Out of Such Darkness (6 page)

She turns to face him. ‘You have to be strong, Jay. I thought I’d lost you and you’re back. So we have to make the most of it; this is our second chance.’

Is this her best stuff? Is this motherhood-and-apple-pie her method for bringing you back to the life she wants for you
?
What about Nancy? Remember her, Jay? Leaning over your desk? That body. Her vitality
…

He starts to blub. Emotion drains his muscles of power as he swings round and casts the lilies on their way. They flop down only a few feet into the water and nestle in their wrapping, like Moses swaddled in his wicker cradle-craft. The paper becomes waterlogged and the flowers lose the will to stay afloat. The sight of them embracing their drowning so willingly sends Jay into a moment of darkness even deeper than anything before. He groans.

Rachel speaks sharply. ‘You should have taken them out of the paper. What about the litter?’

Jay swivels his heels into the millions of particles under his feet and heads back to the car.

As Leo and I approached them the Brownshirts stepped to one side to let us through the first ring of trees and now we were on the edge of a lake. Red-hulled wooden rowboats lined the shore to the left as we carried on into the clearing with others arriving ahead and behind us. Here the surrounding trees and posts were festooned with swastikas which also adorned the raised wooden platform set with long pine tables and benches. There must have been thirty tables and two-thirds were already full.

There were two stages. The band dressed in Lederhosen played from one and on the other was a choir of young boys and girls dressed a little like boy scouts with open-neck, khaki shirts and light-blue, cotton neckerchiefs. They were joking amongst themselves and I was struck by their open smiling faces and their chubby knees poking out from their dark knickerbockers. For all Leo’s imputation that the National Socialists were a sinister cult I have to say that all I could see was young people having fun protected by a necessary ring of strong men who were needed to defend them against any of the Communist Red Front Brigades who might try and disrupt this idyllic German scene.

A waitress in the traditional dirndl dress served us with large beers and we started drinking while taking in the scene.

We were on our second beer when a man in the brown SA uniform stood to speak. His collar tips bore red patches and an ornate lanyard dangled across his chest where others of lowlier rank wore dark ties. I was amused by how the extravagant flared thighs of his jodhpur-style trousers brushed together as he strutted about but he seemed to be a capable orator and he whipped the men and women around us into an enthusiastic applause when he jumped off the stage and gave a signal to a compatriot.

Immediately the swastika flags behind the choir moved aside to reveal a cinema-style screen. It was shaded by the trees and a projecting awning and we could see the pictures clearly.

A buzz went round the audience as the credits stopped and, following a drum-roll, Hitler himself was on the screen. Immediately some in the audience stood up and gave the salute “Heil Hitler!” I felt Leo’s hand on my arm.

We watched the extraordinary performance that kept the spectators spell-bound. At the end the greater part of the audience stood up and again raised their hands in the Nazi salute. I had been swept up and was on my feet clapping. Leo must have thought that he ought not be the only one left seated so he stood alongside me putting his hands together in a perfunctory way.

The swastika curtain closed over and the SA officer was on the stage again, this time only long enough to introduce the choir. They had remained standing after watching their Fuhrer and gave a concert of what I assumed where traditional folk songs.

He steps forward at the end of the third song. He has the most incredible face, blue eyes scanning the audience imperiously. They are like binocular lenses peering out between the right-angles of his brow- and cheek-bones. The latter are cushioned by an elasticity that age will destroy. My mind is calculating involuntarily: he is young but not too young.

I can sense that Leo is no longer looking at the stage. Out of the corner of my eye I see him watching me intently.

What he may deduce from my fixation with the action on stage doesn’t concern me. Adonis stands before me and he has the voice of a songbird – at once trilling but also broken, manly. He is wearing the uniform of the Hitler Youth – but the style of his covering is irrelevant. I see only the detail of his body which creates a statue of the naked David. The youth’s sleeves are rolled to above the elbow and I sense rather than discern the down of fair hair on his forearms. My mind travels on and I feel my arousal starting as I imagine the pattern of blondeness that stretches down from his navel. Beneath the roll of his shirt sleeve a bulge of his bicep peeps out and my mind fills in the same quality of muscle on his calves, his thighs, his buttocks.

