The Ice Cream Man (13 page)

“Don’t be afraid, Mother. Everything is perfectly appropriate.”

“Don’t you act smart with me.”

“How’s Dad doing?”

“The same phantom pain day and night,” she says wearily as she thumbs through my notes. “How do you make any sense of these?”

“Isn’t there anything that can help him?”

“What could possibly help? You know perfectly well. They’ve tried everything. It’s between his ears.”

“It’s not just between his ears, Mom.”

She sighs and doesn’t even bother to answer. I refuse to give in.

“His false leg rubs against his stump, and it’s become inflamed.”

“Don’t be silly, Jan. Your father won’t even let me look at it.”

“Because it repulses you.”

“What, am I supposed to worship it?” she snaps.

“What do you usually do on a Friday evening?”

“I go to the canteen downstairs.”

“What have they got there?”

“Beer and wine.”

“Can you get anything to eat there?”

I haven’t offered my mother anything. She wouldn’t have brought it up after I hauled the stinking cans and bread crusts off to the trash chute.

“I can take you out to get something to eat, Mom.”

“Don’t talk such nonsense. I can’t be bothered to go looking for a restaurant in these conditions.”

I’m about to suggest that I pop down to the kiosk at the bus station to get a bite when she asks again whether there’s anything to eat in the canteen. I don’t want to take her there.

“They have sandwiches.”

“Well, let’s go take a look.”

“In the canteen?”

“Yes.”

“It’s just students there.”

My mother laughs a joyless laugh.

“Goodness me, students. You’re not ashamed to take me there, are you?”

We sit down at a table next to a frosted glass wall. My mother edges toward the wall, obviously wanting a good view of the other tables and the bar. The chairs at all the other tables are mismatched. The candles on the tables cast large, flickering shadows on the walls. Everything appears yellowish brown, as if seen through a beer bottle; there is a single white-green fluorescent tube humming over the bar. I sit down opposite my mother and start drinking.

She delivers her verdict based on her first impression: “So this is what it’s like these days.”

Whenever she is among unfamiliar people, my mother always looks around as if she were searching for someone. I first noticed this when I was small, as we walked for hours through the city on national holidays; she would always pick her way into the crowd and turn and look in every direction, as if I had become separated from her among the mass of complete strangers.

“Jenda, there’s a young man who looks a lot like you. He has the same dark hair and your eyes.”

I am not interested in the least, but my mother is craning her neck to get a better view over my right shoulder.

“There, look. Maybe you know him.”

“I don’t.”

“You’re not even bothering to look.”

“Do you have any idea how many students there are in Prague? I probably don’t know him.”

“But I would have thought it was mostly people from these student rooms who come here. Look, there—just as good-looking as you.”

What is she playing at? Am I supposed to be jealous? For as long as I can remember, she has studied the faces of boys, and now young men, who resemble me. As if she knew that I must be merely a pale copy of another boy somewhere.

“Come on, Mom, don’t stare.”

“How can you be so surly? Would you rather I hadn’t come to see you at all?”

“I’ll go get us another beer.”

The glass door keeps opening and closing next to our table, and more people keep coming in. The buzz of conversation increases, and every time the door opens, there is a stir at a table somewhere, and hands holding bottles of beer are raised in the air. I fear the worst, and then it happens. The door opens again, and Pavlina is standing very near us, shaking the snow from her coat. She is bare-headed; her hair is windswept and there is snow in it; her nose is red. She spots me right away—my expression and my head sinking down between my shoulders—and she is puzzled, then glances at my mother. My mother still has her hat on, like a still life painted
in situ
that will not fade away, and Pavlina, understanding that she will have to forego a greeting, goes over to the bar for a beer.

“Who’s that girl?” my mother asks.

“What girl are you talking about?”

“Is that Pavlina?”

“Who?”

“Don’t be silly, Jan. Why don’t you ask her over to our table?”

