But one day she was waiting in João’s dingy apartment, and João came by with one of his impeccably high-class friends. The boy gave her a look that dismissed her utterly, as if she was of less interest than the furniture. And when he bid farewell to João, his fingers lingered a little too long on João’s arm, and his glance lingered a little too long on João’s eyes, and she thought, Why, he is looking at João just like a lover would. And then, never even having articulated it to herself until that moment, she thought, But of course, why shouldn’t he? He must be João’s lover.
Until then it had never struck her as odd that João had no girlfriends. He was handsome enough; he could have had any of Estrela’s friends if he had but once called their name in his gentle, commanding voice, but she had only thought that he was too good for them.
Why, João is a veador, she thought, and suddenly all that had been opaque to her became clear.
João, when she mentioned it, shrugged. “I can’t believe that you didn’t know,” he said.
“Aren’t you afraid of diseases?”
João looked at her.
“You know. The homosexual disease. The—you know!”
“Say it.”
“You know! AIDS!”
“I am far more cautious than you are, my little orchid,” João said. “You have, what, a dozen male friends who skewer you like a barbecued goat on a spit? Are you not yourself afraid?”
“I take precautions,” she said, indignantly tossing her hair.
“What precautions?”
“I make them all wear—” She made a gesture with her hand, like unrolling a tiny inner tube. “You know. The tiny shirt. Camisinhas.”
“Ah, so you do make your knights wear their rubber armor,” João said. “As well you should. I am glad to hear it. And so do I.” He lowered his eyes. “Am I afraid?” He raised his eyes and looked directly at her, his dark eyes penetrating through her like fire. “Yes, of course I am afraid. It is a horrible thing, when love is death and death is love. It is my worst fear, and each time I love, I think, is this it? Is this one to be my death? But what can I do? Can I change the stars in their course, or keep the ocean from surrounding the world? No more can I change the way I am. If it is fated that I must die, well, then, every man must die. And I will have lived a little, and have known the love of a few men. I am careful, my love, I am as careful as I can possibly be, but death comes for all men. And for women too, little orchid.”
Oddly, once she knew his secret, it brought her closer to João. He would now bring her out with his drinking buddies, and after a while they accepted her as just a rather odd friend of João’s. She saw them, at first, as shallow poseurs pretending at an assertive masculinity, unworthy of João’s affection; later as confused young men, uncertain of their sexuality or their identity; and finally she didn’t see them as anything at all, just friends of João’s: Andrew who got drunk and sang, Justin who liked to take her to ancient Hollywood musicals and then discuss the characters and the costumes all night long, Dieter who taught her to ride a dirt bike, Jean-Paul who wrote poetry.
When João broke up with the two others he had shared his apartment with, it was only natural that he took a new apartment with her. João was in a Ph.D. program at Cleveland State University by then, the rising star of the geology department; she had won an assistantship and would be starting the following autumn. Unlike João, who studied rocks with an intensity that sometimes almost frightened her, she had no particular passion for geology. It was as good a subject as any other, no better, no worse.
What does he see in those rocks? she sometimes thought. What does he see in those men?
But it was an excuse to avoid going back to Brazil.
17
Trevor on Wheels
Trevor drove to the theme music of the songs stomping through his head—
riding on that lonesome road, riding riding riding
He was being excruciatingly careful. Driving the dirt-rovers had been easy enough in the virtual reality simulation, but he was acutely aware that this was real reality, and smashing up a dirt-rover would mean that none of the crew would ever trust him again.
hauling down that heavy load, riding riding riding
He stayed well behind Estrela, following in her tracks, watching where she avoided obstacles. Estrela banked it over casually, sometimes weaving lazy S-curves for no reason he could see other than just for the hell of it. The rocky surface had little traction, though, and he was afraid to follow her. If he leaned the rockhopper over very far, he was afraid it would slide out from under him. So he slowly dropped further behind. It was okay. He was practicing being cautious, and there was no real way he could get lost; the dirt-rover had its own laser-gyro-based inertial navigation system that gave him a readout of his position to within a fraction of an inch. In the very worst case, if he lost track of both Estrela ahead of him and the rock-hopper behind him, he could radio and ask for a position.
So he didn’t mind that he was slowly dropping behind her.
He was almost a mile behind when she drove over the cliff.
18
Marriage of Convenience
In 2014, when Brazil announced its astronaut program, João had studied the application guidelines—both the ones that were written and the ones that were implied. A Mars mission was in the air; everybody knew it. The Americans had already announced their intention to go to Mars, and João studied the Brazilian space program carefully. They were asking for geologists. Why, he considered, with no oil to drill for in space, no mountains, no ores, why would the Brazilians want geologists for astronauts? Why, then, if not for Mars?
João had kept his tastes for young men discreet. In America, to be openly homosexual sometimes would invite an attack, and it certainly meant a dead end for advancement, at least for those not in careers friendly to those who were not straight, such as hairdressing or dancing. No, it was wise to keep his private life silent.
João was already at a disadvantage, being Brazilian in an American-dominated economy. He was working with a petrochemical company now, scouting locations for exploratory wells in the Yucatan. It was work that he enjoyed—of everything, he most liked walking in the field, picking up rocks and examining them and trying to imagine what tectonic conditions had formed them, what their history was, what story they told about the geological conditions deep down under the earth. The rocks of Yucatan were mostly limestone. The core drillings, the seismic tomography, the petrography and magnetometry and analytical chemistry—all of the tools of physical geology he found interesting and was adept at using and interpreting, but at heart what he most liked was just walking in the territory with a hammer and a hand lens, looking at the terrain and picking up rocks.
Did he want to become an astronaut? Yes, he decided.
Estrela had not, in all that time, gone back to Brazil.
Often she stayed with João. His passion was for young men, preferably lean, blond young men with mirror-shades and a taste for suede. But some years lean young blonds were few and far between, and on those evenings when he was between lovers, and bored, Estrela had been available, and so—
Well, it was of no consequence to him, a physical comfort, a small shared intimacy he could enjoy, even though he might have wished that Estrela were a man. She was his friend, and even if she did not share his soul, she was the one he bared his soul to, the only person on earth who really knew him.