Smoke of silence
published: 2009-06-19The continuous smell of smoke. The rattling sound of dice. I lean over our balcony to verify: indeed, she is back. That skinny, short-haired, fourty-something woman has returned. And so has their life they had together for a short while. The chain-smoking, their playing backgammon or scrabble, and therefore not having to say a word to eachother. That same brand of rosé in a cooler on the table. I had never seen him outside. Only when she had entered his life. She puts cushions on the chairs. They eat her home-made cooking at a laid table. The silence between them would make it seem as if they have been together for over ten years. But she entered the scene only very recently. Then suddenly disappeared. After which the rowdy nights returned. Doors slamming at 3 am, people staying over. Young professionals, it seems. But with the strangest of working hours, probably made possible by coke. Every once in a while there is an incident. The police drop by late at night. There’s a lot of fighting out on the streets, between the blue-eyed bachelor and his guests.
“They won’t let me into my home,” he screams.
I once apologized for the fact that our son wasn’t sleeping well. If we put our son back to bed, he’d scream. Intensely. Loudly. And insistently. Our son also tends to stomp around in the morning and drop things on our wooden floor. The bachelor pretended to have no idea what I was talking about and quickly retreated into his home, which I have never seen from the inside.
He once mentioned he imports frozen meals from South Africa for old-aged homes. But now she’s back. And so has the smoking truce of silence.