Of Brackens and Cowries

The night after my Mom’s funeral, you showed up dressed as a pot of hot soup on the stove, as all the tumbleweeds of fallen hair mysteriously vacuumed from the floor, as fresh linens smelling of her capim-limão perfume. It wasn’t what I was expecting when I cried for help against my pillow the day before, the moment the blaring absence of my Mom made me realize I wouldn’t survive if I kept trying to control the uncontrollable; I understood it was what I needed, though, when the first spoonful of broth warmed my soul as much as my mouth.

I won’t lie: I was so wrecked that the thought of what exactly you were barely flickered through my mind. The night after my Mom’s funeral, I didn’t know anything about you, but I was simply glad to have you there to comfort me.

I can’t say I wasn’t expecting another visit. After that night, you left many vestiges of your lingering presence. You were in the smudges of movement ghosting in the corner of my eyes, in the thick rows of lava-pés ants forming trancing spirals on the kitchen tiles; in the faint, bittersweet bite I would feel in the air as soon as I entered any room, an ancestral yet fresh scent that reminisced of Mata Atlântica brackens and stately ritualistic piles of cowries. And above all, I knew you were there in the rare and treasured moments in which I felt a sudden, astonishing urge to keep living despite it all.

This is why I wasn’t surprised when you appeared a couple of days later. My unsavory new neighbor had, again, knocked late at night; tipsy and in his briefs, he asked if I perchance could lend him a cup of white wine for his risotto, oily eyes stripping me bare with a carnivorous intensity. He was already stepping inside my apartment when you came from the bathroom, dressed as a man I had never seen. Tanned skin, tattooed lean arms, fragrant dark hair dripping water, towel wrapped around your hips; I could feel the warmth emitted by your bare chest when you placed yourself right behind me, a beautiful tough scarred hand resting on the doorframe, your body almost shrouding mine.

All good, meu bem?, you said. I’d never heard your raspy voice; still, it seemed like I knew it from another life, the phonemes familiar and natural like bees buzzing and waves spilling onto the sand. The neighbor all but ran away—and, before I could thank you for controlling the uncontrollable for me this time, you too vanished, deep galaxy eyes shining while you faded into the cloud of steam of an improbable hot shower.

Then, there were all the lazy, lonely Sundays when you would visit me dressed as a huge dog; the fur, shaggy and soft, was the overlapping browns and greys of the Dois Irmãos standing against the horizon from Ipanema Beach. In the winter, you would curl up with me in bed while I read, slowly healing from inside out. In the summer, the shallow huffs of you panting while laid sprawled on the cold kitchen floor reminded me I somehow would never be alone anymore if I didn’t want to.

Then, Carnaval came. Under the driving rain, I went to a bloquinho, where I danced and kissed, but no sweaty body rubbing against mine held the promise of being enough to sate my lust. Something hungrier than life stirred up in my lower belly—and, when I came home, red lipstick smudged across my face and soggy clothes, plumes, and hair, you were already there. You were waiting for me in my bed, dressed as everything I had never been able to find in any man, woman, or person in between. Hidden by the darkness of a night where the absence of witnesses would absolve all my sins, you were a multitude of limbs and members and tentacles and tongues. You hugged, licked, bit, penetrated, and scratched me just like I’d always wanted, the only one capable of making me feel for real. You fucked me in a way that would make any god envious, drinking my moans and reveling in my screams while purring and thrumming your own ancestral delight.

Now, almost a year after my Mom’s funeral, I’m still learning about you, this curious solicitous entity with purposes and origins lost in logic, space, and time. You’ve already come dressed as fresh, colorful flowers cascading from my ceiling when I finally had the nerve to quit my shit job; as an anaconda, slick and muscular, you’ve wrapped me in a secure, cold embrace when I went to bed yearning to disproportionally avenge some minor wrongdoing. As the familiar shaggy dog, you kept coming every other Sunday. You also showed up another two times as the tattooed man, even though we never exchanged a word. You’ve appeared dressed as my favorite book on a couple of rainy nights, and once again as a pot of hot food—this time, a cauldron of feijoada I shared with friends I had long missed. There’s no fixed pattern in your apparitions. Life rarely offers a dress code, but I trust with my life your ability to dress up according to what I need.

This is why I don’t dread your omnipresence, even with the unshakable certainty you most definitely will end up showing up as the thing I fear the most: myself.

And, when this happens, I won’t be able to run away from all the conversations I owe me—but I also know you’ll be there with my arms wide open to comfort myself with my own loving embrace.