Love Today by Maxim Biller

Author:Maxim Biller
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2007-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

Dear Arthur

I had a rather difficult relationship just behind me. First I didn’t want to, then she didn’t want to. Then she said, “I’ll write you a letter, darling, when I know what I’ve decided.” The letter had arrived a few days ago, and now I could begin again from the beginning.

The next evening, when I arrived at Borchardt much too late, I thought: Now, that one’s not bad! She was sitting at a table with Emil, and we saw each other from a distance.

Emil was still all excited because of the Horvath Prize, which had been presented to him at the Berliner Ensemble theater that morning. “Why weren’t you there?” he said. His small, anxious face was as pink as the peach sorbet in front of him.

“Sorry,” I said, and shook hands with him. He wanted to kiss me, because theatrical people are always kissing. So we kissed. Then I said hello to the others sitting side by side at the long table with its white cloth. Most of them I didn’t know, and I thought the few I did boring.

She was still looking at me. She had the kind of eyes you call dark and interesting, and can quickly get on your nerves. And she had a very red mouth. Women with dark and interesting eyes often do, and their lipstick is usually shinier than it should be.

The eyes of the woman who wrote the letter had been different. Dark too, but different. When you looked into them you saw yourself, as long as you were with her anyway.

I pulled a chair over from another table and asked people to move up. Now we were sitting exactly opposite each other. I pressed my knee slightly against hers, and she moved away.

“What will you have to drink?” she asked.

“I don’t care.”

“Will you drink red wine with me?”

“No.”

She laughed. She was fifteen years younger than I, and she addressed me by the formal “you” pronoun.

“Are you hungry?”

“I’ve been feeling unwell for days.”

“Okay,” she said. “I understand.”

Then she told me what she was doing in Berlin—it had something to do with Emil’s prize. She was going back to Cologne the next day, and she had another twelve hours before her train left. She said so twice.

While she was talking I wondered what it would be like to rest my head on her shoulder. I wondered whether she had two little dimples at the base of her back. And then I leaned toward her to find out if I liked the smell of her.

She leaned forward too and said, “I’ve seen everything you did in Bochum, Arthur.”

The voices around us rose. It was as if someone were slowly turning up the volume. It didn’t bother me, I didn’t have to hear every word she said.

Then Emil, anxious little Emil, called down the entire table, “Hi there, I’d like us all to raise a glass to Ödön!”

The waiter went around with a tray, and everyone had a glass of vodka. We drained them,

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