Crumbs (9 page)

A pause.

‘And on it a forest…'

I was fiddling with the bottle in my hands. At great
length I studied the label and the date on it. I remembered the girl from the foundry. I thought of my malfunctioning glands. One hormone too much, another too little. My feelings come in waves, from happiness to hatred. But most often a mess of bittersweet sadness. Poet only needed his book as a prompt. He wasn't reading anymore but reciting.

‘And in the forest, trees…'

I looked at our hostess. She was listening to him intently. Whining always finds hearts full of pain and frustration. There's no real what-the-hell-do-I-care attitude in poets like there is in healthy people.

Maybe that's why nobody reads them.

‘And on trees, branches…'

I was bored to death. I kept turning the empty bottle in my hand. The girl really was in a trance. She didn't notice that my beer was gone. A betrayal from within your own camp.

I looked out on the empty street. I listened to the pensioners, who were going on about putting a stick up ‘their' asses and roasting ‘them' over a fire.

It would be good to ask poet what the title of the poem was. ‘Botany for Beginners'?

‘And on branches, leaves…'

I moved to another chair and opened my legs. With my knee I touched her thigh. She didn't move away.

I put my hand on the bare skin. Pulled her skirt up and slid my palm towards the warmth between her legs.

She squeezed her legs and grabbed my hand. Not in defence.

‘And the leaves are moving in the wind…'

My middle finger, the finger made for knocking on the door when visiting, penetrated first. My index finger
didn't want to be left behind.

‘To and fro. They touch and then move away…'

Poet didn't notice anything. The booklet lay closed on the table.

He was staring at the wall between the girl and me.

‘Some meet, others don't…'

She tried to stay calm. Motionless. She was biting her lips. She wasn't listening to Poet anymore. My usual flaw. I always want to be the centre of attention.

‘The wind moves them, the wind carries them away…'

She was kneading my arm. Her nails dug into the material of my jacket.

‘They go yellow and then they rot away…'

Her breathing got shallower and faster.

‘That's why we people are like leaves…'

Poet raised his voice. The finale was coming. We weren't far behind.

‘The wind which brings us closer and then moves us apart…'

She grabbed the bulge on my trousers, There was no time to unzip them. That's why for centuries they used buttons. They tear beautifully in such situations.

‘And kills us…'

I fixed my eyes on Poet's watch and didn't look around. I didn't care if anybody saw us.

‘And what is that, the contact between the leaves?' he asked in a loud voice.

We didn't answer. Only our fingers went faster and faster.

‘LOVE !!!' howled Poet.

‘LOVE !!!'

‘LOVE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!'

And he collapsed breathlessly onto the table. We are
waiting for him there.

We looked at each other, our heads together, out of breath like marathon runners.

‘Did you like it?' Poet asked the girl.

‘Yes,' she breathed and blushed.

‘Not bad,' I added. He didn't hear my positive tone. He probably wasn't expecting it from me.

Everybody's got a circle of people they turn to when they're hungry for praise. I went to the toilet. I wiped my pants with toilet paper and rinsed my prick under the tap. The water heater wasn't working. The cold deflated my prick in front of my very eyes.

I went back. There was a stranger in my chair.

‘We're going,' he hurriedly explained.

Indeed, he got up. The girl avoided my eyes. His hair was combed very tidily and covered in brilliantine. He too was about forty years behind his time. I looked at their faces and I could only see them in black and white, retouched, slightly faded. A wedding picture in a rococo frame hanging above a marital bed. And on the bed, a doll that says MAMA if you lay her down.

They left. From the door, she sent me the kind of hot and passionate look that the man by her side would probably never receive.

Even housewives sometimes take a walk on the wild side.

Poet looked after them sadly. There went his audience.

I sat back in my chair and lit up. I offered Poet a cigarette, too. We smoked in silence.

I wasn't sure that the girl really had taken the whole thing just as a little distraction from everyday life. I wouldn't want to give her any false hopes.

I'm really not a good person. After the two parties, I
had decided to apologise to her and promised myself never to do it again. I did do it for the third time and again I was making the same promises. It was clear to me I wouldn't keep them. I just forgot as I went along. Maybe I should have a career in politics.

‘What's this?' asked Poet, gesturing at the magazine. I turned its front cover up. He reached for it and looked at the centrefold with great pleasure. I put the magazine under my T-shirt. I was still upset. The news had just finished on the radio. Country music was playing. They had started with the right song.

At first I only listened but soon I was singing along loudly. My worry turned into laughter at myself.

‘IT'S NOT LOVE BUT IT'S NOT BAD.'

The waitress looked out of the kitchen and shouted ‘Oi, what's the matter with you? Can't you read?'

With her raised right hand, she pointed above her head. She pointed to the right sign without looking at it.

NO SINGING

Next to it there were many other signs. She could easily have pointed to a different one. A lot of practice is needed for such precision.

‘It's all right, Wilhelm,' I reassured her, and shut up. She disappeared. Besides singing, things like breaking glasses, playing cards, playing chess, spitting on the floor, and giving drinks to those who were already drunk were also not allowed, each rule appearing on a separate sign. I suddenly felt very restricted. I felt like doing all those things one after another, even though they were the sort of things I normally very rarely do, apart from the last thing. Without prohibition, there would be no temptation.

The time had come to say a few words to Poet.

‘You know, that poem was very good.'

He looked at me with surprise. There was a trace of interest in his eyes.

Maybe I'm not completely lost for art.

‘I really liked it,' I confirmed.

He still wasn't quite sure that I wasn't bullshitting.

Embarrassed, he mumbled, ‘Thanks.'

I leaned forward.

‘Can I ask you something?'

He nodded.

‘Have you published your hundredth booklet yet?'

