by Peter Nadas
And it would be embarrassing, too, if I simply swam out of the water.
And that is why about ten minutes before my planned death, when all of this occurred to me, I could barely restrain my jubilant good mood.
And indeed I failed to restrain it; the sheer idea of how the mind herds together so many opposing, disparate thoughts made me laugh out loud in the darkness, how far a decision is taken from one’s guiding instincts, how far the intent of an action from its pure effects. Out loud I laughed into the darkness, like a lunatic. Wildly, involuntarily, too loud, even though the reason I laughed was that I couldn’t have been more somber and sober.
And the response was whistles from various places.
Again I did not understand.
They could see from under the trees that the young gentleman in black, before taking off for anywhere, was frozen in his tracks and listening like an animal.
I saw myself as a young man gone crazy who nevertheless deliberately chooses death over his undisguised fate.
They warned one another of some danger with their whistles.
From the sinister darkness, from the depth of the shadow cast by the white building came the first whistle, but I didn’t see anyone there. Three of the four figures instantly vanished in the blooming grove. Or maybe they just withdrew into the thicket, I don’t know. As if, along with themselves, they had drawn their own whistling into some echoing space.
The silence thickened.
Anything might happen in it. These people were defenseless against one another.
Irresponsibly I hoped that the one man left was after all the marvelous giant who had pursued me, who despite the whistles did not take off and who stuck to his place. And a possible danger was the police too.
At the moment, no danger fazed me. I was ready to do great things.
I started toward the Árpád Bridge and I knew exactly why. I was in no hurry. I copped the method from them. And I stayed close to the water so that my leisurely steps would make no noise, on the narrow edge of the paved riverbank where the slag and whinstone strips met. One missed step would be enough for me to lose my balance and fall off the steep embankment, but I did not even look down at my feet. I had never felt my body to be so safe. As someone who has suddenly grown above himself. And sees the surrounding world from a higher viewpoint. The soles of my feet barely touched the creaking slag and uneven stones, my steps carried me rhythmically, almost melodiously forward. My neck lengthened too, the butterfly wings of my shoulder bones did not hold it back. I no longer had the feeling that I was not myself and that all this was happening to someone else. Still, I did have the peculiar feeling that there were people accompanying me. In fact, it was for them that I showed what I knew, how complete and light I felt my slender body to be. I became elongated in the waist, my shoulder blades and collarbones adjusted themselves, conformed to the new shape. Every one of my joints and muscles defied the dangers waiting for me. I showed my bodily safety to him, to the giant. I showed him my shirt, taut across my chest, clinging to my waist, my hard ass inside my shamelessly cut pants, and in the much-too-small underpants my semi-erect prick, shoved to the side at its base and adhering to the crook of the thigh, on which the too-tight foreskin now slid painfully back in all the excitement. In my way of walking I demonstrated all the good feelings nourished by my physical being.
With my walking I also showed him the sensation of the cool breezes as they pleasantly chilled my hot skin, and I showed this together with the taste of sweat. I showed it to the giant, who—with his massive, thick, and closely shaved neck, with his stubborn head and pitch-black hair, which kept falling on his forehead—was staying, I thought, under the trees where the trail and the promenade intersect.
What could this man be, I didn’t know.
One could guess the enormous configuration of his loins through his overalls; his powerful ass protruded abruptly. He had thick, dense eyebrows that met above his nose, his nose was short and strong, and on his jutting cheekbones the dark brown skin was so taut it seemed bluish. A navvy—this old-fashioned obsolescent word came to mind for him, the weight of dirt and its autumnal wet fragrance. Or perhaps a carpenter, a stonecutter, a cutter of wood or stone or something that must be grasped by hand. I couldn’t take my eyes off his head, his limbs, his face, his jaws, while we walked around or pursued each other on the trails. I could not forget, either, his suddenly flashing, suddenly vanishing smile.
It was a quick, mute smile.
I could even imagine that he was unable to read or write. I’d stay with him anyway; I didn’t care if he was illiterate. He must be staring at me now, with his dumb head, his partly open, fleshy lips and his eyes with their metallic luster, but in showing myself to him, I was also showing myself to anybody who was looking.
I knew what I was doing; I knew he understood, or several of them did.
I’ll go as far as the next lamp.
That was the second sentence in the mute language of attraction.
I resolved to speak their secret language. The gas flame imprisoned in its glass globe emitted a strong sharp light that turned from yellow to white and white to blue, but the moment the light left the globe it lost its blue, and its yellow grew tired as the night filled it with various hues of gray.
Between two gas lamps, one blended into the mist-filled dimness of the riverbank.
I could hardly wait to reach the next lamp and pronounce the second sentence of the secret language. If someone didn’t stop at the next lamp, that had a very different meaning. That was where I would cross over to the other side of the promenade, making my intention obvious. Then I’d slowly stroll back, and that would be seen as a confession, an advance on my body offered up in sacrifice.
In his excitement, he’s already stamped out his cigarette and stepped a little way out from the shadow of the trees. This would be his response. He’ll open the fly of his loose pants so I can see it: I’ve opened my fly for you.