I have to shift my weight on the seat and pull at the material of my trousers to make myself comfortable and I give a furtive glance towards Leo. He smiles and languidly turns his face back to the stage.

The youth has sung one song and is now on the second. This is a folk tune which is familiar to the audience. The men and women start swaying and some sing along. Men swing their steins of beer from side to side. The last verse comes to a crescendo and the crowd is singing and now standing and clapping in one eruption of emotion. I am standing as well, applauding and smiling, hoping that the boy will turn to me and our eyes will meet. But he merely stands, shoots his right arm forward, hand rigid, and his lips mould themselves around the words “Heil Hitler” which are drowned in the flood of passion from the crowd.

I know my eyes are sparkling as I turn to Leo, nodding encouragement to show more enthusiasm than his methodical clapping. He leans towards me and whispers in my ear, “See how easy it is.”

We took a stroll down Kurfurstendamm after the concert and cut up to Savignyplatz where we stopped for a coffee in the same place we had met.

“You could have told me, you know,” Leo said.

“Told you what?

“That you like boys.”

The way he said ‘boys’ troubled me and I thought about how much I should say. I made a point of blowing my cigarette smoke away as if it was more important than the trifling conversation. “I’m not sure I like you using the word ‘boys’. But, yes, I’m attracted to my own sex. Ho-mo-sexual.”

Leo laughed and put his coffee cup down on the saucer with a sharp tap. “Cam. You’re such a stuffed shirt. I had my suspicions before today. But the way you came alive when that boy sang. It was like watching a dog round a bitch in heat.”

I stubbed out my cigarette and ground the butt down hard into the tin ashtray. “There’s no need to be quite so mocking and graphic in your language. But, yes, guilty as charged.” I leaned across the table. “He was quite the most beautiful thing, though, wasn’t he?”

Leo turned down the corners of his mouth. “I’m sure I couldn’t say. But you don’t have to worry about me. I’m not going to blab or anything. Each to his own, I say.”

“That’s exactly what I say too,” I said and we both chuckled.

We paid the bill and started the final part of the walk to Steinplatz. As we passed between the high buildings in this the most modern part of Berlin, which reminded me of the terraces around Shepherd’s Market in London, Leo linked my arm in his and I felt a surge of warmth towards him. He was not one of our sort; he had made this clear. But he wanted me to know that he was comfortable with my confession and nothing had changed. In the past, men have often kept themselves apart from me once they know about my other life as if my sexuality was an infectious disease.

“Have you heard of Nolllendorfplatz?” he said.

“Is it called the Nolli?”

“Yes.”

“My agent mentioned it. He warned me against staying in that part of the city. He said I’d never get any work done.”

“It certainly has more distractions for a ‘queer’ – is that okay?”

I waved it away. It’s a word we preferred to keep to ourselves but I didn’t want to make a fuss.

“There are clubs. Where the boys go. It’s very open down there.”

“I had heard.”

He stopped and turned to me. “Look, do you want me to take you there? It would be fun. We’ll make a night out of it and then … well if you want to go back you’ll know where it is and how it all works. What do you say?”

I had been conscious that the moment with the youth on the stage had awakened my libido and I would need release and soon. I could have hugged him for his offer but I didn’t want to appear too eager. “That would be very agreeable,” I said. “Thank you, Leo. You’re very kind.”

‘What’s this coat-hanger doing in the bathroom?’ Rachel is holding the Hymie coat-hanger as if it’s contaminated. Her nose is wrinkled and the edges of her mouth are turned down. It’s the mannerism she uses when Ben discards a towel on the landing. They are only half-way into the morning, yet Jay’s head already feels like a bag of popcorn in a microwave.

‘Sorry.’ He snatches it from her and strokes its smooth shoulder. He recalls Great-Uncle Hymie’s imagined voice: ‘A blessing be upon you for this’. ‘I was looking at it the other night.’ Jay is still wearing his night-time T-shirt and shorts.

