São Paulo Noir

by Tony Bellotto

  Or had it been another person?

  Why don’t you go study?

  Lina didn’t understand what to study for and even why people studied; she didn’t understand life in an office and grumbling at the end of the workday and having a car and living in an apartment with security cameras. It seemed to her that everything was the same: work, money, office, street, a dark motel. And after all those years of study the woman didn’t even have an answer: a congressman, his transatlantic shoes in a puddle, the nonexistent knife.

  (The knife should be there somewhere.)

  Nor the voices;

  memory a silence.

  Don’t go around asking about a knife; some may find it strange.

  But she—the lawyer, her cigarette finished, the butt tossed into the gutter to join other garbage and filth and an empty yogurt container, a remnant of pink mixed with the soot of exhausts—she the lawyer didn’t find that strange at all or; she reappeared and stayed even when Lina didn’t have a light, she never did.

  If anyone gets the idea that you did something;

  but was she following him? she only wanted to ask

  (do you still remember me?)

  because she remembered him, or was almost sure she did, and there were few times she remembered someone

  it’s not going to help much to say you’re innocent because they never believe people like you.

  Lina wanted to know what the discomfort she felt was; whether from the absurd accusation or. Do you know to whom you’re speaking, Lina? At times she doubted that presence in flesh and blood, were not the clothes and the work handbag such obvious indications of reality: the fabric frayed by time and the dust of the city infiltrating the fibers. The so ordinary reality: to realize that her shorts really were tight and constituted so little cover that she felt a bit cold.

  But she only wanted to ask

  and he was startled because he recognized her or

  the fifty-reais note

  two ladies choosing children’s T-shirts

  three ninety-nine.

  Valtinho grows so fast it doesn’t pay to buy clothes for the boy; you have to take advantage of sales.

  Suddenly the lawyer wasn’t there either. Lina heard the sound of hurried footsteps, or perhaps imagined them; she heard the wheels of a handcart full of books being dragged by one of the students from the other side of the corner.

  * * *

  First she saw the ID: a piece of paper laminated in plastic inside a black wallet, with the shield of the civil police embossed on the cover. He opened and closed it a few times, to be sure she fully understood the purpose of the visit. Or because the movement made it impossible to read anything or closely examine the photograph, the name, or any proof of authority instead of paying attention to the stitching that was coming undone or the damp stain on the edges. Lina would have opened the door without saying anything; standing there like an interrogation, unmoving.

  The name coming from his mouth was unknown and she didn’t know how to react. Lina, she wanted to say, but—

  I just want to talk.

  It was also a repeated discourse, although not so much by the police investigators who appeared at her door with an old wallet and an incomprehensible ID. Still at the threshold, he cited names and Lina didn’t know what the thread of the conversation was. May I come in?

  No answer, just the subtle movement of her head and the door left open; she returned to the interior of the apartment that in reality was a kitchenette the size of a small bedroom. The kitchen itself was a camping stove with two burners that some crazy guy had thrown in the trash and the neighbor woman had connected to the natural gas outlet with an old piece of hose. No refrigerator, she didn’t need it. On the counter was a package of coffee, some bananas, and boxes of crackers.

  A couple of fruit flies buzzed above a blackened, somewhat overripe banana.

  Were they there before?

  They said you are usually near there toward the end of the day.

  They said.

  Near there.

  What did the man want? She told him to have a seat, removed a magazine and some wrinkled clothing from the sofa bed to create a bit of room. Make yourself comfortable, she must have said. The words didn’t come out? He sat to the side with his arms resting on his legs, his hands clasped together in front, his spine quite straight. She expected more from a police investigator entering with official credentials that left no room to say no. That lack of assertiveness was the same as the lawyers; as the female lawyer and her worn handbag. The congressman who didn’t even deign to be a congressman, on the dirty ground with his feet in a puddle. These people are all so common, in their cheap suits and untidy colored ties. Shoes that have seen better shines. Reality was always disappointing and Lina didn’t even watch soap operas, she didn’t watch television, she didn’t like how the voices also repeated themselves in the electronic medium and continued echoing throughout the day. But the images of a more attractive life, less worn-out fabric and fewer tomato stains on the shirt collar—those images were everywhere, in magazine ads and the display windows at the shopping center close to her apartment.

