“How so?”
“Oh, you know,” said Barry. “You used to come by for a chat, no?”
“Not all the time.”
“Often enough.”
I still wasn’t sure where Barry was going.
“Now you always go straight down after dinner,” he continued. “That’s also why I asked what’s been going on with you, I really don’t have a clue about that anymore.”
Ah, I thought. I know this conversation. I sometimes used to have it with friends when they thought I didn’t call them back soon enough or never initiated meeting up with them. Didn’t invest enough in the friendship. But Barry I see every day. So I found it rather absurd that I was having this conversation with him now; this didn’t seem to me to be the time or the place for a discussion about the desired state of our friendship.
And there it was again: the left slipper on my right foot.
Barry kneaded my shoulders again. But differently than before: faster, stronger.
He asked, “Why is that, d’you think?”
I said nothing, Barry filled in the answer himself.
“I think your attention has shifted a little bit.”
“How?”
“Come on.”
“What?”
“To Leo’s classroom.”
“Oh.”
So he knew. Of course he knew. Perhaps the whole time, like I’d known about him the whole time. And it might actually be good to just talk about the situation. I thought. Briefly. When we only have one option, we sometimes delude ourselves that bad ideas are good.
“Sure, I’m in Leo’s classroom sometimes.”
“At night, you mean.”
“Yes.”
“Fun.”
“Ow!”
“Sorry, did I squeeze too hard?”
Barry let go of my shoulder. I heard him crack his knuckles, the pressure changing in the synovial fluid.
“Don’t worry, I get it,” he said. “The only thing I want you to know is that you have to watch out.” Another crack.
I looked around, saw that Barry’s forehead was glistening and wondered what took more effort: this thorough massage or the conversation.
“Watch out?”
“That you don’t get hurt.”
“Nah.”
“No, seriously: Leo’s a good guy, but you…” Barry stared at his hand like he was looking for a knuckle he hadn’t cracked yet. “I get the sense that you’re in love with him.”
“That sense is wrong.”
“Come on,” said Barry. “I can see the way you look at him. Just now, during poker: You were constantly trying to catch his eye.”
“Duh, that’s the game, isn’t it?”
Was this it? Was this why Barry had just let himself be beaten by Leo? To tell me these things?
“Your strong reaction speaks volumes,” I heard him say, and I felt I was getting angry.
It surprised me, I hadn’t been angry in a long time. Anger costs energy, losing energy isn’t smart here. And the fact that I was getting angry anyway made me even angrier.
“It’s ok,” said Barry, “I get it. I just think you should watch out, Leo’s not exactly… faithful.”
“I know,” I said, measuring my words. “He’s also doing it with you.”
“Ah.”
“And I don’t mind that. I’m not in love. And if I was, I wouldn’t mind either.”
“Hmm.”
Barry didn’t believe me
It’s hard to believe something you can’t imagine yourself.
And suddenly I understood. Why I was sitting in front of Barry on a child-sized chair. Not because he wanted to give me a massage. But because he didn’t want Leo to give me one.
“Do you mind?”
“No,” said Barry. “Not at all. You can turn the chair around again, dear.”
I turned the chair around, sat back down. Behind me, Barry put his hands around my throat, right underneath my ears.
“I was just wondering…” he said, “how many times, you know…”
His hands slid down my neck; a potter’s palms around the neck of a spinning vase. I didn’t know this massage technique.
“Weekly?” asked Barry.
“Mwah.”
“More often?”
The hands now went up along my neck.
“Yes.”
And down again.
“But you’re in your own classroom almost every morning.”
Hands slid up.
“Are you spying on me or something?”
And down.
“Not at all, I’m just up a little earlier than you sometimes.”
And as Barry’s hands went up again, I realized what I’d missed in this morning’s puzzle.
One: Barry was already awake. Two: His own mat had been empty all morning. Three: Leo hadn’t been alone the hours before.
“I was with him just last night,” I said quickly.
Immediately Barry started rubbing harder. I began to feel warm, Barry’s hands moving faster, my neck was burning hot now, but I was thinking about last night, about everything that could have happened after I left Leo’s classroom.
“Every night,” I said.
“What?”
“I sleep with him every night.”
Barry stopped.
His hands lay still around my neck; neither of us said anything. I stared at a little hand twitching up and down. “Your clock’s stopped,” I whispered eventually.
Then Barry began to squeeze.
“Hey!” I shouted.
But Barry didn’t seem to hear me. He squeezed and kept squeezing, I felt a cough coming, but all that came was wheezing, little black spots before my eyes.
“Bar… Barry…”
The back of my head tingled, the black spots became huge clouds: I could no longer see, only felt Barry’s hands, his fingers in my neck, nails in my skin, the way his grip growing stronger. And there they were again: the highways, the roadside restaurants, the logos, the golden edges, and, in the distance, rows of red lights. They were blinking, the lights; they blinked like broken traffic lights, and my steering wheel locked but the tires kept spinning, horns sounded, the golden lanes turned into streetlights, streetlights that kept coming closer, streetlights I shouldn’t crash into. My foot slipped off the gas pedal, my elbow rammed backwards. And hit Barry right in his stomach.
