Intimacies(41)

And I suddenly felt a shiver of fear—if Anton could not tell even Eline why he had been there, then wasn’t that because of Miriam? Wasn’t that because, despite the assaults he himself forced upon it, there was nonetheless something sacrosanct in the idea of his marriage, some illusion he could not bear to break, however divorced it might be from the reality that was in this restaurant now? That was the power of a marriage, and in that moment I thought of myself, of Adriaan and Gaby. Despite having moved out of the apartment, despite knowing better, I had still hoped—that I might yet hear from Adriaan, that he would return from Lisbon free and unencumbered, that I would move back into the apartment and accept the position at the Court that Bettina had just offered to me.

But I knew at last that I needed to accept what was and had been obvious for a long time now. Adriaan would not be coming back to The Hague without Gaby. Their marriage had returned to life, the contract renewed. It was all exactly as Kees had said. Adriaan had gone to Portugal in order to save the marriage, in order for the children to grow up with both parents together in the same household, in order to win Gaby back. Perhaps he had deceived me from the start, or perhaps he hadn’t been aware of his own motivations at the time of his departure, when he had asked me to stay in the apartment and said those things to me. Perhaps it was only upon his arrival in Lisbon and his reunion with Gaby that, surprised by the depth of his own feeling, he had understood that he hadn’t meant what he had said to me, the invitation to stay, the keys on the counter, all of it a mistake.

Is something the matter? Bettina asked. I shook my head, even as I realized that I was crying, that there were so many tears my vision had blurred.





15.


It was in this state of mind that I returned to Adriaan’s apartment. I wanted to retrieve the book that I had purchased at Anton’s shop, or at least that was what I told myself. I knew that it was not a good idea, and I knew that there were reasons other than the book for my return. But the impulse was too powerful to resist and I went early the next morning. I entered using the key that I still carried and that had never left the bottom of my bag. The housekeeper had been there since my departure and the apartment was pristine, what traces I had left behind—a smudge on the mirror, residue in the sink—had been carefully removed. I felt, as I moved through the rooms, transparent, as if the container of my skin had been removed. I sat down in the kitchen and ran my hands across the table. The force of recall was startling, I was reminded not of the weeks I had been here alone, but of the times I had been here with Adriaan, the times he had sat across from me at this table. I felt his presence there in the room with me like a trembling in the body.

I was still sitting at the counter when I heard a key slide into the lock, the sound of the front door pushing open. For a moment I thought it might be Adriaan, but something in the manner of the movement at the door wasn’t correct and my brief elation turned almost immediately to concern. My entire body tensed, as if it were a burglar, someone making a forced entry. But in reality it was much worse, it was Adriaan’s wife. She came into the living room, wearing a long camel coat and carrying a large leather tote but otherwise empty-handed. She looked as if she were returning to the apartment from a meeting, although I did not think this could be the case given the early hour.

She stopped when she saw me and for a long moment we stared at each other. She appeared exactly as she did in the photograph: improbably beautiful and also highly polished, as if she lived in continual expectation of being observed. By contrast, my hair was unwashed and my face bare of makeup. But even under better circumstances, even under ideal circumstances, I could never have competed with Adriaan’s wife. I was newly aware of the stain on my shirt. She frowned as she dropped her bag and shed her coat, as she made her way toward me, I felt as though I had been caught in the act—although precisely what that act was I did not know, I did not even know if Gaby knew who I was, or the nature of my relationship with her husband.

She stopped before me, her face puzzled. Perhaps she was wondering why Adriaan had bothered to involve himself with me, or perhaps she was wondering who on earth I could be. Awkwardly, I rose to my feet and stood before her.

We don’t know each other, she said at last. I’m Gaby.

Yes, I said stupidly.

You’re Adriaan’s friend, she said. You’ve been looking after the apartment. Her voice was bright and a little hard, from which it was clear that friend was a euphemism, and that she understood well enough what I was. She paused and looked around the room. The place looks uninhabited, has everything been okay?

I still hadn’t told Adriaan that I had left the apartment. I didn’t disabuse her of her logical misapprehension and instead nodded. Her manner was not openly hostile, it was studiously neutral. Have you had a coffee? she abruptly asked. She didn’t wait for a reply before she moved past me and to the cabinets, she took out two cups. What would you like? Cappuccino? Americano? I said that I would take an Americano, and she nodded and turned back to the machine. I couldn’t help but feel that she occupied the space with quiet aggression, that this preparation of coffee was in some way performative, designed to remind me who the true owner of the apartment was.

But of that there could be no question. She handed me my coffee and I took a sip cautiously, as if the cup might be poisoned. I was not the only one feeling wary, she also regarded me with a certain amount of caution, as if I were an unknown and unformed quantity, someone whose presence in her life might suddenly grow volatile. I saw that the encounter was as complicated for her as it was for me, maybe even more so, and I was both astonished and ashamed that I hadn’t the imagination to see it earlier, all those times I had spent speculating about this woman.