Yok (40 page)

 

I
'm really glad you got in touch,” said Lion Rosenlind for the second time, shaking Vincent's paw. “Now that you're . . . back . . . we'll have to see about getting together more often. It's really great that you got in touch.”

Vincent didn't know what to say. He was 39 years, 175 days, 7 hours, and about 30 minutes old. As of a few weeks ago he had been living on Calle de Serrano again. Every stuffed animal he met seemed to have aged or changed, both physically and mentally, and objects, streets, and buildings did not appear as he remembered them. He knew it was him and not the outside world that had changed, but it was impossible to grasp that thought when Lion Rosenlind was standing before him, acting this way.

Vincent stood up. He had on a red jacket he had made a few days after returning to Yok, and wrapped around his neck was a dark yellow silk scarf. He held the napkin in his paw. The food was still on the table, but Rosenlind was in such a hurry he couldn't even wait until the waiter had cleared it. He owned the restaurant, so there wouldn't be a bill.

“Stay where you are,” said the lion. “I'm sorry I have to run, but you know how it is. Really great to see you again.”

The awkwardness finally came to an end, and Vincent, exhausted, sat down when the lion had left. His idea had been to ask Rosenlind about a job. But after a gluten-free salad with scallops and carrots, it was obvious that neither a job nor invitations would be given to an animal who had spent five years at the “mental hospital,” as Rosenlind put it. Lion ordered two glasses of white wine and then changed his mind.

“Oh, excuse me, maybe you shouldn't?”

Vincent observed his former friend with surprise.

“What do you mean?”

“I thought . . . wine . . . perhaps you shouldn't have alcohol?”

Vincent did not know what Rosenlind was imagining, but apparently Vincent was a pariah in these circles, suspected of everything from alcoholism to madness. That explained a few incidents that had occurred during the past week.

“I still drink wine,” said Vincent. “I'm not all that different.”

It was not true, but he said it anyway. Rosenlind looked at him with open skepticism, and nodded encouragingly as if it were meaningless to discuss it. When the lion disappeared, Vincent took out his gray notebook, pushed aside the plate of salad, and wrote:

1. Meaning of Life: Can the meaning of life be to seek the meaning of life?

2. Knowledge Account: Nothing scares us more than what we don't understand.

3. Bank Account: Quickly running out.

R
eturning to a normal life after the years by the sea proved to be harder than Vincent thought, and he decided not to call the rattlesnake for help. He knew he could get a job with Bombardelli, because he was a damn capable project manager and architect. He refrained anyway. He had said to Dr. Seinstein during their last session that it had to do with Maria. Nothing suggested that he would fall in love with her again, but there were other, more constructive risks to take in the new life he had to build up, Vincent reasoned, than working a few yards from Maria Goat. The argument sounded so reasonable he did not need to search for additional reasons.

What he had not told Dr. Seinstein, on the other hand (and it will remain unsaid whether she understood it anyway), was the shame he felt when he thought about all the money Bombardelli had spent during the years that passed. Despite the hours, weeks, months, and years in therapy, he had only partly managed to dismantle the pedestal on which he placed himself. And his still inflated self-esteem was hard to combine with the simple gratitude he ought to show Rattlesnake Bombardelli. For that reason the simplest thing was not to make contact at all.

After calling around to his old friends and booking a long series of dinners and lunches neither he nor his friends looked forward to (with a few exceptions), and after getting the phone, mail, electricity, and gas working again, he was sitting one evening in the apartment where he grew up and realized that he would never be satisfied with solitude as his only roommate.

He had done his best to make the time pass, but this evening it was unusually hard. He leafed through a magazine to an article on alternative energy sources, but he was bored before the introduction was over. The silence became intrusive if he turned off the TV, so he left it on even though he was not watching. On the table was a cup of cold coffee, the same cup he had used all week and that he rinsed out with hot water in the morning. There was no soul in this home, he thought. He knew he needed plants, but he was overwhelmed by the choices when he stepped into a plant store, and always left empty-handed. He got suggestions from Dr. Seinstein about books to read, meditations, and thoughts to think on those evenings when melancholy came to call, but he did not have the focus for intellectual exertions. It was Thursday, the Evening Storm had abated, and he was not tired.

