you in me
Presented as the final project in the Creative Writing Workshop at PUC-RS.
At four in the morning, we’re already descending the roller coaster of drugs, not inclined to contemplate the prospects for the rest of the night. But it was precisely at that moment that I saw her. I swear it wasn’t planned. She was sitting on the curb in front of Ximeninho, not in a desolate or sulking manner, but reflective, elbows on thighs, cheeks in hands, observing the few people on the street as if they were a documentary or an art exhibition, I don’t know, with an professorial air of indulgence, seeming to judge, understand, and accept everyone. One of them was me. I approached without knowing how to act, feeling her shy gaze transition from curiosity to interest, and from interest to an invitation that I wasn’t sure I could accept. When I reached the point of having her within my reach, she stood up, tapped her butt to clean the dirt from her pants, and said:
– You’re alone too.
It was our introduction, perfect like that. Then we followed the conventional script: Kethelyn, pleasure, Maria Cecília, pleasure is mine, what are you doing sitting here at this hour, oh, just thinking. When I went to give the customary double cheek-kiss (I know, I’m weird, who does that in the middle of a conversation?), I noticed the stickiness of sweaty faces, the tickle of her curly hair, and the mix of ethyl breath with Antonio Banderas’ Her Secret Bloom. A fraction of a pinky finger invaded my waist under the blouse. I understood that nostalgia would be present, yes, but not without ecstasy. What I secretly expected.
– When you showed up, I was thinking about these people here. It’s all so silly, isn’t it?
– What do you mean?
– Nobody really relaxes. Or know what they truly want.
I nodded in agreement. The acid trip was fading, and I was getting into her groove, smoothingly, naturallly. We walked through the city: Fundição, Cathedral, Selaron, Arcos. I was becoming more and more a part of the Rio de Janeiro night, or rather, the Rio de Janeiro night was revealing itself more and more alive within me. And before I knew it, we were already embracing, playing silly games, messing up each other’s hair, guessing the lives of people on the street. The “Rap da Felicidade” (mas eu só queeeero é seer feliz, feliz, feliz, feliz, feliz, onde eeeeu nascii, hã!) played in some pub, and she seemed to take advantage of my distraction to ask:
– When you were out there, have you already decided where we’re going?
I don’t know why I was so dumbfounded. The possibility of her understanding what was going on was obvious. Ceci had always been like that, perceptive and direct to the edge of rudeness, an ideal combination to generate moments like these. I tried to disguise the disappointment (I don’t think I succeeded) and asked as if it were just out of curiosity:
– Is it so evident that I’m not from here?
She arched her eyebrows.
– I would never have imagined that you guys were clueless about it.
You must be aware that there are infinite possibilities for positioning a world in relation to its immediate superior. In the one I have designed, beings have an awareness of the existence of a reality above and are endowed with a sense of life that involves the encounter between realities. Like a religion, you know? But undefined, without dogmas, rituals, scriptures, none of that. Just a vague idea that people are born knowing. It was my way of not lying while still creating a mystery. This way our encounter would have a touch of specialness, of transcendence even. But the goal was for her to experience everything naturally and piece it together later, attributing meaning as she remembered. It would be more natural. More beautiful, you know? Anyway, I wasn’t so sad because the main thing she still couldn’t know: that world was hers, only hers, and existed for her sake.
– I haven’t decided yet. What do you think?
We chose a cheap motel. We had sex before even going up to the room, standing on the stairs, with a sense of urgency that I noticed wasn’t only mine. Perhaps also a sense of completeness because from the start we kind of did everything, without caring about smells and tastes of bodies too strong or the neglect of the place. It’s amazing how she always knew where and how to kiss, lick, pinch, scratch, and most importantly, squeeze me. I think what really won me over was how she squeezed me. It gave a sense of security, you know? And freedom, I could be anything while held like that. We stayed there until after sunrise. Then we went up and repeated, got into the shower and repeated, lay on the bed and repeated, and when the sun set again, I had regained the sense of having been intimate with that woman for almost my entire life.
