Parallel Stories: A Novel (168 page)

Except she detested me for some reason and that was pretty confusing. Her detestation was attractive in a way, but I didn’t know what to do with it.

On Stefánia Boulevard, one would say to something like this, well, that’s her problem.

The change might have occurred one day when she was coming from her lesson just as I was going to mine, and to my huge surprise I saw she did not detest me so much. She said something to me or, I don’t know, maybe she asked me something, and I answered her politely. I didn’t understand why she had changed so suddenly. Before that, she’d turned her head away whenever we met by chance in the staircase or on one of the landings and then, to be sure I had no doubts about her feelings, she’d make a face to show me that my sheer presence disgusted her.

Or maybe they had already planned what they were going to do and that’s why she was friendlier, out of plain calculation. From then on she always had something to say about the piano teacher, the lesson, Szilvia and Viola. One day she said I should go up to their place after my lesson because her mother would be going to work then.

The piano teacher gave her free lessons, and she practiced on the teacher’s piano because they didn’t have their own.

Because of all the beds in their apartment, they couldn’t fit in even an upright piano, Viola said, and they didn’t have the money for it either.

The image of the congestion in their apartment scared me and did not make me want to go there, though she repeated her invitation many times and always added that she would be alone.

Come on, Szilvia said, they’d have plenty of money for a piano if only they knew how to economize. The reason we have money for everything is because Daddy makes sure every penny goes a long way.

They squander everything, I’m telling you, they’re a bunch of spendthrifts.

But we’re telling this only to you, confidentially.

We’d never say this straight to Ilonka, not for anything in the world.

The truth is they haven’t got enough money to rent even a lousy old upright for her.

On the Stefánia, no one would have said anything like this. And if the girls talked so arrogantly and conceitedly about Ilonka Weisz, then why did they call themselves her best friends.

It always seemed to me that Aréna Road was a real border between the two sections of the city. On the other side of this border, one did not understand many things.

There were three siblings in the Weisz family; Ilonka had two older brothers, Ern
ő
and Dezs
ő
, famous hoodlums in the neighborhood who avoided school, but Ilonka was considered such a great and brilliant musical talent that the piano teacher could not let her go to waste. Many people in the building had a great respect for the piano teacher; they called her an unselfish soul. True, the boys lugged up wood and coal from the cellar every Friday afternoon for her, and their mother scrubbed her floors during the spring and fall cleanings, thus giving proof of the family’s gratitude, but the boys showed absolutely no interest in Ilonka’s piano studies.

Neither did her mother, she just let it happen, if it had to happen; she had enough troubles of her own.

I did not talk to anyone about these things, but Viola and Szilvia told me about them along with many other matters. They gave me the impression they never stopped prattling. The moment one of them stopped the other continued, and sometimes they spoke over each other’s words so that I couldn’t understand either of them. I learned important things from them about everyone; without them, I wouldn’t have found out where Ilonka Weisz lived.

When she came from the piano teacher, we met on the landing between the first and second floors; their third-floor apartment opened from the rear staircase. After a while she stopped asking me to go with her to the third floor after my lesson.

One time she said, I am so alone. But I couldn’t go with her, because anybody in the building would have seen my secret. After her lesson she went down to the mezzanine, crossed the courtyard, and from there went up to the third floor by the rear staircase.

People also called the rear staircase the maids’ stairs.

Another time she said I was callous, since I wouldn’t listen to her when she complained of loneliness.

Szilvia claimed she would rather die than have to use the maids’ stairs to go home.

She hadn’t finished saying what she wanted to say and Viola was already annoyed.

Sure, you’d die; come off it, why this foolish talk. Why do you have to make such a tzimmes over the maids’ stairs.

Szilvia began wailing that she didn’t know who was talking more foolishly, but if you really want to know, you’re making the bigger tzimmes.

And would Viola talk so casually if she had to share a toilet with strangers.

