Mona in Three Acts

by Griet Op de Beeck

  “What’s your favorite line from Chekhov?”

  “It’s from Uncle Vanya.” I’m so happy he’s chosen my favorite playwright, I don’t even have to think about my answer. “As you know, Sonya is head over heels for the doctor. Everyone’s noticed, except the doctor himself. In the end, her stepmother tries to intervene: ‘You know what? If you let me, I’ll talk to him . . . I’ll do it carefully, only hints . . .’ And then Sonya replies, and here it comes: ‘No, it’s better not to know . . . At least there is hope.’”

  “Hmm,” Marcus says, a vague smile showing on his face for the first time. “And what does that say about you?”

  “Everything, probably,” I say as airily as possible.

  “Will you at least have a drink with me now?” he asks then.

  “A pint of beer,” I say.

  He slams his fist three times on the table, like a round of applause for my drinking.

  3

  There’s a party. We don’t start rehearsals until next week, but Marcus feels the first stages have gone well. One of the advantages of working in theater is that any reason for a party is good enough, even no reason at all. Marcus has invited people who are connected to the company in some way. He struts from one group to the next. The music is loud, there’s drinking, smoking, laughing, noisy arguments, and intimate chats. I move around between actors who are my heroes and try to act as though I belong here, as though I find this normal. I’m just heading for the bathroom when Louis stops me. He’s an author whose books I like, and he’ll be writing a play for Marcus later this season.

  “Such dreadful music. Why don’t you come outside with me? I’ll share my cigarette with you.”

  I don’t tell him I’ve actually given up smoking, just follow him upstairs to an improvised roof terrace. He lights the cigarette, sucks on it greedily, and then gives it to me. We stand there and smoke. We’ve never met before, yet we dare to just stand there in silence, which I find quite unusual. We study the late light falling across the housefronts, the church steeples in the distance, the confusion of roofs around us, the square at the front of the building, and the canal between the long rows of plane trees on the neighboring streets. Pigeons walk in circles, cooing noisily, like they’re trying to impress us.

  “If you’re as fierce as the look in your eyes, then you’re the only person I want to talk to tonight.” He says this with a smile that confuses me because it might be scornful, but it could also be genuinely inviting.

  “If you tackle life the same way you dare to stay silent with a stranger on a rooftop, maybe I feel the same.” I stare at him from under my eyebrows.

  He takes his cigarette back from me. The palm of his hand touches mine. He takes a drag and passes it over again.

  “Which play are you acting in this season?”

  “I’m a dramaturge.”

  “Oof,” he says, and then has to laugh.

  “Well, someone has to do it.” I laugh along, trying to gauge his expression at the same time. Perhaps he’s a man who always has a slightly mocking twist to his mouth, I find myself thinking. There’s a lot of irony in his novels.

  “If I asked you to come with me now, would you?”

  “Where to?”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t tell you. Would you come?”

  “Would you ask?”

  He just looks at me, not answering. Then Marcus and Sasha, an actress from the cast, come out onto the terrace. Marcus is wearing a dramatic scarf and carrying a glass of whiskey. He looks at me and says, “I thought you gave up smoking?”

  “I did,” I reply, grinning at Louis.

  Then Marcus immediately begins talking away about Louis’s latest novel and how it’s such a delicious fuck-you to prevailing capitalist norms, and how the omniscient narrator was such a daring choice. I see Louis frown and I go back inside where Jolene and Joris, two actors, wave me over. I’ve been friends with Jolene since I worked with her two years ago, I’m so glad she’s part of this.

  As I’m about to leave at the end of the evening, Louis stops me, just in front of the door. He takes my hand and plants a kiss on it. A bit of theatricality suits him, I think. “I’ll find you,” he says before spinning on his heels and disappearing.

  I walk home. The night is still reasonably warm. I’m happy I’m on foot because slowness helps me to reflect on what just happened. Nothing, probably, I think, it’s my life, after all. Yet I smile as I put the key in the front door. Maybe I’ll sleep well tonight for once.

