The Twin

For a while now the weather has been very still. The weather report in the newspaper and the weather girl on TV - who’s so cheery it always sounds like she’s saying hello when she talks about a high - predicted sun, but we got mist. Cold mist. A couple of days ago the sun started shining after all, but it’s still cold. Freezing February weather. There’s a layer of ice on the ditches but I needn’t bother going to Big Lake; the temperature creeps up above zero in the daytime. Ada’s husband is muck spreading and he’s not the only one. Ada herself has washing on the line. The weather is perfect for both things, but they’re not a good combination: manure and clean laundry.

I love sun in February. This time last year Teun said, “Dead wood is beautiful too.” I don’t know what made him come out with it but he was right, even though the trees and bushes without leaves aren’t dead. Low sun on bare branches is beautiful. On its branch in the ash, the hooded crow is more alert than usual and more cyclists come past than a few days ago. The sun has a different effect on Henk. He’s in bed.

This morning I woke him up by knocking on the door.

“Go away,” he shouted.

I opened the door, felt for the light switch with my left hand and turned on the light. He had pulled the duvet up over his head. The African-animal cover was in the wash, he was now sleeping under dark-blue letters and numbers. Henk doesn’t have an alarm clock. “What’s the matter?” I asked.

“Nothing.”

“Why aren’t you getting up then?”

“Don’t feel like it.”

“Get out from under that duvet.”

“Don’t be so childish.”

“Look who’s talking.”

The duvet slipped down. His ginger hair had grown, it was time for him to get it cut again. He stared at me with drowsy eyes. There was a Walkman among the clothes on the floor next to his bed. A few butts lay in the ashtray on the bedside cabinet. Teun’s poster - still rolled up - was against the skirting board.

“Could you move out of the doorway, please?” he asked.

“Why?”

“It looks horrible, you standing there like that. It’s scary.”

I walked into the new room and sat down on the chair. Henk slid up in bed so that his shoulders came to rest against the wall. The window was open, it was cold. Despite the twenty-five-watt bulb, I could see the hairs on his arms standing up. “What’s the matter, Henk?”

“Nothing. I told you.”

“Why don’t you get up then?”

“I’m scared.”

“What of?”

“I don’t know.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Me neither.”

He keeps snapping back and forth between boy and man. Sometimes I feel like I should take him by the hand, at other times he towers over me. He is unpredictable. He took the packet of cigarettes from the bedside cabinet and lit one, blowing the smoke up at the open window.

“I’d rather you didn’t do that,” I said.

“No doubt,” he said. And then, in a different tone. “I hear noises, at night.”

“What kind of noises?”

“Animals. At least I hope so.”

“That’s no reason to be frightened, surely?”

“Short, high-pitched yapping noises.”

“That’s the coots.”

“It drives me up the wall. And your father coughs in bed.”

“Is that so terrible?”

“I feel sorry for him,” he said quietly.

“Go in and sit with him sometimes.”

Again he looked at me as if I’d asked him to lay out a dead body. “Coots,” he said, “are they the black ones with those ridiculous big feet?”

“That’s right.”

He stubbed out the cigarette. The stench of smoldering filter drifted up towards me. He snuggled back down in bed and pulled the duvet up over his head again. “Will you turn off the light when you leave?” he asked.

Father called out when I walked past his bedroom. I opened the door but left the light off and didn’t go in.

“Is Henk smoking in the new room?”

“Yes.”

“Tell him it’s not allowed.”

“I did. He doesn’t listen.”

“I have to go to the toilet.”

“Later.”

I did everything myself this morning and I didn’t find it easy, I wasn’t back in the house until nine. The yearlings were restless, they’re already used to Henk, I do things differently. In a few days, when it’s a bit warmer in the daytime, I’ll put the donkeys out again.

The young tanker driver is looking at the sight glass when I step into the milking parlor. In the time it takes me to reach him a number of names that start with G have run through my mind and I’ve latched onto his. Ever since Henk has been here, I’ve wanted to introduce him to Galtjo. I don’t know why, I’ve just wanted to see them together and stand between them.

“How do you manage to get that thing so clean?” he says.

“I rinse it nice and hot,” I say.

“They’ve found a replacement for Arie.”

“You’ve got a new workmate then.”

“Yes and no.”

“Yes and no?”

“He’s going to do this run, I’m moving to another district.”

“You won’t be coming here any more?”

“No.”

His eternal smile becomes a crooked grin.

“Where?”

“Oh, near Bovenkarspel. I live up there.”

“Well, all the best, then.” I hold out a hand, which he shakes, somewhat surprised. I turn and walk to the scullery door. “See you round, Galtjo,” I say, just before going into the scullery.

“Um, yeah,” he says.

I close the door behind me and go over to the shed door on the other side of the room. One of the two light switches is next to it. I turn the light off and come back to stand in front of the window, four or five feet back. The young tanker driver stares at the door, shakes his head and looks in the storage tank. A little later he unscrews the hose and winds it round the reel. He unhooks the lid of the tank and carefully lowers it. He fills in a form, looks around the milk parlor one last time and pulls open the cab door. As supple as ever, he jumps up. The tanker disappears and bright light pours into the milking parlor. The storage tank shines.

