Asystole

SCENE ONE-2

His mother had scared him and he did not know what he had done wrong. He sat down, feeling he was being punished, as if he were being put on display in front of everyone. His mother could be like that. Cross. It had hurt when she grasped his hand and had seemed to be stinging him with her words. He wanted people to feel sorry for him and thought of crying but, angry and miserable, made an effort to stay silent, unwilling to give in. Nobody wanted him. He had only to think that to feel orphaned in his heart. In that case, he would not love anyone either.

The men at the table were going to great lengths to show consideration for his mother, as if taking possession of her as she limply acquiesced. Her son was suddenly affronted, on behalf not of her but of his father. Where was his daddy? Why had Mummy told him not to ask about that, when all the people who had come to the party were standing up and making stupid speeches to trick her and him into believing Daddy had gone away and would never come home again?

The little martyr will remember nothing of this tomorrow, but can hardly know that. He will be reborn, forgetting everything, forgiving everyone, amazed upon his re-appearance by everything in the world. Fall asleep to be resurrected, and so it is fated until sleep itself is frightful and seems like death, and there is only tomorrow, and this one path leading to it. You hide under the blanket or remain alert, feeling the beating in your chest, like a clock ticking, but your eyes will close anyway, even if you hold out for a long time, and that moment, like death, not letting you feel anything, creeps up unnoticed.

That is why falling asleep in the dark is so lonely. No sooner do you close your eyes than you set out on a frightening journey. He could not understand why the light from heaven should have to end; or why he too should have to climb to the summit of each day only then to suddenly vanish; why every night he should bid farewell to life, its colours and sounds and scents. He knew everybody goes to sleep at night, yet never met anyone else as he strayed through the labyrinths of the dark. Something, however, makes you resign yourself to the unknown, close your eyes, surrender all the powers of life, fall asleep.

It was so clear, so easy: everyone should love him. His whole being, although an agglomeration of desires and curiosity, was drawn only to their love. It was made for love, from its first days receiving consolation for the slightest suffering, which it announced by crying and screaming. This being was used to receiving gratification, and perhaps the sweetest was when someone else felt they had wronged him and tried to make amends.

“Do you like that?” his grandmother asked with a smile, relenting after giving him a piece of Grandfather’s bait to taste. “The fishes do.”

Cursing, not enjoying what she was doing, she spent the rest of the day boiling something brown and gooey, angrily stirring it until it turned into a kind of dough, and when it was ready, called him and told him to close his eyes. She popped a piece in his mouth. It dissolved into something unbelievably sweet, and the boy, having spent the whole day on his best behaviour, for which this was probably a reward, swooned with delight.

He was afraid he might not be ready in time. His heart, a-quiver, was feeling rushed. It had already been light when Grandfather roused him, coming for him from nowhere. He got himself ready, like a soldier obeying orders. Grandmother was still asleep and did not get up. It was so amazing to feel you were alive in the empty silence where you could not speak too loudly for fear of disturbing all the things engrossed in themselves. It was even too early to be out walking.

As they were travelling on a wildly rattling tram, probably the only one in the entire city, through deserted, lifeless streets, the sun was already pouring down on them.

His grandfather said nothing the whole way, perhaps because he never took anyone with him when he went fishing and was used to saying nothing.

They went to the island, to their little house, which was really just a shed built from planks, even without windows, although it had a sloping roof and stood firm on its foundations, and had for many years. The house smelled of damp from the river and it was cool, and all Grandfather needed for his overnight stays. There was room between the walls only for a steel mesh bed. Just outside, a table and bench were fixed to the ground. The family ate there when they came to enjoy the sun, the river and the fresh air.

There was a little verandah, and beside it Grandmother’s rose bushes.

Inside, where it was dark and damp, were fishing and spinning rods, lures, sinkers and hooks, – all the things he was not allowed to touch, all the things which belonged to Grandfather, as secret and dangerous as a gun, as the things you needed to take from the river, the things hidden in its depths. Perhaps that was why the boy imagined the depths lived here in the dark, lurking, waiting.

The island was a resort, with beaches, beer stalls and entertainments, but their house was away from the beaches and holidaymakers. Enormous horses grazed among the oak trees just beyond the garden gate. They were hobbled and shifted their great bulk jerkily, wandering off as if to hide behind the trees and contemplating each other. He was fascinated by the heavy knotted ropes which shackled them and could not understand why such huge, powerful creatures should uncomplainingly submit to human beings. He was afraid of the hobbled giants, the fear subsiding only after he had closed the gate behind him.

