“Why are we going up?” I said, panting.
“They usually block all exits to the lower parts of the slum. Our only chance is to go the other way.”
I didn’t know what time it was, but it was early, already hot, and dangerous. And that distant mistrust returned crawling over my spine. Why could Renato be so sure of the police’s intentions? How could he know they haven’t come to offer protection?
A new set of gunshots fired. Holes appeared on the wall next to me, debris of cement and brick splashed over my skin while a cloud of dust came out from the wall. Renato bellowed. At the top of the staircase, someone responded with a cry and a waving hand.
A teenager stood up there. Shirtless, he had a radio intercom attached to a cord around his neck. Metallic voices garbled. He carried an old AR-15 rifle, with a 25-round magazine and an extra set strapped together upside-down.
That was an army restricted rifle, yet a teenager carried it in daylight through the community.
“That was close,” Renato said, “he shot at us.”
“What! Why?” I asked, terrified.
“They’re shooting anything that moves, that’s why everyone is inside their homes. But we had no other option.”
Renato’s daring almost killed us. I didn’t know the usual procedures in a conflict zone like this, but Renato knew, and still he chose to threaten my life by going outside.
That was unforgivable, unless staying inside Norma’s house was an even worse alternative. Was it?
We kept climbing, followed by the bumps and chants of the march coming behind us. Gunshots increased in frequency and length. I tried to ignore the aching in my thighs. Same with the grime on the ground when we crouched for protection during intense crossfire.
We crossed more drug soldiers on our way up. Most of them were heavily armed teenagers who had abandoned school to pull the trigger. They perched on roof edges of poorly constructed houses, or hid behind street poles with tangles of wires that looked like beehives.
The police shot back, their bullets flying uphill to catch any wall, window or life along the way. I could tell the distant ones by the sound of the gunshots. They were muffled and echoed twice on their way up. These were the ones that came from the police.
Yet, even though the war was pretty damn real, I was skeptical.
“Stop, Renato!” I said, jerking my hand apart from his.
“No, we must keep going.”
He grabbed my forearm and tugged me forward, but I resisted, despite his strength.
“Can’t you see there’s a shooting going on?” Renato said, after my jerking me back.
“Yes, but why are the police coming to capture me? Why haven’t these armed drug dealers seized your grandma’s house and caught me already—if everyone knows where I am?”
“This is no place to have a conversation.”
We were between two bare walls covered in mold, on a narrow street with a sewage water ditch and scurrying rats.
“I’m not moving.”
“Fuck!” he said. He pondered before continuing. “There are many drug dealers in the Rio slums. They usually fight among themselves for territory and control. Officers Pinto and Rôla belong to a different faction than the one that controls Gloria Santa. Drug lords here are happy with Flávio Beirario imprisonment. That’s why I brought you here. There are traitors and spies everywhere, and they have given away our hideout.”
“How do you know this?” I said. His arguments were consistent—I didn’t know if the facts were right—but I still had doubts remaining. “How can you ever know the police haven’t come to help me, Renato? How?”
“I don’t know. It’s that . . . I just can’t risk losing you to them.”
A burst of gunshots rang from down the hill. Renato turned his back, his hand still grasping my forearm, and pulled me upward. We advanced one step, and another, and another, and a shot echoed, and one more step, and Renato tripped and fell down, and his hand released its grasp, and I tried to pull him back, but he didn’t respond. A blood stain appeared above his left shoulder and widened.
I screamed and squatted on my heels, as I watched his breathing stutter. A drug soldier on a rooftop above us pointed his rifle down the hill and shot. I cupped my hands against my face, leaned down, and a thud came from the roof. A high-pitch rattling of steel bounced on the ground beside me. I was hit on the back of my neck, and now I laid on the ground.
Chapter 15
A screeching fan cast its weak air over my legs. A moan, dim but near. The nape of my neck throbbed in pain and despite the breeze of the fan, rivulets of sweat rolled down my forehead. I shook my head, motioned my arms beside my body, and felt a bedsheet stretched over my torso.
My back ached under the pressure of wood slats running beneath the paper-thin mattress I had been laid on, my sore skin filling the gaps. I had been stricken by something heavy that knocked me unconscious. What was it?
I racked my brain, struggling to recover recent memories, but all I remembered were fuzzy noises and a bright daylight, no distinct imagery. I knew I was hurt. I also felt guilt, as though I had neglected something out of recklessness.
The last time I had this sense of guilt was right after breaking up with Marlon. My boss sent me to an arms fair in San Francisco, which I attended under protest. Instead of writing, I spent my days turning paper-like sheets into handkerchiefs to wipe tears. When I got home I had zero lines written.
That was the closest I ever got to losing my job. At least until getting lost
