AJ Mirag - Clippings
Page 14
Maybe it was best this way, though. The fewer people he had to meet, the more time he could devote to Mephisto. Daniel returned to Mephisto's shack, and they spent the rest of his visiting time in bed.
There was always the Professor, too. Daniel couldn't and wouldn't ignore him. A few minutes before the end of visiting time, Daniel went looking for him. Peeking through the open door of the Professor's shack, Daniel saw him working on his laptop.
“Have your people already left?”
The Professor raised his eyes at him and smiled. “I sent everyone away, hoping that you might want to see me before leaving. You and I didn't even have time to talk!”
Daniel sighed, still at the Professor's door. “I wish I could stay until tomorrow.”
“Oh, come in just for a minute, I want to show you something.”
The Professor walked to his desk, circled it and typed something on his laptop keyboard. Then he turned the screen to Daniel. “I haven't done the drawing yet, but the text is here.”
Daniel read:
“Lampanyctus photophagus. A small lantern fish who lives in the abyssal zone of the ocean. Feeds off the light of other organisms, but strangely the other organisms are not deprived of light because of that. The Lampanyctus photophagus becomes more and more brilliant and illuminates everything around it.”
“Who's that?” asked Daniel, intrigued.
“It's you, of course!”
“Me? Wow, thank you, but I'm just a brat, as Mephisto says.”
“No, you don't fool me. You're a monster. Everyone I included in my Encyclopaedia Infernalis is a monster.”
“You think we're all monsters?”
“Monsters, or dark angels, if you prefer. Those beings who try to make their weirdest dreams come true and who let themselves be guided by the delirious pleasure of those dreams.”
“You're poetic today. Did Mephisto read my entry?”
“Not in its definitive form. But he unknowingly helped me to compose it.”
“How come?”
The Professor rested his hands on the desk and stared at Daniel, who had seated in the armchair. “When you left, everything became dull, colorless. When I saw Mephisto the day after your departure, I was scared by the darkness I saw in him, and asked him, 'Was our life that gloomy before Daniel arrived, and we didn't notice it?' And he answered, ‘No. He arrived and very slowly, he started brightening our lives. We got used to his light, and now that he's gone, we're in complete darkness.’”
Daniel's eyes stung with unshed tears. “You like him a lot. I'm glad that he has you.”
The Professor smiled. “Aren't you jealous?”
“Oh, a little. But it's good to know that he has someone who understands him.”
The Professor covered Daniel's hand with his. “Don't worry. I'll do my best to protect our dark angel, and I'm sure he’ll protect me, too. Speaking of the devil, he’s waiting for you at the door,” said the Professor in a low voice, gesturing toward the door with his head.
“But I would like to escort you to the exit gates. After all, you are my visitor, officially,” added the Professor with a mischievous glint in his eyes.
And Daniel walked to the gates of the Detention House escorted by his two dark angels. He could not imagine a better escort, and he was confident that the same scene would be repeated over and over again in the next months. He hoped he could convince Mephisto as soon as possible that the bond formed between them would last forever.
A. J. MIRAG is a Brazilian writer, and an English/Portuguese, French/Portuguese translator.
She lives a calm life in São Paulo, the busiest city of the country. Clippings is her first novella. You can write to A. J. Mirag at ajmirag@gmail.com.
Notes:
1 A very strong, almost toxic, disinfectant.
2 The jailer's nickname, "Sarará," is the name given by Brazilians to mixed-blood people with tight curly blond (or red) hair, light skin, blue (or green) eyes, broad nose, and thick lips.
3 A dish made with manioc flour.
4 A kind of samba played in parties.
5 It can be translated as "swing", but it's more than that. "Ginga" is a form of personal expression and style.
6 Capoeira is played in a roda, which is a circle of participants.
7 To apply (or to give) a rasteira is "to trip somebody up.”
8 Vladimir Herzog was a Brazilian journalist who was tortured and killed by the military during the time of the dictatorship.
9 Pastel (plural pastéis) is a salty snack made with a thin pastry envelope containing minced meat, cheese, shrimp or another filling, and then fried. There are also sweet pastéis, which may contain banana or other fillings. Pastelaria is a shop that sells pastéis.
10 The name "Garapa" means "sugar-cane juice.”
11 Literally "little plane.” It refers to a youngster who works as a drug carrier.
12 In Brazilian prison slang, a prisoner who conceals an object in his/her anus is called "a safe.”