by Henning Koch
“What were you doing with him in the first place?”
“Do shut up, Chuck.”
We entered the stainless steel kitchen, which was exactly like a restaurant kitchen except for the show-off fittings, slate worktops, brash and branded appliances and brass grilles sunk into a fuck-off limestone floor. The windows overlooked the boundary of the town, marked out by a high stone wall. On the other side was a hillside garden where old men grew flowers, beans and artichokes. Beyond them a few mountains, then the sea hovering under the sky.
Everything was a bloody mess, of course. Once people get used to having staff they’re always inordinately lazy. I put the things in the fridge after I had cleared out some rotten items and given it a wipe-down with one of the new sponges.
Archie seemed oblivious to my bustling activity. She sat on the worktop, frowning. “I’ve just realized I completely hate him,” she said. “I thought he was just an annoyance. My God, I’m starting to think he could be the biggest problem of all. At least Jimmy doesn’t come round to throw stones at the house.”
“You’d better come back with me to London. Hadn’t you?” I said.
“What for?”
“To avoid being killed?”
“Don’t be silly,” she sniggered. “Bertie’s crazy about me. All he’d do is try and rape me in his very own, inept way.”
“Oh, rape you, that’s all right then. My God, it’s a seesaw world with you, isn’t it! One bloke can’t get it up, the next one wants to rape you.” I looked round, exasperated. “Archie, do you ever wash up?”
“What’s the point. Things just get dirty again.”
“We’ll have to call the cleaner later. I’ll pay her myself.”
“We can’t. I owe her two hundred euro. Let’s go upstairs.”
We headed up the spiral staircase. Over my shoulder I said, “So, this Bertie? What was he doing in India?”
“Finding God.”
“And in the end all he found was little old you. Poor little mite.”
“He got confused, didn’t he?”
She led me into Jimmy’s “thinking room”—that was his name for it. If the room wasn’t exactly bursting with intellectual energy, it was certainly an inflated expression of money, that commodity so desired in the world but only ever obtained by a small minority who, once they’ve attained it, immediately start fretting and convincing themselves they’re broke.
I stopped in the doorway, impressed in spite of myself.
The room was large but broken up by a pair of sofas, cream-colored and spotlessly clean. Quite exquisite. Joined seamlessly onto the back of them were flimsy screens of woven silk that stretched up in an organic Spiderman design, until they merged with the ceiling, They were studded with bands of various colors and functioned almost as see-through partitions.
There was an electric fireplace set into the wall, its silvery back studded with crystals turned on by flicking a switch on the wall. It had two settings, each marked with a symbol, one for heat and another for light. The light it gave off had a sort of rippling, lunar effect. It drove me insane.
“This is stunning,” I said. “Really!”
“The thing about Jimmy was that he found it hard to live with normal furniture,” said Archie. “He didn’t like furniture.”
“Oh he seemed to like it well enough,” I said, with slight venom. “I suppose he got an interior designer to do all this?”
“No, he hates them as well. He chose everything himself. In New York.”
I sat down heavily in the sofa, flummoxed by this airy pocket of controlled perfection, while at the same time infuriated by the self-regard of the rich, their anally retentive need for opulence and everything just right.
“If you have a mind you don’t need all this. Do you?” I said.
“Jimmy has a mind. As you know, Chuck. It’s just a mind that’s very concerned with things.”
There was a silence, while my eyes dwelt on Jimmy’s investments. Leaning against the wall by the window were seven large beaten copper panels decorated with concentric circles, some of them breaking right through the copper, others scratched into the surface. Again, totally exquisite, and this time I happened to recognize them. They were by Jacob Verlaine, a voguish New York artist. A pair of them had recently sold for forty thousand dollars at Sotheby’s. One of the panels lay on the floor, with a chair carelessly placed on top of it and an empty tea-cup.
“Have you been sitting on that? You shouldn’t. They’re very valuable.”
“Oh who gives a monkey’s about his stuff?”
