by Ed Siegle
‘Crawl along and hide,’ Gilberto said. ‘They don’t know you’re here. Wait until they’ve gone, then go back the way we came. You can do it, Joel. You’ve got to be brave. I have to do what they say.’
Joel started to crawl. There was a tree a little way along, where he could hide. He turned but his dad had gone. The blades throbbed in the air and the tree shook. Joel pressed his face into the dirt. The wind grew gentler, until he could only hear common sounds: insects, birds, the wind, his heaving breath. Joel knew he should move or open his eyes, but it felt good to lie with them screwed tight. If he couldn’t see the mountain, the cliffs, the drop to the forest and the sea, then maybe they didn’t exist. He knew this was a state of playful thought he’d abandoned many years before, but it felt more comforting to regress – he almost sucked his thumb – lying as he was near the head of a beast of a rock, separated from a father who was probably being shot. No, he thought: they’re not going to shoot him. My mum will have persuaded the major. After a few formalities they’ll allow him to come home. I can’t just lie here. I need to get back. Whatever is going on, they’ll need me, and they’ll be worrying.
He scampered down until he stood near the top of the steep slope again. He couldn’t bring himself to the very edge. He had to sit before he could raise his eyes to the view. How could the world be so far below? There was no way he could go down. Every time he looked at the slope it seemed to tilt to a steeper plane.
Perhaps there’s a way down the other side of the mountain, he thought. He looked behind him and suddenly thought: how good it would be to say he’d reached the peak. He stared at the profile of the beast which had let his dad be taken. How great it would be to stand on its head, like its slayer. Joel walked back to the cliff and along its face, then, finding a gully, he climbed until he found himself on a scrubby plateau at the top. Hardly believing he was there, he walked across the sloping ground to the edge of the summit, where granite rose like the lip of a crown. He stood a few yards from the edge, staring at a world too far away and beautiful to be real. He took out his compass and took bearings on all the points his dad would have pointed out: the green pinnacle of Agulinha, the curved cranium of Pedra Bonita, the sloping back of Dois Irmãos with the city beyond.
Joel realised he would never be able to descend. To look down made the world slide underneath, as if preparing for his somersaulting fall. He sat down. He noticed that the shadow of the rock was stretching across the land. The blue of the sky was darker and the shades around the horizon were thickening into colours. There will be so many stars, he thought. No longer able to look at the view, he lay back near the peak of the rock and closed his eyes. He didn’t hear the rotor-blades until they were suddenly above him. He opened his eyes, surprised himself with a scream and ran. He ran as fast as he could, bounding over rock and scrub. He ran for the gully, as the helicopter wheeled round and he heard its metallic shriek again.
‘Joel Cabral Burns,’ it said. ‘Stop! Don’t run. Shit! Don’t run, moleque!’
Joel was down the gully in a flash and haring to the top of the steep slope of rocks, which twisted under him again. The helicopter wound into view and the voice was telling him not to be afraid, but he lay tight in a ball with hands over his ears, waiting for talons or bullets, feeling his blood had turned to wire which pulled him tight. The air beat on his face, the metallic voice screeched and Joel screamed as he felt a grip on his shoulder.
He opened his eyes to see a soldier.
‘Major Branca says it’s time you came home,’ he said. ‘Your mother is worried.’
He pulled Joel to his feet. The helicopter hovered. The paratrooper grabbed a harness in one hand, Joel in the other, and they were lifted twirling into the sky, high above the world, to be pulled into the machine and flown to a landing pad near the lake. Joel was driven home in a Jeep, arriving to find his mum pacing the pavement in front of the flat. A police van sat a few yards down the street, with its doors open and two agents in the back.
‘If you’ve touched him,’ his mum shouted at the soldiers in the Jeep, ‘if anyone has touched him, I’ll hunt the lot of you down!’
In the flat, Gilberto was sitting at the kitchen table drinking a glass of beer. Joel remembered he looked calm. Joel could hear his mum in the bedroom, opening cupboards.
‘There’s no point packing me a case,’ he called.
