Tony Bellotto: Rio Noir

On the way, I would check out the local scene. The bourgeois women of Leblon, the gays on Farme, the gringas of Copacabana, and the super-hot cougars of Leme. Not that there aren’t any hotties in Copacabana, ripped forty-year-olds in Ipanema, tourists in Leme, or gays in Leblon. At the beach there’s everything everywhere. But the highest incidence, let’s call it, of toned cougars is in Leme. Leme and Copacabana, but the ones in Leme are the pearl in the oyster, eleven on a scale of ten.

At the end of the day I would return through Leblon, pick up my clothes from the bro at the kiosk, and catch the 434 bus for Grajaú, where I shared an apartment with my old lady.

To tell the truth, I was tired of getting gringas drunk for a lousy handful of dollars. I was pushing forty and what I wanted was security, know what I mean? Tranquility.

I’m a fan of toned cougars. I admire the way they refuse to give in to the passage of time or the force of gravity. They’re tough and spare no effort to stay in shape: fitness center, aquatic exercise, personal trainer, dermatologist, nutritionist, Botox, detox, massages, liposuction, meditation, yoga, acupuncture, stretching, Pilates, and in some cases neurotherapy. It’s not easy. Some do triathlons. There was one who even used Ben Wa balls to strengthen her vaginal muscles.

In time I learned to distinguish the tick from the fox. It’s something you can tell by how they look at you. Ticks look at you like a puppy at the window of a butcher shop, foxes like a pharaoh in a tomb. Deep down, what they all want is a cock, but that’s where discernment enters the picture. My dick, pardon the immodesty, has always been able to discern. A fundamental detail: married toned cougars don’t think of leaving their husbands. The topic is out of the question, never mentioned, not even in frank conversations after a few proseccos or strong caipirinhas. Married toned cougars are only looking for an available cock, affection, attention, the illusion of being young again, flirtation, the dirty stuff, sexting, the right mood, get it?

The right mood.

And that’s the basic difference between the fox and the tick: foxes want you as a lover, ticks as a husband. Exclusive.

Once you learn to separate fish from fowl, things move right along.

So, I was putting together a small nest egg. Because married toned cougars always have rich husbands. Just do the math: gym fees, massage therapy, personal trainer, regular dermatology procedures, frequent trips to the beauty parlor (nails, hair, facial massage, foot therapy, colorist), doctors, acupuncturists, etc. — in addition to what the guy pays his mistress. The husband of a married toned cougar always has a lover, of course, and that’s why they start working out. Deep down they love their husbands, and because they no longer have their attention they decide to make over their appearance. Out of need. And after working their asses off, when they realize that even then they don’t get the least bit of attention from their better halves, I come on the scene. Because the cougar who gets along with her husband is ugly and fat, right? Beyond help. She doesn’t need to work out. Really, that’s psychology, it’s not me saying it. There was one who wanted to set me up in a two-room apartment, but I thought it was a bit overboard. I preferred taking the money in cash.

One day, during my morning run through Leme, I met Veronique.

Veronique Delamare was a blond grandma with wrinkled skin, thin but with well-defined musculature and the legs of a woman of thirty. She was easily pushing eighty. Her hands shook a bit, but her belly was a peeled tangerine, wedge upon wedge, impressive despite the chicken flesh. Her arm muscles were still taut, without that characteristic flap that usually hangs like fish gills from older women’s upper arms. And she had a pretty face in spite of the wrinkles. As soon as I laid eyes on her — and she pretended not to notice and I knew then that she was married — I saw she must have been beautiful when she was young. In the depths of those wrinkles glowed two blue eyes that, I confess, hooked me. Know when you lose your way for a second? Forget what you were doing? To complicate matters, she had a very charming French accent. But I’m a pro, and I approached her the way I always do — rational, pragmatic, asking what physical activities she participated in, saying I was a personal trainer and all that crap.

And that’s how we began the affair.

Veronique liked variety and would take me to different places in her imported coupe. We frequented motels in Barra, in Copacabana, on Avenida Brasil, in Grumari. And she was a good fuck, the old lady. I don’t know if she practiced vaginal strengthening, I never asked, but she had pretty strong pelvic musculature and liked giving me pussy squeezes, a thing that clamped my cock when I came and sent me into outer space. She was cultured too and would laugh when I didn’t understand her talk after fucking, some weird stuff about the finiteness of life and the emptiness of existence. What was empty was my balls after swashing the old lady’s insides.

In late afternoon, after a primo lay in a motel in São Conrado, we were having beer in Gávea at a young people’s hangout. Veronique wasn’t concerned, she was up for it and didn’t care if everybody realized she was a rich old woman accompanied by a ripped gigolo. I think she even took pride in it. She had a gringa’s mentality, a feminist. And around the third beer she says: “My husband is fucking rich. And he’s a piece of shit.”

That’s when the alarm went off. Talking about the hubby? Veronique was different. But I already knew that. And with all the beer I had drunk, I didn’t pay any attention to the alarm bell. I said, “Aren’t they all? Let’s talk about sexy stuff. I love your accent.”

“No. Let’s talk about my husband. You can enjoy the accent at the same time.”

And she went on talking about how her husband was indifferent, cold, selfish, and hermetic. Hermetic is a word I’d never heard.

“Someone who lives inside himself like a mollusk,” explained Veronique.

And she went on jerking me around with that business about the rich, cold, selfish, hermetic Mr. Mollusk. At the time it didn’t really register with me, I was sleepy and I had worked out in the morning, fucked in the afternoon, and was now pounding beer. I have a weakness for drink. So that was as far as it went, and I returned to Grajaú and went to sleep.

I went on with my life, but with Veronique it was different: I couldn’t manage to close out the chapter and move on to another MTC like the playbook says. My strategy was never to let an affair go past three months. It’s that old business about a dead fish starting to smell the next day. Cougars last three months. Then they begin demanding more than they give. They’re human, are they not?

The truth is, I was starting to like Veronique.

Crazy, I know. I’ll confess, she’s older than my mother. But Mom is all messed up, diabetic, with high blood pressure and borderline senile. She’s even wearing adult diapers and using a walker. If she was already heading downhill when my old man died, just imagine what she’s like now. But Mom is younger than Veronique, just check their IDs. And I did check Veronique’s ID one day when she fell asleep after fucking. That bugged me a little. Falling in love with a woman older than my mother is troubling. And with shaky hands! I should’ve found a shrink while there was still time. I tried to break away, let a few days go by without calling, but I missed her. Missed her, isn’t that a bitch? I had never felt that, it was like some alien squeezing my chest from inside.