The Girl in the Photograph

by Lygia Fagundes Telles

  “Does she prefer other women?”

  “Don’t be ignorant, love. Contemplative is one who contemplates, don’t you know that? There’s the active and the passive who is so passive the birds make nests in his hair. She recites nude in her room. She goes wild over poetry and Latin.”

  “Aren’t you friends?”

  I want to say yes but now I can’t. Or can I? Isn’t that what friends are for? To tell us everything. Unflinching honesty.

  Ana Clara sat up on the bed, closed the cigarette in the palm of her hand and dragged on it, thinking. Didn’t she like her? She did. She liked her a lot. So.

  “She’s a snob, she thinks she’s really something. But she’s my friend all right. Who else gets me out of trouble? Not you. Not that asshole either, it’s her. My friend. She thinks I’m beautiful, she has the greatest admiration for me. She thinks my eyes are extremely special. Do you think my eyes are extremely special? Max, I’m talking to you, pay attention!”

  He kissed her lengthily.

  “Panther’s eyes. I want this panther …”

  “I can’t,” she said and rolled herself up in the sheet, crossing her arms, hands clenched. “Now I’m a mummy.”

  He bent toward the floor and looked vaguely around. He picked up the bottle but put it back.

  “I’m hungry, Bunny. I want to eat something, come on, let’s eat together,” he called running toward the kitchen. He opened the refrigerator. “Great! Fabulous, I’m finding things, look how much cheese. Wine, there’s wine, eeeh … I’m cold, Bunny, I want to get under the covers.”

  “What time is it? I need to leave right away. What am I saying, what am I saying. It doesn’t matter. I’m depressed.”

  He put on his sweater and stretched it almost down to his knees, then went running back to the kitchen.

  “Come here, Bunny! A fabulous sandwich.”

  He’s already peeled a whole loaf of bread and now he’s on the second one, scratch-scratch with those indecent fingernails. Sickening. What if I call? This is his fiancée. Please tell him that I’m late because I suffered a slight accident and had to file a police statement, millions of questions. Nothing happened to me but the poor priest. Why priest? To make it more unusual. It’s not every day that a priest has his head mashed under a wheel. The black smock. The black suit with that white backwards collar, I love those little white collars. But that took you all this time? No. That wasn’t it. The problem was that my friend Lia was shot. The guerrilla. Guerrillas are like that, they let their attention wander for one minute they get plugged. I’m here in the Emergency Clinic I have to hang up because there are millions of people. I don’t know which Emergency Clinic it is, I don’t know. How can I. The address? You want the address? He wants the address. Already suspecting it’s a lie, the scaly one doesn’t know anything didn’t see anything but he’s already suspicious.

  “Come on, I found some more stuff,” calls Max but his voice is lost in the middle of the sound of china breaking. “Aiii, I dropped everything.”

  I hide my head under the pillow. I’m scared Max. I’m scared. Lião said. Who cares, she’s just jealous. Why doesn’t she save her advice for the flea-bitten types in her group? All she’s good for is to flap her big mouth about Guevara Guevara. Who cares. Next year. Mother Alix will be matron of honor, she loves me to pieces she does a lot for you all, but for me—! Lorena will be a bridesmaid too, she’ll bring her mother who is a VIP. The moneyed rural class you know what that means. Lião can come dressed however she likes, an intellectual leftist could go as a Gypsy and be interesting but Lorena and her mother. So. The nuns with their little party clothes. All the clergy doing me honor. I’ll have to come in on the arm of somebody, who can I ask to give me away. Professor Langue, there. Professor Langue with his stamp of a lord, he could even wear a dark business suit, a decadent lord but classy. Shit what class. My dress very simple but rotten chic. Everybody thrilled the scaly one thrilled just look at the bride I came up with. She was on magazine covers she modeled in London last month. A university student. She dropped out but next year.

  “Max, next year I’m going to re-enroll at the university, you hear?”

  Everybody is dropping out, swarms of girls and they all tell me the same thing, “I dropped out.”

  A fiancé usually gives important presents. He could give me the leopard coat couldn’t he? Why give me money? Does he think I only need enough to pay for a low-rent boardinghouse and buy pins? That’s what he thinks, the bastard. I have debts I’m going to have my tonsils out.

