Parallel Stories: A Novel

by Peter Nadas

  When she could no longer listen to her remarks, neutralized by her smile, that this was not to be sung like that, nor that like this.

  In full voice, Gyöngyvér, not loud.

  Watch the descent.

  As if you were squeezing it.

  It was intolerable that everything was supposed to be done differently from the way she was doing it or hearing it. That her feelings should be discounted. And if she had a shot of something to help her get through an hour’s worth of anxiety, even smile back at her teacher and feel just a little better about things, Médike had the nerve to tell her she could smell it on her breath.

  If you’ve had a drink, Gyöngyvér, don’t come to the lesson. Please, do not let this turn into an inveteracy.

  Inveteracy. That’s the sort of thing she says. Neither her colleague at the kindergarten nor Ilona Bondor knows this word.

  She chewed some coffee beans after her drink, that’s how she tricked Médike.

  It can’t be that in one person everything works the wrong way.

  At least a good cognac before the lesson, she should have at least that. All right, maybe two.

  How could she remember so many things at once. The old crone bleats so much because she wants me to take more lessons. The old hag could fill all her waking hours with lessons. How could a person satisfy so many demands. You don’t have to tell me. Yet she couldn’t even find an extra free hour for you to make up a missed lesson.

  I can’t learn three foreign languages simultaneously. She can’t shove every stupidity down my throat.

  It did not seem reasonable to put up with so much shame and humiliation and to pay so much for it.

  But she did not give up, she kept hitting that fucking F sharp on Mrs. Szemző’s piano, following its sound with her voice.

  In the meantime, she was locked up in the chicken coop.

  When did anyone lock up Médike in a chicken coop, or Irmuska and the famous Mária Szapáry and the rest of the grand ladies, when. Never. They gave her nothing to eat, she drank out of the trough, she had to drink out of the cattle trough.

  Out of what else.

  When had these women ever suffered as much as she had, and she couldn’t have known that this was mental suffering because she hadn’t learned the appropriate words from them. In the morning they gave her a turnip to chew on. She’d never tell anyone that she had picked a live worm out of one and eaten it. How could she have known there would be punishment for that too.

  She did not understand what sins a little girl like that could have committed, or what sin was. And she did not know what a little girl or little boy was because they kept her as if she’d been a dumb animal, and also punished her for being one.

  She drank the chickens’ water.

  She was capable of doing it, that useless thing.

  She looked for her uselessness everywhere, tried secretly to feel it on herself, where it might have entered her, and to figure out what made other children so useful.

  And they always shoved her back here, hungry and thirsty, and she felt that anybody could put her to shame, degrade and humiliate her.

  She could never be free of this. The only reason she could endure the long hours, the whole nights, in the chicken coop was that she didn’t know she might die or that she had been born; how could she have known. How could she have known any of the things other children knew. The bolt clicked again, they locked the chicken-coop door from the outside, and this was her punishment for drinking from the trough again.

  Ain’t yah a disgustin’ li’l animal drinkin’ the water o’ them cows. What am I wastin’ time teachin’ yah what to do, an’ aks fur water when yah thirst. Didn’ I gi’ yah turnip. I’ll leave yah here all night, but if yah budge, the ugly fox come take yah away an’ bite clear across yer throat.

  From the depth of that night, there glimmered in Gyöngyvér’s brain a realization about her first foster mother. She could not remember her face, only her meaty arms tanned dark by the sun, her approaching heavy steps, and that strange large man and what he had done, in the midst of intimate and ominous sounds, to this larger-than-life woman who now seemed to have been the Médike of her old life.

  That is why she is so terrified of her, or of Médike, and of men in general.

  These figures metamorphosed into one another; she could not be rid of them.

  That is why she can’t learn from Médike what she should, not because of the cognac.

  Paying her in vain.

  She will kill her.

  She’d like to take my entire salary.

  These two very different things, her unconsciously committed sins and her sheer existence, were inauspiciously coming together. This was not something she thought; she actually witnessed it. She saw the fox from very close up; in her life, not in a fairy tale, the fox and the rat came in the night and kept chewing and pushing at the coop’s boards until they got to a hen or rooster and they took away the little girl too. That was actually good, taking her away, because then there’d be quiet at last; or maybe it was inside her that something was forever rent asunder, something that could not be mended in her lifetime and it is only her that God punishes like this so cruelly.

  The fox did come.

  To pick at the bolt from inside wasn’t easy, but she kept at it for a long time and finally got it to move and managed to escape. She threw the bolt into the nettles. So they couldn’t lock the coop door on her again. But they did, they also beat her around the head and locked her up using something other than the bolt, seeing how incorrigible and useless she was.

  Not only did she escape, she also drank the chickens’ water, the mean thing.

  She’d better talk or answer me before I knock her dead.

  With what remained of her senses she understood that the world order was different for other people; they wash up and go to church. She didn’t understand why they stuffed soap in her mouth when she did not know how she should have answered, or what her sin meant to her and why she was so filthy and smelly, and why she had scratched her fleabites again until they were bloody.

