What Can I Do When Everything's On Fire?: A Novel by António Lobo Antunes Page A

devil are you bringing me Judite?
    lighted up by the flaming oil of the wine, the shadow of his hand gobbled up by the shadow of the glass, Cristina’s father would have received Carlos in a proper way, come in, come in, her mother would have bustled about him, have a seat, his fluttering eyes taking us both in, don’t whisper to me again that you write to him Cristina, don’t invite me to your birthday party, don’t talk to me anymore, they would have him to dinner, serve him first, if I could have spied from the street I’d have noticed the starched curtains and their stretching out their necks to avoid spilling the soup, the flowers you brought all wrapped in cellophane in the center of the table while what I give you are my father, the café, the whole neighborhood, I was on the verge of tears
    —For heaven’s sake will you leave my fiancé alone
    you in the boardinghouse moaning on the pillow
    —You’ve got to give me time to get used to you
    if I was Cristina you wouldn’t need time to get used to me, something about her that I don’t have
    let me have the bottle, father, don’t pretend to be scandalized, be quiet, let me have the bottle
    a Gypsy woman coming from the river with two buckets, walking like a crow, they cut the feathers off their clothes and they walk on the ground, incapable of flying, at night the whinnying would make me restless, and make the waves restless, running fingernails over the body with a shudder of pine trees until the wind or the blood of the Lamb make openings I don’t dare peep through and never peeped through, your apologetic smile which would go out if I blew on it, poor Carlos and you
    —I’m not capable Judite
    the wind and the blood of the Lamb shouting inside me, I’m forty-four years old and everything’s dead, finished, my son at the door, bigger than I am, and since I don’t recognize him I don’t let him in, your son Carlos because I was thinking about you when the clerk in São João da Caparica was refusing my money
    —Don’t worry about paying we’ve got plenty of time to settle our accounts, girl
    you went with me by the post office and the houses with outside lights and it was you I was going with, Carlos, not him, with you, there was a warehouse or a garage and behind the garage a chicken coop, rubble and chicken droppings, the clerk closed the screen door and that dull peace, those feathers in my mouth, an old man hoeing weeds and the blade was slicing me, cutting me, emptying me out of what I have
    I don’t even have a core, don’t push me I’ll lie down, don’t break me I’m ready, don’t cover my mouth I won’t say anything, don’t worry I won’t report you and he said
    —Your husband never gave you anything, right?
    I was remembering the pearl tiara, that dull peace, those feathers in my mouth
    —Of course he did don’t be silly
    he didn’t believe me, scraping the ground with his shoes
    he looked like just one more hen but he wasn’t, the pail of corn, the trough of water
    —In that case it’s time to settle accounts, girl
    the day my father died the Jehovah’s Witnesses were singing and I was in the pew listening to them, vengeance is mine proclaimed the Lord because my God is a jealous God, dozens of candles on the stove, on the bureau, a drop of wax running down his face and right afterward the shadow of his hand in the shadow of the walnut tree
    —What kind of devil are you bringing me Judite?
    on Sundays without wine he’d spy on me from the washstand while I dried myself, eyes on my breasts and my thighs, pulling on my towel, at the moment when some part of him was meeting some part of me a hesitation, a pause, my mother as her eyes grew weak
    —Floriano
    and he on his knees on the damp cement hugging my waist
    —I’m a wretch forgive me
    his pockets stuffed with nails that he was using to make his coffin behind the house, I remember the holes in the lid so that he wouldn’t suffocate underground, his mouth