The Confession

50

I put Agnes to bed and sat by her side as she sniffed the air and asked me, very seriously, to stop drinking so much. “You’re worried about me?”

She sank into her pillow. “Not worried. I just don’t like you stinking. You smell like those Romanians who play music in October Square.”

I turned off the light.

Magda handed me a plate of cold chicken when I came out. “I’m going to bed.”

“Stay up a minute, will you?”

She frowned.

“And get some wine. For yourself. I’ve got to tell you something.”

I tried to eat a little as she fooled with the cork in the kitchen, but the first bite was dry and tumbled into my stomach like a rock. I set it aside and was relieved to see she had brought two glasses. She poured them both. “What is it, Ferenc.”

I cleared my throat. It was a theatrical gesture that allowed me a moment and a bit of pain to distract me from what I was preparing to say. “This morning I went over to Stefan’s apartment and found him dead. He’d been shot.”

She finally got to her wine. Her hands did not shake. She said, “That’s not possible.”

“I know.”

“You’ve got to be lying to me. Joking.”

I waited.

“Come on,” she said, then stood up. She looked down at me. “Stefan?” Then she walked into the kitchen.

The affair was nothing to me. My oldest friend was dead, and the man my wife loved was suddenly gone. We had been together too long for me not to feel some of the pain she must have felt.

When she reappeared she was wiping her red eyes with a dish towel. She said, “That’s why you called me.” Her glass was empty, so I filled it up in her hand and watched as she walked over to the radio set, put her hand on it, and looked out the window. “You said he was shot?”

“Yes.”

“Many times?”

“I don’t know how many.”

“He died quickly?”

“I don’t think so,” I said, and wondered why I hadn’t lied.

She nodded at the window and finally came back. The glass was empty, and when she sat down I refilled it. “I’m sorry,” she said. “He was your best friend.”

“I’m sorry, too.”

She held my gaze. We were fixed like that for a little while, as if we both had a lot of words that we could not say.

She stood. “I’m going to bed now. But would you rather me stay up with you?”

“I’ll be all right. What about you? Do you need me to be with you tonight?”

“Do you need to be with me?”

We looked at each other a moment more.

“I’m okay,” I said.

She nodded, first slowly, then resolutely, and wandered back to the bedroom.

I went for the sheets and wondered selfishly if her decisions were now finally made.