3

VII

"Ms. Tereska, the cost analysis I conducted indicates that three purchase invoice payments were incorrectly recorded. Please correct this immediately. Mr. N is beginning to have doubts about our handling of his financial affairs, and I think we all wouldn't want Mr. N to terminate his contract with us. This would risk dismissal, including you, Ms. Tereska. You're two years away from retirement, and I don't think anyone would hire you at your age. Please try harder and don't make such mistakes. Do we understand each other, Ms. Tereska?

" "Yes, Mr. Darek.

" "Mr. Director, could you help me? I can't print this data.

" "Let's see. You haven't approved last month's data again. How many times do I have to tell you that you have to do this every time? Don't you understand what's being said to you? Please try harder. This isn't a café where you drink coffee and chat with your friends." Please focus on your work, not on discussing your children's development with your colleague, and you will certainly see results. I've been observing you for some time now and I've come to the conclusion that you're not a good fit for our company. Please make an effort, or we'll part ways.

"Fine... I'm sorry, Mr. Darek.

" "I'm not interested in an apology. I only expect conscientious, reliable work from you, and at least a shred of commitment to what you do."

VIII

With a brisk step, he crossed the threshold of the apartment, carefully completing the ritual of polishing his shoes on the doormat before entering. A ritual meant to protect the house from the filth of the city. This ridiculous act was the result of his fascination with folk traditions, which he had devoted considerable time and money to learning. In each of these traditions, which appeared regularly like the moon's phases every six months, at the beginning of summer and the end of the year, convinced of his own uniqueness, he discovered hidden secrets. He perceived the hidden, and sometimes even the hidden, depths of the wisdom of peoples, cultures, and religions. Knowledge that no one before him, no one had ever noticed. The theatrical, meticulous wiping of shoes before entering the apartment was one of those hidden truths, discovered during a summer of fascination, that he, only he, had noticed.

His energetic, as always, movements indicated good humor. That's what any of us would think. But a disturbing premonition lurked in his thoughts, one he tried to suppress all day. To no avail. He forced himself to concentrate on his work, and above all, knowing his duties, on playing the role of a strong, independent, calculating man who, like a prostitute dispassionately adapting to her client, played the role imposed by his surroundings. The difficult role of life. Waiting for the suffocating inevitable took over his mind and chameleon instincts, preventing him from devoting himself to the things he cared about most: work, fame, but perhaps most of all appearances. Or perhaps survival?

Throughout the day, he tried to recall a moment in his life when he had experienced similar feelings, and he was certain that this mixture of bitterness and inevitability had dominated his thoughts in the past. He alternately forced his mind to repress these premonitions, only to search for memories in his life that had triggered a similar state. The moment he crossed the threshold, when his suppressed thoughts raced toward Joanna, to envelop her as they did every day, seeking solace after a long day of work and struggle, a flash of memory illuminated his thoughts, the time, and the situation connected to these premonitions. The loss of a child.

Bitter memories stabbed his body, pressing against his head, constricting his throat. He didn't want to admit his mistake. He never would, then or now. But the choking taste of remorse after losing Wiktor persisted for a long time. Wiktor. That's what he wanted to call him. The victory of life over death. For many months, he hadn't once thought of Joanna's pain. He blamed himself for not wanting a child. He blamed himself for his selfishness and immature thoughts. Are they mature now? He trembled at the very thought of fatherhood, of devoting himself to someone, but deep down, he wanted to pass on to his child the knowledge that would protect him from the mistakes he himself had made. He wanted to teach him freedom of thought. Freedom unfettered by his own ego. When she lay in the hospital, crying, losing a part of herself, he cried too, though he resisted. He refused to let anyone see his tears, to let anything hurt him. He promised himself then that he would always, at all costs, fight for those he loved. But with the pain gone, in the throes of the struggle for existence, his resolve faded.

He didn't want Joanna to notice his despondency, and he suppressed the feeling that irritated him, but when he remembered Wiktor, it terrified him. Like a man of routine, aware of his behavior, unable to change it despite his best intentions, he played his role as he did every day.

He sat on a stool in the hallway and, in a dispassionate, rough voice, shouted toward the kitchen. Or perhaps toward the living room. He didn't know. He might as well have shouted toward the bathroom, whose tiled walls echoed even more dispassionately, though with a touch of warmth.

"Honey, I'm back. What did you make for dinner today?" His left shoe fell to the floor. He pricked up his ears, waiting for an answer. Yes, there was a theatrical head movement, but silence answered him.

"Joanna, honey," he said her name softly, despite the tension his premonitions had aroused, "I asked what's for dinner today?" His right shoe fell to the floor.

