The Invisible Fence

Every morning when the sun shines over Brazil the grandness and diversity of the country comes into perspective. The sun illuminates the large white sandy shores of Copacabana beach that is never vacant with its inviting deep blue waters and the numerous and towering buildings of São Paulo. The bright yellow light shines on the lush green landscape of the Amazon rainforest. It reveals Rocinha, a shantytown in the southeastern part of Rio de Janeiro. It exposes its small houses made out of concrete, scrap metal and wood built over the large hills that were once undisturbed landscape. Hundreds of small brown, white, and gray houses, some without electricity or running water, were stacked on top of another but all were fundamentally held in place by the hillside. Long and short narrow pathways, instead of streets, divide areas of the shantytown, leading higher and higher up the mount. Occasionally graffiti can be spotted along the wall of some crumbling house, marking the territory of the local drug dealer. At night Rocinha comes alive with gunshots from the “soldiers,” workers for the leading drug dealers of the neighborhood, fighting with rival gangs or with the police. Not too far from the shantytown, favela, is a school where all the neighborhood kids go.

On this day the 8th grade class was asked to write down where they wanted to be twenty years from now. Some didn’t care about the assignment and didn’t write down anything at all, others smiled as they managed to scribble down the word “soldier” on a piece of paper, all except one. This exception wrote down “doctor.” Unlike the others who saw being a “soldier” in Rocinha as the best life possible, João knew that if he had a choice he would leave Rocinha with his mother and three brothers and never look back.

His single mother, Maíra, worked from two in the morning until seven placing newspapers on the steps of the neighboring middle class city. She walked alone in the dark, carrying large stacks of newspapers that came up to her waist. By the time Maíra made it home her large dark under eye circles had always reformed, she prepared breakfast for her three other children and walked two of them to school. She would come back to her house to cook, clean, take care of her one year old son, and wait until João arrived for her to take a nap. This was the cycle repeated every day, and although she became tired she would never complain, because she did it with good intentions for her children’s future. She would tell João of the stories she would hear from neighbors, of the young children getting involved in with the drug dealers and how quickly they died. It was after this that she would express her luckiness, with a proud smile, for having a son that was hardworking and intelligent enough not become involved with drugs. João would always smile, but never say anything back, because it was always at this moment that a wave of guilt would rush over him. He thought about the job at the store in the neighboring city his mother thought he had. He made it up in order to justify the money he was receiving. When he came back from school, he grabbed his nine mm from under the bed and he felt the wave of guilt rush over him once again as he looked his mother in her eyes and told her he was off to work, she kissed him on the cheek and he was out the door.

João walked up the pathway towards his best friends José’s house, passing all the graffiti stained walls, the tattered clothing drying outside the windows of brown houses that lay on top of others, and the children kicking torn and muddied soccer balls back and forth. He was in front of José door now and as he formed his fist to knock on José’s white door, José opened the door, “Hi João” “Hi Zé, ready?” “Hold on, one second”, said José as he grabbed his PT92 nine mm and tucked it inside his pants. He closed the door and they were off together to the top of the hill. José had been João’s friend ever since they started school together in the 1st grade. They were always inseparable. It was José who really influenced him to join the traffic, but João always had some resistance to it. As they were walking João decided to start a conversation in a pensive tone. “I don’t think I can do this for the rest of my life Zé.” “You don’t see the reasoning behind it that’s why. Think about it. How much money would you make working for minimum wage in that store you tell your mom you work? The monthly salary wouldn’t even be enough to buy yourself the shoes you want and you certainly know that your family would starve now that your mom has a new mouth to feed.” João looked pensively ahead and answered “Yeah,” in a low tone. “Minimum wage just isn’t enough João. When we steal, it’s not to support a drug habit, all the things we’ve done wrong were primarily because we needed food. Don’t forget, we also do a service to the community. Before us, the police would break into everyone’s house and destroy everything, but because we now have weapons they hesitate and use caution. They don’t come here as often as they used to. We try to help the people who are in need. Sometimes they need money to buy natural gas, or some medicine. Remember the other day when Renata’s little girl needed medicine? She would have gotten worse if it wasn’t for that medicine.” João took José’s words into consideration, but they weren’t enough to drive away the images from the night before. “Do you think it was right to burn that informant last night?” asked João. “Of course it was! He pointed to the police who packed the drugs. He deserved to be placed in a stack of tires, have five liters of gasoline poured on him and then set on fire. How many of us do you think the police have tortured, beaten, and murdered. A lot of times the police doesn’t come up here to arrest someone, they come here to kill. This is an unjust society and the police guarantee the status quo. Those who are excluded remain under the control and they better not do anything about it. In South Africa they surround the ghettos with fences to keep them under control. Here, they surround you with an invisible fence.”

They finally made their way to the top of the hill, to a small brown house stained with graffiti on all four sides. In the front of the house stood five other teenagers holding AK-47’s in their hands. Décimo, one of the leading drug dealers in the vast neighborhood, walked out of the small door entrance and gestured his hand, calling João and José to come in. Décimo’s real name was Marcelo, he was given that nickname due to him being the tenth child in his family. He lit up a cigarette, took a puff and blew the smoke into the air “Tonight the German’s (police) are coming,” he said calmly. “We’re going to place some people in the front as look outs.” The look outs normally consisted of eleven and twelve year old inexperienced boys. “Then we’re going to set some people on the top of the buildings, others can hide behind the cars, and others in some elevated crevices. If they come close to us you know what to do, shoot, as usual. You two will be on top of the buildings.” They all knew that wasn’t the most fool proof plan. They knew, as well as everyone else that was going to participate, that at least someone was going to die tonight.

