The Truth and Lies of Ella Black

by Emily Barr

  ‘Are they at the same hotel?’

  ‘Yes. In the same room, in case you come back. You could call them there. You wouldn’t even have to speak. Um. I wrote the number down just in case you wanted to.’

  We sit inside a little bar down a side street. It’s lit by a dim wall light. Several other people are drinking beer in there. I recognize a teenage boy who drops his younger brother, Gabriel, off at classes sometimes, and give him a wave. There are flies buzzing around in the doorway.

  ‘I meant it …’ I say. Half an hour ago I thought I’d lost Christian. Now I have him and I need to say it all to his face because I might never see him again and this is important. ‘In my note, when I said I love you … I do love you. I loved you the first time I saw you, and then I loved you more and more. That day on the island. The two of us. It was the most wonderful thing. The best day.’

  He looks at me sideways and smiles. ‘Wasn’t it?’

  ‘Really.’

  ‘We’re heading back to the States tomorrow, Felix and Susanna and me. I couldn’t go without seeing you. I just couldn’t. I had to find you, and so I did.’ Christian hesitates. ‘Ella – look. You’ll probably say no but I have to ask. You could come with me. Back to Miami.’

  I look into his eyes. ‘I haven’t got a passport. It was stolen from my bag. That was … Well, I’ll tell you about that another time.’

  He looks at me. ‘Please do. When you feel ready to be Ella again. Tell me. I’ll come back for you. If you like.’ He is stroking the palm of my hand with his thumb.

  I am staring at him. This is the most enormous thing, and my heart fills up and everything goes soft and fuzzy and I will never forget it as long as I live. Christian wants me to come to Florida.

  He will come back for me.

  He

  will

  come

  back

  for

  me.

  ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Yes. I will.’

  ‘Do you have an email address?’

  ‘No. Not one I look at. I often answer the phone at the school, or you can turn up.’ I imagine logging into my gmail account. It would be full of things I don’t want to see. I look into his eyes. ‘I’ll set up a new email. It will be just for you.’

  ‘Here. Here’s mine. Please write to me. Text me. Call me. Send a letter with a carrier pigeon. Anything you like. Please keep in touch, Ella-favela. You fabulous girl.’

  He hands a scrap of paper to me. It has the hotel’s number on it as well as his details, and I take it and have another sip of my beer.

  ‘I will. My fabulous boy.’

  ‘I need to give you one more thing.’ He pushes an envelope across the table to me. ‘It’s not much. I wish I could give you all the money you need. But it’s just something to keep you going. I know those places don’t pay much in the way of salaries.’

  I stare at it. I have no money, but I have food and the things I need.

  ‘I can’t take your money,’ I say. I have got here by myself. I’ve done all this on my own, and I have food and a home. I can’t be rescued now by a handsome prince.

  I haven’t paid my fees though.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ he says. ‘You can call it a loan if you like. When you can, send me some money back. Or bring it to me. If it’ll make you take it now. I wish I could give you more. This isn’t life-changing money. It’s just a little bit of cash. That’s all.’

  I’ll give it to Ben. I take it and smile my biggest smile at him, hoping he can see my soul sparkling through my eyes. Christian pays for the beers, and I lead him up the hill, past the chickens, right up to the place where the children play football at the very top. The city is spread out before us, a string of sparkling lights. The moon lights up the ocean. The mountains are dark. The city is at our feet, twinkling, alive.

  Christian laughs at the sight of it, and then we turn to each other. He takes hold of me, and I take hold of him, and we kiss each other for a long time.

  I want the moment to last forever. I am Jo, in the favela, kissing the boy I love beyond all words, on a moonlit night on top of a Brazilian hill.

  16

  5 Days

  I open the envelope much later, lying on my mattress on Jasmine’s floor. The light is off and I hold it into the moonlight that’s coming in around the edges of the blind.

  Christian has given me money. I have enough cash to go out for a drink on Friday for Jasmine’s birthday. I can buy her a little present. I can give some cash to Ben and Maria. I’ll pay him back one day. I love him.