Rachel cocks her head to one side. She’s wearing a loose cotton top and jeans. ‘Do you have any plans for today?’ she says.

He’s rubbing his thumb across the end of the hook. It’s like a tear-drop of molten metal, generous. No cost has been spared to ensure that Hymie’s clothes – and his customers – come to no harm.

What has happened to Hymie’s values? Jay wonders. He talks about ‘Customer Care’ when he’s coaching the employees of a client company on rehabilitating its brand. But it’s not Hymie’s model. It’s the ersatz concern of the call-centre agent who asks, ‘How may I be of service to you today?’ with the callous disinterest of a pike swallowing a moorhen chick. Jay decides he will not ignore Great-Uncle Hymie’s nocturnal visitation.

‘Did you hear me? What are you planning for today?’ Rachel asks.

‘Does Howard Edler work?’

‘What? Yes … he runs his own company, I think.’

‘Pity, I was going to talk to him about visiting his synagogue.’

‘He may still be home. See if his car’s there – a big SUV.’ She steps towards him and wraps him in her arms.

His reaction, a swell of blood to his groin, is immediate and the leering face of the MC appears over his shoulder.

Really? Shouldn’t you be better than that?

‘We need to talk.’ Her lips are against his ear. ‘We need to think about how we’re going to earn a living. The company’s gone. Your visa for working here is probably invalid.’ She hugs him tight. ‘We should go home.’

This is going to be her solution, Jay. We’re not ready for ‘home’, are we?

His words stumble over the hurdles of his sobs. ‘I can’t, Rachel. Not until we’re sure about them. All of them. It’s as if they are on top of me, weighing me down. I have to get out from under them.’

Excellent! I could not have put it better
.

Jay is now washed and dressed. He has the inkling that the MC is behind his sense of purpose and this nips at the edge of his consciousness. He makes for Burford Lakes library. The sky is still clear blue but the temperature has dropped. Jay has put on a sweater under his zipped top. He’s on foot, orienteering towards the Presbyterian Church’s white-painted spire that stands alongside the village green. Traffic speeds past; the act of walking to the village marks Jay as different. All his neighbours would have jumped into their cars.

The library building used to be a private house originating from revolutionary times but it’s been renovated so often that not one nail from 1775 survives. Although some internal walls have been removed it’s still a labyrinth of cramped rooms. Jay takes his proof of residence letters from his inside pocket as he ducks through the door. There’s a small group of Burford Lakes women clustered like stick insects round the desk but they fall back when they see him. He doesn’t recognise them but senses that they know who he is.

The MC is at his shoulder pushing him forward.
As soon as you open your mouth they’ll recognise you as the English survivor. They think you’re the man who tricked fate. But you no more ‘tricked fate’ than I did when I fled Berlin thinking I could outrun the Gestapo. Destiny is in control here, not fate.

Shuffling so as to avoid brushing against any of the women’s large handbags or ring-laden hands, Jay looks up into the blue eyes of the woman behind the counter. She’s probably his age and, like the majority of Burford Lakes women, everything is carefully in place from her hair-sprayed-but-loose locks through her perfect teeth, the duck-egg blue of her cashmere twin-set with its twin peaks, to the narrow belt round her gym-trim waist.

‘I’d like to join the library.’

The librarian inclines her head and genuflects with her back straight to reach a form from under the counter. ‘Do you live in Burford Lakes?’ Her voice makes him wince. It has the quality of a diamond cutter on a windowpane.

‘Yes, here.’ He lays the two letters flat on the desk.

‘No Driver’s Licence?’ Familiarity doesn’t soften the corrosive property of her voice.

‘No. I’m using my British one.’

‘That’s cool.’ She flutters her eyelashes. ‘I
love
your accent, by the way.’

‘Thank you.’

‘So if you’ll just fill out this form.’

The other women drift away while Jay writes. He’s aware that the librarian is watching the pen move across the page.

