Nowhere People

Another day. Maína’s sisters cannot guess who the man is who’s getting out of the car with those plastic bags in his hands. He tries to talk to the older one, but she doesn’t understand what he’s saying. Maína recognises his voice, she comes out of the tent and, making no attempt to hide her happiness at seeing him, says she had only been expecting him in two days’ time. Paulo hands over the bags with packets of biscuits, cornflower snacks and soft drinks for her. ‘I’ve brought some junk food,’ he says. Maína wants to know what junk means. Without waiting for a reply she goes back to the tent. Paulo follows her. He goes into the tent and sees the straw mats covering the floor, the wooden crates with cleaning products, clothes, pans, everything improvised, a table with a stack of six Duralex plates, a can of cooking oil, a few opaque plastic tubs and a pot of cutlery on it. Maína arranges the soft drinks on the table, puts the plastic bags away in one of the wooden crates. She takes Paulo by the hand, leads him to the little wicker bench at the entrance to the tent, asks him to sit down for a moment, then she takes two aluminium mugs, opens one of the soft drinks, pours it, passes him the drink. She purses her lips tight showing her interest in knowing what has brought him here. He takes a sip of the drink. ‘I quit my job today. It’s a good place, I stayed to help and to learn. The bosses are good to me. They do me good. You understand? It’s just I’m not doing what I want to be doing. When I’m there I have to help people, people I don’t want to help. The bosses are going to give me some money, money that’s mine, and I was thinking of taking some of it and helping you. Except I don’t know how to help you. It’s not much,’ he says. Maína gets up, takes the mug from his hands, puts it down beside the wicker bench, calls her sisters over, tells them to give him a big hug. When it’s her turn to hug him, she lets slip, ‘We are together, and happy.’ (Paulo has had an argument in the office because, after some days, the lawyers told him that they were indeed going to halve the amount he received from the estate agency’s legal activities. This decision, which he felt was unfair, made him stand up and say he wasn’t going to work with them any longer, and demand that, within the new rules with the decreased percentage, they deposit an amount approximating what he would be receiving from the suits that are filed.) The smallest child sat on his lap without his noticing. He had headed over here out of sheer rage (in order to lessen his rage); gradually he realises what caused it. And — out of context — he replies to Maína: ‘Junk is a word for stuff that isn’t healthy, that has no value.’ Maína puts her arms around him, saying he can come back as often as he likes. ‘Things that have no value,’ she repeats, talking to herself this time.