“This is not the end of the line. We still have a chance. Only... only a few more days...,” he said, a tear trailed down his cheek.
I looked down at him with a mingle of despair and desire. What did that tear mean? Regret? Pain? Or, maybe love? I couldn’t answer that question now, I concentrated on doing what I thought was right.
I heard more shouts, a thud on a nearby rooftop, a teenager sprinted past the stairs outside carrying a gun almost his size. I rushed back to my bed, rummaged the bedsheets on the ground and picked up the pistol.
I loathed guns, but this one I’d bring with me.
Chapter 19
“Are you coming with me or not?” I said to Renato.
The glock was tucked into my jeans. I came closer to Renato, bent over and helped him up.
He grunted, his skin hot from the fever. Outside, gunshots rang out like a battlefield.
“I can´t walk. Fátima will hide us before we can move on. You won´t survive outside by yourself,” he stammered.
“We can´t wait any longer! Flávio Beirario may be invading the slum, as you said. Get up,” I said.
I tugged at his arm—the uninjured one—and pulled him up. He got to his feet, wobbling.
“Can you walk?” I asked.
Renato closed his eyes and gripped my arm at the same moment that Fátima showed up at the door of the clinic. She brought a jug in her hand. After noticing us standing, she froze.
Renato exchanged words with Fátima. She didn’t reply, but after a quick glance at my hips, she motioned closer to us and gave him the jug.
“It tastes like piss, but it helps with the pain,” he said.
“I hope it does,” I said, as we started moving on. I nodded to Fátima when we went past her to leave the clinic. She replied with a baffled expression.
My idea was to walk abreast of him along the alleyways to reach the plateau that would take us out of Gloria Santa. Plan which I had to scratch when he got up. Renato was a big man with a great heart, but his reflexes were faulty and half of his body useless from his injuries.
On my tiptoes, my forearm barely touched his chin, yet I offered my shoulder to help his balance. Renato circled his arm around my back, pressing the gauze on my neck, and a sharp pain made me cringe.
“This is a bad idea. How ridiculous is it . . . for a woman of your size to carry a man of mine? We should hide somewhere else.”
Now it was my turn to leave a question unanswered. The gunfire outside had increased, more footsteps and shouts. Part of his weight was held up by my own legs. Then I heard a crash that opened a hole in the wall of the clinic. Sunlight came through it, a shaft of light revealing a world of floating dust.
Our advancing would be hindered by Renato—I wasn’t in great shape either—but we would advance. Walking outside of the ramshackle clinic would put us at risk of finding a stray bullet, or bumping into another drug soldier, but we had to take that chance.
We limped our way to the door. I craned my neck outside and saw long, slithering stairs up and down the hillside. An explosion nearby caused my joints to ache, voices of men cursing echoed. When the gunshots paused, and the voices rested, a stifling silence washed over the slum.
Climbing up the stairs proved to be difficult. Renato struggled at each step. Gunshots returned along with the cries. The stairs we climbed were empty and sullen. Sunlight didn’t reach us, its light squeezed out by the shanty houses perched on top of each other.
Fátima came with us, but left when we reached a small clearance halfway toward the top. Renato and I went on to a cement slope, winding along the walls of crooked buildings, and then another set of steps adjoining the foundation pillars of a house built even higher. Half-way through it, I heard a different sound--whirring coming from the sky.
I looked up, dazzled by the clear sky, and caught a glimpse of something flying over the slum. My first reaction was to wave, call for help, to find a way to write SOS on any flat ground in Gloria Santa. But before I could react, Renato tugged at my arm and dragged me under the building beside us.
“We must not be seen. It’s a police helicopter. They’ll shoot me and arrest you,” he said.
But, how? Could officers Pinto and Rôla have enough clout to get a god damn helicopter under their control?
We waited for the whirr to go away, but it didn’t. It hovered over the slum.
We waited, sprinting footsteps came closer. We crouched behind a heap of bricks and a twisted iron tank, the ceiling four feet above our heads. A man rushed past the stairs, his face pointed upward. He carried a rifle on his shoulders and ran barefoot. Another man trailed behind--the man with a black and red striped t-shirt, with his gun.
He saw us hiding behind the debris. His eyes widened as he panted for air.
He stood still, halfway across the steps and swiveling his head contemplating whether to shout to his partner, to take a glance at the helicopter, or to stare at us.
Renato clutched my forearm, sweating and cold.
“I wish I could protect you. I’m sorry,” he said.
The man in black and red stripes slid his finger to reach the trigger, his other hand clutched the grip.
He raised his rifle, aimed at us.
I buried my face into Renato’s chest.
Then I heard a shot.
Chapter 20
I raised my head, trembling and shivering. I looked at the stairs where the red and black striped man
