Secret Dinner - Secret Finisher
🀄 JANTAR SECRETO or SECRET DINNER, written by Raphael Montes. A book I finished yesterday. I´ve made my own conclusion on the ending. If you don´t want spoilers, don´t read this post.
When she visits Dante in prison, Cora is lying her ass out in an attempt to emotionally escape Leitão´s death. This is poetic because she´s living in a world of her creation where Leitão was the leader of the illegal dinners pyramid, just like Leitão crafted a world where his mother didn´t die and he keeps sending her letters.
Of course Dante is in prison for 30 years, isolated from the world outside, so he can´t find out for sure whether Cora lies. He keeps writing his book, trying to kill time in his depressing monotonous prison days, unaware of how important that hobby is for processing his emotions and healing.
Dante gets to know more about a specially mysterious guard thanks to the bored prisoners´ rumors and useless chit-chat. After a long while he finds out this guard is someone like him, some kind of low-ranking in a criminal system who wound up in jail. But this one ascended in life after fulfilling his penalty and after years of homelessness could get himself together and became a guard.
Flashbacks of both Arthur and Miguel flood his mind. Dude´s so messed up, new connections make him relive everything he went through. Thankfully the book he´s writing about everything that happened prepares him to face these emotions.
At this point, he´s distant acquaintances with the guard.
Over the years their relationship becomes something a little more solid. Dante expects absolutely nothing of this, and he can´t be seen chatting with a guard too often, but his healing is undoubtedly helped by talking with someone similar to him.
30 years are past, Dante and the guard get along well. The guard was promoted recently and is now a delegate. He sees Dante out, and since Dante is a free man, they can meet sometime after his shift, if he even has a predictable shift. ¨I won´t have a job for a while, so I´ll be free anytime,¨ Dante chuckles as well as a man with a life like this can. He keeps the book he finished, and thinks of naming it something stupid like ¨how I got my ass in prison.¨
Waiting for the guard to finish his shift, he looks at the book that embodies his life choices into a single block of paper.
¨Didn´t think you´d actually wait for me here. I was troubled on how to find you since I don´t have your contact.¨ the delegate puts on a coat, since the night´s cold. Dante sheds a tear.
Their conversation at the restaurant wasn´t as trivial as Dante thought it´d be. The delegate seems to genuinely hold some care for him. So…Dante ends up in his house, takes a shower, they go to a barber and the delegate offers to help him publish his books and contribute as he can until Dante gets his own footing.
Dante really doesn´t know what to say. He decides to start by the smaller blocks of paper the delegate holds under his arm. ¨You didn´t throw that shit away? I had to focus on keeping this away from the other prisoners´ sight,¨ he says with an irritated tinge to his voice, while throwing the sheets on the table. ¨Why are you doing this? I thought it was something normal for delegates to show some over-the-top compassion to the newly released prisoners, for the sake of self fulfillment. I know how small good deeds can massage the ego,¨ he averts his look to the wall, remembering that petition many years ago to stop dog torture in China. He sips on tea, wondering if they got any results with that. He scoffs.
Trying to focus his look away from the delegate and appear as collected as possible, Dante thinks whether this guy is connected to Leitão´s mafia. A tired looking police agent, wearing an imposing thick coat like last night, awakened memories in Dante that set his blood on fire but made him sweat cold.
Leitão wanted to stop Dante from living life out of prison and potentially uncover the current secret dinners. Fuck, he´d have to make a choice now, exactly like the past: let it happen with the help of emotional anesthesia or swallow fear, get in contact with Cora, repeat his experience in the slaughterhouses in an attempt to investigate again to fight the system. He trembles profusely, his hands clutch his hair; he cries heartbrokenly as the delegate tries to shake his arm. Dante´s attention is finally caught, and he can swear he´ll die right now.
Like Leitão, this person who promised to be a friend has also been calling contacts all along, giving the illegal dinners continuity. Like Anthunes, this person who promised to be a friend has also been getting seagulls to serve in the dinners. The first bloodbath he saw at the Federal Highway Police post spins in his head as he contains the urge to vomit and opens his mouth.
Dante points his finger at the delegate, grinding his teeth furiously between trembling lips that let out pent up screams: ¨have you people got no shame? Is the whole police and all police institutions in Rio de Janeiro in on the secret dinners?! What the fuck man?! You were calling Leitão between our talks during my prison time, telling him what a fucking idiot I was for trusting you! Arthur!¨
¨…what Arthur?¨
¨I mean…forget it. Kill me, or torture me, man I don´t give a shit,¨ he drops back on the chair, eyes closed. But, just like Arthur, the delegate doesn´t kill him. He grips Dante´s wrist.
¨I already knew this, but you´re horribly fucked up.¨
¨I know.¨
¨No, I´m saying you need mental help.¨ The delegate takes a deep breath. ¨I´ll pay you a therapist. I can only get one for once a month, sorry.¨
Dante stays silent. Then, ¨your theatrics are going too far. Leitão didn´t kill me even though I was a nuisance to his pyramid in the past, too. Do one good thing in your miserable life I know very well, and kill me.¨
The delegate sits back slowly and looks Dante in the eye. Dante sheds more tears.
They live together for the next months, trying to get Dante´s books published. Once a month, Dante gets a therapy session, but goes one month or another without because money gets short. He becomes a sale assistant at a small thrift store. It´s enough to not feel like a parasite.
