The Apartment A Novel(9)

You should not tell anyone that you were in the Navy, says Janos. I turn around and see him sitting in an aggressive but also embarrassed posture over his empty beer. There is still foam on his moustache and soup in his beard. People don’t like Americans in the first place, he says. I say, That’s true. Did you fight? What do you mean? I mean in a war, he says. Iraq, I say. Iraq? Yes, I say. You must tell no one that, he says. It’s behind me, I say. I never think about it. Tell no one, he repeats. The waiter walks by, so I tell him I’d like to pay – this too you learn quickly, how to say you’d like to pay. He does not register that he has heard me, but they usually don’t. They move like stone chess pieces through fog. It shows a lack of refinement to initiate contact with waiters in cafés like this one, where the whole point of being here is to prove that you are not in a hurry. You must learn to wear an attitude of being ready to pay, or wanting another drink, or being ready to order, and they simply come to you. There’s a degree of mysticism about it. But I haven’t learned the secret, so I just hold up my hand and say the words as they pass. They usually come back a few minutes later and tally up the prices of the things I’ve ordered – this is done on paper – and tell me the total, and when they realize I have not understood, they place their sums in front of me and I give them some cash. I leave a tip on the table, even though you are supposed to include it when you pay. I do this because I do not know how to tell them to take extra for a tip. I watch the way people around me handle the transaction, with as little conversation as possible. I say nothing else to Janos, and he decides to check his phone for messages, and a few minutes pass. I look around the room and watch other people talking. The volume of the place has gone up, or maybe it’s just that I’m paying attention to the noise. A few more minutes pass. Saskia comes out of the door to the toilets. We are looking at each other before we realize we are looking at each other. I turn around. She’s back, I say to Janos. He lifts his head up from his phone. Saskia pulls out her chair and sits down as the waiter returns. He adds up the cost and tells me a number, and I give him a note that is easily large enough to cover it. Saskia tries to give me some money. You pay next time, I say. Fine, she says. In America, a person who says fine is pissed off with you, but here it expresses something like great, or cool. The waiter counts out change, and Janos asks him for another beer. There is no response, but Janos doesn’t need one. I hate shopping, he says. Maybe I’ll just stay here for the day.

Saskia and I stand at the same time. I’m happy we’re going to be on our own again. I’m happy we’re going to be walking again. Maybe we’ll see you later? Saskia says to Janos. Perhaps, says Janos. Good luck finding an apartment, he says. Thanks, I say. Goodbye. Goodbye, he says. Goodbye, says Saskia. Saskia motions for me to go first. She holds her arm out as though she is an usher directing me to my seat in a theatre. She is always doing this, always escorting me through places, opening doors for me, or paying for drinks. I also open doors for her, and I help her put her coat on, sometimes. I see lots of men doing this here, so I do it. I like doing it. Here, in this city, intense joy and intense sorrow are extinct. The place is too old for that kind of naivety. Everyone here responds to these extinctions by opening doors for each other, or making room at tables – they are generous and polite. I admire this – to celebrate the extinction of hope with ritual and composure. To place coats on the shoulders of women. There isn’t a thought left. There isn’t a sentence. There isn’t a human being. Janos has a beard because it is the embodiment of the hope that he is not recycled matter, that he has thoughts that are his own. He will wake up one day, maybe a year from now, or five, and shave it. I take Saskia’s coat off the rack and she walks toward me and turns around, and puts her arms into the sleeves, and we leave the warm orange light of the café and return to the purple and white darkness of the street.

Janos is always unhappy, she says. It makes him happy to be unhappy. It must take so much effort to find unhappiness in everything. You’re not unhappy? I ask. Oh, she says, I’m not stupid, but I don’t make an effort to be unhappy.

The cold gets right into my lungs and refreshes me. The snow is coming down a little heavier than before. We turn right, into the wind and snow. We’ll get a newspaper and check it for apartments, she says, and make our way into the centre. She crosses her arms and I stick my hands in my pockets, and we walk very close together, so close that we bump into each other. I open a hole with my arm and she slots her arm through. If I were looking for an apartment, she says, I would like one with high ceilings and a big bathtub, and large windows facing a park. What about the kitchen? I ask. She contemplates this – again she lifts her head, like a philosopher. I don’t cook well, she says. Do you? I like to cook, I say, and I’d like to have a nice kitchen. I have a small kitchen, she says. I hardly ever eat at home. My kitchen depresses me. I don’t want a kitchen that depresses me, I say. The streets around here are sombre and pretty. We begin to encounter other people. The road curves and widens. There are shops and cafés and a bank. And then there is a small intersection, and a bit of traffic. Saskia and I go inside a shop and she buys a newspaper. She tries to open the paper inside the shop, but it’s a small space, tiny, and other people come in, so we have to leave.