The Sweet Indifference of the World

by Peter Stamm

  NINE

  Back then, it had been Magdalena’s idea. I had just dropped one of my more ambitious projects and was this close to quitting writing altogether. I complained to her how everything I wrote seemed artificial and constructed, any story I think up has been told hundreds of times, and better than I could ever do it, too. Write about something that’s near to you, she said. Write from your feelings, not your head. Tell your own story. I don’t have a story, I said, my childhood was as unique as every other childhood, my youth was no more traumatic than anyone else’s. And my life now? Do you want me to write a book about a guy who can’t get it together to write a book? Write a book about you and me, about our life, our love. Your ideas are a bit simplistic, I said, a literary text needs form and consequence, and our life doesn’t, you don’t get good stories made out of happiness.

  But the next time Magdalena went away for a week to rehearse, I did indeed start writing about her, little scenes from our life together, more images than stories. How we tested out beds in a furniture store, and the sales assistant looked at her as though he wouldn’t mind trying it on with her, how we painted the kitchen, and we got drunk on the paint fumes, how one rainy day we didn’t manage to get out of bed, and then we did, and I found myself running to the bakery, with drizzle in my face, and I suddenly thought about running off somewhere, even though I was happier than I had ever been in my life. How we went walking in the mountains and were caught up in a storm, and I suddenly understood we could die, in fact that one day we would die.

  On the weekend Magdalena came home and asked what I’d done while she’d been away. Oh, this and that, I said. I didn’t tell her anything about what I’d written about her. It felt as though I’d betrayed her with my image of her, as though the written Magdalena was more important to me than the living woman. I looked at her, and no longer knew her, and yet I had the feeling I could see her with more realism than ever, a wholly alien woman. What’s the matter? she asked, looking worried. I shook my head and embraced her, as though I could get closer to her that way.

  * * *

  —

  So she’s got the same name as me? put in Lena. Yes, I said crustily, her name’s Magdalena, like yours. Tell me about her. What’s there to tell? I loved her. How did you meet her? asked Lena. In the mountains, I said, glancing at her, but she looked expressionlessly at me, and said, go on.

  TEN

  We were staying in the same hotel, a little pension in the Engadin. Magdalena was with a group of people who went hiking in the daytime, and every evening kept the guests amused with stories and comic turns. I noticed her because she was quieter than the others, but she still seemed to be the focus of things. She was by some way the youngest of the group, and all three of the men were after her, but in such an eccentric way that the other women didn’t seem to mind.

  I had gone up into the mountains to write my novel. At that time, I still had the notion that you could work better in a quieter setting. I spent most of the time sitting at a little granite table in the shady garden of the hotel, writing or reading, just the way you’d expect of a writer. When I came down to breakfast one morning, the group was just about to set out. They discussed the plan for the day noisily, but this time their cheeriness sounded forced, and when they finally left the dining room, Magdalena was left behind on her own.

  Later, I went into the hotel garden to work, and I found her sitting at my table, with a handful of papers. I just managed to glance at them, and guessed it was a theater script. She must have sensed my hesitation. Is this your place? she asked. Stay where you are, I said, I’ll find another table. She pointed to the chair opposite and said, You’re welcome to sit by me.

  I tried to work, but it was more than I could do, I kept glancing across to her. Then she looked up from her papers, as though sensing my regard, and smiled at me. Are you keeping a diary? she asked finally. At that time I felt a little ashamed of my scribbling; much as I’d have liked to be a successful author, I felt at least as much ashamed of being a failure. Oh, just notes, I said. I keep a diary, she said, I write in it almost every day. Have done since I was eleven. What do you write? I asked. All kinds of things. What I’m doing, people I meet, things that are preoccupying me. Do you think I’ve got a chance of appearing in your diary, then? I asked. Only if you have a coffee with me, she said, and held out her hand. Magdalena. The whole scene had a touch of formality about it, which she seemed to enjoy. I went inside to place the order.

