Blood-drenched Beard : A Novel (9781101635612) (41 page)

Your dad told you he was going to kill himself?

He doesn't answer and she covers her mouth with her hand.

Viv, no part of me is capable of forgiving my brother for what he did. It's not that I want to but can't. I don't
want
to. It'd be
wrong
. Deep down he didn't choose to do it, just as no one chooses anything, but it doesn't exempt him from the responsibility for inviting you there knowing that I couldn't go, for having gone ahead with things. Nor does it exempt you from the responsibility for having gone and for leaving me for him. And I'm not exempted from my responsibility for letting you go, for not helping you to be happy, for having become the guy that you ended up having no choice but to leave. It all works together and is a part of our lives now. At some point you guys decided that your feelings for each other justified hurting my feelings. You didn't decide out of choice, because you didn't have a choice, but Porto Alegre wasn't an option, I wasn't an option, you guys were in love in São Paulo where everything is an option, but the decision is there, it exists in the world like a stone, like a knife, the decision is
here
, it exists
now
, it's something that happened and had consequences like any decision, any gesture, anything you do or say, whether you believe it's your own free will or not. You guys decided that the life you wanted to have together from that point on was more important than any mark that it might leave on me, and you went ahead with it. And it's okay. I can put myself in your place. I don't think I'd have done the same thing, but I can imagine it and understand it. But have the courage to stand by it now. I'll love you forever, and I would still defend my brother's life in any way I could if it were ever in danger. But I don't want to see him, and I won't be your child's godfather.

I'm sorry for coming here.

She gets up and straightens her clothes.

You don't need to leave.

Yes, I do.

But she doesn't leave immediately. She stands there awhile, staring out of the window at the sunny ocean.

Viv.

You're happy here, aren't you?

Me? Yes. I think so.

I actually believe you. When they told me you'd come here, they said you were running away, or were traumatized by what your dad did. I tell everyone it's not true. I must be the only person who gets that that's not it. There's nowhere else you'd rather be right now.

Maybe. I don't know.

I feel like shaking you, slapping you in the
face
for your coldness, your arrogance, your vanity, for God's sake. The
vanity
of thinking you don't need anyone, of believing you shouldn't forgive or be forgiven. But it's not like that from your point of view, is it? You're happy. I can see in your eyes the loneliness I've brought you. I know you never feel alone. It's just because I'm here now. Tomorrow everything will be fine again. I'm going to head back early. I'll change my ticket this afternoon at the airport. You don't need to say anything. I know how much you love me. It exists somewhere. It's safe. I won't come back here again. If you want to visit us one day, the doors will always be open. I'm due mid-April. Okay? He'll be your nephew. If you don't have the dignity, the courage to come and see him, maybe one day he'll come looking for you, when he's old enough. Because that's how you like it, isn't it? When people come to you.

He chokes trying to say something.

I'm going now. Don't worry. Things happened as you predicted they would, didn't they? But it'll be quicker than you imagined. It's already over.

The verse extract quoted at the end of Chapter 9 is by Manoel Brandão de Souza and was taken from the book
História de Garopaba
(
The History of Garopaba
) by Manoel Valentim.

I would like to say a special thanks to my friend and open-water swimming companion Mário Martins da Silva Jr., for his limitless wisdom and generosity, and to my father, Gilson Galera, who told me the story that gave rise to all the rest.

