Short Stories

THE TRESPASSER

LATA JAGTIANI


“Is there no way we can meet then?” I felt like laughing. I sounded so much like needy Greta had when I cancelled our meeting. Her pathetic whimper…it had been devilishly exciting to set her up for a last minute ditch with complete lack of remorse. Very calmly I’d said, “It’s awful, I’ll just have to cancel tonight, this thing’s come up…call me tomorrow and we’ll work something out.”
And now I knew how she must have felt, but I couldn’t help myself, I pleaded. My stressed voice sweetly begged for any answer except the one that was a ditch.
I had become the kind of person one kicks around.
My throat felt dry as I waited for Sheila’s answer.
There was silence.
Had she fainted or left the phone dangling?
Then her soft voice: “Not today, Ash, he’s home today.”
There were two things I wanted to do to Sheila: I wanted to pull her into my arms and show her what a gentle person I was but I also wanted to take her, hurt her and leave her scarred for life.
Soon Sheila will forget me.
As I stepped out I managed a smile for the doorman at the circular door. Six hours before bedtime and there was nothing for me to do. I had nowhere to go. A chill ran down my spine.
What if this was how life would be, what if she dropped me completely? I’ll convince her that I am a good man, that she must meet me. But what if she never picks up the telephone, she might make him to do it, she might not give me the answer I want to hear- there might be somebody else. Time, I hate time; it’s the enemy of every man in love with another man’s wife.
I looked at the clock tower. A quarter past six, just fifteen minutes gone. And then I felt the blood leave my face as I read the day of the week on the clock dial, “THURSDAY”. If he continues to be sick tomorrow, Friday, then he has her to himself on Saturday and Sunday as well, and the earliest I’d get to see her would be on Monday.
I looked for a bench and found it. I sat down shakily. I wished it had been vacant but there was an old man at the other end chomping on his lunch. He stopped chewing picked up his water bottle and pointed it towards my chin. I nearly recoiled from his divergent squint.
“Here have some water, it’ll stop your giddiness.”
I shook my head and turned away from his concerned eyes.
“A shock?” He turned to stare at me. I laughed. My laughter was strange, very high-pitched. Never heard that come from my throat before, I thought.
I thought: here’s a funny sight: a man known for his sexual exploits, known to cast them aside as soon as they began to bore him, the self-assured man was losing it, and what was worse, was getting sympathy from a hobo.
“Ah! A woman!” He grinned. I saw smoke-stained front teeth with a doorway between them.
I nodded.
‘Yes, love.” He looked far away and I saw a woman in a long dress smile at the hobo.
“You too?” I hadn’t been able to help myself. How could a man with dirty hair and a gap in his teeth, a drunkard, have been in love?
He spread out both his arms as if he was trying to encompass the whole world between those two arms, “Everybody here- they all have broken hearts.””Mine isn’t broken, it’s, she isn’t free today… her husband…”I stopped myself. Holy cow.
He scratched his plaited hair. I pulled down my hat over all my hair. I didn’t want his lice. Then, scratching his dry elbow, he asked with an eyebrow raised.
“It is hopeless, you knew that, didn’t you, from the start?”
He pulled out a miniature bottle of whisky and offered to me mouth first.
I shook my head.
“When they lose interest,” he said, chomping and drinking at the same time with his jaw showing every move his mouth made, “my friend, they start bringing in the husband, that’s when you know it’s over…the beginning of the end.”
“But she would never do that, she’d never lie to me.”
The snow began to fall on our shoulders and laps. I looked at my watch again. Six forty-five. Damn her, till Monday, how will I last till Monday then?
Her home isn’t very far from here, I told him with a nervous laugh, maybe I’ll ring her door-bell pretend to be a dictionary salesman and we’ll both laugh at the joke, maybe I’ll get to kiss her while he is asleep in the bedroom. One glimpse, that’s all I want. I appealed to the hobo to approve of the idea.

‘But what if she is dressed up to go out? What if there’s another man at the door with her? What if the door is locked and they’ve gone out? What if you discover that?”
A high-pitched voice, it couldn’t have been mine, screamed, “I’ll kill her! I’ll kill the bitch!”
“Then go!” he said with the kind of sneer we save for braggarts.
I jumped up and walked away from the dirty hobo and his contempt. He shouted hoarsely after me, “I’ll be here tomorrow, come drink with me tomorrow!”
I hated him. She was a good and decent person, she’d never do what I could do to women.

