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(Lisa & Vadinho)
Current days
The grip on Vadinho's hand prevents me from falling over, in this somber abyss that devours me in a single mouth... That's how I feel, as soon as Dr. Rubem finishes talking to me while closing my medical chart.
“This Glioblastoma is a metastatic brain tumor from the cancerous cells of your breast. After the biopsy, we could diagnose that it is inoperable, all we can do is to treat it with the medications and therapies proposed andthe effects that it can cause. I will not be frivolous to give you false hopes, Lisa, we are facing a grade IV tumor in the basilar region, rooted and very voracious, unfortunately in this case, the time is against us.”
“How much time have we got, doctor?”– Vadinho, my husband, asks the doctor in a whisper.
"It's hard to be precise, but maybe a maximum of three months, we'll do a radiotherapy treatment trying to slow down the metastasis and soften the disease.”
While my husband discusses with the doctor the possibility of an error in the diagnosis and thinks aboutall the solutions that have already been discovered for the inexorable, I could only think of a word that was pounding in my mind, as if it was slapping my face:
"Inoperable, Inoperable...!"
How long will I be lying on this hospital bed? How many weeks of life do I have left? I look at my almost forty-yearcompanion of journey and think: "Should we have climbed just a little more?"
My love, like a stubborn boy, rubs his hands on his face with tears and loud cries, forgetting that his Navy austerity days have passed, demanding from Dr. Rubem an effective solution to my problem, as if in a magic trick, the doctor would take a brand-new brain out of his pocket for me. Chemotherapy, spiritual surgeries, holistic therapies, even experimental treatments in New York, obviously at the expense of squandering all our economies, all sorts of possibilities arise in this conversation without a beginning, middle and end, I look silently at my husband and my doctor, in a ping pong of responsibilities about my "near death", until I decide to end this torture, waking them from this delirium in a tone of voice almost like a scream:
“It’s enough! I got it. Vadinho, I'm very tired, leave me alone.”
They both stare with wide eyes in a sepulchral silence, I take advantage of the brief seconds of peace to find the air that I lack and breathe deep, ashamed to lose control. Finally, I ask my love, sweet and bland, just a few more moments of sanity.
"Honey, let your Lisa rest a little, I'm exhausted, go home, explain everything to the children, we'll talk tomorrow."
Before he startsimploringto stay with me in the hospital all night, I lie down on the bed, and close my eyes, pretending that I have been overcome by the tiredness.Nobody says anything, only Vadinho's clear throat denounces that I am not aloneyet.After a while I hear that the door has been closing slowly and I no longer must play the role of the fearless woman who fights against death, so I cry quietly, terrified of the uncertain days that are coming.
I look through my room window, one more day is starting; the sun is rising imperiously, as if it is telling me in its sarcasm that indifferent to me, the hours will continue to pass and the world to spin.Nothing, absolutely nothing, will change because I'm dying.
I wake up from my philosophymoment with the arrival of Valeria, the nurse who normally takes care of me, she is a brunette middle-aged woman, just arrived from Paraiba, I like to talk to her, she is a positive and good person - like me, but today her exhilarating joy is a bit at odds with my state of mind. She gives me a good day out on those of tour leader and I mumble an almost inaudible response, without the least mood to face my routine: oral and intravenous medication, do my physiological needs, then shower, brush my teeth, comb my hair, try to take all the "diversified" on the hospital breakfast and finally, wait for the medical staff to come and visit me saying the same things I'm already tired of hearing: "Your case is still serious but stable", blah blah blah. Valeria smiles and claps her palms when she realizes that I am apathetic, pushing the sheet that covers me.
"Come on Mrs. Lisa, no problem, you know everything you have to do: showering, combing hair.”– And shewhispers, partially hiding her mouth with her hands, forgetting that we are alone –“I havea lipstick and blush in my bag, I think a little color in your little face would fit well.”
