Nina and I drove down to the airport and waited restlessly for the plane from Greece. Final y, we saw Daniel’s parents striding cheerful y toward us. Daniel’s mother was a slim, determined woman who wore her hair in a bun. She was closely tied to national traditions: biking trips across the country, evenings devoted to folk dancing, public sing-alongs of robust pioneer songs and lachrymose bal ads. Her husband was tanned and blue-eyed, and seemed to have drunk from the fountain of youth. They were a good-looking couple, hardy and self-assured.
As soon as Nina saw her parents, she began to cry. I had not slept in two days, and probably looked pale and disheveled. When Daniel’s parents saw the two of us standing there without Daniel, their daughter weeping, their daughter-in-law pale, they assumed the worst, and Daniel’s mother fainted next to her suitcase. There was a great deal of confusion, as everyone around us also thought we’d come with dire news, and none of our explanations seemed to have any e ect. An ambulance was cal ed and arrived within seconds; Daniel’s mother was lifted onto a stretcher. We tried to explain the situation to his father, but his mind had gone blank and he didn’t hear our reassurances, or else didn’t believe them. In the end we had no choice but to climb inside the ambulance, and only then were we able to explain to Daniel’s mother, who had revived from al the commotion, that Daniel was alive, and not in danger— that though he’d been badly burned and we were not sure exactly where he was at the moment, he was al right.
Daniel’s mother began to laugh hysterical y at the news of her son’s resurrection, and was given a pil to calm her down. It seems that being too happy is also a disorder. We then stepped out of the ambulance, and everyone looked at us with pity. “Terrible, terrible,” they murmured. “Be strong.” We thanked them and made our way to the car, where we al burst into tears and laughter. Daniel’s parents hugged each other and began to kiss passionately; Nina was embarrassed and told them to control themselves.
We gave Daniel’s parents a detailed account of what had happened. They didn’t seem at al surprised by Daniel’s disappearance. “He’l contact us in a few days,” I said. “Don’t be so sure,” Daniel’s mother replied placidly, and I never forgave her, especial y since she was right.
I never forgave her, and I never forgave their happiness. It didn’t mat er to them that they could no longer see their son. They knew he was alive; he was col ecting his checks and had even rented a at, which meant that he had a plan and knew what he was doing. I concluded that they didn’t like me, had never liked me, and were secretly glad that Daniel had left me. Later I realized that I was wrong, but somehow our relationship disintegrated. Maybe I envied them.
Daniel’s grandmother died a few months later, and Nina opened a school for spiritual healing with Elena, the woman who had read The Possessed to her grandmother. I lost touch with Nina as wel , though I’m stil on her mailing list and occasional y I receive brochures inviting me to study various therapeutic arts.
TUESDAY
I WOKE WITH A START AT FOUR IN THE MORNING. I had no idea how I’d make it through the next fourteen hours. If Aaron real y had the address, I might see Daniel this very day; no mat er where he was in our smal country, I could reach him within a few hours. The idea was almost impossible to fathom. I had read The Count of Monte Cristo when I was twelve or thirteen, and I thought of it now. I remembered Edmund’s unlikely escape from the dungeon in a canvas bag—in reality he would have certainly drowned—but in the story he managed to cut himself loose, swim in turbulent waters to another island (after al those years in the dungeon he was stil t, with strong lungs), be rescued by sailors on a boat, nd a great treasure (the drawing in my edition showed glorious jewels spil ing out of a chest), and dispense justice. It was everyone’s fantasy. If Aaron know where Daniel was, if it was that simple, I would feel as fortunate as Edmund. On the other hand, I didn’t want to get my hopes up; it was possible that Aaron would only find the fake address, like everyone else.
At six in the morning I went out to buy the papers. When I returned to the building I ran into my neighbor Tanya, who was on her way to get cigaret es. She looked chic, as always, in a silky, silver-and-blue-striped dress, with a vermilion scarf around her throat, and her dyed blond hair fashionably styled. She often urged me to try Hair Rave, where the latest cuts were available from pierced men with tat oos on their arms. She felt I didn’t care enough about my appearance and often chided me. “At least brush your hair, dear,” she’d say. “And why always the same clothes? What about an at ractive belt? You’re too young to give up, my love. There’s no crime in being sought after.” She herself was sought after by women and men across the country for her fortune-tel ing skil s, which she practiced, according to the sign on her door, by means of tarot cards, palm reading, and something cal ed “the Chinese method, learned rsthand from a Chinese master in Beijing.”
I couldn’t picture Tanya in Beijing.
I was surprised to see her up so early; Tanya considered eleven in the morning the crack of dawn. She read my mind and said, “I had such a nightmare, I just had to get up. That’s the only thing to do when you have a nightmare like that.”
“What was it about?”
“Oh, it’s hard to describe. I was in some sort of medieval hel , I couldn’t get back to the present … nothing made sense. Absolutely terrifying, though.”
Impulsively I said, “Tanya, can you read my fortune?” I had never asked her before; the idea hadn’t occurred to me. No one could predict the future, not even Tanya.
Tanya wasn’t in the least surprised. “Of course, my darling one,” she said. “As soon as I get back.”
“I’l wait upstairs.”
I waited in front of Tanya’s door. When she returned with her cigaret es she said, “Why did you wait outside! It isn’t locked. Come in, dear.”
Her at was tidy but slightly dusty, possibly because she was myopic and too vain to wear glasses. The wal s were covered with wal paper on which delicate pink owers hovered against a white background. There was a kitchenet e in the corner and a door on the left that opened onto a tiny pink-and-white- owered bedroom. In the middle of the living room stood a round polished mahogany table and four matching chairs. Embroidered cushions leaned precariously against the backs of the chairs. The cushions were new; I hadn’t seen them on previous visits. Each one bore the name of a di erent bird, which was represented in enlarged form at the center of the square. The birds looked immobile and rather aloof, as if they’d decided they had bet er things to do in life than y. “Lovely,” I said, picking one up. “Where did you get them?”
“My mother made them, poor thing,” Tanya sighed. Tanya always referred to her mother as “poor thing” because she’d had a hard life, but in fact her mother seemed content. She was a bulky woman with a few missing teeth, and she always greeted me with a smile when I passed her in the hal way. But she didn’t go out much; she had arthritic knees. She liked to bake, and she often left plastic bags l ed with cookies or cakes on my doorknob. Or rather, three plastic bags, one inside the other, each knot ed tightly. I rarely ate these desserts; they were too sweet for me. I gave them to the octogenarian taxi drivers who sat idly in patio chairs at the taxi