  I tip the bottle into my mouth my pores open my chest opens. Life. If only it weren’t for this Negro howling I really don’t like Negroes. Or whites either, I don’t like anybody. They’re all a bunch of bums who don’t miss a chance to piss on my head. Now it’s my turn to piss, I scream and laugh from happiness. Max I love you I love you I love you. I kiss his shoe which is on top of my bikini. His shoe. I love his shoe I love all of him but I have to go I have to go. When I get unblocked we’ll wallow in pleasure together, I want to wallow in pleasure. I kiss my Agnus Dei which I pinned to my bikini I love my Agnus Dei I love Mother Alix my saint don’t be sad because in January my saint my saint. Shit now where’s my clothes. They all disappeared. I’d like to be invisible and go out like that guy in the funny papers what was his name? He goes in and out and nobody sees him.

  “I have to go, Max.”

  The drawer falls out. It doesn’t matter he doesn’t ask questions. He’s not like the other one who even suspects Nona. I got sick, why not? A feminine sickness I’m very feminine, so there. So come on Annie because my brother is a gynecologist he’ll examine you let’s go there immediately, let’s go dear, open your legs a little more please? Now relax, very good. There, wasn’t that quick? You can put your panties on because you’re the prettiest knocked-up fiancée my little brother could ever find. Lorena is sick. It’s Lorena who has to have an abortion. “Abortion? What kind of crummy friends do you have, anyway?” Your sister’s the crummy one. Lorena’s from a rich and ancient family. When your Nona was eating rotten bananas in the hold of a ship, Lorena’s family—. And even Lião. A guerrilla and all but her father was a very important Nazi officer. Her mother had a sugar plantation. My friends. So. So get dressed you bitch. What are you waiting for there in your birthday suit.

  “I’m making some fabulous food!”

  Ana Clara steadied herself against the bathtub and surveyed her reflection in the mirror. Wrinkling up her lips she examined her teeth, her tongue. She sat on the edge of the bathtub to urinate. Holding her head in her hands she twisted a curl of hair around her finger.

  “Do you think I look older than twenty? I think I look so old.”

  “There’s this guy I know,” he said coming back into the room. He rubbed his hands over his wine-spotted sweater. “My friend. The greatest cook in the world. We could …” He lay down silently, carefully, as though he were afraid of waking someone who was sleeping on the other side of the bed.

  “And if I got cramps all of a sudden? Wouldn’t that be a solution?” she thought sponging her belly and genitals with a wet towel. “That’s it. I’ll tell him I got the cramps, took a very strong pain-killer, went to sleep and lost track of the time.” She wiped her face with the towel. “It’s not proper for a fiancée to mention such things but that’s tough.” In the mirror she studied her shiny face. And Lião with her theories about the superiority of women. “What an idea. Stupidity. One case of the cramps and everything’s screwed up. If it isn’t cramps it’s a kid hanging onto her and that’s that. Even a guerrilla can’t escape it. Women have to be the way they are. Get dolled up. Wear beautiful things. The only advantage I see, the only one, is our being able to make love without getting all messy. I need to tell Lião that so she can repeat it during one of her little meetings,” she reflected and laughed, pouring cologne over her breasts and thighs. She jumped on one foot, giggling and wincing, “Shit, it really stings!” In the red lacquer medicine cabine
t, beside the talcum powder, was a silver cup, which Ana Clara took out. With the point of one red fingernail she affectionately traced the name engraved in the middle of the wheat-and-flower design: Maximiliano. She filled the cup with water, added a few drops of lavender, and gargled. She spat into the sink, grabbing the shower curtain so as not to fall down. She brushed her hair with renewed energy, teasing it until it stood up in a crown of rings. With the moist point of her eyebrow pencil she accentuated the rust-colored line of her eyebrows. Her hand trembled as she put eyedrops in her eyes. With the other hand she secured her wrist as she began to apply eyeliner; the brush slipped, smearing her eyelid. Again she began the difficult cranelike movement, her left hand sustaining the right, arm glued to her body, mouth half-open. She shut her eyes. “Am I drunk?” Taking a packet of aspirin from the cabinet she chewed one between her teeth and drank from the faucet. She sat down on the floor to put on her stockings and black silk jersey blouse. Around her neck she wrapped the silver chains that were spread over the rug.

