Our mission is engulfed in flames. The searing red and orange eats away at everything I have ever known.
My eyes burn.
Macaco tells me what I must do. He helps me position the stock against my cheek. My heart knocks against my chest and the aching makes the whole world spin. Ants are crawling up my legs and the heat from the fire is sharp. I hold the gun. I feel the metal of the trigger cold against my fingertip. I feel the muzzle of Macaco’s gun press at my temple. Bright stars explode in front of me.
Pó
AFTER FATIMA TOOK her last breath, Machinga and Vasco left for the flat lands. It would take them days.
Ezequiel and I were alone at the top of the mountain. I awoke one morning feeling strong and well. I could see my future laid out in front of me like a clear path. We would start a new life far away from the men who chased after Zeca and infected his mind. I felt free making my way down the side of the mountain. I knew every inch of cliff and rock and shrub. I bathed under the waterfall and I waited for Ezequiel there.
I plunged into the pool and swam to the bottom, the water swirling around my legs and thighs, my breasts and neck. I shot up to the surface to take in a greedy gulp of air. I dove down once again, slicing through reeds at the bottom. I did not hear the distant whirr of helicopters, the rush of soldiers cutting through jungle to climb the mountain.
I wound my way up the mountain path.
In the distance I could see smoke rising from the village. Ezequiel had been gone when I left and now he’d returned, I thought. As I got closer, though, I saw that one of our huts was on fire.
“Ezequiel!” I called, running towards the flames. Between two huts a soldier appeared, followed by another. I looked behind me and saw two other men. I was trapped.
“Where is Ezequiel?” I yelled as two of the soldiers grabbed hold of my arms. I recognized one of them as the man who had been driving the car in Beira, the one who had frightened Ezequiel into silence. He lowered a stick, its tip wrapped in one of Fatima’s saris. The smell of burning petrol made my mouth taste like metal. He set fire to Machinga and Vasco’s hut. I tugged. The men behind me held tight.
Through a wall of smoke, another soldier emerged. He came down the path from our hut. He held a rifle. One of his legs was shorter than the other. His eyes were golden.
“Do you know who I am?” he said, before coughing into a handkerchief. He opened his hand and revealed Ezequiel’s harmonica. “We saw Zeca in Beira…we asked around. The optometrist, the landlord of the Grande Hotel, a man by the name of Fulvio. Which led us to Padre Theuns, a most disagreeable man of God.” He studied me. “What is your name?” His breath smelled like a dead animal was living inside his gut.
I would not give him my name and I would not look down at the ground. I locked him in a gaze. Shamed him.
He brought the back of his hand to my face, dragged his knuckle across my cheek. “So pale. So beautifully white,” he said. “Are you a woman or are you a ghost?”
I pressed my lips tight and stared into his lion eyes. I wanted to take a bite out of the man standing in front of me.
“Perhaps we can help each other,” he said, pressing the length of his rifle’s barrel across my neck. The other soldiers held my arms by my side.
I struggled to stay up. My legs were beginning to buckle.
The soldiers dragged me across the clearing and held me down against the grinding stone. My body seized up. I was unable to move, unable to resist, unable to cry out. No sound, except for the faint notes of Abák’s lullaby, the song I hummed over and over, the words growing clearer, my voice growing louder.
“Turn around!” I heard the man say. The men pinned me down before looking away. The man’s weight pressed down on me.
The sun tried to break through the dark clouds. I saw the vultures circling the sky. My body shifted in the air and I looked down at the woman who remained in my body, held down against the grinding stone. I sang my song and let the breezes caress my skin. The lion man rammed himself against me, going through his motions, grunting like an animal.
From high above, I looked beyond the clearing down the side of Mount Gorongosa. I scanned the shimmering leaves and felt cold. My vision clear, I saw Ezequiel stumbling as he ran down the mountain’s side. It looked as if he were running across the treetops. “Run, Ezequiel!” I was falling out of the sky, slipping back into my flesh and bone.
