The drugstore was not far from the bar I was going to -- I just needed to cross the Botanical Garden, a fifteen minute walk would do and I'd be in Lower Gavea. I usually carry aspirins in my back-peg but, that day, I had forgotten them for some reason and decided to stop for some. It's a habit I have since my early years as a bohemian: after a night of heavy drinking, two aspirins, water and sleep.
My name is Luke -- actually, that's a nickname. It's Lucas, really. I'm a carioca: I was born and live to this day in Rio de Janeiro. Like most of my friends, from the newsroom I work at or not, I'm a bohemian. At least once a week, we spend some five to six hours in the bar drinking, smoking, talking -- laughing. It's a carioca tradition. Some of the best minds in the city are bohemians and each group has it's favorite bar. It's, I guess, a generation thing. The guys around forty go to Lower Leblon; people like myself, in their thirties, usually prefer Lower Gavea. Those are both neighborhoods on the south side of town and that adjective -- Lower -- both describes a geographical fact, it's just besides some mountain, but also describes a place packed with bars.
I'm also a carioca from the south side -- the small amount of land pressed between the Atlantic Ocean and the high mountains that form the better known landscapes of Rio. The famous neighborhoods, like Copacabana or Ipanema, are on the south side. It's also where the beautiful people live -- but that's just my saying; in other places opinions differ. In the south side it's where local celebrities usually live. Singers, composers, actors and actresses, models. Differently from the rest of Brazil -- or even the rest of Rio for that matter --, that's where famous people can walk on the street without the risk of being stopped for autographs.
So, in that particular day I left the bus two stops before Gavea to get some aspirins. Just before me, in the line for payments, was this pretty red haired woman, quite, quite short. She looked a bit tense, three of her small fingers hitting the table as if drumming, waiting for her receipt. It was probably this odd drumming that called my attention to her. The discrete wrinkles on her face would make her around her late thirties, early forties. She wore an over-sized sweater and old jeans, no make up. Very pretty. And then I recognized her -- Isabela Garcia. She's an actress and I had her Playboy.
I hadn't heard of her for some time, now. She was pretty famous in the eighties, when I was a teenager. Very beautiful, good mood always, seductive. A star from the soaps. Well, now, this is something that's different, in Brazil, from other Latin American countries. Soap operas are hot here, as they are in Mexico or Cuba, or all around. But instead of tragic dramas involving orphans and tragedies the like, your typical Brazilian soap will be humorous and wit and political. They are not good pieces of art, of course not, but they are different.
And there's also this thing about the Brazilian edition of Playboy. You'll hardly find some unknown chick on its covers. Playboy, here, is about naked celebrities and, in the eighties, soap opera actresses were the rule. Not anymore, I'd say -- nowadays it's more about instant celebrities, dancers or Big Brother girls -- but, well, I guess I'm not really a buyer of Playboy anymore as I was in my teens, nor am I a tv watcher.
So, this pretty sex symbol of my teens, wearing an overly cute extra-large sweater just left the drugstore while I wandered about times past. "Guess what", I'd say to guys upon arriving in the bar that day, "I've just seen Isabela Garcia, and she's as pretty as ever." I paid for the pills and left the place imagining how I'd tell this story and noticed her a block from where I was, in the opposite direction I planned to go. Why did I decide to follow her? I wouldn't know. Some weird curiosity I guess. Whatever happened to her? Did she marry some guy and left are acting career? Was she still on tv but I wasn't aware anymore?
I followed her discretely for some three blocks until she went around the corner of a charming little street, where some cool bars, a fancy restaurant and a bookstore were. Then, I got interested. There was also a termas I knew well in that street -- I will talk about that in a second. When I finally reached the corner, Isabela was almost a block away and disappeared into the door of the last house -- a red plain wall with no sign in front. The termas. Wow.
Termas are a mix of saunas and whorehouses. You go in, usually only men are allowed, you leave your clothes and put on a robe, have a sauna, the girls are upstairs. This particular one was also a swingers club on Saturdays, when the girls were off and only married couples were allowed. And, on Wednesdays, women were also allowed as normal clients. Usually, they went accompanied by boyfriends or husbands that weren't into swinging, or at least not as yet. That day was a Wednesday and Isabela had just gone in. Alone.
