— Are you really her brother?
Two sticky hands grabbed me by the shoulders, turned me around, and pulled me into a slow dance. My partner was trying to steer me toward the other room. Let myself be directed by her and wound up near the tape recorder. Raising her arms and bust, my partner danced on tiptoe. She had slipped off her shoes, like Donca and the other girls. Even Donca’s gentleman was sliding around in socks. We stopped near the door. The melody had ended. The girl leaned against me. She had twined her arms around my neck, pulled me down near her ear: “That man’s a forestry engineer. He has a lot of success with the ladies. Married, of course. Has a very chic stupidity. Women love it. As a matter of fact, you older guys have an advantage over these boys who are just too young and inexperienced.”
And indeed, as the engineer dexterously palpated his prey, it was impossible not to notice several rings on his long, bony fingers. On the other hand, his charm had it’s uses as it seemed to have rubbed off on me and attracted this young girl, though you couldn’t call me young anymore. Only laziness kept me from taking advantage of this disadvantage. My dance partner exhibited a dry, direct humor; she was easily approachable and playfully, provocatively elastic. She kept brushing her breasts against me, and I was ready to make a pass when Donca’s fiancé showed up beside us, hair on end, bottle in hand, and eyes red with fury.
Unbraiding her black hair, Donca had stretched herself out on the floor and her low voice made itelf heard: “I can no longer, bathed in your languors, O waves. . De vos langueurs, ô lames. . en vuestro languidez. . Nor cross the pride of pennants and of flags, Nor swim past prison hulks’ hateful eyes. . Je ne puis plus. . Drunk with love’s acrid torpors. . I can no longer. . Ya no puedo. . sail. .” She was spouting her favorite verses and rocking unsteadily like a boat about to face the storm. She’d let herself go too far. Scandal would soon erupt.
The girl’s arms pulled me again. Then, she took off her stockings and showed them to me, holding one in each hand like trophies. Her bare, white feet twitched to the music, which blasted so loudly the room seemed to shake — a feeling like screws being twisted into the back of my neck. My head was heavy. Clenched my hands, my nails, so as not to fall. Slipped near the wall. No one saw me. They were all overcome by fervid, nervous expectation. Made it to the hall. Tugged at the sleeves of my overcoat. At that moment, the girl grabbed me by the buttons.
— You’re unfair to yourself. You’re not getting any younger. Why don’t you want? Why don’t. .?
She had nestled, full of warmth, under my coat. She was uncovering herself like an enchanting, helpless child with sad hot eyes. Stroked her cheeks, then her lashes, and promised to come back in an hour.
— If you run away, you’ll get old. It’s stupid to grow old.
She scratched the wall with her nails. With warm eyes fatigued by longing, she remained behind the door. She had offered me an invitation to a night of healing: the girl would have shattered the courage it took to confront a new bout of insomnia. Climbed down the steps, wanting all the while to return. Came back to myself in the freezing air outside. Sank into the snow. Thought about Donca and wondered why we’d never managed to talk together for more than ten minutes at a stretch: she was always confused, distracted, exalted. Hadn’t done my duty to her, either. Recalled the evening when she had celebrated her graduation from high school, and remembered myself too — myself back at that age — preoccupied exclusively with my own flounderings.
• • •
My parents were living in a new apartment, and through the open windows, evening could be heard far away, beyond the hills. The young people were dancing. Their embraces seemed daring for the time. They were kidding around in a familiar way. Hands joined. Their lips sometimes seemed to meet by chance. Didn’t notice any trace of Donca’s previous illness; on the contrary, she seemed perfectly integrated with people her age. She talked loudly and a lot; she moved lightly. She had a provocative way of twining her arms around each new partner. Mama took care to quiet the perplexities I didn’t have:
— You have to understand her. She exaggerates. She has complexes from the things that happened. Anyhow, for a girl. .
This new vocabulary startled me. One could only nod stupidly, not having suspected her of such modern investigations and understandings, which were evidently dangerous because they stretched too far in the direction of error and indulgence. But there was no time to sweat the small stuff. I was waiting for a certain guest, and when I heard, from the next room, that his wife was taking her leave of a nurse, who was our guest, I understood: there was no chance he’d appear. Back then, in the year when Donca was finishing school, if I’d had time to watch her closely and had found a way to get closer to her, it might still have been possible to do something for her, just as it might have been possible to do something for me if the guest that I’d been waiting for had come. Simple, gratuitous suppositions, both.
Came back home for Donca’s first engagement, having been urgently summoned — and again, when things had taken a turn for the worse. Winter had raised snow banks in the streets. Allowed myself then to look for the guest who hadn’t come to the summer party. The truth is, my visits weren’t for the sake of “winning back a sister for myself,” as my parents used to say. They had wanted this daughter and never tired of starting over with her again; but my goal was to find the guest who had been absent on that summer night when Donca was finishing high school. Meanwhile, people had singled me out as a “defective model,” a shell of myself, what was left over after an “imbalance” freed me, and my peculiar search took advantage of the prevailing impression.
It wasn’t easy to find him, but in the end he received me. He was in charge again, although the five years hadn’t passed. He had a suitable office and the same responsibilities on top of new ones. Any normal person would have been terrified to approach a high official freely, and only a madman would have been able to aggressively approach a man whose wife was dying.
— You probably know the reason for my visit.
— To see me.
— And to apologize for the delay. Five years aren’t five minutes or even five months. You once arranged a meeting when I wasn’t able to appear. That probably doesn’t put me in good standing. You’re not a person to summon someone without having a serious reason.
He raised his eyebrows, but to my surprise he quickly entered into the tone tacitly proposed by me. The apparent rebellion hadn’t put him off.
— Indeed. Back then, I called you for something important. As proven by the fact that I had granted myself six months, in order to be able to present myself with all of my bases covered. Given my circumstances back then, it was an act of defiance, out of pride. Things have resolved themselves in the meantime. The conversation no longer has an objective. Your father’s suffering went on for more than six months, I acknowledge, but. .
— Since I came. .
— I wanted to tell you that your father is not guilty.
— Which is to say, less guilty than it appeared.
— It could be said that way, too. But I wanted to tell you that he’s really not guilty.
— Six months or five years of deliberation were necessary for this?