“Look away,” the man grunted in my ear, pressing down harder, urging himself on. I refused to look away. I wanted him to look at me, to see me and to recognize his own impotence.
The man dug his face into my neck. His lips parted like a rabid dog’s.
“You are a coward.”
He cocked his arm back and punched my stomach. One. Two. Three. With the fourth brutal blow, I felt something tear away from me. I arched my back with the knifing pain.
The man stood back. The other men appeared frightened by what they heard and saw. They backed away from me as a pool of blood puddled beneath me.
Ezequiel
“I HAVE A PROVERB for you.” Papa Gilberto looks up through the crown of the acacia. He sees me sitting on my branch, dressed in my birthday clothing. I am thirteen today. “Are you ready?”
I nod.
But then I am a boy wandering the deserted village, the sound of cicadas drilling away at my brain…
Pó drops to the ground and the soldiers close in around her.
The men laugh, but they have not hurt her. It is me they want. I know I must give myself up to save Pó. As suddenly as this decision is settled, I am uncertain. The Commander has never once shown mercy. If I walk into the clearing and demand they let go of Pó in exchange for my surrender, I know he will kill us both.
Papa Gilberto looks up to the empty sky. Macaco presses his gun to my head. I see Father’s big eyes—forgive me, Father. The bullet strikes.
I run.
My bed is soaked. I grab at the sides of my mattress until my knuckles turn white. I feel pinned down by an animal fear as the world shifts. The grinding of metal comes at me.
My bedroom door is closed. The room is dark.
I need my medication.
I hear voices. I can see him by my door. He is waiting for me…
* * *
“Are we leaving here?” I ask, bursting the yolk with the crust of my bread.
“Filho, listen to me,” he says, clucking his tongue. He scrapes his dinner into a small bowl. “There are no answers hidden here. The flock has left the mission, and it is time to rebuild. Now that you are thirteen I must speak to you as a man.” He nods, urging me to agree. I nod. “I’ve always told you to place one foot in front of the other. One step turns to ten, then a hundred become ten thousand, and you’ll always get to where you have to be. So I’m asking you now, you must look after your mother, do you hear me? I will remain behind to spread the word and rebuild the mission. Not here. I’ll move to the capital, where things are safer.”
“I don’t want to leave you, Papa.”
Papa Gilberto takes hold of my shoulders and presses down. His eyes are dark, his skin like worn leather. He breathes through his nose and I smell sour fruit.
“Listen to me. I have made arrangements for you and your mother.” He kneels down by my chair and presses down my upturned shirt collar. “You’ll leave next week by ship for the capital, and from there you will make your way to your mother’s family in the Netherlands.”
“But this is my home.” I brush his hand away. I smooth my own collar into place.
“This was our home, but you must not fight me. One step will turn to a hundred and more, remember? Never look back. When I have found a new place for us, I will send for you. I will find us the most beautiful place, filho, you’ll see. We will return to where it all began.”
I catch the fear in Papa’s eyes as he cups my ears, his palm so warm. He kisses my forehead.
“You will do as I say,” he says, wedging my hand in his and pulling me out of my chair
. I let him walk me out of the kitchen and down the hallway.
“I’m sorry, Papa.”
His free hand rests on the door handle to his office. It stays there for a few seconds. It is enough time for me to place my hand over his. My fingers nestle between the valleys of his knuckles. I hope he invites me in, and I can lie down on the rug where we will listen to our favourite song and I can write my stories and draw pictures in my book. He’ll let me crouch in the corner to apply polish to his boots and I’ll buff them so fast that I’ll see my face reflected on their surface. He’ll drink his port and perhaps let me take a sip from his glass, and if he sees me suck my lips from its sweetness he’ll pour me my own small amount in a shot glass and we will not tell Mother Anke. We’ll spend the whole night this way and only when the animals go to sleep, the occasional yawn from a monkey or the grunt of a wild pig, will he help me to my bed where I will dream of skipping atop the canopy of trees.
