Mortals

how to address it and didn’t know I had a right to address it other than asking you to cut it out in public, in the rare cases when that happened.”

“Cases? Don’t you mean case, singular?”

“No, cases. But this is a byway and not an excuse for what I did and I don’t want to have it taken for an excuse because it’s not an excuse. So let’s stop talking about it. Let’s pause.”

They stopped at the side of the road near Swartruggens. He ate a banana.

He said, “So is this right? two things happened. First, it got, in your words, more intense than you’d expected it would, leaving intense undefined for the moment. And second, it came to my attention. I found out about it and I wasn’t supposed to find out about it. Because you were preserving, or reserving, better, the right to have this thing evolve to its full stature and glory and intensity, at which point I would have been clued in, or not. And possibly you harbored expectations that you would gain knowledge out of this and decide to return to the mixture as before with yours truly in the dark forever? In other words, this was your variant of a very commonplace… with other people… situation. So is that about right?”

“I don’t know.”

“You do know.”

“You’re cold. You’re being cold.”

“No I’m not. Wait until I start on myself. But before I do that, I have to know everything I don’t know about you and Morel.”

“You mean the details.”

“The details, yes. And I have to know about the question of love, who loves who. Because I love you. In all this, that’s absolutely clear, crystal clear, as they say. I can’t be with you, anymore. I know I can’t. And that’s because I love you, paradoxically. This is what I think and this is what makes everything impossible, and that is that even if you told me you loved me again, interesting concept, reloved me, I wouldn’t be able to believe it. Believe it again. I’d be afraid you were being pragmatic or something like that. I mean, I could try to think of your adventure with Morel as an experiment that got out of control and that I was partly to blame for it in the first place. But I don’t see how it could work.

“And I don’t even know if you would be interested in convincing me that it could. That would be presumptuous of me, now that I bring it up. So, no. Yes, the details.”

“You assume I stopped loving you, Ray.”

“You must have. Of course you did.”

“I can’t stand discussing love. Ray, I can’t.”

“Ah.”

“It’s too simple. I have… feelings…”

“Love-feelings? Love-feelings. See, I understand what’s going on here. The reason you don’t want to talk about how you feel about Morel is because it would be disloyal to do that, to give the details to somebody else, such as your husband. You may not have thought of this. You develop a primary loyalty to the person you love and a secondary loyalty to the person you used to love and primary trumps secondary.”

“You’re making it too simple, the way you always do.”

“Well, describe it in your own words, how you feel about him. By the way, I like Morel. He’s sterling, my dear, in many ways. He has gone out of his way to have an interesting mind to present, interesting views. He was a friend to me in captivity. This is just by the way. But you owe me a description of how you feel. You can make it concise. But don’t leave anything out.”

“This is impossible.”

“Ah,” he said.

“I mean, it’s hard enough talking about this, but talking about it cooped up where you can’t move is impossible. Could we just get out and walk around?”

He agreed to do it. He didn’t like it. He didn’t know how dangerous it was in this area. There was some SADF presence. They had been stuck behind a convoy of six army trucks for a few kilometers. He supposed it was all right. He had good, long vantages in every direction. There was plenty of starlight. They would stay close to the vehicle. He understood how she felt. They were discussing enormous subjects under conditions of restrictions that were unfair. He wanted to pace around and break things. But they couldn’t. Wringing each other’s necks would also be appropriate to their discourse. They got out.

She was sensitive to their need to abbreviate as much as they could, if they were going to make it into Joburg not later than nine-thirty or ten. He would have to find a hotel, find a safe place to deposit the Volkswagen, get organized so he could start out early in his search for Kerekang.

“We’re having a sighing contest,” she said. They were leaning against the car.

“We have to go soon, Iris.”

“I know. But I want to get this part over with. You have a right to know certain things. This is so impossible. But you’re going to quiz me about the sex with him, with Davis, and the part that played in everything. And in a way I’m eager to tell you, as much as I hate it, because it reflects well on you.”

“This is a little too abbreviated for me. Say what you mean.”

“Well. First is that you have nothing to be concerned about… about you, sexually. You’re fine. You’re unusually fine, I guess you could say I’m concluding, not that my experience has been so exhaustive.”

This is how much I love her, he thought. He was alarmed at the idea that she was implying inadequacies, sexual ones, that she was preparing to live with. You are a prince, aren’t you, he thought.

He had to ask. “Does he have some sort of problem? Something I should, I mean, I mean you should, be concerned about?” He was thinking of impotence. There were phobias about touching some people had. It wasn’t size. What was it?

“Oh it’s not a problem. Look I’m giving you a compliment, is all I’m doing. This is awkward to say. You’re very skilled, Ray. What I’m saying is that I wasn’t overwhelmed by things he could do that you can’t or haven’t. He’s kind of prudish.”

“I’m skilled? How can I be skilled? I’m what you made me, what we are together.”

She couldn’t look at him. He wanted to know how many times they had done it, and where, and how. She would tell him if he made her do it. He wouldn’t. He wanted to apologize.

He said, “How many times have you done it?”

“Please don’t make me go into detail, please.”

“I have a right to know.”

“I don’t agree with that.”

“Okay, so you’re saying I should be satisfied with what, the overview, let’s call it. That you just gave.”

“If you love me you won’t make me describe everything.”

“I wonder how many times that line has been used.”

She was in misery. He could restrain himself on this, at least for now, he could. But there was another sex question he had to have answered. It was legitimate.

“I have to ask you this. You’ve been absolutely careful, haven’t you? You know what I mean. About infection.”

“Ray, he’s a doctor.”

“I know he is and that’s good and I’m sure it gives him the fear of God he needs to have. But… you don’t know everything about him. You can’t, yet. And you know how it is in Botswana. Half the population may be seropositive. That’s what the embassy thinks. A gigantic nightmare is coming. You know about this. You haven’t been tempted to take any kind of chances, have you?”

“No.”

“It’s always with a condom. I’m sorry, but is it always with a condom?”

She nodded. She couldn’t say it out.

So Morel had never been flesh to flesh with her, fucking. That was something. That experience was his private treasure, so far. Of course at some point, that would be taken away from him, as soon as she decided she could completely trust him.

“I know you trust him, Iris. But be careful. I think he’s honorable, of course, but you have to be