Are you sure about this?
You can shut the book now.
Do you choose to read on?
The Man with the Knife
The famous critic lies back on the sofa, a little pissed. They’re back at the young poet’s flat after she has taken him out for dinner — he said he’d help make her a star of the poetry world. It’s difficult to be a star as a poet, he says. She’ll have to work hard.
She asks him if he wants some tea. If he sobers up a bit they can carry on talking poetry. Rilke and Yeats, even Foucault and Modernism — an ongoing story according to Fredric Jameson. But there’s only one now he can think about — he needs a slash.
She listens to the flow in the bathroom. She feels nothing — it just sounds like a running tap. Her three year old sounds just the same when he does a pee. Sometimes he misses the toilet and it goes on the floor. Will this man do the same? She likes things to be clean, but he is a guest, after all.
He comes back in without doing up his belt. He sits down across from her and she sees he hasn’t done up his zip either. She switches to the other sofa, so she’s sideways on.
What about an orange? That might sober him up. She peels one, but he doesn’t take it. She puts it into his unresisting hand and then tries to pop a segment in his mouth, but finds she has lost her balance and falls on top of him. Some of the orange squashes in her hand and the rest flies across the room. His trousers are coming off.
She jumps up to get the fruit. She says nothing. What can she say to this famous poet? She was calling him teacher a minute ago. Maybe it was an accident. Maybe he’s just drunk.
He’s not drunk. He knows just what he’s doing, and is delighted that she’s resisting. It’s boring when they give in straight away. He’s a famous poet, so they almost all give in. But he likes a bit of resistance first, however feeble, a bit of naughtiness and giggling. Or a few cries of ‘No! Don’t do that!’ which actually mean ‘Yes.’ Sometimes, of course, they are too keen. Like that girl in Suzhou with a condom all ready. That really put him off.
This woman is trying to get away from him. That turns him on. She’s crouching on the floor with her back to him. He grabs her from behind.
Now it’s perfectly clear what he’s up to, what kind of man he is. But she isn’t that kind of woman. She just wants to write poems. Of course she wants to be famous too, and successful. What can she do? She doesn’t want to offend him, so she keeps still at first — if she moves he’ll know she’s trying to stop him. Then she hauls herself up and drags him to the sofa. But when she lets go, he grabs her and pulls her down with him. She’s lying on top of him, with his arms around her.
She struggles out of his embrace, but he keeps holding on to her wrist. She tries to pull away, smoothing her mussed-up hair.
‘I’ll go and get you some tea,’ she says.
He shakes his head.
‘I don’t want tea. I want you.’
She gives him a stupid smile, the kind of smile she makes if a man starts telling dirty jokes at a work dinner, as if she doesn’t understand.
‘Come on!’ he says.
She shakes her head. But she still doesn’t want to offend him. She rubs her neck, giggles and simpers ‘I don’t want to.’
‘Yes you do.’
‘I don’t.’
‘You do!’ He starts jerking her arm back and forth. This is horribly embarrassing. Then he gives a hard, insistent tug, so she lands on top of him. He flips over on top of her and stares down. She can’t look away. It’s awful. She just has to keep smiling.
There’s something sharp, like a knife, prodding her soft flesh. Where on earth has he got a knife from?
She has to get away from the knife, but he’s right on top of her. She looks around wildly, her eyes falling on a photograph of her husband on the low table.
‘I’m married … ’ she says.
‘He’s not here, is he?’ He definitely isn’t drunk. He reaches out and puts the picture face down on the table. ‘Gone.’
It’s true. There’s no one else in the flat apart from her son, asleep in his bedroom. The housekeeper went home when she brought the professor back. What did the woman think? … But why does that matter? If no one finds out, would that make it OK? She doesn’t know. The worst thing is he’s not drunk. She can’t use that as an excuse.
He’s trying to pull down her trousers. She holds on to them tight. The more she resists, the harder he pulls. Pulling the trousers off a respectable woman like this one creates so much more tension than with a girl who’s always ready to drop them. Tension is something he particularly likes to focus on when he’s reviewing poetry. The magic of poetry is all about tension.
The lamp beside the sofa falls with a crash. A wail from the child’s bedroom. He freezes for a second and she breaks free. The boy comes out of his bedroom and she gathers him into her arms.
Seeing the child is a bit of a turn-off.
‘Say hello to Uncle,’ she says to the boy, thinking he can buy her some time.
‘Hello, Uncle,’ says the boy.
The professor gives a half-hearted grunt. The child pulls free of his mother’s embrace and begins to play.
‘Get him back to bed,’ he tells her.
‘Let him play a bit.’
He turns to the child.
‘Go back to bed, little boy.’ Trying to be patient.
‘No.’
He’ll just have to wait.
Time passes slowly.
‘Go on, be a good boy,’ he tries again. ‘Go back to bed.’
‘Don’t want to.’
Furious, he grabs the child and heads for the bedroom. The child struggles. He puts him down inside. The child runs out again. What a pest! He carries him back in and plonks him down on the floor. The child starts wailing. She rushes in.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ she shrieks. She certainly isn’t calling him teacher any more.
She picks up the child and tucks him into his cot. Why is the professor being such a pain? She doesn’t dare get rid of him. She wants something from him. She’s using him, and he wants to use her too, of course. He’s a man, and wants what men want. You’re a woman, she says to herself, you’re only doing what women do to get what they want. Nothing wrong with that.
The child falls asleep. Back in the living room the professor leers at her.
He pounces on her again.
‘You really want this?’ she asks.
‘Yes.’
‘You’re not worried I’ll tell?’
‘Say what you want.’
He leads her into the bedroom and pushes her down on to the bed. He peels off her trousers. She doesn’t really struggle.
She wonders what underwear she has on. Oh good, the lacy ones.
By the time they’re off, she isn’t struggling any more.
He starts scrabbling with his own clothes, so she jumps up to get a condom. She absolutely mustn’t get pregnant. There’s a spare in the drawer from the last time her husband was home. She lies back on the bed, waiting, the condom in her hand.
Is she up for it now? He’s disappointed, just like with the girl in Suzhou. What the hell, he’s going to screw her anyway.
She shuts her eyes and waits for it to be over. But there’s nothing pushing inside. She can’t even feel that knife-sharp erection. What’s he doing? She opens her eyes. The condom is still in his hand. The other hand is pumping up and down, but his penis is soft. She sits up. It’s not her fault he’s not hard any more. But he pushes her back down with the same hand that has been working on his penis. Horrible.
‘You can’t get it up …’ she mutters.