“It’s time to go to bed,” he says, his voice unsteady. My hand slips from his. He steps into his office and closes the door behind him.
* * *
I hold on to the bedroom doorknob to steady myself. I am cold. Papa isn’t here. I open the door.
The basement is dark. A plate is set on the kitchen table. I shuffle over, my slippers tripping on a small rug. I grab on to the back of the couch to regain my balance and make my way to the food. A veil of flies lifts off the canned sardines lined on the plate.
I swallow my pill, sit back in my chair and turn the radio on. Music fills the room. I don’t recognize the song. I am twenty-three and barefoot as I climb the stairs to an airplane.
A snowdrift almost covers the basement window. Hidden this way, I feel safe. A gust shifts the snow, creeping higher up. It is the colour of Pó’s skin—her back—pressed against the glass.
Serafim
MY ROOM IS LITTERED with crumpled balls of paper. Page after page of impotent introductions to an article I need to submit by the end of next week.
I light my last cigarette, toss the pack onto the paper-strewn floor. The air conditioner is broken. I order up chunks of ice to my room. They melt in half an hour. I’ve taken to dipping my facecloth in the cold water and rolling it over my neck and shoulders.
Taking a long drag, I write, Pó was born with albinism, a recessive trait she inherited from her dark-skinned parents. Her skin is bone white, her hair a pale orange shorn close to her head, her eyesight weak.
It’s fuckin’ terrible. Earlier attempts sucked people in with pity. I have to figure this out.
I will not be returning to Brazil. My plane leaves from Beira to Maputo. From there I’m off to Cape Town to begin my new assignment—an investigative piece on worker exploitation in South Africa’s wine-producing area.
Thousands of kilometres separate me from my previous life, if it could be called a life. Distance is simply measured, but time…time grabs ahold of your throat and doesn’t let go.
Under a pale, unimpressive sky, a doctor working with albinos, or PWAs (persons with albinism), explains how misinformation about these people abounds. Locals believe they are ghosts or spirits that cannot be killed. Others believe the birth of an albino child is a curse.
Where am I going with this? Do I open with shock—inform readers that healers entice people to hack off albinos’ limbs to put in magic potions that promise prosperity and cures for what ails them? Or just lay it out there: An albino “set”—ears, tongue, nose, genitals, all four limbs—can sell for as much as $75,000?
It’s what I came to do, lay the facts bare. But that feels like a betrayal.
I switch the lights off. I remove the cap from my eighth or ninth bottle of beer, I’m not sure. The moon’s light spills into my room, a long rectangular strip across the floor.
I am under no illusion about why writing this piece is so important to me. I have shed the guilt that I am using Pó’s life to provide meaning to my own. I am writing it for me. It’s all I have.
“What is it you want from me?” I ask out loud, and like a match striking its strip, I think I have an answer. The recordings and the transcripts I have made of Pó are an intimate invitation to experience this world through her recollections. Unencumbered. Raw. The question What for? comes back at me.
I flick my cigarette over the balcony, orange ember spinning.
I don’t know how this story will end. But I know how it began.
I press my pencil to paper, write They are called children of the moon.
Pó
OPHELIA SNUCK OUT from the hotel in her pink tracksuit three days ago and has not been seen since.
Early this morning the women did not sweep or wash their clothes in the dirty water in the deep end of the pool. The men failed to gather and smoke cigarettes while playing cards or tending their tiny gardens. I did not wake up to the smell of burning coal in the hallways or the echo of children running along the corridors. Whenever one of the residents of the Grande Hotel goes missing all the squatters at the hotel go into hiding. They bar themselves in for two or three days. I understand their fear because I share it. It is a disease. Contagious.
Amalia enters and runs into my arms. Her worries are deadened in my shuka.
“Ophelia has not returned,” she says.
“I will go find her, filha.” I reassure Amalia with words.
