The occasional brief sniff: his way of laughing when he thinks he’s not being watched; with us around, he guffaws with generous hilarity. Just a normal eleven-year-old boy, who devours a comic book as though it were a hamburger or a Mars bar. He has still not noticed my presence, or if he has, he hides it well. I observe him, and melt. When I think back on the scene, I count myself lucky that I did not know then what I do now: that there, eleven years old, he was already halfway through his allotment of years. A bit more than halfway.
8
Sometimes I want to hold him really tightly. The thought usually hits me when I’m in bed reading, and just happen to lay my book aside. Come, Tonio, I say soundlessly. Come, Tonio, climb under the blankets. I’ll keep you warm.
His body is unresisting, limp, but not cold. It is the Tonio who lay on the asphalt after the collision, half a day before his death. The occupants of the red Suzuki Swift are standing outside the car, and do not dare go look at the body that’s been chucked a ways further up. The police and ambulance sirens are not yet audible. The blue flicker of the rotating lights hasn’t arrived yet. It is right then that I pick him up and carry him to my bed, and pull back the blanket.
Come. Come lie close to me. It’ll keep you warm. They’re coming, they’ll be here soon, to make you better.
9
I think Miriam will agree with me if I allow Jenny to have the last word.
Jenny had asked, before going home, if she could have a look at Tonio’s room. ‘Of course, go ahead.’ I understood. That’s where most of the photo shoot had taken place. Miriam offered to accompany her, but Jenny preferred to go up alone.
‘I know the way.’
We heard her gentle treads as she went up the stairs to the second floor — and then, silence. No creaking footsteps on the parquet floor above overhead, as we were accustomed to until two years ago. No, just a very present silence, nothing more.
She stayed up there a long time, Jenny. Miriam and I looked at each other a couple of times without saying anything. We were thinking the same thing. For God’s sake, get that girl out of the house so we can unleash our tears. We hadn’t truly appreciated it: a glimpse at a budding romance was the most awful thing that could happen to us, precisely because there would never, for all eternity, be the chance of seeing it through.
Jenny did not come back down, nor did she make any sound upstairs.
‘Maybe she just snuck out,’ Miriam said. ‘Did you hear the downstairs hall doors? They haven’t been closing so well recently. When the front door shuts, they rattle.’
‘I haven’t heard anything,’ I said. ‘She must still be up there.’
We whispered.
‘Shall I go have a look?’ Miriam asked.
‘I’ll go have a listen at the bottom of the stairs.’
I held my breath as I walked out onto the landing. I listened. Not a peep. The curve in the staircase blocked any view of what was going on up on the next floor. The dim light of the wall lamp on the second floor did not betray any motion, not even a shadow. Afraid to disturb something intimate, I dared not go any further. At the same time, I was anxious.
I went down to the ground floor, where the cats stopped their horseplay on the marble floor and looked inquisitively up at me. To keep them from escaping, I closed the double inner doors tightly. This was how I used to sneak out to Café Welling, but that was no longer necessary. I twisted the bolt so that the lock wouldn’t click shut, and walked backwards between the parked cars onto the street, far enough to look into Tonio’s room.
The curtains were open. There were no lights on. From the right, though, where the door led to the landing, a minimally faint light shone into the room. I waited, in case I might see something move. A few times, I had to take a few steps forward, toward the parking spots, in order to let traffic pass. Soon the Concertgebouw would be opening its doors, so the neighbourhood was already crawling with patrons in search of a parking space.
Nothing happened, so I went back inside. The cats had nestled into the curve of the stairs, as though waiting for me: a moment later, they raced ahead of me into the living room, where Miriam sat on the sofa, fighting the urge to cry.
‘There’s no light,’ I said.
We sat next to each other in silence, waiting resignedly for what was to come. The glasses were empty, but I did not ask for more to drink. It was some time before we heard soft footsteps on the stairs, and only then because I hadn’t shut the living-room door all the way. There was a tentative knock at the door.
‘Yes, Jenny?’
‘I just wanted to say goodbye.’
Jenny hugged Miriam, and then me. Her face was not red from crying, but her lower eyelashes were stuck wetly together.
‘Could you find the light switch?’ I asked, just to break the silence.
‘Oh, I didn’t go in the room.’ She sounded slightly startled, as though she thought I suspected her of desecration. ‘The door was open. I stood at the threshold for a long time. To say goodbye.’ And as she turned to go, she said: ‘You know, I really believe that the dead leave a kind of energy behind for us.’
Amsterdam, June 2010–March 2011
Translator’s note
The translator wishes to thank Ruud van Odenhoven for his invaluable and unstinting assistance in matters pertaining to Dutch culture.
The English translation published here of Gerrit Kouwenaar’s poem ‘there are still’ (originally published in Dutch as ‘Men moet’ by Querido) is copyright © David Colmer.
Hans Faverey (1933–1990) wrote his collection of poetry The Missed on his deathbed, after a lengthy illness. It was originally published in Dutch as Het ontbrokene by De Bezige Bij. The English translation published here is copyright © Francis R. Jones.
All footnotes have been written by the translator, with the exception of one provided by the author and identified as such.
The following works are cited in Tonio:
by Adri van der Heijden:
Advocaat van de Hanen (Lawyer to the Punks)
Asbestemming (Ash Destination)
De Tandeloze Tijd (The Toothless Time)
De Draaideur (The Revolving Door)
Een gondel in de Herengracht (A Gondola in the Herengracht)
Het schervengericht (Judgement by Shards)
De slag om de Blauwbrug (The Battle of the Blue Bridge)
Vallende Ouders (Falling Parents)
Homo duplex (Homo duplex)
Het Hof van Barmhartigheid (The Court of Mercy)
Onder het plaveisel het moeras (Under the Pavement the Morass)