Tomas (4 page)

‘You're a peanut,' Tomas says.

Truth hurts
…

‘Falling in love wasn't part of the plan,' the invisible voice tells Tomas. But what can he do? The whole point of plans is that they work. Or is it that they don't?

Despite his inauspicious start, Tereza meets Tomas the next day. The street cafe with views over the busy seafront is a perfect setting. They can sit and talk and watch the world go by.

The cafe is busy on this bright Mediterranean afternoon. The waiters stand in a group by the serving area.

‘May we please order?' Tomas raises a hand. The waiters look the other way. ‘Service?' he mutters feebly.

After several attempts, a waiter comes over and fixes his gaze above Tomas's head, as if he were wearing a silly hat. The waiter doesn't speak but his bored eyes say a bad-tempered ‘Yes?'

‘Thank you,' says Tomas. ‘If we could please … '

The waiter's eyes cut him off. To communicate orally would be to show interest, effort, respect. The waiter puts an arm on his hip, slouches a shoulder and says through his eyes, ‘Look, there are rules if you want to be here.'

Tomas nods.

‘You can either not be served at all,' the speaking eyes continue, ‘or I serve you and I'm rude. Alternatively I serve you and you wait a long time. With options two or three – the service options – I bang the plates down loudly.'

Tereza shifts in her chair. ‘Is there an option where you're a bit rude and the waiting time is cut in half?' she asks.

‘Are you mad?' the eyes flash back. ‘Everyone would choose that. You'll be asking me to bang the plates down nicely next. What on earth do you think this place is? By the way, a Coke costs twenty euros, including ice that has no cooling effect and a slice of lemon that tastes of soap.'

Tomas and Tereza choose the rude option – with plates banging – and settle down to talk.

Tereza is even more beautiful in the daylight. She wears a tight-fitting white beach dress and beaded sandals. Her hair is tied up at the back, a few strands falling round her face, and she sports oversized sunglasses.

‘Where do we start?' she asks Tomas.

‘Let's try an experiment,' he replies. ‘When people meet they lie, in order to have sex as quickly as possible. The experiment is not to lie. It's more interesting and original, don't you think?'

‘So truth is important?' she asks.

‘Yes,' he replies. ‘But not in a prudish way. Truth because everyone else lies, so let's not.'

Tereza takes off her sunglasses to look at him unfiltered and reveals a bruise beneath her beautiful eye. She puts the left arm of the glasses into her mouth to think.

‘For example,' says Tomas, ‘where did you get that bruise? Most girls would make up a story. Will you?'

‘I don't know you,' Tereza replies.

‘Then my experiment isn't going to work. Which is a relief in a way – I can now start lying to have sex with you.' He leans forward and fixes Tereza with a stare. Now his eyes are speaking – it must be contagious. ‘Give it a try, Tereza,' they say.

She takes a moment to examine him. From the club she remembers his height – well over six foot – and the way he moves: an easy glide, strong arms held loose, effortlessly relaxed. Close up, his unkempt appearance contradicts his sharp speech and quick questions. It's clear
that the stubble on his high-boned cheeks isn't for effect; he has simply forgotten to shave. His shoulder-length hair – thick, brown and slightly curly – also defies form and shape and falls around his face where it pleases. Similarly, the eclectic ensemble worn loosely on his hard thin frame shows that he doesn't care about clothes or, Tereza suspects, any material possessions. Most of all she is struck by the expression in his black eyes; at once penetrating and otherworldly.

‘OK,' Tereza replies. ‘I've never finished a relationship before starting it. That's original don't you think?'

Tomas leans back in his chair to listen.

‘Last night after we met at the club,' Tereza says, ‘I went back to the hotel with my date, an American banker called Hank.' She pauses and decides to continue.

‘He'd just closed a big deal, selling a whole lot of shit to some fat Russian guy – can you believe it? He was tanked up on champagne and cocaine, so by the time we got to the hotel, what with his shit deal, the champagne and the cocaine he was buzzing.'

Tomas remains unmoving in his chair.

‘So he wants to do this new thing. He gets me to undress and lie spreadeagled on the bed. He strips off and crouches on all fours in front of the bed where he can see me.' Tereza pauses again, continues quickly as if she is about to take medicine and wants to get it over with.

