excerpts 37. Hari is a virgin Finally, trolleybus 88 came and I no longer bothered to make the phone call; I hopped then on a tram and about half past ten I was at Hari's. No X drawn in pencil on the door now: instead, big deal, a cool plate reading HERE LIVES HARI; man, how flushed I was! Ten... nain... eit... sevan... six... faiv... fo'... sri... tu... uan... and ting-a-ling! ...Hmm, what was the woman doing, brother? I reckoned she could be in the bathroom or in the kitchen and I waited a little... but nothing... deep silence, so, again: Ting-a-ling! I got it: she made believe not to hear anything so that I didn't think she was dying to see me. So, again, ting-a-ling, TING-A-LING! ...At long last, thanks God, I heard a shuffle of Chip & Dale slippers. That meant she was in her room, which was why it had taken her so long to answer the door. "Come on, woman, why are you dragging your feet like that?" I swear, as if she was coming from Egypt, and when she got to the door she started to fumble, like her hands could not find the lock. ...Good, I got it: now she looked through the peephole... who else could it have been at this hour? "OK, there you are." I cleared my voice, slicked my hair, checked my tie-knot, and pulled a pathetic smile like Alberto Sordi's, and when she opened: "What are you doing, woman, why you keep me..." Jesus, this broad was sleeping, man! Really, she smiled and eyed me in a haze and... hmm, she was quite scantily dressed, only this cheesecloth nightie....Now she yawned, and stretched like a cat and... geez wheez! What was she doing? Wasn't she ashamed? She wore that type of smart panties inscribed in French for each day of the week so that you don't forget to change the outfit, and when she stretched I read Vendredi. "I..." Nothing – plop – she deposited a rapid kiss on my neck and then she ran back to her room, holding her nightie in one hand so that I couldn't see… "What's the time? I'll sleep five more minutes, OK? I was at a party last night, at Paul's. Make yourself some coffee if you want, and make some for me, too!" BANGWHANG! Which Paul, man? Oh, right, I got it. I had said something about a party over the phone and when I failed to call her, then – revenge, sweet revenge – she must have gone to a dummy in the neighborhood. And yesterday she didn't tell me that on purpose, so that now I'd run to her place like mad, and she'd dazzle me with the news, and I'd grow green with jealousy and ask for explanations. Only that I was not that kind of a twit… because after all, why shouldn't she go. Had I ever said she wasn't to go wherever she pleased unless she asked for my permission? O.K. then, I decamped to the kitchen and set to making coffee, strong, so that she could come to her senses. Well... something was not right though. So she yawned, stretched, and stuff but her eyes were not swollen, she did not have dark rings, or messy hair. And broads don't jump to kiss you right when you wake them up. Because any human being after sleeping has a certain smell, personal and unmistakable, and she didn't. Moreover, if I was not mistaken, she smelled of toothpaste. Not too much, that's why she barely touched me with her lips so that I didn't feel, but still it oozed out of her jaws and... oh, I got you! If she had been at a party her knickers should have said "Jeudi", that had been the day before, not "Vendredi", right? Or, because she could have come home after midnight and then, if she was not groggy she would not have gone, plop, to bed. She must have taken a shower and changed. But, still, toothpaste aroma doesn't linger until morning and... "Let's see whether the girl is really sleeping." The coffee was ready and I could take it to her bed, so she'd find no reason to yell at me for barging in on her. After all, she had told me to make coffee, and then she had left the door ajar; so I wasn't barging. I would gently put the coffee under her nose, to tickle her senses; I'd look if she was sleeping and if she were, I would withdraw nice and easy to the dining room. I had a hunch though that she wasn't sleeping. He tiptoes, his heart fluttering, he stops a little a struggle taking place in his heart, then he sets out with such and such steps, the corridor is dark, there is the bathroom, on the other side her mother's room; don't know what, barbed wire, trenches, stories, door wide open, blue penumbra... No, no penumbra, sun like in broad daylight! "I say, woman, you want me to think that you forgot to pull your blinds and you slept like this, the sun getting in your eyes all morning, and not waking you up?" He-he-he, she makes believe to be sleeping, face to the wall so that I can't see her, an arm over the sheet... "hmm, what a fleece on her forearms in this crude light, well, she's a brunette and this is not it, the thing that matters is an entirely different one." What truly matters now, when he stops on the threshold and looks at her, is the fact that she is breathing… kind of weird? She feigns it, by golly, because her breathing is something different, too deep and too regular. Perhaps SHE imagines that is how a girl would breathe in her sleep but she is dumb for HE cannot be fooled so easy. Not that he has seen zillions of broads sleeping in his lifetime – where could he? – anyway, he knows what ARTIFICIAL BREATHING looks like... For the rest, everything seemed all right, all those fluffy toys and that shit on the bed stand, stock-still in that strange atmosphere, and Otto the teddy bear, too; so, plucking up his courage, our young man entered the room where – surprise! – he saw a blue gown, her favorite color, on the back of the chair near the bed. Good, someone would exclaim in amazement, sucker, so what, this was not a reason for... oh yes, man, it was, because the robe was close at hand and one didn't go out like that when one was really asleep, and one didn't make believe to be stretching in the door until HE saw Vendredi branded with fire letters. Unless, mmm, one was sly, one knew the ropes and wanted to turn my head as usual. "Come