FICTION: “Milardo” by Joseph M. Faria

Illustration by Maura Walsh / Black Nail Studio.

FICTION
Milardo
By Joseph M. Faria

Walking towards the tavern at dawn, an old man named Milardo carried his bag. As he approached the squat white building with its bright red shutters burning in the morning sun, he turned his face away. He looked over the wooden fence at the cows grazing. He wondered what it would be like to be a cow, lazing all day in the wide, open green pastures—not a care in the world. But then the bag, as if sensing his reverie, seemed to weigh heavier on his shoulders. It began pulling him towards the bar. He walked into the place. A square patch of sunlight showed through a small window and fell over the counter. The old man dropped the bag at his feet and nudged it into the shade where the sun could not get at it. He ordered a cup of coffee just as one of the patrons clapped him on the shoulder.

“Have a drink, old man.”

“Just a cup of coffee.”

“I said have a drink. A real drink,” the bearded patron snarled.

“Leave him be,” said the owner of the tavern. He drew an espresso and placed it on the bar.

“Drink your coffee and go.” 

“What’s in the bag, old man?” the patron asked. 

“The same as yesterday,” the old man said. 

“It looks empty.” 

“Looks are deceiving.”

The patron scratched his head and tugged at his beard. “You are an old fool,” he said. “There is nothing in the bag.” The patron tried to test the contents of the bag, but the old man kicked his foot away.

“Someone should put you out of your misery,” the patron said, sweeping the room with his eyes.

“That’s enough!” the bar owner said. The old man calmly turned to the counter, drank his cup of coffee, wiped his mouth with his shirt sleeve, and paid for his drink. He picked up his bag and walked out of the tavern. 

Deeply furrowed lines crisscrossed Milardo’s face. He once had a smooth, pleasant face, a straight back, and strong hands. He once had a wife who adored him—dinners served on time, clothes ironed to perfection, the bed made warm by her early retirement. When he was angry, she would soothe him by cooing like a dove, fluttering about, perching a hand on his shoulder, and giving a wing-like kiss to his lips. There were nights she wiped the vomit from his lips, crutched the staggering drunk to his bed, and washed the urine smelling clothes the next day. 

They said he might as well have murdered her.  

When his wife was dying of pneumonia, he was walking to the tavern in a drunken stupor, thinking his wife wasn’t that sick and thinking he deserved one small glass of wine after working hard in the fields hauling sacks of potatoes in that blistering sun. As he approached the tavern, debating this, the doors swung open, as if by magic, inviting him in. And he fell flat on his face. 

Shaken from the memories, he heard Lídia Cabral shout, “Milardo!”

He lowered his head and quickened his pace. On the cobblestone path, he wished his neighbour would trip and fall on her posterior.

She hurried up behind him and matched the old man's stride. "You're not fooling anyone, old man," she said. "The whole village knows why you carry that stupid bag." She tagged his shoulder with a plump hand and said, "God will not forgive you, and neither will your wife."

The old man stopped abruptly and stepped to one side. Lidia, not expecting the sudden move, tripped over her feet and fell forward, scraping her hands and knees.

"Bastard!" Lidia screamed. "Your wife deserved better!"  

The old man hunched his shoulders and dragged the heavy load on his back. He crossed the dust-filled road into a narrow lane. There were volcanic walls enclosing square plots of land. He walked past the walls and kicked the stones that had fallen with age. Further on, he trekked through corn and sugar beet fields toward an abandoned windmill. There, he stopped to catch his breath and sat with his back against the door. He remembered, as a young boy, coming to this place with his father and listening to the corn crushed beneath a large, heavy stone slab. His father would plant him by the door and tell him not to move. The boy would sit there for hours staring up at the blades, creaking round and round. Hours later, his father would stagger through the door and grab the boy by the shirt collar, drag him down across a meadow of wild daisies to a field of potatoes, and shove a hoe into the boy’s hand. Then the father would stretch out on a patch of grass and sleep until sunset. 

