Elvira Dones - Sworn Virgin

Hana congratulates her. ‘I told you you’d find a way.’

‘The Human Resources manager says I have good potential,’ Lila yells down the phone. ‘Are you sure we can’t meet this evening? What do you have on that’s so important?’

Hana confesses she’s going out to dinner with a man. Lila is struck dumb.

‘What? A man?’

‘I’m not going out with a monkey, if that’s what you mean,’ Hana answers, laughing. The floodgates open again and Lila gives her the third degree. To save time and effort, Hana feeds her the name Patrick.

‘The guy with the business card? The journalist?’

‘That’s the one.’

‘When did you see him?’

‘A few weeks ago.’

‘A few — how many?’

‘A couple of months ago.’

‘You are evil, Hana Doda, you are a real …’

Hana hangs up on her before Lila goes into paroxysms.

Patrick hugs her tenderly and sensitively. He puts her hands together and holds them tight. He knows what he’s doing; he wants to find the right way to handle her.

He says he’d just like to see her every now and then. Without stress. He’d like to spend time with her, as much as she wants. It’s simple. To be friends without worrying whether there’s anything unbalanced in the relationship.

She stares at him as he speaks without saying a word.

‘So?’ he laughs. ‘You’re not going to take weeks to answer, are you? I just want to clear up a few things. I’m not looking to have some kind of outlandish affair because that’s not what you need.’

Hana has trouble mustering an appropriate response. She’s panicking again, and she confesses as much. His response is perfectly sensible and that’s why, in the days to come, she is sure she’ll be wondering where the hitch is. She’s not used to this. She doesn’t believe in the perfect man. Not even in novels.

‘How many women in the world … ’ She leaves the sentence incomplete. Then she goes on, almost bitterly: ‘There must be something wrong with you. You can’t be perfect. Your perfection scares me — and it’s irritating too.’

Patrick laughs. And the drop in tension helps her.

‘Hana,’ he says. ‘I’m not desperate and I’m not trying to trick you into anything! Don’t worry, I have plenty of defects. Perfect? Me?’

She tells him she’s scared. Before he arrived, and in the last few days, she was calm. Now she’s feeling nervous, so it’s better if she doesn’t say anything else, or she’ll just talk garbage. He looks at her incredulously, but still with a twinkle of fun.

‘Tell me the truth,’ she pleads. ‘You’re regretting this now, right? I can see it. It’s not a matter of regretting things, or being convinced about what we’re doing. I just know this isn’t going to work. Pretending to be something I’m not, deceiving each other. It’s no good. It can’t work.’

Patrick gets up slowly and looks away. She follows closely behind. At the door she feels a sudden desire to curl up right inside him, but she doesn’t let him read her thoughts. She lets him kiss her forehead while she kisses him all over in her mind.

‘I’m sorry, Patrick. I’ve messed up again.’

He’s already out of the door, shaking his head without a glance back at her. He gestures goodbye and runs down the stairs. He has left his bunch of flowers in the apartment.

You’re fucked, Hana tells herself. You’ll never learn. You’re totally in the shit, ruined for life. All he did was ask you to be his friend and you acted like he was proposing till death do us part. God, you’re such an idiot. Worse than last time getting drunk and all that. What the hell do you want from him?

The question is loaded, and she decides to give herself a break that evening, because she knows damn well what the answer is, and it fills her with embarrassment.

She dials Lila’s number again. If she spends another minute thinking on her own she’ll lose it, there and then.

‘Lila, I like him too much.’

‘Where is he?’

‘I sent him away. I messed up.’

‘You’re crazy! Weren’t you two going out to dinner? Why did you do that?’

‘Because everything he says makes too much sense. Come over. I need you here.’

Two months later Hana gathers her courage and calls Patrick on his cell phone. It’s the beginning of September and it’s still warm.

She needs to apologize to him, she tells herself, and be forgiven. She suggests going out to a quiet restaurant in Georgetown on the canal, if he wants and if he has time.

After saying sorry to a passerby for bumping into him, Patrick says he accepts her apologies, but is still doubtful about the rest. ‘What do we have to say to one another?’

She waits for more. He doesn’t provide it.

It feels like a slap and it hurts. She swallows the pain.

‘Patrick?’

‘Yes?’

‘Please.’

Silence.

‘This evening I happen to be free. I hope that is ok with you because tomorrow I’m going out of town and I’ll be away for a good while.’

She thanks him and hopes her voice does not betray how relieved she is. She tells him she’ll pick him up in her ridiculous car; that way there’ll be nothing else to know about her. He’ll have seen everything.

‘I wish!’ he exclaims. ‘Ok, see you this evening.’ Hana imagines his smile, sees it cracking his face with expectant amusement.

‘And I’m paying,’ she adds.

‘Have you finished laying down conditions?’

The restaurant Hana has imagined for months that she would choose is perfect. They decide to sit outside on the patio rather than inside with the air conditioning. Soothing Celtic music plays in the background.

They order scallops, which are served in a thick white sauce.

Hana launches right into her apologies.

‘I’m sorry for every time I’ve put you out with a question; I’m sorry about my reservations; I’m sorry about my doubts.’

O’Connor doesn’t answer. He’s tanned, she notices. He must have been out sailing.

Another couple sits at the table near them. Patrick looks at Hana tenderly.

‘All we do is explain, reflect, argue. How about we try lightening up a little? How about changing the subject for once?’

Hana explains she’s the opposite of the kind of woman Patrick must like.

‘And what kind of woman would that be?’

‘Gorgeous, well-educated, chic, poised.’

He doesn’t give an inch. Hana decides to start eating her food. She thanks the defenseless bivalve drowning in the béchamel. It’s delicious.

Hana knows how to be silent. She knows how not to die. She knows how to love. She knows how to write. But she doesn’t know how to make love. And she doesn’t know how to hate. Now she knows all these things about herself. She also knows things can’t go on as they are. She says all this to Patrick with unusual calm.

‘There are some things,’ she says, ‘you and I can’t talk about and … ’ she stops.

‘You’re forgetting I learned your story by rote,’ he says, reassuring her. ‘It’s all written in your diaries.’

Patrick rests his chin on both hands.

‘So let’s go make love,’ he says, as naturally as ever. ‘Let’s finish these damn scallops. You pay the bill, since you’re so concerned about it. Nobody is stopping you. And we’ll get out of here. Nobody is stopping us. Don’t panic. I’m not asking you to marry me, to have kids, to commit yourself for eternity. Friends give each other a hand. So let’s try making love, if you feel like it. Start with that and then see what happens with your life.’

Hana has gone red. She tries smiling at Patrick and succeeds, without feeling awkward.

‘Normally friends don’t go to bed, right?’ she quips, scared to mess up again.