Farewell Waltz by Milan Kundera

Author:Milan Kundera
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-10-02T16:00:00+00:00

2

It was ten o'clock, and, as she did each day, Olga had just received a large white sheet and a key from Ruzena. She went into a cubicle, took off her clothes, hung them on a hanger, slung the sheet around her like a toga, locked the cubicle, returned the key to Ruzena, and headed for the adjoining room with the pool. She threw the sheet onto the railing and went down the steps into the water, where there were already many women bathing. The pool was not big, but Olga was convinced that swimming was necessary for her health, and so she tried a few strokes. That splashed water into the talkative mouth of one of the ladies. "Are you crazy?" she cried out at Olga testily. "This pool isn't for swimming!"

Women were squatting in the shallow water, huddled up along the wall of the pool like big frogs. Olga was afraid of them. They were all older than she, they were more robust, they had more fat and skin. She thus sat down among them humbled, and stayed motionless and frowning.

Then she suddenly caught sight of a young man at the door; he was short and wore blue jeans and a torn sweater.

"What's that fellow doing here?" she exclaimed.

All the women turned in the direction Olga was looking and started to snicker and squeal.

Just then Ruzena came into the room and shouted:

"We've got visitors. They're going to film you for the news.''

The women greeted this with great laughter.

Olga protested: "What is all this?"

"The management gave them permission," said Ruzena.

"I don't care about the management, nobody consulted me!" Olga exclaimed.

The young man in the torn sweater (he had a light meter dangling from his neck) approached the pool and looked at Olga with a grin she found obscene: "Miss, thousands of viewers will go mad for you when they see you on the screen!"

The women responded with a new burst of laughter, and Olga hid her chest with her hands (it was not difficult, for, as we know, her breasts looked like two plums) and huddled behind the others.

Two more fellows in blue jeans moved toward the pool, and the taller one declared: "Please behave just as naturally as you would if we weren't here."

Olga reached out to the railing where her sheet was hanging. Still in the water, she wrapped the sheet around her and then climbed the steps and stood on the tiled floor; the sheet was dripping wet.

"Oh, shit! Don't go yet!" shouted the young man in the torn sweater.

"You have to stay in the pool fifteen minutes more!" Ruzena then shouted.

"She's shy!" came with guffaws from the pool behind Olga's back.

"She's afraid somebody'll steal her beauty!" said Ruzena.

"Look at her, the princess!" said a voice from the pool.

"Those who don't wish to be filmed of course may go," the tall fellow calmly said.

"The rest of us aren't ashamed! We're beautiful women!" a fat woman said stridently, and the laughter rippled the surface of the water.

"But

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