Alone, away from his parents, the boy spent the whole summer swimming and sunbathing.

The river beckoned and fondled him. When his grandmother was tired, she too fancied a treat and he had little difficulty persuading her to grant his dearest wish and let them take the motor boat back home. By this time of day the crowds had disappeared, leaving the beach crumpled and trampled, while something cold and dark lay heavily on the water like a shadow, and above it the seagulls wheeled, cawing like crows. The pontoon pier, swaying gently, welcomed back its little boat right next to the beach. The boat ferried people to the other side, even though the river was spanned by an enormous footbridge.

He was feeling happy. Grandmother had bought two tickets. It was chilly waiting for the boat, the wind no longer the caressing breeze it had been on the beach, but keen and whistling.

Nevertheless, his bare feet were soaking up heat from the pier’s still warm metal skin, and felt too the water sloshing beneath it. Flocks of children, suntanned almost black, carried on fishing from the pontoon.

He had never had a fishing rod of his own. An outsider, he envied but was afraid to go too near them. The boat came in and his ultimate wish was granted.

They could sit anywhere and there were plenty of empty seats on the benches along the sides. The motor boat shook and roared, and then settled down, steadily, powerfully accelerating. The bank receded until it was no more than a strip of sand. Heavy black waves churned by the side. When they were in the middle of the river, at every bounce the wind flung spray almost painfully in his face, making him screw up his eyes. Suddenly, however, there was an open view on all sides. His fears and pain, envy and awkwardness melted away and he felt at one with the wind, the waves, and the shore receding in the distance. Then he found himself back among the same kind of holidaymakers as had spent all day at the beach, doing exactly what they were doing, shaking the sand out of their shoes and covering the deck with it. When the boat came in to the granite-lined shore, life again became small and ordinary and uninteresting. In no time at all the boat was biting into the river again, heading back to where people were waiting for it.

Today, though, no one was waiting for anyone. The abandoned, unwelcoming beach was deserted. Even the water seemed dirty and dull.

His grandfather told him to listen and not speak, because the bream he hoped to catch with his spinning rods could hear everything down there on the riverbed, to which he instantly sent down several lines. They sliced through the water as they disappeared, as taut as violin strings.

Soon the sun burst forth, warming the water and the sand, which were suddenly bright and joyful. He was obediently silent but found himself with nothing more interesting to do than play with the sand. Time ran by, like the handful of sand spilling the faster out of his fist the tighter he clenched it.

If his grandfather turned in his direction, he sat motionless for a long time, expecting something to happen, until the old man turned away again without a word.

He began to think his grandfather was not talking to him because he did not like him. It was a feeling he had whenever he himself started thinking he did not really like his grandfather. He decided once and for all that he hated fishing and, with his head wedged between his knees, whispered to himself that he would never come from Moscow to see his grandfather again. He would forget all about him and hoped he died. Who cared! Knowing no words more terrible than these, having thought and said them, he was suddenly frightened of what he had done. He kept really quiet, feeling helpless and crushed.

He fell asleep on the sand. When his grandfather noticed, he quietly came over and covered the inert little body with his shirt to shield it from the sun.

His grandfather woke him up with a prod, holding an enormous fish.

The boy had not seen or heard the little bell ringing its heart out, his grandfather jumping up, flustered, to grab the line. With the rod arching, bathed in sweat, he anxiously, delicately, slowly plied his heavy, powerful prey, his hands trembling with the strain. He called, shouted to the boy to bring him the landing net which was just a few steps away. Getting no response, he waded into the water, seeing a gleam of silvery chain mail. Without giving the great fish a chance to come to its senses, he drew the rest of its strength out of it.

The bream was still floundering frantically. Beside himself with delight, the boy was afraid to touch a live fish. His grandfather said they needed to stun it and bury it deep down where the sand was cold. He could have done it himself as he usually did, but decided to give his grandson a job to do which was more than a game.

The boy proudly felt part of his team, feeling no sympathy for the fish, which was already lying helplessly on its side, gasping for air. He hit the quivering bream’s head with a stone. It became still and blood came out. Proud of what he had done, not afraid of the blood, he began digging a hole in the sand as his grandfather said, although for him it was a game. When he got down to where it was cool, he put the fish in and covered it up again with sand. Now they had fish to take back home to Grandmother.

The mound covering the fish was like a home. He wondered whether fish could stay alive underground, and thought back to the moment when he hit it with the stone. He would have liked to dig down to see what it looked like now, whether it had changed in the sand.