by Sarah Laing
I cast around the room. There was a man sitting on the sofa, all gangly limbs and floppy hair. He had generous lips that didn’t tense as he drew on his cigarette. He was wearing a leather jacket. I smiled at him and he smiled at me.
Someone else had taken over the stereo. They’d stopped dreamy Portishead and put on the Prodigy, a fat agitated beat filling the room. People started dancing frenetically, whooping along to the chorus. Martin pulled Lily onto the dance floor and they jumped together, banging chests.
I danced too, a distraction from pouring myself another drink. I felt quite light-headed, a little wobbly, but if I jumped up and down it wasn’t so noticeable. I closed my eyes and jumped some more, and when I opened them, Lily and Martin had gone.
Where were they? I moved through the bodies, opening the door into the corridor. Pretending that I was looking for the toilet, I opened one bedroom door (unoccupied) and then another. There was Lily and Martin.
Lily’s eyes were closed, her bare nipples glinting with piercings. Martin’s arms were furred and urgent. They hadn’t noticed me: I watched as Martin undid Lily’s hotpants, as he eased them over her golden, pointed hip bones. Her pubic hair was remarkably thick; I watched his silver head go down between her legs, her knees fly up in surprise and weave around in the air. She put her feet back down again, grabbing at her heels, pushing herself into his face. He was lapping at her.
I shut the door as quietly as I could. I felt angry and horny, my crotch moist. I walked down the corridor, opening the door to the living room. I ran straight into the man from the sofa, the one with the leather jacket.
‘Hello,’ he said.
‘Hi,’ I said.
‘Excuse me,’ he said.
‘I’m not sure about that.’
‘Well, if you stay here, I’ll come right back. I’m dying for a slash.’
I leaned against the corridor wall, waiting. When he returned, I lifted my leg up, my thigh revealed by my cheongsam split.
‘Stop, you have to pay a toll.’
‘Sorry, I’m broke. How ’bout a kiss?’
‘All right.’ I lifted my face up to his. His lips were as giving as they looked, a completely different consistency to Bruno’s. I pushed my tongue into his mouth and he put his hand on my breast.
‘Shall we take it into here?’ he said, looking at the empty room I’d already perused.
I unbuckled his jeans, pulling at the zip on my cheongsam, kicking off my shoes. I pulled down my tights and underpants, unhooked my bra. He pushed me onto the bed.
Hold on, back up.
It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. I was drunk, I was jealous, but he could be HIV positive, I could get pregnant. I leant over to open the bedside drawer, pushing aside the hair ties and the Mills and Boon novel. I found a gold-wrapped condom. God knows how long it had been there; hopefully it wasn’t expired.
‘Take all the fun away, why don’t you,’ the man said, scowling. He opened the package and rolled it onto his penis, which I now noticed was long and curved. And it was true, after that the urgency to fuck diminished, and I no longer felt anything, except irritation and a desire for this to be over as quickly as possible.
He came with a yell, then collapsed on top of me. I extracted him, rolling him over onto his back. I pulled on my underwear and cheongsam and, stuffing my tights into my bag, eased my bare feet into my shoes. I opened the door and went through the living room, out the entrance, and down onto the street. I crossed the road to the night-bus stop; mine was due in ten minutes.
When I returned to my hostel room, I climbed into bed, pulling the sheets up to my chin. What had I done? What had I done? My body wasn’t to be trusted. It betrayed me, over and again.
Tap-tap-tap.
‘Beck, are you in there?’
I didn’t answer; I pulled the covers over my head.
‘Beck, I know you’re there, I can see the light.’
Reaching up my hand, I switched it off.
‘You have to get up and practise. Performance exams are in a few weeks.’
I didn’t care; there was no longer any point.
‘Please, Rebecca, let me in. What the hell is wrong with you?’
A day later I heard the key in the door; the hostel warden had opened it for Lily.
I lifted myself off my pillow.
‘Oh, thank God. I was scared that you’d slipped into another coma.’
‘No.’ Although I had, but a different kind entirely.
‘It stinks in here. Have you showered?’
