All Days Are Night (9 page)

She was already thinking of canceling the proposal, but when she met her boss by the coffee machine he said he was looking forward to hearing from her. She went
home at three. She read a bit more of the proofs, but she couldn’t concentrate. She had told Matthias at breakfast that she was going to see Dagmar that evening.

When she set off a little before six, it was raining gently, and it felt colder than in the morning. She looked at the other passengers in the streetcar and tried to imagine them naked. Old women, businesspeople, mothers who had collected their little ones from day care — all naked. A young, smartly dressed businessman whose upper body was densely haired, a man with such a big belly that you couldn’t see his penis, a big-breasted woman, a young woman with thin reddish pubic hair and a genital piercing. Pleats of skin, wrinkles, light and dark skin, spots, freckles, and moles. Gillian felt reminded of medieval pictures of the Day of Judgment, tiny little people doubled over with pain and guilt. She tried to remember the name of the painter who had persuaded hundreds of people to take off their clothes for him and all lie down on the ground.

She had to change at the central station. The big hall was full of people. Gillian wriggled through, the proximity of so many others was suddenly disagreeable to her. During the train ride, she remained standing by the door.

By the time she got there, it was almost dark. She hadn’t taken an umbrella, and her face and hair were wet as she strode quickly down the passageway of the studio building. She walked in without knocking. Hubert was on the sofa, reading the newspaper, beside him on the floor was a bottle of beer. He put the newspaper away and looked up at her. She dropped her coat on the sofa beside him. He looked apathetic. He got up and kissed her on both cheeks.

Are you ready?

Gillian stooped to pick up the beer bottle, took a long drink, and set it back on the floor. She looked at him and nodded. Hubert said she could leave her things on the sofa and went over to the easel to fix the backboard.

The floor’s not very clean I’m afraid, he said with his back to her. Sorry.

In front of the easel stood the empty chair that Gillian had sat in yesterday, with a small electric heater by it.

She pulled her sweater over her head with both hands. Underneath she had on a sleeveless linen blouse. She undid the top two buttons, hesitated briefly. All the time she hadn’t taken her eyes off Hubert. He stood in front of the easel, turned away from her, busying himself with his sketching things. Even so, she turned her back on him when unbuttoning her jeans. They were quite tight, and she had to wriggle to get them off. She thought how silly that must look. She took off her thin kneesocks, and undid the rest of the buttons on her blouse. Then she asked Hubert for a hanger. At that stage he had to turn round, but he kept his eyes on her face.

Linen creases so easily, she said, smiling, when he passed her a wire hanger.

Now she had the feeling that the situation was under control. In her underwear she sat down on the chair.

Do you want me to sit like yesterday?

I thought …, Hubert began, but he didn’t finish the sentence.

Gillian stood up, turned away, and quickly took off her bra and underpants. When she walked naked through the room, she moved differently than usual, slower and more
erect, a little stiffly. She was sure that Hubert was watching her now. The thought that he had already seen and painted so many women naked unsettled her. She folded her underwear under the other things on the sofa and sat down on the chair in front of the easel.

Do you like what you see, then? she asked, and right away was furious with herself.

Hubert didn’t reply. She had taken the same position as the day before and was happy at the way her crossed arms were shielding her. Hubert walked around for a while, and then very slowly approached her, repeatedly stopping to look at her. She tried to sense what was in his mind, his expression was serious and intent.

Do you mind if I take some photographs?

Gillian hesitated, then nodded.

He clicked in a roll of film, then went in very close with the camera. He seemed to have more courage when he was able to hide behind the equipment. When the film had been shot off, he put it in an envelope and sealed it. Then at last he started sketching.