  There’s not only money in there though. When I’ve stared at the money for a while I take the other thing out of the envelope. It’s a photograph of the two of us together, and I never knew that such a thing existed because in all the time I’ve spent with him I was too busy gazing at him to think about taking a selfie. Selfies belong to a different universe. But this is a photograph of me and Christian, in Lapa, dancing in the street. It was the best night of my life, and it was real. In the picture I have long purple hair and I am looking at him and laughing, and he is looking at me and laughing too, and we are so happy. I stare and stare and stare at us both.

  He has written on the back of it:

  Susanna took this. The best night of my life ♥

  Jasmine turns over in her sleep. I put the photograph under my pillow with the money and lie awake, beginning to feel whole again.

  I get up early and, while I’m waiting for the kettle to boil, stare at the English school’s phone. I can’t call from here because they might be able to trace it. I gather up the few coins that were left from my old stash, and I walk fast along the alley and down the hill to where I know there is a payphone. Then I walk right down to the bottom and call from the phone next to Super Sucos instead. If they trace my call to here they still won’t find me.

  I take a deep breath and, before I can think about it for a moment longer, I dial the number for the Blacks’ Copacabana hotel, from the piece of paper Christian wrote it on. My fingers tremble as I do it. I am breathing rapidly but I don’t let myself put the phone down. I force myself to keep it against my ear.

  When someone answers I talk quickly.

  ‘Could I speak to Mr and Mrs Black, please, in room 1108?’ I say it in Portuguese, because that’s only polite.

  ‘Sure,’ says the man on reception in English, and then another phone is ringing, and then someone picks it up and says, ‘Hello?’ and it’s actually Graham Black, my adoptive father. My dad. His voice isn’t urgent. He doesn’t expect it to be me; not at all. It’s half past six but he doesn’t sound as if I woke him up. I wonder what life is like for them now. They stay in their room and wait. They’re not surprised by the phone ringing. They don’t even expect it to be me.

  ‘Hi, Dad,’ I say. ‘Sorry. I’m fine. I’m sorry. You should go home. I’ll call you there, I promise. I need to get a new passport. I need some stuff for that. Tell Mum I’m sorry and –’

  I click the phone down before he can react. I’m trembling all over. I walk quickly back up the hill, not looking back.

  The four-year-olds always make me feel good, and today Ana comes straight up to me and clings on to my legs, and I crouch down and pick her up. She is heavy enough to disguise my still-shaking arms.

  She giggles and strokes my fuzzy head. ‘Hello, Teacher Jo-Paula,’ she says.

  ‘Hello, Ana.’

  Ana is my little saviour. She will never know what she has done. She has never so much as questioned my name: she calls me Jo-Paula and the other volunteers smile indulgently when she does it. No one has asked why she calls me that. It is the most innocuous thing, and it is a secret that would unravel everything. I’ve had several names since I was Ella, and Paula was the shortest lived and most transformational of them all.

  ‘You have small hair,’ she says now, touching it with the open palm of her hand.

  ‘It’s going to grow,’ I say, and I stroke her silky bob. Then I put her down and throw myself i
nto singing nursery rhymes with the little children.

  I kissed Christian again. He made a mammoth effort to find me; and now I’m going to have to email to thank him for the money. All this makes me smile all through the afternoon.

  If I am going to be Jo I’ll need to build a life for myself. A real one. Now I know the man is OK and I’m not going to be arrested, everything is different. Until Christian told me that, I felt like you do when you think you’re at the bottom of the stairs but actually there’s another step to go, and you step off and panic, feeling as if you’ve just stepped off a cliff. That was how I was, every moment.

  Now I’m beginning to feel like the person I always wished I could be: I am different and bigger and living an actual life that I literally went out and got for myself. I am going to grow into Jo. Jo will not be a Black or a Hinchcliffe or a Carr. She won’t be Ella and she won’t be Bella. I called her Marsh, off the top of my head, when I arrived here. Jo Marsh is who I will remain.