‘No.’ I’d got up to eat, a muesli bar here, some dried noodles there, enough fuel to maintain my insulin regime. I’d left my room to go to the toilet, to get a drink of water, but mostly I lay in the bottom of my bog, a peat person, slowly mummifying.
‘Come on, Beck, let’s get you out of here.’ Lily helped me to my wobbly feet, and, handing me my towel, my dressing gown, led me to the bathroom.
I could tell I wasn’t going to make it when I finished the Fauré. The examiners wouldn’t look me in the eye. The necessary adrenalin wasn’t racing through my veins; I lacked the passion to convince them that I was worth saving. In a last-minute flash of survival-instinct brilliance, I played the sight-reading piece perfectly, but it didn’t make up for my previous flatness. I was going to fail. I would have to go home.
But I didn’t want to go home right away; I couldn’t face Lydia, my parents, the AMP scholarship people, my dad’s workmates, my old school friends, all the people who bought the raffle tickets for the cellophane-wrapped basket of chocolates and wine that helped fund my studies. I didn’t want to have to tell them that I’d wasted their money, practically embezzled it on vodka and E, on op shop clothes and concert tickets. Most of all I couldn’t face Bruno. I dreaded telling him that I’d screwed up. I wasn’t the person I thought I was, and I didn’t want him to discover the true weak and unfaithful me. I wrote him a letter; we had to break up and I couldn’t make it to Koh Samui to explain. I also wrote one to my parents; I would be travelling around Europe over the summer break before returning to my studies. I didn’t tell them which studies: they’d find out soon enough when I appeared on their doorstep at Christmas, holding a Victoria University enrolment pack. I’d study composition. Screw Lily.
Lily tearfully hugged me goodbye at Heathrow. She was going back to Ohio for the summer break to work in the sunglasses store she’d left behind. ‘Please come back next semester,’ she said. ‘I’m sure you could get special dispensation, tell them it was your diabetes.’
‘Nah, I don’t think so,’ I said. It wasn’t my diabetes, it was me; I was to blame.
‘It’s not going to be the same without you. Keep in touch anyway. Here’s my mom’s address. Make sure you send me postcards from Europe. I’m so jealous! It’s going to be so boring in Ohio.’
‘I will,’ I said.
Back in my hostel room I ripped down all the band posters, putting them into the bin. I tied together my postcards and wrapped them in ribbon, placing them in the bottom of my pack, piling my clothes on top. The cello would be a pain to lug around, but at least I could busk with it. The bus to Dover left at two.
CHAPTER 24
New York, 1963
Manhattan was different from how Klara remembered it. On her way from the Chelsea Piers to the Upper West Side via taxi, it looked dirtier — more broken people, more rats feasting on mounds of trash. And yet it was exactly the same. She thought she might feel a rush of belonging upon arrival, but she didn’t. Instead, she thought of the tui, their sombre orchestra feathers becoming iridescent in flight, their voice boxes split in two like hers — not that she’d spoken German in years.
When she left thirteen years ago, the city was in upheaval, the people from the old neighbourhood moving to New Jersey or Queens for a better life. Tante Dagmar stayed on in the Lower East Side, her third floor walk-up too jammed with bolts of fabric to shift. Her new neighbours were Puerto Ricans, and middle class kids moving in for th
e cheap rents and the chance to paint, to play jazz music, to write poetry. Tante Dagmar befriended some of them, or so said Esther. One of them even wrote a poem about her.
But Tante Dagmar had died six weeks ago, and Klara was too late to sit shiva. She would have liked to have joined Esther and Ruby, Tante’s neighbours and best customers, but a plane ticket was too expensive; she’d had to travel by ship. Owen couldn’t close the gallery for three months, and Frank was at boarding school, so she’d come alone.
It was her third big ocean voyage, and as she’d lain in her cabin, conjuring snatches of her honeymoon with her fingertips, she’d found a lump in her breast, the size of a hazelnut. How she’d not noticed it before, she didn’t know. Because if she looked at herself in the small ship mirror, her shirt unbuttoned, she could see it rising from her skin. Maybe she’d been too busy in New Zealand, with her performances, her students. She’d forgotten about herself altogether.
