Matthias Politycki - Next World Novella

Even if one is as magically attracted to it as you or I! That is the teaching of the I Ching: you can never stay with any one of the signs. You must keep abreast of changes so that, within the flow of all beings, you become someone else. You, pursuing your indifferent atheistic train of thought, will never understand this. But even for you, Dana’s decision to adorn herself with the sign of the abyss cannot have been pure coincidence. A clear sign of danger, every yang stroke already fallen between its two yin strokes. Most important of all, it consists of water both above and below, water everywhere, a huge lake, almost a sea, I explained to Dana, rather a lot of water for a single lifetime.

‘Water, water, water.’ Dana’s glance was vague — we called it her Galician look. ‘I’m usually up to my neck in it, but I’ll never drown, I was always a good — ’

‘I know.’ I waved that comment away, she’d often said it before. ‘Like a fish in water.’ Only then did I realize what had brought us together, and I knew I had to tell her about it, about the cold, dark lake, and how it frightened me.

As soon as I had finished my confession, Dana took my hand. She had an idea, she said — I was so surprised I couldn’t protest, let alone withdraw my hand from hers. So much water for her and for me, for both of us, she said, we ought to share it.

How, I asked, did she imagine that might happen?

Oh, it was simple. At last she knew how she could thank me: by repaying me in kind. She actually used that phrase. She had nothing else to offer, she said. Imagine, she suggested spontaneously; no, she decided, how can I put it, she made up her mind to wait for me beside the lake. If she were to die before me, as she was convinced she would. Then I could still decide whether to swim across the lake with her to Paradise or wait for my husband in spite of everything, but then I’d be sure to go to Hell with him.

In fact, Schepp, she made the same pact with me as you once did. With the difference that she has no doubts about reaching the far shore. How firmly she pressed my hand! More firmly than you, that’s for sure.

So let’s be clear: when, one day, you set out on the journey to the next world, I will not be waiting for you at the threshold. Ditto the other way round. No need for you to wait for me. You have silently terminated our marriage in the Here and Now, I free you from your promise for There and Then. As far as I am concerned, and Dana is right there, you can go to –

No, even now I don’t wish you that, I will concentrate entirely on what the signs, each in its own way, have shown me. The clock on the Church of the Good Shepherd is just striking eight-thirty, and my taxi will be coming in an hour’s time, so I must hurry. My heart is thudding with anticipation, can you imagine that? Over the past year I’ve consulted the coins of the I Ching almost daily and have received all sixty-four signs as an answer to my only question. Each sign contributed to my decision. Think of the Wanderer, or the Breakthrough, or Liberation. ‘When there is nowhere left to go, then returning will save you. If there is somewhere you must go, then speed will save you.’ How inspiring the signs can be. I never thought so before.

Yesterday evening I consulted the I Ching one last time, and — no, it did not give me the twenty-ninth sign as my answer; that would have been too much of a coincidence. It gave me Number 61, Inner Truth, a happy, cheerful water sign. As if everything from which I have suffered all my life will now be turned into its opposite, the gentle wind above, the rejoicing lake below. ‘It is good to cross the great water.’ But without you, Schepp, do you understand, without you. As far as I’m concerned, and now I will say it once and for all, you can go straight to Hell! Along with

Hanni and Nanni and Lina and Tina and

whatever they might be called. Your

I’m sorry, my head

suddenly hurts again

like when I

Yes, Doro had actually written that. The spaces between the words had become longer and longer, and at the bottom of the page they were in an entirely different handwriting. Schepp had already deciphered them:

and now this too

well we’ll

talk about it

There was no more to be deciphered, to be read. Schepp just sat there. While the afternoon cast its shadows little by little over the pattern of the parquet, while the clock of the Church of the Good Shepherd struck four high and five low notes, while there was another ring of the doorbell, while the last large patches of light merged under the desk, while there was a buzzing and then silence, then buzzing again and then more silence. She had him now.

How peacefully she lay there, how detached, as if none of it had anything more to do with her. Yet she had caused it. Unmoved herself, she had been the guiding spirit, so surely it was her fault? Her eyes, mere slits like a lizard’s eyes now, the whites slyly showing, her nose, sharper still in the twilight; her head a skull carved out of the room’s half-light. Doro? Schepp stared at her, although he had no idea what he might still be looking for in her face. All that he had seen in it unquestioningly over the years, over the decades, had perhaps been a show staged just for him. All he could really do was stare into space until darkness fell.

Stop, Schepp! At least it was over and done with, he had performed his final duty. Now he knew that Doro had had no premonition of her death, that instead she had been editing and writing her way towards a new life. He knew why the doorbell had rung earlier, and what kind of post he might expect to receive soon. Schepp closed his eyes, imagined Dana kissing Doro, raising one leg as she did so and … then he imagined Doro kissing Dana. Although she had made it clear that the whole thing had been platonic. In so far as he had understood it correctly. In so far as she had not been lying. In so far as she had not just wanted to spare him. Schepp pictured Doro lying on that very same chaise-longue , thinking of Dana, thinking of kissing her, which was almost as bad.

When he opened his eyes again — only because he felt a cold draught streaming towards him — he found himself kneeling on the floor, his head buried in the hollow at the base of Doro’s throat, his arm firmly around her rigid shoulders. He immediately relaxed this ardent embrace and looked at Doro sternly, questioningly, imploringly, but her waxen face did not respond. Then he sought certainty by sniffing frantically as if that would help him discover what she had taken with her as her secret. There was still a familiar scent about her although the penetratingly bad smell that didn’t blend comfortably with it was getting stronger, mingling with the traces of her perfume, a sweetish drift of that aroma. Schepp inhaled it like a man newly in love, stopped abruptly, looked at Doro, whispered to her: You are right, when you can’t smell other people, you’re really dead, how sad.

She was rigid all over now, completely cold. When he checked one last time to see whether her hands were still folded, or rather lying hooked together, large marks of livor mortis had emerged over her entire body. The discolouration had made rapid progress. All at once he shivered; he went to the window to close it, then abruptly opened it again.

Yes, that was better. Standing at the window and looking down into the street, Schepp realized that he was now much worse off than he had been in the morning. He had been deserted twice over, a man who had even lost his wife. His wife, what an unthinkable thought! She had fallen hook, line and sinker for Dana and her fairy tales, today she had come close to setting out in pursuit of a chimera. Should he be relieved that Death had intervened, sparing him that humiliation at least?