I lifted the chair away and picked up the panel. The chair-leg had made an imprint in the copper. Carefully I leaned it beside the others.
“No one will even notice,” said Archie with a yawn.
At the opposite end of the room was a semi-bald, Egyptian cat lying on one of the sofas. I only noticed it when it started making retching sounds.
“Oh dear,” said Archie. “She’s not well, I think she ate something funny.”
I went over and picked it up with distaste—I have to admit I hate cats—and threw it out of the door. “Archie! You have to wake up. You must start sorting the situation out! You can’t just vandalize the place and live here like a down-and-out!”
“Oh shut up!”
“You shut up! Listen to me! If you don’t, you’re finished.”
“I am finished. I wanted to be with Jimmy, I wanted to have a child with him,” she wailed.
“Why the hell did you marry an impotent man if you wanted a child?”
“He wasn’t impotent at the beginning. He just became impotent. And the more impotent he became, the more determined he was to marry me. And then I spent years making love to a fucking snail!”
“Archie! I’m beginning to think you made him impotent.”
“Oh for God’s sake, you’re really offending me now.”
By this point I was standing over her, looking down at her upturned face. How sad to think there had been a time when she drove me to distraction. I grabbed her wrists. “Do you enjoy driving men berserk?”
“You prick, you’re no different from the rest of them! Go on then, fuck me! I don’t even care.”
I pushed her back into the sofa, pinned her down and forced my knee between her legs. Then I came to my senses, let go of her and sat down next to her. “Sorry, I don’t know what happened.”
She jumped up and tried to run out of the room, but I grabbed her again and we grappled on the floor. Finally we got tired and just lay there.
“I had an abortion,” she finally said blearily. “A month ago.”
“Oh. Jimmy’s?”
“No. Bertie’s.”
“I thought you wanted a child.”
“Not his.”
“Does he know?”
“Who?”
“Bertie.”
“No, not yet.”
“Are you going to tell him?”
“I suppose he’ll work it out for himself.”
“Couldn’t you write him a letter?”
“I don’t want to encourage him.” She looked at me. “You won’t do that again, will you Chuck? I felt safe with you. Now I’m not sure.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t know where that came from.” There was a long pause before I said, quite decisively, “Archie. You’re going to have to come with me to London. We’ll bring all the art and valuables. We’ll have a removals company bring it to London and put it into storage. And we’ll have to find you a lawyer.”
“I can’t possibly pay for all that.”
“I’ll pay somehow. You can pay me back later.”
She broke into sobs, and I left her to it. Practical matters seemed a useful diversion from all this. “By the way, Archie, what happened to that little Rodin sculpture, the one you were using as a—”
“Yes, I know the one you mean. It’s not a Rodin, by the way.”
“Where is it?”
“I don’t know. I threw it at him.”
“You did what?”
“I threw it at Jimmy. I missed and it landed in the plunge pool, I think. On the terrace outside our bedroom. Unless it bounced into the street.”
We went up another flight of stairs, into the matrimonial bedroom and onto the terrace. A strong, cooling mistral was blowing, blasting us as soon as I opened the sliding glass doors. A similar fate had befallen this plunge pool as the one upstairs. The surface was covered in green algae, and small insects darted about. My arm was submerged up to my armpit as I rummaged about. Finally I pulled it out—a hoary marine treasure out of the depths of time.
When I turned triumphantly to show it to Archie, her face was rather remote and conflicting, and her eyes glimmered darkly as she looked at this dripping object in my hand. I stared at her fixed, unmoving profile. Then realized what should have been plainly obvious right from the very start.
I was in love with Archie. Overpoweringly in love! Just to have her standing close to me was burning up my nerves.
All the same I was aware that my role from here on was platonic. I had to watch her from a distance, sexless and avuncular. Castrated, in fact!
Ah, what dusty answers our souls receive!
We took the sculpture down to the kitchen and cleaned it up with washing-up liquid and a sponge. Later I looked it up in an arts encyclopedia, and found it was worth over twenty thousand dollars. Damned, sterile money! It meant nothing!
