Page 9 of The Secret Dinner

It was preposterous, insulting! I skimmed through the legal department’s email. Total amount owed: R$25,974.38. The agent sneered, running his tongue over his little otter mustache, giving me that I-always-knew-you’d-screw-up look.

“Give me one minute,” I requested. “I’m going to get to the bottom of this. This is all a misunderstanding.”

I called Piglet. It rang and rang and rang, but no one answered. I tried three more times—nothing. His phone never left his side. There was no reason for him not to answer. Unless … In a flash, it all made sense. The truth pushed me over the edge; I looked down and burst into a fit of laughter.

“What are you laughing about?”

I stared at the agent and his mustache and laughed even harder.

“Feel the city breakin’ and everybody shakin’, and we’re stayin’ alive,” I sang along with the Bee Gees, tearing the sheet of paper into tiny pieces and tossing them into the air like confetti.

“Dante, this is serious. You have two weeks to make the full payment, or we’ll take legal action.”

Still laughing, I walked out the door, while the secretary looked at me scared.

“Two weeks, Dante!” the agent shouted again.

I slammed the office door. Too impatient to wait for the elevator, I took the stairs, and only when I reached the street did I wipe away my tears and take a deep breath to come back to reality. Six months of back rent …

I wanted to kill that motherfucker.

3

Back home, all the lights were off, and it was eerily silent. It was off-putting. Piglet’s room was the first one as you came in, the closest to the living room, and he usually made plenty of noise all on his own. I ran to his door and turned the knob. It was locked. I knocked but he didn’t respond.

“I know you’re in there, asshole!” I yelled.

Hugo appeared at the end of the hall, looking sleepy. Since he’d lost his job at the restaurant, he’d been staying up all night testing recipes in the kitchen and only went to bed when the sun came up. He was getting kind of obsessed with the idea of being a misunderstood genius. He walked over, asking what was going on, but before I could answer Miguel arrived home, still wearing his hospital coat.

“You never texted me back!” he complained. “How was the conversation with the agent?”

I didn’t have the courage to tell him and banged on the door again instead. “Open up! We need to talk!”

Seconds later, the key turned in the lock. I pushed the door open, entering the parallel universe of Piglet’s bedroom. There were bags of potato chips strewn across the floor, dirty cups and plates on the furniture, bottles with the dregs of beer and vodka, XXL underwear hanging from closet doors, cables and more cables tangled around tech equipment … Marijuana smoke filled the air.

I walked toward Piglet, who was already back on his bed, his eyes glued to the TV, playing Super Mario on mute. I ripped the controller out of his hands. He raised his hairy arms defensively.

“Calm down, man, there’s no need to attack me.”

“Have you been paying the rent these last few months?” I asked. For a moment I let myself hope it was all just a bad dream, and he’d answer me indignantly, “Yes, of course,” but he just adjusted the pillows under his head before saying:

“No … I haven’t.”

“You spent it all on that whore, didn’t you?”

“Don’t call Cora a whore!” he shouted, letting out a hysterical high-pitched squeal.

“Can somebody please explain what the hell is going on?” asked Hugo, approaching the bed from the other side.

“The property management company hasn’t received our rent for the last six months. We paid our share, but the money never made it to their account. We owe almost twenty-six thousand. Piglet spent it all on that hooker! They’ve been meeting up almost every week. If we don’t pay up in two weeks, we’ll be evicted.”

Miguel’s eyes sank. He took off his glasses and wiped them on his shirt, even though they weren’t dirty. Hugo looked at us, still trying to absorb the news. Suddenly, he lunged at Piglet, grabbing him by the neck with both hands. He spat in his face and shouted in his ear: “You’re out! Get out of this house!”

Before Piglet choked to death, Miguel and I ran to hold Hugo back. He was stronger than us and tried to slip out of our grasp, but he soon gave up and started opening the closet doors, throwing Piglet’s clothes on the floor.

“Fucking glutton! All you do is eat, and not even anything good! And now you blow our money on a stupid whore like that!”

Unfazed, Piglet maintained a smirk of superiority. I had to stop myself from beating him up. Miguel, ever the peacemaker, approached the bed.