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Authors: Ismaíl Kadaré
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Well,
he
was really different, in every sense of the word! He had no respect and no fear. You could have taken him for a silent opponent of the regime. But he probably wasn’t anything of the kind. He was simply indifferent. Indifferent, but domineering.” She had yielded to him, as people say, on their first date. She was then barely seventeen. After deflowering her, any man, at the sight of the signs proving the fact, would have shown if not fear, at least some concern. But he didn’t even comment on it. And she understood at that moment that he was the man she had ardently hoped for. She fell madly in love with him. Maybe he was in love with her? But he uttered words of love only at rare intervals. Each time he penetrated her she thought she perceived in his ardor some secret torment, as if he had been seeking something else in the deep recesses of her body. The mystery and the silence in which he enveloped himself became catching. So it was that one day, when he clumsily let slip that he had already been engaged, she, who on any other occasion would have flown into a rage, demanded an explanation, and burst into tears and recriminations, just bowed her head without a word. Their relationship went on in that way for a long time, until the day the affair was discovered. It coincided with the time when her father was in process of being officially designated as the Successor. It was very probably the new star that had suddenly begun to shine brightly over her father’s career that was responsible for bringing the affair to light. In cut-glass terms, without harping on what her daughter had done, but leaving her no option about future disobedience, her mother had demanded instant separation. “Your father is about to be designated as the next
Prijs
. You have to do this for him. Otherwise we will have no option but to have your lover interned, together with all his close and distant relatives.”
Suzana stared at her mother with wild eyes. Intern the man who had made her so happy? “You are out of your mind!” she shouted. “It’s you who’s lost your head and doesn’t want to understand,” her mother riposted. And she went on to spill out her heart: “You had the cheek to go with that hooligan, and now you want to defend him!” “He’s not a hooligan,” Suzana retorted. She almost added that he was the man who had made a woman of her, but she thought better of it as she realized that even if the argument with her mother went on for a thousand years, they would never agree on that.
Forty-eight hours later, her father asked to see her. The wide bay windows of his office seemed to emit a constant vibration, as if they were forever being battered by winds. Suzana felt freezing cold. She was aware that she would not say any of the sentences she had prepared for this interview. What could her father know about her body? How could she tell him about her breasts and her hips aching for caresses, or about her genitals, where pain and sensuality fatally merged and consumed each other? About renouncing love-making, when she counted the days, the hours, and the minutes that brought her closer to each encounter? When she still did not understand how, despite the heavenly evanescence that made everything in her fall apart and melt like wax, her body retained its solid shape? He and his comrades had other kinds of pleasures, what with their congresses, their flags, their anthems, and their cemetery of National Martyrs, whereas she only had him … his body … his inexhaustible body …
Her father stared at her with his fair eyes, whose coldness oddly seemed more bearable that day. She felt that the look in her own eyes was of the same kind — alien and distant.
For a long while he said nothing. Then, when he began to speak, she realized right away that it was not only his tone of voice but also his words and his diction that had changed. And it was indeed about a change that he spoke. As from now, her father would no
he
was really different, in every sense of the word! He had no respect and no fear. You could have taken him for a silent opponent of the regime. But he probably wasn’t anything of the kind. He was simply indifferent. Indifferent, but domineering.” She had yielded to him, as people say, on their first date. She was then barely seventeen. After deflowering her, any man, at the sight of the signs proving the fact, would have shown if not fear, at least some concern. But he didn’t even comment on it. And she understood at that moment that he was the man she had ardently hoped for. She fell madly in love with him. Maybe he was in love with her? But he uttered words of love only at rare intervals. Each time he penetrated her she thought she perceived in his ardor some secret torment, as if he had been seeking something else in the deep recesses of her body. The mystery and the silence in which he enveloped himself became catching. So it was that one day, when he clumsily let slip that he had already been engaged, she, who on any other occasion would have flown into a rage, demanded an explanation, and burst into tears and recriminations, just bowed her head without a word. Their relationship went on in that way for a long time, until the day the affair was discovered. It coincided with the time when her father was in process of being officially designated as the Successor. It was very probably the new star that had suddenly begun to shine brightly over her father’s career that was responsible for bringing the affair to light. In cut-glass terms, without harping on what her daughter had done, but leaving her no option about future disobedience, her mother had demanded instant separation. “Your father is about to be designated as the next
Prijs
. You have to do this for him. Otherwise we will have no option but to have your lover interned, together with all his close and distant relatives.”
Suzana stared at her mother with wild eyes. Intern the man who had made her so happy? “You are out of your mind!” she shouted. “It’s you who’s lost your head and doesn’t want to understand,” her mother riposted. And she went on to spill out her heart: “You had the cheek to go with that hooligan, and now you want to defend him!” “He’s not a hooligan,” Suzana retorted. She almost added that he was the man who had made a woman of her, but she thought better of it as she realized that even if the argument with her mother went on for a thousand years, they would never agree on that.
Forty-eight hours later, her father asked to see her. The wide bay windows of his office seemed to emit a constant vibration, as if they were forever being battered by winds. Suzana felt freezing cold. She was aware that she would not say any of the sentences she had prepared for this interview. What could her father know about her body? How could she tell him about her breasts and her hips aching for caresses, or about her genitals, where pain and sensuality fatally merged and consumed each other? About renouncing love-making, when she counted the days, the hours, and the minutes that brought her closer to each encounter? When she still did not understand how, despite the heavenly evanescence that made everything in her fall apart and melt like wax, her body retained its solid shape? He and his comrades had other kinds of pleasures, what with their congresses, their flags, their anthems, and their cemetery of National Martyrs, whereas she only had him … his body … his inexhaustible body …
Her father stared at her with his fair eyes, whose coldness oddly seemed more bearable that day. She felt that the look in her own eyes was of the same kind — alien and distant.
For a long while he said nothing. Then, when he began to speak, she realized right away that it was not only his tone of voice but also his words and his diction that had changed. And it was indeed about a change that he spoke. As from now, her father would no
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