Two more days passed and Barbara got a message saying that in light of the pandemic and expected decrease in sales of newspapers in paper form, the publishing office considered consolidating its operations by axing less profitable titles and laying off part of the workforce. Barbara was thinking about similar messages in the past and how many times she didn’t make the cut, but there was no point to despair. Maybe she would keep her job after all, given her competence. The journalists were also asked to come up with stories relevant to the pandemic which could be covered at length. Barbara wrote an e-mail that coffins could be such a topic, given that Italy and Spain were running out of coffins and Poland might be next. She said that together with Anita she could write about their histories and Polish traditions of coffin-making. They could interview by phone the most respected coffin producers and undertakers in the country and add humour to it, to make it entertaining.
Before she went to bed, she texted Adam, asking him to fix a date for her birthday celebration in his summer house on the allotment. The next morning Adam phoned, telling her that things were not so easy, as his daughter wanted to move to the house during the lockdown, to provide more space for her family.
‘This is not what we agreed. You always said this house is for us to use and Elżbieta accepted it.’
‘She did, but I cannot tell my daughter to stay locked in her apartment because I use the house for meetings with my mistress.’
‘Yes, you can say it.’
There was a silence, during which Barbara was thinking how hard it must be for him being torn between different loyalties and that she promised herself many times not worsen this difficult situation.
Eventually he broke the silence and said: ‘I will figure something out. I will let you know in the next couple of days. Take care, don’t be depressed.’
‘I won’t. You know me.’
Barbara wasn’t depressed, but she was anxious. Yet, she couldn’t take a break as there was more to do at work. She got a spreadsheet to fill, listing all her jobs in the last year as preparation to be assessed for possible redundancy. She had been working as a journalist for over twenty years now, but she still needed to prove her usefulness and competence. She also got messages from two other magazines, for which she worked as a freelancer, informing her that they were suspending their operations for three months and would pay her only half of what they owed her. She sighed and said ‘fuck’ quietly in the direction of her two cats. One of them, Minna, looked at her with sad eyes, making Barbara smile. It occurred to her that she needed to stockpile food for her cats, because even in the deepest crisis she couldn’t deprive her four-legged friends of their favourite food.
The next day in the morning she went to the shop where she always bought pet food. She had to queue, but got what she wanted. When driving back home, she was listening to the radio news. The presenter listed more restrictions and how they would be enforced. It sounded like the announcement of martial law in communist Poland in 1981, except then everybody was against the government, while on this occasion 90% were in favour of lockdown and of those half thought that the government didn’t go far enough. It was depressing how Poland had changed since her youth. Back then people were so rebellious and courageous; nobody was afraid to speak their mind and die.
The next day Adam phoned to say that they could spend the weekend at the allotment house, as his daughter would move in only the following Monday. The weather was meant to be gorgeous. It would be best to go there by bike, taking a longer route, as it was likely that the police would check only cars driving on the main road. Barbara’s cats would have to stay in the flat, unfortunately, but one night wasn’t a problem for them. Barbara agreed and her mood immediately improved. She started to plan what to take with her, so that they had everything they needed, but making sure her bag wasn’t so heavy so as to overburden her bike.
When she arrived, Adam was already there, putting logs into an open fire. He took her into his arms and kissed her. She stayed like that, as she needed his help to recover from the stresses of the last week: the worry that she might lose her job and not being able to go abroad the whole year. Adam understood this without her saying anything and he didn’t say anything either, just kept his arms around her.
It was almost thirty years since she’d come to the summer house for the first time. She had been a student of Polish literature with a work placement in the ministry of culture, where Adam was the head of the department. He was then the youngest man in such a position. She remembered how charmed she was by him, although he wasn’t particularly handsome and already showed a tendency for putting on weight. But she didn’t mind. Some people called Adam lazy, as he was never into sports, but for her this was a sign of his indifference to his own life, some kind of fatalism which she found romantic.
She remembered how interestingly he talked about Cortazar and Marquez, in contrast to the boring professors who churned the same platitudes about Polish Romantic poets. Soon after he lent her his books and invited her to the cinema, where he put his hand on her hand and kissed her. Finally, he invited her to this house and that was it – she never escaped his spell. Her love for Adam never faltered her whole life. For her, this was the main reason to live, to carry on, apart from preserving life itself.
Eventually Barbara disentangled herself from his embrace and said: ‘We should go for a walk, while there is still sun, as it’s meant to be cloudy later in the afternoon.’
‘Sure,’ said Adam.
They went straight into the wood which smelled of rotten moss, perspiring trees, and blooming flowers. One of her favourite things about this house was the smells; each season of the year and time of day had its specific aroma and it was different from any other wood that Barbara visited in her life. Of those she liked most the smell of Spring and Autumn, as then the wood was working hard to give birth to something. In Spring these were leaves and flowers, typically small and discoloured, yet crying with their scent to notice them; in Autumn it was the smell of rotting moss and wild mushrooms, again inviting to find them and take them home.
