“You going to call Laura over?”
“Yeah. Laura, honey!”
“Laura!”
“Laura, sweetie, we have to go, say bye-bye to Auntie Ieva!”
“Bye-bye!”
“Bye, Laura, you lively little girl! Laura is beautiful.”
“Yep.”
“When Monta was little, she used to always say that too — yep.”
“Little kids are whole. I already said it, but take care of yourself. Go see a good psychologist.”
“That would just be more schooling, not the truth. It’s not a solution.”
“Truth doesn’t exist. But somewhere there’s a solution. And you’ll find it. You’ve earned it. Don’t look so creepy. Life is good. You’re good. Everything’s good.”
“Thanks, brother.”
“Bye!”
“Bye!”
“Pāvils!”
“Yeah.”
“Be honest — do you think I avoid taking responsibility for my life? But that someday I’ll learn how? Someday I’ll get back into myself? But you know I can’t rush it, it has to happen on its own.”
“Yeah.”
“Is that what you think?”
“Yes.”
“You make everything sound so unrefined. Everything that’s secretive and beautiful, everything that makes sense.”
“You can do so much with words. Lie a lot. Embellish. Make mistakes. It’s a giant avalanche that crashes over you if you so much as move a word. It starts to roll and picks up other words along the way, and there you have it! You can’t even lie with words — but that’s giving it too much meaning. Pointlessly passing the time instead of doing something.”
“For example, going to elections. To vote.”
“Right, for example.”
“Rake the yard. Take off nail polish. You’re naïve.”
“Call me what you want. But I have my convictions.”
“And that’s why I respect you. Thank you for that.”
“Are you back inside yourself when you say that? Where’s the thank you coming from?”
“The universe.”
“Liar, liar, pants on fire… Laura!”
“She’s getting antsy.”
“Go. And God bless!”
“What an old-fashioned farewell! But I’ll gladly accept it.”
“Do you think God is in one piece?”
“Everyone knows that God is a trinity. At least the Christian God. I don’t know. They’re stupid word games. See, at times form is enough. To live together. People live together, so there has to be some sense in it. Raising children or writing dissertations, novels, cookbooks, screenplays, even making pancakes! Earning money. Spending it. Expressing an opinion. Fighting for something. Something like that, right?”
“Exactly. Alright, I’m going.”
“Go.”
“Hang on! How come you thanked me for being quiet for a while during lunch? Were you observing me?”
“No. I wasn’t doing anything special. We were sitting. Talking. Time was passing. That’s almost the only thing that still brings me joy. The fact that time goes on. Cars drive down the street. It’s about to rain. Ducks are nibbling the grass. Nothing makes sense, but the water keeps flowing. Beautiful.”
“Beautiful.”
“Tell me, Pāvils — are you in one piece?”
“I don’t think about it. And I won’t. This illness could be contagious.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t worry about me, I don’t have that much free time. I can’t afford to.”
“What?”
“The same as before. Don’t look at me in such a scary way.”
“You can tell Laura not to do that. But not me.”
“Don’t smoke!”
“Hm. Take care. Write your dissertation.”
“Thanks. You take care, too.”
“Pāvils!”
“Yeah?”
“I love you.”
“I know.”
“You know?”
“Yes. You love me, the earth, the light, slugs, these tiny green leaves here, you love the past and present, children, strange, old and mean women, horrible fates, wavering stares, new buildings, the sea, clouds, God, and goddesses. Total chaos. It’s impossible to love you because you love too much. You love, and at the same time don’t know how to, you don’t know what love is. You’re afraid of life and death, and you desire both of them. You celebrate sadness without really knowing what sadness is. You advertise joy without feeling it. You advertise an empty life without knowing what life without nothing is. Lower your barriers, sis. A dog only becomes a dog when you fence it in.”
“I don’t have barriers. Aksels was a barrier. And he was taken away from me.”
“Maybe you’ll get him back.”
“He’s dead, remember, Jesus!”
“Is there life after death and/or love?”
“There are people who are meant to have only one great love in their lifetime. How do you save yourself for the next one?”
“Do you know who your one great love is?”
“I don’t.”
“Do you know what tomorrow will be like?”
“I don’t know anything.”
“Then stop it. And don’t look at me like that.”
An Open Ending
Surveying the crowd in the Berlin Art Academy café, she was unable to hold back and asked loudly:
“So that’s the end?”
The sea of voices drowned out the sound, but a few people sitting closer to her heard. Elias, from Cyprus, leaned his head of black curls toward her:
“What did you say?”
“So that’s the end.”
“Yes, that’s the end.”
He smiled over his glasses, his brilliant smile. The Berlin seminar was almost over. Tomorrow — her suitcase and the flight home.
Ieva looked around her: Roberta, Neil, Gojel, and Eduardo were at one table. She, Peter, Elias, Barbara, and Marijka were at another. That day the preview of Sybille Bergeman’s photography exhibit had taken place in the exhibition hall, and the café overflowed with attendees. They drank coffee, chatted, smoked. Sybille herself was supposed to show up! — the excited faces of those present read. They’d be able to ask her questions. So close they could touch her. Get her autograph and a smile. The way Sybille would use her lens to capture a smile, a caress, the disappearing shadows and lights in the fluctuating daylight. Now they could get these in excess in person and, when parting, even kiss her hand.
The crowd a single, hundred-fingered hand.
Peter was discussing something with Gojels and the young architect in the red shirt — what was his name again? Marcelle? Mario? — from Berlin. Next to Peter, the otherwise businesslike architect looked like a baby. Noticing Ieva’s fixed, introverted stare, Peter turned toward her and waved a glass of white wine under her nose. She broke free from her thoughts and back into the bustling world around her.
“Isn’t 2 p.m. too early for wine?”
Peter smiled meaningfully.
“I know what too late means, but not what too early means.”
Ieva laughed:
“But I don’t know what too late means.”
Peter stared at her for a moment and in his typical careless manner flipped his dark hair over his shoulder. Then he said:
“Yes, it could be that it’s too early for you to know what too late means.”
The small, dark theater slowly filled with students. How many movies were there left to see — two?
“Peter, please!”
Elias’s smile! Gojels’s, Mario’s, and Barbara’s profiles. They were all so nice.
Except Peter. When he presented at yesterday’s readings Ieva had felt a childish and long-forgotten desire to be protective. He had immediately upset the audience. But those were the rules of the game. Peter had to be edgy by definition. Strange how the truly edgy are rarely crass or confrontational — this type subconsciously calls out for love, sometimes rather violently. Peter was fragile and ironic, there was plenty of love in him, he wanted freedom. “In these bittersweet pages you’ll find the fall of a regime and the past two decades of Eastern Europe”—that’s what Rolling Stone had written about his play. “Simply a polymath vagabond for the needs of New Europe,” Lawrence Norfolk had flippantly added. How could they all place the European label on Peter! Like a bunch of kids who are just worried whether or not they’ll be able to hear their mothers calling for them.