  4

  “So, don’t forget, Charlie and I have supposedly known each other for a year, OK?”

  Lying is a national sport in our family. We learned it when we were little and it’s gotten into our bodies, like blood and water for other people. Daddy, who wanted to protect Marie from any rancor or possible calamity; Marie, who liked nothing better than to share secrets with us and then demand our loyalty. All of this to keep the so-called peace.

  Alexander is talking even faster than usual. He’s ironed his shirt, which he does only on holidays. He wraps his arm around Charlie’s hip, she kisses his neck in response. It’s all moved really fast, it’s true, but those two have taught each other what love is. That’s how it seems, anyway, and I’m happy to see it.

  “Oh yes, and better not kiss me inside, my parents are rather old-fashioned about that.”

  Alexander always talks about his “parents” and about “Mom” when he means Marie, even when she’s not there.

  Daddy is standing in the doorway waiting for us. “Come in, come in!” he shouts, as though he has to drown out the sound of seven cars racing past. When we’re inside, he offers Charlie his hand. “They’re getting prettier and prettier, my son’s girlfriends.” He gives her a big smile; Alexander pulls her closer.

  Marie comes in. “What would you like to drink?” She’s wearing a new dress, dun colored, constructed out of brownish wool, a kind of a sophisticated straitjacket. There should be laws to forbid such things, laws to protect people from occasional poor taste for their own sake and for the sake of the people obliged to witness it. All the same, the beautiful girl shines through in the older Marie, whatever she wears. “Oh, I’d heard we’d be meeting Alexander’s newest girlfriend. Remind me of your name?”

  “Charlie.” She holds out her hand.

  “How unusual!” Marie says.

  Alexander compliments Marie on her outfit. I ask my dad whether there’s any coffee.

  “Coming right up. Alexander, Charlie? Am I pronouncing it right? Char-lie?” As if there are thirty-seven different ways of saying the name.

  “Oh, I’ll have a glass of wine,” Alexander says.

  “At this time of day?” Marie purses her lips.

  “Good idea,” Charlie says. “I’d join you in any other circumstances.” No one picks up on her implication.

  “I’ve got a good Chablis,” Dad says, growing enthusiastic himself now. “I’ll open that. Anyone else for a glass? It’s a festive occasion, isn’t it, Mommy?” It seems like Dad’s prompting Marie, but when she doesn’t say anything, he simply goes to the kitchen.

  “All right, I’ll have one too, then,” she calls after him. Consistency is the last resort of the unimaginative, Oscar Wilde said a long time ago.

  “Not you, Mona?” Dad calls from the kitchen. “Come on, a glass of Chablis?”

  “All right, a small one, then.”

  Everyone is still standing up, as though we’ve never been here before.

  “Sit down, please. Vincent will be right back.”

  Alexander sits down in the middle of the biggest sofa and gestures to his girlfriend to join him. “Where’s Anne-Sophie?”

  “Lesson at music school,” Marie says. “They really push the children there: two theory lessons, one lesson on an instrument, and one on the history of music. Well, as long as it gives her an excuse not to have to spend time with her mother, eh?” She laughs then, a high-pitched cackle. “Joke. Her teacher says she’s very good, actually.” The
n she calls out to the kitchen, “Bring the good pralines too. The good ones, not the normal ones, they’re in the top right of the fridge in the gold-colored box, and put them on that pretty plate, you know the one.” Then she turns to me, runs her hand down my cheek, and says in a conspiratorial manner, quieter but still loud enough for everyone to hear, “You were going to start using that Chanel product, weren’t you? Like I suggested? I can feel the difference and that dull appearance is gone.” I haven’t started to use anything, but I still smile at her gratefully.

  “Well, Charlie, tell us something about yourself.”

  Alexander’s left knee bounces up and down. “Charlie’s a fashion designer. She’s worked in Paris and Berlin, and now she wants to start her own collection.”

  “Oh, she wants to do that or she’s doing it?”

