Read Online The Childhood of Jesus by J. M. Coetzee - Free Book Online Page B

longing in its more urgent manifestations, come frustration and doubt and heartsore. It is as simple as that.
    And what is he up to, anyway, with Elena, a woman he barely knows, the mother of the child’s new friend? Is he hoping to seduce her, because in memories that are not entirely lost to him seducing one another is something that men and women do? Is he insisting on the primacy of the personal (desire, love) over the universal (goodwill, benevolence)? And why is he continually asking himself questions instead of just living, like everyone else? Is it all part of a far too tardy transition from the old and comfortable (the personal) to the new and unsettling (the universal)? Is the round of self-interrogation nothing but a phase in the growth of each new arrival, a phase that people like Álvaro and Ana and Elena have by now successfully passed through? If so, how much longer before he will emerge as a new, perfected man?

CHAPTER 8
    â€˜YOU WERE telling me about goodwill the other day, goodwill as a universal balm for our ills,’ he says to Elena. ‘But don’t you sometimes find yourself missing plain old physical contact?’
    They are in the parklands, beside a field on which half a dozen disorderly football games are being played. Fidel and David have been allowed to join in one of the games, though they are really too young. Dutifully they surge back and forth with the other players, but the ball is never passed to them.
    â€˜Anyone who brings up a child does not lack for physical contact,’ replies Elena.
    â€˜By physical contact I mean something different. I mean loving and being loved. I mean sleeping with someone every night. Don’t you miss that?’
    â€˜Do I miss it? I am not the kind of person who suffers from memories, Simón. What you speak of seems very far away. And—if by sleeping with someone you mean sex—quite strange too. A strange thing to be preoccupied with.’
    â€˜But surely there is nothing like sex for bringing people closer. Sex would bring the two of us closer. For example.’
    Elena turns away. ‘Fidelito!’ she calls, and waves. ‘Come! We have to leave now!’
    Is he mistaken, or is there a flush on her cheek?
    The truth is, he finds Elena only mildly attractive. He does not like her boniness, her strong jaw and prominent front teeth. But he is a man, she is a woman, and the children’s friendship keeps drawing them together. So, despite one polite brush-off after another, he continues to permit himself mild freedoms, freedoms that seem to amuse more than anger her. Willy-nilly he finds himself slipping into daydreams in which some or other stroke of fortune impels Elena into his arms.
    That stroke of fortune, when it comes, takes the guise of a power cut. Power cuts are not infrequent across the city. Usually they are announced a day in advance, and apply either to even-numbered or to odd-numbered dwellings. In the case of the Blocks, they are applied to whole buildings according to a rota.
    On the evening in question, however, there is no announcement, just Fidel knocking at the door, asking whether he can come in and do his homework, since there is no electric light in their apartment.
    â€˜Have you eaten yet?’ he asks the boy.
    Fidel shakes his head.
    â€˜Run back at once,’ he says. ‘Tell your mother that you and she are invited to supper.’
    The supper he provides for them is no more than bread and soup (barley and squash boiled up with a can of beans; he has yet to find a shop that sells spices), but it is adequate. Fidel’s homework is soon done. The boys settle down with picture books; then suddenly, as if poleaxed, Fidel falls asleep.
    â€˜He has been like that since he was a baby,’ says Elena. ‘Nothing will wake him. I’ll carry him back and put him to bed. Thank you for the meal.’
    â€˜You can’t go back to that dark apartment. Stay the night. Fidel