Finally, she stubbed the butt out in an empty cup on my coffee table and went on. “After I loose all my money an’ thing in São Paulo, bro, I just get suck down inside de big cement dragon there, an’ then I spit out on de e’street again. Porra!”
Her sad little singsong tone droned on, her words blending with the lazy, hypnotic whooooosh of the ceiling fan, the silent music of the moment. As Narcisa unburdened herself, I filled in the blanks. Confused, too impatient to deal with a simple airline connection to Rio, what else would she do but go out and get drunk with a bunch of local street kids? She’d lost all her stuff, then dove straight into the cold, gritty, heartless streets of São Paulo, a dark compulsion moving her frantic little steps like a broken marionette.
“ . . . When I wake up an’ no got more nothing, I just e’say fock it! I go right to de Santa Ifigênia, near to de Antiga Rodoviaria, you know it these place, Cigano?”
Santa Ifigênia . . . Shit!
I stared at Narcisa, rubbing my eyes, as if I could stop the visions in my head. Sure I knew the place. Knew it all too fucking well. Crakolândia.
Crack Town.
22. CRACK TOWN
“SÃO PAULO. THAT’S WHERE EVOLUTION HAS REALLY BEEN PUSHED TO ITS LIMITS. IT’S NOT EVEN A CITY ANYMORE, IT’S A SORT OF URBAN TERRITORY THAT EXTENDS AS FAR AS THE EYE CAN SEE, WITH ITS FAVELAS, ITS HUGE OFFICE BLOCKS, ITS LUXURY HOUSING SURROUNDED BY GUARDS ARMED TO THE TEETH. IT HAS A POPULATION OF MORE THAN TWENTY MILLION, MOST OF WHOM WERE BORN, LIVE, AND DIE WITHOUT EVER STEPPING OUTSIDE THE LIMITS OF ITS TERRAIN. THE STREETS ARE DANGEROUS: EVEN IN A CAR, YOU COULD EASILY BE HELD UP AT GUNPOINT AT A TRAFFIC LIGHT, OR YOU MIGHT WIND UP BEING TAILED BY A GANG. THE MOST ADVANCED GANGS HAVE MACHINE GUNS AND ROCKET LAUNCHERS. BUSINESSMEN AND RICH PEOPLE USE HELICOPTERS TO GET AROUND ALMOST ALL THE TIME, AND THERE ARE HELIPADS PRETTY MUCH EVERYWHERE, ON THE ROOFS OF BANKS AND APARTMENT BUILDINGS. AT GROUND LEVEL, THE STREETS ARE LEFT TO THE POOR—AND THE GANGS.”
—Michel Houellebecq
Narcisa talked late into the night, telling me of her time in São Paulo; long, lost months trudging the tragic depths of that throbbing apocalyptic megalopolis, scrounging around in the shadows of the infamous skid-row Crack Town, down by the old, abandoned bus terminal.
I sat listening in silence, shaking my head. My poor little friend had clearly paid a dear and painful penance for the sins of her failed flirtation with the American Dream.
“Porra!” She spat on the floor, then went on, as if describing some terrible movie she’d been subjected to. “São Paulo, these de only place in de whole world where I ever e’smoke so much focking crack I don’ even wanna e’smoke it no more! Crazy place, de Crakolândia, Cigano! So many different drug dealer there, one hundred traficantes in every street, an’ always de big Chevrolet Blazer full up with de cops, all de rifles pointing out de window, all de night they just sitting at every corner, watching, but don’ do nothing. Fock! What de fock they even doing in there?”
“Maybe just waiting around, y’know, for getting payoffs from people?”
“Hah! What focking peoples, hein? No focking peoples in there, bro! Only de Crack Monster. Hah! Nobody know even nobody else focking name in these focking place, got it? In de Crakolândia, they know about only one thing, de dado, de big e’square-shape crack rock, e’same like a big dice, cara! One big dado, always e’same quantity, e’same size, bem servido, ta ligado . . . In de Crakolândia, for fifty reais you get de real big dice, like these, so, sooo much!” She held up her big sooty thumb and forefinger, indicating a massive crack rock.
I whistled. “Fuck! That’s enough to kill a fuckin’ rhino!”
Narcisa’s latest fall from grace had really taken her down this time; all the way down into the dull, soul-swallowing dungeon of Crakolândia.
As she rambled on about São Paulo, it all played out on the screen of my mind. My poor, wild-eyed little friend, stuck in that monsterous drug-slum, crawling like a crippled white lab rat through the dismal, death-blackened, dead-end crack alleys of Santa Ifigênia.