I give her a half-smudged smile and I rose more slowly than usual, because every day that passes my headaches and dizziness has only increased, but I can erect my column, without surrendering myself to the effects that this cursed tumor is afflicting my body and I march to the bathroom to do my tasks.
I linger in the shower more than usual, enjoying the sensation of the water beneath my skin;I dry myself, brush my teeth, and comb my long curly and still full hair, with care. I watch my eyes full of brightness, the opposite of my pail skin, and I think: Why do I have to be ugly? Oh, I forgot, is it because I'm in my last days? But people are not forced to endure my sloth just because a fucking little tumor decided to take root into my head. I smile as I stare at the brunette girl with big black eyes in front of the mirror and, from my silly smile, I burst into an uncontrollable laugh, totally out of context, but it still makes me strangely feel full of life, andbrightlikea flame at the fire. Valeria knocks on the bathroom door worried about my delay and in the middle of my crisis of laughter; I make a great effort to authorize her entry.
"Are you all right, Mrs. Lisa?"
“Of course not, as my grandmother used to say, this life is really complicated, just like politician.”
"And do you understand anything about politician, Mrs. Lisa?"
"No way. But I know it’s really complicated."
Valeria puts her hand on her fat belly tryingnot to laugh, and I laugh and cry at the same time,like a hysteric.At this time, I remember about my boys, I know that they are two thirty-eight-year-old men but, for me, they are still my little boys.
"I do not know how Vadinho is going to give this news to the boys, right now that they were starting to breathe in relief, after my breast cancer surgery. And now, this damned tumor comes back from hell to mess up my life.”
"I believe in miracles, Mrs. Lisa, why do not you pray to Our Lady of the Conception? I have faith that she can heal you.”
I dry my face thinking that curiously we are never prepared to deal with the ephemerality of our day and I agree with Valeria, as if my answer, even if she does not know it, was a kind of consolation.
"I'll do it, who knows?"
The afternoon falls and my room begins to be empty slowly.Today,so many people entered and left here that I could not even count: Romulo and Reginald, my two children, accompanied by Jacqueline and Daniela, my daughters-in-law "almost daughters";Godofredo, the family lawyer, who was subtly invited to go away, after suggesting to Vadinho that my account in the hospital only increases; two long-time friends of mine, who came to make sure that I’m almost passing on; and even Camile, Romulo's hot "secretary", all of themcame to visit me.
Vadinho waits patiently one by one to go away and sits down beside me, entwining his huge hand in mine, I know what he means, I think even the cold walls of this room know what he wants to say, but I wait him to take a breath and have courage to say what he needs, listening him carefully:
"I do not think it's fair. You cannot give up so easily."
I lift my chin trying not to stare at him, but it's useless, he's still a handsome man, despite his sixty-eight, I cannot resist his short brown hair, his brown skin in a golden tone, and his inviting fleshy lips, I turn my face and he stares at me, making me to give up, gifting me with his provocative whiskey-colored eyes, which until now, even after forty years, make my heart flutter like a fool.
"And do you think I wanted it to be that way? I wanted to become a lively, perverted widow, but that will not be possible. Vadinho, you're going to have to go on without me.”
“No, no and no, Lisa, we can have a second medical opinion, and try a treatment abroad, do alternative therapies, rituals, whatever, but I need todo something. I cannot stay here waiting for the moment this tumor will take youaway from me.”
He gets up from the bed and walks towards the door, so I do not see how devastated he is. It is strange how all those years have passed and my love for this man remained intact, unchanged, although the everyday routine, so many unsaid words, small hurts and frustrations, corrosive and opportunistic, that normally only leave a relationship when it is already all broken.However,if we stay together, they were not strong enough to decimate us with our own feeling. I walk towards him and hug his waist, resting my face on his large back.The warmth of his hand spreads over mine, like a balm, and that is enough.The comforting recognition of our bodies slowly relaxing, our breaths and a silence that instead of bothering, answers almost all our questions: We are going to face all this together, not because I am weak to resist alone, but because there is not, in a full way, I without himor he without me.