  “Give me your mouth,” Max began, making an effort to open his eyes. His dilated pupils rolled upward and disappeared in the back of his eyesockets.

  She put on her black velvet coat that almost reached her patent-leather shoes with their antique-style buckles of hammered silver. Her head throbbed between her hands. This pain. Discovering Max’s pants beside the armchair, she explored the pockets and with an automatic gesture removed a roll of money and put it in her coat pocket without counting it. Under the chair was a pack of American cigarettes. She thrust two fingers inside and searched the bottom. In her tweezerlike grasp she drew out a fine strip of carefully folded tissue paper from between the cigarettes. She pinched it gently and closed her hand over it, then turned euphorically to the bed. Max slept tranquilly in his blue pullover. She covered his legs, adjusted the pillow under his head.

  “Sleep, love. I won’t be long, go to sleep.”

  Picking up the cigarette that burned in the ashtray, she buttoned the collar of her coat and went softly out, walking zigzag but upright, with her back straight and her head high. In the street, she moved faster beneath the drizzle which was thickening into rain and squinted up at the tumultuous sky. “Shitty night. Shitty town,” she muttered signaling toward the cars that passed at high speed, all going in the same direction with headlights beaming high and horns complaining at those who lagged. Ana Clara motioned at a taxi which didn’t stop. She waved harder at the second one, protecting her eyes from the glare with her purse.

  “Imbecile! Bastard!” she screamed at the fleeing driver.

  The bald man in the lustrous black car drew up beside her. He made a sweeping north-to-south gesture:

  “I’m going that way, want a ride?”

  She summed up the man and car in a rapid calculation. Panting, she leaned toward the door which opened. As she got in, she lost her balance and fell against the steering wheel. Violently she jerked loose the hem of her coat which had caught in the door.

  “I’ve been on this corner since eight-thirty. Would you have the time?”

  “Since eight-thirty?” the man replied in amazement. He pointed a gloved finger to the dashboard clock: “But it’s almost eleven o’clock, miss. Any trouble?”

  Ana Clara clenched her head between her hands.

  “What a headache. Do you have any aspirin? Give me a cigarette.”

  He slowed the car and turned down the volume of the radio, which was commenting on a soccer game. He examined her in the rear-view mirror, from which hung a little velvet teddy bear.

  “You’re upset, have you had some trouble? There’s everything you asked for in the glove compartment, you’re welcome to it. What I don’t have is water. Or whiskey either,” he added with a smile.

  She ripped open the envelope of aspirin with her teeth, choking in a sudden attack of coughing.

  “I was at a party when they told me. I’m afraid it may be too late, I don’t even know if he’s still alive.”

  “Who?”

  Painfully she swallowed the aspirin tablets. She rested her head against the back of the seat, rolling her hair around her finger.

  “My father. He had a stroke in his office. Could you drop me off in the Sao Luiz neighborhood? Please, take me there. But let’s go faster, could we? Sorry.”

  The man accelerated the Mercedes and turned off the radio.

  “But when was this?”

  “I’ve lost all notion of time, I have the impression I’ve been on that corner for hours. I was at a party when—oh, my poor father! My poor father! He was coming out of his office, he’s a lawyer.”

  “Is this the first?”

  “What?”

  “Stroke. Is this the first one he’s had?”

  “I think it’s the second. The first was when my brother was arrested, my brother is a terrorist. To this day nobody knows whether he’s alive or dead. He disappeared.”

  The man chewed the ends of his long moustache.

  “I’m an industrial executive, not a doctor. But if I can help you, I’d be glad to.”

  You can. By closing your factory, you bastard. Murderer. You throw the debris on all our heads and then. Next year I’m going to throw mine too. A house on the beach and another in the country. The rabble can go screw themselves.

  “This air would give anybody a heart attack. Do you live downtown?”

  “Well, lately I’ve been practically living in my country house, I have a delightful estate outside town. And now with the helicopter it’s like going from here to the corner. Have you ever ridden in a helicopter?”