Santa Ifigênia. The same merciless hell-pit I’d once been stuck in. A place of total darkness, the only light provided by cruising police meat wagons, trolling the night for cadavers.
Crakolândia.
As Narcisa talked, I conjured up the shady figures of dark, dingy urban despair, moving in the blighted shadows of my memory, like crippled phantom tree sloths; haunted, lost souls of the damned, firing up cheap, formaldehyde-laced crack rocks in sooty alleyways, trudging along in a dull, endless procession through the Valley of the Shadow of Death. In a flash, I was there again, reliving my own tortured fall, down, down into that stinking psychic purgatory—seeing it all again in the frantic, flashing light in Narcisa’s eyes. Filthy concrete mazes of narrow, greasy, dead-end alleyways; a world of creeping shadows, the darkness punctuated only by the sad little flickers of cheap plastic lighters.
As she spoke on, my mind’s eyes watched the whole vivid replay of hellish images; the befuddled, huddled, subhuman mummies of Crakolândia, lurking in a long, senseless nightmare of perpetual concrete night, wrestling with the specter of doom in ratty makeshift tents of tattered newspaper and shit-encrusted plastic garbage bags. Dregs of humanity, unwashed and demented, amputated from society, cut off from life like abscesses from the pallid arms of dead junkies’ shambling, rambling, wandering ghosts.
“Porra, cara! I never get so low down in de life before till I go these focking place, Cigano! Only thing I listen inside my head de whole time de e’same e’stupid song, over an’ over. De Doors, ‘This is de enn’, my only frien’ de enn’ . . .’”
I pictured Narcisa there, shuffling through a cold, dark season in hell, just as I had done decades before; back in another lifetime, another nightmare.
Choking back tears, I looked at her. “Why’d ya stay there so long, Narcisa? I mean, what did you do every day?”
Even as the words left my mouth, I knew it was a stupid question.
It didn’t matter. Narcisa needed to talk. “Whatever, bro. Nothing to do in there, Cigano! Porra! Time don’ exist in these focking place, got it? You do only e’same e’sheet all de day. Just go de one corner, get de rock, then run run, go de other corner, e’smoke e’smoke, run run, go. Then back de next corner, e’same thing, like de focking rat! ‘This is de ennn’ . . .’”
I watched her face in ghostly silhouette as she mumbled the eerie song lyrics. Then she fell silent. For a long while, the only sound was the soft, steady hum of the overhead fan.
Finally, she spoke again. “De whole time I e’stay there, I know it gonna be over soon, bro, cuz I know I gonna dead in these e’stupid rat e’sheet place. An’ I don’ even care no more, don’ give e’sheet for nothing, got it? Just e’smoke! Nada mas! Only e’smoke an’ wait for de end come. Porra, que merda!”
I could feel the soul-numbing futility she experienced there. Narcisa, tormented by loneliness, self-loathing, guilt, regret. Her big, triumphant return from the great American Dream, all reduced now to a long, lost weekend in hell. Months of new traumas piling up on top of old ones . . . Poor baby! I couldn’t stop the visions marching across my brain as I pictured my sad-faced, lonely little friend limping along the grimy gray pavements of São Paulo’s cold, dull neon forests, like a deranged, depressive little meat puppet, sinking down, down into the shadows of that faceless, teeming slaughterhouse of souls.
As she narrated the horror movie playing in my head, I didn’t ask how she paid for her monster crack habit. I didn’t have to ask. I could see it all reflected in her eyes, like some rancid delirium dream; Narcisa selling her emaciated, crack-ravaged carcass to cabdrivers and lonely old men for the cost of the next cheap hit.
She let out a painful little groan. “So that’s it, Cigano. An’ then I just e’stay there like that . . . I donno how long de time. Forget about de time, bro! Time e’stop. Forget de New York, forget de Rio! Forget ever’thing else. No more past, no more future, just be in de Crakolândia, li
ke de dirty old ghost. De zumbí, got it?”
I got it. I nodded. I knew.
“ . . . Sometime, de taxi driver, they give it to me whole ten for de quick boquete in de car, an’ then I got enough to e’smoke . . .” She trailed off again. Silence. Narcisa was thinking, remembering, putting the pieces back together.
When she went on, she spoke more softly, as if describing something that happened to someone else. “ . . . An’ you know, Cigano, I never even got rape. No even one time . . . Cuz in these Crakolândia, de thing work different, got it?”
I didn’t get it. I knew Narcisa was no stranger to rape, but her casual mention of it in such a surreal context seemed especially odd. I just looked at her.
