Майя Лунде - The History of Bees

A slanting grin slid across his face.

“You’re afraid.” His voice was loud, higher than I’d imagined.

I nodded slowly, kept looking him in the eyes.

“You’re right. I’m afraid.”

“When people are afraid they’ll say anything,” he said.

I didn’t answer.

“Is the subway running?” I asked instead.

“What do you think?”

“Have you tried going to another neighborhood?”

He laughed. A sharp laugh. “We’ve tried most everything.”

I took a step towards him. “Where I live, there’s food. I can buy some for you.”

“What kind of food?”

“What kind?” The question caused me to hesitate. “The usual things. Rice.”

“The usual things,” he mimicked. “Do you want us to leave our home for a serving of rice?”

I looked down the street behind him. Deserted. Dusty. Nothing resembling a home.

He nodded at the other boy and the girl. They took a step towards me. Were they getting ready to attack me?

“No. Wait.” I put my hand in my purse. “I have money!”

I rummaged around. My fingers came across crackling paper.

“And food. Biscuits.”

I took out a package and held it towards them.

The girl was immediately at my side. She snatched the package out of my hand and started to tear off the paper. I moved a few meters away.

“Hey!” The tall boy leapt forward. The girl clenched her fist and I heard how the biscuits were crushed into crumbs in the package.

She was about to dash off, but the boy was on top of her. He forced her fingers open and took the package of biscuits. She said nothing, but her eyes filled with tears. The boy stood with the package in his hands. The logo was simple, in black and white. The print was smeared a little, perhaps from the sweat on the girl’s hands.

“We have to share,” the boy said and looked at the girl. “We have to share.”

The three of them were busy with one another now.

Should I try to run? No. I had to give them everything I had, be generous. Not flee. Then they’d be on top of me. I had no choice.

I stuck my hand into my purse again. Swallowed, hesitated, but had to.

“Look here. Money.”

I didn’t dare move any closer to them and left a few worn bills on the ground, the last. Only small change was left in the tin box in the hotel room.

The boy stared at them.

I took a step backwards. Tears welled up in my eyes. “Now you have everything I’ve got.”

He continued looking at the money.

“And now I’m leaving.” I took another step. Then I turned around. Calmly I walked away, in the direction of the subway.

One step.

Two. Three.

My legs wanted to run, but I forced myself to walk slowly. To continue to be a human being for them, not start the chase again, not become their prey. Hold my head high, not turn around.

I heard that they were moving a little behind me. The material of a jacket being twisted, the soft clearing of a throat. Every tiny sound stood out in the silence. But no feet against the pavement.

Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.

It was still quiet.

Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen.

I dared to speed up my pace as I approached the station, which was closed with a chain and padlock. Only then did I turn around.

They were still standing there, in the same place and looking at me. All three of them equally expressionless. No sign of movement.

I walked towards the corner, keeping my eyes on them at all times. Then I walked around the corner of the house. I could no longer hear them. In front of me was yet another deserted street. I had the subway track on my right-hand side, a dead row of houses on the left. There was not a soul in sight.

I ran.

The package arrived in the mail ten days later. The writings of Dzierzon. I brought it upstairs with me and closed the door to the room on the second floor, which was now wholly and fully mine. Thilda didn’t sleep there anymore, not even now that my health was restored. Perhaps she wanted me to ask her to return to the conjugal bed, maybe she wouldn’t come until I begged and so it would never happen.

The bed loomed, soft and safe before me. How easy it was, just to go to bed, let the blankets swaddle me, make everything dark and warm.

No.

Instead I sat down by the window with the package in my lap. I caught a glimpse of Charlotte’s white-clad back at the bottom of the garden, bent over the hive. She spent hours down there. She had carried down a table and a chair for herself, sat with papers and an inkwell. I saw her constantly observing and taking notes in a little leather-bound book, with enthusiasm and lightness in her movements. She was like me, worked the way I had previously worked, though it felt like a long time ago now. I hadn’t been to the hive myself since my conversation with Rahm. I had turned my back on it, wanted mostly to break it into pieces, jump on it, to see the pieces of board fly in all directions, splintered and destroyed. But I couldn’t bring myself to do it—the bees prevented me; the thought that thousands of desperate and homeless bees would rise up and attack me.

I undid the twine, broke the seals and folded the paper to one side, and with a German dictionary at my side I started reading. Until the end I kept hoping that Rahm’s claims were wrong, that he had misunderstood something, that Dzierzon had absolutely not produced such an advanced hive. But even though my German was shaky and I only understood a fraction of the texts, one thing was clear: his hive was very much like mine; the doors were positioned somewhat differently and the roof pitch was at less of a slant, but the principles were identical and the method of use the same. Furthermore, he had carried out a series of in-depth observational studies of the bees in their hives and a lot of the research entailed precisely this. The underlying philosophy was rock solid and testified to an infinite patience; everything was scrupulously documented and with an exemplary presentation of the argument. Dzierzon’s work was world class.

I put the writings away and once again turned my attention towards the window. Charlotte put the lid on the hive out there, walked a few steps away and took off her hat. She smiled to herself before setting out towards the house.

I opened the door. I could hear her footsteps below. I moved over to the landing. From here I could see her. She walked into the hall. There she sat down by the sideboard, took out her notebook and opened it in front of her. She reconsidered, her gaze suspended for a second in space, before she bowed her head and wrote. I walked down the stairs. She lifted her head and smiled when she saw me.

“Father. How nice that you’ve come,” she said. “Here—you have to see this.”

She wanted to show me the book, held it out to me.

But I didn’t look at it, simply walked to the coat stand, found my hat and jacket and quickly dressed.

“Father?”

She beamed at me. I looked away.

“Not now,” I said.

The passionate enthusiasm in her eyes, I couldn’t bear to be in the same room with her. I walked quickly towards the door.

“But it won’t take long. You have to see what I’ve been thinking.”

“Later.”

She didn’t say anything more, just had this gaze, so determined and assertive, as if she didn’t accept the rejection.

I didn’t even have the energy to be curious. She hadn’t found out or thought of anything that had not already been thought and I couldn’t bear to explain this to her, disappoint her, tell her that all the time she’d spent down there by the hive only resulted in things that were obvious, that all of her thoughts had already been thought a thousand times before. I opened the door slowly, registered how something indolent had once again descended upon my body and a sigh was released from my diaphragm. I prepared myself for many more in the time ahead. In my hand I squeezed the key to the shop, to my simple, country seed shop. That’s where I belonged.