It got worse. His throat tied itself into a knot. He got goosebumps. His hands started to tremble. His legs were so weak he couldn’t stand up.
He switched off with the remote and crawled over to the video recorder on all fours. He substituted the Love Parade tape for the feature film. Crawled back. Hauled himself onto the sofa again.
Pressed ‘Play’.
Turned off the sound.
*
In the night he woke up. Half dreaming, he shuffled into the bedroom. He didn’t bother brushing his teeth and was past undressing, but he turned on the camera.
REC.
Flopped down on the bed.
*
On his way to Matzleinsdorf goods yard, where Machine Park South was situated, he passed the church on the Mariahilfer Gürtel. He read the poster on its façade as he drove by:
There is One who loves you: Jesus Christ.
He stepped harder on the accelerator.
Apart from the Central Cemetery, Machine Park South was Vienna’s biggest walled enclosure. Jonas had never been there before. It took him five minutes to find the entrance. He was amazed when he rounded the corner. He’d never seen such a concentration of heavy goods vehicles parked at regular intervals as if about to be photographed for an advertisement. There must have been hundreds of them.
Many were articulated lorries. However, handling those took a certain amount of practice, and the trailer had first to be connected to the cab. He wanted an ordinary HGV. A truck with some space.
He threaded his way between the vehicles, annoyed with himself for having forgotten to put on any sun cream. He was so afraid of getting sunburnt he interrupted his search several times to mop his face and drink some mineral water in the air-conditioned Spider. He took a swig, drummed on the steering wheel. Looked in the rear-view mirror.
At last he thought he’d found what he needed. A DAF of around sixty tons. Unfortunately, the key wasn’t in the ignition. He didn’t feel like searching the offices for it, so he plumped for a somewhat older but even bigger model, which was likewise equipped with all the indispensable extras. It had a radio, a small TV, air-conditioning, and, in the spacious sleeping place behind the driver’s seat, a cooker.
His spirits rose when he started the engine. It was a long time since he’d heard anything like it. The truck had power to spare. He liked the view from the cab, too. In the Spider he seemed to be only a few centimetres above the road, whereas here he felt he was on the first floor of a house with picture windows.
The papers were in the glove compartment, as were some of the former driver’s possessions. These he threw out of the window unexamined, together with two T-shirts that had been lying on the bunk.
He fetched two metal ramps from a repair shop. Then he used the marker pen from the Big Wheel office to write Dear Jonas, 21 July. Yours, Jonas on a notice board on the wall.
He drove over to the Spider and lowered the tailboard. Having gauged the distance between the wheels, he placed the ramps in position. The Spider was aboard the truck a minute later.
*
He parked the truck outside his father’s flat. With a metallic clatter, he backed the Spider down the ramps and onto the roadway. Dutifully, he checked the flat. All was as it had been on his last visit, the smell included. The place still smelt of his father.
He looked at the phone in the hall.
Had it rung a few days ago, when he’d called and pictured it ringing? Had this phone actually been here? Had the flat been filled with the sound?
He surveyed the street through the bedroom window. The mopeds were obscured by the truck. So was the dust-bin with the bottle protruding from it.
The wall clock was ticking away behind him.
He felt an urge to leave the city. For a while. To convince himself, once and for all, that he would never come across another soul anywhere. Even if he encountered no one in Berlin or Paris, he might find a way of getting to England. On the other hand, he couldn’t imagine spending long in unfamiliar surroundings. He felt he had to fight for every metre, laboriously adapt to every place he came to.
Jonas had never understood how people could maintain two homes. How, in the long run, could they bear to spend a week or a month here and a week or a month there? In his new home he would think of his old home, and after a month the former would become the latter, and he wouldn’t be able to find his way around when he returned. He would roam around the rooms and see things that were wrong. A wrong alarm clock, a wrong wardrobe, a wrong phone. Although the coffee cup he drank from at breakfast would belong to him, he would still find himself thinking of the cup he’d used the day before. And of where it was at that moment. In a crockery cupboard. Or an unemptied dishwasher.
The bathroom mirror in which he looked at himself after showering wouldn’t show him anything different from the mirror he’d looked in the day before. Yet he would feel that something about the reflection was wrong.
He could lounge on the balcony and leaf through magazines. He could watch TV or use the vacuum cleaner or do some cooking. But he would inevitably think of his other home. Of the other balcony, the other TV, the other vacuum cleaner, the other pepper mill in the other kitchen cabinet. He would also think of the books on the shelves in his other home. Of the sentences in those unopened books and the stories those sentences conveyed to those who were able to interpret them.
And before going to sleep he would lie in bed and think of the bed in his other home, and he would wonder if he was about to go to sleep at home or had slept at home the night before.
*
Jonas connected the video camera to the TV. He lowered the blinds while the tape was rewinding, so as not to be dazzled by the setting sun. The room lay in twilit evening gloom.
He pressed ‘Play’. Turned the sound up full.
He saw himself walk past the camera and flop down on the bed. He turned over on his stomach as usual. He couldn’t go to sleep in any other position.
The subdued glow of the bedside light was bright enough to illuminate everything clearly. The Sleeper lay there with his eyes shut, breathing deeply and evenly.
Although Jonas wasn’t one of those who looked in the mirror more than twice a day, he was familiar with his outward appearance and had a vague idea of the expression he usually wore. But the thought of watching himself with his features entirely relaxed made him rather nervous.
He took the mobile from his hip pocket and put it on the table so he wouldn’t call himself again. He looked at the display. For once, he’d thought to lock the keypad.
After a few minutes the Sleeper turned his face away from the camera. There was a rustle as he buried his head under the pillow. Some time later it reappeared. He turned on his side. Shortly afterwards he rolled over on his back and drew a hand across his eyes.
Now and then Jonas stopped the tape and listened for sounds outside the door. He walked round the room, swinging his arms. Poured himself a glass of water. It was all he could do to start the tape again.
Twelve minutes before the tape ended the Sleeper turned over again with his face towards the camera.
*
Jonas had the fleeting impression that one eye had opened. The Sleeper was looking at the camera. Looking at it in full awareness of being filmed. Then the eye snapped shut again.
*
The second time he watched this sequence he wasn’t so sure. The fourth viewing convinced him that he’d been mistaken. It made no sense in any case.
After fifty-nine minutes the Sleeper muttered a few sentences. He didn’t get their meaning. He flung his arms about and turned away from the camera. The screen went black, the tape whirred. Jonas felt annoyed with himself for only putting in a one-hour tape.