Solaris (7 page)

Desperation and a sort of dumb rage had sustained me while
working with the computer. Now, overcome with exhaustion, I could
not even remember how to let down a mechanical bed. Forgetting to
push back the clamps, I hung on to the handle with all my weight
and the mattress tumbled down on top of me.

I tore off my clothes and flung them away from me, then
collapsed on to the pillow, without even taking the trouble to
inflate it properly. I fell asleep with the lights on.

I reopened my eyes with the impression of having dozed off for
only a few minutes. The room was bathed in a dim red light. It was
cooler, and I felt refreshed.

I lay there, the bedclothes pushed back, completely naked. The
curtains were half drawn, and there, opposite me, beside the
window-pane lit by the red sun, someone was sitting. It was Rheya.
She was wearing a white beach dress, the material stretched tightly
over her breasts. She sat with her legs crossed; her feet were
bare. Motionless, leaning on her sun-tanned arms, she gazed at me
from beneath her black lashes: Rheya, with her dark hair brushed
back. For a long time, I lay there peacefully gazing back at her.
My first thought was reassuring: I was dreaming and I was aware
that I was dreaming. Nevertheless, I would have preferred her not
to be there. I closed my eyes and tried to shake off the dream.
When I opened them again, Rheya was still sitting opposite me.

Her lips were pouting slightly—a habit of hers—as
though she were about to whistle; but her expression was serious. I
thought of my recent speculations on the subject of dreams.

She had not changed since the day I had seen her for the last
time; she was then a girl of nineteen. Today, she would be
twenty-nine. But, evidently, the dead do not change; they remain
eternally young. She went on gazing at me, an expression of
surprise on her face. I thought of throwing something at her, but,
even in a dream, I could not bring myself to harm a dead
person.

I murmured: "Poor little thing, have you come to visit me?"

The sound of my voice frightened me; the room, Rheya, everything
seemed extraordinarily real. A three-dimensional dream, colored in
half-tones…. I saw several objects on the floor which I had
not noticed when I went to bed. When I wake up, I told myself, I
shall check whether these things are still there or whether, like
Rheya, I only saw them in a dream.

"Do you mean to stay for long?" I asked. I realized that I was
speaking very softly, like someone afraid of being overheard. Why
worry about eavesdroppers in a dream?

The sun was rising over the horizon. A good sign. I had gone to
bed during a red day, which should have been succeeded by a blue
day, followed by another red day. I had not slept for fifteen hours
at a stretch. So it was a dream!

Reassured, I looked closely at Rheya. She was silhouetted
against the sun. The scarlet rays cast a glow over the smooth skin
of her left cheek and the shadows of her eyelashes fell across her
face. How pretty she was! Even in my sleep my memory of her was
uncannily precise. I watched the movements of the sun, waiting to
see the dimple appear in that unusual place slightly below the
corner of the lips. All the same, I would have preferred to wake
up. It was time I did some work. I closed my eyelids tightly.

I heard a metallic noise, and opened my eyes again. Rheya was
sitting beside me on the bed, still looking at me gravely. I smiled
at her. She smiled back at me and leant forward. We kissed. First a
timid, childish kiss, then more prolonged ones. I held her for a
long time. Was it possible to feel so much in a dream, I wondered.
I was not betraying her memory, for it was of her that I was
dreaming, only her. It had never happened to me before….

Was it then that I began to have doubts? I went on telling
myself that it was a dream, but my heart tightened.

I tensed my muscles, ready to leap out of bed. I was
half-expecting to fail, for often, in dreams, your sluggish body
refuses to respond. I hoped that the effort would drag me out of
sleep. But I did not wake; I sat on the edge of the bed, my legs
dangling. There was nothing for it, I should have to endure this
dream right to the bitter end. My feeling of well-being had
vanished. I was afraid.

"What…" I asked. I cleared my throat. "What do you
want?"