She wondered whether she ought to see a doctor while she was here. She didn’t want to; it was probably just a cyst. It was nothing. She wouldn’t let her imagination run away with her. Between visiting Heinrich and catching up with Esther, she’d have no time. Heinrich’s onion-skin letters had stopped arriving earlier in the year, and although she’d questioned Esther, all she could say was that he was unwell.
Opening the door, Esther looked like herself, only more severe. Her face was thinner, and her clothes sharper. She took Klara in a bony embrace, helping her with her bag. ‘You take the bedroom. Ruby and I will sleep on the fold-out sofa,’ she said. The one bedroom contained a queen-sized bed flanked by two bedside tables, two bedside lights. Although Klara knew that Ruby and Esther weren’t just companions, she thought they should have made more of an effort to conceal the nature of their relationship. A two-bedroom apartment, or twin beds at the very least. What if someone else less understanding came to visit?
‘So when will I meet Ruby?’
‘She’ll be home soon, she just went out shopping. She’s got a show on tonight that I’m meant to be fitting. We’ll have to leave you to amuse yourself later on this afternoon — I hope you don’t mind.’
‘I can look after myself. Is Ruby still in the chorus?’
‘Yes, she’s now the head of the chorus line. I don’t think she’s ever going to have a starring role, but she’s happy enough. We don’t all have to be the centre of attention.’
Klara sighed; Esther still hadn’t forgiven her for being the more gifted sister. ‘Why didn’t you bring Frank? I would have liked to meet him. What does he think of the presents I sent him? Does he look like you? I hope you brought photos. Why did it take you so long to come home?’
‘Frank’s in boarding school. Third form, that’s eighth grade.’
‘Does he like it?’
‘I don’t know. He accepts it, I think. Owen went to Nelson College so there’s a family tradition. It’s helpful in New Zealand — gets you into the old boys’ network. He’s quite athletic, good at running and the hurdles, I think he’ll do well.’ Klara didn’t much like the boarding school; so gloomy and cold. Frank had to go to church twice on a Sunday, wearing a boater and a striped blazer. She felt as if any last shred of his Judaism was being erased. He was becoming a little Anglican and it made her uncomfortable.
‘Anyway, why haven’t you come and visited?’ said Klara. She wasn’t going to remain on the defensive.
‘It’s just so difficult, with my work and my diabetes. Ruby keeps saying we should go on vacation to Puerto Rico or Hawaii, but how would I know if I could get insulin there? What would happen if I had a hypo?’
‘They have perfectly good health care in New Zealand. The state pays for it. You don’t need medical insurance.’
Esther sniffed, staring at the floorboards. Then she raised her eyes to meet Klara’s, a gaze she normally avoided. ‘Denkst Du an Mama und Papa?’
The sound of German shocked Klara. And Esther and she never talked of their parents. They didn’t have the language for it.
‘Immer.’
‘Ich auch.’
Ruby, small and blonde, bouncy curls and bright red lipstick, appeared with brown paper bags full of deli food. Egg salad and pastrami, rye, pickles and sauerkraut. There were no cakes; Klara presumed they were banned and she would have to meet up with married, Upper East Side Miranda for sweet treats. Her mouth watered at the food; no matter what she did, she couldn’t recreate the New York flavours in her Wellington kitchen. Ruby’s calves were very muscular, presumably from all her dancing, and her face was lined, but not so you’d notice from the audience, especially with all that pancake make-up chorus girls wore.
Ruby opened cupboards and clattered plates, knives and forks onto the table, all the time asking Klara about her trip and what she thought of Manhattan. She seemed cheerful and perky, not at all like Esther, and yet Esther lightened in her presence, whistling as she filled a pot with water. When the pot had boiled, Esther dropped her syringe in. Retrieving it from the drying rack, Ruby sharpened its needle on a stone.
Watching as Ruby pushed the clear substance into Esther’s hip, Klara flinched. Ruby put her finger on the spot where the syringe had withdrawn. Esther pulled her shirt down and began cutting bread, placing two pieces on a set of scales, taking weights on and off until she’d got the balance. Klara was surprised by all of this; she’d known that Esther had to forgo candy, have injections, but she hadn’t imagined the treatment would be so frequent.