I will not wait until the morning. I will go to the police station now and ask about Ophelia’s whereabouts. They must be aware a child has gone missing. I never enjoy these visits. I struggle with the first steps. For two days, I have kept to my bed. There is not much more to give. But I must go. They will hold their breath when I enter the station, afraid they will breathe in my spirit. I use their fear to push my demands. Missing people often go unreported. The police ignore them. They will discuss things amongst themselves but they will not look at me.
Night seeps into the room while Amalia tinkers with the broken record player. She wants to get outside again, but I ask her to stay close by. Sitting by my lantern, she bites her tongue in concentration. It appears in the corner of her mouth, swollen, as she fiddles with screws and springs. A week ago, she dismantled the back of the box and is fitting the pieces back together. She is relentless. It will serve her well.
I miss Serafim’s company. He jotted down his last scribble and left, walked away with my story.
There is a flash to the left of the hotel. It is not lightning. I catch the flare falling down. The sparkle of the tail reminds me of a shooting star. A couple of gunshots and faint cries from revellers. Often nights are filled with city noises, festivals and street parties that have been repeated for hundreds of years. No one knows when they began or why. No one cares.
The voices move along the shore, rising and fading as the wind changes direction. Honking car horns fill the night, and beams of light scan the beach and the shore before shooting up into the dark sky.
“Stay here, Amalia. Do not leave.”
I place a blanket over my shoulders and slip into my boots. Amalia continues to busy herself with the record player.
In the hallway, I hear the sounds of hotel life. I pick up a child’s wail seeping under a door. To my right, a man shouts obscenities. Using the walls for balance, I step carefully down the staircase. It is dark but I make my way through the entrance and into the hotel grounds. I exhale.
It has been months sinceI find the strength to turn I set foot among the small patches of garden and the busted concrete that once surrounded the pool. I look around. I raise my shuka to cover my head and part of my face.
* * *
—
The police station is an ugly place. Stagnant smells of sweat, cigarettes, and old paper have seeped into these walls and stained them the colour of a smoker’s fingers. A ceiling fan cools the area above the front counter.
“I want to file a report,” I say, while trying to catch my breath.
Three men are laughing over something on one of their cellphones. Their shirts cling to their
backs.
I rap my knuckles on the counter. There is no need to say anything more. They all look up and then look away. It is clear from their hushed discussion that they are figuring out who will have the unpleasant task of dealing with a branca.
A young officer, traced circles under his armpits, approaches. The other two take their chairs behind their desks, pretending they are busy with official work.
“What is it?”
“A girl has gone missing. I’d like to report—”
“Girls go missing all the time. You should keep better watch over them, Senhora.”
I let the shuka slip down to my shoulders.
The officer looks back for support, a desperate hope, I think, for someone to intercede and dispatch me.
I will not be sent away so easily. Their eyes avoid mine.
“Her name is Ophelia. She is fifteen and—”
“Girls at that age are like cats in heat.” The young officer is amused with himself. When he does not hear his fellow officers chime in, his cheek begins to twitch. “Go home. She’ll return soon.” The officer looks down at some paperwork, then at his wristwatch. He does not look at me. Drops of sweat sit on his brow. He mops his face with a handkerchief he keeps tucked in his fist.
“You must look for her.”
“And where should we begin looking? The music festival does not end until morning and the streets are crowded with people.”
“What interests me is finding Ophelia,” I say, but it’s a struggle to finish the sentence.
“Come back tomorrow. Your daughter is probably in the arms of a young man, finding some relief—”
“I will not move from this place.”
“Well then, you can stand there all night because—”
“Ramlosa!” A deep voice fills the room. A strapping man I did not see sitting behind a computer screen stands. He approaches the counter. “I am Magassela, the new captain here. This is my precinct and I’d like to apologize for the constable. There is a lot the young must still learn. Now, when did you last see the young woman? Can you describe her to me?”
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