SEVERAL ISSUES WERE hiding behind the apparently simple question she asked with no visible emotion, as she dipped a piece of chocolate roll into her café au lait. “Let’s go for a walk.” I was avoiding her banal question that was not banal at all. I’ve never cared for walking. It’s an exercise that combines contemplation and boredom and has no objective at all, practiced by old men who don’t like television and lonely people who distrust life. I don’t remember ever having walked without a goal in mind: a corner store, a market, a meeting place. My steps must produce tangible results. You don’t walk for no reason. I decided to turn onto Herenstraat and inspect the shop windows, then go as far as the big park at the end of the street, and see what that outsized, baroque, white pavilion in the middle of it was about.
Concealed behind Myriam’s simple question was everything I did not yet understand and that frightened me, despite my happiness. What do we do? We, you and me. What will we do tomorrow, you and I? What’s the plan for us, you and me? It’s not the future that concerned me, it’s this thing called us we were creating, that I desired as much as I feared.
“We’ll go for a walk, it’s nice out. There’s a park at the end of Herenstraat.”
That was what she wanted. I knew that in the park in front of the white pavilion, she would watch the pond and without looking my way, ask, “Now what do we do?” The only original street in Voorburg that called itself “the village” was of no interest at all with its shabby stores. I discovered that the white pavilion was a somewhat chic restaurant patronized by hefty, middle-age Dutch ladies and red-faced accountants. The swans on the pond gave the place a touch of elegance, and the old oak trees, some distinction. Except for my black ducks, I never thought of looking at birds or animals with any sense of pleasure—let alone trees. “Now what do we do?” I knew it. The question would return constantly like a mantra, or a verse from the Koran. “We’ll go back to the hotel.” “Okay, but tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, next week, next month, next year…?”
I liked Myriam very much. I didn’t want to tell her that Kabanga had pushed me into her arms, that Kabanga being freed had laid me down on top of her, and that anger helped me discover the desire to live, and not her small breasts and her shy smile, though those things drew me to her. I couldn’t imagine myself without her now. The tree I admired was because of her. Otherwise I’d be in my room ruminating or consulting my files. I was less afraid, but still untrusting. Happiness was like a springtime flower.
She took my hand and held it tight. I had to answer her.
“We’re going to live in Bunia.”
Maybe I went too far. We’re going to live in Bunia. I should have said, “We’ll go and visit Bunia.” For now, we’re going to live in the Mövenpick a few more days so I can finish the complex transactions that await me. Transferring my money to a bank that has relations with the Congo, with the promise that I’ll be able to access my funds there. I have no intention of strolling around with thousands of dollars in cash in my pocket.
The us was settling in, and this personal pronoun worried me, despite how often it was used. “Let’s go to Martin’s place, the wine bar, you can meet my old companions in solitude.” Those companions tended to be homosexual, and discreet since they were civil servants or diplomats or judges, but they did have an eye for women. They recognized beauty and grace in an instant and were effusive with their compliments when I introduced Myriam. She played the game much better than I did, since I never knew what to say when someone paid me even the ghost of a compliment. They asked about her clothes, and she twirled and made her long dress dance, then put on the timid, feminine look of a Somali woman in a foreign land. It was an act for the benefit of White men. Other men’s eyes on Myriam comforted and delighted me. I could see it and feel it, she was watching me like a fawn hiding in a thicket. What fear can be born of admiration? I asked Martin as we smoked a cigarette in the doorway of his bar. Martin had that beauty that aging men have when they retain their elegance and wisdom, and sometimes he spoke of his secret garden, which he recalled without going into detail. “The fear of love, Claude. But I think you are in love.” Myriam had stopped smiling. The customers were cackling away, and she shot me a desperate look. We took the last train to Voorburg. The car was dirty, the train noisy, and a group of punks amused themselves by terrorizing the passengers. I held her hand and she put her head on my shoulder, and if the trip had been longer than four minutes, I think she would have fallen asleep. I don’t know if I was in love the way Martin thought, but I know I have a woman for the first time in my life. Have a woman. Do women say “have a man?” I don’t think so.