She loved to drive herself crazy. Sometimes she'd smash glasses and unbreakable dishes. Then she'd make a picture out of the shards, gluing the shards to plasticine, depending on her mood, whether it was black or white. Usually black—by then she'd be furious. She loved to prove that what's breakable doesn't break, and what's unbreakable does.
She knew it was dangerous to leave her alone, she knew she was a danger to herself and to everyone else when she was alone. That's why, like in some cheap flower shop, you'd find so many artificial flowers, fakes, for some unknown reason, just to remind them of their imperfections. In her place, you'd meet people who resembled all these artificial creatures. People were dummy figures, standing in for her friends, on duty just so she wouldn't be left alone with her watch, her timepiece, and the stars, just so she wouldn't realize how completely different she was from herself, how many years could she sit like that without rocking back and forth on a white stool, drifting far out the window, beyond the world, beyond the horizon.
Despite everything, she was popular. She was quite perfect, very beautiful, able to afford all the beauty treatments, manicures, and hair dyes. Her slight artificiality didn't cross the line into ugliness. She was extremely intelligent, at school and university, always the best, witty, wry in her jokes, with smiling eyes and a dimple. Her perfection always devastated her, as she stared in horror in the mirror, wondering why no one was interested in her. The imitation of people, her friendship and love, they believed they were real, for such an ideal, they were happy about it. And she was happy that finally, finally, she wasn't alone.
Those hours—she remembers, just a few of those hours—were enough to realize I must always have someone by my side. She stumbled upon some mementos of her old life, of someone who had once loved her. And she loved, truly. He realized what a miracle stood beside him, how good she was to him, and he decided to fight for her, even though it had been a fight from the beginning, a fight he'd thought had been broken and lost. He knew strangely, he saw that she was worth much more than her worth. Ha, ha.
Magic, she found herself somewhere far away again, when someone was interested in her. How far removed from what she was now. She truly didn't want to hurt anyone. No one. And so it ended: someone yanked her so hard that she bit her lip and stood, as if completely naked, before the mirror in her bedroom, counting her losses, counting the bruises. Fate, which had so crippled her with perfection, wondered diligently what this woman was up to. He decided to leave her alone. If she didn't know what she wanted, he wouldn't give her what she didn't know.
And it's not like if you stop thinking about the problem, it will simply disappear. That's nonsense, she knew it. That's why she was happy for a month because she got something for free. Or rather, the free gift fell upon her, like a parcel from heaven from an angel she'd believed in so strongly.
For that month she'd just returned to with souvenirs, memories, scraps, and papers. She was undoubtedly as happy as a wasp. Like a wasp, she had everything, she looked even more beautiful, it seemed, when someone finally noticed. She had true friends, she had a package, she had an ideality similar to hers. She had Him. He meant a lot where she was, and she meant a lot to him where she was. He was addicted to her. She loved to admire her justice, how could she mean everything to him, but she wouldn't sting him, she wouldn't lead him by the nose, simply no, that's not how it works, my friend.
He disappeared
. One day, he disappeared from her. That is, no, he would never disappear from her. He had gone far, farther than far, farther than farther than far.
She pondered this for those few lonely hours, when she began to realize she would never let herself be left alone again. Never, never. He had so many possibilities. He could have seen someone ordinary and thought, oh, better. Or he could have forgotten. He could have forgotten, stopped. Don't stop, she thought, but it was too late.
She tore out her dyed, perfect hair, called her friends, measured the time she sat there, the time she got up. No one wrote. Silence, no one called. He was sitting by some river now, I don't know the exact name, maybe the Vistula, maybe the Potok, or the Little Potok. He wondered if she thought he was an idiot, and what he was doing now. She did absolutely nothing. Suffer? How can anyone suffer? How can anyone despair over me, he asked himself, seeing her familiarizing herself with a kitchen knife at breakfast in the magic ball. Oh, I'm strange, maybe I could tell her something. Maybe I could say hello, or good morning, or come and hug her.
