“He got them in Hamburg,” said the alcoholic.
“Uh, a person shouldn’t go to Hamburg.”
“No, avoid going to Hamburg.”
“I’ve never been to Hamburg,” Charles said and stuck his wallet into his pocket. Obviously he’d shown them pictures of his grown sons. Two enterprising men in their twenties. Business, that slightly fishy word. The younger one earned his first million when he was seventeen. A happy story. He isn’t my son. But I too have expectations of him.
Charles fell back in his chair laughing and looked at me, shaking his head: we had landed among surrealists. (I thought of Gulliver and what he’d been subjected to, how surprised he was. As a kid I could never look long enough at the illustration in which the giant Gulliver wakes up among the Lilliputians and finds himself tethered to the ground by countless thin threads, while on and around his body there swarm an army of miniature humans, as industrious as ants, all of them carrying some useful object or other in their hands, on their way to carrying out useful tasks.)
“He’s a stallion.”
“Unnnh, a stud-boy,” my darling said, pulling a chair up behind mine and embracing me.
“You devil,” she said.
It was a short while later that she took my head in her hands and kissed me. And I started to believe that she was falling in love with me. Our acquaintance lasted from about nine o’clock, when we arrived at the club and she sat down on a chair next to me, to seven A.M., when we left the place, unwillingly (I, in any case, was unwilling).
Every single time she left me in the course of the ten hours, for example to be with the short Chinese, I felt like I was missing something. As if my existence were a clutching at empty air (which it quite possibly is). That’s exactly how it was when, over fifteen years ago, I met Charles. Empty, lonely, hollow, all wrong—if he wasn’t close by.
[ROMANIA]
DAN LUNGU
7 P.M. Wife
He left the tinted-glass high-rise building without looking back. Not once. He was walking with resolute, unhurried steps, his eyes trained on the impeccably shined toecaps of his Timberland shoes. He hadn’t even bothered to reply to the doorman who had probably wished him well, smiling like someone in a dental-floss ad. He’d had enough of smiling and talking nicely. Being polite. Not being able to afford to lose his temper. That was what he did all day long. “Hell’s fuckin’ bells,” he hissed in spite of himself. He jumped into his car and took off his jacket and tie. Meaning it was Friday. On regular weekdays he’d only loosen his tie.
He nosed into the traffic instinctively, his mind void of all plans. He drove with the flow.
It was Friday after all.
The images around circled his brain like so many soap bubbles around a fan.
He reached the outskirts of the city and pulled over. He didn’t want to go anywhere. Well, he did, sort of, but not all that badly. Some other time.
He got out of the car to look at the hills.
Everything was so beautiful. Nothing was ever beautiful.
Still two hours to go until seven.
How long till seven? He glanced at his watch again. Two hours.
Sometimes he’d ask himself something and forget what it was.
Alternately, he’d answer his own questions and forget the answer.
“Hell’s fuckin’ bells” echoed through his mind.
His own voice. Or the memory of his own voice.
His temples were throbbing. The weekend headache. Nothing out of the ordinary. Everything was under control. Sales were doing well. What sales? He started. The memory of his boss’s voice.
He went into a bar and ordered a double shot of brandy. Closest bar to where he’d parked.
He eavesdropped on the patrons’ conversation, but their words circled his brain like so many soap bubbles around a fan. He liked the thick smoke. He liked the squalor in there. He liked the people—ugly, toothless, unshaven. Come to think of it, it was a good thing sales were doing so well. What sales? Installment sales, what else…
“Hell’s fuckin’ bells,” his voice snapped back at the memory of his boss’s voice.
A tumble with Carolina, a tumble with Carolina, kept ringing through his head.
One hour to go till seven.
It would have been nice if it had started raining out of the heavy smoke. A downpour of beer into the mugs of the toothless. Let the losers have a field day. Let ’em dance in the rain.
As for him, Carolina was going to save him. She was going to suck all the headache out of his head.
It was Friday after all.
How long till seven?
He drained his brandy and called her, though she was expecting him. No one answered. He left no message. Could be she was with another one of her johns.
“Hell’s fuckin’ bells.”
7 P.M. was booked exclusively for him; no one could take that away. He was paying for it. He was a faithful customer. He didn’t take anything on credit.
A tumble with Carolina, a tumble with Carolina.
He was a paying customer, wasn’t he? No one could take his hour away from him.
Frantically pressing the keys of his cell phone, he finished a second glass of brandy. Carolina wouldn’t answer. He panicked. It was the first time anything like this had happened to him. As a rule, Carolina was always waiting for him. There, in her rented flat.
He felt cheated.
Without fail, at the beginning of the weekend, he’d come to Carolina. She’d be waiting for him in lingerie he’d bought her himself. Sand-colored. 7 P.M. was his hour. He didn’t care about anything else.
He felt double-crossed. It just wasn’t fair. He had never ever barged his way in at any other hour. He didn’t care who she was screwing the rest of the time. But at 7 P.M. she was supposed to be at home for him. At 7 P.M. she was as good as his wife.
Carolina knew him well. Knew all his whims.
After a tumble with Carolina, he was back on his feet.
His temples throbbed.
Everything is under control. Nothing is ever under control.
Carolina had been unfaithful to him.
Like the cheapest whore.
Carolina was screwing another guy at his hour. She didn’t give a fuck about his headache. About his tiredness. About his having to go back to work on Monday. Having to talk nicely and keep smiling. Not losing his temper. Boosting sales.
“Hell’s fuckin’ bells…”
Carolina is a bitch in heat, he chalked on an imaginary wall.
He made up his mind to call Renata. She was a friend of hers, sort of. Well, to the extent two women working in that profession could be friends. She used to talk to him frequently enough about Renata, whom she had kind of adopted. Taught her the tricks of the trade. She’d given him her phone number the moment they started seeing each other. If you can’t reach me, you should try Renata, she’d told him back then. There’d never been any need to.
Renata answered the phone.
He didn’t have to go into any details about who he was before she said: oh, right, the 7 P.M. customer, aren’t you? No, she knew nothing about Carolina. Nothing whatsoever. They hadn’t seen each other in days. But she was available herself. Sure, right away.
He jumped into his car and drove back to the city.
A tumble with Renata, a tumble with Renata, kept ringing through his head.
It was getting dark.
On his way, he drove past Carolina’s block. All the lights were off. Totally off. He groped his way around the neighborhood till he found the right address.
Renata was waiting for him in a satin gown. Her curves hinted she was naked underneath. She was medium height, plump, and she looked somehow mischievous.