  Now you’re going to have to say or do something extraordinary, said Magdalena with a smile, once I was back, so that you’ll cut a good figure in my diary. She laid the script face down on the table so that I couldn’t see the title, and looked at me expectantly. Why didn’t you go off with the others? I asked. She paused, as though wondering if it was worth telling me the reason. That’s another story, she finally said. It’s not interesting. We’re actors. Next week we’re going to start rehearsing a play. Before that we wanted to spend a few days in the mountains to get to know each other a bit. The director said he thought it would help us to bond. Probably didn’t work. She shrugged. And now I’m sitting here, bored. Would you like to go walking with me?

  We finished our coffee and arranged to meet outside the hotel in fifteen minutes. When Magdalena showed up half an hour later, I was just studying the signpost, which had arrows pointing every which way. But it turned out she already knew which way she wanted to go, and pointed up the slope behind us, and said it was too steep for the others.

  The path led straight up through a larch wood. We walked silently in Indian file, only speaking the few times we stopped to catch our breath. At the end of an hour or so, we reached the timberline. The path led up to a scree that formed a great hollow. By now we had been walking for over two hours, and we sat down on a rock to rest. All I had with me was a bottle of water, I had had no idea that what Magdalena had in mind was a proper mountain hike. It was a hot summer’s day, and I was bathed in sweat. Magdalena was delicate and slightly built, but she seemed to be less exhausted than me, and before long she was pressing to carry on.

  Fully three hours after setting off, we reached a tiny lake in a dip in the rocks. Magdalena was intent on reaching a nearby summit whose name she liked. And half an hour later, we duly got there, and the landscape opened out below us, the valley and the lakes down in the depths, and across from us a chain of snow-covered peaks.

  ELEVEN

  Then on the way back we bathed in the lake, said Lena. I was surprised by Chris’s pallor, and he was amazed at my lack of inhibition. The water was ice cold, we just dipped into it, then lay down naked on some rocks to get dry.

  She stopped and looked me in the eye. A young man who had been hard on her heels almost walked into her and said something unfriendly-sounding in Swedish. It’s all in his book, she said. I don’t know how you got to see the text, but the fact that you know it proves nothing. I didn’t read it, I said, I wrote it. Almost twenty years ago. In that case, you can tell me how the story continues, she said. I could at that, the question is whether you’d want to hear it. Without another word, she walked off down the street. When I had caught up to her, she said triumphantly, Anyway, I never bathed in the lake. It was his idea, but I never dreamed of undressing in front of him. He said he just wanted to cool off quickly. I went on. He thought he would catch me up, but he was mistaken about that.

  * * *

  —

  It was our first trial of strength, and Magdalena won it, the way she won almost all our battles later on as well. When I walked into the restaurant that evening, she was sitting around a table with her theater friends. I nodded to her, but she just gave me a mocking smile. Later, I ran into one of the men smoking in the hotel garden. It turned out he was the author of the play they were going to produce. I asked him when and where they were having the premiere, but he didn’t seem to want to talk to me. When I went back inside, I ran into Magdalena. She greeted me
like a perfect stranger.

  I left the light off in my room and went up to the window. Out in the garden I could see the outlines of two people standing close together, and I was almost certain it was Magdalena and the playwright. They seemed to be talking, then they embraced and started kissing. I felt violently jealous, not just of their love, but of their life and the world they moved in and seemed to belong in.

  That night I couldn’t sleep for a long time. When I went downstairs just before ten o’clock the next morning, the theater group were just carrying down their luggage and stowing it in a taxi.

  TWELVE

  You can ask me anything you like, I said. Not just what’s in the book, but also what actually happened. Why should I? asked Lena. You’ve got your life, and I’ve got mine. And I’ve no intention of letting you tell me mine.

