I tried the doorknob but it didn’t yield. The mold in the building made me cough. Renato, panting in exhaustion, slid against the wall to sit on the floor. I tried to force the door open, rammed my shoulder against it—it didn’t move.
I heard a noise coming from the window we had jumped over. I turned around and saw the man with the rifle in hand, narrowing his eyes against the dark looking for a target. My eyes adjusted to the blackness of the room, allowing me to made out the shapes of old furniture and rags on the ground.
But the rapist’s eyes didn´t.
He shouted at the window and pulled himself over to sit on the windowsill. He swiveled his body, doubled up his legs and pulled them into the building. When he raised his rifle back up, looking for someone to shoot at, I squeezed the trigger.
Three times, like in gun demonstrations around the world.
Inside darkness, no blood was spilled. At least, not that I had seen. I heard the thud of the body hit the ground, the squeaking of wooden slabs, the rattling of his gun, and the last gasps of the man who had tried to rape me. Then I dropped the pistol, my hands shaking, the image of that shadowy silhouette jolting after each bullet, falling headlong, rewinded and replayed, as though in an eternal loop inside my head.
A dead body laid there, frozen, in the same damp and rotten place as me. Renato uttered phrases in Portuguese that I didn’t understand. I coughed, trembled, and compared that building to a family-sized coffin.
I remembered home. My cozy place in Atlanta, where I spent my single nights. I missed my mom. How could I ever imagine that fate would derail my life into so much irony, so much agony.
I closed my eyes and cried. My hand was drenched in blood. God, I wished I had had the courage to forgive Marlon. Even though he cheated on me, we still had nice memories together, memories of true, innocent happiness. I’ve carried too much lately, and now even the weight of resentment seemed unbearable. I didn’t want to have it buried alongside me.
I felt a hand grabbing at my shins. I jerked back.
“You’re alive, Emily . . . Alive. You’ll have another chance to forgive. But first you need to open this door, and get us out of here,” Renato muttered.
Was I the delusional one? The one who had talked alone or had chatted with the veil of darkness that enwrapped everything?
I crouched on the floor, after a surge of energy, and groped about for the pistol. Then I squeezed the trigger, three times again, smashing the doorknob and its inner gears into shatters. I thrust myself against the door, it slammed open, and sunlight fell on my eyes as both a spur of life and a cut of razors.
I was back at Gloria Santa alleyways, alive, and poised to fight my way out.
Chapter 22
Renato’s tanned skin and bright eyes had dimmed into an emaciated, bleached appearance as his time ran out. We walked out of the building, most of his weight heaved on my shoulders. We staggered down a steep staircase that looked as damned and shabby as the others. I noticed eyes peering outside. They came from open doors and slammed shut right after seeing us.
The nape of my neck ached, but its pain I could endure.
Our only way was going down the steps, toward the clattering coming up from the foot of the slum. The clear sky rumbled as if a storm was taking place right above Gloria Santa, the rumble and jumble of a berserking throng ricocheted on every brick.
I couldn’t tell what caused all that noise. My only concern at the moment was to bring medical attention to Renato as fast as I could. Or, perhaps, on a new sudden twist of fate, find someone trustworthy to rely on.
We tripped on slick steps on our way down. My ankle throbbed, probably under the strain of supporting my own weight plus part of Renato’s, but we continued.
People came out from their houses to follow us to the lower part of the hill. They seemed disturbed, unquiet, most of them carrying aluminum pans and pots and big metal spoons. They banged the tools against each other, as though in a march heading downward, producing a din much alike to those coming up from below.
They never looked toward us.
My only resolve was to keep going down, but instead of cutlery and pots, I’d carry alongside me the groaning of a man barely alive.
However, our path swerved before long. I crossed eyes with someone concealed inside a building where the door had been narrowly opened. This stranger didn’t slam the door shut when we stared at each other. The eyes, gleaming like wet rocks through the crack of the door, returned my gaze. They didn’t show fear, nor distrust, only pity.
I averted my eyes, looking down the winding steps that would take us to somewhere lower in the maze. But when we passed in front of the door that had been looking at me, it opened wide. A girl reached out a sympathetic hand, gesturing for us to come inside.
She had been Fatima’s aide at the clinic.
Without a word, I turned toward her, desperately agreeing to her offer. Renato grunted over my shoulder and wavered on the steps, as she came out to share his weight with me.
We laid Renato over a couch that had been worn down. He reclined his head back and fainted.
I pleaded her to help Renato with his wounds. She at first resisted, or didn’t understand me. Then, after many gestures, she walked into another room and came back with what resembled a first aid box to treat his gored shoulder.
I