  It’s all I do, thought Ana putting away the pack of cigarettes she had taken out of the glove compartment. Furtively she inspected the chrome-plated lighter.

  “What kind is it? Your industry?”

  “Meat-packing,” he muttered and slammed on the brakes as the light changed. “See that? It’s too much, the green light turned red without any warning. Where’s the yellow caution light? On vacation?”

  She looked for the lighted cigarette that had fallen from her hand into her lap. Imbecile. Mongoloid. He ought to learn to drive.

  “It was nothing. You drive marvelously.”

  “You have to be suspicious of even the traffic lights, let alone other drivers.”

  “Really. I have a Corcel but I avoid driving.”

  The man examined her, disturbed.

  “His office is in the Rua São Luiz? Your father’s office.”

  “Yes, one whole floor. He’s a big-time lawyer, my father. Fransisco de Paulo Vaz Leme.”

  “But do you think he’s still there? He couldn’t be, what would he be doing there? Naturally they will have taken him to the hospital.”

  She rolled down the window to throw away her cigarette. Bending over frontwards, she clenched her hands into fists against her body. This crumb-bum wanted to know everything.

  “My uncle, the cardiologist, has a clinic on the same floor, the other time my father stayed right there in the clinic,” said Ana Clara resting her head on her knees. She laced her arms around her legs. “Oh, I feel so depressed. Do you have a handkerchief?”

  He took one from his suit pocket.

  “Here, I haven’t used it. But what’s this? Don’t cry, calm down, don’t cry! Your father’s being taken care of, isn’t he? What’s your uncle’s name? The doctor?”

  “Loreno. Loreno Vaz Leme. I’m named Lorena after him, he’s my godfather.”

  The man stroked Ana Clara’s hair lightly.

  “I know several doctors on that street, but not that one. Vaz Leme? … No, I don’t know him.”

  “In reality he spent most of his professional life in the United States.”

  I’ll say I went with Lorena to a conference, it’s settled. The guy talked for two hours without stopping and that was due to good luck because he knocked over his pitcher of water. And where was this conference? At the university dear. A lawyer who is a relative of Lorena’s all the important lawyers are her relati
ves. We sat in the front row and couldn’t get up and walk out because during conferences and during a fuck you don’t get up and walk out, it’s not polite. And I’m polite. Don’t you want to marry a polite girl? So.

  “You’ve been drinking, girl. Do you hear me, Lorena? Lorena!”

  I lift my head. I fell asleep. Didn’t I tell you? Always somebody poking me. Now it’s this man with his little hands, look there at his little hand. Is he going to ask more questions? He is indeed. He gives one a ride but he charges. He reminds me of the scaly one.

  It doesn’t matter. I’m Lorena now.

  “You’ve been drinking, haven’t you? And quite a bit.”

  “I mixed champagne and whiskey at the party. I’m not really used to drinking but I’m feeling better now, I’m fine, Mr.—?”

  “Would you like a cup of coffee? Let’s stop at a cafe ahead, you’ll feel like a new girl. And don’t call me Mr., I’m not so very old, am I? Shall we go to a cafe?”

  “No, no, please, they’re waiting for me, I’m worried. I’m sorry but.”

  “What do you do, Lorena? You’re a charming girl, do you know that?”

  “I’m in my senior year of Psychology at the University of Sao Paulo.”

  His hand again, this time on my knee. Not even with my father dying does this pig show any respect.

  “Beg your pardon!” he screamed. “These idiots! Did you have a scare? Beg your pardon.”

  We almost ran into a truck and he begs my pardon. He’s the one who had a scare. Is he going to hold the wheel with both his little hands now? He is. Or I could say that I had an auto accident. I was a witness, a three-car collision and I was in the third. The drivers caught in the wreckage. Oh I need to. Quick quick.

  “Can we go faster?”

  “But you’re not feeling very well, Lorena. How …?”

  “I’m fine, really. It was just a shock, I thought you’d forgotten about it.”

  “Call me Valdomiro.”

  “In reality I’ve never felt better, if it wasn’t for this business of my father. Here, you can leave me here on the corner, quick, that’s a great help. You’re a saint.”