Nine

by Andrzej Stasiuk

  Green and white lights went on and off in the shadows, reminiscent of Christmas. A chill blew from far Krakowska, and she felt a prickling on her cheeks. Some white already gathering in the seams of the sidewalk. The wind drove bits of ice and formed them into flakes. A booming sound to the right, lower, and the earth shook. Her hands numb in her pockets. The plane landed. In a movie once she had seen a landing strip like black water. It seemed as if the plane would keep falling, to the center of the earth, but it didn’t.

  She was calm now. What she had run from floated slowly back to her, cooled, transparent. The fear no longer rattled in her body, it settled in her throat like a pellet. The driver told her that this was the last bus, that she could catch a night bus back. The trams had all left too. She walked a little, just to hear the sound of her footsteps, it was so deserted. Cars passed the concrete island, some headed for the wide world, others returning. She felt something in the lining of her jacket, found the hole and fished out her old leopard lighter. The flame didn’t last. “The fuel must have evaporated,” she thought. In the cigarette receptacle of a trash can she found a long butt with a white filter. She warmed the lighter in her hand and managed to light up. The smoke had a minty taste. A limo sped by. A rumbling, pulsing bass came from inside even though all the windows were up. The glow over Downtown was so bright that she couldn’t tell where the sky began and where the air of the city left off. Somewhere over Mokotów the moon occasionally appeared, white as mercury and almost a circle. It never completely disappeared in the clouds, as if that cold, sightless eye couldn’t leave her. Another booming of a plane. Those people up there were happy as angels, sitting in comfortable seats, being served colorful drinks by beautiful young women, the city below like a crystal palace, but the glow of her cigarette they couldn’t see, it was too tiny. Green and white flashing signals again, now from the south, from the depths of the darkness. “That’s where Zakopane is,” she thought, and at that exact moment tasted the burned filter. “But they’re coming from some far, hot country.” She pictured palm trees, sun, blue water. She tossed the butt away. The roar descended, covered her, but this too was a kind of shelter.

  Something went wrong with the mechanism. There were slips, breaks, blanks, as when a film snaps, the screen goes white, and the audience starts whistling and stamping. Strangers appeared and wanted something from him. They spoke directly to him, like the people on TV who read the news. Berlin vanished. The past gone, its place taken by a present that made no sense. That’s always the way when the mind has had enough and wants out. Terrified, he couldn’t breathe, he opened his eyes, felt around, knocked over the bottle of mineral water. “Ich entschuldige,” he said, to see if what he had dreamed was true. The words came easily. “Zug nach Braunschweig. I’m fucking nuts. Next minute I’ll start speaking Russian,” he finished in Polish. He found the bottle, took a swallow, said, “Danke,” in a whisper, beginning to enjoy the game.

  “Autobahn, Strasse, bitte,” giggling, short of breath. “Hände hoch, schnell, schnell,” breaking out in a sweat. “Hands, hands, Hans,” trying not to burst into laughter in the darkness. He dozed again and saw Zosia in an apartment he didn’t know. She was walking from room to room, but the rooms were endless. He followed her, not to pursue but in a kind of game, because she looked around from time to time, to see if he was keeping up. Everything in order: beds made, tables cleared, chairs arranged, vases on shelves, heavy drapes drawn across the windows so you didn’t know if it was night or day. The light from an unknown source, because as he walked he saw no chandeliers or lamps. Completely quiet. Zosia wore high heels. He was certain that she was leading him somewhere, showing him the way, taking him to a safe place deep in the labyrinth, where no one would find him. There were sofas, padded footstools, couches, bookcases filled with objects. At times he came within arm’s reach of her and could see the double swell of her ass under her short dress, the back of her neck with a visible line of backbone, the outline of her shoulder blades beneath the bright, colorful fabric of her dress. She opened door after door, but he couldn’t grasp any handles, couldn’t touch any piece of furniture, he was too far. He trusted her, loved her. Tears welled. He broke into a run, saw her profile, her smile. She quickened her pace lightly, her hair flowing as in a wind. He was happy, sure that he would catch her in the end and that she wanted him to. Mahogany shelves left and right, red and gold cushions piled on leather sofas, mirrors in carved frames, black televisions on low silver tables beneath papered walls, unlit candles in ornate candlesticks. She pushed open a double door, and they were in a huge kitchen. The metallic surfaces gave off a cosmic light of luxury and desire. The floor was warm, and he was aroused. Since no more doors led anywhere, he understood that the chase was over. Zosia had her back to him, her hands on an immense sink. The memory of a porno flick, but it wasn’t like that, from now on everything would be different and he wouldn’t think about such things. He went up and put his arms around her, felt sweetness and trembling, slipped to his knees and embraced her hips. She turned to face him but was no longer wearing the flowing dress, it had turned into a purple tracksuit, and above him, legs planted apart, stood the blond man. Paweł tried to move away, but the man grabbed him by the hair.

  The light blinded. It went off, then on again. He felt the wall at his back and another flash. He raised an arm to shield himself. The light went out again, and a woman said quietly:

  “I thought it was Jacek. Someone was moaning, and I thought it was him.”