“Aaaah,” he groaned.
I grabbed my neck, it burned. “Jesus, Barry.”
“Shit,” I heard behind me. “Fuck.”
Carefully I turned around.
Barry was on the floor, staring down in a daze. Like a child who doesn’t get why the puzzle’s remaining pieces don’t fit together.
“Barr?”
He kept staring at the floor. I slipped off the chair and sat down next to him.
“You’re scaring me, Barry. You’re acting weird.”
Barry nodded slowly. More in response to something he had realized himself than to what I said, it seemed. With red eyes he stared at me. Then he slowly stretched out his arm, his index finger pointing to my chest. Reconciliation, I thought: reconciliation like apes do it, only without the curled-up lips.
“Sorry, Merel. I’m sorry. Really.”
His fingers traced my neck, carefully ran through my hair. Brushed a brittle lock behind my ears.
“Sorry,” Barry whispered again.
He sniffed, swallowed, put an arm around me, and pressed his face against mine. His snot stuck cold to my cheek as he whispered, “It’s just been such a weird day today.”
Day 129
“Good morning, beautiful!”
“Has the mailman been yet?”
“He’s not coming, it’s Sunday.”
“Ah.”
“Are you expecting anything?”
“A letter from Barry, about when his plane’s coming in.”
“Didn’t see it. Tomorrow maybe?”
“Who knows? I just hope the mailman’s got
snow tires.”
Day 99
Barry is Mickey Mouse. It was him, all this time. It happened right in front of my eyes and I don’t get how I could’ve missed it. My classroom has ceiling tiles; they’re white with gray dots. They have different sizes, the dots, and seem randomly distributed. On the ceiling tile right above my mat, for instance, three dots overlap; one big dot with two smaller ones on top; one head with two round ears: the Mickey Mouse logo. Probably the result of an algorithm invented to simulate chance. Simulated chance isn’t really chance, although the logo probably wasn’t sprayed there on purpose. What I mean is: For weeks I stared at those dots every morning. But only on the fiftieth day did I see that they form Mickey Mouse’s head. It’s the same with Barry. I think I know what’s going on, and now that I see it, I don’t get how I could have ever not seen it. But I already told you that, I think? Sorry, I write before I think now; I should be doing the reverse, otherwise you won’t get it. But at the moment my thoughts are like ants: They may look like they’re swarming all over the place, but they’re really heading for one clear goal, yes, everything supports this realization. Barry is Mickey.
Create order, I will create order. Collect my thoughts, so I can explain it to you.
All right. As I told you before, there were once seven of us here. Back then, in the days just after the bang, I found a pill bottle in my trashcan. It had contained Halopax. That’s something people took in the old situation when they felt or saw things they didn’t want to feel or see. Sometimes those things were really there, sometimes not. Anyhow, when someone stopped taking these pills they changed into someone who thought too fast or too slow, or someone who was very happy and then very sad again; in any case someone they didn’t want to be, otherwise they never would have started taking the pills. And if someone isn’t who they want to be, they can get sad. Or angry. Or both. When we found a second bottle, we suspected that the owner had had a reserve supply, which he or she had just run out of. I believed that owner was Natalie. Because Natalie started keeping to herself, crying more often, complaining, talking about things others couldn’t see. And after fifty-five days deciding to carry Yuri off into the fog. All strange behavior befitting someone who doesn’t function normally without medication. At least, that’s what Barry said. I made a list of it in Melissa’s diary:
Barry was the first who said that the pills could be Natalie’s (day 22)
Barry didn’t believe they were Kalim’s (day 22)
Barry said that Yuri must have gotten the second bottle from Natalie (day 53)
Barry said that Natalie had been talking nonsense when he overheard her one night (day 53), and that she lied about talking to him (day 54)
I believed Barry. Because I believed he believed it himself. But now I think something else.
He must have had a modest reserve that ran out a few weeks after Natalie and Kaspar’s departure. That’s when he began acting strangely. Frantically energetic around my birthday, short and crabby the days after, and extremely volatile during the last massage, the first and only time I was afraid of him. That was on day forty-eight. Soon afterwards he suddenly spent entire days lying on his desk.
I have to ask him, find out if it is true.
Leo doesn’t get it. “Are you still going on about those pills?” he said. And: “Whether they are Barry’s or not doesn’t change anything about the situation.”
“It does,” I said, “it really does.”
We were doing our daily circuit, and at the bottom of the stairs Leo stopped. “Yeah, it changes your situation. You get an answer to your question. But why do you want to know things that don’t make a difference whether you know them or not?”
“Why do you care?”
“Barry wants to get away from here, Merel.” Leo nodded briefly in the direction of the stairs, to the second floor, where Barry probably still lay underneath the red sheet, the door to his classroom closed.
“But maybe he doesn’t really want to get away!” I said. “Maybe he just thinks that, because he doesn’t have his pills.”
Leo grabbed the railing and squeezed. Perhaps afraid he would squeeze something else if he didn’t. “Aren’t the thoughts someone has without medication the only real ones, Merel?”
