Intimacies(18)

I turned now to face him. In the dark, his features appeared tentative, and then soft with misery. I was caught off guard, the distance between my elation—because that was what I had felt upon hearing his words, elation unbidden and uncontrolled, that pulsed through the whole of my body—and his frank unhappiness was overwhelming. I wondered if he had reached this decision reluctantly, a step taken after months of unmet hope and hesitation, an internal debate he had kept from me. He seemed aware of my uncertainty and smiled. I’m not looking forward to it, he said, but there are some things we need to discuss, things that cannot be talked about on the phone or written in an email, and that need to be done face-to-face.

I nodded, I only asked him when he was leaving. Tomorrow, he said. I decided to make the trip a few days ago. My flight is early, I’ll need to leave the apartment at five in the morning. Have you booked a car? I asked. He ignored the question and took my hand again. I thought you might like to stay in the apartment while I’m away, he said. You’ll have less of a commute in the mornings and it would make me happy to imagine you there. He paused. I don’t like to leave you. We haven’t known each other for very long, but I want to know that you’ll be here when I return.

I’ll be here, I said. He took my hands and kissed me. At the time it didn’t occur to me to wonder why he needed this assurance, or why a departure of a week required such declarations of intent. Good, he whispered, and I saw that he was relieved, some matter now settled in his mind. We rode in silence back to the house and when we entered the apartment he asked once more, So you will stay? I nodded. He again looked relieved. He said that he would leave keys out for me. It will only be a week, or possibly a little longer, he said and I thought that he was trying to reassure us both.

He was true to his word on this point, departing early the next morning. I awoke some hours later in the oversized bed. It was the first time I had been alone in the apartment. I got up and went out into the hallway. Behind the doors lining the hallway there was only silence. I briefly wondered if Adriaan might have changed his mind, if there would be no key after all, the offer retracted either by intention or by oversight. But he had not forgotten, and when I entered the kitchen I immediately saw a set of keys, resting on the kitchen counter alongside a note that read I will imagine you here while I’m away.

I stood in the kitchen and read the note twice. I picked up the keys, I felt a shiver of pleasure. I decided to make a coffee using the ludicrous machine, I looked in the cupboards and found a cup, poured out milk and added water. The machine began to grind and whir, and then to spurt out coffee and milk. I sat at the counter and drank the coffee, I realized how removed the apartment was from the stream of life outside, through the miracles of double glazing and insulation. Alone, the quiet had a different meaning, forlorn and almost burdensome. Suddenly restless, I put my coffee cup down. I had a set of keys, I could come and go as I wished, I had been told to treat the place as my own.

I dressed and made my way down to the street, the area was well serviced by public transportation and within moments I was on a tram running in the direction of the Old Town. I had been on the tram many times of course, but somehow this journey felt subtly different, the city frequently changed before my eyes but now I felt an attachment I had sought but not previously felt, it was as if an anchor had been dropped. I stepped off not too far from the Mauritshuis and stood for a moment in the crush of pedestrians and tourists. I walked down a street at random, and realized it had been some time since I had moved through the city in this way, with this leisure and freedom.

I had been walking for some time when I passed a bookshop with leather-bound volumes in the window. I suddenly remembered Jana’s words, He’s a book dealer, a man called Anton de Rijk, he has a business in the Old Town that is very successful. Giving in to sudden impulse, I circled back and entered, there were not so many bookshops in the Old Town and there was at least some likelihood that this was the one. A young woman looked up as soon as I entered and smiled in a vague but not unfriendly way, I nodded and pretended to examine the shelves. Despite the deliberation with which I perused the titles and the emptiness of the shop—I began to worry that it was not so successful as Jana had thought—the young woman did not approach or speak to me.

Eventually, I went to the desk, my eyes still on the shelves, and she asked if she could help me. I shook my head, I said that I was only browsing and asked if she was the owner of the shop. She laughed, a loud and indecorous sound. Far from it, she said and smiled. I asked how long she had worked at the shop. Three years, she said. It wasn’t a bad job, it was quite interesting and the customers were colorful—antiquarian books drew a certain kind of clientele, although it wasn’t only antiquarian volumes, they sold all kinds of things. Then, because she was silent and I wished to prolong the conversation, I said that I was looking for a history of the city, something that would make a nice gift.

She rose and retrieved several volumes, opening them to display beautiful maps and foldout plates, as I examined the books she said they ranged in price from a hundred euros to considerably more. I asked her when the volumes had been published and she said they were mostly nineteenth century. I touched the morocco binding, they were beautiful things, and although it was more money than I had to spend, I told the woman I would buy one of the books, I thought I might give it to Adriaan.

As she was ringing up the purchase, I asked her who the owner was. She seemed surprised by the question and I said I only asked because the bookshop had a great deal of personality. The statement was inane and yet it was not untrue, you could feel the imprint of the person behind the shop. She said the owner was a man called Anton de Rijk. Quickly, I asked if he was often at the shop and she said that normally he was, but he had unfortunately been called away, when exactly he would be back she couldn’t say. I thought she seemed uneasy and yet I couldn’t help but ask, Nothing serious, I hope? And after a pause, she shook her head, not in the least, I had only to return in a week or two and I would find him there. A week or two, she repeated, or possibly three. Abruptly she held out the packaged book. I took it from her and thanked her for her help.