there, we cut behind the pool, past the archery range and the tennis courts, and up the fire escape next to the music room. The science room was the last one on the second floor. We hadn’t seen anyone or heard a sound.
After spending the afternoon at his house, we had intended to say good-bye at the dock on the island. But neitherof us could bear to part so soon, and he had ended up riding the excursion boat with me back to the mainland. Then, after the boat reached shore, we wandered around town while he waited for the next boat to take him back, and ended up at the school.
“I get terribly frightened sometimes,” he said. “When I finish a job, I take the boat to town to mail it off—it might be a pamphlet advertising pills made from sturgeon fat … ‘just ten tablets a day improves circulation and strengthens the liver.’ I buy a stamp and drop it in the box. The envelope makes just the slightest sound as it falls, and at that moment a terrible fear comes over me.” He reached out and drew an alcohol burner toward him. The curve of the lamp fit perfectly in his palm; the wick snaked through the glass. “It’s not a matter of being sad or lonely. I no longer feel lonely. No, it’s as though I’m being sucked silently into some hole in the atmosphere, to disappear altogether. Pulled in by an overwhelming force, and once I’m gone, I’ll never get back.”
“Do you mean you’d die?”
“No, everyone dies. This is something else, like being drawn toward an invisible chasm. I feel I’m being singled out for some sort of punishment. In fact, I’m afraid I won’t be permitted to die but be forced to wander eternally at the ends of the earth. No one will mourn me, or even so much as notice that I’m gone. No one will look for me, except perhaps the sturgeon pill company wanting to pay my translation fee—and they would give up soon, over such a paltry sum as translators are paid.” He stared at his reflection in the glass ofthe lamp. His hand moved, and the reflection wavered with the shifting liquid.
“I pay these women to help me escape this fear. The desires of the flesh confirm my existence. And then, in the morning, I take the first boat back to the island. I throw out the notes for the sturgeon translation, the sample pamphlets, even the blotter I’d been using—and then I’m sure that the crisis has passed.”
I nodded. I hadn’t understood everything that he’d said, but I didn’t want to disturb the quiet of the classroom. He breathed a long sigh, as though his fear had finally left him.
The wind off the ocean had died at dusk. The leaves on the trees were still, and the school flag and the nets on the soccer goals hung limp. We went into the storage room at the back of the classroom. It was dark and stuffy and its shelves were filled with equipment for high school science experiments: flasks, beakers, mortars, a scale and weights, a chart with the periodic table, a slide projector, a model of the human skeleton, test tubes, microscopes, insect specimens, petri dishes. … We walked down the narrow aisle between the shelves. The air was faintly medicinal, like the translator’s plastic cord.
“Did you think me contemptible?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “I’ve known about these women since I was a child. They come to the Iris all the time.” A specimen box caught my eye; the pin inside had come loose, and the beetle lay at the bottom.
“Do you do the same things to them?” I asked.
“They could never be the same,” he said, shaking his head. “Mari …” I loved the sound of my name on his lips. “There is no one like you. You are unique, every fingernail, every strand of hair incomparable.”
I didn’t know how to answer—I just wanted him to say my name over and over. There was no need for other words, words that had a meaning. I opened and closed the drawers under the shelves at random, test tubes rattling together.
Earlier that same day, I had been tied to a
After spending the afternoon at his house, we had intended to say good-bye at the dock on the island. But neitherof us could bear to part so soon, and he had ended up riding the excursion boat with me back to the mainland. Then, after the boat reached shore, we wandered around town while he waited for the next boat to take him back, and ended up at the school.
“I get terribly frightened sometimes,” he said. “When I finish a job, I take the boat to town to mail it off—it might be a pamphlet advertising pills made from sturgeon fat … ‘just ten tablets a day improves circulation and strengthens the liver.’ I buy a stamp and drop it in the box. The envelope makes just the slightest sound as it falls, and at that moment a terrible fear comes over me.” He reached out and drew an alcohol burner toward him. The curve of the lamp fit perfectly in his palm; the wick snaked through the glass. “It’s not a matter of being sad or lonely. I no longer feel lonely. No, it’s as though I’m being sucked silently into some hole in the atmosphere, to disappear altogether. Pulled in by an overwhelming force, and once I’m gone, I’ll never get back.”
“Do you mean you’d die?”
“No, everyone dies. This is something else, like being drawn toward an invisible chasm. I feel I’m being singled out for some sort of punishment. In fact, I’m afraid I won’t be permitted to die but be forced to wander eternally at the ends of the earth. No one will mourn me, or even so much as notice that I’m gone. No one will look for me, except perhaps the sturgeon pill company wanting to pay my translation fee—and they would give up soon, over such a paltry sum as translators are paid.” He stared at his reflection in the glass ofthe lamp. His hand moved, and the reflection wavered with the shifting liquid.
“I pay these women to help me escape this fear. The desires of the flesh confirm my existence. And then, in the morning, I take the first boat back to the island. I throw out the notes for the sturgeon translation, the sample pamphlets, even the blotter I’d been using—and then I’m sure that the crisis has passed.”
I nodded. I hadn’t understood everything that he’d said, but I didn’t want to disturb the quiet of the classroom. He breathed a long sigh, as though his fear had finally left him.
The wind off the ocean had died at dusk. The leaves on the trees were still, and the school flag and the nets on the soccer goals hung limp. We went into the storage room at the back of the classroom. It was dark and stuffy and its shelves were filled with equipment for high school science experiments: flasks, beakers, mortars, a scale and weights, a chart with the periodic table, a slide projector, a model of the human skeleton, test tubes, microscopes, insect specimens, petri dishes. … We walked down the narrow aisle between the shelves. The air was faintly medicinal, like the translator’s plastic cord.
“Did you think me contemptible?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “I’ve known about these women since I was a child. They come to the Iris all the time.” A specimen box caught my eye; the pin inside had come loose, and the beetle lay at the bottom.
“Do you do the same things to them?” I asked.
“They could never be the same,” he said, shaking his head. “Mari …” I loved the sound of my name on his lips. “There is no one like you. You are unique, every fingernail, every strand of hair incomparable.”
I didn’t know how to answer—I just wanted him to say my name over and over. There was no need for other words, words that had a meaning. I opened and closed the drawers under the shelves at random, test tubes rattling together.
Earlier that same day, I had been tied to a
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