Divided Kingdom

Chapter Ten

Night has fallen on the city like black snow. I sit in the appointed place and wait for her. It doesn’t matter if she’s late. My patience knows no boundaries. In fact, I don’t even think of it as patience; I have no anxiety, no sense of time.

While I was on the phone to her, I came up with a plan. I’m going to forge papers that will give her the right to stay in the Red Quarter. Then no one will be able to harm her. She’ll be safe. That’s why I’ve decided to take the job Vishram offered me. It will make things easier. No, it will make things foolproof.

To live with her, that’s all that interests me. To live with her — and perhaps, after a while, to have a child. We would be undermining the system, of course — its ethos, its integrity … We’d be making a mockery of it. I don’t care, though, not any more. I owe the system nothing.

Imagine what Victor would say if he were still alive!

I tilt my head back until it’s on a level with the sky. Such clarity up there. The stars seem to echo the freckles on her face. Like one of those road signs in the country. I smile to myself and shake my head. In the faint stirring of the air I can feel her breath, her gift — her mystery.

The thought of her has me trembling, as if with cold.

I want to hear my name on her tongue. I want to feel her skin on mine, my body mingling illegally with hers. I want to learn her off by heart. You’re not going to forget me again, are you?

I’ll never turn my back on her. I promise.

The lake twitches below me, restless, like a dog dreaming. A broken branch floats on the water, its buds already open. In the east I hear the wind rise.

Now she’ll come.

And I’m standing in the truck again, with strangers all around me and a light rain falling, and I can see my mother and father on the road, and I call out to them.

It’s all right. I’m going to be all right.