Of all the foolish nonsense; somebody, please hold me back. You’re only saying that to protect your sweet little Ilonka.

They were talking as if each of them knew in advance what the other one wanted to say and lost interest the moment she said it.

I don’t remember seeing maids in this building. One recognized maids from far away. I explained this maids’ stairs business to myself by thinking that Ilonka’s mother must have been a maid once, and the name somehow remained stuck to the stairs.

When I told my grandmother about Ilonka’s existence, about the girl whom the piano teacher taught for free and let practice in her own apartment, my grandmother nodded and said that was a very decent thing to do and we too might help the girl by buying her sheet music.

She’d write a letter about this to the piano teacher and give me the money to take to her when the time came.

Somehow I tried to protest, saying that no one had asked us to do this.

I was terribly ashamed of my grandmother’s eagerness and sorry I had told her about it. I told her the story only so I wouldn’t despise Ilonka Weisz as much as she despised me.

Grandmother looked at me severely.

She asked what sort of help I thought was help that had to be asked for. What makes help really help is when we give it without being asked.

But I sensed this wasn’t going to turn out well. Ilonka would detest me even more because of this. And then I had better tell my grandmother what I did not want to tell her.

I asked her if it mattered that Ilonka Weisz detested me.

She said, why shouldn’t it matter, of course it did, it mattered very much.

Then let’s not buy her sheet music.

She did not reply for a long time; she was thinking. It’s impossible to buy someone’s empathy, I was right, we should not give the impression that that was our intention. However, we were talking about two different things and they could be separated sensibly. With this gift we would show our appreciation for Ilonka’s talent. Grandmama would solve this problem in such a way that Ilonka wouldn’t even know about it. And I should somehow make her stop detesting me; I should also think seriously about what I might have done to offend her.

Still, I hoped Grandmother would forget about writing the letter. She and Grandfather always laughed at themselves for forgetting so many things.

But she did not forget, and on her nice butter-yellow handmade letter paper she wrote to the piano teacher, to whom we should be very grateful for her decent behavior during the Hungarian Nazi era. Grandmother had said she would make an arrangement with the teacher in such a way that Ilonka would not know about it. She did not seal the envelope, because she didn’t have to hide the contents from me, but still I didn’t dare look at the words describing the terms of the arrangement she was making. Here was another word, another something I didn’t understand, which people sometimes used to specify what they had agreed, or how they had decided to leave things at
that
. The term they used was that
that
, but I could neither memorize nor understand it. I didn’t quite understand the word
maids
either. The piano teacher had a cleaning woman but she didn’t have a maid, though in her apartment there was a tiny maid’s room in which nobody lived. My grandparents had a maid, Rozália Török, but it would never occur to anybody to talk to her the way my aunt Irén in Damjanich Street and my aunt Erna on Teréz Boulevard talked about their maids, whom they often had to dismiss.

Such a stinking beast, Szilvia would say, and despite our mother’s good intentions we couldn’t keep her on.

And she made a haughty face that perhaps disturbed me more than the word
beast
.

My grandmother always told me I should be attentive to Rozália. Or she would reprimand me in no uncertain terms for irritating Rozália and warn me not to do it again. I should be more considerate and polite to her than to anyone else because we owed her so very much.

When with her friends they talked about their maids, she always said, well, Róza is a treasure.

And one evening, looking up from the book she was reading, she told Grandfather that she was amazed not so much that we were still alive but that providence had chosen to guide such a soul to us, and it was because of her that we’d survived.

Whenever they talked about this, tears welled up in Grandmother’s eyes.

And she’d say that goodness always makes me shed a few tears.