"Next month we're going to celebrate forty years marriage." - I say changing the weight from one leg to another, as if we danced a song that only I hear.
“December 23rd, did you think I forget it?”
"I would neverthink anything so mean of you, after all, how many times have you forgotten?"
Even on his back, I know he smiles, certainly remembering the countless times we fought when he committed this "little lapse".
“I'll propose you a deal.”
"I'm listening, Lisa.”
“I will submit to all treatments, therapies, everything you want me to try during this month, even if Dr. Rubem wants to stick an anal catheter inside me, I will gladly accept without complaining, but if after all attempts my tumor does not regress, you will promise me that you will sign a term of responsibility, will take me out of this hospital and travel with me on our last honeymoon, do you accept?”
"It will be like you want, sweetheart."
I turn him to face me and I hand his neck, his eyes are full oftears to imagine that I can leave; He does not want me to go, I do not want to go, but our wishes are like a grain of sand, before the sovereign destiny.
Vadinho raises my chin with his finger and touches his lips on mine, kissing me sweet and softly as a spring breeze. Before my love leaves and so I do not see he cries. I tease him as I have always liked to do.
"It's always good to deal with you, dangerousman."
He puts his face in the door opening, winks at me, and throws a kiss, just like when I first saw him on that dance floor.
CURRENT DAYS –four weeks later
Valeria gives me an Our Lady of the Conception rosary, pressing her lips not to cry.
"Wasn’t you who said you were a strong woman from Paraiba?" – I laugh, not to start crying with her.
"And I am, but I cannot say I will not miss you. Take it; it's just a souvenir, from the heart.”
"Thank you, dear, I'll use it with all my affection, after I return, if I come back, come and visit me, did you save my address?"
"Mrs. Lisa, don’t mention it. Of course, you'll come back.And I'll go to Leblon to see you, the address is right here, it's in my pocket."
Dr. Rubem once again gives me all the instructions he has been giving me since yesterday and then says to Vadinho:
"You have my phone; I will give you the contact of a doctor, a friend of mine, who lives in Holland, if your wife has any intercurrence during the trip he will know how to act. No excesses, Mrs. Lisa, and come back in peace.”
After a month of frustrated treatment, where my tumor resisted in regression, I leave the Onco Care Hospital in Barra da Tijuca, ready to make the biggest trip of my life, my last honeymoon with Vadinho, where we will travel all over Europe by train.
"Ready to go, captain?”
"If I'm with you, I'm going to the end of the world."
"Am I still worth a fight at a dance?"
"Always my hummingbird, always."
Listening to him to call me like that seems the time has not passed since he threw me on his shoulders and pulled me out of that nightclub.
OBA OBA NIGHTCLUB IN IPANEMA – February 1975
I renew my makeup in the huge mirror of the dressing room, with a set of asses behind me, covered only by little sequins of all colors. I arrived from Minas Geraistwo years ago, scared by the immensity of this jungle of people and cars that is Rio de Janeiro, and since then my life is this nightclub: during the week, I practiceexhaustively with the other girls the singing and dancingnumbers, and on weekends we present the Brazilian spectacle, especially for tourists and enthusiasts of the good old pair: samba &mulatas.
I pretend to not hear the gossip of some jealous dancers, who do not settle for, according to them, a girl from Minassinging two songs in the show, and I continue to put thecompact on my face, trying not to melt in the scorching summer of Rio. I hurry to put my wine-colored lipstick on, as soon as I hear the first tap to enter the stage and, on the third, I am ready to rejoice the audience, that, through the opening of the curtain, I can see that it is full.