The sun was shining, but when they turned onto their favourite narrow path, along which they found probably thousands of boleti during their visit, Barbara started to shiver. Adam noticed it and said: ‘Spring is the time of year when it is summer in the sun and winter in the shade.’
These words were very appropriate to Barbara’s current state, including her mental condition, but she knew that they weren’t Adam’s, but Dickens’, as he uttered them several times during their life together. Adam had always charmed her with his erudition, but also made her aware that there was a limit to it. He was good at finding an appropriate quote for an occasion, but less good with creating something of his own. At work he was good at the parties, creating a pleasant atmosphere, but struggled in creating a convincing strategy for his department or finding the right collaborators. He was also unable to fire people, as he had too much sympathy for them, even if they were hopeless. These shortcomings were noted both by his superiors and his subordinates. A couple of times he was overlooked during promotion and, finally, sacked from the ministry. Adam always blamed political changes for his demise, but Barbara knew that it was only part of the story. But she stood by him during the difficult periods and accepted that his misfortune made it difficult for him to leave his wife. This was even more the case when both Barbara and the wife got pregnant at the same time, and Barbara miscarried while Elżbieta gave birth to a healthy girl. Barbara’s friends saw it as a bad omen and a sign that she needed to give up on Adam, but Barbara didn’t believe in that.
Barbara was so immersed in her thoughts that she didn’t notice when they found themselves again in front of the house.
‘I forgot to bring you a birthday present,’ Adam said as they went inside. ‘This corona business distracted me. I will bring it next time we meet. In your place, most likely.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Barbara. ‘I will wait. Next week will also be our anniversary: thirtieth. Do you remember?’
‘Of course I do,’ said Adam. ‘My god, how old we are now.’
Barbara smiled, thinking how things had changed. For many years he used to say to her: ‘You are so young,’ because he was nine years older than her and his wife was three years older than Adam, adding to Barbara’s youth. Now these differences were obliterated, in part because Elżbieta aged very well; she looked better in her fifties and sixties than thirties. By contrast, Barbara’s face was covered with wrinkles; a guide to her problems and defeats. Luckily, her body was still firm, even athletic, younger than her real age.
In the evening they watched a film by Woody Allen, Irrational Man, drinking wine and eating remnants of Barbara’s birthday cake. The film was meant to cheer them up, but the story of a philosophy professor, who almost kills her young student lover when she discovers that he is a murderer, made Barbara uneasy. There was a cynicism in this film that hurt her. When she shared with Adam the pain of seeing how easily the protagonist jettisoned love for self-preservation, he replied: ‘Charles Bukowski said that the difference between life and art is that art is more bearable. But for you life is more bearable than art.’
This was true. She could take a lot, because there was no good alternative to not taking it. The bad alternative was a mental breakdown, solitude, poverty.
‘What about you?’, asked Barbara with a trace of resentment.
‘I agree with Bukowski. I can survive any art. Its life which is destroying me. But maybe not for too long. Apparently this virus targets people like me: older overweight men with underlying health problems.’
Barbara felt a bit angry, thinking that whatever the situation, Adam was always able to present himself as its victim. But she didn’t say anything, as she didn’t want to spoil their time together.
Finally, they had sex, which was slow and tiring. Adam’s physical effort to succeed was diminishing the romanticism of the act. For some time Barbara was thinking that she would be fine with them meeting just for the pleasure of talking, touching and hugging. Yet, she was afraid that she would offend Adam by suggesting this to him, as it would mean that she treated him like an old man. Barbara knew that he stopped having sex with his wife some years ago and Elżbieta was fine about it.
Straight after sex Adam fell asleep, while Barbara couldn’t sleep, either due to alcohol or the film. She got up, put the kettle on and with a cup of tea went outside. It was quite cold, but it was pleasant to sit on the bench in front of the house. She was thinking that the most important things of her life, good and bad, happened in this house. Here Adam told her that he loved her and her child was conceived. Here she also broke her leg, caught Lyme disease and her cat Tusia was killed by the neighbour’s dog.
The house remained the same, yet subjectively it changed. When she came here for the first time, it felt modern and tasteful, with its walls covered with wood and posters from exhibitions of Pollock and Rothko. Now, however, it came across as old-fashioned and neglected. The wood which was light-coloured and fresh thirty years previously, was now dirty and dark and Rothko’s posters looked like the decoration in an English toilet, as one guest remarked. The neighbours, who were young, self-confident and keen to socialise, now were old and defeated, like the communist system which they once represented. Yet, for Barbara, this summer house was still her home, the only home she ever had.
The next day they spent the morning walking in the wood and Adam collected for her a bunch of primroses and violets. First she thought about taking the flowers back to Warsaw, but in the end decided to leave them on Tusia’s grave.