I had a feeling it might not be him after all, that I had made a mistake. Just a figure partly concealed behind the budding jasmine. We no longer had doubts about each other; we understood each other. Even though I obviously couldn’t exchange more than two sentences with this marvelous man; what would we talk about anyway. He too should right away gauge the distance between us. So much comfort and reassurance emanated from him, such mute laughter, that I was ready to spend the rest of my life with him, no doubt of it.
Or at least my imagination had a comfortable niche in which this too seemed possible.
Until I return, he won’t whip his prick into an erection for someone else. As I approach, I can see on his shoulders and neck how brutally he is working at it under cover of the bushes. I stop at a respectable distance, turn my back to the water, the jasmine conceals me too, from everyone else. I knew how it would be, I wanted to do it the way they did it; there must be no misunderstanding between us. What we do should mean that we want each other and nobody else; for my sake, he should leave his mustached assistant too. I also open my fly, at last we can stare into each other’s face over the bushes hiding our bodies, I reach into my underwear and lift out my cock, which had shriveled, I felt, in my abject fear.
It happened exactly as I imagined it would, only it was not the older man standing on the other side of the bushes, not the black-haired giant in his ugly gingham shirt two sizes too small. I should have noticed earlier that this was a coarse sailor’s shirt with horizontal stripes. Sometimes one sees simultaneously what one sees and what one would like to see. Two darkly brilliant, frightened, slightly amazed little eyes in a bright face shone on me.
I could not leave, though in my disappointment I wanted to get away instantly.
As if he were still a child, at least his countenance was childish, but sharp dark grooves sat in his features; on his dented forehead two vertical grooves cut across three horizontal ones. His small lips, red and swollen with blood, fitted between two grooves that sliced his stubbly chin in two, and o
ne sole groove ran across his thin face. As if his face were a surface on which two human beings had been drawn. His matted dark hair, divided in long individual curls, clung in waves to his forehead and fell in unkempt batches on the frail, childlike nape of his neck.
He undoubtedly captured me with his exterior, though I knew right away that I’d leave him on the spot for the giant.
He had a long thin nose, a powerful Adam’s apple, and in his excitement he kept swallowing. The long sleeves of his shirt were rolled up to the elbows of his strong, long arms.
It was not attraction but rather pity that I felt for him, but this feeling filled me completely.
I was still shivering a little with the animal excitement I felt for this older man, with my attraction for him, with fear of what he might do to me and whether he would accept me for a whole long life, but the boy on the other side of the bushes could notice none of this because I kept my agitation under control. The trembling did not get out of hand or become as vehement as it had been before. Stealthily I looked around again to see whether my man wasn’t nearby after all. I was actually glad that the trembling, which had to do with his size and beauty, no longer hindered me in what I was now ready to do.
With anyone and at any time.
If he wasn’t here, well, he wasn’t. He didn’t seem to be around anywhere. Either he willfully deceived me or my imagination had played a dirty trick on me. I felt my body drying out; when I blinked or swallowed, my eyelids and my esophagus literally clicked. My trembling for him was coursing through my flesh; though not strong, it was becoming permanent.
I could not see behind the bushes but I could discern that with his milk-white, thickly veined arm he was working more slowly now. His prick must have filled and become distended. With his arm movements he deliberately showed, or even exaggerated, the proportions of his member to make it seem even more imposing. Every man tried to show himself in the most favorable position so the one watching would imagine him as strong and mighty as possible. Actually, they hoped to captivate one another not as real humans but as parts of secretly nurtured fantasies, which is what ritualized their encounters. They knew what fantasies the others were nurturing.
They built their secret language with different dialects of their shared imagination.
He also wanted to see what I was doing with mine; that’s why he kept standing on tiptoe. It would have been terrifying to think that in this very instant everything would be decided. I was gripped by my empathy for him, but my burning excitement completely vanished because my interest was not directed at him. I had nothing more to do. It was enough to see how his arm and shoulder moved, to discover in the position of his white, fuzzy-haired neck the pleasure of his erection, and my imagination disloyally abandoned the older giant and willingly followed the boy.
It grew stone-stiff in my hand, rearing up impetuously, aggressively and painfully, I was holding the beak of the foreskin so as not to let it slip back in, for the sensitivity of the naked bulb would inevitably have resulted in an ejaculation. For the same reason, to hide it from him no matter how hard he tried to see it, I covered it with my other hand. Which was an exceptionally important expression in the ritual language. He was requesting an advance from me, so the sight of my cock would strengthen his erection, which my presence would make perfect when the most propitious moment arrived and he revealed his to me. I should feel the strength of my seduction in him, and be completely unable to avoid the perfection of his penis.
I was striving for unconditional mutuality, however, nothing else, and therefore imagined that the ceremonial introductions should occur not separately but simultaneously. I could not give him an advance that he might forge into a business advantage.
The lack of mutuality offended my taste. I wanted him to understand that.
Otherwise I was going to leave.
