by Samuel Park
“You’re old—maybe you’re dying,” I accused.
“No,” he scoffed. “I am and I am not. Everyone is. You are dying right now.”
“But you must have some disease?”
“That’s a funny thing to ask a fat, old, mostly blind man.”
I waved my hands in front of me but he did not react. I stepped a few feet closer, and still he did not react. If he was faking it, and I couldn’t imagine why he would, he was doing a terrific job.
“If you’re sick, maybe you’ll be able to relate to my mother’s condition.”
“What’s wrong with her?” he asked, sounding concerned. That surprised me.
“I don’t expect a man like you to have compassion, but my mother has a heart condition. Your phone calls upset her.”
I heard a sudden noise burst from outside, like a guitar being tuned too loudly, but right away the silence returned. I noticed for the first time how every piece of furniture and every object seemed anchored to its place, as if they hadn’t been moved in years. That way the Police Chief could navigate the room, know where everything was, without bumping or breaking anything. There was a clear path between the chairs, the tables, and nothing on the floor that Lima might trip on. I had not, in a million years, expected this. What caused him to go blind? And when?
“Is she going to die?” he finally asked.
“No,” I blurted out, horrified.
“Is it something that can be cured through surgery? A heart bypass can be a real lifesaver, though it’s expensive.”
“You know enough. You don’t need to know any more.” I glanced toward the door. My time in that room, I sensed, was up. Lazarus might come looking for me, and if he found me in that room, he’d be very upset. I didn’t want that, for whatever reason, for this kind, lonely boy.
I’d done what I’d come to do. I’d said what I had to say. I had gone much further than I had ever dared to hope.
I reached for the door and opened it farther, making a creaking noise.
“Wait,” the Police Chief called out, with urgency in his voice. “Wait a minute. I want you to take something to your mother.”
“Excuse me?” I halted, squinting, confused. I knew, I knew with all the sureness of my soul, that this was the man who had tortured my mother. So why was he acting as though he were an old friend? I began to wonder if he was calling my mother for a specific reason. Had their conversations always been as volatile as the one I witnessed? I thought suddenly of my mother’s sly smile in the dubbing booth. He got up from his chair heavily, with difficulty, sending his sour aroma of medication and soiled sheets into the air. I could see brown spots everywhere on his hands. As he walked, I held the door open, one foot in the hallway. But he did not walk in my direction, and instead moved toward a wall on the other side of the room, where he revealed a hidden built-in safe. No one in the Brazilian upper class kept their money in the unreliable banks. They exchanged their cash for dollars and kept them in their homes. He lumbered over to me, tossing a bag in my direction. It fell thunderously on the ground in front of me. When I reached for it, curious, and opened the bag, I saw that it was filled with cash. A few thousand American dollars. More money than I’d ever seen before. I looked up to see the Police Chief leaning on his desk for support.
“Take it to her,” he ordered me, pointing his backscratcher in my overall direction with authority.
I could not believe what had just happened. “I’m not here to—”
“Take the money,” he said, shaking his head. “You’re only a child, but you’re old enough to know what to do.”
“Is this restitution?”
“I didn’t hurt your mother,” said the Police Chief. “Like I said, I helped her. And she helped me. Take the money. She earned it. It’s all hers.”
“What do you mean, she earned it?” Did he really think he could make it up for torturing her by giving her that money?
“This money belongs to her. Fair is fair.”
I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to accept a gift from that monster, but those bills in front of me were not abstract—they were health and relief from pain. What would be worse in my mother’s eyes: accepting charity from that man or turning it down?
“I will never call her again,” said Lima. “She will never hear from me again. That, I promise. Now go!” he roared suddenly.
I rushed down the stairs. I rushed down the halls. I rushed past drunk teenagers swaying their bodies to the latest track by some American band. I kept my face down, and all I could see was a broken succession of feet, until I made my way outside. There, I was greeted by the sight of the gate in the distance being opened by a maid, with help from a butler.