‘He pulls out a rasher of bacon and rolls it into a ball, which he ties with a piece of string. He pushes another piece of string through the middle of the ball and makes a knot to hold it. He gives me one end and tells me to pull
when he says. He swallows the ball, gags and just stops himself from being sick.'

Tereza's momentum is now unstoppable. Even while speaking she thinks, ‘Well, you asked for it.'

Hank starts to pleasure himself, watching me on the bed. Because he's drunk and wasted, this takes some time. I'm also drunk and I see Hank turn into a pig, then back into Hank, then into a pig again. Hank cum pig, on all fours in front of me, masturbating, with a bacon ball attached to a string down his throat.

Eventually he reaches his climax and with an urgent ‘Urrgghh' signals me to pull the string. I do it hard. Instantly he vomits. His body contorts from the double sensation of climaxing and vomiting simultaneously. It's revolting. The alternation between Hank and pig stops and only the pig remains.

I'm disgusted and pull back. My look is as plain as daylight. The pig takes offence, lunges forward and smashes a trotter across my face. I fall off the bed on to my back, more stunned than hurt. I close my eyes to catch my breath.

‘When I open them there's a pink sphere floating inches above my face. It's the pig's arse. It's squatting over me. Before I have time to move, it relieves itself on me, grunting and snorting. It's over in seconds and there I am on the floor spitting foulness from my mouth. The pig trots off. I hear a door slam and I know it has left.'

Tereza leans forward and using her eyes says, ‘How's that for the truth?'

Kaaboom! Tomas's heart is shattered. He begins to shake, his black eyes fill with tears.

‘But,' he says, ‘you're an angel. A golden angel.'

‘No,' Tereza replies, ‘I'm not golden, I'm faded grey. And I'm not an angel, I'm a prostitute.'

Things are rarely what they seem
…

They stare at each other, eyes unspeaking, for a long time. The truth torpedo has scored a direct hit and Tomas is sunk. Tereza decides to launch a rescue mission.

‘We've done your experiment. Now I've got a question for you,' she says.

Tomas doesn't reply, verbally or visually.

‘What's the difference between a prostitute and a girl who marries for money?'

Tomas remains adrift.

‘OK,' Tereza continues, ‘let me give you a clue. At the bottom of the chain there's the fifty-euro street hooker. Then come the phone-booth dialup girls. After that are the internet “escorts”, and next models who'll be your “friend” for two thousand euros. But the biggest beast in the jungle is the girl who marries for money.'

‘There's no difference, then,' Tomas says. ‘They're all prostitutes.'

‘Wrong,' Tereza replies. ‘With a prostitute, you know what you're getting. With the girl who marries for money, you're in trouble.'

‘Fine,' says Tomas. ‘Prostitution is a nobler profession than gold digging. So what? Most people live normal lives.'

‘Do they?' Tereza replies. ‘What about all the quick grabbing for happiness, the thoughtless coupling, the
selfish and stupid unions, the “Look at me! Look at me on my wedding-day!”? And then what? Disappointment, deception, separation.'

‘So it's better to be a prostitute than get divorced?' he asks.

‘I'm going to show you a secret,' Tereza replies. ‘You can work it out. But first we've got to choose some people.'

Tomas gives a shrug like a child refusing to play.

Tereza looks around the cafe. ‘OK. I choose the grandfather sitting over there with his grandson, the Euro couple and the old lady by herself in the corner.'

By now it's getting dark. Tereza guides Tomas along the seafront towards a spit of land at the end of the city. From afar they see the twinkling lights of a funfair. Soon they can hear merry-go-round music.

They walk through the Ferris wheels, shooting galleries and candy-floss stalls. Tomas again experiences everything in slow motion, the colours smudged, the music dulled. They sit on a bench at the water's edge. There Tomas in his desolation and Tereza in her fatigue fall asleep.

When they wake, the fairground is closed, the bright lights and tinkling music extinguished. Tereza takes Tomas by the hand and leads him to a spaceship attraction with ‘The Ride of Your Life' painted in big letters on its side.