  That’s where you hang out, isn’t it?

  Wasn’t that how it was said? Hang out? What odd turns words take. He repeated a name. Lina didn’t know why the man was there. She distracted herself by thinking of knives and spotted leopards—had she been been robbed of a part of her memory that had been replaced by the vague sensation of running a fingernail along tacky fabric stained with sweetened coffee? She said: I can make some coffee; do you drink coffee? Was that how it was, Lina? Sometimes the voices remained silent, and Lina forgot what people did to have a conversation.

  Listen, there’s no need to worry; I’m not here to talk about your work.

  But coffee, mister, she was talking about coffee. He would use one of those gestures with his head and hands like someone saying, Please, relax, or, I’ll have some coffee, of course, why not. Him and his jeans that hadn’t been washed in a week, beat up and dirty, wrinkled at the knees and beneath the hips. His sneakers were a soiled white, disguised among exaggerated colors that would never go with the long baggy shirt to conceal the gun stuck in the waistband of his pants so obvious from the motion of sitting down and leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

  The flaking enamel of the small stove that had once been white;

  perhaps.

  Perhaps she should tell him, explain to him: It was a knife like this, understand? More or less this size, with a wooden handle, the kind that lets you see the continuation of the blade all the way, which is an indication of quality, they say. Because then—isn’t that right?—the blade won’t come loose from the handle no matter how much force we use when we are cutting an onion, for example. Cutting an onion can be dangerous. The blade was something like a handspan more or less in length—the flash of the metal impresses and memory tends to exaggerate what we remember, especially when it’s replaced by a thick coffee stain. It was there, I’m sure of it. The knife, you understand?

  (Don’t go around asking people about a knife.)

  He got up to avoid the open part of the sofa bed and went to the window with his hands behind his back, just like a television detective and completely wrong given his ordinary presence.

  (If someone gets the idea you’ve done something.)

  This is the third time it’s happened, and if you help us this time.

  Fill the pan with water and light the fire with a depleted lighter still good to produce a spark

  (got a light?);

  open the package of coffee and wait.

  (If you help us this time.)

  Because it wasn’t the first time and Lina remembered

  the knife

  someone.

  Are you sure, Lina?

  (She never had a light.)

  But what could she tell the police investigator if reality had the habit of always taking wrong turns; or she would become confused and needed to ask
the time or the price of a pair of shoes, just to be sure the world had not suddenly been replaced by another, unknown. From the back she saw that his shirt had two small holes in it, at waist level. Also the stitching was coming undone in one spot, leaving a piece of yellow thread hanging.

  Someone is killing under the nose of the police, in the open air.

  A boy running away and the police who shot him in the back, in the open air. Pay more attention, Lina. The voices can teach you something, explain how these people work. She still remembered when she was a child and had gone to the zoo with a class from school. She remembered the spotted leopard and the capuchin monkeys, and some birds with long legs and pink feathers that tucked their necks into their bodies, to rest standing on only one foot.

  You’re always in that area, girl.

  And the guide said, Now we’re going to see the area with the elephants. Wasn’t that how it was? The capuchin monkey picked up trash from the ground and jumped back to what looked like a tree house, full of small doors and windows.

  Just what was it the spotted leopard did?

  Whose idea had it been to put animals on the back of currency? Lina opened the drawer to get a spoon and stopped with her hand hovering over the cutlery

  (please don’t bother me, I have to get back to work)

  and was it a smile or merely an expression of relief at seeing it was no longer necessary to search.

  You were there the whole time?

