The Sun Rises Once

[1]

I waited for a long time by the café counter, feeling at once sad and happy. The faces around me looked as pale as death. My coffee was getting cold. One customer was sipping his juice, but I wasn’t drinking. I had been waiting for a long time, so I couldn’t share other people’s happiness. Faces looked pale. Just a few yards away, the clean shop-windows reflected a tableau that edged towards silver. . . . Four p.m. . . . I let my coffee get cold. “Maybe she’s not coming,” I told myself. The coffee no longer tasted good; it felt weak on my tongue . . . it had lost the zing I was used to . . . that wonderful sweet bitterness. I started telling myself that everything is subject to change, even the heart of a woman who pretends to be faithful.

But I was wrong. My sweetheart did come, her eyes colorfully bright . . . rhythmic melodies. . . . Then, . . . then the world turned into a happy child who knows nothing of sorrow.

I left my stool and walked toward her.

“Will you sit with me?” I asked as I blew both happiness and cigarette-smoke in her face.

“No, I can’t,” she replied

“Why not?” I said. “You can do anything.”

“You’re wrong, but thank you for thinking so.”

“Let’s go somewhere else,” I suggested. “That may be better.”

We sat on a wooden bench in the park where children were playing.

“Do you like children?” I asked my sweetheart.

“Yes,” she replied.

“Do you want us to have children?” I asked.

“Our relationship wouldn’t allow it,” she replied.

“Why not?” I asked. “Don’t you love me?”

“No, I admire you.”

I said nothing but stared at the children. . . . As I waved my fingers in the air, I watched her hair being blown by a slight breeze. I suggested that we get up and stroll along the wide street. . . . People’s faces still looked pale, and store-fronts no longer reflected the sunlight. . . . Could such tall buildings ever reflect sunshine?

I said goodbye to my sweetheart and walked away, heading down toward the suq . . . and enjoying the display of human stupidity.

[2]

“I love you so much,” I told my mother that evening. “You’re wonderful . . . you’re a saint.”

She gave me a kiss and hugged me. I was touched.

“My son,” was all she said.

I used to love my mother so much. It never occurred to me that someone could change my love for her . . . but things are always changing. . . . I had the impression that my sweetheart, who, as she put it, didn’t really love me but only admired me, was in control of my feelings. She was throttling my heart (even so, my sweetheart, I’ll still worship you for ever and ever . . . ). She has managed to replace my mother in my heart, but now my mother is going to reclaim her place. That very evening, I expressed my long-suppressed feelings to her, the loving, unspoken relationship I had with her. My mother is wonderful; she can control the world with her finger. So often she has told me that she couldn’t live without me. Her husband still loved her even so. He isn’t my real father, but she thought she would be able to compensate for my own father, who had been snatched away by the darkness. What a kind mother! Yes, I love you too; I can’t live without you. Look up at the sky and stare at the pale moon; that’s where our gazes will meet, and you will find out just how much I love you, the way a child loves his mother. . . . Don’t you realize that you are the most precious thing in the world? Please believe it . . . !

That night I stared at the moon longer and longer; the geometrical pattern in the sky kept moving toward the east, but I couldn’t detect any motion. Yet my imagination was too strong to be defeated: I loved my sweetheart, I loved the moon, I loved the night, but I didn’t love my stepfather. He reminded me of the Jewish character in Jean Anouilh’s play, Invitation to the Palace. Too many speeches and declining values. . . . What’s the value of money compared to gaining the love of a companion? A woman may be impressed by her boyfriend’s wealth, but she will never love him (I don’t think that my mother loved her husband for his money, but he certainly loved her till death did them part. And let’s bear in mind that women have only recently acquired the right to fall in love). Sweetheart, I don’t want to be admired; I want to be loved . . . Never forget that the world functions only on the basis of love. Without love, the moon will never shine. I will keep waiting and waiting. . . .

That night I slept better than I had ever slept before. . . . I felt totally shattered, and yet I had the sensation of loving the whole of humanity the same way.

[3]

Next day I walked along dirty, garbage-laden streets, the kind where children eat their own snot. I needed to go there. Narrow, dirt-encrusted eyes stared at me. . . . I paid no attention and went into the nearest house. . . . When I left, I was feeling sadder than ever before. . . . My imagination took over. I was bound to get syphilis . . . but I would still go on living, even if I caught the disease. . . .

“The world can go wherever. . . . Nobody can change its direction . . .”

Once I found myself on wider streets, I collapsed on to a chair at the nearest café. . . . I ordered a black coffee and then started staring at all the pale faces. . . . For a long time I waited for my sweetheart to pass by so I could ask her if she still admired me or had moved on to the stage of real love. I could put on a brave front and take whatever she had to say; to hell with feeling down. I waited for ages, but she didn’t come. Syphilis kept threatening me with a lingering death. But, in spite of it all, I still love humanity. I shall return to the back streets where the encrusted, narrow eyes are to be found and children feed on snot . . . and the Jew will have to learn how to be happy with his money. . . .