Daniel Galera - Blood-drenched Beard

Five men are sitting at one of the tables. The mustached bartender is behind the counter drying cups with a white tea towel. Everyone stares, and no one says a thing. He has already forgotten what they look like and glances from one to another, feeling the blood running into his eyes, blinking without stopping, and frowning with his swollen face. Four of the five are wearing baseball caps, three are blond, and he can’t take in any more than that. He places his hand around his chin and runs it all the way down to the tip of his blood-drenched beard, which drips into a small puddle on the white paving stones.

Which one of you was it that took my dog?

You’re kidding.

He’s in a state of shock.

He takes a step closer and runs his tongue over his teeth, feeling two crushed molars and a loose canine.

I forget people’s faces. Now, who was it?

It was me.

Ah, right.

Still not happy, jerk?

Can I take my dog now?

Give him the dog, for Christ’s sake, says the bartender with the mustache. The dog’s mine, says the local.

Then I want to know if you’re man enough to fight without the help of your girlfriends here.

What?

He repeats himself, trying to pronounce each syllable clearly with his bitten tongue and cut lips.

I don’t kick dead dogs. Go home, motherfucker.

He spits all the blood in his mouth at the guy, who sits there frozen for a few seconds, wipes himself off, gets up, and turns to his companions.

Wait here.

He takes a few steps back into the middle of the street and waits for the local to come. He raises his fists up to fight but receives three punches in the face in rapid succession and falls to the ground.

Someone tries to help him up, but he waves everyone away and stands up again. He knows that if he takes just one more punch, it’ll all be over. He goes down to the beach and signals to the local again.

This time the local hesitates, feeling sorry for him. He watches him come down the steps looking disgruntled, visibly annoyed to still be fighting a broken opponent. Or maybe he is scared. Maybe he remembers certain stories about things that happened in decades past, right there. Things that his parents and grandparents refuse to talk about.

He sets one foot in the sand. The strong light from the lampposts on the promenade give the sad scene with its audience of twenty or thirty people the contours of a spectacle. The two of them study each other, and he takes advantage of the local’s hesitation and bored stance to kick sand in his face. The local reels back, rubbing his eyes, and as soon as he takes his hands away from his face, he gets a blow square in the nose. They start blindly throwing punches, a few of which hit their target, until he manages to grab the local between the legs with one hand and his throat with the other at the same time. He can feel the guy’s crushed testicles and windpipe squashed between his fingers. The local’s legs grow weak. They topple onto the sand together, but he doesn’t let go. He keeps squeezing and sees the local’s numb, terrified face start to turn red and then blue.

Only a bullet in the head’ll get rid of me now, motherfucker.

People start trying to separate them, first pulling at them, then with punches and kicks, but he doesn’t let go until he recognizes the voice of a woman who has been shouting at him for some time.

Look at me! she says. Let him go. Look at me!

He lets go. After a long, apparently lifeless, pause, the man starts to cough and choke on the sand and is rescued by his friends.

He sinks his fingers into her curly hair.

Dália. I can’t see you properly.

My God! Get up, come on.

What’re you doing here?

Me? I came for a fucking caipirinha ! And I find you two mauling each other on the beach like animals. You need to go to the health clinic. Jesus, your forehead’s really hot. Come here.

Hang on. Just a minute.

He gets up and staggers over to the gate with everyone looking on. He goes into the driveway and kneels in front of Beta.

There, Beta girl. Everything’s okay now.

He can’t undo the knot with his fingers. A man comes over and holds out an open penknife.

This’ll help, champ.

Thanks.

That’s the dog that swims in the sea, isn’t it? And you’re the guy with the beard who swims with her. I can see you guys from my front veranda.

He cuts the collar off and pats Beta’s ribs. Dália comes over and scratches Beta’s back.

Get up, you nutcase. The police’ll be here soon. Let’s try to get to the hospital beforehand — otherwise it’ll take a while.

Soon.

You’re not thinking right.

He staggers out of the gate and over to the bar with Beta behind him. He has a coughing fit before he is able to order.

I’ll have two of those caipirinhas with bergamot leaves.

You serious?

One for me, and one for the lady here. And a bit of ice in a plastic bag, please, if it’s no trouble. Are those motherfuckers still here?

They’re over there on the other side of the street. I’ve seen you here before, haven’t I? I remember the beard.

I think so. But my beard didn’t used to be so long.

They’re going to shave it off at the hospital.

That’s okay — it’s about time it came off.

The barman hands him a plastic bag of ice cubes and starts slicing limes. Dália sits down next to him, covers his whole face with the bag of ice wrapped in a tea towel, and presses on it. When she removes the compress a minute later, blue and red lights are licking the wooden facade of the bar.

I feel a bit dizzy, Dália. I might pass out.

The barman brings the caipirinhas to the table and puts his hands on his hips.

Where are you from again? You’re not from here.

He’s Gaudério’s grandson, someone says.

• • •

T he nurse handing him a glass of water is wearing a name tag that says “Natália” and her uniform reminds him of a scene from a porno movie he watched over and over on the Internet a few years back until he got sick of it. All that is missing is the hat with the red cross on it. She has blond hair, a big nose, and eyes the color of a swimming pool. With an accent from western Santa Catarina, she asks if he knows what his name is and where he is. He thinks about it. He doesn’t know. He is in the São José Regional Hospital, Natália tells him, and he was brought in by a woman called Dália, who said she was his friend and left a few hours after checking him in. The same woman phoned in that morning to give the hospital his full name and ID number. He thinks about that too. He doesn’t remember a thing, much less having spoken to Dália recently. Natália and Dália, he stammers. Dália, Natália. The nurse grins and squints at him as if assessing how lucid he is. He turns his head with difficulty on the soft pillow and sees hospital-green curtains around him, his own body wrapped in a pink blanket like the ones that used to cover the cozy sofas and armchairs in his grandmother’s living room, and pieces of the metal frames of the other beds in the room. The dog? he asks. What have they done with my dog? Natália remembers that the woman said to tell him that the dog was fine and not to worry. She’s at her mother’s place or something like that. Another nurse, very thin, with a name tag that says “Maila,” appears, and she and Natália celebrate his waking as if they have all known one another for a long time. He asks how long he has been there, and Maila smiles and says it’s been almost twenty-four hours. Natália goes off to check on another patient, and Maila goes to look for the doctor. He feels stitches and bandages on his face when he wrinkles it. His jaw and neck feel cool, a sign that his beard has been shaved off. There is a needle in the back of his right hand, hooking him up to a saline drip or something of the sort. A woman in an adjacent bed has an intermittent hacking cough. The doctor, whose shaved head makes him look like an undergraduate student, says he was transferred by ambulance from the health clinic in Garopaba the night before with hypothermia, hypoglycemia, dehydration, and bacterial pneumonia, which is being treated with intravenous antibiotics. He has a fractured nose and rib, and cuts and abrasions on his face. The doctor asks if he has had a drowning incident or inhaled a lot of water in the last few days, and he replies that yes, he took in a lot of seawater, a great amount, about four days ago. He can see that the doctor is thinking about something else much more serious. He discusses something with Maila in a low voice and hurries down the corridor.