  “I’m doing it,” Charlie says to stop Alexander from speaking for her purely from nerves. “The first reactions have been enthusiastic.” She looks cheerful, with a hint of a deep-down confidence. Some people can do that—simply believe in who they are and what they do.

  “And how old are you now, might I ask?” Marie says.

  Charlie is indeed visibly older than Alexander, who is twenty-one. His knee begins to bounce even faster.

  “I’m thirty-two.” Charlie glows as she says this.

  I loved this woman immediately, right from the first time I met her a few months ago. Alexander had sounded enthusiastic, but he was always like that at the start of every relationship and normally got fed up with them after three weeks. This time, though, I noticed that things were different, not because she was older but because she seemed to understand the way life worked—life, and what made him tick, that too, and she wouldn’t just be swept under the rug. It made me jealous.

  “Ah, eleven years older than Alexander, then. Ah.” A silence falls.

  “How many years is Vincent older than you, again?” Charlie asks Marie.

  Touché, I think. Nine years, in any case.

  “The man being a bit older, well, that’s different, of course. But anyway. Fashion?”

  “Yes.” Charlie nods.

  “I’ve made clothes myself in the past. And for the children when they were little. Did a lot of knitting too, crochet, embroidery, tried that too, but well, it was just a hobby for me.”

  “Same here, only I hope to be able to make a living from it.”

  “Hope’s a fine thing, yes.”

  Dad comes in with a tray with a coffeepot, four big glasses of white wine, and some pralines in a dish. He puts it down and Alexander immediately takes a praline.

  “Oops. You didn’t remember the good plate for the pralines, then? The one with the bunches of grapes along the edge?”

  “Um,” Daddy says, “I could only find this one.”

  “What a pretty dish,” I say, “stylish.”

  Dad nods gratefully and takes a praline as he sits down. He looks at Marie, smiling; she stares at the “wrong” dish with a frown on her face.

  I eat three pralines one after the other, murmuring now and then in an approving fashion. I look at Alexander and Charlie. There’s something Jane Birkin-ish about her: big eyes, full lips, small nose. Alexander looks older than twenty-one with his beard; I wonder if that’s why he’s grown it. The two of them will surely produce beautiful children.

  Suddenly, Alexander jabs his foot against mine as he says, “Almost a year now, or thereabouts.”

  “Yes, must be something like that.” I hadn’t realized we’d gotten on to this important topic of conversation.

  “What?” Marie says, looking at me. “You’ve met her already? Before us?” Marie takes small sips from her glass, like people do with hot tea.

  “Maybe more like ten months, and I’ve been busy. I can’t introduce you to just anybody.”

  “Oh, so you thought she was just anybody?”

  “Of course not.”

  Hopefully he’ll shut up now, I think, otherwise he’ll only make it worse.

  “Yes, of course you’re busy, son. A medical degree is nothing to sneeze at.” Then Dad turns to Marie. “He passed his first three years with flying colors, if only his grandfather had been alive to see it.”

  Alexander gives me a questioning look. I simply nod.

  “There’s actually a good reason we’re sitting here now. I have some fantastic news.” Alexander gulps so loudly we can hear it. “We’re expecting.”

  My brother asked me to come here with him—he was that scared of telling them. But it’s like I told him: I can’t do anything to help.

  A silence follows, not a polite one. No one looks at Dad, everyone looks at Marie.

  “You knew about this too, I take it,” Marie says to me.

  I nod. It seems something is expected of me now. This house is always so full of expectations, the trick is to sense them and deal with them, but I can’t think of anything concrete to do or say. Dad rearranges himself on the sofa, clears his throat, but then remains just as silent as everyone else. Marie purses her lips, as though trying to hold back all the things that come to her spontaneously.

  “We’re very happy,” Charlie says.

  “I get that you would be happy.” Marie doesn’t look at Charlie.

  “But you’ve got so much studying left to do, son,” Dad almost whispers. “How’s that going to work?”

  “Yes, so that’s the second piece of news. I left the program. I know what you think, but I’ve reflected long and hard. I’ve never dared to tell you before, but medicine isn’t really for me.”