*
He came. He got there before me. He just left. I've never seen your brother like that—he looked terrified. He was afraid of running into you, of course. He spent ages over by the coffin. . . . Of course he didn't cry—your brother doesn't cry, you know what he's like. All he asked was if I knew what time you were coming and if she was coming with you. I told him she wasn't coming, but he doesn't have a problem with her. It's you he doesn't want to see. He told me he couldn't stay. He said, if I do, I'll plant one on him when I see him. And I told him, Your father's lying there dead. Stop being a child, you're almost thirty-three years old, do it for your dad, he'd want you two to make up. But your brother just laughed. . . . I don't know why, I've never understood, but your father and him always had something that was theirs alone. Go figure. He had Beta in the car with him. . . . I have no idea, Dante. . . . I also think it's really weird, but I'm afraid to ask. Your father left a note . . . he left the house to me and some money for you kids. We're going to read his will tomorrow. He didn't have anything else, it's incredible. He blew everything. And now it'll be a while because there's all the bureaucracy—. . . Nothing. Oh, there's also a private pension plan, which will go to you two. It's a decent sum of money. He wrote, about the house, Do what you want with it, Sônia, but I know you're going to sell it and split the money between the princes. That's what I'll do, of course. It's been so long since I loved that man and we fought so much afterward that I can't remember what it was like any more. But your brother stayed for about fifteen minutes, spoke to Uncle Natal, to Golias, who's over there . . . he's the only one of your father's old pals that I can stand too. He spoke to that woman there who I don't know. Was she his girlfriend? . . . I knew it. Just look at that tart's face, all stretched out. . . . A whole bunch of them are going to show up—there'll be venom flying everywhere, and they're going to treat me as if I was some parched old prune. . . . What? . . . He didn't do anything else. He came, looked in the coffin, and left. . . . No, darling. Come to think of it, he did say that he'd have to talk to me some other time because he was moving. He's leaving Porto Alegre. . . . I don't know yet. He just wanted to leave. Except for the minute he spent over at the coffin, he spent the whole time looking at the gate and then he came and said, I've got to go, I'd better go, then he hugged me and left. . . . But I tried! It's your father's wake, I said, stop being a child, it's going to be horrible for me, for you, but he upped and left. I think he only came for my sake—if he didn't, people would give me a hard time. He just stayed long enough to be seen, but what good was it, leaving like he did? Family was never our speciality. Only you, darling. I was able to introduce him to Ronaldo, I'm going to introduce you too in a minute, he's gone to park the car somewhere else, he was afraid of getting a fine, there are parking meters. . . . Yes, I'm happy. . . . Do you think so? I'm old, that's what I am. . . . Just because I'm your mother. But it may be. We look better when we're at peace with ourselves. It's a tragedy what your father did, but we had been so distant for such a long time. I thought he'd die of a heart attack or something like that at some point—after all, he never looked after himself, as you know, but something like this . . . at his age. Why do it at sixty-four? And in such a horrible way, he could have . . . Yes, we'll never know. Now he's gone. . . . Yes. . . . I agree, darling. . . . Yes, you're right. . . . No, leave your brother in peace. It'll be worse. Let him be. He doesn't want to see you. If he didn't want to see you today, he doesn't want to see you ever again. . . . I think so too, but that's how he is. I think you suffer more than he does, darling. . . . Yes, I know. But let's not talk about it now, okay? Come here, let your mother give you a kiss. . . . They let you pay for the service in four installments. This funeral parlor is good. We'll put it all down on paper afterward. Look, here comes Ronaldo. I'm so happy with him. You have to come visit us. . . . Yes, it's near Assis Brasil. São Paulo isn't so far. It's just a hop, skip, and a jump. You should come more often. Okay? Come visit your mother more. Ronaldo, this is my eldest.

