Intimacies(35)
And did it work? Eline leaned across the table, her face intent.
No.
Nothing new?
I’m afraid not. He did the whole rigmarole, taking me back to the moment of the attack, putting me in my body or was it taking me out of my body? Either way, it was of no use whatsoever. I can’t remember a damn thing, whether or not I’m hypnotized. I only know what I was told after the fact.
He reached for his wineglass again. He took a long drink, his eyes blinking restlessly. Eline cleared her throat, It’s a kind of amnesia, she explained to me. He can’t remember anything about the night of the assault.
It’s apparently very common after a severe concussion, Anton said. Obviously, this is endlessly frustrating to the police. They keep hoping I’ll remember something and as you can see, have resorted to desperate measures.
You don’t remember who attacked you? I asked.
No. I don’t remember anything—who attacked me, or why I was in that neighborhood, which I’m not exactly in the habit of frequenting, I’ve never been there before in my life, it’s a real shithole, not the kind of place I’m likely to go. Apologies to your friend. He looked down, his eyes shifting and his mouth tense, I had the definite feeling that he was lying. I suppose it’s a sort of selective amnesia, he continued, his voice silky and too smooth. The brain’s response to the awful trauma of the whole thing.
What I don’t understand, Eline said, is the fact that you can’t remember why you were there. I can understand why you can’t remember the assault itself, why there might be amnesia around the concussive event—I could see that she was struggling with the language, and I wondered if perhaps she didn’t believe him either, it wasn’t just me, there was something unconvincing about the entire matter. But the reason why you went there in the first place, that would have been something you would have known from the period before the trauma, presumably.
How should I know? he said roughly. If I knew, I wouldn’t be in this predicament. It’s not exactly pleasant you know, it’s not as if I’m doing it on purpose. My body was already a ruin, and now my mind is as well. His voice had grown petulant and his face flushed. It’s as if a piece of my brain has been removed and no amount of trying will bring it back. The police think if only they ask the right question the key will turn and the floodgates will open and I’ll be able to pick out the perpetrators from a convenient police lineup. But it doesn’t happen. I’ve sat there for hours. I’ve looked at my diary, at my messages. I let myself be hypnotized for Christ’s sake. But there’s nothing.
Shh, Eline said, and she reached her hand out to him. Calm down. He shook her hand off. Yes, he said viciously, that’s what Miriam says as well.
A silence fell upon the table. He knows, I suddenly thought. He knows more than he is saying. Eline began clearing the table and I got up to help her. There was fruit for dessert, and shortly after I said that I should be going, the Court was in session the following day and I would need to get a good night’s rest. The shadow of loneliness had crept upon me as I watched Eline and her brother, for all their bickering and all the secrets between them, they shared an air of intimate collusion, of things implied and understood. Anton nodded, to my surprise he also rose to his feet, saying that he too would be going. He followed me down the corridor. I was aware of his presence in a new way, as we both pulled on our coats, and when I turned to say thank you to Eline I saw a startled look of warning in her eyes.
Outside, Anton walked with me half a block until I saw a taxi and I said that I thought I should take it. He flagged the car and opened the door for me in a courtly fashion, as I got in I said that it had been very nice meeting him. He leaned forward and said that he hoped that he would see me very soon. His voice was mischievous and there was something lewd in the movement of his body toward mine, so that I was suddenly made nervous. Still, it occurred to me that it might not be safe for Anton to walk the streets alone, not in his condition, and after a moment I asked if he wanted a ride. I was aware this might have sounded like an invitation of sorts, although that was not my intention. However, he was already walking away, he shook his head and waggled his cane through the air. Not tonight, he called back over his shoulder, not tonight.
13.
I sent Eline an email thanking her for dinner. She wrote back to say that she was glad I had made it home okay, a statement that seemed at least in part to refer to her brother, and to which I wasn’t entirely sure how to respond. It occurred to me that she was fishing for information, which made me even more uncertain, and for that reason her email languished in my in-box, unanswered.
The following week, Amina went on maternity leave. Robert was now my regular partner in the booth and we quickly grew accustomed to each other. He was kind, and seemed to understand that these new circumstances would require an adjustment on my part. At the end of our first day working together he accompanied me down to the lobby and warned me to pace myself. The trial will last for many more months. You have to think of it as a marathon. We had reached the entrance and he paused to help me pull on my coat. Months, I said, as I fastened the buttons and tied a scarf around my neck. I could hear the disbelief in my voice, although I already knew how long the trial could last. He patted me on the shoulder. Not to sound patronizing, he said, but you will get used to it. It becomes normal.
He was right. As soon as the following week, I noticed that the extremity of the trial—its content and language, the physical demands of being in the booth—had started to recede. I was less depleted at the end of each day, despite the fact that by this point in the trial we were mired in technicalities, the sessions dragged on for hours of testimony that were mind-numbingly precise and rarely resolved into an obvious advantage for either the prosecution or the defense.