  The investigator continued looking out the window, staring at the dirty wall of the neighboring building. In the silverware drawer the spoon she used to measure the coffee was hidden behind a large knife with a wooden handle, just as she remembered it; the blade wasn’t shiny

  some fifteen centimeters?,

  maybe fourteen.

  Lina grabbed the spoon and closed the drawer.

  How old are you?

  How many spoonfuls of powdered coffee? The perfect consistency was impossible because of the old filter or the cheap brand of coffee, but she didn’t give up trying, ever. She noticed the water boiling and the man at the other side of the apartment observing her and waiting for an answer, any answer. Can I use the bathroom? Lina pointed to the narrow door near the entrance and he crossed, once again, the space that separated them, to disappear from view with a click of the latch.

  She poured water into the filter full of powder and watched as the black liquid flowed through. Black coffee.

  Pure

  strong

  thick.

  She served two cups and went to look in the drawer for a small spoon to stir the sugar. She didn’t notice the sounds coming from the bathroom, sounds of someone moving cautiously in a restricted space, lifting clothes and displacing objects. She thought about asking if he wanted sugar; she didn’t have artificial sweetener—they say sweeteners cause cancer. She approached the bathroom with the cup in her hand just as the door opened and the enormous body of the police investigator appeared. An unexpected gesture and a scream when the hot coffee streamed down the checkered shirt

  (son of a bitch!)

  and to Lina it seemed a multitude of arms when she moved the knife rapidly upward and forward, with force and skill. The man’s hands on her shoulders her arm her neck in an effort to grab the weapon in his waistband but the door too narrow and the bathroom a cubicle suddenly painted in red; there was barely space to fall to the floor, slide along the wall, and hit his knee on the toilet. It mattered little that he would reach the weapon in the rear of his waist. Lina wielded the knife until it struck a rib, curved, made contact with the rib on the other side. The investigator’s right hand found the pistol while his left closed around the handle of the knife over Lina’s hand, without the strength to stop her from raising it and attacking his chest again. On the checkered pattern of his shirt the coffee stain merged with the blood, a dark sticky red that was a little like a lost and then rediscovered happiness; it was the fingernail on the tablecloth stained with sugary coffee, knowing that she no longer needed to remember, that the voices asked no questions, and that reality was more than a shirt with holes in it, an old worn handbag, trash and soot in the gutter, the sound of a law student’s wheeled valise jolting over the uneven sidewalk in the city center.

  Any Similarity Is Not Purely Coincidental

  by Marcelino Freire

  Guaianases

  It was Luciflor who told me this story.

  True, very true. And she sets the scene slowly, bleakly, like a silent film that speaks. She tells me that her district was born more black than white. In the fog, in the darkness of low clouds, in the terror of stairways. “And they get darker all the time. Have you seen the Nigerian immigrants? Everybody’s choosing to live here nowadays. All of Africa, for heaven’s sake!”

  There are many stories. One inside the other. When she arrives to do the cleaning, I only find peace when she leaves for the market. When she buys powdered soap, or guaraná. She touts fabric softener. “That one smells good, it’s new, lavender. You’re a writer, aren’t you? One of these days write a story about me. Because my life is a novel, you know? This Mexican life of ours.”

  Tell me, Luciflor, tell me. So a few weeks ago, she gradually related the strange story of her neighbor Guiomar, who was already a grandmother and found herself pregnant. She began trussing her belly so no one would suspect. What would her only son, who lives next door to her, think? My mother is a whore. Her little grandson would get a playmate now. “I turn purple just imagining the harassment of the poor woman. I’m a grandmother too. And I think. Without meaning to, she was capable of killing the fetus. Death by asphyxiation. Such suffering!”

