Herta Müller - The Appointment

In those days I was a good liar. Nobody ever found me out. But the trouble was that the lies themselves began to take me at my word. Since then I’ve preferred to be caught in a lie rather than be caught by trouble. The exception is Albu — there I’m good at lying.

These days I walk aimlessly into town. Riding to the factory never seemed to make any sense. It’s hard to believe, but the senselessness kept itself better concealed in those days. If I sit down at a sidewalk café and order an ice cream, as I did yesterday, I immediately decide I want a piece of cake. In reality all I want is to sit: not even that, just stop walking for a while. Making myself comfortable, I push the chair closer to the table. Once the chair is right, I want to jump up and leave, but I’m still not ready to go on walking. From far away the streetside tables are a destination, inviting me to linger, the tablecloth corners fluttering. Only when I’m sitting comfortably does my impatience flare up. Just when my exasperation at the wait reaches the breaking point, the ice cream arrives. The table is round, so is the ice cream dish, so are the scoops of ice cream. Next come the wasps. They’re very pushy and determined to eat their fill, their heads are also round. Although I had to think twice before spending any money, I can’t bear to eat what I’ve just paid for.

Senselessness was easier for me to handle than aimlessness. Nowadays I invent goals to pursue around town instead of lies in the factory. I follow women my age. I spend hours in the clothing stores and try on the things they like. Only yesterday I put on a striped dress, deliberately backward. I plucked and pulled at it, placed my hands around the neckline as a collar, and let my fingers dangle as if they were a bow. I was beginning to like the dress. What I hadn’t reckoned with was this feeling of leaving myself behind. The dress looked as if I’d have to say goodbye quickly. My mouth was bitter, I couldn’t think of anything to say to myself in the short time I had left. I didn’t want to sit back and just let myself disappear, and I said:

Why now of all times, you won’t get far without my feet.

I said it out loud, my face turning red. I don’t want to be one of those people who look like lunatics because they’re talking to themselves out loud. Some people sing. I don’t want someone near me to shake his head because I can’t tell thinking from speaking. Having total strangers hear what you’re saying makes an even greater fool of you than if they don’t see you at all and barge right into you. Although she must have heard me, one woman for whom I obviously didn’t exist opened the curtain to my changing room, rudely set her bag on the chair, and asked:

Is this one taken.

Can’t you see it is, after all you’re speaking to me, not to an empty dressing room.

In the commotion I lost sight of the woman I had been following. I continued trying on clothes in the hope of becoming so beautiful I would begin to exist. Actually I’m not going to find anything, least of all myself, in the clothes other women want to buy. The clothes punish me; if another woman and I happen to try on the same outfit, I wind up all the more ugly by comparison. In the factory I tried on the most gorgeous dresses and strutted like a peacock, crossing the packing hall all the way to the door and back. When clothes were sewn for the West, I’d go upstairs with Lilli before the consignment was shipped. I’d try on two or three styles, one after the other.

That’s enough, Lilli would say.

Because it was strictly forbidden. Not as strictly with skirts, trousers, and jackets as with blouses and dresses. We were allowed to buy dresses from the factory just before International Labor Day on the first of May and again in August before the Day of Liberation from the Yoke of Fascism. The office people bought the most. The dresses made for the West are more elegant and no more expensive than those in the shops. Unfortunately they’re also full of weaving flaws and oil stains from the sewing machines, otherwise they’d be too good for the likes of us. Many people bought them by the sack: better weaving flaws and oil stains that never come out than the low-grade, mousy clothes in the state-owned stores. But I couldn’t stand the weaving flaws and stains, and on top of everything else, I knew how attractive the dresses were that we weren’t allowed to buy. The ones that wind up looking so nice on Italian, Canadian, Swedish, and French women, different ones for every season of their easygoing lives. Cutting, stitching, finishing, ironing, packing, and knowing all the time that you’re not worthy of the final product. No doubt a lot of women thought:

Better a few coarse weaving flaws and black oil stains than nothing.

Because of the flaws and stains, and because I didn’t want to have the factory at home in my wardrobe after spending the entire day there, I refused to buy the dresses. Sundays walking through the park wearing the factory rejects, eating ice cream in the café. The envious looks those dresses get you. You stand out. Everyone knows where you work, where you got them.

When Lilli and I went to the Korso after work and I went into the shops instead of continuing our walk, she would wait outside. I didn’t have to hurry, Lilli disapproved if I came back too quickly. She’d stand with her back to the shop window and look at the sky, trees, asphalt, at the old men too, no doubt. I’d have to tug at her arm as if I’d been the one waiting for her, not the other way around. I’d say:

Come on, let’s go.

What’s the rush, she’d ask, aren’t we going for a walk.

We can walk slowly, but let’s just get away from here.

Didn’t you like the clothes.

What is it you like so much about standing here.

She clicked her tongue.

Soft steps and a slightly stooped back, that’s what I like.

And so.

So what.

How many have you seen, I’d ask.

Her lack of interest in shops had nothing to do with the factory. Even before, Lilli never had any time for clothes. Still, men would turn around to look at Lilli. I’d have noticed her too, if I had been a man. The worse she dressed, the more striking her beauty. It was all right for her, but I’d been vain since I was a child. When I was five I cried because my new coat was too big for me. My grandfather said:

You’ll grow into it, wear some heavy clothes underneath, then it’ll fit. In the old days, two or maybe three coats would have to last your entire life, if you were lucky, and that was if you were rich.

I’d put it on because I had to. But as soon as I’d turned the corner by the bread factory, I’d take it off. For two winters I carried it more than I wore it, I preferred being cold to looking ugly. And two snows later, when the coat finally fitted me, I refused to wear it because it was now too old as well as ugly.

If I were going to my hairdresser’s, I’d have to get off right here, next to the student dormitories. I’d much prefer having my hair permed today, or even styled in a bun the way the old secretaries wear it. In fact, I’d rather be having my head shorn beyond recognition at ten sharp than be knocking on Albu’s door. Than lose my wits while he kisses my hand. A beam of sunlight is beating down on the driver’s cheek, the window next to him is open, but there’s no wind coming through. He brushes the grains of salt off the console but doesn’t touch his second crescent roll. Why buy three if all he needs is one. Leaving the tram to sit there, dashing off to the shops, then coming back and putting on this hunger act for all the people he’s kept waiting. The child has fallen asleep, clutching the handkerchief. The father is resting his head against the window, and although his hair is matted and dull from days without washing, the sun has set it aglow. Can’t he feel that the tram’s windowpane is even hotter than the sun outside. For the moment I’m safe in the shade, until we reach the bend in the tracks, and even then there’s a chance the sun will keep to the other side of the car. I don’t want to show up at Albu’s dripping with sweat. I’m not sure I’d go so far as to switch seats, with so few passengers I’d get stared at. You need a reason. The father could move to the shady side anytime he wants, a small child counts as a reason. The father could change seats if the boy started to cry, in case it was because of the sun. On the other hand, if the tram were full he couldn’t possibly do that, he’d be lucky to find a seat at all. No matter how much the child cried, the passengers wouldn’t think about the sun, they’d just ask that fool of a father if he didn’t have a pacifier for his miserable bawling brat.