Gilberto beckoned Joel to him and said, ‘Keep an eye on your mum for me. Always take care of your mum. Think of me when you’re by the sea. I’ll think of you there too. Good lad… now don’t cry… promise me you won’t cry… you’re the man of the house now… good lad, good lad.’
He stood up. He didn’t pick his keys up from the bowl on the side, nor grab the linen jacket he wore in the evenings. He bent and did up a shoelace. He smiled at Joel. He said something to Jackie about the major, then laughed. He opened the front door, turned and winked at Joel and said, ‘Até a morte, pé forte – strong foot, until death,’ then left the flat.
Jackie came and knelt beside Joel, who was still looking at the door.
‘Listen, my love, we’ve got to get out. They won’t let us stay. There’s a plane, soon. I know how terrible this is, but we’ll have time later… We need to be quick. I’ve packed us a bag. See if there’s anything else –’
Joel ran to the door. He darted down the stairs with his mother’s voice echoing after. He ran into the street. Along to the right, the jaws of the van were swallowing his father’s back.
‘Papa!’ he shouted, but the doors closed.
Joel stood in the road and watched the van drive away. Jackie seized his hand and pulled him back inside. He didn’t cry. Jackie was in a flap.
‘Just a few things,’ she said. ‘I’ve brought a blanket, it’ll have to do. If there’s anything you want, grab it quickly. How about a book? Why don’t you – ?’
‘Where are we going?’
‘We’re going on a plane, sweetheart,’ she said.
‘Where to?’
‘I’ll tell you on the way, petal.’
‘Are we going for long?’
‘Just until things are a bit easier.’
‘Is Dad coming to join us?’
‘We’ve got to be quick, Joel. Come along!’
From a shelf in the living room, Joel took some photographs Gilberto had been meaning to put into an album. He fetched his lucky Flamengo ticket stub and his compass and gave them all to his mother.
‘Is that it?’ she asked.
‘You said be quick.’
‘What about your cars, some books? Don’t you want anything else?’
‘I don’t want to go to England, if that’s where we’re going.’
The intercom buzzed from the front desk and they heard the lift start.
‘Quick!’ said Jackie.
She put Joel’s stuff in her case and took his hand. They left by the back door and took the service lift. They emerged into a side alley and hurried to a street at the rear, where they flagged down a cab.
Joel stared out of the taxi window at the sights of a city he was losing. He tried not to blink. He wanted to open the door and roll to a stop in the road, alive or dead. They drove along the Ipanema seafront, the last light smouldering over the sea, street-lights illuminating palm trees, neighbours enjoying a beer. Through into Copacabana and round the great sweep of the beach, past street kids looking for a bite, a pocket, a fix, a place to rest away from harm. Through a tunnel, along Botafogo beach, past Sugarloaf, through Flamengo park, past the airport of Santos Dumont, past high-rise blocks and favelas, catching a glimpse of the Maracanã which made him think of where his father might be now and whether the cops were giving him a chance. The car was flying towards a plane he didn’t want to take and he hoped the police would catch up and escort them back and throw them all in a cell and do whatever they wanted – how could it be worse? We’ll be back, he told himself. We’ll come back. The major will realise he’s made his point. A lesson learnt – that�
��s the important thing. Whatever that lesson might be.
Jackie clutched Joel in the queue for check-in. He wanted to break free, to shout at her, to tell her they could run inside Brazil, hide somewhere with one of their friends. Perhaps they could go to Tiradentes, stay with Gilberto’s family. There must be somewhere. But he didn’t know how to shout at his mum, so he glared at her.
‘I’m angry too, darling,’ she said. ‘But we’ve got no choice –’
‘I don’t understand,’ Joel said. ‘Why can’t we stay?’
‘They won’t let us, honey. The major said we have to leave today.’
‘But what can they do?’
‘Whatever they like!’
‘You want us to go!’
‘I do honey, you’re right, I do. I’m scared, Joel, we’re not safe –’
‘But what about Dad?’
‘Don’t, petal, don’t.’
