Authors: Jim Crace
Genesis (8 page)
Still, she had to eat. So rather than order anything from the sidewalk cafeâan unflattering choice of cold snacksâshe went to the little fixed-menu cafeteria, the ABC, behind the railway station where single men and women stranded by their lifestyles and their trains could eat without expenseâand without embarrassment.
She ordered menu C, the soup, the fish, the crème brûlée, andârecklesslyâanother glass of the Boulevard liqueur she'd been given at the cafe. She'd pay for one at least that night, to save face.
She ordered menu C, the soup, the fish, the crème brûlée, andârecklesslyâanother glass of the Boulevard liqueur she'd been given at the cafe. She'd pay for one at least that night, to save face.
She didn't have anything to read. Not even a pen to doodle with. So she could be excused for looking around the restaurant and studying the gallery of faces, the exhibition of clothes and postures. Staring was polite compared to some behavior there, the table manners and the arguments, the lack of modesty. The ABC was the sort of place where you could stare. Nobody considered it rude. You stared and they stared back. No need to be genteel with such a cast of students, bachelors, artists, unemployed, third-class travelers.
She spent ten minutes gazing around, not really looking for her dishonest lover with another woman possibly, or with his work colleagues, or with his children and his wife, not really practicing what she would say to him, in front of everyone. She studied almost every visible face, the back of almost every other head. So she couldn't miss that half-familiar blemished man three rows of tables down from her and walking in between the diners and their bags and cases, looking for a place to sit. The pattern on the cheekbone was unmistakable. It was her clandestine admirer. She knew at once he'd recognized her, too.
How could she be so reckless? That was not her style, not normally. She was the sort who only spoke when spoken to, in matters of the heart at any rate. A woman of that age even in those newly unshackled days did not initiate encounters of this kind. But now her fury and her disappointment seemed to shift and occupy
a different space. Instead of standing boldly at the family table, the wife amazed, the children cowering, the lying husband silent, pizza-faced, as she'd imagined, she was instead half standing at her chair, pulling back the table, making room for Lix. For once she'd made a move on her own behalf. It had been easy, actually. She simply pointed at the place opposite her and said, “It's free.” He had no choice. To walk on past, without a ready lie, would be unnecessarily rude. So he sat. He was blushing uncontrollably. The spy exposed.
a different space. Instead of standing boldly at the family table, the wife amazed, the children cowering, the lying husband silent, pizza-faced, as she'd imagined, she was instead half standing at her chair, pulling back the table, making room for Lix. For once she'd made a move on her own behalf. It had been easy, actually. She simply pointed at the place opposite her and said, “It's free.” He had no choice. To walk on past, without a ready lie, would be unnecessarily rude. So he sat. He was blushing uncontrollably. The spy exposed.
The blushing, though, was irresistible. Not only was it evidence of innocence, embarrassment, and shame, but also of desire, arousal, fear. She'd never seen such fear on anyone's face. It made her feel unusually powerful, to be able to bring on such involuntary discomfort in a man. The shoe should be on the other foot. Had always been before. So this was what it felt like to be male, a hunter, predatory, to have a blushing quarry within reach, the color in his face the flag of his arousal.
She made Lix look her in the eye by simply chatting at him like a cousin. It helped that he was so much younger than she was. Perhaps ten years, she judged. It helped, as well, that she had already drunk two shots of alcohol. It let her talk. Why not? It's not unnaturalâespecially in the ABCâto talk when you are sharing a table with a stranger. She bullied him till he submitted to her questions. And as he spokeâabout his theater studies and his agitprop, his many opinions on almost everything, includingâon that dayâthe good news, bad news from Iran, the coming plebiscite, the confrontation planned for Nation Day, the famine in Cambodia for which he'd organized a street performance called, he said, PolPotteryâshe
started once again to feel contented with herself, to feel attractive, passionate, even to like the woman sharing a tablecloth with him, the unmasked Peeping Tom. She wasn't listening, of course. The theater and PolPottery? Iran?
started once again to feel contented with herself, to feel attractive, passionate, even to like the woman sharing a tablecloth with him, the unmasked Peeping Tom. She wasn't listening, of course. The theater and PolPottery? Iran?
She liked it best when he was being playful, playing someone else, that is, and not himself. His speaking voice was beautiful. And he could sing. He could do accents well. Though his repertoire of American actors was amusing, his imitation of their waiter with his odd head and his strange, strangulated voice was clever enough to make her laugh out loud.
