The Woman at 1,000 Degrees - читать бесплатно онлайн полную версию книги автора Hallgr ímur Helgason (42 Night Mail 2009) #44

42 Night Mail 2009

Oh yeah. I lie here through long nights, illuminated by the blue light of the computer screen like some dishevelled, grey-haired goddess with a russet tail end (bed sores) and a red glow on my lips (the cigarette), and peer into the void, whatever that might mean. I launch the occasional adverb into the world to tease young men on the other side of the planet and poke my relatives under false profiles but am otherwise mostly busy dying. Smoking kills, the packet assures me, but it’s taking ages.

To die… Oh death, please do come soon so that we can start our honeymoon.

Death dwells at night but is still resting with his big backpack, stick and bundle, on the stub of a tree trunk in the deep, dark forest, black browed, with a weary, jaundiced grin. He’s still waiting there but casts his glance down the leafy path to here. Through the thick, quivering mist of seconds I see his brazen stare.

He’s coming. He’s coming soon.

The November night is dark and humid with stormy sounds. The Almighty Farmer Above occasionally whips my corrugated iron roof with shivering branches as if he wants to punish me.

And e-mails reach me with chirps, perching on my quilt like birds, after a long voyage from sunny cyberlands, here into my darkness, shiny-eyed and beaming. I read those that catch my fancy. The Aussie tells me he’s proud of Bod, who’s reached his long-sought-after goal of 300 pounds on the bench and will be celebrating by inviting fourteen eggs for breakfast. I immediately reply that I, Linda, will now have to talk it over with my lover, that sluggish Icelander can handle only 210 pounds. There won’t be much sleep in Melbourne over the coming nights.

Out in the darkness the planet spins towards the sun, tossing in space like an old man in bed, with all its African trees and Icelandic mountains, midges in Lofoten, towers in Toronto, and the swarming throngs of Bombay and Delhi. Oh, I wouldn’t mind being God. An old lady and God at the same time. Who both seduces and torments men. And controls the lives of all the Jóns of this world. Nothing is impossible to the one who is willing to die, as that ancient Icelandic saying goes. And I therefore send a late-night e-mail to my sons:

The end is drawing closer now. There is clearly no life after death, so it’s probably a good idea to grab the opportunity while I still have blood trickling through my fingers. You will hopefully live on for some time, but I’m on my way to the oven. I’m told it’ll be a thousand degrees, which makes it easier for me to send you warm thoughts. Once upon a time you were my life, but now I’ve nothing left except this very life, nothing but the pretentious old beating of my heart and a few stale thoughts that swirl at the bottom of my brain like dregs around a plughole. I can’t say that I’ve missed you, because no one misses those one has betrayed, and there’s no point in crying over spilled milk. You are still, however, my sons, try as you may to fight that fact. And that is and will undoubtedly be your everlasting handicap. I am as I am, and no one can flee his genes. The kitten takes after the cat, as they say.

Farewell, my sons.

I bid you a tearless farewell. And leave you nothing, apart from a white chamber pot and a pretty good swivelling chair. You’ve already gobbled up my life’s savings and shitted them, if I’ve understood correctly. I’ve no intention of pestering you after my death, although I’d have every reason to do so. I take my leave from this life utterly consumed and exhausted and don’t expect to feel any longing to return as a ghost. Be happy, my dear kings, far and near. May the Almighty Farmer on the Farm Above bless you and all your children.

Wishing you a good night.

— Your Mum.

A quarter of an hour later an answer arrives from Norway. They get up early over there on the West Coast. My Ólafur is brief and to the point: ‘Hi, Mum. Didn’t you get the Christmas card from us last year? Regards – ÓHJ.’

‘No. That’s one of the luxuries of living in a garage; you can do away with all that paper mail. Was it anything special?’

He doesn’t answer.