Then, the sound of sirens promised the arrival of police cars.
It dawned on me, what had just happened. Lima had tricked me, made it so the police would find me with his money, made it look like a robbery had taken place. I was in trouble. Serious trouble. Within seconds, I saw the red lights flashing, their tires crunching over the gravel.
I immediately ran toward the back of the house instead. The heavy bag slowed me down, but I clung to it like the lifeline it was. I could barely see in the dark, trees leading toward a woodsy area. There was no walking trail, and I had to crouch and slide my way through spiky thickets and matted branches. I was about to enter a grove of almond trees, following a rich carpet of leaves on the ground, when suddenly a hand reached for me and I screamed.
“Hey, hey! It’s okay.”
It was Lazarus. I felt my heart push against my throat. The sirens raced into the front driveway of the house. He looked at my face, registering my panic, and then looked down at the bag I held stealthily in my arms. I knew then that I would have to fight for my escape. Lazarus would try to drag me back, hold me down until the police arrived. But his smoky breath hovered over me for a second, then moved past me like a cloud drifting.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Are you all right?”
“The police! The police are here!” I panicked.
“Yes, my asshole neighbor called them because of the noise. Looks like the party’s over.”
I stood with my mouth open. “They’re not here because of—”
“Doesn’t matter,” he said, practically rolling his eyes. “It was a boring party anyway. Let’s split.”
To my surprise, instead of pulling me back toward the house, he pulled me forward, as if to show me the right way out. His hand still on my arm, his skin against mine almost a caress. He led us, pushing through foliage, our heads lowered underneath ficus branches, as he carved a pathway through the scrubland.
We climbed up a hill, above the neighbors’ backyards, the faint trace of crooked television antennas, and clotheslines. Laundered shirts and pants hung upside down, flattened and longing for bodies to fill them; sheets shivered in the wind, like oversized banners. When we finally reached the top of the wooded area, Lazarus and I came upon a gate with bars shaped like fleurs-de-lis. Lazarus opened this back gate and led us out.
Out on the street, there was a road leading to a favela. I saw in the distance the tiny makeshift homes plopped down in diagonal lines, some made of concrete, some made of wood—the materials probably stolen from city garbage. It was as if someone had taken all the trash in the Dumpsters, and built houses out of it. The pungent smell of urine filled my nostrils as we walked, and I found myself crossing my arms, so as to hide the bag against my chest, underneath a denim jacket Lazarus had taken off and placed over my shoulders.
We were walking completely in the dark, as there were no streetlamps here, and no electricity in the shantytown. I felt the tension in my body grow with every step, scared that a drug dealer, or robber, or even worse, a policeman, would stop us at some point. We didn’t speak. Finally, after turning a corner, I saw a cab come in our direction and I practically jumped in front of it to hail it. Its stopped headlights illuminated all the particles in the air twirling, all the dust that was normally invis
ible. As I walked toward the cab, I felt again a filmy, viscous layer coating my skin, and I couldn’t wait to wash it off. Lazarus, meanwhile, remained in his spot, and when I looked back at him, I saw something akin to regret in his eyes.
“Are you going to be okay?” he asked, concerned.
“Yes,” I said, swallowing. “You should go home.”
I realized he didn’t want me to leave. As the cab door stood open, I hesitated, the headlights still shining upon his dusty confused face, abandonment tinting his eyes. The innocence of that look tore me in half. I took his hand and I led him inside the cab. I didn’t know what I was doing, only that I didn’t want to be alone, and I couldn’t go home just yet. Not until I figured out what story I would tell my mother.
Lazarus pulled down the chain, and the yellow lamp bulb hanging from the ceiling illuminated the motel room: the circle-shaped cot, the dresser with broken laminate, the bars on the window blocking the view of the highway. He was my getaway partner, but also my hostage.
I perched myself on the tip of the cot, almost like I didn’t deserve the comforts it promised. I’d been holding the bag of money against my chest, hiding it under my jacket, and I finally let it slip from between my legs. Lazarus had never remarked on the bag, never asked what was inside.