‘There’s sugar in that mayonnaise, make sure you account for that,’ said Ruby.
‘Half a cup and I’ve got my carbohydrate allowance.’
‘This is a nice place,’ said Klara, piling the pastrami and sauerkraut onto her rye, helping herself to a big serving of egg salad. Not half a cup, just a mound. Klara ate unthinkingly, sometimes for boredom, sometimes for hunger. Often she forgot to eat at all.
‘Rent control — they can’t raise our rent now even though this place is getting fancy. People will pay crazy money to live here,’ said Esther.
‘And look, you still have your cello,’ said Klara, seeing it in the corner, hiding behind the long curtains. It was dusty. ‘But you haven’t been playing it.’
‘I get it out sometimes. I still play, don’t I, Ruby?’
‘Yes,’ said Ruby, intently showering her sandwich with salt.
It drove Klara crazy that, after all these years, Esther still wouldn’t admit she only got Heinrich to make her the cello out of jealousy, because she didn’t want to be left out.
‘Maybe I’ll play it while I’m here.’ Klara felt itchy without her cello, as if she’d forgotten something vital, left the baby at the park.
‘That would be wonderful, wouldn’t it, Esther?’ said Ruby.
‘Don’t get her started. She won’t leave the apartment.’
‘It’ll do it good, if it hasn’t been played for a while. You don’t want the instrument to seize.’
‘It has been played.’
Ruby rolled her eyes, winking at Klara. In her company, Esther was rendered a charming, impossible girl. Esther leant over to give Ruby a squeeze.
‘Have you seen Heinrich lately?’
‘No, I haven’t. He didn’t come to Tante Dagmar’s funeral.’
‘I still use his cello, when I’m playing in the orchestra. Not for the big solo billings — then I borrow an eighteenth-century Italian one. But I hear that Heinrich’s cellos have improved, that some big names have bought them.’
‘Yes, he even expanded out of his apartment, got himself a workshop and some apprentices. Not that I imagine he’ll ever use that again.’ Esther sighed.
‘What’s wrong with him? What happened?’
‘I don’t know. I really don’t keep in touch. Why don’t you go see for yourself?’
The Lower East Side of Klara’s childhood was no longer there. She was prepared for that. It had already been changing in the 1950s, but now the synagogues seemed abandoned, people spoke Spanish around her. The o
nes who weren’t speaking Spanish dressed like Beatniks, in leather jackets and black turtlenecks, swearing at each other on street corners.
And the music floating out the windows, it was different. No longer could she hear mournful violins, piano accordions. There were trumpets, there were drums, there were car horns and dropped garbage can lids. Golden-skinned men stood in the middle of the road, the hoods of their cars open, the engines running, tinkering with their wrenches, calling out Que pasa? to their friends.
A large, middle-aged woman in a uniform opened Heinrich’s door and introduced herself as Nurse Kelly. She was the one who had answered the phone, who had told her that Heinrich would be delighted to see her; he didn’t get many visitors these days. Klara could tell by the set of her face that she’d never been a beauty. And yet she was solid and practical, her red left hand indented by a too-small wedding ring.
The hospital bed occupied the room where Heinrich had first taught her the cello, in the space where the sofa used to sit. Half the old books were gone, replaced with bottles of medicine, glasses of water, white towels. There was a small shape lying in the bed, a ridge for a shoulder, white hair bursting like feathers from the pillow, the stump of leg visible beneath the sheet, the other tailing down. Even though it was hot in here, he curled around himself as though it were cold.
‘Mr Weiss, you have a visitor. Aren’t you lucky?’ said Nurse Kelly.
And the hunched form turned over, slack cheeks falling into mouth sockets, bloodshot eyes lolling. Klara felt a cramp in her guts.
But a smile, she could see the old Heinrich. ‘Da-daa! Da da, da da da da da,’ he said. Was he making a joke? Or did he really believe he was talking? Her scalp prickled, a cascade of nerves down her spine.
‘He’s had a stroke, but he can still understand you. Go on, talk to him.’