I spotted Fernanda just as her face lit up in fond recognition.
She slid up beside me like a shaggy little cartoon ghost in a light cotton denim mini skirt and knee-high brown leather fuck boots. She gave me a quick hug and a humid little kiss on either cheek.
“E aí, Ignácio, tudo tranquílo?” she breathed in my ear.
Fernanda was always a pretty good egg, one of the cooler ones. She knew the score. She was down. And she sure knew how to dress. Not like these other silly dog-faced Carioca bitches. She was a thin attractive aging alcoholic Paulistana, a pretty little cokehead with a quick cynical wit and a mouthful of razor-sharp doomsday humor.
We’d spent some good nights together while Narcisa was away. We’d had some good times and good sex. Good long bullshit sessions too sitting out there on the pre-dawn pista on slow winter nights when there was nothing to do but hang out and talk shit and wait for the dawn.
Fernanda usually stayed at some cheap rooming house over in Lapa, not far from where I lived. Sometimes I’d give her a ride home on the bike at the end of the night if she didn’t score a trick. More often than not she’d reach over and give my crotch an affectionate grope halfway there and then I’d take her back to my place and shag her free of charge. She’d usually stay over like that for a few drinks and some friendly company rather than just going home alone in defeat.
Fernanda liked my little crib. She called it ‘the doll’s house.’ She liked me and I liked her well enough too — but that’s as far as it went for either of us. We were friends. And she knew all about my hopeless love for some apocalyptic phantom named Narcisa.
Sometimes I’d sit out there with Fernanda after midnight. I would buy her a few shots of cheap cachaça and feed her cigarettes, keeping her company while she leaned on my bike and entertained me with the local whorehouse gossip in her hilariously cynical paulista drawl. Fernanda had a few regular gringo clients, and she knew the comings and goings of the endless rotating cycle of gringos and whores out on the pista. She always had her ear to the ground in Copacabana. She had a pointy nose for the glittery white powder too, but usually only did it up when she got invited to party with a coke-holding trick. Otherwise she just drank the long boring nights away out there on the street corner.
Fernanda wasn’t much of a pro when it came to drugs though, so whenever a John wanted to score, I remembered, she always just tossed the business to one of the many roving alcoholic coke-running cabbies who patrolled the night shift like trolling sharks — a friendly gesture to the friendly drivers who sometimes set her up with high-rolling tricks at the expensive luxury beachfront hotels.
I took Fernanda by the arm and led her over to the nearest street vendor where I bought her a double shot of pinga. She powered it down in one quick professional go. She gave me a grateful smile that lit up the night.
“I gotta start making some fast cash around here, ‘Nanda… you know any gringos that wanna score some blow?”
She cocked a weary eyebrow at me.
“Já ‘tá nessa, Ignácio? Now you running the brizola? Wha’ happen to all you clean and sober thing, gato? You fallen off the wagon?”
“No way, baby! Nothing like that, don’t worry. I can’t fuck around with that shit no more! I just need a little temporary gig. Strictly business…”
“’Tá bom, gatinho! Pagando uma de avião agora, hein? Tst tst… you always surprising me, Ignácio!” she scolded, clicking her tongue with mock reproach.
After an awkward little pause, I gave her the punch line.
“Narcisa’s back. Got it?” I said.
“Pobre gatinho!” she grinned. “Poor baby!”
She got it.
“Tá legal, gato. Me presta seu cellular aí!” she winked.
I reached in my pocket and handed her the phone. I watched as she dialed, then expertly pushed the speaker button so I could listen in.
“Copacabana Palace Hotel, boa noite,” the voice crackled.
“Boa noite. Por gentileza. O Senhor John Johnson, por favor,” she said.
“John Johnson?!?” I said laughing out loud. “Ya gotta be fucking shittin’ me here, ‘Nanda!”
She smirked and winked, holding a warning finger to her lips. Then a voice with a distinctly American accent came on the line.
“Hello?”
“Hel-oo Johnny!! Is Fernanda, bay-bee!” she cooed in the most adorable English.
“Hi there, Fer-naaan-duh!” the gringo said.
“Hey, Johnny… remember the little white thing we talkin’ ‘bout the night before? I got somebody here I wan’ you meet, bay-bee…”
Copyright Jonathan Shaw 2010.
wild stuff!