The Painting of Porcupine City (36 page)

“I miss his mom too.” I took a deep breath and blinked fast.

“Have you been staying at the apartment? I hope Robbie and my dad didn’t leave too much of a mess. Thanks for letting them in, by the way.”

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it. Yeah, I’ve been staying here.”

“I wondered if you would’ve been staying at Mateo’s.”

“He and I aren’t really—involved anymore.”

“Oh. I’m sorry, Bradford. I wondered, when I didn’t see him at the funeral.”

“He’s in Brazil. I talked to his landlady.”

“Oh. Brazil?” There was a mechanical, uninterested quality to it I would’ve resented under other circumstances, but I knew Jamar had bigger things to worry about than my failed relationships.

“So do you think you’ll be coming back here?” I said. “I mean like ever? Will you live here at the apartment again?”

“I hope so. I want to. I want to come back soon, actually.”

“Really?”

“I don’t want you to have to move out. Or replace me.”

“I could swing the rent for a few months by myself. If you need time.”

“No. My parents have been awesome, but— If I stay too long I’ll never leave. I want to leave before I get into a routine here. Or get too dependent. Does that make sense? And I want to be at Cara’s house. I want Caleb to be around her things. Is that morbid?”

“No. It’ll be good to have you back.”

“Do you mean that?”

“Jamar, it’s so quiet here.”

Mateo got up and went

to the living room to poke his finger into the birdcage and found the little food tray that clipped to the inside bars empty. There must be seed around here, he thought, and he found it in the second drawer of the bureau on which the television stood. He unlatched the cage door, careful to block it with this other hand to keep the birds from flying out, and shook some tiny yellow seeds into the tray. The birds peeped in offense, hovering near the top of the cage, and then, when he’d withdrawn the box and closed the door, they flew to the tray, peeping and nodding into the seed.

“Be careful not to let them out,” his mother said as she came through the door. She was wearing her white nurse’s shoes and purple scrubs. She put her bag on the couch and went in the kitchen. Mateo heard the refrigerator door open.

“I didn’t,” he said. “Are you home already?”

“My short day,” she said, returning to the living room sipping a glass of juice. “They’re pretty, no?”

“When did you get them?”

«My last birthday. Your father bought me one.»

«Just one?»

“One, and he just sat there. He didn’t sing. And we said,
What good’s a bird who doesn’t sing?
”

“Heh. He was lonely.”

“He
was
lonely. A week later your father came home with a little paper box and said,
Here’s the other half.
”

“Did they sing then?”

“You have ears,” she said, waving at the cage. «They don’t shut up!»

“It’s nice.”

“It
is
nice. And the weather is nice today too.” She finished her juice and was quiet a minute while they watched the birds knock seed out of the tray. Then Sabina said, «Put on your shoes.»

They walked slowly down Rua Giacomo, past the dragons and the flame-maned horses, past Edilson’s new smiling motorcycle, past the purple waves and the googly-eyed jaguar, past the dancing woman with the skirt made of jungle, and all the way past the planet Saturn.

“Edilson got big,” Mateo said.

“Well, he grew up,” Sabina said. “They say he’s going with Olive. Do you remember Olive?”

“Sure. Tiago’s sister.”

“She’s
much
too old for him.”

“He paints like he’s thirty.”

“Hm. He may paint like he’s thirty but if he’s not careful his little ding-dong will make him a papai at sixteen.”

“Mom.”

She smiled. “Remember when your cousin was with Olive? Aye!”

“He seems pretty happy with Aline.”

“For today. We’ll see about tomorrow. So many different people to meet in this city and these kids just keep dating each other.”

“Heh.”

They walked further along the arc of the S that was their neighborhood. A moto-taxi went by, then a scooter. A scrawny yellow dog barked at the scooter. They passed an underwater sunset.

Sabina said, “Vinicius says you have a little bird of your own up in Boston?”

It took him a moment to realize what she meant and when he did he blushed. “Kind of.”

“Well that’s good,” she said, nodding. «Does he make you sing?»