He got worried, expecting a sting in the tail. He hesitated, wondering whether to claim ignorance. Admitted in the end, ‘the one I just read from is the hundred-and-second.'

‘May I look at it?'

He gave me the book.

I read the first three poems. With my palm I covered the open pages to stop it from closing, and I looked him in the eyes.

‘I've got to tell you something. You know, I haven't read your last thirty books at all. I've been putting them in a heap without even opening them.'

He nodded understandingly but with a terrible sadness, completely resigned to his fate.

‘I'm regretting it now. I hadn't thought you could still develop. But there's a great difference between the last book I read and this one. This one is much better. As if it hadn't been written by the same person. Just first impressions, of course. When you delve deep into the poems you realise that the themes are the same, just treated on a higher level.'

It seemed that I'd defrosted him. He leaned forward trustingly and nodded.

‘But! Look!'

I started to leaf through the booklet.

‘Cyclostyle. Usually. Sometimes photocopies. Covers made of slightly thicker writing paper. You take it in your hands and there's no temptation to open it. And you think to yourself, another schoolboy writing rubbish.'

He sighed.

‘What can I do? Do you have any idea how expensive printing is these days?'

‘I know, I know.'

I leaned nearer.

‘After a hundred books printed on, forgive the expression, toilet paper, it's time for a real book. Don't you think so?'

An even deeper sigh.

‘But they don't want to—'

I interrupted him as if I hadn't heard him.

‘Bound in leather. With a protective cover in colour. Real print on sparkling white paper of the best quality. On nice, heavy stock. On artist's paper.'

He started daydreaming. Quickly I bent over nearer to his ear. Using a voice suited to a terrible last secret, I whispered, ‘Ninety grams per square centimetre.'

He looked at me with confusion.

‘Well, the weight of the paper, you know.'

He nodded quickly.

‘Oh yeah. The weight, yeah.'

I leaned back.

‘It'd be good if you chose the best poems out of the hundred and two booklets and bring them to me. I'll do the rest. The time has come to look back and draw a line after your first hundred. Do you like the title
Selected Works
? Or would you like something else?'

He didn't understand anything anymore. I hurried on with the explanation.

‘My contact can send your manuscripts to the printers. The publishers would publish it even though it's not in their annual plan. My contact would call it an external order from someone who is paying for it himself. Clear?'

He was clear that we were talking money now. Quickly he sobered up.

‘How much would it cost?'

I told him the approximate amount.

‘That's two months' salary.'

The air escaped from his lungs. His shoulders sank.

‘You did ask me earlier if I knew how expensive printing was these days.'

‘I know, but—'

I raised my voice. Changed the tone of it to firmness and decisiveness. My face expressed annoyance and disapproval.

‘My dear Poet. If you're unwilling to take risks you'll never get anywhere. It's better to have something firm in your hands than a hundred of these sheets crumpled in your pockets. Do something! Take a risk! Move out of the greyness. Think. A book. A real book. You open it and smell it. There's nothing nicer than the smell of fresh print. And what can you smell now? Toner from the photocopiers.'

He hesitated. He agreed with me, it was just the money that was still bothering him.

‘I know –' I put my hand on my heart ‘– you don't trust me. I have a bad reputation. This is what we'll do, if you agree of course.'

We put our heads together.

‘I've got some savings for a rainy day, you know what I mean? I'll pay for everything. I'll lay the money down for you. In the end, you get five hundred copies, a few advertising posters, an organised book signing, and an
invoice. Only then do you pay me. You don't give me a penny before then. Who's taking a risk now? You could tell me to fuck off and all my savings would be just a pile of books in my flat.'

He bit his lip. Scratched behind his ear.

‘It'll be done in two weeks. No waiting. You know how long you have to wait normally? Years.'

Quietly I added, ‘It's your decision.'

He took a good minute before he offered me his hand.

‘It's a deal.'

I shook his hand.

‘You won't let me down?' I asked him again.

‘No,' he said vehemently and ordered two beers. That's never happened to me before. He was serious. So was I.

We poured the beer.

‘Why are you doing this?' he asked me. He didn't dare ask me directly what my cut was.

I answered the unasked question first.

‘I won't take anything for myself. You'll get an official invoice with a date and a stamp. You'll pay the exact amount on the invoice. Why am I doing this? I don't know if you'll understand. I'm a real cynic who disdains everything. But you know, I used to write, too, years ago. I stopped. You've either got talent or you haven't. Maybe I'd like to realise my lost ambitions through you. If I can't be a famous poet, I'll at least let you be one, you with talent but without any marketing skills. I'll make my name famous through yours.'

He looked at me warmly.

A group of artists walked into the bar. Four men with goatees and the sort of hats that painters wear, and with them two not badly preserved forty-year-old women. Aging groupies. I knew them by sight. Poet belonged to
their circle, I didn't. They sat at our table, taking no notice of me. I knew one of them was an amateur painter. He had his own circle, which used to be very popular. The number of members had grown to immeasurable heights. They used to walk the meadows carrying easels and all the rest of the equipment and paint haystacks. They invaded the countryside like biblical locusts. You couldn't piss in a bush or throw a stone over a haystack without hitting one of them. They exhibited their work together and gave advice to each other. But now the number of members was considerably smaller. Paints and canvases are expensive. They'd completely saturated the market; there was a haystack hanging on a wall in every household.

They ordered a round.

I was interested to see whether they were such bastards as to exclude me.

They weren't. I got a beer. One of the women looked at me as if I were a parasitic worm. Once, she must have been a beauty. Now she was only poisonous. She was trying to compensate for the breakdown of her body by enriching her spirit. I wasn't sure that the local artists were the right choice.

They started to let off hot air. I leaned back in my chair and fell asleep with my eyes open. That's one of the most basic facets of polite behaviour. Those who don't master it look uncultured.