19

Guests

My heart pounded when I heard his knock at the door. This heart of mine had waited for him for so long! I decided not to hold it back. Let it love as much as it wanted, as much as it can. Let it love so hard that it breaks!

“I hope it’s not too late?” he asked, entering with a smirk.

“Just in time,” I answered, smiling broadly.

He sat down. He looked around my room and said, “Your walls seem strange, upside down. How dreary.”

“Maybe they’re angry that you haven’t been here in so long.”

“Did they hear you complaining about me?”

“A little, but . . . how’s life?”

“I’m getting by.”

“That’s more than I can say.”

“What, you’re not?”

“No, I’m just—existing.”

“You know, your hair has grown much longer since I last saw you,” he said, stroking my hair.

“It’s thinner than it used to be, so it looks longer.”

“You always find a way to be self-critical.”

“Let others give me compliments.”

“You want others say nice things about you when you can’t say anything nice about yourself?”

“Of course. Can you kiss your own lips?”

“Well . . .”

“See, love is like anger. It takes two.”

There were footsteps outside the door. A. glanced unhappily at the bright gas lamp. B. would have thought nothing of dimming it until it was completely dark. Then he wouldn’t have been able to find a match to light it again. A. didn’t do this. Should I have done it instead? But that would have been . . .

A knock on the door. The landlady had a letter for me in B.’s handwriting. I couldn’t believe I was going to read a letter from B. in A.’s company!

“Don’t worry about me,” said A. “Read your letter! I’ll peruse your books. I see you have a lot of new ones.” I hurriedly read the letter:

“My dear, my love! Can you imagine how desperately I want to see you? It’s been three weeks since I was last with you. Three weeks! An eternity. Tomorrow or the next day—for certain—I will come to you for the whole evening, or perhaps until morning, as I did that time before. I have so much to say to you, or, if you would prefer it, we can say nothing at all! Yours, B., who may love you more than he loves himself, and that’s a remarkable thing! P.S.: Can you hear now, child, how my heart is pounding for you? No, you do not hear. And I can see how your eyes, so soft, and good, and bad, and wise, are smiling, smiling and almost laughing . . . Oh, my love!”

“You’re already done reading? What did he write?” A. asked teasingly.

“He’s well, thank God. The rest is no concern of yours.”

“When’s he coming to see you?” he prodded.

“Who knows.”

“Today?”

“Would you rather tomorrow?”

“Is that what you want?”

“No,” I said, looking him right in the eye. And I thought that B. might actually come, as his letter proposed, so I suggested that it might be better for us to go for a stroll. A. said that he would prefer to sit as we were, with my hand in his, listening to me talk. It was so warm and pleasant in my room. Outside the wind was blowing, and there were so many people.

We sat close to each other and both looked at the gaslight with the same thought—if only the light would go out on its own!

“Is the gaslight bothering your eyes?” A. asked quietly.

“Yes. Should I lower it?”

“No, let me—”

My heart was pounding harder, like it was applauding him for his initiative. I imagined the two of us sitting in the dark, clinging tightly to one another. I’d tell him all of my feelings. He would understand and passionately kiss my lips, my eyes, my hand, all of me.

A knock on the door. It jolted us like thunder. A. stood still, his hands poised at the gas lamp. I looked at him, bewildered.

“Well, open it.” And he went to look at my books.

Yes, I had no other choice. I opened the door. Rae and another girl with fiery red hair and blood-red lips came in.

“Oh, so it’s you!” the fiery girl cried out, and grabbed both of my hands. “I’ve heard so much about you! Rae says you are the cleverest girl in the world. I’m Katya.”

“Oh, Katya—” I remembered that Rae once told me about a Katya, a girl with a passionate soul, a taste for modern literature, who hated men and loved life. A unique girl, an eccentric. I introduced her to A.

“Do you speak Russian?” she asked him.

“No,” A. answered.

“But you understand it!”

“Only a little.”

“But you’re a Russian.”

“I’m a Jew.”

“All the same, you’re from Russia.”

“I’m an American citizen.”

“A citizen. How banal! And who do you vote for?”

“That’s not something I share.”

“Are you for women’s rights?”

“I’m for . . . the right women.”

A knock on the door. I opened it. It was B. Rae grew pale and turned to speak to A. B. looked at everyone curiously, and his gaze rested upon Katya. I introduced her to him: “This is Mr. B.”

“And my name is Katya!” she introduced herself.

“Oh, Katya?” B. repeated, laughing. “And how are you, Katya?”

“Fine. I’m alive.”

“It’s good that you’re living. And how are you?” he asked Rae.

“I’m living too.”

“So it seems that everyone is alive. Good! And do you know why I’ve come?” B. asked, turning to me. “I’ve come to ask you, in my daughter’s name, to come to our home for a party. And since you are here,” he said to A., “I will save the cost of stamps and invite you in person. It’s happening a week from today. Will you come? Good! And you can come too, Katya.”

“Will there be a Russian kruzhok?”

“A kru-what? Company, certainly. And a Russian samovar too.”

“Weren’t you born in Russia?”

“Of course, where else would I have been born?”

Katya asked questions like a class of kindergarteners. B.’s answers made everyone laugh. He exchanged glances with A. over Katya’s logic and smiled. So the evening passed, and as the evening went away, so did my guests.

I stood for a while in the dark and watched as they all went out together into the street. Rae with B. and A. with that girl Katya. Katya took A.’s arm and looked up at him with her vampire lips and, instead of love, my heart was filled with hatred. My soul was choking to death.

My love came looking for roses and found thorns instead.