‘That’s good, Lesley,’ she says, as if she’s his teacher congratulating him for being able to make the words. ‘My name’s, Prentice, by the way. While I’m putting you into the computer and filling out your temporary card is there anything I can help you with today?’

Her formulaic use of ‘server’ words makes Jay’s temperature rise. ‘My name is Jay. People call me Jay, not Lesley.’ He can feel a heat on his back from the stares of the women who have moved behind him. They’re whispering.

They know it’s you. Their words are dripping with ersatz concern.

Prentice looks down at the card. She frowns and looks up at him accusingly for making her misstep with his name.

Overcoming the urge to apologise, Jay says, ‘Do you have Christopher Isherwood’s novels?’

‘I’m not familiar with them. Would that be fiction?’

Dummkopf! And she calls herself a librarian.

‘Yes, fiction.’

‘You’ll find fiction on the second floor.’

‘Thanks.’ Jay visualises the library facade as seen from across the green. It has two storeys. Where is the
second
floor? But he’s manufacturing irritation as a reaction to Prentice’s mannerisms.

From the top of the stairs he crosses to the ‘I’ shelves and there are three books under Isherwood.
Mr Norris Changes Trains
is in paperback with a see-through plastic jacket. So is
Goodbye to Berlin
. There’s a hardbound copy of
The Berlin Novels
. He takes it down and reads the blurb that describes how
Goodbye to Berlin
was the inspiration for the stage-play
I Am a Camera
and the ensuing musical,
Cabaret
. He decides to borrow only the novel that is his primary interest.

So you don’t have enough time on your hands to read two books?

He changes his mind and takes the hardback downstairs. He appears to be alone with Prentice now but there are hidden rooms where other residents could be lurking.

‘Have you chosen something?’

‘Yes, Isherwood.’ He holds up the book and waits for a response.

She takes it from him and passes it across a reader. She enters the numbers from his temporary card into the computer one by one, her long fingernails tip-tapping across the keyboard like a ballerina on points.

‘I had expected to find you fresh out of these.’

‘Fresh out’? Did you say ‘fresh out’? What are you turning into?

She raises an eyebrow and pauses until the last number is entered. ‘Oh?’

‘Because of the High School Production?’

Her eyebrow is tireless. ‘Is that
Cabaret
? The one in rehearsal? My Briony is in the chorus. I’m so worried about her costume. Have you seen the film? I do hope that the costumes are going to be a lot less …’ she shakes her head and presses her wriggling lips together ‘… revealing.’

‘I saw it back in England. A long time ago.’

You want see it again, though. You’ll have the opportunity to admire once more my singing and dancing.

The librarian looks at Jay with her eyes wide. Her head wobbles from side to side and her chin is tucked down towards her neck. Jay decides that it’s a look that wouldn’t be out of place in a comedy routine featuring gossip over a backyard-fence in a Northern town. ‘We have the video, you know. It has been popular since they decided to do the play. But it’s just come back.’

See? I knew she would have it.

‘You have?’ Jay looks round and then back at Prentice. She’s pointing.

Jay heads in that direction, pauses and looks back at her from the entrance to a second room. She’s nodding and the back of her hand is making a ‘shoo’ motion. The room has shelves of videos sorted by title and
Cabaret
is under ‘C’, sure enough. He takes it back to the desk.

The MC is jabbering in Jay’s ear. It’s as if Jay’s a newsreader and the producer is cajoling him through an earpiece.
This is so wonderfully exciting, Jay! In my mind already I’m stepping my moves from the opening number. Where’s my cane? Why do I not have my cane?

Prentice is still holding the book. ‘It’s called
The Berlin Novels
.’

‘Yes.’

‘And it’s connected to the school production?’

He feels awkward. Why did he embark on this? Is he showing off? ‘Isherwood wrote the book which gave them the idea for
Cabaret
– the character Sally Bowles. I thought other parents might be interested as well.’

‘But this Isherwood – he’s from England like you, Jay.’

Jay decides not to explain that the writer character in the book was English whereas he’s American in the musical.

