Swimming in the Dark - Tomasz Jedrowski Page 0,22

to your hair, that it was the only right thing to do, that now wasn’t then, when you whispered, ‘Goodnight, Ludzio’, and shifted away from me. It was the first time you had called me that, you’d changed my name affectionately. It made the void on my shoulder even more unbearable.

‘Goodnight,’ I replied weakly, turning around, regret washing over me. Your breathing became calm and steady. My mind raced like a crazed horse. The rain carried on through the night.

When I woke in the morning, I saw your body rising and falling peacefully with your breath. Through the cracks between the wooden boards, strips of light entered the barn, illuminating you. Your shoulder was covered in little freckles I had never noticed, random and beautiful like a constellation of stars.

I climbed out of the sleeping bag as quietly as I could, pulled on my T-shirt and shorts, slipped on my sandals and went out into the morning. It was a clear day and the sun was already up, soft and new like a freshly peeled egg. The air smelled green and yellow and deep, fertile brown. In the daylight the farmhouse was smaller than I remembered, only one storey high, made from dark wood with a steep roof of old brown tiles. It looked both ancient and fragile, as if it had stood in this place for ever but might easily be crushed. Just outside it, the farmer’s daughter was feeding a group of chickens. She was about fifteen, with a bright heart-shaped face and a timid childlike smile, and she was wearing a headscarf. She greeted me and invited us to breakfast.

‘We’re in the kitchen,’ she said. ‘Come and bring your friend.’

I went back to the barn and found you up, pulling your trousers over your tight, white briefs.

‘Hey,’ I said, aware of my forced voice.

You zipped up and turned around. ‘Hey.’ You looked almost shy, ran a hand through your hair.

‘Hungry?’ I asked.

‘Starving.’

We walked out of the barn and into the house. There was a dark corridor that smelled of must and soot and earth. Nothing seemed to be moving. A few beams of light revealed a world of dust specks floating in the air, and on the wall Jesus hung on a cross, muscles and ribs defined, naked but for his loincloth. We looked at each other for a moment, quizzically, suddenly close again in the dark. Down the creaking corridor we found the kitchen on the right, where the young girl stood by the stove over a pot of steaming milk. She’d taken off her headscarf and her long dark-blonde hair fell all the way down her back.

‘Come and have a seat,’ said an old woman by the table in the corner. ‘You must be hungry.’

We sat on wooden chairs that creaked under our weight. Everything felt as if it had been covered in dust, worn out by generations of use. The plates were chipped and glued back together, the motifs on the cups faded. Faint, pearly light came from a small window.

The old woman looked us over shrewdly, curiously. ‘My husband is out,’ she said. ‘Help yourself.’ It dawned on me that she wasn’t so old after all and that she wasn’t the girl’s grandmother, but her mother.

We started to eat. There were cucumbers and radishes, a pot of honey and a hunk of bread. The daughter came over from the stove and poured the hot milk into our cups.

‘So you’re students,’ the mother said.

‘Yes, ma’am,’ you said through a bite of radish, looking more at ease than I felt. ‘Just finished our studies.’

She nodded, as if she was agreeing to something uncertain. ‘Married?’ she asked, looking at you.

‘No, ma’am,’ you said, shaking your head, smiling at her. ‘Not yet. Am still young.’

She laughed in her hoarse voice, revealing a set of missing front teeth. ‘And you?’ she said, turning to me.

I could feel myself blush. ‘No, ma’am.’ I took a sip of milk to hide my discomfort. My lips brushed against the floppy skin that had formed on top, sending a wave of nausea through my belly, and the liquid scalded the inside of my mouth. I tried to keep a straight face and reached for the bread.

She watched us eat with apparent satisfaction. ‘So you’re travelling. Know where you’re going?’

‘Just looking for a quiet spot,’ you said. ‘Can you recommend anywhere, ma’am?’

She looked out of the window, where nothing much of the outside could be seen, only a hazy green from the trees