Tereza stops in front of the spaceship and stretches out her arms. Steam billows as a door opens and a beam of light illuminates a ramp on to which she steps. Amazed, Tomas follows.

‘This,' she says, ‘is a time machine. Here's how it works.' She sits in a pilot seat and signals to Tomas to take
the one beside her. Before them is a console of buttons, knobs, levers and a giant screen.

‘It's easy to use,' Tereza continues. ‘You just plug in what you want to see and the machine does the rest. Look.'

Tomas sees a picture of the grandfather sitting with his grandson in the cafe a few hours earlier. Tereza presses a button and Tomas hears the old man say, ‘You know, Ludovicio, all you've got in this world is your honour. This is sacred.'

Tereza moves a dial and a picture of the grandfather as a young man is displayed. He's in an orchard comforting a girl. ‘I hate him,' she tells the young man. ‘He comes home late every night. Your brother is a drunk and a bum. Sometimes he smells of other women. I can't take it.'

The young man's consoling hand strays to the girl's breast. They lock eyes and he lowers her to the ground.

Tomas looks at Tereza, stunned.

‘Press this button and the machine adds some touches of its own,' she says. ‘Look, the Euro couple.'

The screen shows them at their first meeting a few years ago. They're at a club, in a crowd that is alive with pleasure. They have sex that night.

A fabulous wedding appears on the screen. The church is decorated with flowers, the congregation magnificent. The ceremony begins. A groomsman a few rows from the back starts playing with his BlackBerry. Soon all the bankers in the congregation are playing with their BlackBerries.

The bride turns to her groom to speak the sacred words. To her horror, he too is playing with a BlackBerry. She
spins around, seeking consolation from the congregation, but all the men have turned into hedges, playing Black-Berrys with their leafy hands. She tries to remonstrate with her groom but he is now a hedge as well.

A few years later, they see the bride explaining to her children why their father has left home. The children cry.

‘Finally,' says Tereza, ‘the old lady.'

There she is on screen, a beautiful girl escorted by a smooth-looking type, the sort that plays the cad in an old movie. He's a count with limitless family estates, or so he says. They marry and after years of living a half-life together he dies. But he's not a count, he's a cad. And there aren't estates, only debts.

Worst of all, waiters whose purpose is to be rude now feel sorry for her. ‘Your usual table, countess?' they ask, and forget to bring the bill.

‘You see, Tomas,' Tereza says, ‘we all have our stories. At least in mine there are no children crying and all the waiters are rude.'

Tomas looks at her amazed. His eyes are speaking again. ‘I love you,' they say.

A modern-day Little Red Riding Hood
…

A single shot rings out and echoes around the hills. Moments earlier, the pretty girl had been flying in a circle, her father's strong arms holding her aloft and swinging her around. ‘You're an angel,' he says, ‘you can fly, fly away.'

Now she tumbles hard to the ground, her father slumped beside her. Instantly she enters another world.
This hasn't happened. Her father, the foundation of her life, fallen? He must be playing. A red stain seeps across his shirt. Within seconds it's soaked. The pretty girl's breath comes hard and fast. She squats on all fours like an animal and is violently sick. As she lifts up her head, spittle drooling from her mouth, she sees it on the hillside.

The black wolf puts down his rifle and stands up on his hind legs like a man. He's big, over six foot, with an arched back that bends him forwards. Even from a distance she can see his long snout and snarling mouth, the hideous distended tongue lolling between the fangs. His ears are massive pricked-up triangles and his eyes miniature black beads. As he returns her gaze, he slowly raises his front legs before him like a demon about to cast a spell.

The pretty girl stands up to face her father's murderer. Another random shot, another senseless death in the killing fields around Sarajevo. Now she feels she's slipping from another world into a dream, or rather a nightmare. For the wolf, with exaggerated slowness, arches his shoulders and tilts his snout towards the sky; then he straightens to an upright position, moving one leg forward with an overpronounced step. He repeats this strange manoeuvre, still at a snail's pace, with his front legs outstretched before him like arms, claws clenching and unclenching, eyes fixed on the pretty girl. His intent is clear. He's coming to get her.