Solidarity, a fine thing.

I go in, walk up the stairs and bring Father back down. I put him on the toilet.

“Ow,” I hear him mutter.

“What is it?” I ask through the closed toilet door.

“It hurts.”

“Wipe properly,” I say.

“It hurts,” he says again.

I pull open the door. He’s sitting on the toilet like a half-dead bird, a piece of toilet paper in one hesitant hand. He looks at me with big, helpless eyes. “Just stay there,” I say. I walk to the kitchen and get a flannel out of the linen cupboard. I turn on the hot water and moisten the flannel. I walk back to the toilet. “You have to bend forward a little.” He does. Carefully I wipe his bum a few times with the warm flannel.

“Pants up,” I say, while lifting him up under his armpits. He obeys. I carry him upstairs. A strange sound is coming from the new room, a shrill, rhythmic sound. I lay Father in bed and tuck him in. Then I walk to the new room. I pull open the door and in two steps I’m standing at Henk’s bed. I tear the headphones off his head. “Now get up out of your bloody bed!” I shout.

“No,” says Henk.

I tear the duvet off him and drag him out of bed by one arm. He doesn’t have time to get his legs under him and falls onto the floor. “Get up!” I shout.

“Take it easy,” he says.

“Get up!”

He scrambles to his feet.

“Get dressed.” I hook my foot under his jeans and kick them towards him. They land on his bare feet. He looks down. I feel like hitting him, hitting him and kicking him. His semi-naked body here in this small room is too much for me. Instead of doing it, I walk over to the poster lying innocently against the skirting board, bend over and start to tear it up. Henk looks at me and pulls on his jeans. Then he pulls a T-shirt over his head.

“Teun will be pleased,” he says sheepishly.

“Socks,” I say.

He sits down on the bed and puts on his socks.

I grab him by one arm, jerk him to his feet and shove him over to the door. “Get to work,” I say. But I think, What’s he going to do?

He walks out onto the landing calmly, then runs to the door of Father’s bedroom, pulls it open and disappears inside. An artery in my neck pounds so hard I have to put my hand to it. I stand still for a moment, then turn around and go back into the new room. I pick the Walkman up off the floor and lay it on the bedside cabinet. The duvet is on the floor behind the bed, half of the girl singer’s face whose name I’ve forgotten is lying at my feet. I flick the thick paper a couple of times with my big toe. I pick up the duvet, spread it out over the bed and lie down on top of the dark-blue letters and numbers. I close my eyes.

It must be a couple of hours later. I’m hungry. I haven’t slept, but I haven’t been thinking either. I’ve been lying on someone else’s bed and seeing my own large bed before me. I used to go to bed to sleep and get up to milk. Now I notice more and more that my bed has become a place to rest. Not to sleep, but to rest. Sometimes I do my best to avoid falling asleep. Because too much happens in the daytime. The bed has become a safe place, like a shed full of cows in the winter or, until recently, Father’s bedroom. Before getting into bed, I look at the map of Denmark and recite the names of a few towns or villages. I no longer concentrate on Jutland. I no longer wonder where Jarno Koper has settled. More and more often, I take a nap in the afternoon.

“Helmer?”

I open my eyes. Henk is standing in the doorway.

“What do you want?”

“Old Mr. van Wonderen . . . your father says you have to go and do the milking.”

“Why?”

He turns. I hear him asking Father why. He comes back.

“Because it’s already five o’clock.”

“Tell him to do it himself.”

He’s about to turn around again but reconsiders. “He can’t,” he says.

“Why not?”

“He can’t walk.”

“No?”

“No.” I can tell from the look of him that he’s too scared to come in. It’s his room, with his things in it. His eyes keep returning to the packet of cigarettes. It must be at least two hours since he’s had a smoke.

“Maybe I should get moving then,” I say.

“May I . . .”

“It’s your room, isn’t it?”

“You’re lying on my bed.”

“That’s true.”

He comes in, picks the cigarettes up off the bedside cabinet, takes one out and lights it. I sit up straight and swing my legs off the bed.

“Are you going to do the yearlings?”

“Of course.”

“And are you going to help me tomorrow with the new fence along the side of the donkey paddock?”

“Sure.”

“Good. Have you been in there with Father the whole time?”

“Yes. But he falls asleep a lot.”

“He’s very old.”

“He sure is. Christ.” He stubs his cigarette out in the ashtray.

“Come on,” I say.

Going out onto the landing he looks over his shoulder quickly, as if to make sure nothing has changed in his bedroom. I see it because I have turned around to make sure he is following me.

“About time,” Father mutters in his bedroom.

“Mind your own business,” I say, closing the door.

“It is my business,” he shouts.

“How old are you actually?” Henk asks me on the stairs.

“Fifty-five.”

“Really? Your hair’s still completely black.”

In the scullery we pull on sweaters and overalls. Henk puts the packet of cigarettes in his breast pocket and runs his fingers through his hair. We set to work, the farmer and his hand.