As soon as the sun set over the mountain top, and the children were inside their tiny living spaces, João and José climbed on top of one of the small houses with as much stealth as their bodies could possibly produce. They waited patiently for the police to make their way up on to their pathway, in the meantime José spoke with a big smile, “You know what I forgot to mention from earlier? The women, those one of the perks of having a weapon, the bigger the weapon the more women you have. Décimo has five.” “Yeah I guess that’s nice,” responded João. “ Nah man it’s really nice every time I walk out of my house I feel like a king, I feel like I can take on anyone, the police, the military, B.O.P.E., anyone. I could do this for the rest of my life.” “Well I don’t think I want to. You really believe that everyone here helps out one another? What about the other day when that kid owed Décimo money? That kid disappeared, José, and is now in a bag somewhere, chopped up. They don’t care about anyone.” “Yeah they do,” José responded in a hurt tone. Just then three police officers made their way up to their path, guns moving swiftly through the night air, looking for the slightest move. José began to slowly crawl towards the edge of the roof, placing the gun slightly on the edge. João began to crawl as well. “Wait until they get closer,” João whispered. He knew it was too late to convince him. José had his hand on the trigger. He closed one of his eyes and pushed his index finger down. “Bang!” the bullet went flying and missed the officer, hitting the concrete wall next to him instead. In an instantaneous second all three police officers heads turned in José and João’s direction. The two boys shot up into the air, like rockets. João bolted for the roof of the next building and José was right behind him. Just then, “Bang!” another bullet was fired, but this one did not come from João or José, it came from the officers. The next noise was curdling scream of anguish, João knew instantaneously it was José. He turned his head around and could see José on the roof of the other building on the floor bleeding profoundly from his chest. João began to walk towards him, even though more and more bullets were flying near José’s area. Just then as João was five feet away from him, he could hear José screams. He realized that they weren’t only of anguish, he was screaming “RUN, RUN, RUN!” and the closer João got to him the louder and faster he repeated them “RUN, RUN, RUN!” José tried to numb himself of the pain and lifted himself off the floor. João rushed towards him and grabbed him by his right arm, propping him up, and then letting him go. They ran across what seemed to be an endless amount of roofs, for João, dodging the bullets as they came flying out the policemen’s guns. João could hear José’s wheezing, as he tried to gasp for air. When they could no longer hear the sound of gunshots they jumped down onto a pathway.

As they were both approaching José’s house, João could still hear José’s whizzing mixed in with his own, but then he realized José’s had stopped. He looked behind him and could see José’s body three houses away. He ran towards it, José’s eyes were closed and blood was still gushing out from his chest. “Ze! Ze!” João screamed as he shook his injured body. He could feel José’s slightly cold arm as he grabbed hold of it and could see the color from his face begin to fade. He knew at that moment one of the closest things in the world to him had died. He picked his body up and carried it in his arms to José’s house and placed it on his bed. João told José’s weeping and startled mother what had occurred and then walked back home, in the quiet night, to let his mother nap before she left to work.

The next morning, before going off to school, João made his way up to Décimo’s house. Décimo gestured as he normally did. “I heard your friend died.” Décimo said in calm expression. “Yeah I came here to talk to you about that. I need money for his burial.” “No. José was careless, plus he’s no use to us anymore. I don’t spend money on useless things.” João tightened his fist to the point he could feel his nails about to puncture his skin. He wanted so desperately to shoot Décimo, but he knew he wouldn’t get out alive if he did, instead he grinded his teeth and walked out quietly.

As the school day was over, and as João headed for the school main gate, he could hear his teacher yelling his name. He turned around and she rushed over to him. “João I’ve got great news. You’ve been accepted into the science program at the local university!,” her eyes ecstatic with joy, as if she was the one accepted. “Mrs. Silva, I don’t have the money for that,” João expressed in a passive tone. “Oh! You don’t have to worry about paying for it. It’s a scholarship and they will also give you a stipend,” she said with a wide smile exposing her milky white teeth. João looked at the paper and couldn’t believe his eyes. He had to read it three times in order to believe it. The stipend was enough to quit trafficking and to get his mother and three brothers out of the favela for good. He took the paper and quickly made his way to the bus to get home. “It was finally happening,” João thought as he sat in the bus, “no more blood, no more drugs, and no more violence.” Then a little smile formed across his face as he began to think of his mother reducing her hours and him finally being free of the guilt that had plagued him for the past two years.

He stepped off the bus and as he walked down the narrow pathway he had taken hundreds of times, he could feel every fiber of his being become alive with sheer joy for the first time in the fifteen years of his existence. He couldn’t wait to tell his family the news. His eyes gleamed with hope for a future he believed to be wonderful. It was at this moment that a stray bullet, from a nearby police raid, entered and exited João’s cranium and instantaneously killed him.