She seemed to sense my next question. “Nobody in these focking place wanna know about de sex. Não importa o sexo! Only wan’ de crack, mermão, de droga, got it? Ever’thing is a case of violence if de crack she no good. Only de droga mean anything in there. When de drug she good, is all peaceful. When you got some money, you can get de good drug, an’ then you just rent de little cubicle in de building for only five buck for a couple hour, an’ then you can get out from de e’street an’ go e’smoke you stash all alone. E’smoke till you ear she e’start ring like de police siren! Hah! But when you no got de money, bro, fock, then you gotta go e’smoke on de street with all de Crack Monster peoples!”
I asked her if she’d had any trouble with the cops, remembering my own ultraviolent days in Crakolândia and its sinister, brutal netherworld of beatings, muggings, stabbings, shootings and lootings; the professional thugs armed with heavy, long wooden clubs, coming down the sidewalk every morning to clear the crack zombies out when the local shops raised their noisy metal shutters, opening for business.
Narcisa seemed to be thinking for a moment, remembering. Then, her eyes darkened. “One time I get de big problema in there, Cigano, when one e’stupid guy try an’ sell it to me de bad drug, he gimme de focking mothball for e’smoke, an’ then I choke up an’ almost dead . . .”
“Ya smoked a chunk of fuckin’ mothball? Fala serio!” I grimaced, wondering how much punishment one person could take.
“Yeh, bro. Make me so-oo sick. Afff! Then I get piss off an’ go to de focking guy what sell it to me these e’sheet. Hah! I cut up de focker face with de broken bottle! An’ then all de policia come from nowhere, whooooooop! An’ all de Crack Monster peoples run away fast, go, go, an’ only they catch up on me alone! Fock!”
“What happened?”
“Nada, mano. Just de usual terror. They make me take off my shoe an’ all de clothes in de street, an’ then de one real ugly fat cop, he put de pistola in my mouth an’ e’say I gotta give it to him de boquete, de blow job to de gun, an’ they all laugh laugh laugh. They e’say they no wanna see me again, if I don’ e’stay away, they gonna throw my cadaver in de river!”
I winced at the image of my poor little friend being stripped and taunted like an animal, humiliated and bullied by a gang of hard-faced, beefy street cops, all armed to the tits, standing around mocking her, threatening her unhappy little life.
“ . . . These São Paulo cop, he don’ give e’sheet for take de mo-oney for let you go either, Cigano, cuz he got it already too much cash from all de drug dealer. Nobody wan’ no trouble in these place! Daytime, all de Crack Monster peoples gotta e’stay off de e’street an’ wait like de vampiro for de night. Porra!”
I remembered it all from my own miserable, strung-out days there. She was telling me nothing new, just reminding me of a dark, sinister netherworld I knew too well. Narcisa’s present was my past. A living hell. I said nothing more. I wanted to let her keep talking it off, like bleeding an infected wound.
“De next time de cop see me there, almost they kill me! They beat me up bad an’ take away my money an’ all my droga. They e’say these de final warning. Next time, de Narcisa gonna be dog food . . .” Her big, soulful eyes grew round as saucers as she drew her finger slowly across her throat. “These when I e’say, okey, fock these e’stupid place, an’ then I hitchhike back to Rio. Crown crowwwwn! The End. Thank you come again! Hah! Next?”
She shrugged with a weak little grin.
Behind her poor little attempt at humorous bravado, I could hear it, feel it—the dark undertone of pain in her voice, a bitter tone of disappointment, resignation, humiliation, failure, defeat. Maybe she sensed the pain I felt listening to her stories. I don’t know. But for some reason, Narcisa opened up her heart to me that night, and I fell in like a trapped beast.
“Serio, Cigano . . .” She looked away and sighed. “You know it, before even all these e’sheet happening to me there, already I got so much trouble, I just get so tire with de life, then I only wanna dead an’ finish forever!”
She fell silent again. I could see her face lit in eerie profile as she squirmed around on the sofa, trying to make herself more comfortable in a world of everlasting pain and discomfort. Then she settled back against me again. Not wanting to disturb whatever unburdening process she was going through, I stayed quiet, like someone listening to a confession, gently stroking the back of her neck, waiting for more.
She shifted around, then went on. “Na moral, cara! I wan’ only to dead anymore, Cigano, for just get de fock out these e’stupid Crakolândia an’ go back my home in de Alpha Centauri, go! So then I decide to make de suicidio . . .”