“He did. I showed him everything, all of it. And in the beginning it felt like I was showing him a whole new world or something and he seemed so open to it. But then I don’t know what happened. He hurt me pretty bad, right before I came here. Think maybe I’ve been hurting him longer than that, though.”

“Ah.” It made her sad to know that he had come home to get away, and not simply to be home. But then it was a relief, too, to know that when he was hurt he wanted to be near her, still, even though he was a man now.

«It’s complicated,» he said.

«Very. Yes.»

“I told him once about how I ended up in the States again. About how you sent me to live at Marjorie’s.”

“Oh?”

“He was amazed that you could do that, send me to live with someone who caused you such sadness. He was pretty impressed.”

“She caused me no sadness.
She
wasn’t unfaithful.”

“I guess.”

She shrugged, moved some hair out of her eyes. “Has it been good for you? To be there?”

“Yes.”

“You answer so fast. Then I did the right thing.”

“It was a big thing.”

“Well you always have to make the best of a bad thing. Could I have left your father? Yes. For a while I wanted to. But I married a man, not an angel. You have to always remember the difference.”

Thinking of the difference, and of the strange place in between, he said, “I’ve seen Tiago.”

“Oh?”

“A couple times. He looks good.”

“He’s always had that in his favor.”

“Heh.”

“But Tiago has—troubles,” she said.

“...What kind of troubles?”

“Well.” She shrugged, apparently unwilling to go through the door she’d opened. “They say he goes with—older men. And the men give him things in return.”

“They say that, huh?
Who
says that?”

“The kids.”

“Vinicius?”

“Olivia, sometimes, when she and Vinicius fight. She says that Vinicius goes off with Tiago and that’s what they do. I think—well.”

“Tiago does what he has to do. His parents were not like you and Dad when they found out. His parents never even cared enough to put an H in his name and it was downhill from there. Everything he has he’s gotten by himself. He’s never kept anything from me. I always knew. Always.”

“I know.” She could see that he was angry and she wanted to touch him, hold him. Instead she said, to change the subject, “Did you see, a while ago, in a magazine they had new pictures of the Moon, of the landing place? Somehow they had a camera in space and you could see, very very tiny,” she held up her pinched fingers at the sky and squinted, “the footprints, the flag of America, the piece of the gold spaceship they left behind.”

“I didn’t see that, no.”

She grinned. “I looked for an hour.”

And he said, “Do you know some people don’t believe humans have ever really been to the Moon? They say it’s just a sham, that the landing was filmed on a stage in Arizona or something.” He was still feeling angry and he added, “Their evidence is compelling. Sometimes I really wonder.”

“I have heard that.” She touched her chest, as though newly appalled by the old idea. “I believe because I’ve seen pictures and read newspapers and because I watched it on the TV when it was happening. But if none of this proof existed I would still believe.” They passed a shooting star in blue and purple and a satellite rendered in silver; an old explorer’s galleon sailed on the tail of a fiery comet. “I would believe even if there was no evidence. I would believe because it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard, and so I choose to believe. A man on the Moon. A man on the
Moon
, Mateo. Who can possibly benefit from denying such a beautiful thing?”

He was dreaming, and in

his dream he was a can. A person-size can with legs and arms, and his arms ended in hands that were cans. And he was almost finished painting the world. All the continents were done and the oceans were complete, but one obstacle stood in his way. He stood at the bottom of it, at its base, its shadow falling across his glinting metal body. He felt hopeless.

A jab on his shoulder

woke him. He rubbed the spot and rolled over, tugged up the sheet.

«
Psst.
Primo.»

When he looked up Vinicius was standing over the bitch pad, looking down at him. «What are you doing?»

«Get up.» He nudged Mateo again with his flip-flop.

«Shit, V, I have to travel in the morning. Leave me alone.»

«Get
up
.»

“Fuck off.”

Vinicius knew enough English to understand that, and responded accordingly: he seized Mateo’s wrist and dragged him off the pad, Mateo’s bare back squeaking across the tile.

Tiago’s car was waiting outside. They ushered Mateo into the backseat and closed the door. Vinicius went around and got in the passenger side.