We entered into a kind of relationship. We went out always at night, almost always in that downtown area and a few times along Zona Sul waterfront. This beginning was quite enjoyable, a simultaneous reliving and exploring of new possibilities, without responsibilities or burdens, a perfect carpe diem, I would say. I tried not to maintain a strict temporal pattern. Sometimes I let a few days pass there and returned after just an hour from here. Other times I stayed for about two months here and only let a day go by there. It was all play, I enjoyed thinking about the differences in what she and I felt according to different times. And, no matter how much time passed, I didn’t seek to know what she did when I wasn’t there. I was curious, but what did that matter in the grand scheme of things? If it wasn’t my reality? I was convinced that everything would work out this time if I repressed the paranoia, if I could focus not on what would happen at any time or place, but on what actually happened around me. Being with her in a separate world made it so easy: arrive, smile, say a half-shy hello, peck on the lips, go out dancing, French kiss, get high, do silly things on the street, laugh until the belly hurts, tell the rest of the world to go to hell, condense everything one could want into a moment of pleasure, repeat, repeat, say goodbye, and whenever I wanted, come back.
Thus, things remained more or less frozen for a while, I don’t remember how long.
Until she ditched me. Actually, it wasn’t quite like that because we never made any plans, but by now I considered our Friday nights a tacit agreement. I waited until Saturday morning, immediately skipped a week to the next Friday, and this time found her at Ximeninho, the usual spot. She was more carefree than usual, lighter. After the hello and the peck on the lips, I casually mentioned that I hadn’t seen her there last Friday.
– I was with someone else. Do you mind?
From the tone of the “do you mind,” I understood the meaning of the “was.” I held her gaze. It didn’t seem like her. But it was her, I knew. I had confirmed it myself. I reached a conclusion that impressed me at the moment but later found somewhat obvious: not everyone always resembles themselves.
– No – I replied curtly and changed the subject. I tried not to think about it anymore because, in my view, it was the only possible answer. Throwing a jealousy fit within one of my own worlds was the height of the unacceptable.
From there, things got worse. Not that we were less affectionate or argued, but something ethereal was dissolving. Both of us became more distant, distracted. You know that transcendence I spoke of? It completely dissolved. Trips to the beach became predominant and, worse, strange. For example, she started coming up with the idea of going into the sea far ahead, waving at me, diving, and disappearing. I spent minutes or more than an hour on the sand waiting for her to return, reproaching myself for feeling restless even though I knew nothing was going to happen, unable to speed up time because I didn’t know when she intended to reappear.
After one of these disappearances, the crazy girl surprised me and lay on top of me. I always loved the pressure of eighty-something kilos on my body and bravely endured the lack of air to the limit. This time her face was close to mine, her cold lips on my cheek, and her gaze turned to the horizon. When I was almost suffocating, she asked:
– You folks created the world, right?
– You could say that.
Little oxygen in the brain and having to start a conversation like this?
– Do you have control over what happens?
– To a certain extent.
– Like, can you influence people? My decisions, for example?
I lied:
– No.
This was apparently the question she wanted to get to because after that, she didn’t say anything else. She relieved the weight of her body. I, in turn, took a deep breath and started the litany:
– The world here is an almost perfect copy of the one there. Our only action is to import the operating mechanisms and maintain the infrastructure. Everything runs autonomously, as, by the way, any reality worth its salt does.
But I also fell silent because she no longer seemed interested. She began to bite me while I spoke, those wet bites on the muscles of my arms and neck that end up working for me like a massage, actually the most wonderful one possible. I forgot everything, fears, contradictions, as I always did, and for the next few hours, I managed once again to live everything as it used to be, the original life, the original Ceci.
When I came back here, I had already decided what to do.
I can not only influence her but also be her. And after that night, it was impossible to resist any longer. As soon as I woke up the next morning, I accessed virtual reality for the first time with a focus on Ceci in the third person.
Do you think it’s sick? Assuming the identity of the person you love? Invading her subjectivity, having total access to her consciousness, making all decisions, without anything changing for her, without her realizing, without her ceasing to be her? I knew that trying this wouldn’t lead to anything good. Seriously, it should be forbidden. Or at least difficult to do. It was such a crazy thing that, even though it only lasted a few minutes, I’m still mustering the courage to go back. This must have been about two years ago. Here and there.