I wondered how much he already knew.
Lima said that he’d helped my mother; he said that she’d helped him. Willingly? As though they’d been amicable? I didn’t know this woman he described. This woman was not the same woman I loved and lived with all my life. This woman was not the one who had taken care of me for as long as I could remember. That woman did not keep things from me. The possibility was crushing.
Lazarus sat down beside me, gently, as if aware of the turmoil blazing through my head.
“You went to talk to my father, didn’t you?” he asked me, quietly, his eyes avoiding mine.
“He’s not what I expected.” The words sounded off, as if I’d said them underwater.
“He’s changed since the diagnosis,” Lazarus said. I could feel the vibrations passing between our bodies.
“What diagnosis?”
“What did he say to you?”
“He said so many things. I don’t know if any of it was true,” I said.
I looked at him. Lazarus. I wanted to feel safe with him, this stranger, desperately, but for all I knew, at any moment he could push my body against the bed and crush my neck with his hands.
Instead, Lazarus remained where he was, his face as opaque as milk glass. He looked serious, but not sad. Caring, but not worried. The space between us felt too big, and I reached over to him, my fingers on the stubble on his chin. To my relief, he did not push me away. I began to graze his jaw more and more, feeling the hard but pliable texture of his skin. I explored his face gently, tapping his lips, my palms a bit shaky. I felt his nose in the space between my thumb and my indicator, his breathing a kind of touch. I could feel his lashes tremble in my palm, and then close.
What had happened between my mother and Lima all those years ago? Those hours they’d spent together in the police station, she had always made them sound torturous, but how exactly had they been filled? I glanced away from Lazarus to the bag. The thought that Lima could be her abuser and her savior was overwhelming.
I sniffled, unable to control my breathing all of a sudden. To my surprise, Lazarus reached over to me and placed his lips over mine, as if to make me stop. I felt his tongue inside me, filling me up, and for a moment, it made the throbbing pain disappear. I liked that, wanted more. We held each other at a perfect angle, breathing into each other. As I tasted his lips, I felt in touch with the chemical parts of him—the combination of molecules that produced his scent, the way it combined with my tongue to create our sense of each other. I put my hands over his face, and though I didn’t know why, I kept patting his cheeks, ears, temples, as if to reassure myself, at every second, that the body in front of me was really there.
I let Lazarus wrap his arms around my waist, liking how he comforted me, and I buried my fingers in his hair, making fists again and again. Both our bodies shook slightly, and we grabbed at each other as if we were vanishing. With him, it felt right to mix sex and fear. I’d never made love before, but the night felt ripe for firsts.
Hungry, he pressed his face against my neck, his lips on my clavicle. As my eyelids relaxed and fell, I lifted my arms and removed my shirt and bra. Lazarus started kissing my shoulders, my nipples, his lips smooth and humid against my breasts. Then he moved downward, as if following a trail. I felt his tongue flutter restlessly around my belly button.
“Hang on,” I said.
I got up, and, still shirtless, matter-of-factly walked to the door and bolted it. The nakedness felt like a clothing of sorts, a thing out of context. After I locked the door, I didn’t return to Lazarus right away. Instead, I walked past him to the window. Trying to stay out of view, I looked around to check if anyone could see us. In the backyard, I caught a glimpse of a chambermaid in uniform marching hurriedly from the garage back to the motel. The maid looked up and locked gazes with me. She was a girl only slightly older than me, barely out of her teens, probably from the countryside. I wished her no harm, but the maid gave me a frightful look. I pulled the window closed, sealing the room as if behind a zipper.
When I turned back around, Lazarus was sitting on the bed. He had taken his shirt off, and I could see the freckles on his shoulders, a large mole by his belly button. I walked to him and made him lie on his back. I pulled his pants and underwear down, and then my own. I straddled him. I guided him inside me, occasionally lowering myself to kiss him. I had no idea where I’d figured out how to do this. The room grew hotter with the window shut. At one point Lazarus lifted himself up, and I put my arms around his drenched back. Our eyes stayed open, never blinking, staring at each other. He held my head with both hands, clinging.
