Open Heart (29 page)

That evening I informed my landlady, according to the
agreement
between us, that I intended to leave at the end of the month. She was very sorry. I knew that I was a highly desirable tenant in her eyes; the fact that I was a doctor apparently filled her with confidence, even though she had never consulted me on personal problems up to now, but only on general medical
questions
. “May I know why you’re leaving?” she couldn’t resist
asking
. “I need a change,” I said, with an honesty I immediately regretted, for I saw a shadow of pain cross her sharp face. “But what change?” she insisted, inexplicably angry. “A change.” I stubbornly repeated the word, which I may have chosen by
mistake
but was now stuck with. “Just a change.” I lowered my head and went away without any further discussion. That same evening when I phoned my parents to tell them about Nakash’s offer, I couldn’t resist telling them about my plans to rent Lazar’s mother-in-law’s apartment as well. They were immediately
worried
. The idea of transforming the Lazars into my landlords struck them as a very bad one. “Why go and complicate your relations with Lazar now, after having won him over on the trip to India?” said my mother crossly. “But I’ll be reliable as a
tenant
too,” I argued, “and besides, it’s not exactly with him, but with his wife.”

“That makes it even worse,” my mother burst out vehemently, trying as hard as she could to dissuade me from the idea. “If you break something in the apartment, or if you demand money for repairs, she’ll complain about you, and that will count against you at the hospital too. And believe me,” she added with
unexpected
venom, “she knows how to look out for number one. Anyway, you should never mix business with friendship.” My father lectured me too. “I don’t understand,” he began in his quiet voice, which revealed signs of emotion. “Are you trying to get a quid pro quo for what you did for them in India?”

“Certainly not,” I retorted angrily. “I’ll pay more for that apartment than I’m paying now.”

“You’ll pay more?” said my father in astonishment. “How
much?” When they heard that no rent had yet been agreed on, their disapproval increased. And then a kind of cry of protest burst out of me: “My dear mother and father, I’m twenty-nine years old—do me a favor and trust me to decide what’s best for me!” This outburst silenced them. It wasn’t really fair of me, because in fact they always trusted me, and their anger with me this time stemmed only from the fact that I had confused them by hiding my real motives. I immediately took pity on them. I didn’t know how to appease them without getting further embroiled in lies. “I need a change,” I said gently. “I saw the apartment by chance and I liked it. It’s close to the sea, it’s on a nice quiet street. I won’t make problems with Lazar or his wife. You know me.” They listened attentively, trying to accept my inexplicable decision because of their love and respect for me. “The fact that you want a change,” said my mother finally, “is all to the good, because you definitely need one. Just be careful it’s not more of a change than you bargained for.”

When a week went by without any sign from Lazar’s wife, I wondered anxiously if I had been in too much of a hurry to announce the change in my life. Had she forgotten me, or, on the contrary, had she decided to beware of me? I knew that her mother had already moved into the old folks’ home. I had called her there myself to ask if the new dosage had indeed given her the hoped-for relief. She was very excited by the telephone call and happy to talk to me. Her chronic constipation had indeed been relieved, perhaps not only because of the change in her medication but thanks to the peace and quiet of her new home, which she spoke of admiringly, inviting me to come and visit her there. “Do you know,” I said to her in the end, “that I’m going to rent your apartment?” To my astonishment, she knew nothing about it. Her daughter hadn’t said anything. So, I said to myself, it’s a good thing I talked to the old lady. Now I can expect a clear sign one way or the other. If Dori has changed her mind, or found some other tenant, then okay, that’s it, let her go ahead and crush my love. In the meantime my landlady had found a couple to rent my apartment, whom she agreed to let in without consulting me, to take preliminary measurements. One day she
stopped me on the stairs and demanded coldly that I move out before the end of the month.