Filled with morose thoughts, this eunuch went back to his room, drank some grappa and slept.
XIII
The days that followed were very busy:
I spoke to a notario about the planning dispute with the municipality, and was assured that the matter was largely political and could be resolved by means of delicate negotiations and a modest sum of money. This was duly deposited in the appropriate pocket. An inventory of the contents of the house was drawn up, everything valued and insured, and a specialized warehouse in Buckinghamshire sent a lorry down to pick everything up.
It goes without saying that all this cost me a great deal. In fact, I had to raise money on the equity of my London home. I even paid off the cleaner and got her to mop the floors and dust the rooms before everything was locked up and the key ceremoniously placed in Archie’s hand.
She was grateful, and gave me a kiss. On the cheek.
It was a boiling hot day as we set off in the car. Archie was unbuttoned. A bead of sweat in the tiny hollow at the base of her throat burst its banks and moved downwards, coalescing like fat butter on hot toast, then gathering pace, breaking into a gallop as it delightedly found the tightening, shimmering crevice between her orbs.
I fought an insane urge to lean forward and stop its progress with the tip of my tongue. Then I was overwhelmed by disgust. My eyes, moving upwards and alighting upon her right-hand nostril, focused on a long black hair, slightly curled and tipped by a crustaceous nodule of snot.
Some pox, some infectious emotion raged through me. In a mere second the garden had turned rank, somehow. Her skin grew pockmarked. Her breasts swelled in an exaggerated manner, became large shapeless sacks filled with clear aspic, trembling each time the car went over a bump.
Ultimately this distaste that arose in me was a help. I could draw a deep breath and look out the window. Maybe after all I would be able to forget about Archie, or at least relegate her to the second division? Given that she no longer cared for me, would not this be the best thing to do? Or should I pursue her, declare myself? If I did, would she once again transform herself, unfold her body, cleave to me and give me passage?
Ultimately, sexuality dominates us, takes our time and attention away from more important things. And for what? What is woman, after all? Isn’t she just a sort of fruit that wanes into a soft, dissipating over-ripeness? Yes. Woman falls into the yellow leaf, in the words of the Bard. Man also has his penance to pay, in the form of castration and loss of erotic powers—only his mozzarella gut is capable of growth. Everything else in slow retreat.
There’s a double penalty for man. Post-menopausal woman enters a sort of blissful state of repose, out of which she continues to have full recourse to her sexuality, but man must pay for his sensual transports in blood. He wakes in a cold sweat, ever alert to the test, ever aware of his growing weakness.
In the period that followed our arrival in London, my self-imposed determination to be abstinent—because of my disgust for her—began to change me. My superficial view of Archie evolved from that of a splendidly sexual being, to a chaste and rather annoying incompetent. Was I now seeing Archie as she truly was? Or was it all just a ruse to stop me lusting after her?
In the end I had to concede sex would have been far more satisfying than most other activities we conjured up in the evenings. Sex beats sitting round watching television and eating stale biscuits, which was the sort of thing we usually got up night after night, slumped in my shabby sofa. Archie never seemed to notice the way I constantly and surreptitiously glanced across at her. Disdain or desire—it made no difference to her. Not at all.
All I ever got was the odd pat on the hand, peck on the cheek, and so on.
Question: Bereft of a lover, what is a man?
Answer: A spiritual traveller in search of love.
Man sits on the beach, he sees a beautiful girl, and he is filled with melancholy and regret. He writes “The Girl from Ipanema” but it makes no difference. His lance is broken and only imminent death can free him. For a man, erotic love is all about penetration. Why else did heroes once ride out with their spears to seek out the serpent?
The spear is man’s great ally in dealing with the monster.
XIV
Six weeks later I was sitting in my favorite back-street café in Islington with a plate of slop (by that I mean an English breakfast) and a pile of manuscripts in front of me waiting to be read.