But the boy, Milardo, did not mind doing the work because his mother fawned over him and called him a little man, and the villagers treated him like a man for doing it. At the tavern, the men hitched him up on the bar and admired the boy’s calloused hands. Someone shoved a cigarette into the boy’s mouth and they slapped the boy's back and acclaimed, “A boy that works this hard deserves a cigarette and a beer.” 

Milardo left the windmill and climbed up a small hill where the pine trees grew straight and tall. He looked back at the windmill and shrugged his shoulders.    

He took deliberate steps, descending the other side of the hill, and fought his way through a wall of thorny brambles that grew beside a winding brook. The brook was dry and filled with empty bags of seed from the farmer's co-op. Black branches had tangled the bags. He crossed the withered bed and scrambled up the other side and over a ledge overgrown with hibiscus. As soon as he was over the arid riverbed, three youths accosted him. He didn’t recognize any of them. The taller one, lanky and sweating profusely, asked, “What’s in the bag, old man?” The other two leaned on one leg and eyed the old man, juggling rocks in their hands.

“Nothing to do with you,” the old man said as he tried to walk around the taller one.

“There’s nothing in the bag, Carlos,” said one of the other two, the one with a patch of curly, black hair. 

“Why would he carry a bag like that over his shoulder?” said the third boy.

Carlos shoved the old man back and tore the bag away from his feeble hands. He shook the up-ended bag and laughed. “It's empty.” Carlos kicked the old man and threw the bag at him. Milardo fell to his knees. The other two circled the old man, laughing. 

Milardo got up slowly, picked up the bag, and walked away. He winced when a stone hit the back of his head. Then another stone buzzed by, and then another hit the back of his leg. But he kept ploughing forward as stones whizzed and sailed over and under him, striking him again in the leg and shoulder until he was finally out of range. When he felt safe enough, he stopped and looked back. The boys were nowhere in sight. He spat on the grass and patted the back of his head. It was wet with blood. He took out a handkerchief and held it hard over the wound. Far out in the distance, he could see the shimmering blue of the sea, the orange-tiled roofs of the houses, and the green fronds of tall palm trees swaying in the wind. 

Once upon a time, a girl existed. She wore an apron, and it swayed in the wind. Her name was Amália. She was a slender creature with a pocket full of tea leaves. He watched her bend behind a tea bush, and for a while, all he could see was the arc of her back. He walked up to a stone wall, and beyond were rows and rows of tea bushes. They stretched to the horizon. He watched from the wall as other girls stood up and stuffed their apron pockets with tiny green tea leaves. Green confetti lay strewn along the path. A little boy, trailing behind, gathered the stray leaves into a white flour sack. When the boy saw Milardo, he smiled and waved a green-stained hand. The girl appeared again, and the sweat on her face glistened in the sun. Milardo jumped to his feet and shouted, "You... yes, you. What’s your name?”

"Amália!" the girl shouted.

“Amália.” It rolled off his tongue like sweet licorice. 

Milardo whispered her name and closed his eyes. He wiped the moisture away with the back of his hand. The sun was still high overhead when he finally reached the town of Capelas. In the distance, tall and slender Acacia trees grew on the side of the cemetery, where a gravel road meandered around it and back towards the centre of town. 

The old man slung the bag over his shoulder and slouched with the weight of it. He tried to lift his face to see where he was going, but the heavy load forced him to look down. It was less than a mile to the cemetery, but for now, it was enough. He dropped the bag at his feet. It fell noiselessly, but to him, the bag made a loud, thumping noise, as if it were filled with rocks. He sat on the grass and covered his face with his hands. He did not want to look at the grass. It shimmered too brightly in the sun for his weak old eyes. 

He sat for a long time, mumbling and muttering to himself. He did not hear feet approaching. He peeked through his fingers and saw a pair of bare, dirty brown toes wiggling in the grass. He looked up and saw the young boy, Pedro, from the village. His father was a great fisherman and they lived in a big yellow house abounding with fig trees. The boy’s trousers were torn at the knees and the tattered sweater was so big that the old man could only ask, “What fish are you hiding today?”  

The boy smiled and lifted his sweater high over his face, revealing a long, smooth, shiny fish. It hung from a netting sack anchored around the boy’s neck with a thick piece of twine. 

