ Paulo strikes the match and brings it toward Lugosi to light her cigarette. ‘She’s nearly fifteen, and I’m falling for her.’ He blows out the flame (in that moment he thinks how it’s only with Lugosi that he can speak so candidly). ‘Nearly fifteen?’ she says. ‘It feels like millennia since I was nearly fifteen.’ The waiter arrives. ‘Get us a couple of gin-fizzes, Diego,’ Lugosi asks. The waiter gives her an anything-else-bitch look, and getting no answer he turns his back and walks away. ‘You fucked her already?’ Lugosi asks. ‘It isn’t that simple … ’ he tries to slow Lugosi down. ‘She barely speaks Portuguese, she lives in a tent on the side of the highway … It’s a pretty sorry sight.’ Lugosi gets up, goes into the space reserved for the DJ, mixes one track into the next, sits back down with Paulo. ‘I get it, she’s the Tarzan of the Minuane tribe and you’re her Jane-in-breeches … Ha ha ha … ’ She pats him on the head. ‘You’ve outdone yourself, old man,’ (she rarely spares him). ‘And all that today. Fucking hell. This is a day that’s going down in history,’ she mocks. ‘Nope … That’s a good one … It’s your Independence Day … Weren’t you saying it doesn’t make sense any more to do that stuff you do for the Party, that in law the only thing that made sense was the philosophy and stuff, that it’s been ages since you’ve been in love … ’ He interrupts her. ‘I’m not in love … ’ The waiter arrives with the cocktails. ‘Sorry, but you are. You’re in love, and you’re trying to get over the Christian guilt they shoved up your ass when you were nine and taking your First Communion. You want to have this girl, which is fair enough … I lost my virginity when I was twelve to a guy who was eighteen, did you know that?’ she says and holds her own tab out to the waiter. ‘This first round is on me.’ The waiter makes a note of the drinks and goes. ‘I have no idea what can have happened to you. I can imagine how weird it must be getting involved with someone who’s so different … But the passion in your eyes, that’s definitely there … I know you, sweetheart, I know you very well.’ Paulo takes the drinks and passes one to his friend. They clink glasses. He downs the cocktail in one go, he doesn’t really appreciate the taste of alcoholic drinks; when he drinks it’s with the specific intention of getting a buzz as quickly as he can. He turns towards Lugosi; she looks back at him without blinking, serious, with her light skin and very short black hair, just the way all actresses in horror films ought to be. Wordlessly, Paulo tells her that things are really getting out of hand, which is why he’s going to do everything he can to understand Maína, confounding all expectations that might still exist about this middle-class guy, perhaps intelligent, perhaps with a future in some promising profession, the son of civil servants from the upper levels of the Federal Civil Service, both recently retired, a perfect little type from a class with serious ambitions to climb the social ladder. Wordlessly, Lugosi tells him not to expect any great advice from this girl from Higienópolis, the poorly daughter of lecturers at the Federal University, who has been diagnosed with depression and who has already enrolled at three different universities, each time dropping out in the middle of the first semester, and who supports herself, or kids herself that she is supporting herself, playing in clubs. Wordlessly, he will tell her it’s good to be there having a drink with her, and, still wordlessly, Lugosi will tell him he’s just as complicated as any of these other twenty-something guys who read too much and think too much and believe they know what a girl wants even if in practice they do not. And an hour and a bit from now, when the Enigma’s clientele are starting to fill up the dance floor, she’ll ask if he wants to split a tab of LSD that the boyfriend of a friend sent over from Los Angeles in a box of flick books (not to go into just how square she and her friend think he is for being so unnecessarily scared when it comes to popping a pill from time to time; he won’t even smoke a joint, like a good little doctor, losing out on the chance to understand wha
t’s really missing from this world of ours), and, not hearing her, he’ll be amused when she puts on ‘Relax’, that Frankie Goes to Hollywood song full of double entendres, accepting the little slip of paper that she will put in his mouth.