Norman Manea - Compulsory Happiness

“So, you always charge the same fee?”

“A hundred lei doesn’t mean anything anymore. I replaced the shower pipe. At the plumbing-supply store, it costs thirty-two lei and it’s a piece of garbage, rusts right out. I put in a good one, it’ll last. I replaced the washers in the faucets so they won’t drip anymore. I cleaned out the crud in the drain; it shouldn’t get stopped up now. Give me a hundred lei and you’ll have a bit of credit for the next time. I keep track of my accounts, don’t worry.”

“Which means we’ll be seeing you again. .”

A little more and the smile would break into laughter.

“You bet. So, goodbye and stay well. Above all, stay well.”

In other words, let the warm weather last a long time. .

No other news from the lone warrior until a chilly December evening, when a bulletin arrives in the form of a retrospective summary.

A great mass of people, all jammed together, waiting at the bus stop. It’s not the first time that public transportation has been the target of curses and insults, bitter grumbles distilled from the hatred and despair of would-be passengers. They mill about, bump into one another, lean out once in a while to gaze into the distance, hoping to see this monster that’s supposed to take them home finally heave into sight. Numb with cold and fatigue, they bitch unmercifully. Anyone overhearing their choppy burst of resentment might think they’re working themselves into a rage and will shortly explode in revolt. But whoever has heard them too many times, pouring out over and over the same hopeless torrents of abuse as they wait on line for meat, soap, matches, toilet paper, milk, cigarettes, shoes, or the bus, whoever has heard this daily chorus of humiliation and anger from these endless lines has already learned not to expect anything beyond such periodic sullen grousing.

A huge crowd at the bus stop on this dark, frigid evening in December. Shivering children, women lugging bags and shopping baskets, but quite a few men as well, stamping their feet to keep warm and contributing their fair share of profanity.

He’s easy to spot among them. Short, glum, three bulging plastic bags in each hand. Unlike the others, he stands quietly, stock-still. He doesn’t make a move, or a sound. Bareheaded, wearing a thin, frayed lumber jacket, he doesn’t seem to feel the cold. His brush cut is immaculate; he’s close-shaven, slender but broad-shouldered, with arms that seem too long for his frail body. He stares indifferently at the black winter sky. He looks like some lost adolescent bound for boarding school, where other young people just as poor and proud as he is confide their problems and ambitions to one another.

The gentleman who approaches him hesitates for a good long moment before addressing him. First he examines the man closely, from a few steps away, as though to make sure that he hasn’t been mistaken. He walks around the other man a few times before tapping him lightly on the shoulder, to rouse him from his reverie. They recognize each other, would like to shake hands, but those plastic bags are in the way. They lean their heads together, though, and begin to talk.

The city lies prostrate, overwhelmed by the night. The streets running into the public square by the bus stop seem like tunnels in a cavern deep underground. Darkness settles more and more thickly along the great arteries of the metropolis, as though it were a village lost out in nowhere. Only the headlights of an occasional passing car illuminate for brief moments the compact mass of black ants, a clump shaped like a dragon that occasionally opens its huge, gaping jaws to moan. A poisonous volley of invective. A chilling, somber rumbling.

The two men are oblivious to their surroundings, however, completely absorbed in each other.

The worker Valentin Nanu appears before the Supreme Court of Bucharest on June 8, 1982. He submits to the presiding judge a voluminous dossier containing statements, affidavits, and copies of medical records. These last concern not only his own state of health, which for the past year has been considered psychologically precarious, due to the plaintiff’s stressful situation at work, but also the health of his children: Maria, nineteen years old (anemia and hypocalcemia); Angela, sixteen (asthma and kyphoscoliosis); Mihaela, thirteen (acute rheumatoid arthritis and a defective mitral valve), and Marian, ten years old (rheumatoid arthritis and dysfunctional thyroid). About two months after this hearing, Valentin Nanu receives in the mail the decision of the Supreme Court in favor of his appeal. On September 26, 1982, a court order is issued requiring the reinstatement of the worker Valentin Nanu at his place of employment with no loss of seniority, and payment by the Republica Factory of Bucharest of damages to said worker in compensation for his arbitrary transfer from the boilerworks as well as the full salary due for periods of paid leave that were improperly denied him. This sum amounts in total to 8,730 lei. The plaintiff declares himself dissatisfied with this judgment, on the grounds both that it does not require punitive action to be taken against those responsible for the administrative abuses in question and that the said monetary award does not reflect the full extent of the damages to which he is entitled.

On September 27, 1982, Valentin Nanu reports to the personnel department of the Republica Factory to sign a contract of reinstatement with the firm and to collect the money awarded him by the court decision. Although the political authorities at the company try to convince him to return to work immediately, explaining that the official court order might not be delivered to them until almost a month after the actual decision in the case, the plaintiff refuses. He maintains that he will not come crawling back to the factory where he has been an exemplary worker for twenty-five years and that he will wait until all the relevant documents are in order and in his possession. In addition, he makes it clear that he is not completely in agreement with the judgment rendered and that he will continue to press, within the framework of the law, for the satisfaction of all his rightful demands. He is finally persuaded, after much urging, to go on leave without pay until such time as the new work contract is duly signed, which it is on October 22, 1982. On Monday, October 25, 19 82, Valentin Nanu returns to his job in the boilerworks; he is absent on Friday the 29th, having been advised by his doctor to go on sick leave. He returns to work again on November 8. On the eleventh, the firm’s cashier pays him 8,750 lei in accordance with court order #4444 dated September 26, 1982. On October 28, the plaintiff Valentin Nanu sends a petition to the Attorney General to request a review of his case and the decision handed down upon appeal. On December 18, 1982, he is notified by letter (docket #567,132) that the Attorney General of the Socialist Republic of Romania has declared the judgment of the Supreme Court in his case to be final and without appeal.

The man tries to tell his wife what the worker Valentin Nanu has related to him. With a brusque gesture, she cuts him off. She’s preoccupied by something else. Some painful reflection from which she cannot bear to be distracted.

“You went there again,” he says. “Were you at the cemetery? I can feel it. Each time, you seem to fall into a trance.”

“Not at all. When I’ve had a good day, suddenly I remember. . But it can happen when I’m depressed, too. So I go back. To remind myself that things might be even worse. As though it gives me strength, somehow.”

“I hope you don’t go there. . to remind yourself that I’m vulnerable.”

“No, but what I remember. . involves you. I come home terrified at the idea that something might have happened to you.”