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Angels so easily turn into demons.
“See you later, hon”, an attentive voice comforts a child, afraid of kindergarten. But the child keeps
crying. “Com’ere, give me a hug”, the kid’s father presses him against his chest, with unending arms.
I remember something. Father´s hands had lines like scars. He would often come and stir memories
off my skin.
“Anne, who are you talking to?”, they interrogated a child. “Shh, dad's listening to music. And mom
is trying to sleep”, I would say. I didn't understand why they laughed at that time. They stood around
as if they were watching an animal, fighting its metal cage.
I am now sitting on a bench, kids playing around me. At the school backyard, autumn scattered tired
leaves. Ms. Flannagan is how they call me. They don´t know my name. “Ms. Flannagan, can we go
there?”, they ask. “Always”, I say. I am sitting somewhere, far.
"How are you, Anne?", the newly arrived teacher asks, with genuine curiosity. "I am good, thanks".
Was that a lie? I’m usually just caught up with existing, but I guess that is not strictly speaking good .
"Where are you, Ms. Flannagan?", someone asks. “I’m here”, I say. Here is usually where I am. But
there is a kind of question that never dissolves in time, and it has a way of taking us back to an
indelible past. And sometimes, there
is where I find most parts of me.
Dad died before I was born. He died before my mother was. So did mom. They all died, never existed.
Or they did, I don't know. I was left somewhere. Ordinary calamities must have killed them, and now
there is no family to be told. When I was a child, I fantasized about family, but learnt that from
imagination no parents could spring. But I still think about them.
“Why do I have to bring this back?” I wonder. I am tired of worn out tragedies. I feel a drop on my
shoulder and look up to the sky, hoping it would pour some distraction into my troubled boredom.
Dad would always predict rains. “There is something in the wind”, he'd say. Something subtle and
sour.
A lot falls from the sky, rain and angels alike.
I hear a child falling on the backyard and that brings me back to now , our more present wearing out.
“It must be some mindless child”, I think. A deaf sound reaches my distracted ears. Mom used to call
me a mutant. I could tell a fall from a slip, I thought.
“Anne, what are your parent´s names?” I haunt myself with orphaned interrogations while kids play,
dull. A child had fallen to ground. He doesn't cry.
The nuns realized I was often caught up in an imaginative talk with my parents. Sister Mara was the
first to notice.
“Anne, who are you talking to?”
“Shh, dad's listening to music…"
Sitting on the bench, I am now listening to the acute apex of grave voices. It is De Profundis by some
dead composer, dad's favorite. The kind of music you expect to listen to alone in old claustrophobia
inducing places. The organ gives it that eerie quality that along with a Latin text both creeps and
anesthetizes. The Latin text is the Psalm 130. Before, the children got surprised to see me carrying
vinyls down the backyard, “What a piece of junk”. Now, they don't care. De prufundis, clamavit,
Domine . I can see all voices.
Maybe he felt a god in them.
Was I innocent? Sister Mara told us we were sinless, like angels. “Innocence is like a bird,” she once
said. “Why, Sister?”, I asked surprised. She looked into me with liquid sight, “Because it flies high,
not afraid. It is unhurt hope, the light in a child’s eye”.
“It must be really tiny to fit in my eyes”, I thought. For me, innocence was an indigo bird.
Once she knelt down close and said, with a metallic voice, “What are your parents´ names?” I
stopped. My words dragged, “They never say”. At that moment, I realized why they used to laugh. I
Swas frightened. Sister Mara was right, innocence is unhurt hope. But innocence, too, dies.
I discerned that summoning my non existent parents by imaginary scenes of happiness would not
draw them near. What are their names… ? I had no parents. It wouldn’t change. I would never know
their names. The nuns showed me the only communion to have was the eucharist.
I suddenly remember the kid falling, stupid. The fat sound says it was Zaccheus, always alone. After
the fall, no cries are heard. Choir is rising. “He is such a whiner. Why silence?”
