kicked off her dusty sandals and opened the sliding doors onto her balcony to let out the accumulated stuffiness of the day. The incoming tide brought in a strong smell of sea and kelp. She breathed in the clean atmosphere. All day long she worked in a pall of farts: library borrowers seemed to experience an immediate relaxing of their bowels as they perused the shelves or read the free newspapers.
When she had begun studying for her diploma, she’d thought that she would end up working with scholarly or at least thoughtful people. But she had ended up in a suburban library that mostly serviced pensioners who fought with one another over whose turn it was to take out Foyle’s War. The staff was also kept busy by children from three or four local schools. Teachers set identical projects with identical deadlines so that there was always a crisis about “Volcanoes” or “Robben Island”. Once a week the librarians were supposed to get together for a book discussion, but it turned out that two of Nina’s colleagues didn’t like reading or perhaps struggled to read. Her career had more in common with police work or refereeing. She had to stop patrons from stealing the Bob Marley biographies, bringing recording devices into the music section and, every now and then, photocopying whole books.
She liked the detail of classification, though. Only the other day, for example, they had received a batch of CDs from the provincial library, classified alphabetically rather than according to the Dewey decimal system. Absurd, thought Nina. You couldn’t have books on Beethoven shelved at 780.92 and then some music by Beethoven (but not all) shelved at Beet. It gave her pleasure to fix that.
While she reclassified Beethoven, Nina dreamt of places where laughter and champagne glasses tinkled, and intelligent people spoke about fascinating things. But now that just such an event was so close and so real (she’d even paid for the cake), she felt apprehensive. How much pleasanter and easier to stay at Cockle Place, not to have to stand on tiptoe to open the latch of someone else’s gate; not to have to walk up the garden path in full view of other, more legitimate guests; not to have to introduce herself, account for her existence.
Yes, she wanted to attend a party at Midden House, but perhaps not this party, not today. Another time, when she was less tongue-tied, when experience had waved its wand, transforming her mousy words into dapper footmen in shiny livery.
There wouldn’t be another chance, though, she knew that. And while it was possible that somewhere down the line she would develop a little more confidence, that wasn’t going to happen by staying home alone. She tried to jolly herself into a positive frame of mind. Already she was guaranteed the cachet of arriving late, since she had to attend the community forum meeting first. She might even walk from the meeting to the party with Chas and his mother.
Thank heavens she had a suitable dress, clean and ironed. Perhaps it would speak for her and say: “The wearer of this dress is modest but open to suggestion. She reads a lot and has an interest in history.” This much could be said by a soft peasant neckline and a little red piping around the hems.
Nina stood on her balcony looking down, as if studying Chas’s Edwardian seaside home might teach her to enter it like a native. But there was no way to fix Midden House in one’s gaze. Everything seemed to spill out of it. The painted green shutters were flung open; guests milled on the stoeps that wrapped around both floors. Nina could hear voices trilling up from the front steps and the lawn where Chas’s mother sometimes played croquet; even a splash and a shriek from the tidal pool below. Clearly, the party had already begun.
She showered and put her clothes on in her usual modest way, not looking in the mirror until she was covered, only one section permitted to be naked at a time, like solving a Rubik’s cube. She could not see herself undressed without hearing the ex-boyfriend voices, the one who had said: “Now I know what they mean by Rubenesque!” Or the crueller one’s observation: “You’re built for comfort.” And then they wondered why she ran away. It was all part of the same conundrum – her weight and her fear of sex. She ate chocolate not only to insulate herself against male regard but also because she was frustrated by the lack of it.
It was still too early to set off. To pass the time, Nina sat on her tiny balcony looking through her Slangkop file. Perhaps here, among the newspaper clippings she’d collected, there was something that would help her make conversation tonight. Not the magazine article on Neville and Sharon’s caravan park, and not the City of Cape Town’s fifteen-page conservation report on this “relatively undeveloped coastal terrace” – no one wanted a guest who spouted gobbets of tourism. What might help her were Chas’s articles and reviews, the photos of him at society events.
“If you like my figure so much, why don’t you visit me?”
It was Fundiswa’s voice, floating straight up to Nina’s balcony. Fundiswa must be speaking to someone on the phone. Nina dared not even turn a page now, for fear Fundiswa would know she was eavesdropping.
“Before, your excuse used to be that everyone would see you if you visited me. Too public. So I move to this completely clandestine place and now you say it’s too far away. You could come and spend the night here. Tell them you’re going on retreat.”
Strange, Nina thought, that a woman of Fundiswa’s age should be speaking so flirtatiously. Didn’t you firmly shut the door on that aspect of life once you turned sixty? Apparently not.
“Might die on top of me! How can you say such a thing! I don’t like the way you assume we’ll be in the missionary position.”
Fundiswa was laughing at her own wit, in a way that suggested the other person was laughing too. The joke seemed to set matters right between them, because Fundiswa ceased to be confrontational.
“Alright, Bishop,” she said. “Tell me all about your week.”
Nina heard nothing more. Perhaps Bishop had a lot to say about his week, or perhaps Fundiswa had moved inside again. Nina could pull her chair in without worrying that the hard metal scrape would betray her presence.
She turned her attention back to the society pictures of Chas in her file. He was a person the camera loved. It caught his dimpled cheek and his large eyes that seemed all pupil. His expression was merry, inviting. Such a well-made man: not too tall, neither muscle-bound nor flabby, but finely knit and compact. And then there was always that hair, framing his face like a girl’s, except that the face itself was so evidently a man’s: high-browed, the lines of jaw and nose unequivocal.
It was enough just to be allowed to look at someone like Chas, she told herself. Except that, of course, it wasn’t. It flicked a switch; it turned on a fluorescent light in the empty room of one’s own emotional and sexual life. See, said the light, you have none of that beauty here. You have only this poorly furnished room.
William climbed his pole so that he could watch the two women continue their journey. He used to be able to skim up it, using a strong grip and his core muscles, but since turning forty he’d had to nail in footholds.
When he reached the top, he clenched his knees around the beam for support and stretched out his arms to welcome the light summer breeze. Brilliant! This little wind hadn’t travelled far; it was only the lightest wisp.
Despite its elevation, his cottage had no sea view. It was completely enclosed by milkwoods. From the top of his pole, William surveyed the little settlement of Slangkop and the great expanse of the Atlantic Ocean, stretching out towards Cape Point on his left and Hout Bay on his right.
He knew who the women were. The librarian’s name was Nina. She was blonde and fresh-faced, though short and roundish like her companion. If he had heard her correctly, she was looking for a sperm donor. For William, this was a problem that could be solved. The only difficult part would be bringing up the topic, because it