‘You don’t want to help him.’
‘I tried, honey, I tried.’
‘You didn’t try hard enough.’
‘Don’t say that! This isn’t easy, Joel. Oh, Joel!’
Joel stood and watched the sun set from the roof of Tiffany’s. Down by the beach he could see three street kids passing along the seafront pavement far below, pushing one another, bouncing a tennis ball, asking passers-by for change. They went down on to the sand, where one of them stopped to show the others his juggling, then the other two took it in turns to try, without success. The two non-jugglers formed a shoulder pyramid, upon which the juggling kid teetered for a while, until they all fell into a heap and wrestled one another.
He went back to the flat and mushed himself a caipirinha. It would be good to see Liam. He didn’t want to think about the past. He sat on the balcony as the light died and was pleased to hear the lift open down the hall and Liam’s voice at the door.
Debbie wandered over to Jackie’s. Jackie made a pot of tea and they sat on the sofa cradling mugs as Jackie talked about Tony.
‘What are you going to do?’ Debbie said.
‘I don’t know. I suppose I’ve got one last chance, when I go and get my things. Maybe it’s not too late for him to change his mind.’
‘I’ve not seen you like this, Jacks. There was a time when I wondered what you saw in him.’
‘I’ve known enough bad ones to know a good one,’ said Jackie.
‘He certainly seems to have got you hooked.’
‘A bit too good for the likes of me, that’s the trouble.’
‘Don’t talk nonsense!’
That was the trouble with dating an honest man, Jackie said to herself: you could be more confident they wouldn’t mess you around but God, you had to stick fast by the rules. She wondered how a man like Tony could play it straight and waltz through life unscathed. Surely even he had skeletons?
‘Let’s change the subject,’ said Jackie. ‘What are we going to do?’
‘Brighton’s your oyster,’ said Debbie. ‘What do you feel like doing?’
‘We could go for a walk?’
‘I’ve always found walking without a destination a bit pointless.’
‘We could walk to the Rusty Axe?’ suggested Jackie.
‘Now you’re talking.’
The Rusty Axe sat on top of the hill on the edge of Hanover. From a yard at the back it had a view over the city to the west and along the curve of the coast. Jackie and Debbie bought drinks and found a table with a good view of the pub. They liked to watch people come and go and discuss which famous people they resembled. The cast was far from stellar, so they gave up and played the Bullseye quiz machine.
‘You can’t beat a bit o’ Bully,’ said Jackie.
Bully beat them soundly. Debbie wondered what she would have thought in her younger, more sophisticated days – whenever they were – had she gazed into a crystal ball and spied herself playing a Bullseye quiz machine with a woman nearly twice her age who wore dark glasses inside and swore a lot. Debbie suggested they try their hand at darts, but it turned out Jackie was rather better on the oche than she’d bargained for. The day was heating up, so they moved outside to sit in the sun. They ordered pie and chips, ate their food in a serious silence, then leant back with fresh glasses of wine and looked out over city roofs and tower blocks towards the sea.
‘Let’s face it,’ said Jackie, ‘it’s not the prettiest view in the world.’
‘How can you say that!’
‘Don’t get me wrong – I could look at it forever – but it ain’t Ipanema.’
‘Ipanema’s got tower blocks too,’ said Debbie.
‘And twin mountains, and views of forest, and a curve of sand.’
‘Well, I wouldn’t change it for the world.’
‘You know what I really like in a bit of coast?’ asked Jackie.
‘No.’
‘Rock pools. I used to love mucking around in them when I was little.’
‘They’d invented Majorca by the time I was young, thank God.’
‘You don’t know what you’ve missed.’
‘No matter how hard I try, Jacks, I can’t imagine you mucking about in a rock pool.’
‘Was a time you couldn’t keep me out of them.’
‘When I think of you holding a little net, the only image that comes to mind is of fishing battered cod from a frier.’
Jackie laughed.