… apud Dominum misericordia, the voices sing.
I image dad, transfixed, and I close my eyes too. I see no shape but white.
As white as Father Lucas’ skin. He was the first man I ever saw. His smile was comforting. With a
bright voice, he said, “What is your name, little girl?” I take some seconds to answer, “They call me
Anne”, I pause, “but I like Alice better.”
Curious, he asked, “Why Alice?”
“Alice had a blue dress. I like that.”
He gazed into me with sky filled eyes, “One day, you'll have one.”
Father Lucas started coming around. In a locked confessionary, I cried but he received us with
unending arms His scarred hands would stir me off my sins.
“Why silence?” I know it will take three minutes for the other kids to see Zacchaeus on the ground.
“Is he dead”, they’ll ask. One minute for some of them to reach me. Music will be over. Then I will
be able to care. Now I feel heavy from my memories.
Four minutes have passed, “Ms. Flannagan, Zac is on the ground!”
“Where is he?”, I ask. He is under the tree, the kids shout. They head towards him. I go first, walking
faster. There is a distance between me and them. I see Zacchaeus, some 15 meters ahead.
A lucid voice resonates, “Anne? Father Lucas is here.” I looked up, childish and hopeful, “Yes,
Father.”
“I have a surprise for you. Come here.”
I followed him. Through the window, I saw a sky scratched with red strokes of lachrymose sunset. He
took my hands. I entered his wooden room with broad curtains, drawn.
His voice turned pale, “Here is your blue dress, my Alice.” I bolted to take hold of my sea colored
dress. But when I did, he hid it behind his back.
“Little one, I don't know if it will fit you. What do you think?”
“I don't know, Father.”
“You'll have to try it on.”
I looked down, shaking. But he showed where to begin. I took my clothes off, brown dress, shoes then
knee socks. Father was watching. He asked me to sit on his lap, while he would put my dress on,
himself. But it took a while. One of his hands was busy.
An uneven voice interrupts, “Ms., is Zac ok?”
“Kids, wait.” I had to feel his pulse.
Father whispers, “You can't tell anyone. The kids will want the dress but it's only yours, sweet Alice.”
“Can I have it?”
“You can't wear it around. Every time you want it, you come here. But it is only yours.”
I leave his room. My body was warm. The other day I came and he gave me another gift. Silk panties,
this time. They felt so soft on the skin.
I don’t know how to feel Zacchaeus’ pulse. The back of his neck was warm. I touch him. Father
would read Psalm 130 every time he touched me, “ Si iniquitates observaveris, Domine, Domine, quis
sustinebit?” He asked but I never knew the answer.
I feel the boy´s chest with my ears, the way Father would lean his head on mine, when his body was
above me.
“I love you.”
Love for me was misericordia . The mercy Father said he had had on us. A mercy turned flesh. Love
was communion. Pleasure, pain and palate.
“I love you, Alice.”
.
Words resonated in my newborn mouth. Him me
and were the only sounds.
“I love you, Alice. Do you?”
“Yes, Father.” “Yes, dad”, I exhale, , voluptuous.
The kids kept asking, “Ms., is Zac ok?”
I don't listen. I am elsewhere.
“Do you?”
Father Lucas’ psalm resonates, forgiving.
Si iniquitates observaveris, Domine, Domine, quis sustinebit?
If you, Lord, were to mark iniquities, who, O Lord, shall stand?
I didn't love him. But he knew me. He felt me all. And I, too, must forgive. Misericordia.
Was he a devil or a god? Father was my only mom and dad. And every time I touch, I feel Father's
hands around my neck. If he was a devil, I was his demonologist.
A voice again, “Ms., Zac ok?”
I smile.
“He's dead.”
I felt Lucas, wings wrapped around me. But the devil has no wings...
David Lucas Costa Cecílio Word count 1498
462 Otto Boehm St.
Joinville, Santa Catarina 81201700
Brazil
dc.cecilio@gmail.com
55 47 3021 2503