Black Lies, Red Blood

Fifteen

Itaberaba-Portal da Chapada, it said on the wall of the bus station. Gateway to the inferno might be more like it, thought Anders Brant.

For an hour he had fought with flies, stared blankly at the blaring TV, had a cup of overly sweet coffee, and turned down several taxi drivers.

He should have taken the first offer, but indecisively lingered at the station. The trip had taken four and a half hours, and once at his destination he felt mostly like getting on the first available bus back.

He was sweaty and strangely irritated at the people around him. He found himself looking for faults: one was too fat, another had ridiculously ugly clothes, and the third was talking nonsense. This behavior was quite unlike him.

He was usually not easily annoyed. If anything he was tolerant of people’s ideas and ingenuity, but now he felt as if the whole city, the bus station anyway, was one big taunt.

He had been in Chapada before, stayed at a hippie-influenced guest house in Lençóis and from there went out on various adventures, hiked in the mountains, rode a spavined horse during a three-day tour with a guide who talked about sex most of the time, and rafted down a river together with three Dutch women, all of it pleasurable and exciting. He liked Chapada, but not this time.

Now there were no outdoor arrangements waiting. The anguish made him sweat even more. He had a second cup of coffee. The man behind the counter asked what bus he was waiting for.

Anders Brant only shook his head and pretended not to understand, but realized that as a gringo he stood out, all the more so as he did not seem to be on his way anywhere, but hung around like a homeless person trying to pass the time.

He went up to the wastebasket, threw away his plastic mug, and decided it could not wait. Going back with unfinished business would be both silly and irresponsible.

He had prepared what he would say. In his money belt was an envelope with cash. When he left the bus station it was with a feeling of fateful distress, as if he could not have done this any other way, at least that’s what he told himself. There had really been no choice, everything had worked toward this ignominious end.

Obviously there had been a choice at one time, he could have left the place, even after they established contact and started exchanging small talk in that way Brazilian women are so good at, demure and flirtatious at the same time. But he wanted to hear the music group that would appear an hour or so later and decided to wait. In the interim he could just as well pass the time with a little company. She introduced herself as Vanessa. He ordered a beer, which they shared, and then another.

If he had left the concert and instead taken the last ferry back to the island, then he would not need to go back to Itaberaba like a scoundrel, with words and money ready, but without honor. You got horny, it was that simple, admit it, you idiot, he thought, heading for the first available taxi. I should have gone home, given myself a hand job and woken up at sunrise, sober and free.

The taxi ride was short, maybe fifteen blocks or so. It cost 8 reais. Brant gave him ten, got out of the car with sweat running down his forehead, and headed for the blue-painted house with the light red wall she had described.

A few children were playing on the street. A gas peddler pulled his cart as he called out that he was in the neighborhood. Anders Brant looked around in hope of finding something, a sign that would give him a chance to leave the field. Maybe Vanessa might come walking with a guy at her side? Then he could sneak away behind the ice cream seller’s hut, observe them, let him give her a passionate kiss, which could not be misunderstood, before he continued up the street. He would wave at the man and then disappear through the gate to the blue house.

Fantasies! But could he simply, untruthfully make up a man? A rival. Go back to Salvador and then from Sweden write a letter, filled with anguish and injured fury.

Give up! Vanessa is a good woman and you’re a childish prick. Go up to the gate now and ring the bell, don’t tell her everything, but enough. Offer her support, money, whatever, to make things easier and smooth. Give her everything except your faithfulness and love. Give her betrayal. Then flee. Fight back the disgust and bad conscience, keep building on the myth of Anders Brant, the unreliable Swede, who for twenty years never paid for sex or even started a relationship on all his travels in Third World countries. On the contrary, he had maintained, with a type of moral superiority, that it would be cruel and unjust.

The men, Scandinavians, Germans, Americans, or wherever they came from, who with the power of the dollar bought sex and temporary intimacy, for a day, a week, a vacation, to feel like kings, with their cocks as a scepter, left devastated women and a sick system behind them, a prostitution economy.

Vanessa was no whore, and he was no traditional john. They had not met with a business transaction as starting point, there had been genuine attraction and sincere joy, perhaps love. He did not know whether he was in love or if he was only a victim of the Western middle-aged man’s need to feel potent and desirable.

He could not see a life together with Vanessa, it was that simple. She had many good qualities, she was beautiful as a dream and easy to be around, in short, an amazing woman, but still there was no future for the two of them. She could see a future, but he could not.

Of course he had asked himself why, but could not formulate an explanation that was entirely convincing. So how could he convince her?

It was more a feeling of inequality. He would always be the stronger one, the one with money, and above all the one who had a possibility to leave. Then, when he did leave, and he would sooner or later, he would leave a Vanessa with considerably worse opportunities than she had today. She was twenty-nine, talked about children, inconceivable for him. He was fifteen years older and could not imagine becoming a father at that age. Besides, it was doubtful whether he had the purely physical prerequisites. During the last two years of a five-year relationship with a woman they had tried to have a child, but failed. Two years later she was pregnant by another man and now had four children, no fertility problems there.

Were those only excuses to be able to flee with honor intact, albeit somewhat tarnished? No, he answered himself.

He did not want to give up his independence and he did not want to tie Vanessa down in a relationship, it was that simple. There was nothing chauvinistic about this, he maintained, on the contrary it was an expression of concern for her.

He still felt like a traitor.

The bell rang. If only she weren’t at home, he thought before the door opened. First surprise on her face, which quickly changed into a broad smile. He tried to smile.

She ran up to the gate. He adjusted the money belt.