BLUE SQUARES IN THE DUST

The man's bowl had a crust of flour stuck to the bottom. Luzia scraped it with her fingernail and pushed the powder to the centre, where it would fit in a spoon. Then she brought Ilva's bowl, Antônio's, and a fourth, kept since the house had begun to count more mouths than places to sleep. The envoy held the rod suspended before the girl's feet. The blue line was still projected across the yard and ran into the kitchen, cutting through the mat where the man slept. Measuring past the threshold would be enough to turn the proposed route into technical continuity. Luzia gathered up the four bowls. Going to eat, the man asked. I'm putting the house in its place. She set the first by the door, the second near the bench, the third beside the partition. She carried the fourth out to the yard and settled it on the luminous line. The rod recognised metal, recalculated the surface and shifted the projection a few centimetres. Luzia followed the shift with another bowl. The envoy lowered her arm. The strip must remain unobstructed. This is where the bowl of whoever arrives last goes, Luzia answered. Antônio had done it that way for years. When the bar filled up, the bowls took over the counter in order of hunger, and whoever came later waited without losing their portion. Nael used to move his own place close to the door. He said he ate better watching the road. After the crushing plant had spread over the old football pitch, the road began carrying more ore than people, but he had kept his choice. Ilva looked at the distance between the bowls. The fourth was too far from the kitchen to belong to the table and too close to the dry root to be forgotten. Luzia knew it. She got the position wrong by nearly a step and stood waiting for someone to correct it. The man got up carefully. He rolled up the mat from the hallway and took it out to the yard. The cloth had rectangular marks left by the grey box and a darker strip where his body had lain these last nights. He spread it over the line, between the fourth bowl and the narrow shade of the murici. You sleep outside now, Ilva asked. Only until she finishes measuring. If you leave the kitchen, there's room to spare, said Luzia. The sentence settled among the three of them. The man smoothed the mat once, then left a fold on the side where he usually rested his heel. The envoy consulted the surface of the rod. Movable objects would be excluded from the reading. Continuous domestic occupation would require presence throughout the entire measurement cycle. How long does it take, he asked. Until first light. Ilva went into the house and came back with the thin blanket. She laid it on the mat. The envoy breathed through her mouth, beaten by the still heat under the porch, and ran her bandaged thumb along the side of the rod. She could wait. The operation paid territorial presence per completed interval. Luzia took Antônio's mug outside and set it beside the fourth bowl. That one stays inside, said Ilva. He isn't inside. The girl fetched her own bowl and completed a curve around the mat. One was missing. She looked at the empty mixing bowl, then at the kitchen. The sharing out in that house always began before the food. Each person was given a place, and only then was what there was measured. That late afternoon there were four bowls, a mug, and enough flour to dirty the tongue. The rule had survived because no one needed to agree with it. It was enough to feel the lack when a place stayed empty. Ilva brought her own bowl. Instead of closing the curve, she handed it to the man. You choose where it goes. He held the metal against his chest. He could put it near the blanket, confirming the night in the yard, or inside the kitchen, where the improvised space still depended on Antônio's return. He stood still long enough for the rod to announce reading pending. Then he went in, pulled the partition a few centimetres and left the bowl on the floor, between his bag and Ilva's bowl. Luzia undid the outer curve. She took up the blanket but kept the mat lying across the blue line. Who sleeps here, the envoy asked. No one, the girl answered. Here we eat when there's room. The measurement would need to distinguish passage area from area used by the house. The woman rested the rod on her forearm and agreed to wait until first light. She sat on the outer step, outside the order of the bowls. Luzia divided the crust of flour into four portions. One stayed in Antônio's bowl. The other three barely covered the bottom. She ate last, scraping the metal with her tongue. When it grew dark, the blue projection stayed trapped beneath the mat. Through the worn fibres, the light rose in small squares and dyed the kitchen dust blue.