  We were walking on, now in the old town, whose crowded streets made it difficult to talk. Lena looked at the window displays and saw a plain blue dress she liked and was desperate to try on. I went into the shop with her and told her how lovely she looked, as though she wouldn’t have been lovely to me in any other dress. I offered to buy it for her, but she insisted on paying for it herself. For the first time she seemed seriously annoyed. Just because I’m listening to you doesn’t mean you can take liberties with me. I’m not your Magdalena and don’t intend to become it either. I apologized and said I hadn’t meant any harm. She walked out of the shop and briefly stopped. I was already half-afraid she wanted to run off and had no idea what I could do to stop her. Finally, she walked on, and I followed her in silence, so as not to make her angry a second time.

  Only when we had left the city center did we start talking again. We were walking through a section of characterless gray tenements. There were lights on in many of the windows, and in some of the lower stories you could see people going about their domestic tasks. One man who was standing on a balcony smoking gave us a wave and called out something I couldn’t understand.

  Whenever I look into an apartment, I imagine what it would be like to live in it, said Lena. She was back to sounding like before. A new life in a new city. I would have a different job, maybe a husband and children, a dog, I’d play tennis, or take courses at a local technical college. Don’t you always slip into the skin of your characters when you play a part? I asked. I don’t mean it in that way, said Lena, I mean a completely different life, a different history. Tell me about being in love, said Lena, how did you fall in love with her? Love isn’t really the word, I said. I liked Magdalena, she fascinated me and challenged me, but it took me some time to fall in love with her. You see, said Lena, Chris fell in love with me right away. It really was love at first sight.

  * * *

  —

  Maybe I believed that to begin with, but after everything that happened later, I had a different sense of the story. In writing, I was cautious with big words and sentiments, questioning them not only in others, but also in myself. I had liked Magdalena from the first, but that was hardly surprising, she was young and beautiful, and she had a lightness that straightaway charmed everyone and won them over. On our walk, it was usually her going on ahead, and I had plenty of opportunities to watch her. Her movements were swift, as though she was in a lighter atmosphere or somewhere almost without gravity. She was wearing climbing boots, but her footfall was light, almost skipping. She kept turning around to face me and smiling and calling out words of encouragement, but when she felt my eyes weren’t on her, her expression was serious, almost dismissive. Sometimes it felt like seeing the face of the old woman she would one day become.

  * * *

  —

  Love at first sight, I said. Looking back, you believe that kind of thing, when you find your narrative, settle on a version, a creation myth for your relationship. Because that’s always the easiest thing to believe, and the pleasantest. That you were destined for each other, that there was no other possibility. But if I hadn’t happened to see a poster for the play two months later, in all probability I’d have forgotten the whole thing, just like I’ve forgotten lots of other beginnings.

  When I saw Magdalena again, this time on the stage, first I didn’t recognize her. She was playing a rather foolish young woman who senses that her boyfriend is still in love with his ex, and who is then seduced by the ex’s husband. I couldn’t really remember the play, all I knew for sure was that there was a fish on the poster.

  * * *

  —

  That figures into the play as well, said Lena, it’s a carp that slowly asphyxiates. It’s night. The middle of a lake. I am floating on the water. It’s snowing, and the snowflakes fall into the water and dissolve. I have to be naked, but I don’t feel cold. There is no greater feeling of abandon. Then suddenly I see that underneath me, facing me like a shadow, is a gigantic fish in the water. Is that in the play? I asked, I can’t remember.

  He paid me, said Lena. In the play, I mean. The man didn’t seduce me, he offered me money to sleep with him. Not like a prostitute, though. He said that was the purest form of love, when you own someone. Because that way love isn’t based on reciprocity, loving someone just to be loved in return. Do you think that’s right? I asked. Nonsense, she said. I don’t want to possess anyone or be possessed by them. What about being obsessed by them, then? It’s more like having someone obsessed with me, said Lena. That’s what I said to Chris right off the bat, when he was waiting for me at the stage door. I don’t like that. But you stayed and had a glass of wine with him anyway? Why shouldn’t I? said Lena.

