all
suffered, but what woman has not? Frankly, like I said, I do not feel comfortable with
happy women, those who are obsessed with what my shrink calls intimacy. You have an
intimacy problem, Genevieve had said, in one of her rare assessments of me.
Intimacy, I exclaimed. What intimacy? I do not understand you.
Like expressing love.
How? For whom?
Like saying something nice to a woman, or bringing her flowers.
So the day before our next meeting I stole some flowers and brought them
to her.
She did not know how to react. She was uncomfortable. She laid the flowers
on the table, without saying a word.
I stole them, I said.
You stole them?
Yes, I stole them for you.
That is interesting, she said, dismissing the act of theft and changing
the subject: Do you want to tell me more about yourchildhood today?
If we do not move forward, if we do not improve, I might have to recommend that you go
back to the institution. Frankly, you do not give me much choice with your silence. I
have a responsibility towards the taxpayers.
Tax prayers? I asked.
No tax
payers
, people who actually pay taxes. Some of us do.
So, I will tell her stories, if that is what she wants. Itâs better
than going back to the madhouse and watching robotic people move between iron beds,
pacing the floor, lost between the borders of barbed wired on the windows and the hollow
hallways, drooling, laughing, crying, and exchanging life stories with their own private
audience. I would look at those people and see them watching their own little stages.
Some of the performances, I thought, were genuine, spontaneous, and exquisite. Abstract,
even a little esoteric, but nevertheless worth a peek. And frankly, I wouldnât
mind seeing again that beautiful lady with green eyes who came for a few days. God, she
was so pretty, even when she took off her clothes and ran naked through the room,
leaking fluid down to her ankles and through her lovely toes, screaming at the top of
her lungs, Freedom! Freedom! I followed her and then I lost her. Like a trapper, I
tracked the little patches of urine that had gathered, like islands, on the hospital
floor.
What do you want to hear? I asked my shrink.
Letâs talk about your mother, she said.
My mother dragged my sister by the hair off our balcony and told her to
stop parading her legs in front of the men down the street. Those low-life men leaned on
parked cars,smoked, and laughed loudly. They obsessively cleaned
and waxed their cars, and like a horny pack of wild dogs they smelled my sisterâs
wetness and pointed at her breasts from behind their erect car hoods.
My sister was beautiful. I used to peek through the bathroom window and
watch her in front of the mirror, playing with her wet hair, kissing the towels and
brushing them across her face. She would put her hands under her breasts and twirl
around. Holding her hairbrush to her face, she would sing to a large audience who came
from all over the world to hear her tender voice, oblivious to her topless chest, her
naked shoulders, because she, naturally, enchanted them with her graceful moves, her
sparkling eyes, and her profound, sentimental voice. She was so enchanting that no
clergy cared to object, no man in her presence had indecent thoughts about her, and no
woman in the audience was jealous of her firm breasts, her generous, curly pubic hair,
her long, wavy locks that covered her buttocks, her radish-coloured nipples. Not even my
father cared that his daughter was naked on a stage â he knew that what was
important was that she could sing, that she was respected, that she would never be
preyed upon by some military man who would deflower her, eject sperm into her belly to
inflate her uterus, swell her ankles, fill her bosom with milk.
But one of those men often stood below our balcony, dressed in his
military uniform and boots. He carried a gun, and I could see him
suffered, but what woman has not? Frankly, like I said, I do not feel comfortable with
happy women, those who are obsessed with what my shrink calls intimacy. You have an
intimacy problem, Genevieve had said, in one of her rare assessments of me.
Intimacy, I exclaimed. What intimacy? I do not understand you.
Like expressing love.
How? For whom?
Like saying something nice to a woman, or bringing her flowers.
So the day before our next meeting I stole some flowers and brought them
to her.
She did not know how to react. She was uncomfortable. She laid the flowers
on the table, without saying a word.
I stole them, I said.
You stole them?
Yes, I stole them for you.
That is interesting, she said, dismissing the act of theft and changing
the subject: Do you want to tell me more about yourchildhood today?
If we do not move forward, if we do not improve, I might have to recommend that you go
back to the institution. Frankly, you do not give me much choice with your silence. I
have a responsibility towards the taxpayers.
Tax prayers? I asked.
No tax
payers
, people who actually pay taxes. Some of us do.
So, I will tell her stories, if that is what she wants. Itâs better
than going back to the madhouse and watching robotic people move between iron beds,
pacing the floor, lost between the borders of barbed wired on the windows and the hollow
hallways, drooling, laughing, crying, and exchanging life stories with their own private
audience. I would look at those people and see them watching their own little stages.
Some of the performances, I thought, were genuine, spontaneous, and exquisite. Abstract,
even a little esoteric, but nevertheless worth a peek. And frankly, I wouldnât
mind seeing again that beautiful lady with green eyes who came for a few days. God, she
was so pretty, even when she took off her clothes and ran naked through the room,
leaking fluid down to her ankles and through her lovely toes, screaming at the top of
her lungs, Freedom! Freedom! I followed her and then I lost her. Like a trapper, I
tracked the little patches of urine that had gathered, like islands, on the hospital
floor.
What do you want to hear? I asked my shrink.
Letâs talk about your mother, she said.
My mother dragged my sister by the hair off our balcony and told her to
stop parading her legs in front of the men down the street. Those low-life men leaned on
parked cars,smoked, and laughed loudly. They obsessively cleaned
and waxed their cars, and like a horny pack of wild dogs they smelled my sisterâs
wetness and pointed at her breasts from behind their erect car hoods.
My sister was beautiful. I used to peek through the bathroom window and
watch her in front of the mirror, playing with her wet hair, kissing the towels and
brushing them across her face. She would put her hands under her breasts and twirl
around. Holding her hairbrush to her face, she would sing to a large audience who came
from all over the world to hear her tender voice, oblivious to her topless chest, her
naked shoulders, because she, naturally, enchanted them with her graceful moves, her
sparkling eyes, and her profound, sentimental voice. She was so enchanting that no
clergy cared to object, no man in her presence had indecent thoughts about her, and no
woman in the audience was jealous of her firm breasts, her generous, curly pubic hair,
her long, wavy locks that covered her buttocks, her radish-coloured nipples. Not even my
father cared that his daughter was naked on a stage â he knew that what was
important was that she could sing, that she was respected, that she would never be
preyed upon by some military man who would deflower her, eject sperm into her belly to
inflate her uterus, swell her ankles, fill her bosom with milk.
But one of those men often stood below our balcony, dressed in his
military uniform and boots. He carried a gun, and I could see him
Similar Books
