Tinnitus

Renan was sleeping on the couch. again. For the third time this week. I really doubted he'd have the energy to go upstairs to his own room. I woke him up and asked what was going on. Whether he felt nice in his room. He himself had insisted on staying there.

"Don't you really want to move in to the bigger bedroom?"

"Been tired, some nights I jus' can't make it upstairs."

Been nearly a month since he moved in. I tried to convince his family to accept him back to no avail. If this was going to happen one day, it'd take long. Haven't seen the Teixeiras lately. Not even Guilherme shows up for a visit, one of the members of the society I had had most contact with besides his younger brother. With Renan living with me it is like having the son I had never had. With all of the issues of having a child and none of the good things it brings. When he pisses me off, I call him by his full name. I let him know he's going over the limits when I do so.

I connected my mp3 player to the sound system. I let it go random as usual.

"I try to say goodbye and I choke; try to walk away and I stumble. Though I try to hide it, it's clear: my world crumbles when you are not near."


I Try, performed by Macy Gray, written by Macy Gray, Ruzumna, Jinsoo Lim, David Wilder, on On How Life Is, 1999, Epic Records

I love Macy Gray, she has such a hoarse voice, so different from the divas you can find everywhere around you. Renan seemed not to have the same opinion and asked me to turn off the music or change the song. There was such urgency in his request I couldn't help but feeling baffled. Why would he react that way to such pleasant music?

"Why do you want me to turn it off? Don't you like the song?"

He wouldn't answer, but his eyes were watering as the song played on. I noticed his deep sorrow and turned the mp3 off. I remembered a song by Baden-Powell, "Journey", my mother in her last days asked to turn off too. At first I thought to myself she hadn't liked the song, but soon I realized the melody had touched her so deep inside she simply didn't know what to do of that feeling. The same seemed to be happening to Renan at that moment.

He spent the whole of the afternoon looking at nothing. there was a moment in which I couldn't stand that silence any longer. I didn't mean to make the boy sad, but I didn't want to lose the freedom of doing whatever I wanted in my own house. I thought of how having children was a lot like abdicating this freedom. I thought of how having Renan at home was all about having a son at the same age for the whole of the Eternity.

Then I thought I'd be considered his creator and forced to keep him in my house for the time to come. But were it like that, then I'd be forced to house the whole of the town, since everything here was created by me. Andrés, all of the seven lads, master Danilo, Zé of the Depths, the Mayor, everyone.

"There are outsiders in town, they got in today", told me Andrés a bit later when I left Renan at home and went for a walk to the farm Taurinos, "I thought I'd let Renan know, but he always sees that before me. Haven't seen Anderson these days, but I guess he knows about it as well. If Renan already knows and hasn't come off the couch yet, well I dunno; there's definitely something wrong with the fella."

"Renan is dying", Adriano had a serious look that would scare me hadn't I known death was now a taboo for the whole of Taurinos, "I know no one else dies in Taurinos, but as you yourself once said, there are worse things than death."

"How silly", growled Andrés, fulminating his brother with his eyes as usual.

"I don't think it's silly", I contradicted him, "I think Adriano is right. Renan has been lying on the couch for a week, gazing at nothing at all. As though he was really dying from the inside. As though he was turning into a lifeless wooden stick."

At the end of the afternoon, when I got back home, Renan had left. I went to the back of the house. The first horse I saw was the palomino, but there were only two black horses. He was sure on patrol. I have now come to worry about the two coming out at night for trespassers, especially about Renan. What's next, taking a night meal for the two officers? The Obscure Police was nothing you could talk or take doughnuts to at night (or at any other time of the day).

Adriano dropped by at night. He had come to rob me of some coffee (in his own words). I was happy to have him at home, since he had never shown up for some good old coffee (even being the builder of the house along with his father). He said he was willing to help me out with anything in the house that needed to be fixed except for the front door's lock.

"I'm no locksmith; it's Anderson who handles that best", he said smiling.

"Well, since Anderson is now my enemy, I wouldn't expect him to come and fix the lock even if it were for money."

Adriano was embarrassed and changed subjects. I asked him about his younger sibling and he replied Andrés was on the Internet. I noticed a strange noise ringing in my ear. As if it were tinnitus. Asked Adriano if he could hear it. Expected him to come with up with a "no" as an answer since I had had serious hearing impairment times ago was surprised to hear he did too. Then we heard no more of the noise or it happened that we just got used to it. We were talking for lost time, time neither of us would worry about measuring until the sound of horses' hooves was heard in the distance. Adriano cringed to the sound almost immediately. The sound of horses' hooves at night made him frankly uncomfortable. And it made me frankly uncomfortable too, I must say.

The horses now came trotting on the dirt road.
It was definitely no Obscure Police's usual unleashed galloping. But the horses came to a stop in front of my house. The air was heavy and stuffy as I had felt before, still, dead. I knew what lurked outside. Adriano crossed himself, "I believe in God", or any common Catholic prayer to that effect, and was shaking all over. I had chills all over my body when I heard the five fatal knocks on the front door's brass knocker.

"Who's there?", a classic question of those dwelling in the bush in the middle of nowhere. As though I didn't know who it was outside.

"It's me and Anderson, Miss Grisam", the tiny little voice rang outside sounding far off the door.

"Adriano's here and very scared. You aren't…"

"Can't you hear what my voice is like? We're normal, Miss Grisam, now please do open the door!", the tiny voice sounded more impatient and annoyed now.

Why weren't they coming in? The door was never locked and it was no secret for anyone in town (what could make me insecure, but strangely never does).

I finally opened the door and saw why. The two were leaning against one of the porch columns. In their black uniforms, covered with blood as I had seen them so many times before, but now it looked different. The two had a black eye each, and several bruises on the face and, I was going to find out, some parts of the body too. The lack of energy I had been perceiving in Renan I could now see in Anderson too. As if it weren't enough, the two looked real sick. Adriano helped me put the two under the shower. Anderson wouldn't utter a word; only stared at us, glassy and petrified eyes. He apparently had no energy not even for a "yes". Renan was silent too under the shower. We had to wash them, they didn't seem to be able to even move. We put Anderson in a robe and set him on the bed in the larger room. We changed Renan's clothes and put him to bed too. Took the boots to the laundry, tucked the uniforms in the washer. When we were finished, Adriano and I were exhausted. It wasn't only for the amount of work we had. There had to be something else.

"The two had a violent row", stated Adriano glancing at me, "one can tell by all them bruises."

"Yup, the patrol must have been the kind…"

"Patrol? Nonsense, Miss Grisam; the two fought each other after the patrol, I say", he rolled his eyes towards me as if to indicate how naive I was really being. Not criticizing the boy at all, but being deemed as naive, let alone by Adriano was more than enough for me to handle for a day. But I had to agree that a fight could have been the reason for their condition. Uniforms full of creases everywhere as if they had been pulled around with rage (though they were not torn at all) were good evidence that could be so.

I was going to call Andrés, but he was the kind of fellow that needed no telephone communication most of the times. His communication with the city of Taurinos was direct and sometimes enviable. He came out of the blue knocking on my door. Andrés, his brother and I were talking, drinking coffee and eating corn bread loaves around us.

"The hell is that they had to come apart to keep together. This bad blood between the two is destroying the Police, Miss Grisam."

Andrés really seemed worried under his usual cover of cold-bloodedness. This made me worried too. When he let it show it was because something really worried him. I never know what is worse in this town, whether tranquility of the most insane strife and violence.