Suicide? I couldn’t imagine Narcisa taking her own life. I winced at the thought. After a while, curiosity outweighed my horror and I asked. “So, what happened? Why didn’t you do it?”
Silence.
Narcisa just shook her head and smiled.
Finally, she nodded and told me she’d tried.
I felt a lump forming in my throat.
“How?”
23. THE END
“AND THE SMOKE OF THEIR TORMENT ASCENDETH UP FOR EVER AND EVER; AND THEY HAVE NO REST DAY NOR NIGHT, WHO WORSHIP THE BEAST AND HIS IMAGE, AND WHOSOEVER RECEIVETH THE MARK OF HIS NAME.”
—Revelation 14:11
I sat beside Narcisa on the sofa, choking back tears, fondling her pale, knobby knee as she talked on, describing her suicide attempt. One cold, drizzly, strung-out gray afternoon, she hiked out to the middle of a crowded pedestrian bridge, the expansive old Viaduto do Chá, the busy São Paulo landmark, looming high over the throbbing downtown streets.
“When I go walk on de center of these viaduto, Cigano, all de peoples walking there, walking, go go, on de way to work, e’school, dentist, whatever. So many peoples walking around like de insect robot, all walking, but nobody look, nobody e’stop, nobody see nothing, nobody think, only walk an’ walk, go go go. Fock . . .”
She stopped talking and lit a cigarette. She took a deep drag and exhaled. “I go all de way out to de highest part an’ then I e’stop. Nobody never e’stop on these place, you know? An’ I thinking, ‘Why I e’stop here now, hein?’ An’ then I can hear a voice e’say, ‘’Cuz now you really gonna be nobody here’ . . . No more no body, got it?”
Her big eyes darted around like skittish fish in a cloudy aquarium. “An’ so I just e’stand like e’statue, Cigano, no thinking. I look down de big precipicio, an’ I e’say, ‘Goodbye, e’sheet place, fock off, e’stupid world,’ an’ I climb up on de railing an’ I look around. Just when I gonna jump, I look down an’ I see my tennis e’shoe! Porra! De original purple Nike shoe, Cigano, only thing I e’still got from de whole time in New York! An’ then I thinking, ‘Porra! Que merda! De last focking thing I gonna see in these world gonna be some e’stupid gringo shoe!’ An’ I hear it whole time e’same music in my head. ‘This is de ennn’ . . .’ an’ I e’say, ‘Okey, now or never! Go!’ An’ I let go de rail an’ I hold out my arms for fly away, free now, go . . .”
The End. I closed my eyes and envisioned Narcisa standing there, my only friend, arms spread wide like a tall white stork, like Christ the Redeemer.
Tears flowed down my face as she recounted how, at the last moment, a pair of powerful hands reache
d out of the crowded pedestrian stream and plucked her from the air.
“I donno who it was e’save me, Cigano! Porra! Some e’strong guy, maybe de Angel from God, de Je-sooz, whatever! I just feel de big hands hold on to me, an’ then he take me down an’ put me on de ground. De guy look me an’ e’say, ‘Think about it!’ Then he walk away, an’ boo! He gone! Porra! I e’say, ‘Okey, fock it! Desisti!’ I go an’ walk back through all these e’stupid insect peoples, all de way back to de Crakolândia. Porra! Que merda!” She stubbed an angry cigarette out in a glass.
I sat there beside her, shaking my head. Poor Narcisa. Thwarted again. Whoever saved her life, she never even knew him. Abandoned again, even by her Random Angel of Salvation.
It was right then, she told me, that she’d made a bitter decision. From that day on, the only way she would end her life, she swore, would be from a massive overdose of crack cocaine; that or go crazy trying.
After another long, brooding silence, she looked up at me with a pained expression. “All my focking life, Cigano, all de e’stupid peoples always e’say me how I e’suppose to live, an’ they try an’ force it all de e’stupid human rule on me! Porra! All de life I been lock up, tie up, beat down, rape, confine, drugged, restrain, use for de sexo, molest, abuse, abandon an’ left all alone for dead.”
Then she riveted my brain to the moment with the full force of those big, urgent, tormented eyes, sucking me down into a terrible whirlpool of anguish.
“Do you ever got rape, Cigano?”
I shook my head, feeling sort of guilty.
“Hah! Me, I get rape so many focking time I can’ even remember it, cara! I e’stop count from when I twelve year old, got it? Never even got it my own way with these e’stupid body I e’stay de prison here with you focking earth peoples, never got it de privilegio for do nothing I wan’ about no focking thing in these e’sheet life on you e’stupid e’sheet planet!”
Narcisa Page 11