  “But, son—” Dad’s voice is getting quieter and quieter.

  “My grades were good, while so many students drop out each year, so I carried on. Also because I know how important it was to you both. But to be honest, my heart wasn’t in it. I don’t want to study for a decade just to spend my life with the sick and dying. I don’t want to spend more time in hospitals than in my own house.”

  “But what are you going to—”

  “I’ve already found a job, at the Museum of Modern Art, right near our apartment. Marketing, developing small projects. They thought it was very interesting that a person with my CV would apply, and after the interview they decided to give me a chance. I’m starting in three weeks, shadowing a man with a lot of experience. I’m going to learn so much, and I think I’m going to be happy there.”

  They couldn’t have looked more shocked if he’d just told them he was going to jail for stealing a truckload of zucchini. Marie’s mouth is still hanging open, but she doesn’t speak.

  “But, son, why?”

  “Because I want to see my child grow up. Because acting like the-world-needs-me-constantly-and-so-I’m-always-busy-busy-busy isn’t a very interesting way to lead your life, as far as I’m concerned.”

  Dad smiles, like he always does when anyone says anything that hurts him.

  “Coffee, anyone?” Marie doesn’t wait for a reply but gets up and trots to the kitchen for mugs, her heels clicking frantically on the parquet floor. She walks the way women on the catwalk do, in a straight line, decisive, elegant, back straight, neck long. It’s every woman’s duty to be elegant, she believes. “Will you come and help me, Vincent?” My father stands up, shrugs apologetically, and follows.

  “That went well,” Charlie says with a laconic kind of laugh.

  Alexander looks perplexed.

  “We hardly expected anything else, did we?” I try to make it sound like a consolation.

  We’ve never learned how to handle this—disappointing them. We do it constantly, particularly me. Sometimes I picture myself through their eyes and see a girl with hair that’s too short, a face that’s too long, patchy eyebrows, and breasts too small and hips too wide, not the graceful beauty they’d hoped for. A life too messy and an apartment too small and in the wrong neighborhood. A nightlife too turbulent to lead to anything. Career decisions that don’t show enough ambition, not the fantastic career they’d dreamed of for me. Not enough money to be able
to easily do, and not do, what I want. Too many acquaintances I call friends. Too little time for my parents and too much for myself. A character too difficult for love. Too much of a thinker to be happy. Too weak, too probing, and too sensitive for the world that is hard, that’s how it is and they know everything about it. I can read their minds.

  Alexander had to compensate for the both of us. Us, the children Marie had gotten for free. If she’d been able to invent us herself, she never would have conceived us as we were. For a long time, it had seemed as though Alexander was going to work out, until now. I wonder whether this doesn’t give me a perverse kind of pleasure somewhere in the darkest depths of my mind, there with all those things that aren’t allowed to exist, that you won’t let exist.

  They’re gone for ages. Alexander talks to Charlie in muted tones. I eat another praline, which brings me to the edge of nausea. Then the door handle moves, our heads turn, we hear pinched voices through the crack, loud whispering. It’s unintelligible, which I’m glad about on my brother’s behalf and also on Charlie’s. Then the door opens completely. Dad walks toward us, apologizing with his face contorted into emphatic creases that Marie cannot see. Marie remains in the kitchen for a while first, her back to us. She blows her nose on a piece of paper towel, and only then does she come. Her makeup has been partly rubbed away but she leaves it like that. If you look at it objectively, it can be said that she cries a great deal and that’s because everyone is always against her—that’s how she sees it and that’s how she experiences it. Some people are so attached to their expectations that it’s almost impossible for them not to be fulfilled.

  “Sorry for getting emotional, folks, but I’m finding it difficult to process that you’re doing this to me, Alexander. You of all people.” She blows her nose one last time. “But all right, it will pass. Let’s talk about something else.” She lights up a cigarette and allows her hand to dangle nonchalantly. She even smokes with refinement. She blows the smoke shamelessly into the living room and says, “Charlie isn’t even three months gone yet. Anything can happen.”