The children of the angels and the children of the stars
Chapter 2: Infinity
When she was eight years old, Deodorina’s father Diego gave her the book he loved the most. The story was too complex and the writing was difficult to understand. She decided to peek at the last page of the book and found something incomprehensible. The little girl then ran to her father’s bedroom, where the man was resting in his bed. He had been doing that for weeks, occasionally going to the hospital, ever since he fell ill. Instead of getting better, the man seemed thinner and weaker each day. Her mother told the girl many times not to bother him, but Deodorina always went to see him while the woman was busy in the family’s stationery store, located in the ground floor of their two-floor house.
“Dad! Someone drew a number 8 taking a nap in the last page!” Deodorina told her father as soon as she entered the bedroom with the book opened in her hands.
“You shouldn’t be in that page yet, I gave you this thick book yesterday,” he chuckled, weakly. “That’s not a number 8 taking a nap, though. It’s the symbol of Infinity.”
“Infinity?” she asked, not understanding.
“What lasts forever… what never ends…” the man explained, closing his eyes. “I need to rest now… we’ll talk more later, okay?”
That night, Deodorina’s father was taken to the hospital once more. But that time, he would not go back home or have the chance to talk to the girl again.
At the funeral, her mother Rute cried the whole time and all what she heard as consolation was that what happened had been God’s will, and that humans could not understand His mysterious plans. That explanation stayed with the girl, but not in an expected way. Wasn’t God a lot like a writer, creating people and deciding what would happen to them? In that case, Deodorina, along with every other person in the world, was nothing more than a character in someone else’s story, powerless to stop whatever plan the writer had for her. Nothing she did or thought mattered because she wasn’t really in control of anything.
One night, during dinner, the girl asked her mother:
“Is Dad in Heaven?”
“Of course he is. He was a wonderful man,” Rute replied, smiling. “When God decides it’s our time to go, we’ll be there with him. But we must keep on living before that.”
“I want to go to Heaven now,” the girl muttered, startling her mother.
“Your father wouldn’t be happy if you went there too soon. He wanted you to have a long life, a job you like, a family…”
“Then God will take my family from me when He feels like it.”
“Deodorina! Don’t talk like that!” Rute scolded her. “God isn’t your enemy! He doesn’t do things because He likes to see people suffering!”
“Then, why did He make Dad sick? Why did He kill him?!” the girl cried. She looked down and rubbed her eyes, but that didn’t stop the tears from coming. Soon, the child felt her mother’s arms wrapping her.
“God makes us suffer so we can learn and grow from our pain,” the woman explained. “He does that because He loves us and wants what’s best for us!”
That statement caused a revolution in Deodorina’s mind. She remembered the various stories she had read where the characters suffered immensely and grew stronger to overcome all obstacles. If God was like a writer, then He was doing that so Deodorina could learn from her pain and develop, right?
The child wanted to understand the mind of her creator better. Therefore, she consumed every fictional book she could find. If she could understand God’s mind, the girl would know what future had in store for her and prepare for it. With that mentality, Deodorina decided to study literature when she grew up. Aside the books she had to read, she would always borrow more from the library. Because of that habit, she came to know the cute guy with small brown eyes, short dark hair and light brown skin. His name was César da Costa Ishida.
He had lost his mother when he was still a toddler and had no memory of her. The student always carried a photo of the woman with him, though, and he showed it to Deodorina. His mother was called Marisa, a beautiful black lady with a warm smile. His only relative in Belém was his father, who owned a supermarket and insisted for him to become a lawyer. César was a cheerful and easy-going person who quickly befriended Deodorina. They both talked about fictional stories, despite it being obvious that César didn’t see those stories the same way she did. Aware that her reasons to obsess over literature could come across as strange, Deodorina never spoke of her wish to comprehend God to César. Maybe if she had, he wouldn’t have made her that suggestion during that afternoon in the line of the University’s Restaurant:
“You should become a writer.”
Deodorina stared at him in astonishment. A writer was the last thing she would ever want to be. Who was she to create worlds and burn them down? To create people and bring them misery, even if out of love? But she couldn’t tell him that. What haunted her soul was hers and nobody else’s.
“I know what you’re thinking,” César said, with a nervous chuckle. “It’s not easy to become a writer in Brazil. You could try writing in English, perhaps. If you feel like it, you could name the main character Cah-eh-zar.”
“W-What was that?” Deodorina asked, trying to muffle a laugh.
“Y-You know… how my name is spelled in English…” César mumbled, blushing and looking away. “C-A-E-”
“Caesar! You were trying to say Caesar!”
“It’s my name and I’ll pronounce it however I like it!”
“Alright, then,” she said, smirking.
“Oh, so you’re going to write Caesar’s story?” he inquired, beaming.
“I never made such promise,” she replied, pouting.
The thought of writing a book wouldn’t return to her until a few months later, when she and César were already dating, and his father died of a sudden heart attack.
Few people talked to the son during the funeral and the burial.
“Only his friends and colleagues are here. His relatives didn’t come,” César explained to Deodorina once they were alone in the cemetery, looking at the man’s tombstone under the sunset. “Mom’s family lives in another state.”