I was in an embarrassing predicament. Was I now going to be thrown out into the street because of a bizarre and abstract
infatuation
which had no point or purpose? Finally, I mustered my courage and called Dori to ask her where I stood and what I could hope for. The secretary put me through without asking me to identify myself. Dori picked up the receiver and held it in her hand while carrying on a lively conversation with someone for whom I suddenly felt a faint pang of jealousy. Her voice was loud and enthusiastic, full of confidence and authority. When I identified myself, I could tell she was confused. So, I said to
myself
, a spark or two has already escaped to her. “There’s been another misunderstanding,” I began jokingly, “and I’m going to be out in the street with my goods and chattels starting next week.” Then I sensed her relief. She no longer had to hesitate about letting me use the apartment as a means of ensnaring her. The situation in which I had landed myself, which I described in terms that were no more than accurate, forced her not only to accept me as a tenant but even to apologize for not getting in touch with me sooner. “The apartment’s not ready. There’re still a lot of things we don’t know what to do with.”

“Never mind,” I reassured her, “you can leave them there. I don’t need a lot of room.” After some waffling on her part, we arranged to meet in the apartment on Tuesday afternoon, when her office was shut, so that she could see what had to be removed and what could be left there, and of course to finalize the terms of the lease. When I put the receiver down, I wondered whether she would bring Lazar with her or come alone.

She was waiting alone for me in the apartment. Behind the door I heard soft classical music mingling with the pleasant sound of running water. I knocked, two light taps, because I didn’t want to press the bell, whose jarring noise I remembered from my first visit. She opened the door with a somber, serious expression on her face, wearing high heels and with a bright red apron cinched around her waist. Her hands were covered with soap. “You’ve complicated things for me,” she complained, her face flushing slightly. “Look at all the things I have to do here for you now.” Her direct, aggressive tone startled me; I was
unprepared
for it. Her eyes too, which had not yet flashed a single
smile, looked hard behind the lenses of her glasses. “But what’s there to do?” I began stammering stupidly, trying to defend
myself
and perhaps also to dismiss her complaint as I stepped weakly into the apartment, in which I immediately felt a change even though I had only been there for a few hours the first time. The apartment was still neat and tidy, but the coziness and brightness that had prevailed on the evening I had examined her mother were gone. Perhaps it was the removal of the
embroidered
cloths from the little tables next to the sofa and the
disappearance
of the crystal and silver goblets which had stood behind the glass in the dark sideboard, or perhaps because the big family portraits had been removed from the walls. The curtains were open, and the view from the window consisted exclusively of rooftops, without a single scrap of sea between them. There was no visible sign of the apartment’s proximity to the beach, which had made me so happy on that evening. However, I quickly
overcame
my disappointment as I glanced around and saw how the rays of the setting sun were transmuted into a golden powder, which made the whole interior glow sweetly. On the white
marble
counter in the kitchen stood a row of delicate long-stemmed goblets crowned with soapsuds. The possibility that she was washing them for me, and not in order to store them, touched me profoundly. For a moment there was an embarrassing silence. My eyes avoided staring too obviously at her straight legs clad in honey-colored silk stockings. She still looked annoyed to me, perhaps somewhat humiliated by the dishwashing that had been forced upon her. “We thought we’d prepared everything,” she said, “but there’s still a lot left to organize here.”

“How long has your mother been living here?” I inquired in a friendly tone. “Not long. Seven years. Since my father died. But she loved this apartment. And she invested a lot in it. It’s a shame; she could have stayed here for a few years longer. I still haven’t come to terms with the fact that she won’t be living here anymore. That’s why I wasn’t in a hurry to get in touch with you. I hoped that she would change her mind and come back. But now you’ve forced me to hand it over.” The surprising
admission
that she had actually surrendered to my demands flooded me with such a strong and unexpected wave of pleasure that I had to bow my head and close my eyes, which she
interpreted
as a sign that she had offended me. “If your mother
changes her mind and wants to come back, I’ll move out
immediately
,” I said gallantly, in an attempt to make myself into an even more desirable tenant. But she shook her head firmly. “There won’t be any need for that. Don’t worry. So far she’s very happy there.” And then I couldn’t resist saying, “I know,” and
proceeded
to tell her about the telephone conversation. She listened in silence. A pleasant smile hovered on her lips, but her eyes were fixed in a hard, suspicious expression, as if intent on assessing the precise degree of danger posed by my determination to invade her life.