Vincent threw the magazine on the table, got up, and went into the hall. He pulled on his jacket and jogged down the steps. In the solitude of a bar it was easier to lose yourself.

He ended up at Les Pommes Rouges in southeast Tourquai. It was a recently opened nightclub on Avenue Gabriel, furnished in dark blue plastic and red leather. Along with a complicated lighting system that consisted of thousands of encapsulated diodes, the decor gave both an enclosed and colorful impression. Three months had passed since Vincent left Lakestead House, and it was the first time in many years he had decided to drink until his head exploded. He had not reached any of his old associates—only a few of them still went out—but it was easy to make new friends if you paid for a few rounds.

Vincent managed to get one of the small tables to the right of the bar, from which he had a view of the dance floor and the entry. That was how he noticed Jack Dingo. It had been more than five years since he had seen his old friend. Without wanting to, Vincent felt exhilarated. The episode in Bois de Dalida that afternoon was long forgotten and forgiven. In his life after Lakestead, Vincent lacked friendship. He had made an agreement with himself never to return to the house by the sea, and for that reason he had no contact with Teddy Bear. Jack Dingo was still a stuffed animal Vincent knew well, and he got up from the table.

Dingo was on his way into the place with a beautiful cat in a long, black dress. He had on a white jacket and was moving at a calculated slow pace, his chest thrust out and head high. He laughed at something the cat said, but the laugh was a way to mark territory. When he lit his cigarette, he made sure his claws flashed a little more.

Dingo and his companion went up to the bar and ordered drinks. Vincent squeezed his way between tightly packed stuffed-animal bodies. On his way images popped up, pleasant and less pleasant memories. Together with Jack Dingo, Vincent had experienced a lot.

Finally he came up, tapped Dingo on the shoulder and smiled broadly.

“Jack! It's been a long time!”

It was obvious from the expression in Dingo's eyes that he didn't have a clue who was standing in front of him.

“It's me, Vincent,” the hare said, disappointed.

Dingo nodded.

“Of course I recognized you,” the dingo answered.

But it was not true, and after a few minutes Dingo turned his back to Vincent and concentrated entirely on his beautiful companion.

Vincent took a taxi home right after that. He sat staring out over the deserted streets in Tourquai which after a while turned into worn streets in Yok. Here and there was a light in a window, stuffed animals lay sleeping in doorways under thick layers of blankets and rugs, music was faintly heard from a transistor radio that was suddenly turned off, and as the taxi passed rainbow-colored Calle de Tremp he heard the engines of the Pirates' motorcycles; their headquarters was in an old bread factory farther down the street.

The memory of the life he had once lived at clubs and bars, Vincent realized, was too old. There was no way back; he no longer had the furious, blind energy needed to reestablish his place at the bars of the city. He had to find a new way forward. There was no way of turning the hourglass around.

V
incent is dreaming. The dream is familiar. He is getting on board a train. In the opening between the asphalt and the train he glimpses the rails. They glisten. In the narrow corridor of the coach there are burning-hot radiators below the windows. He opens the first door to the left. Inside waits a dark compartment where he sits down by the window. The sounds from the train station fill his empty thoughts.

Outside the window a massive emptiness is piling up. The high sheet metal roof held up by massive iron beams. The many platforms next to one another. The large monitors where departure times flip past in an endless stream, even though there are no other trains there.

Just as he sits down, the train accelerates so vehemently that he is pressed back against the seatback. A few moments later they drive into a tunnel. Through the gap in the window he can hear the chugging of the steam engine echo through the mountain. It sounds ominous and distant. He realizes that the tunnel is endless. He closes his eyes. It smells cold and damp. His heart rhythm adapts to the thumping rail joints and just as he opens his eyes, the train shoots out of the tunnel. The sunlight is blinding.

