Norman Manea - Compulsory Happiness

“Last year, when Banu had to go with everyone else in his office to help with the potato harvest, he brought back two sacks. They didn’t do a lick of real work, they just screwed around playing games. It was the farmers out there who told them to take some home, can you believe it … Now, when it’s time to go back there, he’s stuck doing military service. I called up my old aunt, I asked her to help us out with some food, until we get a chance to drive out to the country one of these Sundays to fill up the car, because we just can’t go on like this.”

Viorica, the fluffy little cloud, was softly pouring out her heart while she scribbled away and signed her name at the speed of light. A fast worker, Viorica, faster than all the rest, but she couldn’t resist backbiting and telling tales out of school. She wrote, added, signed, stamped in the twinkling of an eye. Which was what she was up to at that moment, and she’d yakkety-yakked about this and that until Geta finally got up to get herself another glass of water from the sink.

“You know, I told you zis zummer that I had zome pillz. But you didn’t want them at the time. Zo I zlipped them to a neighbor, a young engineer. She livez in our building on the ground floor, she’z zingle. She getz oodles of pack-agez from her brother, who landed up in Canada.”

That was Geta, with her sweetly sibilant s’s, so sweet they’d put you to sleep. Easy to recognize her. So it was Geta, not Viorica, to whom Chickadee was talking, with those long pauses between words and that look she’d give you from time to time — astonished or mischievous, an irresistible look that would melt all resistance. Men, poor things, such easy marks.

A metallic rustle nearby: the Lady Carmen, obviously! Ina didn’t bother opening her eyes, she knew who it was, she knew what was coming, and she didn’t feel in the slightest bit like getting ready for it… If Milady Carmen was busy using that horribly provincial aluminum comb on the tangles in her thick black hair, that meant she was treating herself to her oh-so-familiar break. Soon she’d bring her chair over to Ina’s desk. Then she’d trot out the usual opener: “Well, what’s new, my little Inouchka from Sevastopol?” And she’d begin to caress her hand gently: “What pretty hands and eyes you have, my sweetheart of the steppes!”

Comrade Carmen Petroianu, who was in charge of this group, clearly preferred Ina to all the others. She showed her that protective friendliness reserved for tourists, when one points out to them the location of such-and-such a street or hotel or museum, tells them when a shipment of shoes is expected, and suggests they try looking for a certain item in this or that part of town. Ina had been living in Romania now for many years, a good ten of which she’d spent working in the bank; moreover, she was better than Comrade Carmen at all the chicanery necessary to survive daily life, but she accepted her assigned role. A warm welcome, no rebuffs …

No, she’d keep her eyes closed, she wouldn’t open them even when she smelled the hovering odor of Comrade Carmen’s huge body, soon to be seated on her right.

“Don’t forget, you’re assigned to the art brigade, Chickadee! This afternoon. For the patriotic festival… Perhaps we’ll get to see you on TV, who knows?”

Carmen’s voice definitely had carrying power. She was probably putting her barrettes back in, before getting up to go visit her attractive colleague. She called her Ina Chatova, even though for a long time now everyone else had been calling her Murgule , naturally, as the wife of ex-Comrade Murgule , formerly an important corporate director and university professor.

“An art brigade — juzt what every pregnant woman needz,” groaned Geta from her desk.

Chickadee didn’t say anything for the moment, only for the moment, of course.

As might have been expected, there was the sound of a chair being moved. One sensed the approach, the breathing of the matronly Carmen’s massive bulk. Ina waited another moment. Then she finally opened her eyes …

“What’s the matter, Inouchka, you’re tired?”

The sweetheart of Sevastopol had barely had enough time to recognize the beauty mark beneath her supervisor’s thick and scarlet lower lip.

“A bit tired. Last night, uncle of Micha came and stayed long time. But he gave me pair errinks of, how you say, of the pearl. Very pretty, very very pretty …”

Carmen could just have eaten her up! Much amused, she lighted a Kent, placing the pack on Ina’s desk so that she could help herself. Comrade Petroianu didn’t need to depend on the baksheesh of savings-bank customers trying to open special accounts, or the retired people all clumped together in lines on the fifteenth of every month, waiting to get their hands on their meager due, or lottery winners exhilarated by the good fortune that’s come to them out of nowhere … Obviously, she wouldn’t have refused a pack of imported cigarettes, or a bar of Western soap, or her fair share from what was given to her girls, who passed her quota on to her from time to time … It wasn’t much, of course; they didn’t work in a clinic or a gas station, for example.

