A furious snowfall fell silently. Despite the relatively early hour, it was already beginning to get dark. In the cold and dusk, in the doorway of the nearly crumbling tenement building, a slim, almost childlike figure could be seen. In rags, without shoes or jacket, with sunken cheeks – he presented a pitiful image. Flakes of snow mixed with rain fell on his narrow shoulders, his worn-out cap, and the frozen ears peeking out from beneath it. On a spread-out newspaper, in true military formation, he arranged matchboxes in rows. He praised their craftsmanship to passersby, urging them to buy them. This was how he had supported himself for many months. Or maybe years…? Unfortunately, he couldn't determine that today.
"This can't be true!" he shouted when his wife threw him. She left the packed suitcases on the street – right there, in this doorway. She walked away, her hobnailed heels clicking.
Melancholy, sadness, depression? Oh no! The ultimate numbness, a pleasant inner peace. Visions conjured up at the sight of wrinkled women. Wrapped in woolen shawls, they seemed to be of absolutely no use.
"Sloppy portions of stale meat," he muttered under his breath, before accepting pennies from the grateful buyer of a box or two.
Three months later, he even tried to return—begging, crying, bringing wildflowers. Then winter came, frost settled over the meadows, and oblivion settled over his heart. In spring, the wild flowers were beyond taming. Or perhaps he had simply grown accustomed to nighttime visions of the sky, to a hotel with billions of stars, to the highest match sales in the area...?
Another matter was that in the evenings, he still missed her like crazy. He often recalled the waiting room, the cool study, the ascetic interior of the office. He sat for hours in the armchair opposite, gazing at her warm, honeyed lips. Her eyes seemed to drip with tiny drops of morning dew. She laughed in him, and he in her. She rejoiced in his ears.
And as the setting suns that evening seemed to be entering the final phase of this graceful process, he decided once again, this last one, to go to her. To woo her. He packed up the unsold goods, then rolled up the newspaper, intending to toss it in the trash, only to flatten it out reverently after a moment's reflection, inhale, and wipe it with the sleeve of his worn-out sweater. He decided to save it for another time, because it was a truly good newspaper. He pulled his cap further over his ears and, full of confidence in victory, whistling softly to himself, set off.
She lived three blocks away—the distance was short, but the tons of icy snow on the sidewalks were an almost insurmountable obstacle. It was easy to slip and fall on his unshaven face. So he was careful, stepping carefully, constantly looking down at his hairy legs.
At her door, as usual, he found a huge queue. The number of interested parties was growing at an alarming rate. He timidly took the last, lost position. No one seemed eager to strike up a conversation with him. He was fingering the scrap of his soaked cap. When he finally got his turn, all his previous confidence vanished, without even the slightest trace. With the expression of a wounded animal, he timidly knocked on the door.
"Who's there?" she spoke. Dignified yet accurate. Insightful, yet oh-so-joyful! What had he done? What windmills had he been tilting? Why had he even come here?
"Nobody," he replied in the voice of a two-day-old hanged man, and was just about to leave when he heard:
"Come in, Antoś," simply.
He pressed the doorknob. A wave of warm, perfumed air whirled in his nostrils. He took two steps and looked around. "Nothing's changed..." he thought. Perhaps only his own position in that same office. Once—a proud husband, supported by a magnificent woman with equally impressive breasts and earnings. And today? Well, today he didn't even have his own image.
"Well, Antoś, what are you here for today? What's changed for you since yesterday, the day before yesterday... since the anonymous letter—under my door, an hour ago; since the rabbit sent straight to my window; since the silent calls from almost every payphone in the area. What business are you here for today?"
Ashamed, he bit his lower lip intensely. A drop of blood trickled down his chin. He wiped his face with a handkerchief.
"Don't you need matches?" he asked.
Silently, she studied his chapped lips with a certain amount of curiosity.
"She's probably wondering how many boxes to take," that single thought flashed through his mind, rather abstract, considering who else but he knew better than anyone that they hadn't installed gas in her building—everything was electric.
"Ten boxes, Antosia. Sit down."
With a sigh of relief, he took a seat directly across from her, in a comfortable armchair covered in synthetic yellow.
"Yes, Małgosia. That's why I came. I wanted to sit down, even for a moment. Start—from the very beginning."
And so she began her story: about the rabbits in Antosia's cages and her allergy to fur; about morning wakings and her fear of cold water; about not fitting in, her aversion to children, the piles of dirty dishes. Sometimes she raised her voice, other times she lowered it, almost to a whisper, only to burst out again with redoubled force. And: "tum, pata-boom, pata-boom." And: "plum, apricots, in church." Her words, like the murmur of a mountain stream, flowed over him indifferently.
Finally—she finished. She realized, as was her custom, just in time. Carefully, she removed the small diamond knife from his numb hands. Without a word, she connected herself to the respirator standing nearby, specially prepared for this moment. With a decisive movement of her hand, she cut the first two strings. The rest involuntarily unraveled on their own. With a gesture, she beckoned him to her. He looked through her slightly open stomach.
When he thought about this meeting, he imagined many things, perhaps too many. Visions of monsters from Mars haunted him almost every night. He saw his beloved as a small, overcooked dumpling, then again—a completely normal individual, with a huge grass snake gnawing into her bottomless entrails.