  Mrs. Bizsók did not do things like this to her but she slapped her face and spanked her bottom mercilessly.

  Though she won’t forgive her for beating her with a vine pole.

  Don’t yah fret, nobody’s gonna look for yah if I beat yah to death.

  She did not lash out at the others whom she wanted to understand, to win over, love or bribe to compensate for the heat of the chicken coop, the constantly fidgeting hens, and the scratched fleabites. She wanted them to accept her, take her in; she’d show them that she too could be useful or that at least she wasn’t useless. This was the reason she paid so much money to Médike. Fifty-seven forints for an hour that was only fifty minutes.

  They should not do this to her.

  She threw up; in her alarm, she vomited on her little dress when they were taking her to church, but how could they take her wearing something she’d thrown up on.

  In the coop, it was also hard for her to learn how to avoid the rooster.

  She had the runs because of her fear; they tethered her to a tree because she soiled everything in the summer kitchen.

  Or to stick a knife in them, that long-bladed knife her foster mother pulled out from behind the saltbox to slit the throats of the geese and let them thrash between her legs until they bled to death, down to the last drop.

  She was quick to flare against those she could not strangle with her hands.

  She desperately envied them for their always different lives, none of which would ever be hers.

  Not to turn around or look back.

  At first he only quickened his steps, trying not to limp so much, but the dog’s tapping feet followed him even faster.

  He did not want to take the starving cur under his wing now that he was so defenseless himself.

  Only not to turn around.

  Then, as if hit by lightning, her brain was shot through with an electric discharge.


  Whereupon her hearing seemed to open onto her voice, and the voice, small and miserable because of all the secret crying and infinite joy of having possessed that beautiful man, now breaks free, is liberated, and this time she is the one chaining someone to herself. Who is not right for her. Although she had been with a man like that before, this is not the first time she has done it with them, Jews. If he is a Jew—he says he isn’t. And she felt the joy because of this incredible exhaustion too, and her elemental fear of him, being so exhausted because of her. All right, let him be half a Jew, what do I care, it’s all the same to me. Anyone can wear you out in three days, that’s for sure. Why should I be scared of things that are good for me. Because of him, she won’t be able to go to work today, yes, because of him. And she trembled because of her constant anxiety about having the money to pay Médike. I should be ashamed of what he did to me, ashamed that with me anybody can do anything; he can make my knees shake and my soul tremble at the same time. My head will explode, because I’m such a miserable creature, God put me down at the wrong place, Providence slipped me into the wrong body and there isn’t a person in the world who can help me.

  Everybody gets my goat and I have to be afraid of women too.

  Yet she had never before experienced such profound sexual contentment with a man.

  It was more than ever before; simultaneously, she moved with him in various deep layers and on high plateaus, simultaneously.

  Well, goddamn it, it’s not all the same to me.

  It was new and shocking, just thinking about it was enough to make her brain cells come, but she was just as enthusiastic about that old saying she had heard in Tiszavésztő, that humans are mortal and licentious. She must have picked it up during a Bible lesson, or maybe it was from a familiar psalm, but which one.

  Then it must be something by Bach. She vainly searched her mind for the fucking psalm. So she could quietly console herself with it in the endless city night.

  Which made her realize for the first time in her life—she in fact saw—what a wide ditch yawned between physical and mental gratification.

  If this was so, then all these years she’d been getting fucked in vain.

  Only for things to be a little better.

  I’ve been getting myself screwed for nothing; with their puny cocks, these wretches could give neither of those gratifications. If they had the cock for it, they lacked the necessary rhythm. What’s to be done if, in her case, one ability does not exist without the other. They can reach neither her body nor her soul. They could never get it up enough to screw her properly or, who knows what and why, something was always off. They stayed too far away or pushed themselves too close and left her no room to feel, but feel what. Because of her mortality and licentiousness, then, she had thrown away her soul’s opportunities. She’s been wandering soullessly in this earthly existence, but this too is but a psalm.

  Because this one too will be only a dumb little technician in her life; they try hard, they pant, they hope to make every effort, which is why they shove, push, chew, and lick so desperately and so fast.

  The moment they stop, their things droop; men become miserable because of me.

  With his beautiful body, he works very nicely for me though he’s completely soulless toward me, as I am to him. I don’t love him, that’s the truth, I just needed to chalk up one of these well-educated men. She saw her fate before her; the terrible ditch opened up like this, like a wound. To this day, she knew exactly where the ditch ran between the reapers. Only the big boys could jump across it, in the spring, when the ice began to melt and the ditch filled with water. She couldn’t jump across it, but she thought nothing of getting into a fight with them. You weren’t careful with your clothes, were you, you snot-nose, you little shit, you useless thing, you, who will buy you clothes now, you barren creature. From the very beginning she had to give up things because she not only had been born a girl but was a foundling. Children can jump that far only if they get their milk every morning and without the sweet cream taken off the top beforehand, and if they also get potato noodles. She understood that the Bizsók boys had to have the cream so that their noodles would grow better, but who decided that she shouldn’t be a boy but a foundling, this she did not understand. Mrs. Bizsók made the decision. She understood that girls did not have to grow as much as boys because girls didn’t have noodles between their legs. Mrs. Bizsók beat her soundly when she got her dress wet in the ditch. She’d done something wrong, spoiled something again. But Mrs. Bizsók always had some cream, so why didn’t she have one between her legs, and why wasn’t she more understanding toward her. You knew I forbade you to jump across, but you went ahead and tried just the same. I always ruin things because I don’t understand what I have to give up. A foundling should behave herself, lie low. You can’t have anything to demand of us, not even before the law, little girl. And a female child should be especially obedient. You should be glad I’m teaching you, you useless thing, you. Who will slap your face, you little shit, or spank your butt if not your foster mother. And she always talks back to me, this state orphan here.