“Girlz, I’ve got newz for you. They’ve ztarted zmoking king-zize even in the bookztorez: zomething’z going on, they muzt have reduced the zize of their printing runz,” Sugar Candy had announced at one point. Comrade Petroianu couldn’t have cared less. As for the boxes of cookies and packets of sweets, they were a pain in the neck. She couldn’t stand confectionery. Sweet things revolted her, she gave them away on the spot, without even opening them. And she wasn’t putting on an act, either, because she really wouldn’t have touched them for the world. It made you wonder how she hadn’t managed to lose any weight. Actually, she didn’t even try to diet, she hadn’t the patience to deal with all those half-assed low-calorie recipes. Who cares about fashion? Why should she worry about her figure? She felt fine, she had no reason to get all balled up in that complicated weight-loss stuff. But she really and truly did not like sweets. She wouldn’t have anything to do with them, period.

“Forget about your ‘earrinks,’ or whatever you call them, let’s talk about boots. Won’t be any this year, not a single pair. Everyone’s going to find themselves with their fingers up their … Wha? I heard it from someone at the top who knows, believe me. If you want, I can get you some in our special store. For eight hundred, Italian, with heels. And I asked Bebe to put down Chanel on the list, too. Only a hundred bottles are supposed to come in this year. We ought to be able to get two of them.”

Ina had grown used to these periodic favors, she didn’t even say thank you anymore. She waited patiently for her loot, as instructed.

“You don’t have to thank me,” Lady Carmen had once stated firmly. “Me, when I do a favor, it’s ‘cause I like the person. After all, what’s the big deal? If you knew how much others take … I asked him, too: Do you think it’s the same in the afterlife? Now he’s off to Brazil, my sweetheart. And me, I’m stuck at my desk, like an idiot. But he absolutely promised me a vacation in Italy, my dear Party member. As it happens, he’s already busy pulling strings for that one.”

Comrade Carmen’s husband held a mid-level but useful position: he traveled, had lots of connections. His wife had jealously clung, not only to her mistakes in grammar and spelling, but also to a certain good sense that kept her from turning her nose up at the often-aired problems of her modest fellow workers, while preventing her from getting involved in petty intrigues or inappropriate gossip. She listened, didn’t dodge the bittersweet stories or the constant grumbling, never interrupted, even chimed in occasionally with a snippet of information or an example, but maintained a consistent outlook: “I won’t spit in the soup I eat. If I eat it, then that’s what I eat, and that’s that.” Her unique and secret revenge, so to speak, against the privileges she enjoyed — privileges that were welcome but also faintly despised, and properly so — seemed to be precisely this fondness for Ina, a pleasant enough colleague and one who never caused any trouble, but who was treated with noticeable coldness by her superiors, for her Russian name. Of course, Milady Carmen didn’t have any children … However, Ina wasn’t all that young anymore, either. Be that as it may, Carmen made no effort to hide her affection for Chatova-Murgule ., yet she didn’t favor her in any way in office affairs, treating her exactly like the others. Personal gestures, though, were saved just for her. A kind of affectionate mentor relationship, geared to making life easier for Ina and obtaining certain things for her outside of work. The most astonishing part was that they didn’t visit each other: neither had introduced the other to her family, or invited her home, the way most people do. They didn’t even call each other on Sundays. The sweetheart of Sevastopol acknowledged the special nature of their relations only on the occasion of Comrade Petroianu’s birthday. Her fellow workers had long stopped being impressed by the lavish presents she inevitably bestowed on their supervisor. Still, the gift represented the barest minimum in the way of a return gesture, and was far from equaling the advantages accumulated throughout the year thanks to the wife of Bebe Petroianu, an official who managed very nicely in his job at the Ministry of Foreign Trade.