She'd picked up that memory quite by accident. Sometimes she still sits still and wonders. What had happened?
She was going crazy. She wanted to cut off her arms, wanted to jump out the window. But not to die. Just to hear even the faint rustle of her body against the concrete. She hated the loneliness she had to endure, hated the silence that spoke in its silent voice: you're alone, you're nobody, you have no one left... no one left for you...
First, she did it once, out of anger. She did exactly what she wanted. She smashed the crystal glass she was holding on the ground. Innocent nerves, innocent anger. Innocent venting. Damn innocent.
"Hey, how old were you when he fell so in love with you, huh?" Aga asked.
They were talking, and she suddenly asked. Suddenly, a blast of despair hit her face, hidden beneath a crust of reddened skin after surviving the frost outside. It was my despair, mine, mine, reflecting off her face as if in a mirror.
"Hmm, sixteen," she said, "hmm." Everything irritated her. Aga fell silent. She fell silent, and hinted just a little at what she was thinking. So she could hear it herself.
"Adela, that was ten years ago, you know? How fast time flies? Can't you give yourself a break, can't you beat yourself up over your stupidity? Why are you an exception to that damn rule that time heals all wounds? What possessed you back then to let it end like this? Don't you know how I've always envied you for being who you always wanted to be, for pretending to be perfect and yet you are, for wanting an admirer, and yet you do. And then there's all this nonsense... Those glasses on your floor look very unpleasant, Adela, get up and go. Go to confession, look in the mirror, and beat yourself up for who you are, I can't look at you, I hate you!"
She spent that summer completely alone; she didn't hide. People hid from her. She ruined most of the things put in front of her. No one wondered why this was happening, why she got out of bed when she heard the roar of an engine, distinguished it from the other roars dreaming and flowing across the road. No one asked. No one was there.
She decided, curled up in bed, listening to something that was fighting sleepiness, pressing only the right buttons. Hunched, desperate, she gently rubbed her hand against the velvety, smooth sheets, sinking deep. The fetal position led to even greater misery. Misery, but it was ridiculous. Everything had worked out for her, after all.
She decided right then. I'm terrified of loneliness like the plague, I can never be alone again.
It was terribly easy. Especially since nothing had changed, nothing had ever changed for her since then. People, one after another, wandered through her house. She arranged them, directed them, and they willingly submitted.
Hours of stay, not an hour alone.
No loneliness. Never a maddening thought about THAT past. It was like returning to a ride on a giant carousel at an amusement park. That intoxicating smell of cotton candy, reality spun by someone to the rhythm of brilliant music. That's how she lived back then, but it's not pleasant, never, when you come back from a trip and only this memory remains, the other one is gone. You can only recall the feeling, the facts far, far away.
She slammed her index finger in the door. She looked at her watch. Damn, why does this five-minute break between people have to be so long? She played some awful music and danced, trying to make herself as dizzy as possible. To fall or trip, maybe crack her head. I CAN'T DO ANYTHING ANYMORE!
The thing about wrecks is that they once meant a lot, they were important. Look at the Titnic. Look at Adela. Look at her smashing the window in her apartment, the serving window in the dining room, how she spits at a dog walking down the street, how she doesn't admire the view from a skyscraper, she just doesn't care. She doesn't care that she's long since stopped being perfect, the curse, she only remembers that it once meant a lot, that she is who she is.
No, she was never alone again, not lonely, not quirkyalone, not single. Don't worry, she's gone gray, she didn't have children. But she was never alone, not lonely, don't worry. She had you in her brain and in her memory. She had you under her skin until it landed underground, buried in sand. Don't worry that you didn't write her "bye." What does it mean, it means nothing. Look at the class photo. Remember her. It will mean a lot to her. You thought of her, didn't you? It was like back in the day, when it would have meant so much to you. You're such a smartass.
Kiss me goodnight and tell me another story about Adela's sisters. Or you can tell me another story about her, whatever.
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