  She barely sticks out of the ground and she’s already working her jaw.

  We barely get anything to raise you on, you hear me.

  A father only has to beat his son, can’t your tiny little brain remember even this much. You’d like your foster father slapping your ass, wouldn’t you.

  I’d let him have it for that, I would.

  She’d like that, yes, she would.

  It’s always her impatience and her demands that ruin her life. She’ll fuck things up with this lovely, ravishing man too, just as she fucked it up with the old Jew, which is why she hasn’t inherited anything, but what the hell am I talking about, I can’t believe the things my mind can dredge up. At least his feet don’t stink. You’re safe with these people, you can even lick their asses. He not only shits but properly washes it for himself. And he also knows what is where in the other person’s body, he knows what he’s supposed to lick patiently, for a long time, oh, so delicious, what to keep softly sucking or what to stab with just the right force.

  And if she loses him, it would be just as it was with Bizsók. Or with Médike, from whom she could really learn, finally, where to look for what in her own system.

  Her dumb adoration and thirst for revenge scare them away.

  She must be on her guard.

  This time—because of the hungry hatred she felt for them, her will to take everything and learn everything from them, feel contempt for them, be better than they and better than everybody—the F sharp found its right place.

  More correctly, several necessary things found their proper places all at once, and because of that she could at least put the note in its right place. If not her entire life, retroactively and in anticipation. She was busy contemplating her hatred—clearer than daylight—and remembering Médike’s prediction that if and when she ever put the note in its right place she, Gyöngyvér herself, would hear it.

  She would feel it as though she had acquired an entirely different system of hearing.

  The Holy Spirit or some such thing must have seized her.

  You’ll be standing next to yourself, listening to your singing.

  To hear what you’ll be hearing then, you won’t need your ears, my dear.

  Or perhaps sweet Médike lent her own hearing to her.

  A feeling of triumph will be swelling in your body.

  In her joy, she felt like pissing on Mrs. Szemző’s old piano stool.

  It was only her dumb urge to pee that put the note in its place. Of course, in this miserable maid’s room, where she could hole up thanks to the generosity of these grand ladies, she’d caught another cold. Sweet Médike would be glad to predict everything for her. Now she can suffer again for weeks with her bladder infection and ovaritis; she’ll be bleeding and then she’ll have to send away even this rotten pretty boy too.

  Experiencing the convergence of so many different things en
thralled and moved her so much that she propped her arms on the keyboard and then lowered on them her migraine-tortured pretty little head. She continued with her infinite self-pity, lamenting that she had been dealt such a cruel singing teacher who was nevertheless the best voice coach in the city. That she pays fifty-seven forints per hour. Every month she has to give half her salary to this woman; she can’t buy herself a damn thing, every one of her best pieces she has had to charm off somebody. How could she be so hapless, such a shiftless, hopeless case who can’t exploit her own talents, such a useless mortal. Doomed to suck cocks as babies do tits, but without finding a man who at night would give her what’s rightfully hers and love her tenderly.

  There is no such man and never will be, but at least she knows where to put this shitty little F sharp.

  And not even these people can take this away from her anymore.

  In the meantime she’s making ungodly noises with her helpless limbs on the superannuated concert piano.

  What makes you think that such a pampered pretty boy would give you yours, of all men, such a Lothario. Don’t hold your breath, the young gentleman looks only for his own pleasure in you.

  Why must we women be such dumb whores.

  Why should I get him a blanket. Why should I steal a nice warm blanket from Mrs. Szemző’s closet for him.

  Let these pretty boys look to the Almighty of their decrepit old mothers, why don’t they go lick and suck Him.

  Oh, my good Lord, I shouldn’t be thinking of Him like this.

  I’ll slap your mouth, little girl.

  Only don’t turn around; and while he prayed like this, which made him shudder, he began to run. But on the bridge there was no place to run to and running made his injured shin throb terribly.

  The moment he stopped to chase away the dog panting at his ankle, to beat him away cruelly, mercilessly, however he could, no stray dog like that should follow him, and to do this he had to turn around, he felt the dog’s feet on his shoulders and a warm wet tongue on his face.

  From then on Kristóf wore on his face the stamp, as it were, of the dog’s wide, warm tongue. Although not everyone could see that he constantly rebelled against his own goodness with all his might and wanted to hear nothing about any kind of mercy or compassion.