Prentice is still turning the book in her hand. Jay would like to see her caress the cover and so demonstrate her passion for books.

She’d show more interest if it were a packet of
Dreft
flakes.

‘So
you
have someone at the School?’ she asks.

‘Yes, my son Ben. He has a part in the production.’

‘And this is the book?’ She turns it over. ‘All about Berlin.’

‘Yes, actually it’s
Goodbye to Berlin
that Cabaret is based on … loosely. You have it upstairs as a separate novel.’

‘We do? I’ll take a look. Perhaps I should suggest it for my book group.’

That’ll be a middle-aged sorority meeting running on Chardonnay that gossips about a book’s characters as if they’re neighbours.

‘Yes.’ He’s holding out his hand for the book. His feet are already turning for the door.

‘Are you taking the film?’

‘Yes.’

‘The book is free – we are a free library – but the video rental is two dollars and fifty cents.’

The sky has clouded over while Jay has been inside and he zips up his jacket. He decides he will stroll past the rest of the shops before returning home. SUVs swing out of and into the car-parking spaces cut into the ancient green. He watches the drivers, women mostly, climb down from the high driving seats and set off for the cookshop or the deli, the greengrocer or the patisserie. They are there to buy the fripperies that accompany the ‘main shop’ that will have been planned and executed on the appointed day at the temples to consumerism strung along Route 84 farther north in Connecticut.

The movie house is showing films with titles Jay doesn’t recognise although he has heard of two of the principal actors, Jake Gyllenhaal and Jennifer Aniston.

You like Jennifer Aniston?
You’re so predictable!

He’s not ashamed to admit it. She
is
cute in
Friends.
Great hair.

And what about Nancy? Didn’t she have great hair also?

Jay ignores him.

Did you fantasise about Nancy? Not just a little bit? Those tits? That ass?

Maybe a little bit.

And where are they now? Those tits. That ass. The rest of her. The rest of them. Your colleagues. The thousands of others.

The tears have started and he sets out for home.

‘Is that you, Jay?’ Rachel emerges from the opening into the kitchen. She’s wiping her hands on a tea towel. ‘Don’t take off your shoes. Howard came home for lunch not long ago. You’ll catch him if you want to pop down there.’

The film, Jay. I thought we were going to watch the film.

‘Later.’ Jay catches himself speaking the thought as he places the video on the side-table. He turns back down the steps. Howard’s SUV is parked in front of their double garage. Jay’s feet shush through the first fallen leaves that litter Ponds Lane. As he approaches the Edler house, he thinks about what he’ll say. He wants to rehearse the opening line but struggles to find the right words. Before he can resolve this, he has swung back the screen door and pressed the doorbell. There’s an ornamental plaque alongside the bell push and he wonders what it signifies. He recalls that his childhood home had one.

Howard opens the front door and stands two steps above. He peers at Jay over the top of his reading glasses and this positions his bison-like head as if he’s about to charge. ‘It’s Jay! Why, come in.’ He flaps his arms as if he’s shooing a flock of poultry across the threshold.

Howard touches a finger to the Mezuzah and puts the same finger to his lips. He removes his glasses and composes his face – grave and concerned. He has the manner of an undertaker persuading a client to choose his catalogue’s most expensive casket. ‘How are you, Jay? I don’t suppose you’ve gotten used to it yet?’

Being alive, he means. Alive when every other poor bastard in the company is so much dust.

‘That’s why I’m here, Howard. I don’t know what I feel.’ His eyes film over with tears. He swallows down the lump in his throat.

‘Come in. Sit down.’

‘Do you have time? Don’t you have to get back to work?’

Howard shakes his head and makes a tutting noise while pursing his lips into a grotesque kissing shape.

‘I can come back later,’ Jay says.

‘No. Sit. Drink?’

As he lowers himself into one of the leather armchairs, Jay rolls his tongue across the back of his teeth. ‘I’d be happy with water, please.’

‘Gas or no gas?’

‘Still is fine.’

‘Wait there.’