The cane seat cut into her bottom, and the electric heater only warmed one side of her body. She tried to think of something else. She asked herself what she was doing there. If Matthias saw the painting, he was certain to make a huge scene. Of course he would recognize her, whatever Hubert said. And he would never believe that she hadn’t slept with the painter. He knew her past, for ten years after drama school she had done pretty much whatever she felt like doing. Sometimes she had slept with a man purely because she admired his lifestyle or because she wanted to know what it would feel like to deceive her
boyfriend of the time. Matthias often quizzed her about those years, and she didn’t keep anything from him. Well, you’re mine now, she had often heard that sentence from him, and even though she didn’t much like the expression, it did give her a kind of security. She had no reason to play around now. If she did, and he found out, that would be the end of everything, of that she was certain. She couldn’t account for what it was about Hubert that attracted her. He dressed scruffily and didn’t seem to be interested in his appearance. And his laconic, even grouchy manner was enough to lead Gillian to expect coarseness or inattentiveness. She had had a brief relationship with a painter once before, and that had been a disaster. Perhaps she was in search of uncertainty, in the hope of being unsettled. She needed perhaps to be made to feel who she was. That sounded like something that would be more at home in a self-help book. Sometimes she and Matthias had giggled over the tips in magazines, techniques to keep a tired relationship alive, and even so he arranged for them to spend holidays in a spa hotel in the mountains where they would be pampered with massages and baths and good food. Then they slept together, as though that too was on the menu. Currently, Gillian found sex with him less satisfying than the fact that they had it at all. It was proof that their relationship was in good shape, and that things could go on as they were.

The egg timer went off. Her pose had come to feel like a protective garment, but as soon as she got up she felt her nudity again. Even so, she walked over to Hubert who still had the charcoal in his hand. He took a step back to inspect the drawing, quite as though not to be too close to
her. He was more careful of her altogether since she was naked. She turned to him, stood next to the drawing, and copied the uncertain expression on the girl’s face.

Did I really look like that?

She tried a big confident smile, but it didn’t come off. Hubert went over to the door and took down a thin kimono from the hook and passed it to her.

I don’t want to be responsible for your catching cold.

She looked at the sketch. Even though it was just a rough sketch, she could see the likeness, but it didn’t strike her as significant.

Are you happy with it? she asked.

Hubert shook his head. I get the feeling there’s nothing coming from you, he said. A bit of shyness at the start, but after that you were just gone.

What do you expect from me? I’ve never done this before.

Presence. You’ve got to be here so that something can happen between us.

Gillian smirked.

Get undressed, he said. Stand here. Feet apart. So that you feel solidly rooted. Do you feel the floor? Your weight?

Gillian recalled the exercises in her first year of drama school, even then she hadn’t quite understood what they meant by presence. Hubert circled around her at a distance, stopped still behind her. She could feel his attentiveness.

What are you thinking about?

I was remembering drama school.

How do you feel?

I don’t know. Tired.

Sit down.

She had to sit on the cold floor, her knees drawn up, arms on her knees, one hand grasping her other wrist. She thought of a statue by Aristide Maillol in exactly that pose. Hubert wound up the egg timer, started drawing. Sometimes he groaned loudly, or hurled the charcoal on the floor. It’s not working. The timer went off, they split a beer, a new pose. The more it went on, the more taciturn Hubert grew. Sometimes he would crumple up a sheet of paper after a single line. Gillian was tired, her body cramped, she was hurting. In the next break, she did a couple of stretches, but Hubert had already wound the clock again.

Get undressed.

She opened the kimono. He stepped up behind her and almost ripped it off her.

Lie down.

She lay on her front, her head pillowed on her folded arms. She could feel herself getting goose pimples all over.

I need to go to the bathroom.

Not now. Arms down by your sides.

The cold floor pressed against her cheekbones. Hubert stood close beside her, she could only see his feet and legs.

Lie on your back.

When Gillian turned over, bits of grit were clinging to her belly, her breasts, her face. Chill from the floor crept into her, her breasts rose and fell. She covered her pudenda with her hand.

No, said Hubert.

