The Same Sea Read online

  Nadia looks

  A framed photograph stands on the sideboard: her chestnut hair

  pinned up. Her eyes are a little too round, which is possibly why

  her face expresses surprise or doubt, as though asking: What, really?

  It's not in the picture, but Albert remembers what pinning

  her hair up did to her. It let you observe, if you wished,

  the soft, fine, fragrant down on the nape of her neck.

  In the photograph hanging in their bedroom Nadia looks

  different. More worldly. Fine earrings, a hint of a shy smile

  which both promises and asks for

  more time: not now. Later, whatever you want.

  Rico looks

  Kind-heartedness, bitterness, stamina, scorn—these are what Mr. Danon sees

  on the face of his son in the photo. Like a double exposure: the clear, open brow and eyes are at odds with the wry,

  almost cynical line of the lips. In the picture the uniform broadens the span

  of his shoulders, transforming the boy into a tough man. For several years

  its been almost impossible to talk to him. What's new? Nothing special.

  How are you? Not too bad. Have you eaten? Have you

  had a drink? Would you like

  a piece of chicken? Give me a break, Dad. I'm all right.

  And what do you think about the peace talks? He mumbles some wisecrack,

  already halfway out the door. Bye. And don't work too hard.

  But still there is a kind of affection, not in the words, not in the photo,

  but in between or beside. His hand on my arm: its touch

  is calm, intimate yet not really. And now in Tibet

  it is almost twenty to three. Instead of investigating further

  what's missing from the picture I'll make some toast, drink some tea,

  and then get down to work. There's something wrong with this photo.

  On the other side

  A postcard arrived, with a green stamp: Hi Dad, its nice here, high and bright,

  the snow reminds me of Bulgaria in the bedtime stories Mom used to tell

  about villages with wells and forests with goblins (though here there are

  almost no trees; only shrubs grow at this altitude, and even they appear to do

  so out of sheer stubbornness). I'm fine here, got my sweater and everything,

  and some Dutch guys are with me—they're really safety-conscious. And by

  the way, the thin air somehow

  totally changes every sound. Even the most terrifying shout

  doesn't break the silence but instead, how can I put this, joins it. Now

  don't you sit up working too late. PS On the other side

  you can see a picture of a ruined village. A thousand years or so ago

  there was a civilisation here that was lost without trace. Nobody knows

  what happened.

  All of a sudden

  Early next evening Dita turned up. Light-footed, out of breath, unannounced

  she rang his doorbell, waited. No use, he's not in, just my luck.

  When she had given up and was on her way downstairs she met him coming up,

  carrying a string bag full of shopping. She grabbed one handle

  and so, embarrassed, hands touching, they stood on the stairs. At first

  he was a little startled when she tried to take the bag away from him:

  for a moment he didn't recognize her, with her

  short hair, and her cheeky skirt that almost wasn't there. The reason

  I came is that I got a postcard this morning.

  He sat her down in the living room. He told her at once

  that he too had had a postcard from Tibet. She showed him.

  He showed her. They compared. Then she followed him into the kitchen.

  Helped him unload the shopping, and put it away. Mr. Danon

  put the kettle on. While they waited they sat facing one another

  at the kitchen table. One knee over the other, in her orange skirt,

  she seemed almost naked. But she's so young. Still a child. Quickly he

  averted his gaze. He had trouble asking her whether she and Rico were still

  or no longer. He chose his words carefully, tactfully evasive. Dita laughed: I'm

  not his, I never was, and he isn't mine, and anyway, you see,

  those are just labels. Everyone for themselves. I'm allergic

  to anything permanent or fixed. It's better to just let everything flow. Trouble is,

  that's a kind of fixed notion too. As soon as you define, it's a mess. Look,

  the kettle's boiling. Don't get up, Albert, let me see to it. Coffee or tea?

  She stood up, sat down, and saw he was blushing. She found it sweet. She

  crossed her legs again, straightened her skirt, more or less. By the way, I need

  your advice as a tax consultant. It's like this: I've written a screenplay,

  it's going into production, and I've some papers to sign. Don't be mad at me

  for taking the opportunity to ask you, just like that. You mustn't feel

  obliged. On the contrary, I'll be delighted:

  he started to give her a detailed explanation, not as to a client,

  more to a daughter. As he clarified things from various angles, his docile body

  began suddenly to strain at the bit.

  Olives

  Sometimes the taste of these strong olives cured slowly in oil,

  with cloves of garlic, bay leaves and chillies and lemon and salt,

  conjures a whiff of a bygone age: rocky crannies,

  goats, shade and the sound of pipes,

  the tune of the breath of primeval times. The chill of a cave, a hidden cottage

  in a vineyard, a lodge in a garden, a slice of barley bread and well water.

  You are from there. You have lost your way.

  Here is exile. Your death will come, and lay a knowing hand on your shoulder.