I tasted him the way an epicurean would. No selfish thoughts clouded my mind as shivers coursed through my body. Our hands and knees mirrored each other’s perfectly, like two halves of a dyad. In the dark, like this, we would spend the entire night.
There was stillness in the morning. Grayness, wetness. A damp, dewy chill. I sat on the bed, putting my bra back on, my hair disheveled on my shoulders. I opened the curtains and I spied concrete highways leading to Búzios, Petrópolis, and São Paulo, a city with a mouth big enough to swallow you whole. As cars piled upon cars, this was not a postcard-pretty view of Rio de Janeiro, but it was the land I’d woken up to. It looked lovelier to me than any of the Seven Wonders of the World.
Lazarus was still asleep, his head beside a pillow, clutching the sheets. I ran my hand over his hair, like the tips of wheat fields.
His eyes slowly fluttered open. Without moving, he watched me as I put on my blouse and my skirt. I moved the comforter so it’d cover the blood on the sheets. He looked at me as if he knew everything, all of me. I lingered, unsure if I really had anything left to do, or if I was just delaying my departure. I kept looking out the window, and then back at him, finding bits and parts of me I feared accidentally leaving behind.
“What’s your real name?” he finally asked.
I knew I looked nothing like a Betania. If I lied again, chances were we’d never hear or see each other again, and this strange night could finally be over, erased.
Neither of us said anything to the other for some time, the line between us so fragile, it could crack with a single syllable. Finally, I spoke the five words my young self was unaware would create waves, ripples for years to come.
“My name is Mara Alencar.”
When I got to our apartment, I turned the key and pushed the door open. The curtains were still drawn, but some hazy light grazed through the gaps in the wooden shutters. I quickly closed the door behind me and raced in, my heart beating madly. Right in the living room, under the jaundiced glow of a lamp left on from the previous night, my mother lay half asleep on the sofa, cradling herself small, b
oxed in between the two armrests. She looked crinkled, like dried fruit. She had been up all night, worrying.
If not for the bulging bag of cash tucked below the waistline of my pants I would have wondered if the entire night really happened at all. I sat down next to my mother on the couch, not waking her, and placed the bag with the money on the space between us. I pulled the notes out of the bag, covering the sofa. Pretty soon I could no longer see its furry brown fabric. My mother stirred, reaching for my hand, squeezing it harder than I expected. I wondered what it was that my mother was dreaming about. We turn blind, deaf, and mute in our sleep. I could say to her whatever I had stuck in my throat and she would never know.
I felt all my tiredness hit me all at once, as if my body had been too polite to bother me before, but now gave up any pretense of chivalry. I stared out into nothingness and the nothingness suddenly became filled with the Police Chief’s blind eyes. I thought of his heaviness—how incredibly heavy, the weight of a thousand stones. I then noticed, for the first time, the specks of blood in my hands, under my fingernails, and I had to toss my head back, to hold back a desperate need to vomit. I forgot that the blood had come from me.
“Mara,” my mother called out as she awoke. Her eyes opened. “Good God. You crazy girl, you tore my heart in half!” She unfolded herself, sitting up. “Are you okay? I was so worried about you. Where were you last night?” Still a bit drowsy, she moved her legs to clear a bigger spot for me on the sofa. As she did so, some of the money fell on the floor and she finally noticed the packets on the sofa. “What is this? Where did this come from?”
“Promise you won’t be mad if I tell you what I did.”
“Where did you get this?” my mother asked, fear etched in her brows. “Where did you spend the night?”
“I still don’t know what happened. It was so confusing.”
My mother held the notes in her hand, her mouth agape. “This is a lot of money, Mara.”
I hesitated. “Police Chief Lima. I went to see him yesterday.”