“I think you’d like her,” he finally adds.
“I’m sure I would,” she answers evenly. Now her look is mischievous.
They order room service. She wants pasta with lemon and a little Parmesan
cheese on the side; she seems used to explaining such requirements with
precision to people who will care. Rabih, easily intimidated in service contexts,
admires her sense of entitlement. The phone rings,
and she takes a call from a
colleague in Los Angeles, where it’s still late morning.
Perhaps even more than the sex itself, it is the intimacy possible in its wake
which draws him in. It is a quirk of the age that the easiest way to start a
friendship with someone is generally by asking them to get undressed.
They are warm towards and considerate of each other. Neither will have a
chance to let the other down.
They can both appear competent, generous,
trustworthy, and believable, as strangers will. She laughs at his jokes. His accent
is kind of irresistible, she says. It makes him feel a little lonely to realize how
easy it is to be liked by someone who has no idea who he is.
They talk until midnight, then fall asleep chastely on opposite sides of the bed.
In the morning they travel together to the airport and have a coffee at the checkin
area.
“Stay in touch—as much as you can.” She smiles. “You’re one of the good
guys.”
They
hug tightly, expressing the pure affection available only to two people
who have no further designs upon each other. Their lack of time is a privilege.
Under its aegis they can each remain forever impressive in the other’s eyes. He
feels tears welling up and attempts to compose himself by staring at a watch
advertised by a fighter pilot. With the prospect of an ocean and a continent
between them, he is free to let loose all his aspirations for closeness. Both can
ache with a desire for intimacy and be protected from any of its consequences.
They will never have to be resentful; they can continue to appreciate each other
as only those without a future can.
Pro
He makes it home early on Saturday afternoon.
To his surprise, the world
appears to be carrying on much as it has always done. No one stares at him at the
airport or on the bus. Edinburgh is intact. The front door key still works. Kirsten
is in the study helping William with his homework. This accomplished,
intelligent woman, who has a first-class degree from Aberdeen University, who
is a member of the Scottish chapter of the Royal Institution of Chartered
Surveyors and daily handles budgets in the millions, has been ordered to sit on
the floor by a seven-and-a-half-year-old boy who holds an unparalleled
command over her and is just now impatiently
urging her to color in some
archers in his version of the Battle of Flodden Field.
Rabih has presents for everyone (bought in a duty-free shop on the other side
of passport control). He tells Kirsten he can take over with the children, prepare
supper, and do bath time; he’s sure she must be exhausted. An impure
conscience is a useful spur to being a bit nicer.
Rabih and Kirsten go to bed early. She has, for an age, been his first port of
call for every piece of news, however trivial or grave. How odd it seems,
therefore, for him to be in possession of information
at once so significant and
yet so deeply resistant to the customary principles of disclosure.
It would be almost natural to start by explaining how curious it was that he
and Lauren happened to bump into each other by the lifts—since he was
scheduled to be at a talk at the time—and how touching he found it when, after
their lovemaking, she haltingly described the illness and death of a grandmother
to whom she had been unusually close throughout her childhood. Adopting the
same easy, digressive approach they take when picking apart the psychology of
people they meet at parties or the plotlines of films they see together, they might
review how moving and sad it was for Rabih to say good-bye to Lauren at Tegel
Airport, and how thrilling and (a little) scary to receive a text from her on
landing. There could be no one better qualified to consider such themes with
than his insightful, inquisitive, funny, and observant co-explorer of existence.
It
is a bit of a job, therefore, to keep reminding himself how close he is to
unleashing a tragedy. Esther apparently has a playdate the following morning at
an indoor ski slope. This is where their story could come to a decisive end, and
madness and mayhem begin. They will have to leave the house at nine to be
there by a quarter to ten. It would,
he is aware, take only a sentence to bring
everything settled and coherent in his current life to a close: his brain contains a
piece of information a mere six or so words long which is capable of blowing the
household sky-high. Their daughter will need her gloves, which are in that box
in the attic marked
Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: 