  Come, its time to go home.

  Sea

  There is a village in a valley. Twenty flat-roofed huts. Mountain light,

  sharp and intense. In a bend in the stream the six climbers, mostly Dutchmen,

  are sprawled on a groundsheet, playing cards. Paul cheats a little, and Rico,

  who is out, retires, swaddled in anorak and scarf, slowly inhaling

  the crisp mountain air. He lifts up his eyes: sharp sickle peaks.

  A couple of cirrus clouds. A redundant midday moon.

  And if you lose your footing, the chasm has a womblike smell.

  His knee aches and the sea is calling.

  Fingers

  Stavros Evangelides, an eighty-year-old Greek wearing a crumpled brown suit

  with a stain above the left: knee, has a bald brown head patterned with wrinkles,

  moles and grey bristles, and a prominent nose, but perfect, young teeth,

  and large, joyful eyes: guileless eyes, which seem to see only good. His room

  is shabby. The curtains are faded. There's a crooked wooden shutter

  secured on the inside with a bar. And a thick blend

  of sepia smells heavily overlaid with incense. The walls are covered

  with icons, and an oil lamp illuminates a Crucifixion with a very young

  Christ, as though the painter has brought Golgotha forward,

  so that the miracle of the loaves and the fishes, and the raising of Lazarus

  must have occurred after the Resurrection. Mr. Evangelides is

  a slow man. He seats his visitor, goes out and comes back twice,

  the second time bringing a glass of water

  lukewarm. First he collects his fee, in cash, counting the money methodically,

  and enquires politely who it was in fact

  who recommended the gentleman to him. His Hebrew is simple but correct,

  with a slight Arab accent. Are his perfect teeth his own?


  Impossible to tell for the moment. Then he asks a few general questions

  about life, health and so on. He takes an interest

  in Albert's family and country of origin. He maintains that the Balkans belong

  both to the west and to the east. He writes all the answers down in detail

  in a notebook. He wants to know about those who have gone before,

  who and how and when. And who is the deceased who has brought you here

  this evening, sir? Then he ponders. Digests. Studies his fingers

  for a while, as though mentally checking to make sure they are all present

  and correct. He explains modestly that he cannot guarantee

  results. A man and a woman, you must surely know, sir,

  are a mysterious union: one day they are close, the next

  they turn their backs. I must ask you to breathe normally, sir.

  Palms up. Clear your mind. That's right. Now we can begin.

  The visitor closes his eyes to remember. Narimi narimi the bird said to her.

  Then he reopens them. The room is empty.

  The light is grey-brown. For a moment he fancies he can make out

  an embroidered pattern in the folds of the curtains.

  Some time later Mr. Evangelides came back into the room. Tactfully

  he refrained from asking how it went. He brought

  another glass of water, this time cool and fresh. A pleasant, soothing light

  shone from his smiling eyes between the brown wrinkles, the smile

  of a bright child displaying milk-white teeth. Treading softly

  he saw his visitor to the door. The following day over herbal tea at the office

  Bettine said to him, Albert, don't take it to heart, one way or another

  almost everybody ends up disappointed. That's the way it is.

  He was in no hurry to reply. For some time he studied

  his fingers. After I left, he said, just like that in the middle of the street

  I saw someone who looked a bit like her. From behind.

  You can hear

  Bettine sits alone at home after midnight in an armchair reading a novel

  about loneliness and wrongdoing. Someone, a secondary character, dies

  because of a misdiagnosis. She lays the book

  face down in her lap, and thinks about Albert: Why

  did I send him to the Greek? I caused him unnecessary pain. And yet

  we have nothing to lose, after all. He is living all by himself now,

  and I am on my own too. You can hear the sea out there.

  A shadow

  Vague rumors abound, and half-testimonies too, concerning a gigantic,

  almost human creature, that roams alone in the Tibetan mountains.

  Single and free. Footprints have been photographed in the snow

  once or twice in inaccessible places where even the most intrepid

  mountaineer would hardly dare venture. Almost certainly

  it is nothing but a local legend. Like the Loch Ness monster

  or the ancient Cyclops. His mother, who sat embroidering

  almost to the hour of her death, his sad, withdrawn father

  who sits night after night at his computer looking for loopholes

  in the tax laws, everyone in fact, is condemned to wait

  for their own death locked in a separate cage. You too, with your travelling,

  your obsession to go further and further away and hoard more

  and more experiences, are carting your own cage around with you

  to the outer edge of the zoo. Everyone has their own captivity. The bars

  separate everyone from everyone else. If that solitary snowman really exists,

  without sex or partner, without birth or progeny or death,

  roaming these mountains for a thousand years,

  light and naked, how it must laugh as it moves among the cages.

  Through us both

  Before excuse me is this seat taken,

  before the color of your eyes, before can I get you a drink,

  before I'm Rico I'm Dita, before the fleeting touch

  of a hand on a shoulder, it passed through us both

  like a door opening a crack in your sleep.

