“Yes.”
“Idiot. He’s using you — when’ll you finally get it?”
“Thanks for the kind words. Bye!”
Ieva cuts the conversation short and throws the phone onto the bed.
She takes off her T-shirt. Looks at her breasts in the mirror. Nothing wrong with them.
Her face still looks good, too. When we’re young our faces are like uncharted maps — smooth, flat. As they age they acquire Bermuda Triangles, underwater territories, landslides, avalanches. Her mom’s face doesn’t show signs of wear, or stress, because she never blames herself for things. But Ieva will definitely get wrinkles, 100 %. Ieva is a single, black splotch. She’s sick of it, but what can you do? She’s got that kind of personality. Everything she does is a result of inspiration, nothing else. She works in an office supply store, and the other saleswomen are always surprised at how much of what she does comes from inspiration alone. “Some days you’re so creative, but others you’re totally out of it,” says Gunta. Gunta is young, pretty, and — most importantly — always cheerful. Cheerful people are never out of it, and it’s a good thing if you meet someone like that in your lifetime. When everyone else has a heart full of sorrow and complaints.
Ieva puts on the violet dress shirt. She’s also young and pretty, so what. Sometimes it kills her.
A disheveled head of hair emerges from under the pile of blankets on the bed.
“G’morning,” Monta says. “Where are you going?”
“We’re going to Grandma’s because Mommy is going to go see your father. Time to get up and brush your teeth.”
Monta runs to the window and hugs the dog, who is once again frozen in vigilance.
“Dārcis is coming to Grandma’s?”
“Of course! Put his collar on.”
The south-facing side. Pigeons scrabble on the outer windowsill of the small, sunny room.
Their landlady Fanija sits on the edge of the bed among pillows covered in crocheted slips. She looks like an amber mummy, in her white blouse and the same wavy grey hairstyle actress Zarah Leander wore in her prime. Fanija looks at the peeling floor paint with great interest and occasionally pokes at it with her cane.
She says to Ieva:
“Come look at my country house, Ieva — here and here. And there, too. And this one here, look, an old man with an upturned nose, two white dogs… and this one’s a map of Latvia. Where are you headed, Ieva? That shirt looks good on you, it’s a nice men’s dress shirt, isn’t it? You don’t see that much these days, women going with this kind of extravagant style, but it really is an extravagance, isn’t it, Ieva? What’s more — winners aren’t judged. Can I call you Eva? Y’know, I was once lucky enough to fall in love with a boy a lot like you… yes… it was in Paris in ’37; my mother was an actress in Baty’s theater… Theatre Montparnasse… That won’t mean anything to you, but if you’d seen the old façade of the Montparnasse theater, believe me, it would change your life… Baty was staging Flaubert’s Madame Bovary… It was a good show. They played pieces from Lucia di Lammermoor. Donizetti… My mother was one of the four beauties who voiced poor Emma Bovary’s thoughts… like a Greek chorus. The boy played Leon — he was a very beautiful man, and how he sang! I was seventeen, he was my first love. I almost went insane, but I couldn’t show it… When Emma shouted ‘love is not better than marriage’ on stage, I always started to cry. She stood in a cheap and dirty hotel room and screamed — love is not better than marriage! Imagine how awful it was, Ieva!.. I think his name was Charles, the boy. He came to our place for lunch.”
Fanija sinks into her thoughts. Ieva waits. Until Fanija finally stirs, like she’s wriggling out of a bog of memories.
“You’re not in the least bit similar to him, but there’s still something… a gesture… a look, when you come in.”
Ieva looks at the veins on Fanija’s hands. Ieva doesn’t have time to wait.
She says:
“I want to pay in advance.”
Fanija looks at her blankly. Old people can sometimes suddenly flare out mid-sentence — like a candle that’s been tipped over. Ieva puts her money on the table.
“For the room.”
Fanija nods, but Ieva doesn’t know what for. She backs up toward the door.
“I’m going now. I’ll be back tomorrow. I’m going to visit my husband.”
As she reaches the door, Fanija speaks, surprising her.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, Ieva, I find you incredibly nice. Just remember to always put the bathroom key back in its place. I don’t have a spare.”
Ieva, Monta, and Dārcis stand in the front hallway of the apartment. Monta leans against the wall and holds Dārcis by his collar. Ieva puts on the necklace Andrejs gave her — the Virgin Mary hanging from a woven cord. We’re all set to go with our collars on, Ieva thinks.
“Let’s go!”
And they go.
She drops her daughter and the dog off at Pērnavas Street, where Monta is quick to fish her mother’s white guinea pig from its sand-filled aquarium and drop it on the ground — much to Dārcis’s barking delight and the guinea pig’s mortal fear. Ieva listens through her mother’s complaints and suggestions, then heads back into the street after a wash of goodbye kisses from Monta. She puts on her headphones and turns on her CD player, listens to Laurie Anderson’s album “Bright Red.”
Remember me is all I ask
And if remembered be a task forget me.
This long thin line. This long thin line.
This long thin line. This tightrope made of sound.
This music is like a frosty glaze forming over an oppressive heat. Over life’s distorted faces, broken-down by the black ice of passion, over the fire-filled bodies, markets, sales, weddings, births, and funerals. The music climbs over the dusty streets and freezes these things in moments, echoes, reflections. It fits in perfectly with Ieva’s own Ice Age.
She turns the volume up as far as it will go and shrinks into a corner of her world. Her mother just told her, “Read your life like a book, and with pleasure! It’s your privilege and yours alone.” Ieva skips ahead few tracks and watches as the city shifts in crystalline arcs.
All of these faces, her species. Ieva is able to participate when the music plays, to once again breathe in the air so many others have breathed for millions of years.
Watch your life as if it’s a movie — with an aching.
You had that rusty old car
And me I had nothing better to do.
You picked me up. We hit the road.
Baby me and you.
We shot out of town
Drivin’ fast and hard
Leaving our greasy skid marks
In people’s back yards.
We were goin’ nowhere.
Just driving around.
We were goin’ in circles.
And me I was just hanging on.
In the Central Market Ieva breaks through the hundred-headed mass and thinks about Monta. Her soft, silk-like skin, her clear eyes, the warmth so newly ignited in her heart! The way she looks along at the road ahead.
Stay with Grandma, be good, don’t give Grandma any trouble! Mommy’s going to go see your father. To visit.
For now Monta doesn’t have any questions. It’s what has to be done, obviously the entire world works like this. Mommy has to go see Daddy, who Monta doesn’t remember. She doesn’t know where he lives; all she knows is that she has to wait for him to come home. A priori love. She has to wait for Daddy like she has to wait for Santa Claus. But even Santa comes around more often — once a year.