My last day with Greta flashed before my eyes as I waited for the pedestrian signal to turn to “WALK”. She had returned from work, cooked my meal, cleaned the collars of my shirts, and answered my letters. When she had finished all of them I had said, “Oh Greta, thanks a lot for everything. I have a meeting to attend, it’s deadly boring, but I can’t get out of it…. You can leave after the washing’s finished. Thanks so much…. “
Her eyes had tears and I had kissed her on the cheek, “Come, come now, be nice, you are so understanding on other days, I can’t put this one. We’ll meet again tomorrow. By the way, in the cupboard there’s my brown shirt which needs a button. Maybe you can sew it on tomorrow and then we’ll have a drink together, sweetie.”
When I returned that night after a hard couple of hours at the bowling alley, I had found the buttons sewn on. She hadn’t returned. I hadn’t called her. She was like the other nice bitches, they always understand.

I crossed the road but found my feet carrying me involuntarily towards the train station. It was just one stop away. I squeezed myself into an over-crowded compartment. There were huddles of men and only a couple of women. They were pretty but they didn’t interest me. How would I go about it? I’d buy a dictionary at the bookshop near her apartment block and then ring her bell. Soon I’d see her laugh at the novel idea of meeting her like this, she would throw her head back, her hair would fall away from her long neck and she would hold my fingers tight. The memory of her flushed face and shaking shoulders made me walk faster. I looked at my watch. Nearly eight. They dined at nine-thirty the days he was home. It was a good hour to dinner. She might be in the kitchen cooking her favorite pasta with green garnishing which she said was spinach but I had never found it tasting anything like spinach.
I bought the dictionary and didn’t wait for the change.
The hobo was stupid, did he really think I would meet up with him on the snowy bench tomorrow? I felt cold and my hands were frozen. I reached her door, combed my hair, and straightened my tie, shirt, and jacket. I pulled out my dictionary from the plastic bag and rang the bell.
Nobody opened the door. I stepped back to see if her first floor bedroom light was on, her sick husband ought to be watching TV from bed. Yes, the bedroom light was on but it was more like the night-light. I rang again. They might have gone out and she told me he was ill. There were no approaching footsteps.
I decided to peep into the kitchen. There was a dim light on and with its help I could see an open, half-empty bottle of wine. She doesn’t drink. It must be the sick man wanting to cheer himself up. Just then I heard steps and hid myself. I heard somebody pick up the bottle and then heard his retreating footsteps. I hid away from sight but the strong men’s cologne drifted to my nostrils. I felt the rage building in me.
I’ll kill her. She’s two-timing me.
I unlocked the kitchen door and entered silently. It was easy. I knew the layout. I tiptoed up the stairs and was careful to avoid the creaky steps six and nine. In the dim light I could hear the soft sound of somebody in pain or in tears. I felt ants crawling up my skin. I’ll kill him if he hurts her, I vowed, even if she’s done with me, I’ll kill him first.
Her bedroom door was afar. I hid. I stood carefully behind a window curtain to the immediate right of the door and watched.
She was crying, her shoulders were shaking, and she looked frightened. He was shouting and abusing her.
“So you clever one, today you can’t meet the f***ing bastard. Not so clever after all”. He put his arms around her shoulders and she recoiled.
“Don’t touch me, I won’t be touched by a drunken brute like you!”
He began to whimper, slurring his words.
“Just let me, for once, I’ll be gentle, slow and tender… give me a chance.”“ I won’t, don’t you dare near me!” She was in trouble. I decided to wait for him to retreat quietly. I couldn’t possibly explain my presence to him if I intervened. I was a trespasser.
She collapsed on the bed and began to wail. He tried to comfort her with his left hand while he held a glass of wine in his right. ”Come, come, I’m your very own first love, have you forgotten, don’t be cross with me, my darling.”
Her shoulders that had been shaking now stiffened.
“I’m pregnant.”
Pregnant. Jesus. He became rigid and said nothing.
There was a long silence. I felt beads of perspiration on my face.
We were pregnant. Shit.
Finally, very, very slowly, he said like somebody who has been sentenced to death. “I accept the child, I know it isn’t mine. It’s ours. But don’t leave me, please.”
She took his hand and kissed it.
“Do you want to leave me? “ He was trying hard not to slur. It was the voice of a man with a breaking heart.
She shook her head, “He doesn’t like children. And then he’s a happily married man. “
Liar.
I left the room with greater care than when I had entered it.
So that was it. She’d been afraid to tell me, but she had told him. He had understood and accepted. She was better off with him.
I slowly entered the station and found an empty train. It makes sense now. I didn’t want to kill her anymore. I just wanted to be left alone to contemplate the silence of a baby-less bachelor life. I wanted to forget.
Suddenly my spirits soar.
Well, she won’t forget me even if she tries.

A woman in a pale pink dress entered the compartment. Thirty something, no wedding band. Subtle lipstick and eye make-up, the gentle kind that wear pastel shades. Her handbag fell to the floor.
“Allow me!” I said diving for it.
When I looked up I saw her dimpled smile.
Single and pretty.
Maybe six months, I thought as I introduced myself. Six months, no more.
Maybe even three. I could see her sewing on my shirt buttons in three.