The Apartment A Novel(5)

We reach the other side, after a long minute, and the sound of the tyres on the road changes back, and we are in the immediate outskirts of the centre now. The buildings here are all the same. You walk along one street, turn a corner, and you are on the same street. This is what the foreigner tells himself. The longer I stay here, though, the more I notice imperfections in the repetition. I notice a laneway here or there that is small and winding, a shortcut. Or an alley that leads to a street that it seemingly shouldn’t, which tells you that your inner compass has failed. Or you notice a little gateway that leads to a square. Or there’s an old monastery. Or a man who always sweeps the sidewalk outside his shop. You begin to notice that no two buildings are really alike. You begin to see that what you suspected was perfect repetition in an orderly grid is apparent repetition in an imperfect grid, and after a while you learn that what you once considered monolithic is infinitely intricate. And from here you begin to understand the vastness of the place.

The bus stops at a hub for streetcars, trains and buses that come in from the west, across the bridge. Is this us? I ask. Saskia is yawning again. The bus is really warm now. Everyone has been breathing, and creating heat. No, she says, we have a few more stops. The doors open and the bus almost empties. The heat is released with the people who alight. It is sucked immediately into the morning, and what’s left in the bus is cold and refreshing space. Where are we going? I ask. Saskia says, A café with lots of students. It’s … and she pauses, seemingly searching for the correct English word. It’s the first time since I met her that she has paused for a word, and this makes me momentarily wonder at how impressive it is that she speaks English so well. Her accent sounds a bit British. Did you live in England? I asked her once. No, she said. But we study English here for a long time. I studied Spanish in high school and college, I said. Habla español? she asked. Not a word, I answered. She taught herself Latin, so she could read Virgil in the original. She is now reading Dante in Italian, and hopes to learn Japanese next. This is a girl who also spends half her life at parties.

I wipe the window again to see where we are. The closer we get to the centre, the more Christmaslike the city gets. I don’t mind too much about spending Christmas in a hotel. But I would like a little more space. As much as I like Mr and Mrs Pyz, I’d like to have a life where people don’t monitor my movements, even accidentally. I’d like to have my own pots and pans. I’d like a table to place a bowl of fruit on. I have an idea of myself walking around markets where butchers and grocers shout prices over the crowds, and where I’ll carefully and slowly choose vegetables and meat, and come home to cook myself meals. I’d like to have breakfast without having to get dressed. I’d like to wander in and out of rooms and take a bath with the door open. And I don’t want to look out the window of a little room and wonder where, in the city, I’ll end up. The most essential quality of hotel life is the thing I want least: a presumption of departure.

Saskia peers forward and hits the button on the rail. There’s a pleasing ding, and a light illuminates near the driver that says the bus is going to stop. This is us, says Saskia. She puts her hat and gloves back on and stands. The bus pulls over into the grey slop that snow ploughs and traffic have driven toward the kerb and comes to a halt. The door opens. Saskia hops out and I follow. I put my hat on and zip up my coat and put my hands back in my pockets. The unlit Christmas lights stretched above the street are rocking in the wind. They could easily light them – it is dark enough. Are you hungry? I ask. Not really, she says, are you? I am, I say. I think I ought to eat something straight away. Are we far from the café? Ten or fifteen minutes, she says. Okay, I say, then let me just get a quick snack. Right beside us there’s a stand that serves fish fingers and fish sandwiches. These stands are everywhere, and they’re not bad. They load the sandwiches up with mayonnaise and lime juice and fresh coriander, and the bread is always nice. I’d never heard of anything like fish sandwiches from street vendors before I came here, and for that reason I eat them all the time.

I eat while we walk. Saskia suggests we stop so I don’t get a stomach ache, but I know she’s only being nice. It’s too cold to stand still. I eat the whole thing in four bites, so that I can put my hands back in my pockets. The first three bites are small, but I take the whole last half of the sandwich with the fourth, and have to cover my face with my hands. You eat like an animal, she says. I chew and chew and hold my finger up, indicating that I’m chewing. I always used to eat quickly, but lately I have been sitting at dinner tables in restaurants and cafés, and after I swallow a bite I put my fork and knife or spoon down and allow a thought to rise to the surface – one that is purely philosophical, that is in no way actionable, and that relaxes the mind.