“What about your friends?” she asked. “Did you tell them what happened?”
“They’re people I talk to and joke with… they find me funny…” he muttered. “I’m not really that close to them…”
“I know what you mean…” Deodorina murmured. She too didn’t feel especially close to anyone. Even from her mother she had grown distant with the years. César, on the other hand, slowly made his way into her heart, without her noticing it or wanting it, to a point where the sight of his sad face caused her pain.
“Wherever my Dad is, he must be really happy,” César said in a bitter tone. “He’s together with Mom, like he has always wanted... and doesn’t have to put up with me anymore. He might even be smiling now…”
“I’ll be here for you,” she promised. “For how long you need me… and even when you don’t need me at all.”
César hugged her tightly, burying his face on her shoulder. He cried quietly and she caressed his head.
“You’re my whole world,” he told her on that occasion and many more after it.
That night, she took César to her place, after talking to her mother, who agreed that the young man shouldn’t be alone. After he slept on the living room couch, Deodorina observed him for various minutes, restlessly, at the entrance of the room.
“Do you want to talk?” Rute asked her.
“I don’t know what to say,” Deodorina muttered.
“I never thought that someone who reads so much could run out of words,” the older woman commented. A small smile lit her face as she gazed at her daughter with her loving black eyes while tying her dark hair in a ponytail. “You didn’t do much talking after that day. You kept everything to yourself… it felt like you had entered a world where I couldn’t follow you. I didn’t know how I could help when I had no idea of what went through your mind.”
“Sorry…” Deodorina said in low voice. “I didn’t want to worry you, I just…”
“I was really glad when that boy entered your life. You seemed more cheerful,” Rute added.
“I like him a lot,” Deodorina acknowledged, sadly. “César is a sweet guy, the kind of person that never does anything to hurt others… he didn’t deserve to go through this and I can’t understand why he had to… I try but… it doesn’t make sense…”
“That was God’s will,” Rute said. “We can’t understand because no person can think like God.”
Think like God… those three words echoed in Deodorina’s mind. There was a way for her to think like God. She never wished to do that, she never wanted to be one of those people that played with others and destroyed their lives as if it was nothing. Deodorina wanted to understand how a writer thought and tried to achieve that through reading but it never worked. That was, of course, because only another writer could do that.
“Mom, may I pick a notebook in the store?” Deodorina asked.
“Sure!” Rute replied. “I hope it helps.”
The girl picked a large notebook with a hard black cover, taking it to her bedroom. She sat cross-legged on the bed, grabbed a nearby pen and pressed it against the first page.
What should I write? Deodorina wondered. After a few seconds, the first words came to her:
Caesar was a kind man, maybe the kindest human on Earth. He lost everything.
Thick tears rolled from her eyes as she remembered her boyfriend’s devastated face in the funeral and how he cried on her shoulder. The feeling of his trembling body against hers was still too recent.
But then, she remembered the smile he had when he offered to borrow the extra books she wanted. She remembered the loving way he looked at her and how easily flustered César got whenever he laughed. That was the person she loved and who she wanted to see again. Deodorina continued to write:
But Caesar’s heart was strong and resilient; it wouldn’t break so easily, not as long as he had love. And that was something he could never lose. For he was a hero.
From that day on, Deodorina would always find time to write about Caesar, which would make her boyfriend really excited and bring forth his first smile after his loss.
Months later, on the first anniversary of when they started dating, César made dinner at his place and gave her a silver necklace with a pendant that had the symbol of Infinity on it. She had never told him about that book. How did he know?
“Deodorina…” he said, smiling from across the small table. “Like Diadorim, right? Riobaldo’s love, for whom he was willing to sell his soul to the devil.”
“How come only now you’re telling me you’ve read that book?” she inquired.
“I hadn’t read The Devil to Pay in the Backlands when I met you. I found your name different and researched it, which led me to the book,” he explained. “And then, I wanted to surprise you. Did you like it?”
“Yes…” Deodorina assured, smiling at the same time a tear fell from her left eye. “It’s just… my Dad gave me that book a little before he…”
“I’m sorry,” César apologized. “Are you okay?”
“I’m okay, don’t worry,” she told him while putting on the necklace. “It’s just that… I haven’t thought about Infinity in a long time.”
“You’ll have to now. It’s the only way to measure my love for you.”
“How can you be so cheesy?” she asked, laughing.
“It might sound cheesy but it’s how I feel,” César said in a serious tone, gazing into her eyes. “I will love you forever.”
Her heart accelerated as she looked into his beautiful eyes. In that moment, she knew that César had become a part of her life that she wouldn’t bear to ever lose.
“I want to be with you forever,” she told him, which made César smile largely.
“Then, I guess we should get married,” he said.
They weren’t in a hurry to get married, though. After graduation, César had to get his license and Deodorina wanted to further her studies in literature. They waited until they were both financially stable to get married. The wedding was simple and small, and they didn’t invite too many people. Their first year as a married couple was the happiest period they had.
And then, lights fell from the sky.