Pavlina gasps in astonishment, saying that she hadn’t noticed us at all, that it must be due to the relentless sleet outdoors and the lectures she’s been in since eight that morning. My mother takes her bottle of beer, places it on the table next to mine, and has to practically push Pavlina down into a chair when the girl’s knees go completely rigid. My mother studies both our faces, giving a tired smile, not believing for a moment that we wouldn’t go on to hurt each other the way all other people eventually do; we both lean our too-sharp elbows on the too-hard table and grip our bottles of beer with both hands. My mother doesn’t mention anything about the letter. Pavlina’s back relaxes some time later, when it occurs to her that the letter might remain a secret between them.

My mother drinks her beer in urgent gulps and asks me to get her another and see if they have any sandwiches. I wait at the bar for a good fifteen minutes—probably giving them plenty of time to talk about everything under the sun. To top it all off, Milan bursts through the door, and Pavlina tugs on his scarf to come and sit next to my mother.

“And here I was thinking you didn’t have any friends,” my mother says as I bring the beers to the table. “Didn’t they have any sandwiches?”

“They’ll bring them to the table in a while.”

“We’ll see about that. They only have one waiter running the whole place. This young man said he’s your roommate, Jan.”

“Are you sleeping here tonight?” I ask Milan a little brusquely.

“No, I just came to pick up some books.”

“What are you studying, Milan?”

“Medicine.”

“What, medicine? In that case, shouldn’t you have some concern for hygiene? Washing your hands before and after seeing patients; making sure your instruments are sterile.”

“Oh, yes, that’s extremely important.”

“So how is it that you’re growing a load of bacterial cultures in your room? And Jan’s been ill. And you don’t even need to touch them. They spread through the air.”

“What’s that?”

“The bacteria, of course! And you’re transporting them to the hospital as well. Even the flies need to put protective covers over their feet there. They teach doctors about all the esoteric points, but they don’t have a clue about the basics.”

Milan, not entirely following, makes an uncertain face. “Once we did an experiment in the lab where we had to create our own bacterial culture. We weren’t allowed to wash our hands all day, and at four in the afternoon, we pressed our hands on the agar.”

“On the what?”

“Agar. It’s this sort of gel that has everything the bugs like. The next morning, we went in to check out our fingerprints.”

“That must have been a sight to behold.”

“It was fantastic! They’d burst into blossom.”

“Horrible cigarette smell.” My mother’s polished nails prod the air. Her lipstick has collected into clumps and, aware of this, she keeps pressing her lips together to smooth them out. “What’s keeping them with my sandwich? Jan, go and see where it is.”

I go and wait my turn again until I am handed a burning hot plate. Slices of cheese and ham have been crammed between two slices of wheat bread, and the grease has oozed out during heating. By the time I return, my mother’s state of intoxication has increased, and the conversation has progressed accordingly.

“Pavlina, you may have noticed that Jan is circumcised.”

Pavlina almost chokes on her beer and starts to cough ridiculously, as if she were in an amateur comedy production.

Milan stares at me disinterestedly, saying, “I had no idea you were . . . that you’re . . .”

“Jews?” My mother finishes his sentence. “We’re not Jews, if that’s what you’re trying to say.”

“It could be for purely medical reasons,” Milan suggests coolly. “
Phimosis
, for example.”

“What on earth does that mean?”

“It’s when the foreskin is too tight.”

“That’s not it,” my mother states categorically—and I’m sure she would give me a couple of pats on the crotch if she could reach. “Let’s just say it was for sociological reasons.”

Pavlina and Milan expect further details; the red nails scold me, but I can’t even feel shame, having downed three beers.

“Jan’s going to America someday. I dreamed about it when I was pregnant. All the boys there are cut. He’ll blend in better.”

I get up. “Who wants another beer?”

“Another one? Haven’t you had enough?”

I head for the toilet, where the stench is so bad that the mop leaning against the cubicle wall looks ashamed, like a human being. The beer comes out in a golden arc. It has not changed color; you could almost drink it again.

At the bar, my mother is tossing her head around so much that her hat would fly off if it weren’t fastened to her hair.