To tell the truth, though, this snooper, for all his cleverness and youth, for all his physical difference from her older, paunchy lover, wasn't her type of man. Not broad enough. Too loud and sensitive and too much of the student in his dress, his voice, his hair, too keen to change the world with his slogan T-shirt and his campaign buttons. And far too inexperienced with women. She could tell at once. He couldn't flirt if he were paid for it with gems. He didn't have the nature or the skillâunlike her own pitiless and impatient lover, who used the worldâand herâso roughly and so carelessly.
This inexperience was tantalizing in a way. It put her in command. She needed more than anything, on this of all nights, to imagine she was at the steering wheel. His inexperience also made her strong enough, once they had finished eating and there was nothing on the table but their coffee cups, the bills, and their two pairs of hands, to touch his fingertips, the fingertips that had held the spyglasses in which she was desired, and then to grip his wrists, and then to sayâquite shockinglyâ“Where do you live?”
And then, before he had the chance to reply, “I know exactly where you live. The fourth floor above the cafe along the street.” How wonderful to see him blush again and squirm.
And then, before he had the chance to reply, “I know exactly where you live. The fourth floor above the cafe along the street.” How wonderful to see him blush again and squirm.
She could not stop herself. The night was beckoning and she was dressed for it. But if there was any hero in her sights, the young man (now hurrying with her out of the ABC and into Cargo Street, four flights of stairs ahead of them) was not the one. She herself was the only person she observed in her mind's eye. The clock reversed. Again she was the woman, half a couple, waiting at the street cafe. But magnified. Enlarged. Desired. The blur of men passed by and liked her hair, her dress, her face, her legs. How better she must be than any wife, they thought. Half of the city wanted to sleep with her. She was the woman on the poster for
Life
magazine, the lipstick and the glass of wine, kissing everyone. Her mouth. Her tongue. She only had to lift her face and look around and smile for them, for all the men. The telephone could ring and be ignored. She'd not be caught. Four stories up the winking lenses could only catch the light.
Life
magazine, the lipstick and the glass of wine, kissing everyone. Her mouth. Her tongue. She only had to lift her face and look around and smile for them, for all the men. The telephone could ring and be ignored. She'd not be caught. Four stories up the winking lenses could only catch the light.
Â
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“So,” SHE SAID again. “It's quite a view you've got up here.” She meant it as an undemanding invitation for the man, the boy, to step across and wrap his arms around her waist. Somebody had to close the gap between the sidewalk table and the room. Surely that was partly his responsibility. She soon knew, as seconds passed like struck bells, the binoculars still heavy in her hand, that this young man would never take the single step across the kitchen to press against her at the windowsill, his lips against her
neck, his cock lengthening against her leg. He was too scared and innocent. She'd have to make the move herself.
neck, his cock lengthening against her leg. He was too scared and innocent. She'd have to make the move herself.
The act was simple. She reached across and touched the bare torso above his belt, the boyish plume of hair. “So!” she said again. The word seemed unavoidable, as did the pouting moue that delivered it. Then, “You're quite the little spy.” She wanted him to talk before she kissed, before they made their way to his untidy bed in his unruly room. She wanted to discover what she looked like in the lens. “Tell me ⦠why you look at me.” She nodded at the street below, the almost empty cafe, as if she were still sitting there.
Lix did not consider himself to be a spy or a snooper, of course. His frequent reconnaissances from behind the kitchen curtains were just routine for him, something for the wasting moments of the day, which at least allowed him to imagine that he had a part to play in all the kissing that was taking place that year. What else was there to do when he was homeâan empty homeâexcept put on the radio or choose an album for the record player, then browse the street with his binoculars. This was the closest he could get to contributing anything to
Life's
portrayal of the city.
Life's
portrayal of the city.
The woman from the cafe standing with her fingers wrapped around his belt was wrong if she imagined she was special. He did not only have eyes for her (though it was hard, for the moment, to think of anybody else while she was pushing up his T-shirt). He was indiscriminating in his interests, so long as his attention could be held by someone female and attractive. His eyes were robbing women from the street as nonjudgmentally as a mugger.
And his excuse, should he be caught? And his excuse, now that he had been caught and challenged by the woman breathing in his face, so close that he could smell her perfume and her scalp? It was his duty to observe, of course. Watch people in the street, his drama teachers had instructed his group. Watch how they behave. Follow them even, to see and learn what people do when they are innocently on their own. He was only studying, through his binoculars.
“It's just part of my course,” he said. “You're always there. I always watch, that's all.”
“It's something more,” she said. “I know about you men.”
She wanted him to tell her that he'd always wanted her, that he had thought about this moment many times before. She wanted him to say, “I was excited when I caught you in my lens.”