  I look across the room at Jasmine. She is gathering up the leftover stickers from the children’s activity this morning, and I go to help her. I need to be open with Jasmine; not in the sense of telling her anything, but in the sense of talking to her and laughing with her and not being so guarded any more. It’s difficult because I don’t want to say anything at all about my old life, but I’ll do it.

  ‘Where are you from, Jasmine?’ I say. She looks at me and I realize that it came out all wrong. I laugh. ‘I don’t mean where are you from? in a racist kind of way. I mean, you said your parents live in Dublin, but is that where you grew up?’

  She grins. ‘You should say: No, but where are you from originally? with a little tilt of your head. Yeah, I grew up in the West of Ireland. I was born in Hong Kong, and my dad died when I was little. He was Chinese. So when I was still tiny Mum moved back to Ireland and I was unusual, looking like this while being Irish. I never lived above a Chinese takeaway so that was hard for some people to understand – not only that but I’m literally shit at maths and I can’t play the piano. Baffling. So. She and my stepdad moved to Dublin a few years ago. It’s good there. How about you? Where are you from? Originally?’

  It’s funny: Jasmine is my best friend now, and without her kindness I would never have stepped through the door of this place. I sleep on her bedroom floor every night, yet we’ve never even had this conversation. I suppose that shows how much I have shied away from talking about anything personal. For nearly three weeks I’ve done everything I can to avoid the How about you?

  ‘London,’ I say. It isn’t very imaginative but at least it’s huge, and a place I know.

  ‘Oh, that must be cool,’ she says.

  ‘It’s OK,’ I reply. ‘I mean, I haven’t been there for ages but it’s home, I guess. In a way. Not like this is home though.’

  ‘Oh, it’s the best here, isn’t it? I’m just loving it.’

  ‘Me too,’ I say, and I mean it. I knew I would love Rio and, even though none of it has been anything like what I imagined, I do. I know there are things out there that I will have to face soon enough, but for now I can strive to be happy, just as it says in the poem.

  17

  2 Days

  On Friday Ben turns up just before we’re leaving for the club to say happy birthday to Jasmine. Then he turns to me.

  ‘Have you got a moment?’ he says quietly, and he leads me into the kitchen.

  One of the girls is making coffee but she takes a look at us and leaves. I don’t know what he wants. I gave Maria some money but it wasn’t much. Now I’m worried that he has discovered that I’m here under a fake identity and he’s about to kick me out.

  He fixes me with his all-seeing look. I wait for him to tell me how disappointed he is to discover that everything about me was a lie.

  ‘Congratulations, Jo,’ he says, instead. ‘We’ve received the money, and you’re a fully paid-up member of the team. I can switch things about and find you a bedroom, or you and Jasmine can move into one of the doubles if you like. You two seem to have hit it off.’

  ‘I owe her. But … I didn’t give you that much money …?’

  ‘No, and I can give you back the deposit you gave Maria, because the full amount arrived. I assume you arranged it from home, like you said you would. Our admin staff said they got a call from someone saying they were paying your contribution, and when they had the details they transferred it straight over.’

  Christian.

  That’s the first thing I think. Christian has paid for me to be here.

  The Blacks. That is the second thing. If he’s told them where I am, they could have done it.

  Ben is still talking.

  ‘Are you going out with everyone tonight?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good. I hope you all have a good time.’

  ‘Thank you. Was it …?’ I try to compose my thoughts. ‘Was it a man who paid? An American?’

  Ben smiles. ‘Your friend who came here the other day? He caused quite a stir, I’ve heard. No. It was a woman actually. Your mum.’

  We pile out into the street together, the seven of us who are going to celebrate Jasmine’s birthday. I try to compute what has happened. Christian has told the Blacks that I’m here and that I owe the charity some money. They have called to pay it. That’s their way of saying that it’s all OK. I’m here legitimately now. If they know I’m here they could have come to get me, but they didn’t. They have sent me a message and I love them for it.

