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Authors: Herman Koch
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party at someone’s private home.
“So turn it around for a moment,” I said. “Your birthday’s next month. Would you invite Ralph Meier to your party?”
“Well …” Caroline looked at me teasingly. “No, okay,” she said. “I don’t suppose I would, no. You’re right as far as that goes. All I’m trying to say is that you shouldn’t always assume the worst. Maybe he really does like us. Both of us, I mean. It could be that, couldn’t it? I talked to his wife for a long time the other evening. I don’t know, sometimes you have that feeling, that you click immediately. I had that with Judith. Who knows, maybe she told Ralph to invite us.”
Judith. I’d forgotten her name again. The first time I’d forgotten it was less than a second after shaking her hand in the theater lobby. The second time was this morning, when Ralph Meier had started talking about the party.
Judith
, I admonished myself inwardly.
Judith
.
I’ll be honest. When she held out her hand and told me her name, I looked at her the way every man looks at a woman who enters his field of vision for the first time.
Could you do it with her?
I asked myself, looking her deep in the eyes.
Yes
, was the response.
And Judith looked back. It’s only ever a matter of a few fractions of a second, of making eye contact for just that little bit longer. That’s how Judith and I looked at each other. Just a little longer, strictly speaking, than one might consider entirely respectable. And while I was forgetting her name, she smiled at me. It wasn’t so much her mouth that smiled, it was above all her eyes.
Yes
, those eyes said back to me.
I could with you, too
.
Respectable
is not the right word.
Respectable
belongs in sentences you’d rather not hear yourself say out loud. Sentences like “I thought we were going to at least keep things here to a minimum of respectability.” No, respectability is not something I can claim for myself. I look at women that way because I have no idea how to look at women any other way. It may be too bad for the “likable” women, for the “really rather nice” women, but to be safe I never look at them for too long. I’m not rude. I’ll launch into an animated conversation if I have to, but my body language leaves no room for misinterpretation.
Not with you
, my body language writes in big block letters on my forehead.
I don’t even want to think about it. Not with a ten-foot pole
. Likable women compensate for their lack of physical attractiveness with talents natural or unnatural in other areas. At meetings attended by more than a hundred people, for example, they make all the sandwiches themselves. Or they go out and hire party hats and masks for all the guests. Or they arrive on a delivery bike carrying more firewood for the braziers. “She’s so lovely, Wilma,” everyone says. “Such a lovely person! Who else would come up with something like that? Who else would even think of that?” Wilma, of course, is plainly too pale or too thin or just too ugly, but at the same time she does so many lovely things out of the goodness ofher heart that you’d have to be a complete asshole to say anything negative about her. In the end, at one of those meetings of more than a hundred people, there is always some man who remains hovering around Wilma. Often literally. It’s the same man whom we saw hanging around at the edge of the dance floor. He was trying to make the moves along with the dancers but never stepped out onto the floor itself. The bottle of beer in his hand was rocking to the beat of the music. But that was the only thing about him that moved rhythmically. “Remember that guy?” people ask one another later. “That guy at the party? Did you know that he and Wilma …?” From that day on he’s the one who buys the two hundred whole-wheat buns from the bakery and chops wood for the braziers. Wilma takes a break from years of being “lovely.” And who can blame her? Then the children
“So turn it around for a moment,” I said. “Your birthday’s next month. Would you invite Ralph Meier to your party?”
“Well …” Caroline looked at me teasingly. “No, okay,” she said. “I don’t suppose I would, no. You’re right as far as that goes. All I’m trying to say is that you shouldn’t always assume the worst. Maybe he really does like us. Both of us, I mean. It could be that, couldn’t it? I talked to his wife for a long time the other evening. I don’t know, sometimes you have that feeling, that you click immediately. I had that with Judith. Who knows, maybe she told Ralph to invite us.”
Judith. I’d forgotten her name again. The first time I’d forgotten it was less than a second after shaking her hand in the theater lobby. The second time was this morning, when Ralph Meier had started talking about the party.
Judith
, I admonished myself inwardly.
Judith
.
I’ll be honest. When she held out her hand and told me her name, I looked at her the way every man looks at a woman who enters his field of vision for the first time.
Could you do it with her?
I asked myself, looking her deep in the eyes.
Yes
, was the response.
And Judith looked back. It’s only ever a matter of a few fractions of a second, of making eye contact for just that little bit longer. That’s how Judith and I looked at each other. Just a little longer, strictly speaking, than one might consider entirely respectable. And while I was forgetting her name, she smiled at me. It wasn’t so much her mouth that smiled, it was above all her eyes.
Yes
, those eyes said back to me.
I could with you, too
.
Respectable
is not the right word.
Respectable
belongs in sentences you’d rather not hear yourself say out loud. Sentences like “I thought we were going to at least keep things here to a minimum of respectability.” No, respectability is not something I can claim for myself. I look at women that way because I have no idea how to look at women any other way. It may be too bad for the “likable” women, for the “really rather nice” women, but to be safe I never look at them for too long. I’m not rude. I’ll launch into an animated conversation if I have to, but my body language leaves no room for misinterpretation.
Not with you
, my body language writes in big block letters on my forehead.
I don’t even want to think about it. Not with a ten-foot pole
. Likable women compensate for their lack of physical attractiveness with talents natural or unnatural in other areas. At meetings attended by more than a hundred people, for example, they make all the sandwiches themselves. Or they go out and hire party hats and masks for all the guests. Or they arrive on a delivery bike carrying more firewood for the braziers. “She’s so lovely, Wilma,” everyone says. “Such a lovely person! Who else would come up with something like that? Who else would even think of that?” Wilma, of course, is plainly too pale or too thin or just too ugly, but at the same time she does so many lovely things out of the goodness ofher heart that you’d have to be a complete asshole to say anything negative about her. In the end, at one of those meetings of more than a hundred people, there is always some man who remains hovering around Wilma. Often literally. It’s the same man whom we saw hanging around at the edge of the dance floor. He was trying to make the moves along with the dancers but never stepped out onto the floor itself. The bottle of beer in his hand was rocking to the beat of the music. But that was the only thing about him that moved rhythmically. “Remember that guy?” people ask one another later. “That guy at the party? Did you know that he and Wilma …?” From that day on he’s the one who buys the two hundred whole-wheat buns from the bakery and chops wood for the braziers. Wilma takes a break from years of being “lovely.” And who can blame her? Then the children
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