«Here,» Tiago said to Mateo, handing back a grease-stained paper bag, «eat these. You’ll need some energy soon.»

Mateo took the bag with two fingers, could tell by the smell it was last night’s manioc fries.

«Not exactly breakfast, I know,» Tiago said. «It’s all I had.»

Mateo said, «Am I being kidnapped?»

Vinicius laughed.

«You guys know I have to be at the airport in the morning, right?»

«We’ll see,» Vini said.

The bullet-proof windshield of Tiago’s armored car made the clicking streetlights look as though they were under water, as though the Volkswagen were a submarine. The reds were more pink, the greens more lime, and everything, through that glass, had the gauzy glow of an old movie.

Mateo ate the cold fries one by one and didn’t ask any more questions until twenty minutes later, when they arrived at the power plant.

«No, primo,» Vini answered with a laugh, «we’re not taking you to the power plant.»

They drove through the parking lot and came out at the back, navigating a pair of bumpy, curving side-roads. From there they continued for a long time down a single-lane dirt access road with the Pinheiros River on one side and two sets of train tracks on the other.

When Tiago stopped the car—when their destination was clear—Mateo stopped chewing, letting the manioc gather in his cheek in a thick paste. Then he carefully swallowed it down as he looked through the bulletproof window up at the Oliveira Bridge.

«We’re here!» Vini exclaimed, turning around, clapping the headrest. Tiago looked up in the rearview and grinned.

The main structure of the Oliveira Bridge was a gigantic X, through the bottom triangle part of which ran two highways, one curving above the other as they split in two directions on the far side of the river.

They got out and stood by the hood of the car, looking up at it. Colored lights at the top, and the glowing suspension cables, and the headlights and taillights of cars moving in both directions across it had the effect of making the whole thing look like a quirky alien spaceship. Mateo half expected it to lift into the air and streak across the navy-blue sky.

«Dedinhos,» Tiago whispered, threading his fingers through Mateo’s and feeling them squeezed gently back, «I can get you inside.»

Mateo let go and took a lurching step forward. Behind him Vini grinned at Tiago, who put a finger to his lips.

“You can get in?” Mateo said.

Tiago slung his arm around him. With his other hand he dug in his pocket and withdrew a key-card, half the width of a credit card and twice as thick. He held it out and Mateo took it.

«How’d you get this?»

«You asked me to find your heaven spot,» Tiago said casually, though anyone could see he was practically bursting. He took Mateo’s hand again. «Let’s go in. C’mon, V.»

They walked to the nearest of the structure’s two bases, the first of the surprisingly delicate concrete feet of the X. The highways rumbled like constant thunder high above their heads.

«Didn’t know there was an entrance at the bottom,» Mateo said.

They noticed how he seemed to inspect the gray door, bumping the heel of his hand against it and examining the control pad before sliding the key through.

When the door beeped and let them in Vini clapped Tiago’s shoulder and mouthed:
We’ve got him.

They noticed how he memorized the large room beyond the door—part vestibule, part storage shed for highway equipment. He walked around the perimeter and stood in the middle and looked up at the harsh fluorescent light and then down at the concrete floor, as if orienting the place in his mind.

They noticed how carefully he proceeded to the back of the vestibule, as if counting the paces to the first steps of the metal staircase. They noticed how he thumped his sneaker against it before taking the first step.

Delighted, they thought he was savoring it.

He was learning it.

Mateo and Vini slid open

the heavy door on its dusty steel tracks, while Tiago kept one hand firmly through each of their belts in case a rush of wind tried to suck them out. But it didn’t, and when they had the door slid to an opening of about a meter, they stopped, and stood, and stared.

They could see the sparkling Pinheiros in the first light of dawn, and the buildings and hotels beyond it, and on the outskirts the favelas huddling against the city. The slums had a discordant beauty in this light.

«Wow,» whispered Tiago.

«Wow,» said Vinicius.

«It is pretty,» Mateo admitted.

«I wanted to give this to you, Dedinhos,» Tiago said, lacing his fingers through Mateo’s hair. «You asked me to find you a heaven spot and I don’t know how I’d ever do better than this.»