Even shy, I have always had the dream of singing one day.Music is a visceralfor me, a physiological necessity, like eating, sleeping or drinking water when I'm thirsty; it's natural, it's part of my contradictory, sometimes lyrical, poetic, or protester. I learned it from my father, an army band musician, who loved music. On Sunday mornings, as soon as Mama went to thechurch,I used to sing in secret, accompanied by my father at the piano. While he loved to hear me playing jazz, my heart beat was louder by the boleros, those pungent, sexy, so sad that we can almost see thesinger bleeding heart. After I had made the small slip of losing my virtue with my French teacher, Mama, ashamed by what the people of the city could say, dispatched me to live with my aunt Vanderlea, her sister, who lived in Rio de Janeiro as a seamstress and, like me, left Montes Claros when she was young, after also doing "something bad".
My aunt lived in a house in Bras de Pina.When I arrived there, I also worked as a seamstress, in the same factory where she worked. I barely learned how to sew, and one afternoon, just after lunch, my boss found me singing a Dolores Duran song to my colleagues and instead of dismissing me, he gave me the address of a nightclub that belonged to his friend. And here I am today, at Oba-Oba dance club, where I sing and dance Osvaldo Sargentelli’s music, a visionary cultural producer, who loved mulatas and samba.
“Now, Lisa Hurricane, playing the samba song: "Da cor do Pecado", by Bororo.
I take the robe that covers my body off, showing my very short satin rose dress, with rhinestones at the bottom and I start singing accompanied by the guitar, drums, double bass, tambourine and mandolin quintet.
Esse corpo moreno
Cheiroso e gostoso
Que você tem
É um corpo delgado
Da cor do pecado
Que faz tão bem
Esse beijo molhado
Escandalizado que você deu
Tem sabor diferente
Que a boca da gente
Jamais esqueceu
E quando você me responde
Umas coisas com graça
A vergonha se esconde
Porque se revela
A maldade da raça
Esse corpo de fato
Tem cheiro de mato
Saudade, tristeza
Essa simples beleza
Esse corpo moreno; moreno enlouquece
Eu não sei bem porque
Só sinto na vida
O que vem de você.
“ His brown body
Smelly and tasty
That you have
It's a slim body
The color of sin
What makes it so good?
This wet kiss
Scandalized you gave
It tastes different
What the mouth of people
Never forgot
And when you answer me
Some things with grace
Shame is hiding
Because it reveals itself
The Badness of the Race
This body of fact
Smells like weeds
I miss you sad
This simple beauty
This dark body; moreno goes crazy
I do not know why
I only feel in life
What comes from you.”
I only realized that I had changed the end of the song, singing "moreno" instead of “morena” when I stopped at the edge of the stage, facing a sailor who was absolutely handsome.
God, where did this man come from? His golden skin contrasts with the whiteness of his military uniform, his short brown hair cut close to his head, almost bald, makes nothing in him perfect, but very attractive, he had everything to be more of a kind of ordinary face, butwithout a logical explanation, the features of his face are so harmonized, his arched eyebrows go perfectly with his straight nose, imposing, his lips, more fleshy than proportional, harmonize with his square jaw, unkind, as if it were carved from wood, giving him a masculine, sexually primitive appearance, that I couldn’t stop looking at.
The last chords of the song play and I finish the number, applauded by the excited tourists, but I cannot pay attention in the audience, I only look for him, sweeping the dance floor with his eyes from one corner to another.The light is switched onand,where is he? I leave the stage down the side stairs, tripping on the last step, almost falling over and I'm prevented from falling on the ground by strong arms that wrap my waist gently.
I raise my face in embarrassment, I quickly mumble an apology for being so clumsy, and my heart almost comes out of my mouth when I realize that it's him, the dark-haired man. I struggle to keep myself upright and he gives me a seductive smile that wins anyone over.His lips arepartly open, showing his white teeth; our eyes meet and I lose my speech. I’m totally captured by a magnetic force that I cannot explain. Unaware of the voices that are covered by the high sound of the band behind us, the clinking of the glasses around us, his whiskey-colored eyes are spilling into mine, so blackish, and I only realize that I am not in a dream, when I hear a familiar voice near us.