  Beata put the lighter in her pocket and knelt by Paweł in the dark.

  “He’s not in the apartment. I knocked. I thought something had happened to him, that it was him hiding.”

  “Is that you?” asked Paweł.

  “It’s me,” she said.

  “Why isn’t he there?” he asked. “I knocked too, then I came up here and I’ve been waiting.”

  “You were yelling in your sleep, having a dream.”

  “Where is he?”

  “He ran away. I saw them chasing him.”

  “At Central Station,” he said.

  “How did you know?”

  “I didn’t. I was guessing.” He curled into a ball, put his arms around his knees. He couldn’t see her but felt her warm breath on his face.

  She touched his knee, his jacket, as if looking for something, then grabbed him by the shoulder.

  “Tell me, you have to tell me.”

  He tried to pull away. “They chased him before, so they could chase him again,” he answered, so she’d leave him alone. He had a bad taste in his mouth. He turned and spat into the darkness.

  “Who was chasing him?”

  “How should I know? Listen: I came here yesterday. I don’t even know him. I used to, now I don’t. I don’t know anything. I’m waiting till he gets back, because he has a phone number I need. Not written down but in his head, an important number. I’m here by chance. Nothing connects us. I had nowhere else to go. Some business of his is going badly, but it has nothing to do with me.” All this in a whisper, quickly, but when he felt the girl’s grip relax, he stopped.

  “I’m afraid,” she said.

  “Everyone’s afraid.”

  “Afraid for him.”

  “He’ll be fine,” Paweł said. “He always lands on his feet. He makes no effort, but it comes out OK.”

  “We were going away.”

  “He would always laugh at me when I tried to do something.”

  “I even bought toothbrushes. See?”

  She moved, and he felt cold air.

  “They’re yellow,” she said.

  “When were you going away?” he asked.

  “This evening. I’ve never seen the mountains. He said he had something to take care of and we could go. He left, then I saw him running.”

  “Ran off with my phone number,” Paweł muttered.

  “He said he’d be right back and bring more money. We only had two million. Not that we needed to buy tickets, right? At wors
t they take down your names and addresses. Like in the tram. I don’t know how many times that’s happened to me . . .”

  His turn to move. She heard the swish of his clothes, the crackle of cellophane.

  “Give me one too,” she said, reaching.

  Their hands tried to find each other in the dark like a game with a blindfold. He caught her wrist, held it, put the cigarette between her fingers. They were dry and warm.

  “Ever been to Zakopane?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Are the mountains nice?”

  “I don’t know. We always got there in the evening, loaded the goods, and had to go back.”

  “What goods?”

  “Leather, sheepskins. When they went out of fashion, the trips stopped.”

  “You never saw the mountains?”

  “Once we were there in the daytime, but it was foggy.”

  The tips of their cigarettes made slow red lines in the dark. In the silence, they could hear the smoke leaving their mouths. The beating of their hearts. They were completely alone. The city crouching in wait below. A copper glow over the traffic circle. The bodies of people in their beds were reddish, as if molded from clay and baked in an oven. Refrigerators hummed quietly; clocks showed the hours and minutes; thermostats turned on the central heating. In the old-fashioned cold-storage plants in remote spots, freon condensed and vaporized in turn. Current flowed, maintaining essential operations. The girls in the purchasing office dozed off for a moment. In concrete tunnels, the stream of sewage slowed and at times stopped entirely.

  She crushed out her cigarette and said:

  “I have to go.”

  “Where to?” he asked.

  “Home. He might call.”

  “It’s up to you,” he said.

  He heard her knock at the door on the floor below, then the silence fell again.

  People dreamed different things that night. Everyone dreams. The worst people and the best. Iron Man fell asleep in the backseat and dreamed he was a watchmaker. He was sitting in a warm place on a soft chair, and people kept bringing him their watches. A lamp was on, and a large table held hundreds of timepieces. Some were ticking, some only lit up, and some had quartz hearts to push the hands around. He listened to the gentle ticking, studied the straps and bracelets, unscrewed or prized open the casings to check that dust hadn’t gathered inside and to gaze at the little red jewels. The modern ones he set aside, though some were expensive. With clockwork there was no trickery, but with electronics you never knew. When a real watch stopped, there was something wrong you could fix; when an electronic watch stopped, it was dead. A clockwork Atlantik, sometimes it was enough to blow on it to start the tick tock again, and the little silver bird chirp. Polyots, Vostoks, Raketas, each had its own sound, but those Casios—a boring flow of electrons like everything else in nature, nothing there to admire. This was Iron Man’s dream. He sat, wearing black sleeves over a white shirt, reaching for a magnifying glass to look deeper. Beside him, a fresh bottle of Królewskie beer and a full pack of Caros.

  Bolek and the blond man were not asleep. The blond man drove, and Bolek stared into the emptiness of łazienkowska. They came to the bridge. To the right, the dark Torwar skating rink. Bolek thought about Irina, compared her to Syl. They were a little like mother and daughter. It resembled a dream, because he couldn’t stop one from turning into the other. He was going to Syl but would have preferred Irina. A man needs a woman who understands him. What could Syl understand? He tried to remember what he understood when he was sixteen: things happened, that was all. He wanted someone to understand him without words. Also, Irina was bigger. The silver streetlamps reminded him of her earrings, the night of her black brassiere. Syl, on the other hand, was a sparrow, nothing to hold. Syl and Irina, Irina and Syl. At some point he lost the “a,” and it was Irin. It sounded nice. He’d call her that when they next met.

