Ivan Klima - Lovers for a Day

'Sing something,' she said quietly.

'Okay.'

She still could not see him, but on the adjacent wall she could now make out his silhouette as he opened his mouth.

He sang very quietly. His voice was pleasant and the melody very simple: slightly soothing and slightly amusing. Soon she

stopped being aware of it, even of the words, leaving only random pictures without any meaning: elephants with flags, damp roofs plaited out of football shirts, flocks of flying bears, palm birds, mouse-driven clocks; warm colours, pictures like flickering ink blots. She could still see the moving silhouette, but it was no longer leaning against the wall nearby but standing beneath a tall, white staircase: it belonged to her. She could stretch out her hand and say, Come to me, don't go away, don't struggle, stay with me — she could say it and knew he would understand it and stay with her.

So she said, Come with me! And they were running up an enormous staircase, with thousands of actors milling about, some waving flags, others just mournfully reciting, but they ignored them completely and climbed up and up.

'Not so fast!' they shouted after them. 'The abyss looms before you! pon't lose your heads, youngsters!'

'Take no notice of any of them,' she heard his voice. 'Those old clowns, those fogies, those windbags, those car-driving TV heroes paid to recite anything at all.'

'Let them witter away here,' she said. 'They're quite amusing when they perform here.'

'What can you see?' he asked.

'Everything,' she said. 'It's a total blank but in it I can see everything I ever wanted to see.'

He had stopped singing. For a moment she was alarmed, but the silence was now cheerful and friendly and she was still standing on a thin strip of concrete beyond which lay everything and she could make out his dark silhouette in front of her. Don't let him move, she wished, let everything stay the way it is, we'll stay here together always. Let the morning never come, let this moment last for ever.

She was overcome with a drunken longing for laughter and held her breath; then she felt tears on her cheeks. I'm happy, she realized with amazement.

3

It was a silly song that they had made up during evenings at the student residence when they were feeling totally drained. It had thirty verses. I'll sing her two of them, at most, just to show her how she wide of the mark she was about those poems and then I'll kiss her. But he went on singing more and more verses, staring at her face: motionless and very beautiful. She was beautiful. He could lean down and kiss her, but at the same time she was too remote and indifferent, so he didn't.

It's because I know nothing about her, it struck him, and he didn't take his eyes off her: he was accustomed to staring with concentration for hours on end, imprinting on his memory the shapes of beetles and plants, although he had never taken the trouble to memorize the appearance of a particular person — that tends to be obvious at first sight.

He had watched her from the first moment they were together. At the same time he had registered the journey, the houses, the night, the barking dogs and passing trains. He had also talked a great deal and thought about what he was doing and what he was going to do. But at this very moment he was not thinking about or even noticing anything else, just her and her stillness, and then beneath that stillness he saw with astonishment a slight tremor of hair and eyelashes and at last he saw tears well up and start to fall. And he felt compassion and sympathy; she must be experiencing something terribly painful.

But he would do everything to make her happy! He touched her on the shoulder.

'No!' she blurted out. 'Not here! Not now!'

'Say something! Tell me something about yourself.'

'Yes.'

'You will?'

'Yes,' she said quietly, 'but not now.'

He took her by the hand and they left the chapel. To the north-east the night was gradually receding.

They blundered down the stony path in silence. He helped her and waited. She was extremely tired. Her hair was mussed and there were shadows under her eyes. It would soon be morning and they had not even kissed yet. Just because she had to stay so stupidly silent all the time! Why? What was she waiting for? What was she still waiting for?

He turned to her. 'I'm looking forward to hearing everything.'

She felt his impatience.

'Shall we sit down here?'

'Wait a bit.'

She was very tired and gripped by a peculiar feeling of regret. As if someone had woken her up abruptly from a vivid dream full of colour and powerful emotion. She could neither rouse herself nor go back.

The first cottages of some village emerged out of the darkness. Cocks were crowing like mad, the path grew lighter and the dust was slightly damp.

'Well?' he said.

'Just wait a bit.' Then she asked, 'How will we get home?'

'Do you have to go to work?'

She nodded.

'There'll be some long-distance drivers along soon,' he said. 'They're bound to stop for you.'

But they were walking along a byroad and he knew that no long-distance drivers came this way. He was quite glad they didn't. They had so little time left.

'Come on, let's sit down here!'

She shook her head. What shall I tell him? she thought wearily to herself. That time back then, when the first one took her by the hand… It was strange, it had been the very same gesture as his yesterday evening. It hadn't been on a bench but in the empty natural-history study. She recalled the tall green cupboard full of stuffed birds, the toad in alcohol, the tarantulas, the very same gesture as his yesterday. It was strange how many important and involved experiences she had had since — rendezvous and car journeys, protestations, entreaties, threats, men's tears, nights in parks and nights in strange flats, disappointments, hotel beds and separations — but this was something she recalled more clearly than all the rest, and she remembered that touch, how he had covered her hand with his, that lovely touch that was so tender and so long ago.

I'm awfully sentimental, she thought. It must be the lack of sleep.

She closed her eyes slightly and managed to clear her thoughts. Her entire life had collapsed. The feeling of that dream came back to her. She could see the dark outline of a forest below a sky that was turning blue — the charred wall of the city. She could see the faint reflections of the fire: now she was part of a column of marching soldiers that was once more approaching its destination.

Where are you leading me?

I'm leading you soldiers to the future. To a greater love. To a new and more valuable happiness!

No, she said, I don't believe any more. I know I won't be convinced. I'll stay here.

In that case, said the one in front, you'll be a little lost soldier. Little lost soldiers are worst off of all. They're the ones that stumble around an empty field telling themselves they'll conquer something on their own. You'll suffer rain and loneliness and silence, you'll get out of the habit of our regulations and excellent orders, and when the enemy finds you you'll just gibber with fright and he'll slaughter you and there'll be no one there to close your eyes.

I'll stay here with him, she said happily. I'm fond of him.

He suddenly stopped to listen. He was unable to conceal his annoyance. 'Something's coming!'

It was a heavyy Tatra truck, with its load covered by a tarpaulin. The driver opened his swollen eyelids wide: 'You've been out gallivanting late,' he said. 'I've never seen the like — four o'clock in the morning!'

He remained silent for a moment, looking first at her, then at him, then back at her.

'Okay, climb aboard,' he said eventually. 'You'll find a bit of space somewhere among the barrels.'