“Ah, it looks like a good-sized mackerel.” 

“Three pounds,” the boy said, beaming. The fishtail smacked the boy’s chest a few times and then quieted. 

“It is still alive,” Milardo said, admiring the fish. 

The boy covered the fish with his sweater. “We must hurry before death makes him stiff with crooked angles, and then we cannot cook him evenly.”

The old man closed his eyes, and the memories of the not-too-distant past tumbled into his mind. He tried to shake them away, but they strangled him until he saw himself again crawling on his knees like a dog through his front door, in the dark, and into the silence of a tomb. He had tried to stand but his legs thought otherwise, and he fell and bumped his head on the tiled floor. He had to get to the bathroom, and when he tried to stand again, he felt the warm, wet pants sticking to his right leg. He found the toilet bowl and stuck his head deep inside, where the water was cool on his face. 

The old man tried to open his eyes. He wanted to look at the boy and see the blue sky, the mountains and the trees, but the past would not let him. He was back with his head in the toilet bowl, gagging on the smell of his vomit. Again, he tried to stand, but the floor rose and hit his face. It was safer on his hands and knees. He crawled out of the bathroom and called his wife. “Amália,” he repeated. "Amália, I’m lost.” 

A dog howled, and the thunderous sound of a horse and cart pounded over the cobblestone and rattled the windows. But his wife never stirred, and the old man eventually fell asleep. 

The boy waited a long time for the old man to open his eyes. He looked at the sky and saw the sun poised high over the distant cliffs, preparing for its descent into the sea. A light mist passed overhead, and at the farthest reach of the valley, a rainbow appeared. It seemed to bridge two small hills in the distance.

“You look troubled,” the old man said. 

“It is you I am troubled about,” the boy said. “Every day is the same. You come to my village to go to the cemetery, but by the time you reach Senhor Mendonça’s pasture, you are too tired to go on. Then you sit on the grass for such a long time that when you start moving again, it’s hard for you to untangle your legs.”

The boy helped the old man stand. “I think from now on I should carry my father’s oil can and grease your joints properly.” The boy laughed and picked up the old man’s bag. “I shall carry it for you, or you shall have another relapse, and we will never get to cook the fine mackerel for lunch.” 

The boy swung the empty bag over his shoulder. A faint smile appeared on the boy’s face. “It feels much heavier than yesterday. Someone must be stuffing the bag when you are not looking. Soon, you will be carrying everybody’s sorrows, and everybody will be walking a little lighter.”

The old man grinned and stretched his legs. The joints popped and cracked like logs burning in a fire. 

When they reached the cemetery, the old man wiped the sweat from his face and leaned on the green wrought-iron gate. The boy paused for a moment and then opened it to let the old man walk ahead of him. 

The old man stopped at his wife’s gravestone. The gravestone was only a marker, a long steel rod supporting a round metal box with a glass door clasped shut. Behind the glass was a photograph of his wife, rosary beads, dried flowers, a pair of knitting needles, a pencil, and a pocket-size notebook. He opened the round window, took out the small writing pad and pencil, and marked something on the pad.

“How many days now?” The boy asked. 

"One hundred and fourteen days.” The old man placed the pad and pencil back inside and shut the window. He bent over the grave and cleared away some bits of paper and twigs, and then he knelt and made the sign of the cross.

“Do you think she will forgive you today?” the boy whispered. She had died of water in the lungs, as his mother had told him. The boy tried to imagine how anyone could die of such a thing—on land. He dropped the bag near the old man’s knees, took a step back, and waited. Fidgeting with the mackerel under his sweater, he whispered, “Have patience; we will eat you shortly.”

The old man’s lips moved in a silent dialogue, and then he leaned his head slightly to one side. The boy walked around the grave with his hands in his pockets. He could not keep still any longer. He was anxious to get away from the shore and build a small fire to cook the fine mackerel. As he made another pass around the grave, he looked up to the hills and searched for the rainbow, but it was gone, and in its place, a wide bank of clouds had begun to move in from the sea. They were dark and swollen with rain. Soon the valley would be darkened, and the rain would fall and fill the streets with water. Then there would be no chance to light a proper fire to cook the fish. 