  Guiomar was only going to show the offspring to everybody when the offspring was born. The strong girdle that she made was clumsy, awkward. It gave her latitude to put on weight. The child’s father was a watchman at a train station near Poá. They slept together several times. Right there, in the ice cream stands. They drank cane juice and beer near the church. Guiomar was never one for drinking beer, but she drank. She even began to make things up. “My belly is growing because of drinking.” She’s a day worker too. She got sick going to work. The Itaquera subway, you know what it’s like—a sardine can.

  She secretly went to a doctor. To find out if it was a boy or a girl.

  “It was that damned Deusdete who set it up. She knew that in Guaianases there’s a quarry. From time to time a bomb goes off. And I’m not talking about a gunshot, like I hear when they shoot at the water tank. I pretend not to listen. I know who’s bad, who’s good, and who’s gonna be saved. There’s lots of worthwhile people in the neighborhood. It’s just that everywhere there’s sons of bitches. Right here, my dear, in this rich area, you’re surrounded by a bunch of bad guys. Aren’t you, Murilo?”

  Luciflor pauses. Overcome by emotion, perhaps. And eats stroganoff with rice.

  “Someday I want to make a lunch for the two of us. You’ll come, won’t you? Say you’ll come. You’ll like the place where I live. My house is your house. I’ll take you to a laying-on of hands, in the home of a woman with the power. Many people come, even from other countries, to be cleaned by her. Guiomar only decided to go after the shit hit the fan. The doctor puttered around, here, there. In a makeshift walk-in clinic with room for nobody. And he spoke, without preparing the old woman’s heart. You’re expecting twins. Did you hear that? Twins. Not just one child. Guiomar was hiding in her immense belly two births.

  “Know what happened? It was Deusdete who had the crazy idea. Is reality more literature than literature, or not? More real than that stuff you write? I see something worse, something bigger, happen every day. Deusdete told her to keep just one of the babies. She would sell the other. It would help with the cost. It wasn’t poor Guiomar’s fault. You think it was wrong? Twins would be a real heavy load. Guiomar would have to stop working. And how would she face her older son with a double dose? Or the daughter-in-law who was already giving her a hard time, the envious woman. Her young grandson w
ould get two playmates to fly kites with, or whatever. The future would be hopeless. Her life wouldn’t be easy. And there was already a family in São Paulo who wanted to adopt the kid.

  “And that’s how it was done. On the morning of the birth, when Guiomar woke up, she had only Betinho in her arms. The other baby was already gone to its destiny. The money was enough to buy a crib and diapers. Deusdete is very dangerous. With one hand she helps the desperate woman. With the other she disappears. We don’t forget. Guiomar doesn’t forget. But what to do? She came home one night holding a package. Her grown son asked what it was. She didn’t answer. She fainted at the entrance. She almost lost the baby from the fall. She was bleeding like a stone, broken there at the quarry. They had to call an ambulance. She was in the hospital a long time. Guiomar and the child, hovering between life and death.”

  Luciflor exaggerates. She holds back the tears. She incorporates long silences, especially in the unfolding of the facts. She tells me that time has passed. Guaianases, of course, has changed greatly.

  “When I moved there, there was nothing but my house on top of the hill. And lots of woods around. Today—shops, markets, lottery stores. It doesn’t rain like it used to. That chilly mist is a thing of the past. The end.

  “The Arena Corinthians is a stone’s throw from here. During the World Cup, I even rented a room to a Haitian, who almost ended up wanting to stay but didn’t.

  “Like I was saying, Guiomar found her other son, the one she didn’t raise. You believe me, don’t you? These things happen. It was like something out of a soap opera. She went to work in a successful doctor’s apartment and the doctor was the picture of Betinho. The same smile, the spitting image. As soon as she saw him she collapsed on the sofa. Her sight darkened, she blacked out. A tragedy. Guiomar went looking for Deusdete. She wanted to know who the damn woman had sold the little boy to. She had to be certain. And she was dumb enough to bring Deusdete with her to work one day. The assassin took a look at everything. At the doctor’s possessions. The modern clothes. The car. He gave them both a ride to the subway.”