  Albert in the night

  On the roof her shadow, a slow shadow,

  a shadow that is gradually leaving me.

  Indoors it is bad. Outside

  it is dark. The bedroom at night

  feels lower.

  Butterflies to a tortoise

  At sixteen and a half, in a country town, she was married to a well-off relative.

  A widower aged thirty. It was the custom

  to marry daughters within the family. Her father

  was a gold and silver smith. One of the brothers was sent to Sofia,

  to study to be a pharmacist and bring back a diploma. Nadia herself

  learned from her mother how to cook and embroider,

  make sweetmeats and write neatly. The widowed bridegroom, a draper,

  came to visit on Sabbaths and holidays. If asked, he sang wonderfully

  in a rich, resonant tenor voice. He was a tall, elegant, well-mannered man,

  who always knew what to say

  and what to pass over in silence. Nadia's heart

  was not in the marriage, because her best friend whispered to her

  what love was really like: it must not be stirred until it pleases.

  But her parents, patiently, understanding, brought her to another point

  of view. Surely to do her duty was also in her own best interest. And they set

  a date, not too soon; they wanted to give her enough time

  to become accustomed gradually to the widower, who never failed

  to bring her a present Sabbath by Sabbath

  she learned to like the sound of his voice. Which was pleasant.

  After the wedding her husband turned out to be a considerate man

  who inclined to a measure of regularity in intimate matters. Every evening,

  scrubbed, scented and cheerful, he would come and sit on the edge

  of the bed. He started with a gentle word of affection, turned out the light

  to spare her blushes, drew aside the sheet, caressed her sparingly,

  and eventually rested his hand on her breast. She was always

  on her back, her nightdress rolled up, he was always on top of her,

  while outside the door the pendulum wall-clock with gilt fittings

  slowly beat time. He rammed. He groaned. Had she wished, every night

  she could have counted about twenty moderate thrusts, the final one

  reinforced with a tenor note. Then he wrapped himself up and slept.

  In the thick darkness she lay empty and bewildered

  for another hour at least. Sometimes solacing her body herself. In a whisper

  she told her closest friend, who would say, When there is love

  it feels different, but how can you explain butterflies to a tortoise.

  Several times she woke at five, put on a housecoat and went up on the roof

  to fetch in the washing. She could see empty rooftops, a patch of forest,

  a deserted plain. Then her father and her husband, setting off together

  to early-morning prayers. Day after day she shopped and cleaned

  and cooked. On Sabbath eves guests came, imbibed and dined

  and nibbled and argued. On her back in bed when it was all over

  she sometimes had thoughts about a baby.

  The story goes like this

  After about three years it became clear that she could not give him children either. The widower, sadly, divorced her and married her cousin instead. Because of the shame and grief she was suffering her parents gave her permission to join her brother and sister-in-law who had settled in Israel, and live there under their supervision. Her brother rented a room for her on the roof
of a building in Bat Yam and arranged for her to work in a sewing shop. The money she had received from the divorce he deposited in a savings account for her. And so, at the age of twenty, she was a single girl again. She enjoyed being on her own for much of the time. Her brother and his wife kept an eye on her, but in fact it was unnecessary. Sometimes she baby-sat for them in the evening and sometimes she went out with somebody or other to a cafe or the cinema, without getting involved. She was not attracted by the thought of being put on her back again with her nightdress rolled up; and she could easily keep her own body quiet At work she was considered a serious, responsible worker and in general a lovely girl. One night she happened to go to the cinema with a quiet, sensible young man, an accountant who was distantly related to her sister-in-law. When he escorted her home he apologized for not flirting with her; it wasn't because he didn't find her attractive, heaven forbid, but, on the contrary, because he didn't know how to go about it In the past some girls had made fun of him for this, he explained, and he even laughed at himself a little, but it was the plain truth. When he said this, she suddenly felt a sort of pleasant inner roughness at the nape of her neck in the roots of her hair that radiated warmth towards her shoulders and armpits, which is why she suggested, Lets meet again on Tuesday at eight o'clock. Almost joyfully Albert said: I'd like that.

  The miracle of the loaves and the fishes

  There was also sex for money. It happened in a low-roofed

  backpackers' hostel in Kathmandu. She had a dark voice like a muffled bell,

  not unlike a fado-singer's bitter wistfulness. She was a tall,

  well-rounded woman from Portugal who had been thrown out of a convent

  on account of temptation (which she had both committed and succumbed to).

  The Saviour had forgiven her. Her trespasses were themselves

  her penance and her penitence. Now she took in wayfarers for a modest

  charge. Her name was Maria. She spoke some English. She was not young,

  her makeup was thick, but her knees were shapely and her breasts

  unrestrained. In the tender furrow that crossed the neckline of her dress