“You’re so young, you two, you can’t possibly know. During the war, you could still speak French to a Russian officer! And now? I told them right to their faces last August . . .” Then she puckers her lips, blows a kiss in Milan’s direction with a charming smile, and says something in French.

“What does that mean?” Now it is Milan’s turn to be humble.

My mother gives a sigh of satisfaction.

“Well, maybe you’ll go on to become a good doctor after all, as you don’t claim to know everything. Just shave off that mustache; it makes you look like a Hussar. That was French.”

“Yes, I realize that now.”

“I feel like baring my ass and farting you back to Siberia!
”
she translates.

It carries to the neighboring tables, and suppressed laughter hangs in the air.

“And guess what those fatheads said!”

“Well?” Everyone is holding their breath.

“Da, da! Get back, get back!”

It’s cold and windy outside. The orange streetlights sway on their cables suspended above the streets, but they are of no use beyond illuminating the darkness to make it even more visible. The shadows in the side streets stand with their backs to us, like men in black overcoats; the whole city is full of them. My mother stops short, and I nearly crash into her; she tries to open her handbag, but the fiddly little clasp is difficult with gloves on. She is clearly agitated, has remembered something important, and is fumbling for something in the depths of her bag with the astonishing precision that always gets her fingers around the very item she is searching for.

“Mom—”

“What!”

“What have you lost now?”

“I never lose anything! Everything just disappears.” She stands under a street lamp in order to see inside her handbag. She still hasn’t bothered to buy glasses. “There’s something I should give you.”

“This is no use. Let me look. Just tell me what you’re . . .”

“You stay out!” She swats my hand away. “Here it is.”

I look at the brown envelope with unease. Does she mean to give me Pavlina’s letter after all?

“Take it.”

“What’s inside?”

“Don’t open it until after I’ve gone,” she replies theatrically.

“If it’s money, I won’t accept it.”

“Oh, yes, you will.”

“I don’t need money.”

“Don’t be silly, you need money just like everyone else. What sort of special case do you think you are?”

“You’ll miss your train if we stand here arguing.”

“It’s for driving lessons.”

“What?”

“Use it to pay for driving lessons,” my mother says as she opens the envelope and fans out the banknotes in front of my face like a peacock’s tail.

“Where did you get that money?”

“It’s my money.”

“Yes, but where did it come from?”

“What’s it got to do with you?”

“Nothing, but I’m not taking it.”

“How do you think you’re going to pay for driving lessons?”

“What driving lessons? I have no intention of learning to drive!”

“You need to learn. What sort of man are you if you don’t know how to drive?”

“I have other things to do.”

“You don’t even go to class; you just lie around all day!”

“Is that what she told you?”

“Who?”

“I saw you. You two hit it off.”

“Are you talking about that girl? I’d already forgotten all about Pavlina. Seems like you’re having trouble getting her out of your mind.”

“Are we going to the station or not? We have exactly fifteen minutes. The next train doesn’t leave till morning.”

“Who cares about the train! I don’t understand you. How many boys in the same circumstances would have been pleased, given their old mom a kiss, after she’d scrimped and saved out of her miserable salary for months . . .”

I look at her helplessly. She’s begging me for signs of affection that she herself never granted. Her eyes tell me that she doesn’t dare to love me as much as she ought to; I am the most awful thing that’s ever happened to her. I have been a knife blade an inch from her carotid artery.

“If it helps you to swallow your pride, then I’ll also ask you for a favor along with it.”

Her voice has suddenly taken on such an embarrassed tone that I stop resisting as she opens my coat and tucks the envelope into my inside pocket, carefully buttons it back up, and briefly rests her hands on my scarf, fidgeting with the felted wool.

“There’s enough there for about ten lessons. Shouldn’t that be enough for the son of a pilot?”

She doesn’t smile, and I can hear a familiar, poorly disguised acrid note in her voice, but she utters the right words with no great strain. I wait for my mother to tell me more, but something is clearly bothering her. She glances at her watch and continues along the slippery, icy pavement.