I felt around the floor with my bare feet, searching for a pair
of slippers. I stubbed my toe against a sharp edge, and stifled a
cry of pain. That'll wake me up, I thought with satisfaction, at
the same time remembering that I had no slippers.

But still it went on. Rheya had drawn back and was leaning
against the end of the bed. Her dress rose and fell lightly with
her breathing. She watched me with quiet interest.

Quick, I thought, a shower! But then I realized that in a dream
a shower would not interrupt my sleep.

"Where have you come from?"

She seized my hand and, with a gesture I knew well, threw it up
and caught it again, then played with my fingers.

"I don't know," she replied. "Are you angry?"

It was her voice, that familiar, low-pitched, slightly faraway
voice, and that air of not caring much about what she was saying,
of already being preoccupied with something else. People used to
think her off-hand, even rude, because the expression on her face
rarely changed from one of vague astonishment.

"Did…did anyone see you?"

"I don't know. I got here without any trouble. Why, Kris, is it
important?"

She was still playing with my fingers, but her face now wore a
slight frown.

"Rheya."

"What, my darling?"

"How did you know where I was?"

She pondered. A broad smile revealed her teeth.

"I haven't the faintest idea. Isn't it funny? When I came in you
were asleep. I didn't wake you up because you get cross so easily.
You have a very bad temper."

She squeezed my hand.

"Did you go down below?"

"Yes. It was all frozen. I ran away."

She let go of my hand and lay back. With her hair falling to one
side, she looked at me with the half-smile that had irritated me
before it had captivated me.

"But, Rheya…" I stammered.

I leaned over her and turned back the short sleeve of her dress.
There, just above her vaccination scar, was a red dot, the mark of
a hypodermic needle. I was not really surprised, but my heart gave
a lurch.

I touched the red spot with my finger. For years now I had
dreamt of it, over and over again, always waking with a shudder to
find myself in the same position, doubled up between the crumpled
sheets—just as I had found her, already growing cold. It was
as though, in my sleep, I tried to relive what she had gone
through; as though I hoped to turn back the clock and ask her
forgiveness, or keep her company during those final minutes when
she was feeling the effects of the injection and was overcome by
terror. She, who dreaded the least scratch, who hated pain or the
sight of blood, had deliberately done this horrible thing, leaving
nothing but a few scribbled words addressed to me. I had kept her
note in my wallet. By now it was soiled and creased, but I had
never had the heart to throw it away.

Time and time again I had imagined her tracing those words and
making her final preparations. I persuaded myself that she had only
been play-acting, that she had wanted to frighten me and had taken
an overdose by mistake. Everyone told me that it must have happened
like that, or else it had been a spontaneous decision, the result
of a sudden depression. But people knew nothing of what I had said
to her five days earlier; they did not know that, in order to twist
the knife more cruelly, I had taken away my belongings and that
she, as I was closing my suitcases, had said, very calmly: "I
suppose you know what this means?" And I had pretended not to
understand, even though I knew quite well what she meant; I thought
her too much of a coward, and had even told her as much….
And now she was lying across the bed, looking at me attentively, as
though she did not know that it was I who had killed her.

"Well?" she asked. Her eyes reflected the red sun. The entire
room was red. Rheya looked at her arm with interest, because I had
been examining it for so long, and when I drew back she laid her
smooth, cool cheek in the palm of my hand.

"Rheya," I stammered, "it's not possible…"

"Hush!"

I could sense the movement of her eyes beneath their closed
lids.

"Where are we, Rheya?"

"At home."

"Where's that?"

One eye opened and shut again instantly. The long lashes tickled
my palm.

"Kris."

"What?"

"I'm happy."

Raising my head, I could see part of the bed in the washbasin
mirror: a cascade of soft hair—Rheya's hair—and my bare
knees. I pulled towards me with my foot one of the misshapen
objects I had found in the box and picked it up with my free hand.
It was a spindle, one end of which had melted to a needle-point. I
held the point to my skin and dug it in, just beside a small pink
scar. The pain shot through my whole body. I watched the blood run
down the inside of my thigh and drip noiselessly on to the
floor.