In the words of the sign language, the relationship would then still retain an exciting business condition. I would not budge from my position.
This in turn created a shared question: which of us could impose his will on the other, or, to put it in my terms, would my sentimental desire for fraternity prove stronger than my primitive curiosity. This turned out to be such a nerve-racking question in the motionless summer night—which of us would first show his to the other—that I could feel my suicidal intentions evaporating along with the black-haired, dark-skinned giant.
The hyperemia in my mind left no room for him.
I grew so weak it no longer mattered whether I showed it to him.
Look at that, look what a pecker he’s got, he cried enthusiastically, goodness gracious.
His reddish fleshy lips, a little offended and excited, trembled in amazement.
Jesus, he prayed, how lovely your pecker is.
His voice sounded as if it came, flutelike, from a third person trying to hum and sing in various falsettos.
His surprising adjective touched me because until then I’d never thought of anybody’s pecker as lovely, least of all of my own. As if he were speaking not to me but to a third person like me, perhaps standing behind me; or the whole thing wasn’t true at all, only flattery. Something crackled in the thicket, letting me know we weren’t alone, somebody else had also heard what had been said, somebody or somebodies had been spying on us.
Not only did he not reciprocate my confidence but he used the crackling sound as an excuse to hide his own instantly.
He was doing everything too fast. He stepped out from behind the bush while still buttoning his fly. His movements made clear that he was only a dumb little faker who couldn’t get it up.
He couldn’t possibly have put it away so fast if it had been stiff.
He whispered into my face that we should get out of here but quick.
His breath was as sweet as that of a suckling babe. These dumb fairies, he said, as I could hear for myself, won’t leave us alone, such a rotten bunch. I was eager to hide my own too, but it took some doing. He reached for it while sweetly whispering into my mouth, but I wouldn’t let him.
They’re so jealous, believe me. They always want what somebody else has. He laughed.
There was something explosive about him, merry and playful. I probably know that rotten jerk from Újpest—such a dumb fairy, he thinks he’s queen of the whole place. His name is Pisti. He must be the one who managed to wind up somewhere behind us, come on, hurry up, damn it. I think he wants to separate us. He always wants everyone to suck him off, but don’t think he ever comes.
And I mean never, he said indignantly, with nobody.
He asked me if I had a place to go to, which I did not immediately understand because I was having trouble buttoning up my fly. I did not answer him.
Because he had no place of his own, he added by way of explanation, he was only on leave. He did have a grandmother in Pestimre, but we can’t go there even if the streetcars are running. His grandmother found out about him a long time ago when she caught him with one of his buddies, and then he quickly added that with him I could do everything but absolutely everything I was used to doing with girls.
I was amazed, watching his face, his eyes and his lips; how would he know what I was used to doing with girls or whether I had done anything with them at all.
He liked Mohács more because there you just go to the upper sandbank or even by the lime-burning factory and somebody will pick you up. Several times his grandmother made a fuss, throwing things around, slapping and beating and breaking everything she could get her hands on. He wants no more scandals, and not because of the neighbors, they can kiss his ass, but the old girl really has nobody in the world except him. I should understand.
Unexpectedly he sniggered, interrupting himself to say he shouldn’t have told me the whole story, because at this time of night there isn’t a single rotten streetcar to take them to Pestimre. We could walk, but by the time we get there, his short leave will be over.
For some reason, this too he found irresistibly funny.
The
re I was with this total stranger in the middle of an early summer night, his sentences bubbling out cheerfully and I not believing a single word. And not because he was lying; he wasn’t. What was unbelievable was how convincing I found his whole being; yet I had to refuse him, and I would too.
As it turned out on that early summer night, I simply could not believe that this might possibly be my life, or that such a strange being as this boy could be part of either of my lives or share any part with me in any way, or that I could fit him into one of my lives just as he was, along with his entire life and his grandmother, without upsetting my other life. But neither could I imagine, nor was it morally acceptable, that I’d abandon this man just like that, when he’d shown such enormous confidence in me. Frankly, a man of this sort was all in all too much for me. Even if I decided to take him home to my room on the boulevard, how could I navigate him past Balter without being seen.
Balter would come out with his dislocated hip, open the gate, moaning aloud, checking out both of us; a single glance would be enough for him to assess the situation and seal my fate. My upbringing gave no instruction as to what one was supposed to do in a situation like that, but I did have instructions that the best thing to do with unusual situations was to avoid them. Hearing about his grandmother sent me reeling to the edge of madness, if only because of my own grandmother. I shuddered at the thought of two people meeting in a summer night who had never had and never would have anyone in this world except their grandmothers, and that this was far from a coincidence.
This thought hurt, and it also filled me with painful hope, but the hurt was stronger.
Standing before me was an entire man with his irresistible warmth, unfathomable indifference, intrusive odor, living grandmother, obviously unwashed hair, and everything else that was his, presenting me with his unbelievable exhortation that I should go with him because with him I could do everything I had ever done with girls, and I did not understand, it made no sense.
Perhaps all these things together in a single human being was what was too much for me.