"I let you alone one night, and you've alreadymade a date?"
Jairo comes closer to me with his eyes glazed by the alcohol, for more than six months we have lived a suffering and troubled relationship. We met each other here, at the nightclub, as almost all men courted the dancers at Oba-Oba, after one of my presentations, he sent me flowers and, assisted by a waiter, came to talk with me at the end of the night.
Since I started working here, I have always resisted making dates with the clients in the nightclub, but the way he came to me disarmed me, as well as being an undeniably charming man with bright blond hair and intense green eyes, he behaved like a gentleman by giving me a ride home, from Ipanema to Bras de Pina, where I lived.
Along the way, Jairo revealed to me that he was an engineer and had recently lost his wife in a car accident, after we met, this and many other times, the attraction between us became strong, and we started a scorching case of love. My castle collapsed when I discovered that my lover had lied to me shamelessly, because his so-called "dead wife" came to me one afternoon, accompanied by the couple's two young children, and told me that I was not the first woman to fall into thattale of the "needy widower".
And for my disappointment to be completed, after I confronted him forcing him to admit the truth, his gentleman's mask fell, revealing a violent and cowardman.
I quickly turn from my memories, watching how Jairo stares at me with his eyes twisted with hatred. The anger contained in the way he looks at me makes my heart chill.Saying that I'm not afraid of him would be a lie, because my skin hides the marks of his fury. After I found out the handsome bastard he was, we had several arguments and the ending was always the same, his heavy hand on my face and a series of terrifying threats.
His fingers wrap my arm like pliers, and I grimace, trying to pull myself out of his rough hands, groaning in pain.
"Thisguy just held me, so I would not fall over, let me go, you're hurting me."
“You think I'm an idiot, I saw the way you were looking at this guy, but do not think I'm going to believe in yourlies, you're nothing but a slut, but you’remine, only mine, did you understand?”
The dark-haired man steps between us, grabbing Jairo by the neck and says, with his face pressed against Jairo’s:
"Pull your dirty paws off her and apologize now."
"Mind your business, she's mine.”
"Even if she was, you lost this right, you like to hit women, do not you? I'm going to show you what is to feel pain.”
Jairo loosens my arm and sets off the man like a tiger. But the man throws Jairo to the ground with a scramble and leans over him on the floor, punching his face so many times, until he is covered with blood. Finally, he pulls Jairo through his shirt, whohardly moves, but stands up, drags him by the collar to my feet and pulls his hair, forcing him to face me.
"Apologize to Miss..."
The dark-haired man gestures with one hand as if expecting something, and I look at Jairo’s spitting blood, his mouth was hurt, I slow to realize that the man is asking my name.
“Li... Lisa, Lisa Oliveira.” – I say, stammering, very afraid.
“Osvaldo Silva, your servant”.– He turns to Jairo and continues to say – "I do not have all night, I'm waiting."
Jairo moans and cries as he spits out a tooth, saying with his twisted mouth:
“I'm sorry, Lisa.”
“That's a lot better.”
People start crowding around us and three security guards arrive, trying to pull the dark-haired man by the arm, but three sailors come and stop it. What used to be a fight of ex-lovers becomes a generalized confusion, as one of the security guards went off on a sailor, stirring up the anger of all the others. A security man tries to punch the dark-haired man and he breaks a bottle that was on a table, on his head, the dance floor in a minute turns into a sea of blows and kicks.
I stand where I am, like a statue, paralyzed by fear, I am afraid, crying out, when the man wraps my knees and throws me on his shoulder, keeping me immobilized with one of his arms just below my buttocks.
"Shh, keep calm. I'll get you out of here.”
Since that day I've never again returned in that nightclub and married Vadinho, my superhero, five months later.
SMALL EXCERPTS FROM AN INSANE DIARY