This is what he saw: two perfectly matched kidneys, a liver worn out by the nation, a punctured heart, a scoop of human fat, a slightly twisted mind, a full stomach, a pure conscience, unused eyes…
Everything was in place! In short – these were human entrails. His wife was human! This unexpected discovery so astonished him that initially, despite her loud protests, he greedily picked the most beautiful organs from her belly, only to convince himself once again, not only by sight but also by touch, smell, and even taste, that this was not a dream, not a nightmare, not a delusion…!
His wife truly had human entrails. I'd even say quite ordinary ones. Antoś realized this too. He no longer protested as, with rubber-gloved fingers, she stuffed the disorganized organs into their proper places in the body. She sewed everything up very neatly, with silk thread, leaving no trace. She breathed oxygen for a moment longer, then disconnected the mask and calmly returned to her interrupted work.
He didn't know what to say now; how to comment? His embarrassment infected Małgosia. She raised her head from the desk, her gaze fixed on something in the distance. The awkward silence stretched on endlessly.
"You keep running away from me..." he finally stated in a disinterested whisper, as if to himself.
"No, Antosia. I'm not running away. I'm simply chasing you away," she replied immediately, as if with a learned line. "I sweep you away with gentle broom movements like snow in spring, which never quite wants to melt. And you keep coming back, and coming back, and coming back...
" "Don't be angry," he whined almost silently.
"Can anyone be angry at snow?"
Inspired by a new idea, he took a box of matches from his pocket. With a twinkle in his eye, he scattered the contents on the varnished countertop. He arranged them into a small, elegant, multi-story well.
"Look."
She blew. Undeterred by the failure, he took out three more boxes.
The newly assembled structure looked excellent.
"Well, look."
She seemed to accidentally nudge the table with her elbow. The structure collapsed. "Time to change sides..."
"Małgosia, Małgosia... Do you remember? Do you still remember how we met?"
She remembered. She closed her eyes thoughtfully. Now Małgosia was standing at the bus stop, waiting for the MKS bus. She sprawled comfortably on a plastic bench. After a moment, she felt a slight tingling sensation around the back of her neck—the bench was damp. She swung her legs like a young foal. Drops of water from her sandals splashed onto potential passengers scattered here and there. The sun reflected off the greasy lenses of her sunglasses, perched on her small, freckled nose. It was so beautiful...! And then He approached—Antoni Wołodyjowski. She barely resisted as he bought the ticket, consulted the timetable, checked his zipper, and wiped his nose with a tissue because he had a runny nose, despite the hot July weather—the runny nose of an allergy sufferer who hated lilacs. And it was dusting, dusting...! The nettles were dusting too.
A violent shiver ran through her. Further visions were no longer so pleasant. The beaked face of her chosen one reduced the pleasant sensations of marriage to an erotic minimum. She shook herself, weary. No, she didn't want to think any longer. She waved her hand, a little too abruptly, knocking a glass of water off the desk.
He was the first to rush to clean up. He was picking up shards of glass with a small horsehair broom. When he saw a drop of blood on his cut finger, he cried like a baby. He unconsciously laid his bald head on her warm lap. She caressed his face carelessly with her fingers.
"Go, go... I'll take you back to your dump. It's late, it's dark." Go…
Into a large leather suitcase, she packed scattered matches, a horsehair duster, shards of glass, an embroidered handkerchief, nettle pollen, remnants of silk thread, two drops of spilled blood, and a used oxygen mask. She turned the key in the lock, slipped it into his small pocket, and wrapped it around his neck with the fluffy scarf she'd been crocheting for him since last winter. A huge, fluffy, orange scarf.
She gently pushed him toward the door. He emerged—no longer hysterical. He had been waiting for her meekly, the enormous suitcase in his hand, as she closed the office and gave instructions to the answering machine. Together they descended the stairs.
Once on the street, they stood silently, looking at each other expectantly. The carriage stopped beside them, with a long, wet squeal of its wheels. The interior lights, beaming from their faces, delighted by each other's presence, glinted eerily on the wet, cobblestone road.
"Want a ride?" a cheerful man who was earning a good living today leaned out to them.
"No, thanks," Małgorzata smiled at him.
The cab drove away.
The sound of the loud, pearly laughter with which Małgorzata finally burst out rang in his ears for years to come. She had already said goodbye to him, waved, turned her face away, and taken two steps. She couldn't contain it. That laughter had been building up inside her for hours, days, maybe even years. Held back, instead of escaping into space, it condensed daily; it swelled, grew, intensified. Today, the last straw was over. At the sight of his frozen ears, the melancholic expression on his face… at the memory of those idiotic matchstick buildings…
The straw that broke the camel's back. She was laughing now, rolling on the sidewalk, recklessly. Whenever she managed to control herself for a moment, a new giggle would burst from her lips. Ha, ha, hi, hi, ho, ho… And so it went, louder, quieter. She held her trembling belly so as not to submerge it in the muddy slush of puddles.
Antoś said absolutely nothing. He had been expecting this for a long time. With calm steps, he approached the nearest street slope. And he tumbled down.
***
And so the eternal homeless Antoś roll down the slopes of reality, which you yourself, man, foresaw, so much so that it began to live on.
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