It is Sunday, early evening, and I am running to pick up my maxi dress, I’m prepared to wait for it until midnight if it turns out it isn’t finished yet, even if it means Julia dropping dead; I’d soften up by the age of twenty-six, but at nineteen I am still hard-nosed, the only thing I’ve experienced is my father’s illness, with no tragic outcome so far, and though I can sense my own selfishness, I’m not fighting it because I haven’t yet dug myself a well into which I can toss in the truth and leave it there to die a slow death.
Luckily, the dress is ready, there are just the buttons to sew on, and I’ve brought them, along with a pair of suede high heels, a nice brown to go with the dress, so that I can have a dress rehearsal in front of witnesses before my debut to the universe the next day, which is how I see this snippet of life I’ve plunged into. As soon as the buttons are sewn on, I disappear into Julia’s bedroom, where the fittings are done, and dive into the dress as if into a new life, which this remake will give me, because even Cinderella found her prince and became a queen only after she had her dress (and shoes and carriage), not before, that’s what the fairy tale taught me.
Ah, that bedroom of Julia’s, with its jumble of fabrics, double beds and eiderdowns, all puffed up and white as if one sleeps in the clouds, and on the walls souvenirs of bygone faces in ornate gilded frames, ribbons, threads, fashion magazines and dress patterns tossed on the table and chairs, clothes hanging from the wardrobes waiting for fittings, skirts, blouses, dresses, coats, and then the dressing table with its triple mirror in which clients can look at themselves from all angles, from the front, in profile, left and right, and over their shoulder at the back.
I put on the shoes and twirl in front of the mirror, posing like a model, fixing the expression on my face as soon as I catch sight of myself in the mirror, something I do even in shop windows, I am always so surprised that what I see in the reflection is me, I mean you don’t live with your face, a face you can’t see, so of course it comes as a surprise. And I decide that I’m satisfied with what I see there, the dress is exactly what I wanted, striking, unique, because maxis are still new on the street, they aren’t seen everywhere and never will be because women like to show off their legs, as I’ll come to understand soon enough. I still have to try it out on the people behind that door, in the kitchen, especially on my younger and middle cousins and their brother, whose response to everything is to joke, so that when I’m with him I always feel I’ve been pecked by parrots – my eldest cousin left to meet up with her fiancé as soon as I walked in, because they are about to get married – so I throw open the door, stop, and say, What do you think?
Oh, beautiful, it looks great on you, my cousins say in unison, both carbon copies of their mother, but prettier, in fact the younger one is gorgeous, they wanted her in the movies, but she wasn’t interested, their brother makes some crack that I’ve forgotten because it isn’t worth remembering, and laughs to himself; the middle cousin says I remind her of Marilyn Monroe, she’s exaggerating, of course, because I’m not pretty, I have an ordinary face, with a jutting chin and suspicious dip to my nose, thin hair, I have to tease it to give it volume, I have charm, not beauty, the only thing that breaks the mold of this perfect mediocrity are my eyes, big, heavy-lidded, piercing, I’m all about the eyes. But I enjoy being Marilyn Monroe for a second in that dingy kitchen with its Singer sewing machine and smell of chicory coffee; the whole point of that dress is to be who you’re not, to create an image, not be a person.
Standing by the bed with the eiderdowns, I take off the dress, so that it doesn’t age by the time I get home, and can hardly wait for daybreak to put it back on again and walk to uni in my heels, my maxi billowing around my legs, straight-backed, fast, with a magnificent walk, as some people later said, my skirt probably carrying the smell of my little dog which was in heat. And what I want to happen happens, the skirt does its job, it sweeps, it collects, it drags some thoughts underneath it, adopts them, imprisons them. I have no idea that from then on I will be imprisoned myself, that the game is over.
III.
I’d already noticed him, he’d already caught my eye at the first lecture, in the huge lecture hall, the college amphitheatre, with its semicircular rows of benches, and down below, in the middle, a table called a lectern, and behind the lectern a green board to write on. I noticed him when I briefly turned around to see who was sitting behind me, I always turn around, because I can, and he was leaning against the wall by the door, tall, thin, all bones, nice looking but nothing special, I decided, glued to my bench as I turned back to face the lectern. The lecture hadn’t started yet, the students were still settling down in their seats. So I turned around again to get a better view, and he was still there, leaning against the wall by the door, exceedingly fair-skinned, which I didn’t like, his hair thin and lank, like mine, which I didn’t like either, the only thing I did like was that he had dark hair, but standing next to him now was another guy of the same height but much healthier-looking, he was more the athletic type, he didn’t look tired, or melancholic, or tubercular as they used to say before tuberculosis was eradicated, with thick fair hair that had no intention of falling out, but for who knows what reason I rated less attractive than the first one.
They gave no sign of wanting to sit down, like the rest of us, they doggedly stood their ground by the door, as if intending to run off, because I could envisage them opening their mouths, waving their arms, nodding, laughing, as if they knew each other from before (and, as I was later to find out, they did, they went to the same high school, there was a two-year age difference), and I was slightly jealous that they had each other, compared to me, I knew nobody there, everybody was a stranger, and I was one of those people who didn’t know how to bridge the gulf between two bodies with the ease of a smile, I’d accept a smile but wouldn’t give one, and as a result I was the person always sitting on a chair in the corner whom nobody approached.
Admittedly, one student did approach me, all fair and blond and bearded, he introduced himself as Adam, but two girls, smiling ear to ear, immediately dragged him away, as if they owned him, and as there was nothing for it, he shrugged his shoulders and disappeared.
Meanwhile, the double act disappeared as well – I saw that when I turned around again, at the end of the lecture, and I decided that they were rude. That they had some nerve. That they had no respect. They had come to study something wonderful and lofty like literature, not technology, economics, medicine or law – so boring you wanted to die, just thinking of the syllabus was enough to make you go numb, but they had scuttled out like rats caught stealing. I wrote them off right away, but they reappeared on the evening of the same day, and stayed. And so I felt more kindly disposed. Amazingly, they kept coming regularly, in the morning and in the evening, with the other one taking notes, like me; but my guy didn’t, he didn’t even carry a notebook with him, ignoramus, I thought, but I didn’t hold it against him.
I usually went to classes with Flora, my neighbour and childhood friend, who was studying English and History, and we often waited for each other after lectures; we talked about boys, and soon also about the double act, because she had noticed them, too, especially him. I also got to know two or three other girls, one of them, Petra from Kutina, ambushed me on the tram, I think you’re the most interesting person at uni, she said out of the blue, and would I like to hang out with her? Of course, I answered, what else could I say, flattered, but also surprised by her manner, by the way she belittled herself, I’d never do that, I thought to myself.
I met the other one first; Filip: he introduced himself before a lecture, my guy wasn’t there and I was with Petra, who immediately glued herself to him, and I thought, never mind, I’m not interested in him anyway.
***
For a while I vacillated, yes I do want him, no I don’t, some things attracted me, others put me off; his eyes were big and blue, like forget-me-nots, but when you looked into them they weren’t warm, they were cold, like blue ice; you’re going to melt that ice, I said to myself, always stupidly believing in my own power to change things, as I know now but didn’t