Peter Stamm - On A Day Like This

“How did you two meet?” he asked.

“I was in the same soccer team as her brother. I knew her already when she was a little girl. But it only really started when we met again at his wedding, years later.”

He seemed to want to say something more, but then he didn’t. His good humor had something artificial about it, and even though he was tanned, he seemed tired.

The house was on the edge of the village, on the road in. It had belonged to Jean-Marc’s parents. They had moved into an old people’s home some years ago, and since that time he and his siblings had used the house as a holiday home. Marthe was sitting in the living room, watching a political debate on TV. She greeted Andreas casually, without getting up. She too looked tired. Jean-Marc showed Andreas up to his room.

“Well, you know where everything is,” he said. “Come down whenever you’re ready. I’ve opened a bottle of wine. It’s good stuff.”

Andreas unpacked his bag and washed his face and hands in the bathroom. He tried to be quiet, so that he didn’t wake the children. As he came down the stairs, he heard loud voices from the kitchen. The door was ajar. He knocked and walked in. Jean-Marc was sitting at the table, and Marthe was leaning against the sink. Neither spoke, but they had clearly been arguing.

“Everything all right?” asked Jean-Marc, getting up. He put his arm around Andreas. “I’m glad you’re here.”

He got a glass out of the cupboard, filled it, and handed it to Andreas.

“Shall we sit outside?”

“It’s too cold,” said Marthe.

“Then put something on,” said Jean-Marc irritably. “I’m sure Andreas will want to smoke.”

Marthe walked to the door. As she passed Andreas, she briefly put her hand on his arm, and asked him how long he planned on staying. Andreas said he didn’t know. As long as they could stand to have him.

Marthe and Jean-Marc sat shoulder to shoulder in a rusty love seat. Andreas refilled their glasses. It was very quiet. There was only the croaking of frogs to be heard, and the occasional car that whined past.

“They drive like madmen here,” said Marthe. “Last year someone killed himself, just a couple of hundred yards away.”

“On purpose?”

Jean-Marc shook his head. “No, a drunk,” he said. “It was the middle of the night. He didn’t take the corner and went head-on into a tree. The tree was OK.”

“Jean-Marc’s little brother was here when it happened. Pascal, you’ve met him. He repaints cars.”

“He’s got his own business now,” said Jean-Marc, and pushed off with both feet. The love seat swung back and forth a few times, creaking. Marthe said she was glad Andreas was here. Jean-Marc was out all day with the kids, and she got bored all by herself in the house.

“They’re just like him. Nothing but sports. The idea that they might sit down and read a book …”

“That’s not true.”

“When was the last time you were at an art exhibition? Or the theater?”

Jean-Marc pretended to think about it.

“That was the time with that … what’s her name? The blond,” he said at last.

“A German artist,” said Marthe. “That was six months ago.”

“She paints naked men,” said Jean-Marc. “Of course Marthe thinks it’s wonderful. She pretends she’s interested in art. All she wants to see is cock.”

Marthe rolled her eyes and said, God knew, there had been enough naked women in the history of painting. Why not men for a change. Of course, there was a tremendous fuss over it. But there were just beautiful paintings. Anyway, the woman painted clothed men too. And landscapes. She asked if Andreas knew Robert Mapplethorpe. He nodded.

“You should have seen Jean-Marc at the exhibition,” said Marthe. “He was going crazy.”

“They’re not really that big,” said Jean-Marc. “If you use a wide-angle lens, the foreground always looks bigger. It’s a distortion.”

Marthe laughed maliciously. She said it was a pity she didn’t have a wide-angle lens at her disposal. There was obviously something going on between them. Andreas made some remark about Mapplethorpe’s flower photographs, and Jean-Marc started swinging again. They talked about one of their colleagues, a French teacher, who had got divorced recently.

“Andreas did the right thing,” said Jean-Marc. “He never married.”

“Are you with someone at the moment?”

“You can’t ask him that.”

“Delphine,” said Andreas. “Do you know her? She was a trainee at the school this past year.”

Marthe and Jean-Marc glanced at each other and said nothing. Andreas wondered whether Marthe knew anything about Jean-Marc’s infidelity with Delphine, and whether that was what they’d been quarreling about. In the end, Jean-Marc sat up straight. He looked furiously at Andreas.

“Obviously, she’s sleeping her way round the entire staff room,” he said.

Marthe laughed aloud, and rather artificially. Jean-Marc stood up and went inside. He walked slowly, as though he was very tired.

“More wine?” asked Andreas.

Marthe leaned forward and held out her glass. He poured. He sensed there was something she wanted to say, and he waited for her. She drank.

“Cold,” she said, and she laughed again. She said she and Jean-Marc had a kind of tacit agreement.

“What do you mean?”

“He can do whatever he likes. As long as I don’t get to hear about it. And as long as he doesn’t fall in love.”

“What about you?”

“Same with me, naturally.”

She said that of course the agreement had failed. Jean-Marc had fallen in love with Delphine. He had admitted it to her last night. They hadn’t slept all night, and talked about separating. The fact that Andreas was now going out with Delphine of course changed everything. She stopped to think.

“Or then again, maybe not,” she said.

They drank their wine in silence. After a time, Marthe said she sometimes dreamed of going to bed with another man.

“We’ve been married for fifteen years. We’re old hands. But sometimes you find yourself longing for another pair of eyes, a different hand on your neck.”

She spoke very softly. Andreas had sat down next to her on the swing. He put his arm around her. She drew up her knees, and leaned against him. She said again she was glad he was there. Andreas began to stroke Marthe’s hair. She didn’t seem to object, and he caressed her ear, her cheek, her neck. When he began to nuzzle her neck, she stood up, and looked at him with amusement.

“Come on, you’ve already taken Delphine away from him,” she said.

“I’m not thinking about Jean-Marc,” said Andreas. He didn’t like the way his voice sounded. He felt like a caricature of a seducer. He was a little shocked himself, that he was prepared to give up a male friendship that had lasted many years, in order to sleep with the man’s wife. But that was the way of it.

Marthe ran her hand through his hair as one might do to a little boy, and said she had enough trouble as it was. He got up and followed her into the house. Jean-Marc was sitting in the kitchen. He had his elbows on the table, and was staring into space. He looked like Andreas’s idea of a Breton farmer. Marthe and Andreas passed him in silence, and walked upstairs.

“Good night,” said Marthe, and kissed Andreas on the mouth.

He took her around the waist again, but she shook him off.

“No,” she said. “Maybe another time. When everything’s over.”

“You’ll get through it OK,” said Andreas.

“I don’t think so,” said Marthe.

When Andreas came down in the morning, Jean-Marc wasn’t up yet. The children were at the beach, Marthe said. Did he want coffee?

“He won’t be up for ages,” she said, and gestured at a couple of wine bottles by the bin. She poured Andreas’s coffee, and sat down at the table, facing him.