Rydahl - The Hermit

On New Years Eve, under the influence of a triple Lumumba, Erhard decides to find a new girlfriend. New is probably not the right word. She doesnt need to be new or attractive or sweet or fun. Just a warm body. Just one of those kinds of women who potters about the house. Maybe shell hum a song or curse at him because hes spilled cocoa on the floor. What can he ask of her? Not much. And what does he have to offer her? Not much. But it wont get any easier. In a few years shell also need to empty his piss pot and shave him and pull off his shoes after an entire day in the car if he can still drive, that is. In a few years.

The mountainside near the house is invisible; the darkness is complete. If he sits still long enough, hell suddenly be able to see the stars. And if he sits even longer than that, hell see a narrow band of shooting stars growing brighter and brighter. The silence grows, if one can put it that way. Grows like the sound of nothingness drowning out the heat of the day still whining in the rocks, and the winds relentless C major, and the beat of the waves lashing against the coast, and the blood thats seeping through his body. A silence that makes him want to weep into the New Year. A silence thats so convincing, so satiating, that it blends with the night and his wide-open eyes which feel closed. This is what he loves about living out here. Out here where no one ever comes.

Just him. And Laurel and Hardy. And here come the stars. Theyve always been there, but now he can see them. First all the specks, then all the constellations and Orions Belt and the galaxy like an old-fashioned punch card with messages from the Big Bang.

Its been seventeen years and nine months since the last time. He smells Beatrizs perfume, which practically clings to his shirt right where shed touched him this afternoon as they parted. She suggested that he come along tonight. A half-hearted attempt, if even that. Ive got plans, hed said tartly, the way only an old man can. Cmon, shed tried again, sweetly. No thanks, those people are too fancy for me. Which they were. She didnt say anything to that. Instead Ral said: You are one of the finest people I know. But nothing more was said about it, and when they began arranging the champagne flutes, he gave Beatriz a Happy New Years kiss and left. Ral walked him out. Buen viaje , Erhard said, when they stood among the distinctive throng on the street. From the opposite pavement, the suitcase salesman, Siln, shouted Happy New Year! to them, though mostly to Ral, whom everyone knows. Erhard headed to his car, feeling the same pang that struck him every New Years Eve. Another year gone like all the rest, another year looming.

Cheers, my friend. Its good with cognac. It burns all the way down. The night is warm. His body is tingling hot now. Maybe because hes thinking of Beatriz, her dark place, right where her breasts part and vanish into her blouse, the very source of her aroma. Damn. He tries not to think about her. Shes not the one he should be spending his time on.

The hairdressers daughter. He can think about her. Theres something about her.

Hes never met her. He has seen her once, at a distance. Hes often seen her image on the wall in the salon. He thinks about her. He thinks about simple events. Little scenes where she walks into the salon, the bell above the door chiming. He imagines her sitting across from him at the dinner table when he eats. Or standing in the kitchen, his kitchen, preparing steaming, sizzling food on the stove. In truth shes much too young, absorbed in things he doesnt understand. Shes not exactly his type. What could he possibly say to impress a young woman? She probably doesnt even cook. Shed probably rather talk to her friends on the telephone, like all young people do. Maybe she eats noodles out of a small box while staring at her computer screen. In the image at the salon shes a teenager and the very picture of innocence, with thick curls and big, masculine glasses. Not beautiful, but unforgettable. Shes got to be at least thirty now and apparently both sweet and quick-witted, according to her mother, whom he obviously doesnt trust. That time hed spotted her down the street, he recognized her light, curly hair. She crossed the street with her back ramrod straight, a purse slung over her shoulder like a real woman, and she spurted forward running when a car raced towards her. She wasnt elegant, she was even a little clumsy. He doesnt know why he thinks about her so much. Maybe its just the island eating its way into him. The whistling of the wind around the rocks and corners. Like a note of loneliness continuously rising from a piano.

Its Petras fault. Her unnaturally high-pitched voice that pacifies her clients in the chair and rules out talk and counterarguments and reasonable thoughts as one thumbs through a magazine or reads an article about the islands football team. She has this firmness about her. For her, love is something to be squeezed out of others. She talks non-stop about the daughter, clawing at Erhards scalp with her long nails as she tells him that shes moved to an apartment, that shes bought a little scooter, that shes got a new client, that shes broken things off with her boyfriend, that she not the daughter would like grandchildren, and so on. And then a few months ago she suddenly said: If only my daughter found someone like you. Thats what she said as she stood gazing at him in the mirror. And afterward: Shes not like most girls, but neither are you. Theyd chuckled at that. Petra mostly.

Erhard had been completely alarmed at the suggestion. She couldnt just say something like that. Wave her daughter under his nose. Did that mean she wanted him to ask her daughter out? Didnt Petra know what they called him about town? Hadnt Petra noticed that he was missing a finger? And what about the age difference? Didnt Petra consider that? They are separated by at least thirty years; hes the same age as her mother, older even. But the symmetry appeals to him. Generations reaching back and pulling the next generation forward, Eschers drawings of the artists hand sketching itself. Five fingers on one hand and five fingers on the other. Five + five.