What was the use? Terrifying thoughts assailed me, thoughts
which were taking a definite shape. I no longer told myself: "It's
a dream." I had ceased to believe that. Now I was thinking: "I must
be ready to defend myself."

I examined her shoulders, her hip under the close-fitting white
dress, and her dangling naked feet. Leaning forward, I took hold of
one of her ankles and ran my fingers over the sole of her foot.

The skin was soft, like that of a newborn child.

I knew then that it was not Rheya, and I was almost certain that
she herself did not know it.

The bare foot wriggled and Rheya's lips parted in silent
laughter.

"Stop it," she murmured.

Cautiously I withdrew my hand from under the cheek and stood up.
Then I dressed quickly. She sat up and watched me.

"Where are your things?" I asked her. Immediately, I regretted
my question.

"My things?"

"Don't you have anything except that dress?"

From now on, I would pursue the game with my eyes open. I tried
to appear unconcerned, indifferent, as though we had parted only
yesterday, as though we had never parted.

She stood up. With a familiar gesture, she tugged at her skirt
to smooth out the creases. My words had worried her, but she said
nothing. For the first time, she examined the room with an
enquiring, scrutinizing gaze. Then, puzzled, she replied:

"I don't know." She opened the locker door. "In here,
perhaps?"

"No, there's nothing but work-suits in there."

I found an electric point by the basin and began to shave,
careful not to take my eyes off her.

She went to and fro, rummaging everywhere. Eventually, she came
up to me and said:

"Kris, I have the feeling that something's happened…"

She broke off. I unplugged the razor, and waited. "I have the
feeling that I've forgotten something," she went on, "that I've
forgotten a lot of things. I can only remember you. I…I
can't remember anything else."

I listened to her, forcing myself to look unconcerned.

"Have I…Have I been ill?" she asked.

"Yes…in a way. Yes, you've been slightly ill."

"There you are then. That explains my lapses of memory."

She had brightened up again. Never shall I be able to describe
how I felt then. As I watched her moving about the room, now
smiling, now serious, talkative one moment, silent the next,
sitting down and then getting up again, my terror was gradually
overcome by the conviction that it was the real Rheya there in the
room with me, even though my reason told me that she seemed somehow
stylized, reduced to certain characteristic expressions, gestures
and movements.

Suddenly, she clung to me.

"What's happening to us, Kris?" She pressed her fists against my
chest. "Is everything all right? Is there something wrong?"

"Things couldn't be better."

She smiled wanly.

"When you answer me like that, it means things could hardly be
worse."

"What nonsense!" I said hurriedly. "Rheya, my darling, I must
leave you. Wait here for me." And, because I was becoming extremely
hungry, I added: "Would you like something to eat?"

"To eat?" She shook her head. "No. Will I have to wait long for
you?"

"Only an hour."

"I'm coming with you."

"You can't come with me. I've got work to do."

"I'm coming with you."

She had changed. This was not Rheya at all; the real Rheya never
imposed herself, would never have forced her presence on me.

"It's impossible, my sweet."

She looked me up and down. Then suddenly she seized my hand. And
my hand lingered, moved up her warm, rounded arm. In spite of
myself I was caressing her. My body recognized her body; my body
desired her, my body was attracted towards hers beyond reason,
beyond thought, beyond fear.

Desperately trying to remain calm, I repeated:

"Rheya, it's out of the question. You must stay here."

A single word echoed round the room:

"No."

"Why?"

"I…I don't know." She looked around her, then, once more,
raised her eyes to mine. "I can't," she whispered.

"But why?"

"I don't know. I can't. It's as though…as
though…"

She searched for the answer which, as she uttered it, seemed to
come to her like a revelation. "It's as though I mustn't let you
out of my sight."

The resolute tone of her voice scarcely suggested an avowal of
affection; it implied something quite different. With this
realization, the manner in which I was embracing Rheya underwent an
abrupt, though not immediately noticeable, change.