  I walk faster, to catch up with Jasmine. She is the longest-serving volunteer at the English school: everyone but her has arrived since I did, as the previous set of volunteers moved on to be home, or elsewhere, for Christmas. The girls are dressed in little sundresses and tiny cardigans, with swooshy hair and shiny shoes. I have cobbled together the best outfit I could manage, which involves the denim shorts I wear every day, and the halter-neck top I bought in Rio when I was Ella, which I meant to throw away but never did. I have borrowed a silk scarf from Sasha and tied it around my head. Jasmine lent me her make-up, so for the first time in ages I’m wearing eyeliner, mascara and lipstick. It feels odd, painting on a face. I stepped right away from being like everyone else, and now I’m stepping back into it, just for a night. I worry that I look ridiculous with make-up on, but it’s the best I can do really. I’m used to feeling like the odd one out on occasions like this, and the good thing is that now I don’t care.

  ‘Oh my God, Jo,’ says Sasha when she sees me. ‘You look amazing. You really do. I mean, you always look amazing, but tonight you are just … Wow.’

  Amy, who has got over her distaste of the favela thanks to actually living here, nods. ‘Yeah. You do look cool.’

  ‘No one’s as cool as Jo,’ says Jasmine, putting her arm round me.

  I look at the ground. I don’t know what to say, so I don’t say anything at all. I’m glad they’re being nice to me, but I really don’t mind whether I look nice or not.

  The fat woman is sitting at the café opposite our alley, on the main road. She is always around the neighbourhood, sitting and drinking coffee. I like seeing the same people every day. Now that my Portuguese is better I might try to strike up a conversation with her.

  When I smile at her she smiles and looks away. I walk down the hill with the others, all of us heading for the bus stop.

  The venue turns out to be much grander than I expected and everyone is showing their passports at the door. When I get to the front of the queue the woman looks at me and says, ‘ID?’

  ‘We need ID?’

  ‘It’s the law in Brazil,’ Jasmine says from the till next to me. ‘Any club, anything like that, you have to show ID at the bar. I did say everyone should bring passports.’

  ‘Yes. You did.’ Jasmine said that and I ignored it for obvious reasons. ‘I’m really sorry,’ I say to the door woman, ‘but I haven’t got it. I forgot. Sorry.’

  She looks at me through narrowed eyes. ‘You can’t go in without ID.’

>   ‘Oh, please? I’m with them. They’ve all got it.’

  This is like being at home in Kent, talking my way into being served alcohol. It usually worked then, one way or another, and it works now. The woman makes the silence stretch out a long time, then sighs, says she’ll let me in this once, and tells me to bring my passport next time. I promise I will. I pay the entrance fee, which takes up a scary chunk of my precious money, and she takes a photo of me. I don’t like that, but it seems to be happening to everyone.

  Then we are in. This is a proper old-fashioned samba hall that looks as if it has been here for a hundred years. It is glitzy and glamorous, with chandeliers and polished floors and high ceilings. A man in a white tuxedo leads us up a grand staircase and shows us to a table. The downstairs is a dance floor, and we can look down on it over some railings. There is at least one other dance floor in a room nearby.

  ‘Please,’ he says, handing us menus. ‘Please, choose a drink.’

  I look at the glossy menu. This is a different world – a different universe – and for this night only I’m going to enjoy it. I was expecting a venue like Antonio’s, where I met my darling Christian and his friends: a busy, informal bar filled with locals. This is a tourist place, and everything about it is shiny and impeccable. This is the kind of place the Blacks would like.

  It’s not a place most of my Rocinha neighbours would have access to. It’s strange to be here. I feel like an imposter, but when I look around the table I see that no one else does.

  I thought the others didn’t have money, and yet it seems they do. I suppose these are gap-year students from Europe and America, and they’ve paid thousands of pounds to join the project, so of course they probably have spending money on top of that for treats. Most of them are going travelling later. They are, I realize, in a completely different situation. It will not occur to anyone that I’m any different from them. They consider my funny hair and my lack of wardrobe to be stylistic or ethical choices. I am a part of the school and I am good at art. They have no idea.