She took her hand away. Slowly she calmed down. She lay there like a corpse. Hubert was still standing very close to her, looking down. She studied the ceiling, the
electric wires that led to the ugly halogen lamps. Dirty gray shadows had formed around the lamps. She tried to look Hubert in the eye. After he finally returned her look, he walked away. She sat up and saw him standing at the window, staring out into the dark. Gillian stood up, and with her hands brushed the dirt off her face and body. Then she picked up the kimono off the floor and went over to Hubert.

I’m sorry.

It doesn’t matter.

She pressed herself against him, placed her hands on his chest. When he still didn’t react, she undid the belt of the kimono.

It’s all right, she said.

Her voice sounded false, she was speaking lines from a script. She started stroking his neck and shoulder, her breath came faster, she kept her mouth close to his ear. She wanted to be aroused, wanted him to. He broke away with a jerk and took a step to the side, without turning to face her.

Stop that!

For a long time neither spoke.

Don’t you fancy me?

Finally Hubert turned toward her and looked at her.

My girlfriend’s having a baby. The due date’s next month.

Gillian laughed and took a step toward him.

Who cares, we’re grown-ups.

She was playing a part in a bad film. Even so, her lust was genuine. She wanted him to grab her and push her onto the sofa. It would be like a punishment that would
relieve her. Just then the egg timer went off. It seemed not to want to stop. Hubert went to the door and opened it.

Please go.

Gillian’s father stood by the window, even though there was nothing to be seen anymore besides the doctors’ parking spaces, a bit of lawn, and some small detached houses. In the past few days Gillian had often stood at that same window and asked herself who lived in those houses and what sort of lives were conducted in the rhythm of the lamps going on and off, behind the opening and closing curtains, whose shadows were flitting over the blinds. But her father wasn’t looking out, his head was lowered. He had hardly been there for fifteen minutes, and already he was restless. One of the nurses had taken off the bandage so that he could see his daughter’s face.

Gillian stepped behind him and stopped a couple of paces away. He had driven down from the mountains and interrupted his skiing holiday expressly for her sake. She was touched, but when she tried to say so, he gestured dismissively, it hadn’t even taken him three hours.

The doctors have done a good job, he said. It’s looking all right, almost like before.

Gillian looked nothing like before. Now that she could identify her features again, she saw even more clearly how she had changed. She would never look the way she had before the accident.

I had a word with the doctor, said her father, after the third operation there’ll be hardly any trace left.

That’s in five months, said Gillian. In summer.

She had called her boss after the operation. He had suggested expanding her editorial function, since she wasn’t able to appear in front of the camera for now. He had cautiously felt her out about the prognosis for her face. In five months it’s supposed to be fully restored, said Gillian, with the help of a bit of makeup. Let’s talk nearer the time, said her boss. When can you start work?

When can you start work? asked her father.

He had never liked her job, never even approved of drama lessons. She was surprised to see him at her graduation show. Nor was her father impressed with her journalistic training. For him, journalists were all lefties, out to wreck the private sector. As a student Gillian had started presenting a lifestyle show for a local television station. She had been so good at it that she was called in for a screen test when the national broadcaster was looking for a host for a new flagship arts program. But even after Gillian started getting more and more prominence, her father continued to criticize her profession. The thing that most got on his nerves was when a customer or acquaintance of his asked if he was related to her, and he had to undergo a detailed commentary on the program and what she was wearing and what the magazines had to say about it.

After the accident a tabloid newspaper published a blurred hospital picture of her. Her father had pulled the page from his briefcase and held it out to her. He said no one could account for the picture, presumably it had been taken by someone working here, who had sold it to the paper. Gillian was barely recognizable, it must have been
taken by a cell phone camera and with poor light. Under the picture was a brief report: tragic accident and so forth. She didn’t feel like reading the piece. Instead she looked at the other picture, of her and Matthias, taken at some party or other, her smile appeared forced, and she looked older than she was.