The rails turn out to be laid through Yok. At a hysterical speed the train thumps along through narrow alleys. It is a reckless ride. The wheels screech from sudden turns. Sparks hiss, stuffed animals throw themselves out of the way. Vincent takes hold of the edge of the seat. They are going faster than he can conceive. Sometimes he recognizes a street, a doorway, a stuffed animal. He glimpses Dingo on a street corner. He sees Gavin Zebra in a window. He leans forward, and catches sight of Maria. But the train has come out onto Avinguda des Pedrables and further increased its speed. Their eyes meet, but he has already left her behind. The city is reduced to colors. Streaks of blue, orange, and turquoise glide past. His heartbeats increase in frequency. His pulse tries to keep up. His body shakes, spasms that soon make him vibrate. The vibrations increase in force, and he feels how he is rising out of the seat. Hovering up in the air. The experience is marvelous, but after only a few moments it is over. The speed is too great. The vibrations too powerful. He has passed the crescendo, there is only one way to wake up. He is going to crash.

T
en days later Vincent Hare was standing at a rotating sky bar on the top floor of Plaza Costeau, looking out over Tourquai's skyline. He was 39 years, 265 days, and about 9 hours old. He was the one who asked for the meeting, but he had not chosen the place. He had on a narrow, pinstriped jacket, white shirt, and narrow black tie. In the afternoon the bar smelled of old booze and nicotine. It was furnished in shining steel and black leather, the windows were from floor to ceiling, and the bar was long enough for a couple of cricket teams to stand at. But there were only two of them, and the weather was brilliantly clear outside.

“I'll just have mineral water,” said Daniela Fox. “No carbonation.”

The bartender nodded, and Vincent Hare felt ashamed about his martini.

“You're sure you want to come back?” Daniela Fox asked again. “Because I've heard otherwise.”

Fox was, as always, the image of success. Her manicure was perfect, her fur glistened, and her clothes were expensive in the modest way only wealthy equals could appreciate. She wore a simple chain with a single but large diamond around her neck. She had a slight lisp that did not distract, but only made her more attractive.

“Stuffed animals talk,” Vincent declared, “but it's seldom worth listening to.”

“And Bombardelli?”

“What do you mean?” he asked, taking the olive from the glass.

“Bombardelli called and asked if I could see you. He suggested I try to get you to come back.”

“Flattering.”

“Maybe. But I don't get why you're using me as a proxy. Something you want to tell me?”

Vincent sipped his martini. The bar was on a floor that slowly turned 360 degrees. It took fifteen minutes for it to rotate all the way around.

“I called Bombardelli,” Vincent admitted. “But . . . I didn't want him to hire me for the wrong reasons.”

“But you do need a job?” asked Fox.

Vincent shrugged his shoulders. He needed not only a job; he needed a life.

“I thought you were great,” said Fox. “It's been a while, but as soon as I came in I remembered your charisma. No one at the office has the same kind of . . . energy. It's because you know you have talent, Vincent. You know it. It gives you the kind of self-confidence that . . . even when we're in this situation . . . it feels like you're interviewing me, and not the other way around.”

She laughed. She had never flirted with him, and he had never asked her out. Right now that made them both content. He finished his drink.

“I'm good with customers,” he admitted. “I'm good at selling things.”

“You're good at selling architecture,” she corrected. “Because you know it.”

“I want the job. I don't intend to argue.”

“You've got the job. You'll work with me. I've talked with Bombardelli. You start on Monday. Same terms as when you quit.”

Vincent nodded.

“One more thing: Maria isn't working there anymore. She left a few months ago. Don't know where she went, but it was her decision.”

Fox slid down from the bar stool and left him with the bill. She had not touched her glass of water.

V
incent Hare met Diego Tortoise by the coffee machine the second day back at the office. Vincent greeted him enthusiastically, as if he had a bad conscience, and noted that it did not look as if Tortoise had aged at all.

“You look like you're . . . feeling well, too, Vincent,” Tortoise answered in his hesitant way.