Intrigued, he reads his other novels one after another, in the order they were written and published. One accurate prediction after another. He recognizes individuals, feelings, sensations, successes, and failures, always written months before the event. He sees his whole life anticipated from book to book. He presages events, situations, women, dramas, and epiphanies. The almighty power of the character in Green Steppe anticipates his own power a while after. The anguish of the protagonist in Pure Soaked Earth anticipates what he subsequently suffered. And the musician’s awareness of his failure in All the Fire of His Great Sun was his very own a few months later. He also recognizes actual individuals. The woman in Colts in the Corral is Lluïsa, whom he met on the very day of the book’s launch. Teresa appears portrayed with almost photographic precision, in The Spirit, but when he was writing it, he didn’t even know her. He systematically foresaw and wrote things that would happen to him months afterwards.
When he finally comes to his last book, the one he has published a few days ago, he is frightened by the fact that his protagonist dies. He leaves the book on his desk, goes into the kitchen, looks for a can of pre-cooked stew, opens it, pours the contents into a saucepan that he puts into the microwave. He can’t recognize any of the characters or events in the book. On the one hand, it’s obvious sufficient time hasn’t passed for what he’s written to turn into reality. On the other, however, the fact he can’t recognize anything at all is cause for hope: if it’s all about prediction, some of the events should already have happened. That this isn’t the case may indicate that this novel is different from the others. Indeed, no law decrees that the norm has to be eternally realized. He thinks all this while setting the table; he is aware of the situation and is going to try to avoid the inevitable.
4
Centripetal Force
The man has unsuccessfully been trying to leave his apartment since daybreak; whenever he opens the door, the same thing happens: he can’t see the landing, only the hallway he’s trying to leave at that exact moment. He’s tried dozens of times. He tries again: He opens the door to go out, it’s dark out there, he takes a couple of steps, touches the wall, gropes for the switch for the light that’s next to the elevator. He can’t find it. On the contrary, he finds the coat stand, and underneath that, the umbrella stand. So he’s back in the hall he’s just tried to leave. He stretches a hand out to the hall light switch, finds it, switches it on, and sees that he’s standing with his back to his own front door. He turns half around and once again confronts the door. Opens it wide and looks outside. It is very dark, and there’s a single patch of light on the floor, the light that is coming precisely from his hallway through the open door, too little light to determine whether beyond his doorstep the landing that’s always been there is still there, a generously spacious one, as in all old apartment blocks. He could try to leave again, but there would be no point. He’s tried repeatedly and unsuccessfully since the early morning. He shuts the door and leans back on it.
He goes into his dining room and looks into the street. Several people are walking up and even more are walking down it. He tries not to get stressed. He must get out one way or another. He picks up his phone, dials a girlfriend’s number. It’s a girl he’s not known very long, and he hasn’t yet managed to be intimate with her, which he regrets. Why not? Is it because he’s shy? Because he’s never had the right opportunity? He thinks that it’s perhaps because he’s not reached that degree of intimacy with her that he’s decided to ask her this favor: She should come to his place immediately. The friend asks why. He adopts an extremely somber tone of voice, and without saying exactly what’s wrong (he doesn’t tell her because she won’t believe him or will think he’s mad and won’t come), he tells her he is caught in a most unusual situation (not a serious one, but a most unusual one), so unusual that if he tells her on the phone she won’t believe him or will think he’s gone mad; he needs her help. She says nothing for a few seconds and finally says she will drop by at three, after work.
The man spends the next couple of hours staring at the door and smoking non-stop, until he’s filled a vase with butts. In effect, his friend arrives when it’s three minutes to three. He briefly tells her what the situation is, as clearly as he can, and before she can react in shock, he tells her what they are going to do: “This is what we are going to do: We will leave the apartment together. If I leave by myself, I will never reach the landing. I always find myself back in my hallway and not on the landing.”
She asks, “Why do you think things will be any different if I’m with you?”
He doesn’t reply, grabs her wrist, they walk towards the door, he takes a deep breath, turns the handle, opens the door, and they go out; in effect, they reach the landing as he’d predicted. He gives a sigh of relief. She looks at him, taken aback. He presses the button for the elevator. She says there’s no point because the elevator is out of order: she’d had to walk up. They walk downstairs. On the ground floor there’s a notice on the elevator-door: OUT OF ORDER.
They go for a stroll, look at the shop windows and the colored lights—shaped into stars, little birds, and bells—that decorate the street. She buys two presents for Twelfth Night. A truck and a cement-mixing truck, huge, plastic toys, for her nephews. With those presents for company, they dine out, drink tea in a café until she looks at her watch and says it’s time she was going. He takes her right hand in his left.
“Come home with me,” he suggests, “don’t abandon me. If you do, it will happen again.”
The woman laughs and acknowledges nobody’s ever used this line on her before, but it’s not ingenious enough to persuade her to spend the night in his apartment. They’ve often talked about doing it. She knows he wants to sleep with her, but for the moment she’s happy the way things are. She understands he’s frustrated: she knows men can’t usually accept the possibility of a straightforward friendship with a woman without sex. He finds her little homily rather tiresome, is annoyed and decides that in fact it would be better if she did clear off. They kiss each other on the cheek; she disappears down into the subway. The man walks on along the street. He can’t be bothered (he’s not afraid, just can’t be bothered) to go home because he knows the minute he’s back inside he won’t be able to leave. So he decides there’s no point rushing back. There’s a cocktail bar nearby that he particularly likes, with a wooden floor and ceiling and glass cabinets full of bottles mounted on every wall. He heads there. In the distance he can see the elongated light over the gold nameplate. He pushes the thick, heavy door open, pulls aside the red velvet curtain, and, hey presto!, he’s back in his hallway. He turns half around and opens the door again: every step he takes to leave is a step that takes him inside. He turns half around again, opens the door again, leaves again, and comes back in again. He’s back inside now.