The interphone rang:

     "Senõrita Patrícia?"

     "Sí, soy yo."

     "Senõr Carlos, puede subir?"

     "Sí, sí, puede."

     Patrícia left the door unlocked. Carlos soon entered the room, his face pale and his breathing labored:

     "Patrícia, for God's sake! Help me!"

     "What happened? You've barely left and you're already back?"

     Carlos was shaking:

     "I screwed up! I'm fucked!"

     "Sit down, I'll get you something to drink."

     "Good idea. Take that whisky I brought earlier. I forgot it here. Shit, I tried to call you on your cell phone and I couldn't. It was only busy. I didn't know the hotel number. Then I decided to come."

     "You fool, I changed my cell phone here in the city."

     Patrícia was anxious, but she waited for him to take a sip and a deep breath. Sitting on the bed, Carlos gulped down all the contents in one go, collapsing backwards. She asked:

     "What happened, anyway?"

     In a flash, Carlos Eduardo seemed to review the events on a mental screen:

     Reconstitution...

     "Where were you, Carlos?"

     "Just walking around."

     "With a slut, right?"

     "What? What are you talking about?"

     "About this! You dropped the little note from that slut: 'Carlos, I'm waiting for you, my love. Crazy with desire, Hotel Bellavista, Av. Espanã'. Ah, if only I'd seen that paper as soon as you left... I swear I'd gone there... But I only saw it now."

     Instinctively, he almost reached into his pants pocket for the note, the one Patrícia had given him at the airport. Unfortunately for him, it didn't just contain the name and address of the hotel, but also some very spicy words. He didn't even remember the note, since he had memorized the address at first glance. It must have fallen out of his pocket without him noticing, when he took out his cell phone and wallet as soon as he arrived at the hostel room with Ema.

     "I don't know what you're talking about!"

     "And you still want to deny it? I can't believe it! Even here in Punta Arenas you're cheating on me? Isn't São Paulo's betrayal enough?"

     He still tried to fix it:

     "How absurd! What are you talking about?"

     "I know you've been cheating on me for a long time."

     Carlos didn't know if it was the effect of the whisky he had drunk with Patrícia, but he was no longer willing to hide anything. He decided to speak out:

     "Ah you wanna know something? Yeah, it's true. Here in Punta Arenas... Back in there in São Paulo too... I'm sick of it!"

     "You bastard! I pulled you out of the slums, I made you someone, I paid off your debts... And that's what you pay me back? You're disgusting! You had the nerve to have sex with me and then go to bed with some trashy girl. And almost at the same time, was that it?"

     Silently, but ironically, he let his answer hang in the air, which irritated her even more. Despite her nervousness, she was still able to find soft words to describe his lover, such as 'disqualified', although 'bitch' and 'slut' were new to Ema's lips. But it was appropriate, she was upset, at the point where emotions can take over rationality. Even so, she took a deep breath and planned to put on a coat to go out and get an explanation from the other woman. Carlos, however, didn't allow it. He took her by the arm and pushed her towards the bed. By being stronger, he managed to lay her down, pull down her sweatpants and rip her underwear. Covering his prey's mouth with one hand, the other supporting him on the mattress, he raped her. He orgasmed like an animal in heat. Ema practically fainted, but managed to watch as he got up and sat down in a chair, exhausted. Ema was stunned. How could he have gotten to that point? He was a real monster!

     Gathering her strength, she didn't know where, the biologist stood up and grabbed a heavy metal souvenir, a replica of a monument in the region, and lunged at him, trying to strike him, but he easily overpowered Ema and disarmed her:

     "What? You want to kill me?"

     "Let me go!"

     "No!"

     "Let me go!"

     She tried to get away from him, but he held her tightly:

     "You want more?"

     When Carlos finally let her go, Ema had the chance to slap him hard across the face, which was returned with extreme violence, causing him to fall and hit his head on the bedside table.

     The mental movie ended and he returned to the present scene with his lover:

     "Ema..."

     "What did you do to her?"

     He was unable to speak. She insisted:

     "What did you do to her?"

     "I killed her!"

     "You what?"

     "She's dead!"

     Patrícia rested her hands on her cheekbones, pressing her fingers nervously against her lips:

     "What the fuck did you do?"

     "I'm an idiot, a son of a bitch! I went back to the hotel, she was nervous about my delay and we started arguing. I had dropped the paper you gave me, with the address and the erotic words. Why did you have to write that? Wasn't the address enough? Then she said she already knew about the betrayals. I wanted to know what betrayals. She said: 'From here and from São Paulo'."

     "She knew it? Did she follow you? Have you been followed?"

    "She didn't say. But I pissed her off and confirmed that it was all true."

     Patrícia:

     "You really are an idiot. She threw out hints and you fell for them... Tell me the rest!"

     "We continued arguing, she became hysterical, she came at me... I got out of control and slapped her. I have to confess that it was a very strong slap. I think it was the whisky I drank, I don't know. She fell! She hit her head on the bedpost."

     "Jesus! Are you sure she's dead?"

     "Yes!"

     He lifted his body:

     "What do I do?"

     Patrícia shook her head several times, in a clear sign of disapproval, but there was also despair on her face:

     "What you do now? You've already done it, you idiot! Now you have to call the police."

     "No, not the police, for God's sake!"

     "And what else do you think you should do? You slap your wife, she hits her head and you don't even help her..."

     "But she died! There was no point in me helping."

     "Well, it doesn't work like that. It doesn't matter if she was dead or not. It wasn't up to you to decide that. You should have taken her to a hospital. In the event that she is still alive, you have not provided help. Omission of aid is also a crime."

     "I'm sure, she's dead!"

     Patrícia started pacing back and forth, getting more and more nervous. She also took a sip of whiskey, picking up the pocket flask offered by Carlos:

     "Are you sure she died? Under the influence of alcohol and driven by anger, how do you know? And I don't know what you expect me to do, honestly."

     "You're a writer, find a way out."

     "A way out? You think this is a book? What way out can there be other than within the law?"

     She pulled up a stool and sat down opposite her lover. He thought for a few moments, which seemed like an eternity. He took her hands:

     "We have to find a solution, I don't know, all I know is that I can't be arrested."

     "We have to find? You get yourself into such a mess and you want to make me an accomplice? Fuck, this isn't a soap opera, it's real life, we're going to get screwed.

     "I know you can."

     Patrícia nervously ran her fingers over her closed eyes. Then she clenched her fist and clapped her hand over the lips:

     "No!"

     "And if I tell the police that she slipped and hit her head, how about it?"

     "Of course not! They'll see the slap mark on her face. They'll see that you drank."

     And there were other "marks", those of sexual violence, which he omitted from his account for fear of her reaction....

     "But deep down I didn't want to kill her, it was an accident. Is it considered a crime?"

     "Of course! It is a crime! Whether she's dead or not, just hitting a woman nowadays can land you in jail. Maria da Penha Law, my dear! I don't know if there's a similar law here in Chile, but extradited to Brazil, you wouldn't escape it. Now, if she's dead, it's murder, as well as omission of aid and assault on a woman..."¹

     "But isn't it a culpable crime?"

     "In Brazil it is a felony. When you hit her, you took the risk of killing, but there are various frameworks, I'm not a lawyer, I don't know for sure. I only know a little about it because of my books."

     Patrícia got up from the bench:

     "I'm just wondering...If you don't give yourself up, you'll have to take the body out and make up some story."

     That statement echoed in her mind: 'Take the body out of there'!
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¹Note: At the time the story takes place, Brazil had not yet passed the law that classifies this type of crime as "Feminicide".