Frozen Lie

     Rather than admit the truth, she panics as a frozen lie creeps past her lips.

      She chirps, "No sir, I don't know who ate your pie, but let me go down to the Rio Vermelho to Aninha's house and I will ask her if she did."

     Recklessly, she runs down the alley to her best friend’s house.  She trips over her vira lata dog, Chiquinha, who lopes ahead, left ear flopping.   Phoebe’s bare toes sift copper-rich street dust.   Aninha, is sitting on the front steps of her house.  She calls inside to her Dad who invites them in for midday feijoada.  Phoebe plops onto a chair at the table with An-inha’s family.  They offer her a plate, she accepts, but only picks at the pork foot, snout and linguiça bobbing in the drowning bowl of rice.  After ten minutes, she excuses herself.  She must figure out what to do.

     Phoebe chooses to detour atop the banks of the muddy Rio Vermelho.  She searches for a magic escape via the frothy ripples in the red, red waves, but still she finds no courage to tell the truth. The lump in her throat is suffocating. She secretly wishes a favela rat would jump from the water, bite her, give her rabies, and send her to the hospital so that she won’t have to tell.  Phew!  Instead, she whispers a prayer to São João and swats at a lazy fly with the back of her sweaty hand.