Jonathan walked up to her and put her head on his shoulder.
“Don’t worry, don’t worry about it,” he repeated, out-talking his thumping heart.
“It’s not because so much depends on Simon, promotions and various… It’s just that I feel cut off, you understand, like a helium balloon cut loose from its string,” snivelled Megi.
He stroked her hair, a little stiff with lacquer.
“Do you miss your family, friends?”
She pulled herself up and wiped the smudged mascara with her fingers.
“Are you kidding? Not them.”
“Is it because you’ve never lived anywhere apart from Poland?”
Megi shrugged.
“It’s not because of Poland! We’re not immigrants, we’re free individuals, we can buy pickled gherkins at the nearest corner. It’s a sort of feeling, oh, I don’t know? The umbilical cord being cut?”
“That you’re suspended between one and the other? One thing’s coming to an end, while the Other…”
“Exactly, a transition. And during the transition, total uncertainty.”
Jonathan looked at her and raised his hand, which froze in the air. He clenched his fist and gently lowered it on Megi’s shoulder. After a short hesitation, Megi replied with the same gesture.
They were still standing like that, staring at each other in silence, when whispering and clattering reached them from the room.
“What are you doing there?” Jonathan asked suspiciously.
“Ta-da!” Antosia stood in the doorway, ceremoniously pointing behind her.
Jonathan peered into the room. On the table stood little bowls of sweets, in the center towered Belgian chocolates and ptasie mleczko, Polish speciality chocolates.
“Sweets? Before going to bed?” Jonathan feigned outrage.
Megi burst out laughing; Tomaszek leapt from behind his sister and stood in line with her.
“Mommy’s party!” He stood straight as a ramrod and looked at Jonathan. “Mommy’s!”
As long as Andrea sought a reply, Jonathan didn’t return her messages, but when finally she fell silent, he plunged into despair. He couldn’t enjoy the regained clarity of his situation. He drove the children to school, came home, sat on the edge of the sofa, and stared in front of him. He craved the love of this one and only woman and, although Megi gave all of herself to him, his body howled for Andrea.
During the first days of blossoming summer, Jonathan cursed being in love, the plague that for months had given him wings but now devoured him, more biting than soap in a wound, salt on a cut, a blister in a shoe. He ceased jogging, did just what needed to be done, and only the Pavlov Dogs held him upright as they milled around in his head, ignoring his moods.
Jonathan sat and wrote but when he tore himself away from the laptop, the awareness of loss stabbed at him twice as hard. Unable to bear it any longer, he called Stefan. He briefed him about the metaphorical slap on the cheek his lover had dealt him – she hadn’t invited them to dinner, which devastated Megi. He also poured out what hurt him most: they had made great love that morning yet Andrea hadn’t uttered a word about the party in the evening.
“To which I’m not invited,” he fumed. “From which, in fact, I’m going to be excluded! And along with me, my wife.”
It took Stefan a few seconds to assess the situation accurately.
“So, you’re not going to have it off with Andrea any more?”
Jonathan moved his lips closer to the receiver and said, almost begging, “She’s false and evil, do you understand?”
“Well, she’s a fibber, that’s for sure.”
“Imagine if it was you she’d treated like that, not Megi. Should I go on seeing her? What about loyalty to friends?”
“Well, yes, I forgot that you and Megi are so close.”
“That’s not the point, that we’re close,” bridled Jonathan. “Wouldn’t you ditch a woman if she’d treated Monika like that?”
There was silence on the line.
“No,” said Stefan finally.
Jonathan lit a cigarette although he held to the firm principle of not causing a stink in the apartment.
“I think you’ve done the right thing,” said Stefan after a while. “You’ve broken off with her, and… well, and good.”
“‘Good,’ what do you mean ‘good’? I can’t even be happy I’ve ended it. I’m not in the least bit relieved.”
Stefan started tapping something on his side of the line. Jonathan was just about to tell him to stop when Stefan said, “Remember when we were going to the Masurian Lakes, a policeman stopped us once and demanded a fine?”
“I remember, you bribed him.”
“And he, being grateful, said to me, “Keep your eyes open on the bushes twenty kilometers from here. They’re there, too. What if you come across an honest officer?” ’
Jonathan stubbed out his half-smoked cigarette.
“You’re a decent officer,” declared Stefan. “You’ve broken off and stick to it.”
“But I can’t go on without her.” Jonathan hardly understood what he was saying himself.
Stefan put his hand over the phone and answered something to somebody in French at the other end.
“What am I supposed to do?” asked Jonathan.
Something scraped in the receiver.
“Maybe fuck her one more time…”
4
THE CAR RAN ALONG the motorway zipping western Europe away and unzipping its central-eastern part. Jonathan watched the receding landscapes in the mirror; the children, in the back seat, made a racket, then after stormy negotiations agreed to watch Home on the Range.
“Lord, what blissful silence!” sighed Megi now that Antosia and Tomaszek, headphones on, were staring at the small televisions attached to the headrests in front of them. “My neck was beginning to hurt with all that turning round passing juices.”
“Best leave them in peace,” muttered Jonathan.
“They’ll kick up hell! I’ve got to shut them up somehow.”
Megi pulled out some CDs and switched one on.
“Don’t drown us out!” shouted Antosia.
Megi, resigned, pressed “stop” and inclined the seat.
“Racket or no racket, we’re off on vacation.” She stretched out her hand to stroke Jonathan’s hair.
He shuddered, torn from his own thoughts.
“And you’re still stressed with the city,” sighed Megi and gazed through the windscreen. “Hardly surprising. We’ve had a difficult year. The move, a new job for me, and for you the children at a new school. You’re brave to have taken such good care of them.”
Jonathan nodded and slipped into a slower lane.
“I really appreciate it,” continued Megi. “You’ve proved your masculinity.”
“Masculinity?”
Instead of German valleys outside the car, he momentarily saw Andrea’s shoulders revealed in her red dress.
“Any guy can take his children for walks at the weekends but not many can spend the afternoon with them, help with their homework, read to them, put them to bed.”
“You think so?” mumbled Jonathan.
Andrea was now leaning her butt on the table edge. In nothing but stilettos; he’d already removed her Dress…
“…that the story’s becoming clear.” Megi’s words reached him.
“Sorry, what did you say?” He leaned toward her, his alarmed eyes assessing the road. He shouldn’t let himself get so distracted.
“It’s great that your story’s becoming clear! It’s extraordinary how we live together, sleep in the same bed, yet you’ve got a life of your own like that.”