I looked at Leo’s hands. They relaxed, white knuckles tinting red. “That sounded like something you’d say,” Leo whispered.
I slowly nodded, heard Leo mumble sorry, and let him put his hands on my hips. “I mean it,” he said. “I’m sorry. But sometimes I just don’t get you.”
I still said nothing, thought about what Leo had said. Maybe confronting Barry really would only change my situation. But that didn’t necessarily seem like a reason not to do it.
“Come,” Leo said, “let’s make a fire.”
Day 100
The letter was stuck to his door with scotch tape. The title page of The Brothers Lionheart, folded over, my name on it. I read it immediately, in the hallway. And I guess I’ll let you read it too:
Dear Merel
I don’t know if you’re coming by again but I think you will, because so far you’ve kept coming, even though I am horrible to you and never say anything. Really, I want you to know: I think it is really sweet what you’re doing for me now. Really fucking sweet, Merel. There just is no need though. I find it easy saying no to myself. But not to you. That’s why nothing ever comes out, that’s why I never say anything.
But yesterday you suddenly came here with all these questions. I thought about it, and I don’t want you to think things about me that are not true. That is why I’ll do it like this, with this letter.
You asked again what’s going on. Why I am lying here all of a sudden, you wanted to know. Like some crazy person, I can see that too. But we are just waiting, Merel. Waiting until it’s over. They are not coming to get us; there is nothing out there anymore. We all know that much, the pink elephant in the room. And you guys play your games of poker and walk your little circuit to make the waiting bearable. But what made the waiting bearable for me is now no longer there. It was never even there. Not really, at least. Even though I briefly, very briefly, believed that maybe it was. I was an idiot, an IDIOT, Merel. And the fact that you guys now know that, that thought is why I now feel best with a blanket over my head. So no one can see me and I don’t have to see anyone. Because I can’t do it. And don’t get me wrong, I’m so happy for you. I mean, if I can’t have it, at least let one of us have it. And I care a fucking lot about you, you know that, right; without you I probably would have never even made it this far. But if I see you now I will start to hate you and I do not want that. I only want it to stop now. So you don’t have to bring anything anymore. Really you don’t.
And then your other question (which you might have thought was an answer to your first question?), those bottles (are you still thinking about them?!): They weren’t mine. I would never lie to you about that. I can’t even imagine, I really don’t want you to think that. All this time, you and I: On the same team, dear. The same team. Until now.
A hundred kisses. I love you, ok?
B.
As soon as Kalim had gone to bed, I gave Leo the letter. He read it in the faint light of the last flames, the words close to his face.
Then he was silent, thinking. Not about my question, I felt he knew the answer. No, He was considering whether he would give me that answer.
“Here,” I said, and pointed to that one line again: And the fact that you guys now know that.
“What does this mean? What do we know?”
Leo shook his head.
“Come on,” I said. “What does Barry mean? I can see that you know!”
“Yes,” Leo now said, “I have an idea.”
“Then say it!”
“Sorry. I can’t.”
“Did you talk?”
Leo sighed. “No.”
“Then how do you know?”
Leo sighed again, pulled a piece of origami paper from the stack and wadded it
up. With a little arc he threw it into the fire, more for the act than for the effect: The wad didn’t burn, the fire was already smoldering.
“Just say it!”
Leo got up, walked to the end of the bench.
“Ok,” he said without looking back. “There was a letter, earlier. To me, from Barry.”
We had talked about Barry so much, speculated for hours about what was going on with him.
“And you never thought to tell me about that letter?”
“It was private,” said Leo. “And I’m not going to say any more, I don’t think that’d be fair to Barry.” Leo bent over. Lifted the bucket, doused the fire. It softly hissed. The smoke was invisible, but we knew that if we stayed our eyes would start to sting. Silently we walked to our classrooms.
“Just go get that letter,” I said when we stood outside Leo’s classroom.
“No,” Leo said. He opened his door, went inside. I stayed in the doorway.
“Are you coming?”
He hadn’t lied, only omitted something. I just didn’t understand why. “Private” didn’t seem like an argument when someone has decided to stop eating. Private is a luxury. Luxury is irreconcilable with matters of life and death. And suddenly I felt very, very far removed from the man standing right in front of me.
“Come,” I heard Leo say, “come.”
A hand around my waist, an arm under my leg. Leo carried me across the threshold.
Day 101
This is how I’d calculated it: he would undress (10 seconds), stand under the cold water (2 minutes), dry off (1 minute), really dry off (1 minute), dress (10 seconds), and walk back to the classroom (40 seconds). So I had five minutes total.
* * *
At six minutes to three I went into Leo’s classroom. I first looked in the drawer of the teacher’s desk. There Leo keeps his driver’s license, wallet, keys, phone; the valuables of the old situation. I folded open the wallet, looked at the ID picture behind the plastic membrane. Leo as a teenager: sunken cheeks, spiked greasy hair, his forehead red with zits. “That’s what I look at when I don’t feel good about myself,” Leo once told me. I folded the wallet shut, what I was looking for wasn’t in there,
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