Since my marriage I had never went back there, or to any other termas for that matter. I grabbed my mobile and phoned one of my friends that were expecting me and explained something happened, I'd explain it later. "Cover up for me, would ya?" He said ok. "If Jess phones, tell her I'm with you guys, that I went to the bathroom or whatever." Then I thought, well, nothing is going to happen anyway. I just had to check that out.
I got a locker key from the reception desk and went into the dressing room. Nobody is obliged to undress and wear the robe. Some years before, when I used to go there, in the days girls were allowed they'd usually be shy and wear a bikini underneath the robe or remain with their street clothes. They'd go there out of curiosity and wouldn't have the nerve to act out whichever fantasies that brought them there. At least, not most of them. I liked that undressing thing, to be naked on the sauna -- even if it was among the guys. Not a show off thing, just a liberty thing. No homosexual feelings whatsoever, just that comradeship of knowing we would be getting laid later in the evening with some awesome girl.
That Wednesday, I particularly enjoyed that feeling as I undressed and left for the sauna on the first floor. There were two girls in there and some ten guys. One was plain looking and wore a towel, hands tight to a guy in his twenties that seemed to be her boyfriend -- both really tense. The other one, terribly ugly, was naked and fondling around with two other guys. Not finding who I wanted to, I climbed the stairs to the dancing floor. It was dark with blinking lights. The professional girls, wearing tight bikinis or shorts were moving around and men dressed in robes were talking, drinking -- or just watching. I looked around and didn't find Isabela. She could have been in one of the cabins in the third floor, but those were private -- you rent them for forty minute periods. Meaning: I probably lost it.
But -- no. She wasn't. I suddenly saw her in a dark corner, alone on a robe, a glass of scotch on the rocks at hand, watching intently. Nobody seemed to notice her. I went to the balcony and asked the barman to make myself a scotch. I drunk some to build up the nerve to approach her -- but, suddenly, as if I were a teenager again, I couldn't. I though, man, people are here to have sex. It's a given game. Just get there and talk. I went daydreaming for some minutes, my scotch was over, I asked for another one. And probably didn't get my eyes of her without noticing because, suddenly, she smiled at me. It was a quick, self-conscious smile -- almost shy. She raised her glass, and so did I. I trembled -- but, this time, I did walk towards her trying to figure out what to say. "Hi." Not very creative I'd guess. She smiled back. "First time I come here", she said. "They always say that", I replied trying to bring up some humor -- and suddenly regretted saying anything like that. Yet, she laughed -- "They do, don't they?"
"Well, I'd guess, yes."
"How about you?"
"What?"
"First time?"
"Oh, well, not really. First time in years, though."
And, then, we were mute again, pretending to be watching the action. It was her who interrupted the silence this time. "How does it work here?" I didn't know what to answer -- to vague a question, the fear of being to straight forward. "How do you mean?"
"Well", she said, "how does it work? I mean, how do people get laid here?"
"Hmm… well, if you're interested in one of the girls, you simply go there and tell her, she'll get you a cabin and you both go and have sex. In the end, you pay the bill for the cabin and the girl and the drinks in the reception desk."
Isabela laughed. "I know that, but what about the non-professional girls and the guys?"
"In that case I'd guess you'd have to ask anyway, ask if people are interested, then ask the barman for a cabin."
"Would you help me?"
"Sure."
"Show me the place."
"Ok, what do you have in mind?"
The music was very loud so she pointed me to the way out, at the stairs back to the first floor. "I'm an actress", she went on saying. "I know that", I responded -- and she blushed. "You know, I'm researching for a part in a movie I'll be on. The girl is a swinger and comes to places like these. I really just want to get the feeling, you see? Would you pretend to be my date? I mean, if you are planning to go for the girls upstairs I'd understand it's just that…"
"It's ok, sounds like fun." Guess I was disappointed -- but she grinned and, suddenly, I was fine with that.
"Cool", she said. "Let's go to the sauna?"
"Sure."
We went to the room before the sauna where we could leave our robes and get towels, she undressed hers -- and there was a bikini underneath, not large, not small either -- and I felt shy.
"Isabela?"
"Yes?"
"It's just that, well… I'm not wearing anything."
She smiled. "I don't mind watching."