Instead he said, “I'm finding this embarrassing.”
He meant that the impulse that had taken him to seek arousal at the kitchen window was hardly targeted. He was not seeking consummation with a woman with a name but only giving vent to haphazard randiness, that wild anarchic master of the unattached. He only meant to satisfy himself. Now he faced the fear and the embarrassment of achieving the impossible, of doing something he had never had to try before. He must transfer his universal and unfocused longing for any woman safely chancing by at a distance to this particular and all too present woman.
She slipped her shoes off, kicked them across the kitchen floor, becoming short and vulnerable without her heels. “Kiss, kiss. Are you allowed to study kissing, too? Come on.” She shocked herself, on tiptoes, in bare feet, her tongue surprising his, her hands
pushed up inside his shirt as if he were the woman. She was in the mood for shocks. She'd had a shocking and unhappy day and she was hoping for some pleasurable revenge.
pushed up inside his shirt as if he were the woman. She was in the mood for shocks. She'd had a shocking and unhappy day and she was hoping for some pleasurable revenge.
She should not, though, have kissed his birthmark quite so readily. She should not have held its short soft hairs between her lips. He gasped and tried to pull away. “I'm sorry,” he said.
“For what?”
“For this ⦠the blotch.”
His birthmark would unman him all his life, he'd always thought. This red and hairy nevus would repulse the girls. It would be the obstacle denying him a wife. He'd never met a single female who had not stared at it for a moment when they first laid eyes on him or who otherwise had battled with themselves to fix their attention elsewhere. He felt that people's eyes were darting constantly, mockingly, to his cheekbone, that it fascinated and repulsed them like a harelip or a walleye, like some unsightly boil. He felt as if his body had no other purpose than to haul his flaming cheek around. His burning cheek, his everlasting blush. His boyhood friends had teased him about it, called him Smudge, indeed, a pitiless nickname which he had foolishly adopted and still allowed when he went home, just to show that the blemish did not really bother him these days. But, oh, it did. It shaped the way he was.
Lix had developed the habit while still a young boy of holding a hesitant hand up to his eye when he spoke to strangers as if shielding it from sunlight. It drew attention to the birthmark, of course, rather than hiding it, and gave the boys something more
to tease him about at school. He had tried to keep that hesitant hand in his trouser pockets, to beâor seemârelaxed about himself. Too frequently he also felt obliged when making new acquaintances to introduce himself as Smudge and then point out the cherry-colored birthmark as if it had not already been noted and ignored. He made jokes about it at his own expense. He was overinsistent, in fact, and made some old acquaintances so uncomfortable that they started calling him Felix and looking fixedly at their feet when they conversed rather than give offense by flickering a glance at his face.
to tease him about at school. He had tried to keep that hesitant hand in his trouser pockets, to beâor seemârelaxed about himself. Too frequently he also felt obliged when making new acquaintances to introduce himself as Smudge and then point out the cherry-colored birthmark as if it had not already been noted and ignored. He made jokes about it at his own expense. He was overinsistent, in fact, and made some old acquaintances so uncomfortable that they started calling him Felix and looking fixedly at their feet when they conversed rather than give offense by flickering a glance at his face.
What Lix could not accept, would never realize, but which the woman from the sidewalk cafe had recognized at once, was that the nevus was attractive rather than ugly. How tender it had been to kiss him there. It was like kissing someone better on a bruise, or kissing someone's eyes to stop the tears. Here was an invitation to be tender. The birthmark was the sweetest part of him. It lent to an otherwise inexpressive face a sardonic and whimsical note, a touch of innocence and beauty. What small romantic successes Lix had enjoyed in his teens had been encouraged rather than hindered by what the mark did for his face. Lix did not understand. All his personal and public failures he blamed upon the stain.
Perhaps that's why Lix grew to love the cinema so much. It was a refuge where his birthmark was not seen, where everybody faced the front and no one stared at him. It does not explain, however, the oddly self-exposing decision he had made that he would be an actor, someone stared at for a living. Or, possibly, as his best
friend cleverly observed when Lix announced that he had won a place at theater school, “He's looking for a job where he can cake himself in makeup.”
friend cleverly observed when Lix announced that he had won a place at theater school, “He's looking for a job where he can cake himself in makeup.”
If only his best friends could see him now, a woman on her tiptoes kissing him, again, again, on his birthmark as if the cherry stain were fruit. Here was proof for them at last that loveâor passion, anywayâwas blind, that it could overcome, ignore, forgive the blotches and the blemishes.
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