  THIRTEEN

  We had gone to an expensive bar, not far from the theater. I couldn’t think of a more suitable place, and Magdalena seemed happy to be taken to somewhere ritzy like that. Even the barman seemed to sense it was a special moment for us. There were lots of people in the bar, but he still seemed to treat us as though we were the stars of the evening. The bill for two drinks was ridiculous, but spending so much money gave the moment a significance that put me into an almost solemn mood.

  I made a couple of remarks about the play and the production. Magdalena already seemed to be slightly fed up with her part, and she didn’t feel like hashing out the production with me either. I asked her about the playwright, tried to sense how she stood with him, if she was still in touch with him, but she didn’t react to that either, and her answers were monosyllabic. She was altogether rather quiet, and I too was quieter and quieter, perhaps that’s why I soon had a sense of intimacy. Eventually, Magdalena pressed against the bar with both hands, leaned back on her stool, and asked if I’d walk her home.

  She lived on the outskirts of the city, we could have taken a streetcar, but she insisted on walking. As we wandered through the empty streets, we started to talk. We talked about the city and its inhabitants, about our lives and our backgrounds, we got to talking about her part, and about love and possession. The play threw up more questions than answers, and we talked about whether it was wrong to love someone for their looks. What happens when I lose my looks, then? asked Magdalena. By some accident or illness or just over the course of time. Will you still love me then? That would be true love, I said, that isn’t determined by external factors. I’m not sure. But the way I look is an aspect of me, said Magdalena. And if my looks change, then part of me changes too. Why shouldn’t that affect your love? Suddenly she laughed. That’s my favorite part of the play. The bit where I tell my boyfriend that the other man paid me to have sex with him, and he asks, How much? He just wants to know how much I’m worth to the other man. You have to be Swiss to ask a question like that.

  At the end of almost two hours, Magdalena finally stopped in front of a gray Fifties tenement, thanked me for my company, gave me a peck on the cheek, and said if I liked, I could walk her home another time.

  FOURTEEN

  I never asked him if he would still love me when I lost my looks, said Lena, I put the question in a general way. But that was how he took it, I sa
id. And when we said goodbye, he tried to kiss me on the lips, but I turned my head away. A bit late, I said. So what happens when I lose my looks? asked Lena. Does he still love me? You’re just as beautiful as you were then, I said. I’m not talking about you, I’m asking about Chris and me, said Lena.

  For some time now, we’d been walking along a road with heavy traffic, lined with industrial premises, warehouses and workshops, and in one place an auto repair shop with a closed gas station. Next to it was a big yard full of used cars. I need to pee, said Lena. There’s a light up ahead, I said, and sure enough after a couple of hundred yards, we got to a brightly lit furniture megastore that was still open. We seemed to be the only customers. When a solitary sales assistant asked me what we were looking for, I claimed to be interested in a reading chair, while Lena vanished in search of the ladies’ room. The assistant showed me various designs and explained their qualities in uncertain English. After a few minutes Lena came back, linked arms with me, and said, Have you forgotten, darling, we wanted to buy a bed. And to the sales assistant she said, You must know, we’re newly married and we need a solidly built bed, but my husband’s too inhibited to ask. The sales assistant shook his head in puzzlement and said, Beds are on the third floor. But remember, we close in twenty minutes, he said, pointing us the way to the elevators, and we thanked him.

  The bed department had little bays with suggested arrangements on display, simulated bedrooms with beds and cabinets and wall cupboards. Lena stopped in front of a four-poster in the colonial style, with white tulle curtains. On either side were suitable stands and huge wrought-iron candelabra with golden candles. On the thin partition that separated this room from its neighbor hung a painting of a fairy-tale forest, with a great stag peacefully grazing in it. Sweet dreams, said Lena, laughing. If I were a little deerling, I’d walk into the forest clearing…Can you imagine the kind of people who’d buy a bedroom like that? With a few words, gestures, and facial expressions, she played the woman begging her husband for such a suite. Oh, darling, she said, can’t we, please! I always wanted a four-poster.