*
Yeah, he taught here until six weeks ago. He started in 2004 and was here for almost three years. . . . No, he's very professional, you can be sure of that. Keeps to himself. But very professional. Does he want to teach there? But what's he doing in Garopaba? . . . He told me he was leaving Porto Alegre, but he didn't say where he was going. He gave me a month's notice. His dad killed himself at the beginning of the year. . . . Pretty heavy shit. But tell me, what's your new pool like? . . . Fuckin' amazing? Have you bought lane lines yet? Milton's got a supplier in Florianópolis. He called me here once, said his price is good. I'll e-mail you the guy's contact details afterward. . . . You've got to get word out there, otherwise people won't come. Maybe you could have unstructured morning sessions for people who want to do longer swims. Think of something to get the athletes in. . . . Yep, to make money, you've got to offer lessons at set times. Have they asked you to heat the water? . . .Eighty degrees? Hahaha. You're crazy, man. They're going to ask you to heat it every day. You'll have to raise the temperature. . . . Doesn't make any difference, you'll have to bump it up. First it'll be an old guy who won't get in the water, then a mother who doesn't want her kid to get cold, then everyone'll be wanting warm water. People want warm water. I keep it at eighty-six, but I tell people it's eighty-two. . . . Look, like I said, he's very professional. He knows a lot. He was the one who coached Pérsio in 2007, when he won practically everything. And he's a good athlete too. He did the Ironman in Hawaii. He did well in the qualifier but didn't do a good time in the event itself. He had some kind of meltdown halfway through. You know, the kind of guy who doesn't have much of a competitive spirit? He does better times in training than in competition. But he's an awesome swimmer. Best style I've ever seen. . . . He keeps to himself. I had a problem with him once, but I ended up keeping him because the students asked me to. We were changing our approach to lessons to make them more fun. We started implementing games and music and stuff. It's where things are going nowadays. And there was this whole recycling process for the instructors to make the lessons more interesting. Today they're all on friendlier terms with the students. We encouraged it. We paid for them all to do a course in playful sports instruction, which is our approach here. It's important in keeping enrollments up and really boosted our number of students. Music pumping, rankings, everything turns into a game. But at the time I had a problem with him 'cause he refused to take the course. He told me to my face that he thought it was bullshit. And that put me in a difficult spot 'cause I couldn't make an exception just for him. I ended up confronting him, and he told me he was a swimming instructor, not a clown. Things got heated, and I had to fire him. . . . But less than a week later students started coming to management asking about him, asking for him to come back. I made up an excuse, 'cause at that stage it didn't really matter, but the next month we found out that four or five students had left because of him. . . . They wanted lessons with him and no one else. And then the whole story got out, and lots of people took his side. We discovered they absolutely loved him, but no one here in management had any idea 'cause you'd see the guy teaching and he was always kind of scowling, correcting everyone all the time. He's a bit harsh. . . . Yeah, it was funny. Watching him from a distance, it looked like he never talked to anyone, that he was just there to do his job. I thought everyone hated the guy. Then a student of ours came along, Tatanka—You know Tatanka? True, he surfs, he's always around, true. So anyway, Tatanka told me that thanks to him, he discovered that he swam all wrong. He'd been here for years, and no instructor had ever corrected him properly, then he showed up and gave him two months of technique, and Tatanka's times dropped way down, and he made it to the podium in the Torres Swim. There were also some girls who told Maíra, another instructor of ours, that they only swam at our gym because of him. They liked his presence. . . . That's what they said. They liked his presence. Whatever the fuck that's supposed to mean. . . . He broke up with a girl about two years ago. I think he's more of a doer than a talker. . . . Right. Something like that. . . . Anyway, the upshot is that I went and asked him to come back. He did, there were no hard feelings, he stayed another two years, until the month before last. We make fun of him because he doesn't remember people's faces. Did he tell you that? . . . Ask him, it's no bullshit, he's got a really rare memory problem. I think it has something to do with the way he comes across. . . . You'll have to see if he fits the profile of what you're looking for. People here really liked him. I'm the one who didn't really get along with him . . . he doesn't open up much. I don't really hit it off with people like that. But here's the thing, Saucepan. The guy's good. Always up to date. A fucking good instructor, seriously. You can count on it. And don't forget: warm water and music pumping.

*
I appeared in a corridor, unmoving and suspended in the air, and I couldn't feel my own body. I could see my body, but it was as if it didn't belong to me. Then on my right I saw a room with a large table made of dark wood and four chairs, two on each side, with a window at one end. The room was very white, with dark floorboards and a very high ceiling. It was night, and I saw you sitting with your back to me, in black pants and a shirt, with your hair recently cut, and clean-shaven. You looked behind you, as if you could feel my presence but couldn't see me. In the dream I was afraid of being discovered, because I knew that shortly I was going to witness something important. Then at the same time, a man appeared sitting in front of you, and another standing on the left. The man sitting in front of you was a stranger, and I didn't know what you were talking about, because you were communicating telepathically. But the man on the left was communicating with me telepathically and told me that he was your brother and your guardian. At that moment, my astral body very quickly went up a staircase on the right to a corridor, and an intuitive force made me find an envelope hidden in a crack in the wall. The envelope had a wad of banknotes and a kind of dossier that said who you were. It had everything about you. The dossier said that you are a mysterious creature who has already lived many lives and knows it. When I returned to the room, you had disappeared along with the two men. At this moment I was immediately transported to another scenario: a rotting wooden deck outside the house that was falling to pieces. I saw a marshy lake surrounded by forest. An unknown woman, tall, brunette, passed me without a word, entered the murky water, and vanished. Then I woke up, and the first thing I thought was that you were a vampire. I don't think you're going to admit it, you may not even be aware of it, but there's a reason why you don't know it or deny it, and one day I'm going to explain it all to you.