Suddenly there was a voice in my ear: “Thought I’d find you here this time of the morning, you old dog.” I looked up, and there he was, his usual indomitable self: Jimmy! With a smug grin on his affluent face.
“Jimmy! I didn’t know you were in London. You’ve been keeping your eyes on us?”
“As it happens, yes. I saw your lights on last night.”
I put down my newspaper and wiped the chip-grease off my lips. “I’m not much of a dog these days. More of a sheep or something. Wish I was a bloody dog!”
“Don’t tell me, she won’t fuck you, right?”
“No. She won’t.”
“Hey! I knew it. But she’s taken all your dough. Am I right?”
“A fair chunk, yes.”
“Well listen up. I just want you to know there’s a membership card waiting for you. My new club, all-male membership, strictly only guys who’ve been taken round the block by their wives.”
“She’s not my wife.”
“She’s living with you.”
“Staying! In my spare room.”
“And you’re paying for her.”
“Not really, I just feed her.”
“Oh yeah, Little Shop of Horrors, right? Feed me, feed me. You give her an allowance?”
“Fuck off! You should be giving her an allowance.”
“I’d rather make a donation to the fucking Canadian seal cull.”
“Look. I know all about it... your erection problems... it’s not her fault.”
“Excuse me?”
“And your Viagra addiction.”
He laughed incredulously. “Oh sure yeah! Ask my new wife. For a guy in his fifties I’m a fucking tiger. I reckon I could jerk off and hit that wall from here. Know what I’m saying?”
I frowned at my manuscripts. “I’ve got to get through all this. Today.”
He grabbed my arm and squeezed it. “Why are you working in this dump? Why aren’t you at home?” When I didn’t answer straight away he shrieked gleefully. “She asked you to go out, didn’t she?”
I hesitated before conceding with a nod. “She’s having a few people over for a
meditation day.”
“Oh fuck!” He whistled. “You’re right, you’re not a dog. You’re not even a fucking sheep, you’re dog-meat. You better wake up.”
“Maybe I do have to wake up, but I don’t need you coming here to gloat at me.”
He groaned, “Oh man Chuck, I was just gonna leave you here with your stupid manuscripts and your pain-in-the-ass attitude! I can’t believe you helped that bitch get a lawyer and even paid the fees. Are you insane? Where are your loyalties for Christ’s sake? I thought we were friends.”
I gripped his arm, as if drowning. “Jimmy! I’m in love with her.”
Jimmy peeled off my hand. “That’s no excuse! I’m your friend! Your goddamn friend! You know what that means to me? It means I can’t do it. I can’t watch you fuck yourself like this. That’s a man you got in there!” he added, with a little punch to my chest. “Remember him? That guy in there who deserves the best, not some bitch using him, depriving him of his rights.” He clamped his hand round the back of my neck and gently shook my head. “You don’t love her and you never did, you stupid dumb shit! It was something else. It was your issues! Okay? You need a shrink. Have you ever been to see a shrink?”
For weeks I’d had a persistent nervous pain in my solar plexus, and sometimes at night it turned into an agonizing cramp. I suspected it was the beginning of an ulcer. Now, with Jimmy staring at me, I felt it burst into life again. The waitress dropped a huge tray of crockery. There was an almighty crash, followed by scattered applause from the diners, and a fit of roaring from the owner in the kitchen. It was like Jericho falling. I felt my whole life collapsing round me as I gave in to his line of reasoning. Far away I heard Jimmy’s eager, weaselling voice working at me: “Talk to me, Klaus! What are you gonna do now?”
“Stop calling me fucking Klaus. You know my fucking name!” I clutched my head, whimpering: “I don’t know what I’m going to fucking do! I’ve got myself into debt. She’s glued to my flat. She never leaves, never goes anywhere. And she won’t sleep with me. She absolutely refuses.”
I noticed he couldn’t quite restrain a little smile. “You’ll have to give her the flat and hit the road. That’s what I did.”