“Vera! Vera!” he called as they neared the house.
A woman, wiping her hands on an apron, hurried from the front porch as they approached. She looked at her husband curiously but quickly came to River’s other side to help him along. Guillermo, Juan, and even little Anna started to talk to the woman, explaining that they had found River and what River had told them.
River tried to pick out words. He realized that they were all agreeing to help him.
He was hurt; he was in their country. They must tend to him and help him—God and Christ and their own hearts made it so.
As they entered the house, River began to notice several things. He saw that the family was very poor. The dress that little Anna was wearing was nearly threadbare; her shoes were too big for her. They had been a boy’s shoes—her brother’s shoes, he thought.
The house was built of wood and there was a wooden barn out back. River wondered if the family had built the structures by themselves. Perhaps other members of the family had come to help them.
While they had little, it was all clean and neat. The porch floor was freshly swept; a double swing made of raw wood offered a place to sit and look out over the land and down to the stream.
Guillermo and Vera brought him through a screen door to a small living room and got him seated on a couch—an old worn leather chesterfield. Vera dragged over a footstool and began to unlace his shoes.
“Please—por favor!” he said, leaning to do the task himself.
She shook her head, chiding him. He looked up at her. Her face was as weatherworn as her husband’s, thin, and yet beautiful. There was warmth and tenderness in her eyes. She was drawn and haggard, too old for her years—and yet beautiful.
She took off his boots and looked at his ankle. She wagged a finger at him.
“My mother says that you are to behave,” Juan told him, grinning. “This is good—she is yelling at you, not me.”
River smiled. He thanked Vera in English and in Portuguese.
She gave him a smile in return and hurried on into the kitchen. Guillermo followed her; Anna and Juan sat there staring at him.
“So, you are just walking about Brazil?” Juan asked him.
“I love Brazil,” he told Juan. “I came … to see the country.” For a moment, he couldn’t remember exactly why he had come. “Right now, I’m heading back to Rio de Janeiro.”
“Rio!” Juan said, his eyes bright. “How I would love to go! And go for Carnaval. My father says that Rio is filled with the wicked. It’s dangerous. We are better here.”
“All places have good people and bad people, Juan.”
“You are going for Carnaval? You’ll miss it if you don’t go back soon.”
“I don’t care about Carnaval—though it is exciting. There are many performers.”
“And many drunks, my father says.”
River shrugged. “Well, that may be true.”
“If you don’t care about Carnaval, then why do you go?”
River smiled. “I’m going to look for a friend.”
“You can find friends all over the world,” Juan told him gravely.
River laughed softly. “A special friend. We were traveling together, but we became separated. I know that I will find her in Rio.”
“Ah.” Juan grinned at that.
Anna apparently demanded to know what was going on and Juan told her, acting it out by hugging her tightly before letting her go with a dismissive shake of his head.
“You are in lo-ve!” he said teasingly.
River grinned and shrugged again.
Guillermo came back into the room carrying a large, deep basin. Vera followed with towels and a jar of something. The basin went down before him and he was shown how to soak his ankle. He did so, thanking them again.
Vera set to work cleaning his forehead; he hadn’t realized it but he had a gash there. She said something to her son; Juan ran off to the kitchen and came back with a large glass of something white—milk, he thought.
“Mama said you drink this and then she’ll bring you food. You look like a starved rat—I don’t think she means to be offensive,” Juan told him.
“I don’t believe your mother could offend me,” River said.
Guillermo said something to the children and Juan sighed. He told River, “They say that Anna and I must go feed the chickens and do our chores.” He wrinkled his nose. “And I must do my homework. But I’ll be back to help when you don’t understand Mama or Papa—and when they don’t understand you.”
He and Anna ran off—looking at him until they reached the door. He was, he thought, definitely an oddity to them. He broke up their usual existence.
In a few minutes, Guillermo began to speak to him, gesturing. River understood that Guillermo was off to do his work.
He thanked the man again.
When Vera finished tending to his wounds and ankle, she hurried back into the kitchen. She returned quickly with a steaming bowl of food. It was some kind of meat in a sweet and spicy sauce over rice.
It was delicious. He started to swallow it down, gulping.
She set a hand on his leg and shook her head.
His manners, he realized, were disgusting. But, as she pantomimed being sick, he understood that she didn’t care about that. He was just eating too quickly.
He nodded. “Obrigado.”
“Nao é nada,” she said, smiling.
When he was done, she took the bowl from him and disappeared back into the kitchen.
He didn’t know what herbs or substances Vera had put in the basin water but whatever it was, he thought it was magical. Or maybe it was just that the water was hot. He leaned his head back; he probably dozed a few minutes because when he looked up, Vera was before him with a bundle of clothing in her hands and the water had grown cold.
She set the clothing down and took the basin away. Then she pressed the clothes into his hand and pointed.
They wanted him to bathe, he realized. And he smiled because he didn’t blame them; he was a wreck and their little home was spotless.
He started to get up on his own; she reprimanded him and offered him an arm. She led him around a little wall to a compact bathroom and started to enter with him. He flushed and shook his head, showing her that he could balance.
“It’s better—so much better. You’re an angel,” he told her.
She didn’t understand his words, but she did understand his gratitude—and his embarrassment. She waved a hand in the air but smiled.
She left him and he closed the door.
The water from the old shower head was only lukewarm but stepping beneath the spray was wonderful. He closed his eyes and let the water rush over him.
He thought about Tio Amato—and about this man Guillermo and his family. The world could be so different—and so much the same. People, no matter what their language, were the same. Everywhere, there was amazing goodness to be found in people.