He meticulously placed his shoes under the stool and tilted his head again, pricking his ears. This time, the head movement was visible, contrasting with the interplay of studied smiles and flat words, the everyday conformity of gestures. But again, silence answered him. "What happened?!?" he thought, rising, but suddenly a detail caught his attention. A detail that, like a spark, ignites months of resentment. Today's "catastrophe," allowing him to vent the anger and resentment he could no longer contain, was a speck of dust on the hallway rug. It was the pretext for an outburst of frustration and self-pity.

"Didn't she vacuum?"—anger began to fill his veins, finally drowning out the entire day of struggling with his own thoughts. "I'm the one working so hard so my wife doesn't cook, and I have to live in filth?!?" He emphasized the words "my," "cooked," and "lived," giving them meaning, while the word "working" passed through his mind unnoticed, as if the work came easily to him.

Fear quickly turned to fiery anger like a speck of dust falling on the rug. He strode purposefully into the kitchen, his nostrils alert to the smell of dinner, but he had to calm them when all he sensed was emptiness.

The unsettling, pungent smell of emptiness gradually began to permeate his body, filling him with dread. "Where is she?"—the stubbornness of his thoughts softened under the pressure of the inexorable silence. "How could she leave me without dinner?"

The emptiness terrified him, creeping into his eye sockets, soaking them, only to suddenly awaken the last vestiges of his former strength, to spark the last sparks. He jumped up and, peering into every, even the most unlikely hiding place, ran around the apartment shouting, "Joanna! Joanna! Don't hide! I know you're here!" He ran around the house twice, and at the moment when the reality of his premonitions blessed his consciousness and soul, panting heavily, he collapsed onto the kitchen bench and, gazing tenderly at the table, propping his head on both hands, said directly into the merciless silence, "Joanna! Please! Don't hide! Please."

A harsh, calculating loneliness, like a tempter, whispered with the inner voice of ancient sirens: "Smoke. Smoke. You'll calm down." He was no longer that dispassionate machine, the calculating man who directed his life. He was a lonely boy who had lost everything he cared about and everything he didn't appreciate.

Like a sleepwalker, he rose from the table in search of cigarettes. He hadn't smoked for six months, but the sticky stench of the emptiness he feared and the brutal destruction of the monotony he had learned to live in—colorless, conformist, yet oh-so-safe—forced him to take that step. A cigarette. A cigarette!

Without celebration or pathos, he pulled it from the blue pack to light it. For the first time in six months. With trembling hands, not for the first time, he lit the lighter, greedily inhaling the smoke, only to stare, drugged, at his own reflection in the window, his entire attention focused on inhaling. Mythical god of life, who demands ever greater sacrifices from his subjects, ever bloodier offerings. Perhaps he wanted to offer a sacrifice of himself to appease the gods of life who had taken Joanna from him.

He inhaled the last of the cigarette faster than he expected. His body demanded more. More. More. Enough – he shouted. However…. He hunched over, curled up, buried his head in his arms, and pulled out a second cigarette.

It was growing darker, as the air in the kitchen was thickening, filled with smoke that choked his throat and stung his eyes. “Where is she? She’s always been here. She’s always been with me. Why isn’t she here?” His dazed mind pushed premonitions from his consciousness.

The telephone rang like lightning in the summer sky into the dense atmosphere of the empty house. He jumped up, taking small steps, knocking everything over in his path, and rushed to the phone.

“Joanna?! Asia?”

IX

“Mommy, do you have to go out tonight?”

"I have to, son. Grandma will come to you. Now say your prayers and go to sleep.

" "I'll pray for Daddy. I think he's helping us from heaven.

" "Yes, son, he definitely is." She tried to hide from her son that Daddy was in prison.

"Now go to bed.

" "Mommy, you know, I got an A in math today. And that rascal, Maciejewski, got beat up and was arguing with Mrs. Kasia.

" "Ignore him.

" "I don't, Mommy. You know I'm smart and I already have a few principles in my life. Every man should have them.

" "What principles are they? And for that A, we'll go to the movies with Grandma.

" "My first and most important principle is... Guess what, Mommy.

" "Well, I don't know, sonny. I guess I should study hard.

" "You know, Mommy, studying comes easily to me. The most important thing in life is love, and my most important principle is showing respect to women."

Tears welled up in her eyes.

"I love you, son. You, my little man.

" "Do you know what I'd like to be, Mommy?

" "Well, who?

" "I'd like to be a university professor. And work hard so my wife doesn't have to work. And build a house so you can live with us. A big house.

" "Oh, you, my professor. Sleep! We'll talk tomorrow."

She left her son's room with tears in her eyes. She went into the bathroom, slipped her bathrobe off her slender body, and put on a short, tight leather skirt. She covered her lips with blood-red lipstick and her eyelids and lashes with black mascara.

She peeked into her son's room and ran out of the apartment. Today she would only think about what her son had told her that evening. Respect women. Respect women. I don't feel anything. He's just a client. Respect women. Respect women.