“Come on, old man, we must hurry.” 

The old man looked up at the boy. “You go ahead and light the fire.”

“No, you must come now.” The boy grabbed the old man’s hand and helped him up. “See the clouds? A big storm is A strong gust of wind that ruffled the old man’s hair and blew the scent of the sea over the cemetery and into the trees. The salt wind burned the old man’s eyes.

“You’re a good boy, Pedro,” the old man said, and he picked up the bag and dragged it behind him. The bag tumbled over severed tree limbs and loose stones. The boy offered to carry the bag, but the old man shook his head. 

They walked together down the cobbled road past the Nossa Senhora dos Milagres church, the oldest and tallest building in town. Their burnished, rust-filled turrets overlooked the village like benevolent, watchful eyes. The smell of the sea was the strongest here as they passed the fish market. A stream of red water rolled down the black stone steps as a man dressed in high, black rubber boots hosed down the blood-stained floor. 

“Any good catches today?” the boy asked. 

The man with the rubber boots looked up and recognized the old man and the boy. The man shut the water off and lit a cigarette. 

The boy looked anxiously at the sky. A vast bank of black clouds covered the horizon like a heavy woollen blanket. The harbour was empty. None of the fishing boats had come back yet. He looked hard at the sea and imagined his father’s big boat slicing the water like a giant harpoon, skipping over the waves. 

“It’s a ‌bad one coming,” the old man said as thunderclaps shook the ground and lightning sizzled into the ocean. 

“Yep, it’s a bad one,” the man with the rubber boots said.

“Papa!” the boy cried out. “My father is out there. I must help him.”

"Wait!" the old man shouted, but the boy had already dashed off towards the harbour, his sweater and pants flapping in the wind.

The old man made his way down the stone steps and followed the boy to the jetty stretched out into the ocean like a long, black serpent’s tongue. 

The old man wrapped the bag around his waist and tied the end off. The wind whipped the waves high over the cobblestone jetty. The old man struggled to keep his footing. He could barely see the boy as the rain fell in iron-like sheets.

Waves slapped the side of the jetty and crashed down over the boy. Pedro stopped and balanced himself the best he could, but he fell to one knee. “Papa!” the boy screamed as he held on to the slick, rounded surface of the rocks. 

The waves battered the old man as he crawled over the jetty on his hands and knees. The waves drenched him. He looked ahead and struggled to see the boy through the sheets of rain and sea spray. He wiped the water from his eyes, but it didn’t help. The rain was relentless. Each gust of wind pushed him closer to the edge. 

“God help me,” he prayed. The wind laughed, and the sea applauded, sending shouts of foam into the air. 

The old man looked for the boy, but he was nowhere in sight. As Milardo moved forward, leaning into the wind, he felt the weight of the bag dragging him down. He stared up and down the edge of the jetty until he saw a hand clinging to the ledge. He moved towards the boy. “Hold on!" the old man shouted. He fell to his stomach, braced himself against the cold, wet rocks, and extended a hand to pull the boy up. “Come on, grab onto me. Climb over me.”

The boy found some footholds on the rock wall and climbed over the old man. When he made it safely over the top, the boy rolled over onto his back. They stayed there for a while, their backs to the smooth rock surface, until the sea and wind subsided. 

The old man stood as a blush of pink smeared the darkened sky. He picked the boy up in his arms and carried him to the shore. He placed the boy on the wet sand and sat beside him. The scales of the dead mackerel shimmered in the half-light. The old man reached for his bag, but it was gone.

Joseph M. Faria published his first poem at twenty-one. His first published story won 2nd prize in the National Writers Competition held in 1997, in R.I. His first book of short stories was published in June 1998. The book’s title is “From a Distance” and his first poetry collection was published in October 2003, The book’s title is “The Way Home.” His illustrated children’s book, “The Polar Bear with Whiskers,” was published in 2009. Recent publications of 2025: half and one, The Caribbean Writer and Brushfire under the pen name Lily FInch, Tadpole Press, and Wingless Dreamer.

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