The smoke came up the wall around seven. It smelled of salt and burnt fat and something green. I did not mind it.
I am in Vila Nova de Milfontes, on the second floor of a building the colour of old chalk. The street below is narrow. Cars park half on the kerb. I have been here since late July.
Every evening the neighbours bring out a grill. It is a metal box on legs, the kind that leaves scorch marks on the pavement. They set it up between two parked cars. The fish are small and silver, laid in rows on a wire rack. The woman across the hall does most of the turning. She uses tongs and a folded page of newspaper to fan the coals. A cat sits under the nearest car and waits. Nobody feeds it from the grill. It waits anyway.
Two men stand with beers. A child sits on the kerb eating bread. The grilling takes a while. They eat standing, leaning against the wall, and the talk is low and quick. I do not know any of their names. The smoke reaches my window before the sound does. By the time I lean out the whole street is in it. The smell stays in my clothes. I hang the day’s shirt on the chair and by morning it has faded.
I have been here longer than I planned. I came for the fruit market and the figs and stayed for reasons I cannot list. The rent is low. The beach is close. The coffee at the corner place is good and the old man who runs it remembers my order now.
One night I came back from that café and there was a plate on my windowsill. A few sardines, still warm, a wedge of lemon, salt on the skin. No note. No knock. I stood at the window and looked down at the street. The grill was cooling. The neighbours were gone inside. I ate it standing, because I did not know what else to do. The skin was crisp. The flesh fell off the bone. I put the plate back on the sill before I slept.
It happened again. Twice more. The second time the plate had a fork laid across it. The third time there was bread folded into a napkin beside the plate, and the fish were still hot, not just warm. Nobody has ever mentioned it. The woman across the hall nods at me in the stairwell in the morning. That is all.
I keep meaning to ask someone. I have not. The plate arrives and I eat from it and I wash it and I leave it on the sill again. By morning it is gone. I think the woman across the hall takes it back. Or maybe her son does. I never see it go. I do not want to ask.
If you’re thinking about it
- Buses from Lisbon run daily. Book a day ahead in August.
- Rooms above ground level get the smoke but also the breeze.
- Bring earplugs. The grilling and the talk go on late.
- Skip the riverfront cafés in the evening. They fill up fast.
- The corner cafés are cheaper than the ones on the river.
I’ll tell you the rest if I remember it.