They chatted more as they looked at the town and the sea, and Debbie thought how strange it was that the sea always made her think of Brazil, even though she’d never been there. She hoped Joel would find Gilberto, hoped it would make him happy, hoped it might bring him back with… what? Certainty? An end to the wait-and-see-and-give-it-a-bit-more-time-to-be-sure? Debbie had never seriously considered giving up because, unlike a lot of men she knew, Joel didn’t think he was more than he was. Delightful in a child, to be expected in a teenager, the tendency to think oneself bigger than the rest became more tiresome the older a man became. At some point he had to acknowledge he was not much more than nothing. If he saw himself in this way, then the something could be really cherished. This was how Joel thought, or how she’d thought he thought when she met him. She’d since discovered he didn’t think about himself in these terms at all, which could have been great if it weren’t for the fact that he thought a lot more about his dead and psycho dad than he did about his live and loyal lover. This had made things difficult for the best part of twenty years, but then Debbie couldn’t imagine herself in a relationship with someone easy – what would be the point? There had been few dull moments. Besides, the easy ones were never as easy as they seemed. Better the git you know, she thought.
Jackie’s mobile rang, but by the time she’d fished it out of her bag it had switched to voicemail.
‘It’s him,’ said Jackie, then listened to the message.
‘Tony here,’ it said. ‘Wondered if you’d like to come over and collect your things – think I’ve rounded them all up. Give me a bell if you can, I’m in all day.’
‘Wish me luck,’ she said.
‘Good luck!’ said Debbie.
Jackie hurried home, ran a bath, washed her hair, shaved her legs, put on a long white skirt and a white shirt with loose buttons down the front. She put a touch of make-up on, a paler lipstick than normal. Wearing none would be making too much of a song and dance. She grabbed her shaggy coat, dug out the floppy summer hat, egged herself on in the hall mirror, then sat in the lounge looking at the phone. She wasn’t sure what her strategy should be. She lit a cigarette and dialled.
‘I’m popping over,’ she said. ‘I can’t stay long, you’ll be pleased to hear.’
On the radio in the taxi they were talking about how many years of one’s life were spent asleep. Jackie wondered how many she’d spent in these turquoise and white cabs. They hadn’t been bad times, as portions of her life went. She was usually riding to or from an engagement to be excited about. As she lounged in the back she liked to spy on other women who were driving family cars or sport
s cars or being driven by their husbands – and most of the time it felt good to be the one being whisked somewhere. She wondered how many women like her were circling town, warmly stretching conversations with a jolly assortment of drivers whose attire tended to blend into the upholstery.
The cab dropped Jackie at the foot of Tony’s drive. She stood by the gate, out of sight, and smoked her customary cigarette. Were she the lady of the manor she’d get rid of that gravel, she thought. She wondered if she’d stand outside this gate again or if this would be her final, final cigarette. She crunched up the drive. Tony opened the door as she raised her hand to the knocker. She kissed him on one cheek and then the other. He smiled and stood aside to let her pass.
‘Time for a coffee?’ he said.
‘I can squeeze one in.’
Jackie led the way to the kitchen, where she sat at the old wooden table. She wondered how many of the scratches had been made by his wife. He put the kettle on and handed her a shoebox.
‘I think that’s everything,’ he said.
She put the box on the table and removed the lid. All there. In another situation, with a different man, she might have made a show of checking the items. Perhaps she would have refolded the bikini slowly or put on the bracelet. She closed the lid.
‘Thanks,’ she said.
Tony handed her a mug of coffee. He stood leaning against a marble worktop in a blue cotton shirt with rolled-up sleeves. He smiled at her kindly. She smiled back. Jackie had expected him to be a bit more ruffled. Wasn’t he going to ask her questions? Where were the words thrown back in her face, the promises unstitched? All she sensed was an ironed sheet of disappointment, and for a moment she did wonder what on earth she saw in him. He might be beautiful to look at, but didn’t he care?
‘Aren’t you going to say anything?’ she asked.
‘About what?’
‘What do you think?’
‘Listen, Jackie, let’s not –’
‘Argue? Why not? What have I got to lose? It’s obvious you couldn’t give a flying fuck for our relationship –’