THE FILM ON THE HEEL

Antônio had already set aside three measures of water when the panel lit up again. The first fit in a deep lid. The second, half of that. The third was what remained in the cup kept for his son, left for two days beside the dark presence point. The man was sitting on the low bench, his heel held up over an empty bowl. The membrane applied weeks before had lost its transparency and stuck at the edges. The house's commercial reading would begin in twenty-six minutes. Among the requirements projected by the Companhia Arco Norte there was a new line, bodily conditions compatible with service activity. Service meant the bar selling food again. A compatible body was one the camera accepted. Antônio brought the lid with the first measure closer. He wet the membrane in four passes, waiting between each until the material gave. The man gripped the edge of the bench but kept his foot still. Luzia counted six passes. He corrected her without looking. It was four. I count the ones that hurt, she said. Ilva stayed by the kitchen doorway. The cold mirror rested in the low volume, with the third rehearsal closed. Her hand did not go down to the compartment. Antônio lifted one corner of the membrane, loosened the stuck part with water from the second measure and placed the darkened material in a household disposal container. The skin underneath had a pale band, wrinkled from being sealed in. No bleeding. The panel requested approach for sanitary analysis. Antônio covered the sensor with his own hand. Clean first, he said. Into the third measure he mixed two drops of the decontaminant left in Mariana's bottle. He swirled the container once, dipped a strip of thermal cloth and drew it from the centre to the edges. Then he turned the strip over. On the third pass the cloth came away with mineral dust, a fine grey that dissolved in the water and left the bottom opaque. Luzia held the bowl by both rims while Antônio wrung the cloth over it. A drop escaped, ran along the bench and reached the bare heel. The man pulled his foot back, struck the disposal container and knocked the used membrane onto the floor. Antônio picked up the material with two fingers and placed it back in the container. The commercial timer dropped to nineteen minutes. Outside, a technician was waiting for the cabinet to be cleared. He had come to check the aluminium shade and stayed out in the sun, because the cooled space behind the panel belonged to the rotor. He watched Antônio cut the medical film in two. I heard that out there they're voting on a law to give energy and water to the datacenters first, he said. They say whoever's against it loses the election. Or whoever's for it. Everyone tells it differently. Antônio did not raise his head. The technician went on, they said household bills will cover the difference until the machines start paying taxes. Then he lowered his voice. If they start. The whole film was worth four days of protection. Cut, it covered the heel for two. Antônio warmed one half between his palms, applied it to the clean skin and pressed the edges for fifteen seconds. Luzia counted thirteen, then sixteen, to keep his hand longer on the man's foot. When he finished, the panel offered two choices. Present the body for reading and keep the commercial window, or declare domestic care in progress and postpone the classification for a fee. Antônio took his hand off the sensor. The camera swept the bench, the covered foot, the bowl of grey water, the used film in the disposal. It recognised incomplete asepsis. The house could keep its future classification if it contracted technical disposal and accepted weekly inspection of the preparation area. The first cycle cost the equivalent of three portions of corn. Eleven minutes remained to contest. Antônio picked up the clean half of the film and handed it to the man. Keep it. In two days, change it in this order. The man closed his fingers over the material. You used yours, he said. It was the last medical portion linked to the householder. Without it, Antônio would move to ordinary care for one cycle. He confirmed the consumption with his iris. The panel withdrew his priority access and opened the commercial classification. The word future disappeared. At the same moment, the cover over the cabinet came to be listed as a productive improvement. The fraction deducted the night before came back under another name, adaptation of commercial premises. The amount exceeded by one portion the discount gained from the shade. Ilva read the charge without coming closer. The house had been accepted as a business because it had cared for a body before the reading. The care went into the account as proof of capacity, and the dark water in the bowl became residue of economic activity. Six minutes remained to contest. Antônio could open the breakdown or listen to the third rehearsal. Both functions required his bodily presence in the same interval. He looked at the low volume. Then he opened the contestation. The panel asked for the origin of the film, the volume of water used and the purpose of the service. Antônio entered three measures. The predictive machine corrected it to four, counting the moisture held in the cloth. He refused the calculation. The review used up the six minutes and kept the charge pending an inspection with no set time. The third rehearsal remained closed. The technician received authorisation to bring his face to the cabinet. Before going in, he saw the bowl on the floor. If you call this a bar, he said, tomorrow they'll call the house a small datacenter. No one answered. No panel lit up.