Idra Novey - Ways to Disappear

For the first time since she arrived in Brazil, she felt a longing for Pittsburgh, for the alphabetical order of the books above her desk and the plaintive meows of her cats, cries that required no more than a can opener and Fancy Feast to resolve.

She longed for her classroom, for her fastidiously maintained binder of attendance sheets. She even longed for her shared crappy office, to be sitting in a place where passion was nothing more than a conversation, a posturing to be defended behind a desk with a cup of tea.

If Miles cared enough to come here for her, maybe she would be a fool not to return with him. What was she doing here holding this other man’s ear? She didn’t know if she was in love with Marcus. For now, it didn’t matter.

Matter:From the Latin word for the woody part of a tree, derivative of mater, mother. 1.Something that can be perceived by one or more senses — an ear, for example, as seen by an eye. 2.A subject to which a person may refer without having to name it, as in: A woman stared at the matter on her lap.

Emma switched the hotel phone from one ear to the other as she waited for Raquel to respond to the news. Yet however she held the phone, she felt horribly aware of her ears, felt them hotly against her head.

Raquel, are you there? Should I read… Would it be better if… Her grasp of Portuguese felt suddenly, irremediably inadequate. On the other end, she heard water running, sobs, something clattering against the porcelain of a sink.

How much more do they want? Raquel rasped into the phone.

Forty.

Call Rocha.

And you’ll call the police?

Fuck the police, Emma! Ave Maria. They never find anyone who’s kidnapped. They’ll just sell the report to the newspapers. Cops get paid shit here. This isn’t your country, okay? Do you get that? You don’t understand what’s going on! Raquel was wailing now and Emma didn’t know what else to do but go on listening and staring down into the shoe box at Marcus’s ear.

In the next room, the lovers had turned on the shower and the woman was belting out Marisa Monte’s “O Que Você Quer Saber de Verdade” in a shrill, prickling falsetto. Emma wished she could ask for them to switch rooms, as she couldn’t leave this one. What if Marcus managed to escape and stumbled here, clutching at the bloody wound where his left ear had been? To figure out that it was the left, she’d had to imagine the clotted, withered edge of it against the side of her own face, on which side it would curve in against her head.

You get Rocha, Raquel told her. Call him right now.

Emma said of course, she’d call immediately. When Rocha balked at the amount, she clutched the Nike box against her body with one hand and told him Raquel had reached a deal with Flamenguinho. He originally asked for sixty thousand, she lied, but we told him we could only bring him forty and he said that was enough.

Or that’s what he’s saying until you send the money.

But he already backed down from what he originally asked for. Her face flushed at her audacity. But what else did she have? Audacious stories were how she had come by her Portuguese. They were what had drawn Rocha all this way to Salvador.

She asked him if he had another suggestion. If he thought it was really an option to just wait for this man to send Marcus’s other ear tomorrow.

No, of course not. I’ll wire the money to Raquel’s account again. I hope you’re correct that this is the end of it.

Obrigada. Emma thanked him, hearing the Yankee clang of her accent in a way she hadn’t heard it in years. She’d learned the language too late to ever get the r’ s right. Every time she spoke it was unavoidable: she released a fleet of mistakes.

Two women who disliked each other huddled on the edge of a hotel bed like sisters. For some time, they had been hunched this way over the tiny screen of a phone, waiting for the alert of a new email to appear. While they stared, one of the women thought of a story the other’s mother had written. It was about a tribe in which no one looked each other in the eye, believing that such avoidance could ward off the arrival of jaguars. After the occasional animal slunk off with a baby in its jaws, the women would meet in the shade to grind their manioc and lower their heads more intently. They would murmur about the heat, listening for the judgment in the others’ voices.

On the edge of the hotel bed, the two women made a similar effort not to look up from the phone if they sensed that the other had just done so. As is the nature of avoided events, it happened anyway. They both looked up at once, their faces so close they had no choice but to stare into the dilated pupils of the other. They saw the loosened skin over each other’s eyelids, the creases fixing deeper into the other’s brow. They were in their midthirties now and, as at any age, there were jaguars.

They saw this in each other’s eyes and looked away.

To: raquel.yagoda@gmail.com.br

Subject: obrigado você

GOT THE MONEY, AMIGA.

I’LL SEND THE ADDRESS FOR THE ALLEY SOON. SOMEONE WILL MEET YOU THERE TOMORROW WITH YOUR BROTHER.

YOU CAN COME WITH YOUR PRETTY AMERICAN BUT NO ONE ELSE. I HAVE CONTACTS YOU DON’T. CALL THE COPS AND YOU’RE ALL DEAD.

Once again, Raquel found herself having dinner on American time at a sultry 6 p.m. The only Brazilians around them in the restaurant were the waitstaff. All the diners were tourists, many of whom, Raquel found, didn’t seem to notice that they kept scraping their forks against their plates. Emma had insisted on this irritating hour on the pretext that she absolutely had to be in bed by eight, and she kept neurotically checking the time.

The way Emma was knocking back the caipirinhas tonight, however, Raquel wasn’t sure whether Emma was going to make it to her room. Why don’t you try and relax a little? Raquel told her. We’ve got a meeting scheduled. We’ve done everything we can.

But what if my lie to Rocha backfires? What if right before we’re supposed to meet and get Marcus, they ask for more? It could happen. Emma tipped the rest of her drink into her mouth. At every other meal, Emma had been a sipper, bringing the edge of her glass to her lips as hesitantly as a hummingbird at a feeder. Raquel had found that this inhibited way of sipping diminished some of the pleasure of her own drink. But watching Emma now, gulping down a third caipirinha like a glass of water, was even more disturbing.

Emma, take a breath, would you please? Raquel leaned toward her over the table. Flamenguinho’s going to get his money. We need to act like we trust tomorrow he’s going to do what he agreed to. If you’re going to be this nervous, you shouldn’t come.

To the alley? I have to go with you. It’s too risky to show up alone.

Raquel was worried the opposite might be true but didn’t say so. It seemed just as likely that having Emma along would mean an extra liability. Before dinner, Raquel had called Thiago for advice. He said that kidnappers in Brazil didn’t usually bother with gringos and that he didn’t have much patience with the pasty bastards either. He was more concerned for Raquel, he told her, and wanted her to call the cousin of a cousin. He’s the Hertz of handguns, Thiago had explained. He rents them by the day. He’s got a lady’s pistol for you up in Bahia that’s as easy to fire as a cigarette lighter.