For a long time Róza went with me to my piano lessons so I wouldn’t have to cross dangerous Aréna Road by myself. When twice a week the time came to set out, I’d feel I was leaving my grandparents’ house forever. I did not protest, but the finality of the act hurt me in advance. Stefánia Boulevard vanished in City Park at the horizon of infinity. And how far away was the incredibly wide Aréna Road; I couldn’t even begin to imagine how far. As if on each occasion one were swallowed up by a foreboding: this can’t happen again, ever. My school on Hermina Street always seemed within reach even when I walked there alone, while Damjanich Street or Teréz Street seemed halfway around the globe. Yet we always managed to reach it. On the way the sun shone on our heads or it was cold, the wind blew, and the air had a certain quality that I had to overcome with every step but couldn’t. It was dense or too rough; we walked within it as though we were making no progress at all.

Whenever I felt like this, it was no use holding on to Róza’s strong hand. But I tried not to let her notice any change in me.

This was the last thing I wanted to talk about with anyone, the air, because I saw that the air did not hinder anyone else in any way, maybe they didn’t even feel the air resisting their progress.

People were downright glad of it, positively cheerful, that they could be moving.

Róza would simply grab her large kerchief and run.

Grandfather would begin to whistle, the dog would start fooling around, scurry to get his leash, ready to go, and Grandmother would hail her cab as if going to conquer the city.

Something was going to happen to us.

I was afraid of everything that might happen beyond the high fence around our house.

Things were a little better if we took the bus, which we did when making jam for the winter, cleaning windows, or doing the wash did not give Róza enough time to walk with me. Then the bus instead of me had to overcome infinity and all those things in the air that hindered me. Then it was easier to believe that I might soon return time.

The bus was always crowded.

This bus, the number 37, had one of its terminal stops at the corner of Kerepesi Road; it went to Erzsébet Square and from there over to Buda. It reached our stop jam-packed. In the evenings I saw it go by empty among the dark trees. Its passengers were from K
ő
bánya or country people from the train station. If we wanted to get on, we had to squeeze between strange legs and bellies. The pressure increased at every stop. Everybody wanted to get on but nobody got off and the conductor never stopped yelling. Róza could not protect me from the pressure of strange bodies. Adults could hold on because they were tall enough to reach the straps, but I was being rattled, blind and deaf in the midst of living flesh and powerful odors.

I also had to be sure people didn’t knock the sheet music out of my hands.

Yet whenever we walked, I could not help telling Róza that it would be better on the bus.

Getting off was simply impossible. We had to get off at the corner of István Road, but sometimes we couldn’t. Or getting off required merciless pushing and shoving forward, which I could not do without feeling ashamed of myself. People around us were yelling at the top of their voices, the conductor could not calm them down and Róza yelled back. They pushed and I had to push too because I couldn’t let Róza do the fighting alone, I used my elbows, stepped on feet, and kept kicking so that they couldn’t kick me.

After fighting our way free at last, we stood on the empty sidewalk like agitated battle-weary animals, panting and exhausted, arranging our disheveled clothes. Our anger and agitation subsided slowly.

I said next time we should come on foot.

That was too much for Róza.

She sputtered that I should make up my mind about what I’d like to do. One can’t do two things at the same time, and I was beginning to get on her nerves.

I could never be cautious enough to avoid provoking somebody’s anger or dissatisfaction.

Standing in the middle of the sidewalk she was yelling that hadn’t we had enough crazies for one day. She certainly had, and it was time I pulled myself together.

I also noticed that the more cautiously I spoke or the more cunningly I phrased what I had to say, the more offended and irritated people became. They never had such problems with my cousins, even though everyone said I was a much better child because I wasn’t as impudent and violent as they were.

It was hard to remain good if my best behavior wasn’t good enough.

They had grown used to me as a child who did not look for excuses, was not obstinate, quickly acquiesced in whatever was asked of him. Perhaps my grandfather was the only one who did not want me to be better than I was. He was indifferent to my behavior, good or ill; he did not want anything from me. Sometimes I thought he also pretended that nothing touched or interested him. Just as I always had to pretend that I had no objection to anything. They always wanted more, demanded more. But there was someone inside me who made giving in very difficult; it was some sort of obstacle, I don’t know what or who it could have been.