Peter Buwalda - Bonita Avenue

A late-autumn breeze drives waves over the athletic fields, the campus is a turbulent sea of curled leaves, the scent of damp dirt and rot forces its way into his stuffed-up nose. Removed from the world, he crosses the wet gravel of the dimly lit 400-meter track, sheltered by a wide ring of dancing alder and hazel trees. He put all the blame on Wilbert — of course he did, without any scruples. The son of a bitch deserves it, finally he’s of some use. Now that he can think it over in relative peace and quiet, Wilbert’s intrusion seems, all things considered, not so bad after all — as long as he keeps a tight rein, of course, he mustn’t forget that.

The ensuing quarrel was out of his control. Tineke’s conviction that the package was not intended for them turned out to be a form of vague self-deception. “Siem?” she said at once. “Are you mixed up with this? Don’t tell me you know something about this.”

The solution presented itself like a mathematical proof, logical, irrefutable, organic …“Yes, dear, well, I do know something about it,” he admitted, but instead of starting at A he started somewhere around Z , quite naturally, he thought, and yet careering forward, whispering to himself to keep as close as possible to the truth. In a somber tone of voice he told her that the text messages had started that summer, scarcely a week after that reception where Menno Wijn had shown up. At first he had no idea who was sending them, nor what they referred to, but he was hardly pleased to get them. Joni was a whore, that’s what it boiled down to, and did he know, and it was just what he deserved — yeah, it was awful. Some time later—“and here it comes, Tien, brace yourself, this isn’t pretty”—one of those texts contained a website address, advising him to have a look. So he did.

“And? Well? Where are you going with this? Siem — quit being so sinister! What did you find?”

“I’ll explain, honey,” and he took her hand in his. She reacted quite calmly to his account of the website, perhaps because he presented it so calmly, euphemistically, avoiding the word “porn,” while distracting her with his alleged concurrent suspicion that Wilbert was behind those texts — go on, shoot the messenger. “Well, I got the shock of my life,” he said. “Tien, it was one of those sites, I couldn’t believe my eyes, although at first I couldn’t believe I was looking at Joni.”

The strange part was that her indignation was not directed at Wilbert (that’s how accustomed she was to his monkey business, no doubt), nor at Aaron and Joni (she only seemed to partly realize it), but at him . Why wait till now to bring it up? It was a lot to handle all at once, of course: the nasty erotic junk lying there between them, all that “wanker” stuff. (“Why does he call you that?” “You know what a filthy mouth he has.” “Are you keeping something from me? Siem? What’re you up to?” “Me? Nothing, darling, just calm down.”) Yes, the why of his long silence, she made a point of it, the cavernous gap between May 2000 and now. “ Six months , Siem.”

He reaches the embankment that separates the campus swimming pool from the athletics track. Up the path he climbs, through low shrubs and nettles, to the highest point, where one of his predecessors had, with great ceremony, installed a thinking-bench. In the old days he’d come here to sit and contemplate when there was an important decision to be made.

Tineke asked: “Did you confront her?”

“Yes,” he said, because didn’t he, in a way? His wife sat an arm’s length from him, staring ahead in what appeared to be utter astonishment. Then: “But where do you get off not telling me? Do you think that’s normal ?”

“I wanted to spare you, sweetheart, I wanted—”

“You wanted to spare me what? The truth? Facts? What the hell!”

He offered a spineless apology; she should keep his own worries in mind, and what a tricky subject it was to broach. Besides, after he’d given Joni a talking to, the website was history.

“So what’s he after then?” She picked up the stockings and threw them back down.

“Those photos still exist. They’re out there for good.”

Instead of responding to this disquieting remark she wanted to know exactly what he had said to Joni.

“Oh, you know …,” he sputtered, “the kind of things you say in a situation like this, we kept it short, actually.” An answer that did not satisfy her. Rather, it elicited a tirade that rampaged over the real problem, a centrifugal rage that was not about Joni, but about the two of them. She made him out to be the prudish old fart that he essentially is, a fool so devoid of sexuality that she seriously wondered about the scope of his edifying little chat. “You didn’t just give her some sermon, I hope,” she said. “Well, now I see why she’s not coming to France this Christmas.” And: “Are you surprised those two split up?”

He felt the need to stand up for himself, not so much because she doubted his tact — go on, say it: his parental aptitude — but because she just didn’t seem to get it. “Do you realize what we’re talking about?” he asked. “I’m telling you our daughter has put herself on the Internet as some or other … what’s the word … some kind of slut . Do you have any idea what that means?”

“And do you hear your self ? Who are you to call my daughter a slut?”

“Tineke …,” he said, taken aback by her raised voice, by that “my daughter.”

“Let’s see that website. Am I entitled to my own opinion?”

“Pictures. There’s no websi—”

“Pictures, then. Let me see them. Probably nothing at all. For example. I don’t think you have the foggiest idea of what’s a slut and what’s not. Let’s see them, damn it.”

“Sweetheart, please . We’re not going to sit here examining that garbage. It is bad, believe me. Just because I, because we don’t … you know … that doesn’t mean I don’t know what …”

“Well?”

“What porn is.”

“Porn? Now suddenly it’s porn?”

This time he was the one to explode. “Why do you think that bastard’s sending me all this crap?” He swiped the lingerie off the sofa, the panties landed on the coffee table, slid across the tabletop. “Because of vacation snapshots?”

“Let’s see them. Now.”

“Tien — I’ll send you a few on Monday. I can’t do it. Not here.”

When he wakes up the next morning, she’s already up, there’s a note on the breakfast table, she’s gone for a walk, she has to think. He’s glad of it. After breakfast he builds a fire in the living room fireplace and installs himself in the sunroom with a pile of dossiers. But all he does is think up scenarios: say she calls Joni again, say she asks her for an explanation, what’s the chance that their daughter squeals on him? And what if he were to call Joni himself? Keep one step ahead? He tries to imagine that conversation: him trying, one way or another, to make clear to her, to convince her, that he … that he doesn’t … lust after her .

He tries to figure out how to get his hands on that 100 grand without anyone noticing. There’s still a U.S. bank account with twenty or thirty thousand dollars, MeesPierson manages the rest of his Spinoza grant, plus a few hundred thousand in savings. He turns on the TV, tunes into a current affairs talk show, but can’t keep his mind on it.

How about making a deal with Wilbert? The very idea — negotiating with his son — infuriates him. Is he going senile? Luckily he is reasonably certain Tineke did not see the blackmail note. Suddenly he yearns for The Hague. Immerse himself in his department. He calls his chauffeur and asks if he can come and pick him up that evening.