Meanwhile the apartment was growing dark and the golden powder was losing its glow, fading into shadowy hieroglyphics on dull yellow parchment. She dropped onto the sofa at my side and crossed her legs. Her little double chin sagged. From a shabby cardboard file containing telephone, gas, and electricity bills, she took out a sheet of paper with a few words written on it, and said despairingly, “I have to make an inventory of the contents of the apartment for the contract between us. And I don’t have any idea where to begin. We’ve never rented an
apartment
to strangers before. Some people write down everything, including closets and sinks, but you’re not planning to remove the furniture and sell it, are you? Or dismantle the lavatory and the sink, right?” She spoke without humor, and I shook my head solemnly in reply. I was hypnotized by the rapidly darkening room. “So we’ll just list the really important things,” she
suggested
, “the carpet and the more valuable dishes, and one or two pictures. And we’ll write down the number on the electricity meter, and get the phone company to read the phone meter, and that will more or less cover everything. As for the clothing and stuff of my mother’s that she left here—are you sure you don’t mind? At least come and look at the space we’ve left for you and see if it’ll be enough.” She stood up, but to my surprise she didn’t switch on the light in the apartment, which was growing darker from minute to minute, not only because of the fading light
outside
but because of the darkness welling up inside the apartment itself. Between the kitchen and the bathroom, from an alcove where the brooms and mops were standing, a fresh, dense
darkness
was steadily flowing and gradually spreading into the two rooms. When I followed her into her mother’s bedroom I noticed that the glass goblets, from which the soapsuds had disappeared,
were shining on the white marble with a ruby-colored radiance. The window above the sink was set in the wall at just the right angle to catch the rays of the setting sun. I wanted to draw her attention to this little discovery of mine, but she was already standing next to her mother’s double bed, which was covered with a red bedspread and piled with fat cushions with flowery covers, and opening the doors of two empty closets to show me the space already at my disposal. Then, with a gesture of
resignation
, she opened the two full closets too. In one of them I saw gray suits, all alike, hanging, and in the other I found myself standing, as in a familiar dream, in front of stacks of white shoe boxes, in which various objects had no doubt been stored. “There’s plenty of room,” I said in a whisper behind her broad back, in an attempt to reassure her. “Don’t worry, we’ll clear it all away. Just give us a little time to breathe,” she said in a hoarse voice, looking at me again with that suspicious, hostile look, which, far from discouraging me, turned me on so much that my penis began to swell. If only I could talk to her now about some shared memory from our trip to India, I thought quickly, I might be able to lighten the atmosphere a little. But the lust boiling inside me paralyzed me. Only now I realized that the darkness she insisted on preserving in the apartment was
flattering
to her. For I no longer saw the creases in her neck, nor the wrinkles around her eyes, and even her little paunch had
disappeared
, leaving only the impression of a mature, ripe woman. Maybe she wants to seduce me? I asked myself when I saw her turning back in the direction of the living room, where a new stream of light, pouring out of the tatters of a flimsy cloud, was now struggling against the darkness. “Now we have to talk about the rent.” She sighed and dropped heavily onto the sofa, crossing one long leg over the other while the silent battle
between
light and darkness raging in the room drew delicate pale golden arabesques on her stockings. The only thing I’m going to get out of falling in love with this woman, I thought anxiously to myself, is an exorbitant rent that comes from the lack of
experience
of a new landlady. “What figure did you have in mind?” she asked me unexpectedly. “Me?” I laughed. “I don’t have any
figure
in mind. But don’t worry, you’ve already warned me that the rent will be higher than what I’m paying now.”