  The blond man had his eyes open, but he never woke up. Life took whatever shape it wanted, and there was no point in thinking about that. People did one thing or another, for different reasons. Dreams were dreams, and you couldn’t back out of one. Things were a little more even than people, since they didn’t change as quickly, because people always wanted something. He knew what he wanted and wasn’t afraid to take it. As they crossed Paryska, he clapped both hands on the wheel and said:

  “Don’t worry, boss. We’ll get him.”

  “I’m not worried. I was just thinking,” said Bolek.

  Zosia dreamed of Pankracy. He was bigger than a dog—almost as big as a lion. They walked down a dark alley with a confident step. By his side she was nimble, strong, and pleasantly empty. He was leading her, not she him. She touched the fur of his neck. Muscles rippling under skin. The road was wet and glistening, and the buildings they passed grew smaller and smaller. No lights on in the windows, and the cars all old and shabby. She’d never been here before and wouldn’t have come on her own, but now her eyes pierced the dark. She was all in black. But this also wasn’t a dream, because she could see it as she lay with eyes open. Pankracy was asleep, curled in a ball on the pillow. The curtains were drawn, and all the lights were on.

  Outside, it was as bright as a stage. The world went farther, no doubt, but here it resembled a blue box. Friday morning, and the usual stream of cars from Ochota to Praga, from Żoliborz to Mokotów and back again, bringing to mind geometry. The planes of the buildings superimposed on one another, all coming to rest against the plane of the sky. The eastern light crumbled against the straight edges of the roofs. Below, shadow, the puddles not yet thawed, ice reflected in glass, multiplied and magnified images. What he saw was only the sum, resultant, of an incalculable number of reflections, a satisfying thought. He could simply stand there, knowing no formula to make sense of a million random events. The traffic circle a convex mirror. He imagined images gliding across its shining surface and disappearing, while the view from the window was infinity. Except he could not make out what lay beyond the blue sky, which hindered a precise grasp. When he stopped thinking, things returned to their places. But his thoughts had come to an end anyway. The ribbon of impressions was now a blank tape that passed through his head with a rustle.

  “Have you remembered it yet?” he heard behind him but didn’t turn, because it was too dark back there, too cramped and complicated.

  “You don’t even have a towel.” Paweł raked his fingers through his wet hair. “Or a fucking lightbulb, or toilet paper. I need that number, okay?”

  He moved toward Jacek, but Jacek’s immobility took his courage away. He stopped in the middle of the room and looked at his wet hands. He shouted: “The number! Don’t play games! You said you’d remember it. You’ve been standing there like a prick for the last hour and staring out the window at nothing.” He kicked the chair, startling himself. Jacek, not moving, said:

  “If you don’t stop, I won’t remember. I have to concentrate.”

  “You’ve been concentrating for an hour. You’ve lost your goddamn mind. Anyone can see that.”

  “Call the first number again.”

  “I can’t. He told me not to. He said he’d only say it once, and that was it.”

  “So? Do you have to do what he says? Go and make the call.”

  “Remember it.”

  “I’m trying. I can’t.”

  “You can’t remember it, and in the night you couldn’t let me in . . .”

  “I couldn’t.”

  “Out of fear! You were so afraid, you shit in your pants!” He moved toward Jacek again, his hands dry now and clenched into fists.

  “Don’t shout. You’d better leave if you’re going to shout.”

  “And where am I supposed to go? I need that phone number. You’re in deep shit yourself.”

  “I’m not in anything.” Jacek’s voice a tone higher.

  “They’re coming to kill you. They’ll find you, because you’re as stupid as I am, even more, and then you’ll really shit yourself, and they won
’t knock, all you’ll be able to do is jump out the window, but first you’ll stand at the door for hours listening. Like me. You’ll walk around asking people to remember a phone number or let you in, but no one will, because bums like you have to stand at the door and listen.”

  Jacek jumped and sank his fingers into Paweł’s face. The two careened across the room, knocked over the table, fell to the floor. The bookshelf rocked, and books tumbled down on their wrestling bodies. Rubble and ruins, each trying to strangle the other or tear off a limb, but they were too weak, could only tug at clothing, hair, thrashing like clowns or death throes, floundering among broken plates from the table, crunching things into smaller pieces, slipping in the soup smeared across the floor. At times they lay side by side or one on top of the other gasping, then resumed the struggle, which was not mortal, merely desperate, like drunken love or a hysterical fit. They rose to their knees, put their arms around each other, fell back down, but more slowly, because now even the weight of their own bodies was too much. They climbed as if the floor had no air and they were trying to reach the surface. Then simply looking for a body to lean on. Someone hammered. They froze, listened, clinging to each other. It was only the neighbor below banging on the ceiling. They slipped to the floor, panting like dogs. Jacek crawled to a corner, turned his back, curled.