I spent some time looking at his back as he was leaving, and then I splashed back into the lake, and leaned back in myself, sinking into the deep dream of waters.
As soon as he put his hand in the water, I woke up. I recognized his touch, the stinging pain, and rose from the water. Sometimes I waited for a while, to make him wait for me, but I always turned up earlier than he would get bored waiting for me.
He brought unfamiliar smells with him. There was always a book in his pocket. He usually read it on the train, until he arrived at the forest. His coat was full of stories, and so was he. He always spoke about the other people's stories first, but then inevitably he would pass on to his own.
My water grew more and more salty as his tears got mixed up with it, although he cried less and less, and he spoke seldom of Anna nowadays. Sometimes we hiked in the woods, but most of our time we spent sitting on the beach. If it started raining, I melted back to my lake-self, because it was very difficult to keep my shape, and continued to converse with him from there.
This was different from sleeping the dream of the lakes, as if I had only just become my real self. The smells, the colors were sharp and sparkling, and I am sure that I would not have been able to dream Gabó up. Sometimes I recalled on the surface what I had seen, and we looked at the flight of the blackbirds again. Alone, I often replayed how I had pulled him out of the water.
I regretted that I did not remember them, as they were standing on my beach: Gabó putting the ring on her finger, and them kissing. I would have liked to have shown him, but at that time I did not know who he was, and human beings were only light or heavy steps on the green, quickly fading sounds between the trees of the forest.
With whatever hatred or anger he spoke of Anna, I am sure that he would have been happy about this: how had I seen them.
I did not even know. I was asleep then.
One day I asked him to take me to town. I was afraid and expectant about his world, which I had so far only experienced in a dead girl's memories as entangled pictures. But I felt that I had to know; I could not know it only from his words. It was not enough.
As the train left the station in the forest, Gabó reassuringly touched my knee.
"Are you sure?"
"I would like to see where you live."
We talked so that I did not have to notice how the forest thinned out more and more behind the window, how the scenery grew duller and more grey each minute. Gabó spoke about the summer: the bird-catchers, whom he met frequently, the feeling when he could hold in his hand a bundle of feathers with a beating heart. He told jokes, put his arms around me so that I would not see the houses, but I escaped from his arms and gazed out.
The houses were large and colorless, the balconies just like fungus on the trunks of the trees. The city was unfamiliar and cold, not at all like among the smudged-out memories of the drowned girl. I thought that I would be able to handle it, but it was all larger, more grey than I had imagined.
I shivered.
"Come on, I'll take you somewhere where you will feel more at ease,” Gabó said.
He took me to a tiny teahouse. There were pictures on the walls: lakes and mountains, sleeping and dreaming beautiful dreams.
"I live across.” He pointed over to the other side of the square, through the window, at the brownish-grey block of houses. “I like this place."
I did not ask if he usually visited this place with Anna.
"Look!” He showed me a small menu card, but I gave it back to him. I could not read. “I'm sorry,” he said. “I forgot. Sometimes I just forget that you could be something else as well as..."
"A human being?” I replied, smiling. “Sometimes even I forget. Sometimes the lake is the dream, and not the opposite."
"Wait, I'll choose one for you.... The Dream of the Earth.” He looked at me. “No, in the end you'll turn into a pile of mud."
"I will splash you,” I threatened him, and splashed a couple of drops on his nose from myself.
"Mate. Hmm.... You are my mate today, and tomorrow the big-breasted blondes. Wings of Winds? Wind easing grass instead of diuretic tea?"
"Give it to me!” I reached out for the little menu card.
He pulled it away from me and laughed, his huge body shaking.
"But sweetheart, you can't even read!” he chuckled. It was true, and even though I was ashamed, I had to laugh with him.
"Never mind,” I said, grabbing the card out of his hands, and just randomly pointed at one of the lines.
When he looked at it, he smiled at me warmly.
"You know what this is?"
I shook my head.
"It's called Forest Walk.” He took my hands for a moment. “Your hands are cold."
"It is autumn,” I said. “When winter comes, I will freeze."
I always had to remind him that I was not a true human being. He always forgot, and I was afraid that I would also forget. I was already far too awake, I knew too much about him. Sometimes I even kept my human shape in the lake; floating and with my hair spread across the water, I watched the sky.
The tea arrived. This was the first human drink that I had tried. The tastes of raspberry and wild strawberry were floating in my body. It was hot: the sip I had taken was beaming inside me, like the tiniest of suns.
"You're blushing,” Gabó said quietly.
"It is the tea."
I drank the whole pot, steaming hot, as they do, and I enjoyed the heat spreading inside me.
"I have just drunk sunbeams."
"Come!” he said suddenly, and reached for his coat.
He paid, and then we went out into the street.
"Where are we going?"
"You said that you'd like to see where I live. Unless you mind."
We cut through the square. We were halfway there, when it started raining slowly. The drops melted into me, disappeared as they touched me. I accelerated my steps.
It was getting heavier, and suddenly I got scared. The water diluted me, started rippling inside me. I felt it was calling me.
