Andrzej Bursa - Killing Auntie

Slowly, choosing my words carefully, I told her everything, starting with a broad sketch of my relationship with Auntie and a discussion of the complex I had developed about her, feeling totally dependent on her, despite being younger and stronger … The rest I limited to facts. I was afraid I might lose my calm, raise my voice and begin to gesticulate. But I managed to control myself and continued in an even, matter-of-fact tone of voice. When I finished, after a long moment of silence, Teresa asked me:

“Is that all you had to tell me?”

I nodded, but then immediately shook my head vigorously.

“No, no … I mean, don’t worry, I don’t have any more sins to confess. But I’d like to tell you more, so much more …” I mumbled.

Teresa got up and started putting her coat on. She walked past me as if I weren’t there. Her indifference stunned me and got me shaking again.

“Teresa,” I pleaded with her. “Say something … You owe me an explanation, don’t you think? What do you think about it …” I stammered out hopelessly.

Teresa wasn’t paying any attention. She seemed to focus her mind exclusively on simple things like closing her handbag and putting her kerchief on, the way I had when I lit the stove and prepared my first lonely breakfast. She started walking toward the door. I followed her and barred her way.

“Let me out,” she said, “unless you are planning another …” Her eyes were hard and fearless.

“Go then,” I said slowly without moving. “Go, and later, after they’ve hanged me, you can boast to your girlfriends that you slept with a murderer.”

Before I finished saying the last word she slapped me hard in the face.

“You have no right to hit me,” I continued in the same tone. “If you want to, all you need to do is to say a word to those who can do it much better than you. No need to get offended. Sooner or later, you’ll have to decide what you are going to do with this information. One can let go and forget all kinds of rubbish and trifles. But you — you cannot even forget the red elf.”

The last words I said quietly and feebly. I didn’t mean to be cynical. I had lost all my cynicism a long time ago. I carried on tired and dejected.

“That is why you have no reason to take offense. Perhaps it was churlish of me to say what I said, but you can’t deny there was some truth to it. You are not, as far as I know, prudish or devoid of a sense of humor. Your attitude is of a woman who’s open-minded and possesses a high dose of intelligence. And a touch of exaltation. All these traits indicate that you could be … one day … confided in … not by everyone, of course … but confided in quite lightheartedly … you know … with what I told you. I wouldn’t blame you, just like I wouldn’t blame anyone for anything, and not because I don’t … in my present situation … have the right, but because I’m not convinced there is such a right. I think … simply … that we are all guilty.”

Teresa knitted her eyebrows and listened.

“And you don’t know, you simply don’t know …” I was beginning to lose the thread. “Telling you all this, I’m trying to spare you the … so that …” I completely lost it. “Teresa. Do you understand? Thousands of days, thousands of hours, during which nothing ever happens: the staple of my childhood and adolescence. Dreams that turn out to be just as empty. Or worse — they turn out to be a poison that kills any chance of healthy vegetation. Were we fed the stories of valiant kings, knights and other heroes — just to be vegetation? Why have I been condemned to vegetation? Who is to blame for it? Who?”

I began to pace the room. Talking gave me pleasure. Listening to the flow of my words, helping myself with gestures and seeing interest on Teresa’s face, I felt, almost subconsciously, how much I loved myself. Humiliated and ridiculous, I abandoned myself, the crucified fool, to a desperate gesture. “I do not intend to justify my crime with the commonness of crime in our times. The fact that we all, day after day, gouge eyes, break arms and hearts, that we all hide corpses in our homes, does not excuse me from rightful punishment. We do not accept any other justice and the blindness of this one we know only too well. I do not mean to defend myself. If only because I do not feel guilty.”

“It’s terrible, but I understand you, and agree with you,” said Teresa. “It’s terrible.”

“Today I could think that you need my help, you — my red elf,” I continued broodingly. “But that would be misleading. I love you, Teresa, and our time together is the brightest in my whole life. But beyond that? Do you remember, darling, we talked about it — that it cannot last forever? For ultimately, what choice do we have? Marriage, legally sanctioned or not, or breaking up. And again the torture of boredom. At least thanks to this bloody business we still could be lovers.”

Teresa frowned and asked, rather concerned now:

“Very well, but what can we do with it?”

“With what?” I asked confused.

“You know, with … with Auntie.”

“We’ll clean it up somehow,” I said absentmindedly, and suddenly we both burst out laughing.

The exhilaration of the previous evening, the rapture of last night, the despair of the morning and the horror of the last hour — this whole concoction of moods exploded with our young, healthy laughter. The solemn discussion during which I’d put on professorial airs could not have ended in any other way. We laughed like kids. Every time we stopped and one of us tried to say something, it was enough to look at each other and the intended words were blown off our lips by laughter. At last, completely worn out, we fell silent. Teresa looked at her watch.

“It’s late. I have to go.”

“Stay a bit longer.”

“I can’t. I’m famished.”

“Excellent. We’ll have breakfast in town.”

“Excellent.”

“You are a darling for not talking about home, where they must be very worried about you now.”

“I said I would stay the night at my friend’s. And that is how it was going to be, if you hadn’t seduced this homeless maid …”

Laughing again we set off for town.

THE HONEY DAYS PASSED FOR US UNDER THE SIGN OF THE corpse. Going to the bathroom, Teresa dutifully ignored the bathtub with the chopped-up remains. I strictly forbade her to look under the sheet. Teresa was obedient. Her participation in the crime still had for her the charm of novelty. She devotedly followed the unwritten code of criminals. Her attitude toward me had changed into boundless adoration.

“I want to serve you, serve you,” she would often say.

My attachment to her grew with every day. Every hour spent without Teresa was difficult. I could not imagine my life without our moments together, without our discussions, dreams and pleasures. When fear struck, Teresa brought me calm.

“My little one,” she would say, stroking my hair. “My poor little one. Don’t worry. Don’t worry, I’m with you.”

“Who are you?” I’d ask with my eyes closed, “Teresa?”

“I’m your girl. Your red elf.”

“Red? Why red?” I would tease her.

“That’s the color of the king of elves.”

“Tell me about the king of elves.”

Sometimes we would make plans for the future. Teresa, under the spell of our situation, believed everything was possible. We fixed the date of our escape and determined the picturesque routes of our travels. Those talks worked on me like opium. The reality of our situation seemed to me a trivial barrier, which could be blown out of our way with a puff.

On Sunday we decided to go for an excursion out of town and drown two little parcels of the corpse in the river under the ice floes. At first I didn’t agree to it.