Life Like Other People's

Elena was drifting away from him. It all started with minor things. It seemed there was less love in her look, and less joy in her voice. Or could it be just his imagination? Could it be that everything was as it had been, and it was he who was to blame for always expecting a feast which not even the most loving woman could create every day?

Then it was no longer about minor things. Elena hardly spoke with him – spent her whole days tidying their small house, re-doing everything again and again. She would not allow him near her. “Stop hovering, will you? I’m doing the carpet.” “I’m cleaning the windows, don’t you see?”

Then it was worse. She stopped sleeping with him. “Sorry, I’m tired.” “I have a headache.” The common excuses used by all the wives in the world who will not sleep with their husbands.

But why?! Why did he fail to make her happy? Himself, he loved her as before. No, not as before, but more passionately every day. Even her coldness and aloofness filled him with ever greater passion mixed with anguish at her being unhappy and him being unable to do anything about it.

She no longer shared the bedroom with him. “You snore.” That was a lie, he did not snore. There had been a time when the young Kurt – a big guy weighing over two hundred pounds – snored like a Harley Davidson bike, but he had lost that habit in his tours where snoring in an alien territory could cost a mercenary his life.

Elena slept in another room now, and soon she almost stopped leaving her room, hiding there all day long. Her house chores she had given up.

He was desperately groping for answers. Suddenly he was aware that he hardly knew his wife. He adored her, but did not really know her. What were her favorite dishes, wines? Books, movies? Maybe they used to play some table games in the evenings? He did not remember anything.

He was sure he could not have hurt her in any way. He could not – now. But what about before? Maybe their marriage was overcast by a shadow from something bad in their past life which he had clean forgotten?

Dispirited, he gave up his farm model. All day long, he was sitting in the basement, staring at the brick wall, trying to remember something important.

Some recollections started emerging, though it was a hard process, his whole self resisting it.

It was just some pictures, like a silent movie. Now they were having a row, him shouting something and her shouting back. Now she was smashing crockery, and he was grabbing her rudely, giving her a slap. She would ran away and hid in the bathroom. He would break down the door, burst in and take her by force.

He was appalled. “Bastard, swine! How could I?”

He was different now – an understanding, caring man. The thought of raising his hand against the woman he loved was revolting to him. However, it appeared that no amount of understanding and care could make Elena forget their bad past.

The unfinished farm model was an eyesore to him now. “Dream on, idiot! She doesn’t want to see you, and you expect her to go shovel manure with you.” He grabbed a hammer and smashed to pieces the whole farm: house, barn, shed, and all the rest of it.

To heal a wound, one needed to get to it.

What had they been quarreling about? His memory was dumb, as if wadded with cotton wool.

Yet, there was someone who was certain to know all the reasons and details of their quarrels. Margo, his precious mother-in-law.

“Margo?”

He had been prepared for Margo being displeased to hear him but he had not expected her to go screaming right away.

“You scumbag! Murderer! How dare you call me!”

“Margo, I only meant to ask…”

“Bastard! Do you even understand that the poor girl had her jaw put back together from pieces? Do you know how many sutures they placed on her face?

He wanted to ask something else but halted. What jaw? What sutures?

His mother-in-law went on raging. According to her, he was the worst man on Earth, a fiend from hell.

“I hope you’ll get killed off in that jungle!”

“I’m done with that work, Margo. I meant to ask you about Elena…”

“Don’t you dare! Do you hear me? Don’t you dare hound her. She has found herself a decent man and she’s happy with him. And you live with that doll of yours. Society of people is not for you!”

She hung up.

He kept sitting for a while staring at the phone receiver which was emitting short beeps. Then he got up and circled the living room aimlessly several times.

He went down into the basement which was littered with the debris of his former farm model. He said aloud, “What a mess,” and started cleaning. After half an hour all the rubbish had been collected in bags. He took them out to the dustbins.

He stood by the dustbins for a while, his unseeing eyes fixed on nothing. Then he went out onto a foot path and ran.

He was running, circling the neighborhood again and again.

Then he stopped dead. He remembered everything.

Kurt met Elena in a resort town where he was vacationing after a successful tour. He had more than enough cash and no responsibilities, so he was binging big time.

When he was already getting fed up with booze and whores, he saw her. She was singing on the podium of a cafе chantant. The cafе was an unpretentious affair, and she sang accordingly. She had neither a powerful voice, nor a particular style, but altogether it came out beautiful.

She was beautiful herself, too. No, she was more than just beautiful. The sight of her knocked the wind out of him – something that had happened to him only once, a long time ago, when he, a rooky marine, was punched in the gut by a beast of a sergeant.

He started pursuing her, wooing her. She would laugh at him, call him “gorilla”, but would not drive him away – she must have somehow fancied him.

He was throwing his money about, showering her with gifts.

Then she suddenly agreed to marry him.

“Don’t you think you’ve bought me,” she said.

Things would have been easier if he had bought her. She was indifferent to money but she could not do without company. She needed to be the center of everyone’s attention and be admired.

She was dragging him to some motley parties where he felt an idiot. Then she was hanging out at some parties without him.

They did not have children – she did not want any.

He suspected her of cheating on him, though he knew for a fact that he satisfied her in bed.

They quarreled – about anything and about nothing. She was mocking him and provoking him, and seemed even to derive pleasure from his slapping her when she went too far.

One day, as he arrived home from a tour, he caught her with a lover – right in their conjugal bed. Not in the least embarrassed, Elena shouted, her naked breasts shining at him:

“Happy now, gorilla? You’ve got what you asked for!

Her lover was some youngster, like a pizza delivery boy. Kurt broke his neck in a single sweep of his iron arm.

Elena – his beautiful, naked Elena – shouted furiously:

“Come on, kill me, too! That’s all you’re capable of!”