"Gabó ... I am going to fall apart...” I whispered. Drops in my hair, on my arms, I could not feel my borders anymore. I wanted to swallow the rain, so that I could swell into something huge. A wave ran through under my clothes.
"What's wrong?” he asked, frightened.
"Quickly!” The unfamiliar water wanted to erupt from inside me, but I was far too small to open up a dam.
It dissolved my contours.
Gabó grabbed me and brought me up to the flat.
I vaguely remember that we passed by closed doors, and then we were in the narrow hall. Gabó's strong arm held me. I could never evaluate his strength; he almost always splashed me apart. Now I was holding on to it.
He almost pushed me into the bathroom. I staggered, the rain filled me, and then I fell into the bathtub and lost my shape.
"Good heavens!” I heard Gabó's voice, and then I felt that something was pulling me downward. Darkness reached out for me and opened its gap.
Gabó's hand reached inside me, searched for something, and then I heard a pop, and the force was not pulling me down anymore. A rather big bit was missing from me, but the essence was still there. That much I could fill out.
"Tünde!” he shouted above me, his two hands stirring desperately inside me. He did not see that I was still there.
When I rose from the bathtub, he pulled me close. He was brutally pressing me, but on the other hand, I believe the reason he was holding on to me so hard was that he was afraid I would disappear too.
"I am here. You can relax ... I am here,” one of us said.
I became his lake. I was not sure that he knew. I believe he did, but he never let me know, and he possibly even tried to ignore it, because however much he depended on other people, he could not bear it if someone depended on him.
And I kept my mouth shut. If there was something I was really good at, it was that.
I tried to be awake as much as possible e
ven without him, so that I could tell stories about forests, the hikers and the birds. The mountains, crowned by the trees, were ours, the fresh air too. The city and all the other people were lost in the distance. Only this was ours.
I did not speak to him about what it is like holding on to wakefulness, which meant the memory of him, his voice and his person. What it is like staring into the starry night or the foggy morning in solitude, when the owls are hooting, and the woodpeckers are pecking away. I did not tell him what it is like waiting and watching, scared, how the sun crawled lower in the sky each day. I did not tell him about what it is like being wakeful among the sleeping mountains.
I also did not say what it is like being alive, walking next to him, holding his hand, or being in his arms, until the shaking lessened.
We did not talk about a lot of things, at least not in words. But I believe standing close to each other, infused with each other's scent, is worth as much as talking.
The leaves had already fallen, and it took me great effort to ascend from the bed, my joints stiff. Gabó had to hold me for a long time under his coat, for me to become liquid and tepid again.
The mud of the road had been dug up by the jeeps of the forest rangers. There were neat piles of grey beech trunks on the side of the hill. Both of us climbed up them, and held onto each other not to fall down.
"I have reclaimed Anna's key,” Gabó said on the top of the woodpile, and his ever-warm fingers held on to mine. His voice had an “I don't care” quality, but I do not believe that it was the same inside.
"What does it mean?"
"We're getting a divorce."
We looked into each other's eyes.
"I am sorry,” I said, and although I did not know exactly what he meant, I could feel the importance of it from his glance. He had beautiful eyes, the color almost like me on a summer day.
"I know, honey."
We stayed silent for a while, and continued on the forest road.
"It would be so nice if you'd talk about yourself sometimes,” he said suddenly.
"What shall I talk about?” I replied.
"Anything."
We reached the top of the hill, the wooden look-out.
"What shall I tell you? What it is like to dream? I am not aware of anything at the time, the sounds only reach me from afar. Fish swim around in me. In the summer I have ducks. I can feel when they eat, fly, dive, when they take their ducklings out on the lake for the first time...” I did not look back, but continued up the stairs. “Thousands die in me each summer. Thousands are born.” I went silent, and Gabó hugged me from behind.
"When I am dreaming, I am not aware of anything. I do not wake up. I only am. Each life is a small wave on the surface that runs through and disappears on the beach. Now, however, everything has changed. Lakes do not usually think about what happens to the fish. They do not usually wake up. They do not really know anything about death, or suffering, or about love. They do not know anything.” I was shaking.
"It was me, right?” he asked quietly. “I changed you."
I looked out on the naked forest, and the blue sky, where the clouds were lingering just like gossamer.
I wanted to talk about what was really important.
"I enjoy when you talk about yourself,” I said finally. “You have lots of friends; all of them are interesting."
"You are the most important of them."
"And you are the most important being for me. I do not know why, but you are. If it were not so, you could not have woken me up."
"You did not know me then.” He leaned on his elbows on the railing, next to me, and then he pulled away. “The urge always hits me, to jump into the deep,” he said with deep and quiet horror in his voice.
I looked down, but I could only see the fallen leaves.
"Is this why you jumped in me?"
"No. For you, I fell,” he chuckled.
I tickled him, until he laughed out loud.
"But really ... why?"
"It seemed like a good idea. The lake was really lovely ... you were lovely. And you know, there are times when a man gives up, even if he might regret it afterward. I am sorry. You must have thought me pitiful."
