Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in – nothing’s happened – she’s got to get rid of the thoughts flitting through her mind, dancing like ghastly butterflies.
Jonathan stared at the bathroom door. How long could a woman spend fixing her make-up and brushing her hair? His wife’s hairstyle was tidy as opposed to Andrea’s hair, which was free to the elements; it was precisely this aspect of feigned neglect that drove him to frenzy.
Damn Megi’s hairstyle! He had to convince her he was drunk.
“Megi.” Seeing the door open, he rushed forward.
She didn’t look at him but neither did she push him aside. Slowly, he took her by the hand; with the other, he raised her chin.
“I got drunk,” he said with a foolish smile.
13
JONATHAN CLIMBED as though he were mounting the stairs of a lighthouse. Their house, attached on both sides to the neighboring houses, was like a tower, seductively pretty with its stairs like white teeth. Over the last few days he’d mounted the stairs so many times that his calves hurt. Meanwhile, his cell phone remained silent, hidden beneath the marital bed. Text messages arrived from Stefan, questions from his mother, an amusing remark from his father but, since the New Year’s ball, nothing from Andrea.
Had he studied the messages he sent her, he would have realized he resembled himself from the final days of secondary school. He’d believed, at the time, that dignity came second to feelings and that the woman he loved would understand. Since then the notion of “the woman he loved” had evolved, stretched beyond mere desire. This was colored by the half-bitter, half-amused realization that there was no love without play, and not only foreplay.
Now he was behaving as though he were retarded. And, to his surprise, he sometimes found a masochistic pleasure in it. Up and down he went on a swing, throwing his legs out then drawing them back beneath the seat, his hands loosening their grip on the rope, a pulsating ball tightening then opening in his stomach. The movement robbed him of reason. Just as in childhood he had raced his friends, so now he felt he was swinging harder and harder, up and down.
While he kept checking whether the woman he loved had tossed him at least a few crumbs of reciprocated feelings, Megi was taking down the Christmas decorations with the children. They were having great fun as always. Ever since Jonathan had told them that in Sweden people sang a valedictory song to the tree, each year Antosia, Tomaszek, and Megi had tried to compose a song worthy of their Christmas tree. Jonathan went downstairs just when they’d given up, as usual, and began to howl Wlazl kotek na plotek i mruga (The cat has climbed the fence and sits winking), a popular Polish children’s song. They giggled and the dry needles fell, shaken by their intertwined arms as they circled the tree.
“…sits winking!” yelled Tomaszek and tumbled over.
Megi halted to pick him up, herself weak with laughter.
“Sing, you dope!” Antosia, for whom rituals were very important, was cross.
“Mommy, she called me a dope.” Tomaszek pointed an accusing finger.
“Antosia!” Megi’s expression was far from stern.
At that moment she caught sight of Jonathan.
“Come and help us,” she groaned, heaving up her laughing son.
“Do-pey, do-pey,” chanted Antosia to her brother.
“Don’t say that,” said Jonathan spontaneously.
He walked up and pulled Tomaszek to his feet. As he took him by the hand he was horrified at how small and fragile it was. He covered it with his own and grasped Antosia’s hand, soft as a puppy’s paw. Megi grabbed the children on the other side and together they formed a circle around the Christmas tree.
Jonathan wanted to weep so he pressed his face against a branch, hissed “Auuu!”; they laughed.
Jonathan stirred the pot, roughly shaking logs of carrots. The thick mass floated to the surface. He’d learned how to make Polish krupnik, thick barley soup, from his mother. Chicken in beer sauce, a speciality of Nick’s, his mother’s English husband, was roasting in the oven. For dessert, in keeping with French custom, there would be cheese.
Jonathan had taken refuge in cooking when Andrea’s silence had become unbearable. He’d already gone through the stage of hoping that she would write to him, of worrying that something had happened to her, of being frightened that he’d offended her, furious that she treated him this way and, finally, of feverishly trying to arrange “accidental” meetings. Now he was going through a stage of blunt despair.
The children were on their Christmas holiday and his writing course was to resume after the break. Megi had been working exceptionally long hours recently, while Antosia had caught a cold that she quickly passed on to her brother. Jonathan stayed at home with the feverish children, tied down because their nanny had gone to Poland.
He dished out medicine, cooked, pressed food into the noneaters, read to them and, during their brief naps interrupted by blocked noses, checked whether a text message had arrived from Andrea. So long as the children were poorly, he concealed his frustration and forged it into patience, but when they picked up, he was drained.
When one day Tomaszek, still grumpy and afflicted with a head cold, approached and started to tug at Jonathan’s T-shirt, demanding that he play with him, Jonathan, who was just taking the dishes out of the dishwasher, couldn’t stand the weight of the little person clutching at his feet any longer. He took a cup from the dishwater and flung it against the floor as hard as he could.
Tomaszek froze, looking at the swing of his father’s hand, at the plume of sharp pieces. A long while passed before he overcame his fear and started to cry.
Antosia ran downstairs and stood at the door, staring owl-like at her brother and father. Jonathan was still standing over the shell of the broken teacup, his face white, his hands clenched; Tomaszek was shaking with sobs which were becoming less and less like those of a child and more and more like those of an animal.
Jonathan couldn’t bring himself to hug him, afraid that if he took him in his arms the child would fall apart like the teacup. Antosia ran up to her brother and put her arms around him; he clung to her tightly.
“Daddy?” whispered the girl.
Jonathan hid his face with his hands.
“I’m sorry, sorry…”
He felt as if he’d had an accident. If he yelled, “I’m going through a difficult period!” they wouldn’t have understood anyway. He really was going through a difficult period – one of lying in wait for a call from Simon’s woman, the bitch in the red dress, the reason his children were having a bad time with him.
When Saturday arrived, Megi took over the domestic helm and Jonathan pretended that he’d caught a cold from the children. He ached all over; he wanted to cry, didn’t eat, forgot to drink. When he slept, he slept like a log. Blessed sleep, terrible awakening when persistent images invaded him again – the magic of secret meetings, the best sex of his life, soaring, starry lightheartedness. And the thought that all this had fallen apart. He no longer had Andrea. She was having a good time somewhere else with someone new, someone better placed than him.
Then had come the phase of blunt stupor, which led him to the kitchen. Since he couldn’t escape from home he decided to discover its creative aspect – cooking. He anointed the chicken with herbs and in his heart cast a spell over all those who could send him text messages not to do so – except for Andrea. The worst moments were when, with a pounding heart, he opened the envelope only to come across a stupid joke from Stefan.
The approaching spring loosened the beaks of birds; they began to sing but the sound only irritated Jonathan. Others waking up to life, he felt, was unfair when he himself was unwell (he felt left out). He had had no idea that the wound of rejection could go so deep; he couldn’t cheapen his experience by thinking of it as Stefan described it – a couple of fruitful fucks with a good piece of ass such as Andrea. And what, it’s ended? Everything comes to an end.