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cat smell, the water was heated in pans, wobbling in the midst of the fumes, a handle on both sides, the steam spreading, the clown
    —I scalded myself
    Rui lying down reaching for the newspaper
    —Did you scald yourself, sweetie?
    a scarlet splotch with blisters, my father looking for the tube of sunburn lotion and lavender, acetone, pictures of him as a redhead, as a blonde, as a Sevillana with a great show of castanets and mantillas, Rui between two pages, checking his cigarette
    —Can’t you find the lotion, sweetie?
    on the stone lid a cluster of woolen forget-me-nots, Dona Aurorinha nowhere to be found, a tenuous presence in the distant past, days like nostalgia for the dead, the bronchitis rattles breaking apart elsewhere, a palsied claw have a hard time gathering them together
    —Come here
    the Venetian blinds rose with a creak of bones that showed an empty cage holding a rubber stamp, would someone clear up for me whether or not rubber stamps can sing
    how much is a rubber stamp worth?
    a small trunk open just for me
    thank you, trunk with a couple of postcards where grease stains have dissolved some letters
    M ss Aurorinha, please believe that if I live a housand years I’ll not for et that Saturday, yours orever Rosendo
    the boyfriend dead any number of years from some undefined illness, July sunsets in which he kept getting thinner
    gently
    at the baths drinking cups of bicarbonated water while the musicians quavered out waltzes on a bamboo bandstand
    M ss Aurorinha, tonight the fever went down and I’m no longer spitting blood
    lilac messages, dried herbs in books, declarations of love, a complete sentence that the Cape Verdeans wouldn’t swap with me for anything
    —Why do I want this?
    crowned with a star-shaped smear
    As soon as I’m cured and if you’ll have me, let’s get married
    and in the end he wasn’t cured, the waltz was inaudible, doctors in top hats prescribed cupping glasses, baked chicken, naps
    With the rest I feel almost strong and I took a wa k this afternoon, I kiss yo r hands Rosendo
    Dona Aurorinha in a hurry with her trousseau, linking initials, convincing her sergeant uncle to accompany her to Luso, trains slower than oxcarts, linden trees, mists, cottages, characters who were nothing but eyes and mouths wrapped in shawls in wicker lounge chairs and the creaking of the wicker prevented us from understanding who was complaining, not just one Rosendo, ten or fifteen Rosendos in their unknown beards, in their empty boots, in the softness of their asthma, the spring of bicarbonated water was weeping in the woods, kites were hanging down from the sky in a line swaying wires, ten or fifteen Rosendos
    If Miss Aurorinha could only dream how much I love her, my odfather has promised me a partnership in his firm and a share in a house in Arroios
    those who recognized her couldn’t remember her, then recognized her, elated
    —Miss
    the return train broke down in Coimbra, the sergeant uncle on the platform consulted timetables with the kites hanging down from the sky in his mind and no more delicate passion, no more postcards, and the man with the jackknife jeering at me
    —What am I going to do with this?
    what am I going to do with If I live a housand years I’ll never for et that Saturday please accept y sincere best ishes Rosendo, what am I going to do with legitimat ly happy I can tell you that I am almost back in shape I only ost one pound during the past eek and I go to the dining room with the help of the attendant, what am I going to do with a beautiful day oday in the hot baths remembering a certain unforgettable Su day in Alges during which
    I swear it
    I valued her as I never had, arguing with the Cape Verdeans while the cold, the heat, an itching that made me keep scratching myself all the time, pulling off my skin with my nails, pulling me out of myself, freeing myself from the impossibility of not moving, from this apartment in the dark, from this cat smell with no cat,