Blood-drenched Beard

He heads down the first trail he finds, stops at the first diner he sees, and orders a cheese and chicken-heart sandwich. The sound of his own voice echoes in his head, and it occurs to him that he hasn’t uttered a word since his conversation with the yogi in Encantada. Two young men in baseball caps and baggy jeans are drinking beer and smoking cigarettes at the table next to him, slouched in their plastic chairs. Their dialogue is cryptic, but they seem to be talking about a party and a girl who was there. The skinny one talks more, and the muscular one listens as he turns the alarm of his car parked outside on and off with his key. The small TV on the wall is showing a dubbed film, but the volume is so low it is almost inaudible. The pregnant woman in a white apron and hairnet who takes orders and flips burgers at the same time appears with his sandwich and a tray with napkins and sachets of ketchup and mayonnaise. His contracted stomach can tolerate only half the sandwich. He leaves the rest on some grass near a post for the dog to eat. A news bulletin interrupts an advertisement and shows scenes of the flood. A river of chocolaty rapids cutting right through a highway. Men rowing boats around an archipelago of roofs. Families camped out in a gymnasium.

He asks the young men for a cigarette. They look at him with blank faces, and he asks again. The muscular one gets up, walks over to his table, holds out the packet, waits for him to take a cigarette with his long, mud-caked fingernails, and holds out the lighter for him. He thanks him, puffs on the cigarette a few times without inhaling, and tosses it half burned into the middle of the puddle-filled road.

Argh! Disgusting shit.

He clears his throat and spits on the sidewalk. The skinny one lets out a scornful chuckle.

Where’d you come from, nutcase?

He gets up, signals to the waitress, leaves the money on the table, turns his back to the men, and walks away talking.

It all started a long, long time ago, he says in a drawn-out, theatrical voice as he walks toward the beach and points at the shadowy mass of the hills. It was a dark… stormy night…

What a mess, he hears one of them say.

He laughs to himself, checks to make sure Beta is behind him, and stomps his way through the puddles until he reaches the sand. Garopaba is on his right, far away and ghostly. He walks to his left until he comes to a seaside hill and takes a trail that soon leaves him on a craggy headland. The waves crash with gusto against the larger rocks, throwing spray high into the air. The rain has dwindled to a drizzle, and he looks for a way through for the dog, but it is growing more and more difficult. Over the rocks, over the rocks, this is the way, he mutters to himself. He steps from one to another and slowly leaves Siriú behind him. For a long time all he can see is the top of the next rock.

When he finally raises his head to look around, he realizes that it is growing dark. He is in the middle of a rocky headland between nothing and nowhere and has already come too far to turn back. He steps on a loose stone, and his fall is broken by his backpack, but his elbow gets a good whack, and he feels the pain travel up his arm to his shoulder like an electric shock. He tests the joint and feels his arm with his other hand. A little blood and some throbbing, nothing to worry about. He lifts the dog onto the larger rocks before scaling them himself. He progresses in this manner until the boulders of granite give way to greenery. He tries to climb the slope, but the barrier of bushes is too dense and thorny. He returns to the rocks, and shortly before it is pitch black, he spots a natural shelter between two large boulders. As he draws closer, he discovers that the narrow cavity extends inward a short way, forming a small, dry grotto. He leaves his backpack inside, makes the dog comfortable, and sits at the entrance to his triangular niche as if he were a stone statue placed in the most improbable, absurd place precisely so as not to be seen. The ocean in front of him is a large mass of darkness that is darker than the night, a monster that is both invisible and manifest. He knows he is well above the high-tide mark but is afraid anyway. It is the same kind of irrational fear that slowly grips him when he is swimming alone in deep water. On the other hand, where else could he be safer and more protected? Nothing can touch him here. In a few hours the day will dawn as always, and he will be able to leave. No possible surprises tonight. Nothing can happen. Not here.