"No. I was angry. However, I did not think you pitiful. It is not pain that is pitiful."
"Then what?"
"The one who causes it,” I said.
Gabó did not utter a word. He spoke with his silent sigh on my neck.
I could only just remember that I had seen a dream under the ice. This time it was not the thoughts of the bored fish that were streaming through me lazily; I could feel Gabó's warm hand. I was sleeping peacefully under the cover of the ice, and his thoughts were warming me.
Then the ice started breaking in spring. I was lying in my bed, sliding in and out of the dream as I have been doing for centuries, waiting for Gabó.
I could hardly feel his calling. When he dipped his hand in me, the old pain was only a faint, dull throbbing, and I had difficulty waking up.
"I thought you wouldn't come.” Gabó straightened up, and held me close.
"I always come when you call for me."
"The other day you did not come."
Inside me there must have been a tiny splinter of ice left, because I felt cold. I did not wake up to Gabó?
"It was winter."
"But there was no ice anymore.” It frightened me; I felt like disintegrating on the beach.
We sat down on our favorite log.
"Talk to me!” I said, and I was tense.
And Gabó spoke. About the split-up family at Christmas, the empty bed, about dark loneliness, about the fact that he had missed me. He was holding my hand all along, and I began to feel like I did in autumn. The long dream split up into pieces.
Gabó told me about books, poems—he once said that he would write one about me, but in the end nothing came of it—about the bird table in the garden at his parents’ house.
And then with the same tone of voice as he spoke about the sparrows, he continued, “I've met a girl as well."
I smiled, because it was spring, and because there was nothing else I could do.
"We really understand each other. We have a lot in common. When we laugh, we're the only ones who exist. Can you understand that?"
I looked back at him. He was happy and sad at the same time.
"I am only a lake. But even I understand that."
"It's so good that finally I'm not alone.” In his voice the amazement was still vibrating from the feeling of finding someone.
"I am glad,” I said, and meant it.
Still, there was sadness between us, a peculiar gap that is present mainly when you are with someone that you really miss. I am a lake, and he is a human being. It is that simple.
When I saw him next, he was not alone. A slim, dark-haired girl was with him on the beach. Gabó's hand woke me up from the dream, but I did not get up; I stayed silently on the bed of rocks.
"Is the water cold?” the girl asked. She had a nice voice.
"Not that much,” Gabó replied, and whispered down at me. “Are you there?"
I only shaped my face for him.
"Yes, I am here. I can see you.” I looked over his shoulders. “I can see her."
"Don't you want to come out?"
I looked deep into his eyes.
"You are not really eager to see me out there."
He made such a torn face that I felt sorry for him.
"Listen! I am your lake. Always.... But now, return to her...” I reflected over it, and watched the waves as they reached the shore. “After that, come back on the beach and kiss her!"
"What?"
"What are you muttering?” the girl asked giggling, and stepped closer.
"Kiss her!” I said determined, and disappeared.
Gabó straightened up. It was not even his choice, it was the girl who embraced him first. I was watching them from the bed, and made the lights glitter at them. They were pretty together.
>
Gabó emerged from the embrace a little tensely, and then with a glance at me, he started to pull the girl away into the forest. I will be back, his eyes promised.
"Be good,” I splashed after him quietly. I am not sure he heard it.
I waited until they left, and then I floated away relaxed and licked the shore where they had just stood.
I know that Gabó will return one day with or without the girl, and that he will put his hand in the water to wake me up. I think that I will sleep. Not out of spite or anger. The fact is that the pain is not strong enough any more to rouse me.
But I will make an effort. I would like to be conscious for as long as possible, watch the mountains, the lingering clouds. It would be good to hear the owls, however lonely the forest is.
And I would very much like it if they came to visit again. Now I know far too much to just sink back into the dream. I would like it if Gabó would look into me again, just as when he threw himself in me, and see himself and the girl on the beach.
I will be around much longer than the girl, or Gabó, or even the trees.
Lakes do not know about death, pain, or love. But inside me, a couple of tear drops and the taste of raspberry are circulating. That much I can feel. That much I know.
Translated from the Hungarian by Noémi Szelényi
* * * *
Being between always came naturally to me. My mother brought Vietnamese stories, cuisine, and traditions with her, and I grew up listening to Hungarian songs and radio plays, reading European and Asian classics and Soviet science fiction with the same enthusiasm. Opening doors and peeking into other cultures, sciences, and arts is easy once you recognize the nature of your hunger. I opened as many doors in my short life as possible, and it took me some time to realize that I had wandered through the door of writing and made my home there.
I believe one of the curses of being a writer is that while you are, feel, and live, one part of you is always taking notes and making an inventory of everything: jokes, gestures, and the most intimate griefs alike. This part of you doesn't judge only by utility. It cannot be switched off. If you could switch it off, you couldn't be a writer. Once in a while a story is as much somebody else's as it is yours, and you must be careful, for you are opening a window on someone else's secrets. This is one of those stories.
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