what may!" our young man said to himself, and advancing carefully to the edge of the bed, he gently placed her cup on the wardrobe, keeping his in the other hand. It was a quarter to something, but at such moments even Time seemed no longer to breathe, not just HER, who must have forgotten she had to breathe. "You're sleeping, eh?" he said to himself looking for something to sit on. Unfortunately, there was no such place as on the only chair in the room was occupied by the blue robe dumped on top of a heap of other things so that our hero could not help but sit on the bed. "Come on, you'll pass out!" HE begged, a strange something flickering in his eyes. Then it so happened that SHE began to breathe noisily as if dreaming of little lambs jumping over a brook, like in a comic strip; yet a careful observer would have realized that, in fact, the darned girl was striving not to laugh. "You're playing me, right? Well, let's see if you go on sleeping when I do this!" HE said to himself but did nothing, just locked his eyes like two daggers on her nape, bathed by the morning sun, on which there grew a down like, how to put it, iron filings, because he knew very well from his intensive reading that if you stared long enough at someone who pretended to be sleeping, sooner or later that someone would surely give himself out. Aha! The breathing slowed down a bit. SHE moaned after which she barely managed to go on pretending, a strip of her nightie quivering on her shoulder. Deep down, he waged another battle and eventually he slid next to her, lying on top of the sheet though, at a certain distance, naturally, since it was but Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday – the fifth day since our young people were together. ...Well, this time the artificial breathing stopped for good and finally she interjected: "What are you doing in my bed?" The stress fell on "my", just like that, meaning it was her little crib, the place where nobody could do anything uninvited. "I thought you were sleeping and after I brought your coffee I got tired, too. I'll sleep just a little, five minute, may I?" "OK, but you sleep, right?" She said that and put her arm under the blanket, covering herself to the neck. HE slept but then he felt that, how do you call it mister, the heat of a young body, her girlish body, so that in the end he could no longer resist the temptation, and he applied a wee-wee kiss on the vertebrae on her nape, whatever their name. "GO TO SLEEP!""I'll sleep, alright, but I'll come closer to... Hmm... can I smell you?"Silence. No answer. Because that was the technique. If you asked permission nicely she couldn't just say "no". In fact, she could but she didn't, and even... aha! A shoulder came out like an isle to which our young man hurried... OUCH! Naturally, she pretended to withdraw it suddenly, but she kicked me with her ass, by mistake hitting right on... our young man who'd got this… and stuff, because youth demanded its rights. Yes, all right. She pulled herself to the wall and covered herself up, like a mummy. Oh, no, look, she turned to face him. "Morning," I said, "your coffee's getting cold... hm, you brushed your teeth in your sleep?" "I brushed my teeth when I returned from Paul's, smart ass! Don't you brush your teeth when you go to bed?" Yes, I do, but the aroma doesn't keep until morning and why do you go on pronouncing this Pahoul name? Think I'll inquire who he is? Well, I won't because I know too well. Pahoul is an older boy from you choir, necessarily dark-haired and green-eyed, because I, too, have green eyes but I'm not swarthy; yet, he doesn't have curly hair like mine, so that, in conclusion, given this superb arm again resting over the sheet, right under my nose, it will be stamped with several small kisses... "BE NICE!" "Oh, right, tell me about Pahoul! A young man in your choir?" "No, sir, he's a neighbor. We've known each other for ages! Why are you interested? You jealous?" Naturally, that was it, I had to be jealous otherwise the thing'd be tedious! All right then. She stretched a little, lips pursed, eyes closed, kiss-kiss, a peck for the green-eyed monster to succumb! "TELL ME, MISTER, YOU'RE JEALOUS OR NOT, DARN IT!" Sure, now she made it seem funny, but how could our royal selves answer this apparently innocent question? If we responded in the affirmative we'd make a fool of ourselves; if we replied in the negative, it'd mean we are conceited and we didn't care, and if we said "it depends" we then risked to have Pahoul's entire life spilled before us: how he had loved her from swaddling days, and how she too cared for him but he was not the man of her dreams so that, in the end, she told him 'Pahoul, let's stay just friends!" etc., etc. "Why should I be? Can't I trust you?" He said that and wondered what had got into him to contribute such pat phrases from the Love Novel series. "You're evil!" I beg your pardon?! Look at her, mister, she shoved her hand in my hair and pulled me to her violently and now, mmm, we are kissing. How the deuce, she isn't mad because I didn't call her the day before? ...Yes, in conclusion we kissed. Only that – surprise! – a perfidious hand slid under the sheet to rest at first on her waist, as if to keep the balance. Right, accelerated breathing but the kissing went on and the hand, bless it, slid downwards to the border of the nightie. Let me play with this nice lace! But soon the hand got bored, it trespassed the border and got to... wow ! The loin of Dacia and Rome. And from there, seeing that Hari had no idea to protest, it started to climb, slush-slush, burning everything on its way... ouch! "Excuse me, an accident! I apologize!" Vainly. A nail of mine got caught in the elastic of her panties and everything was ruined! Hari jumped up, shoved a hand in my chest and started to look daggers at me. Mistake, huh? What mistake? She knew only too well this type of mistake. That's how we, men, are! Oh, well then, let's look at each other until the end of time, and see who can take it more. Goodness, I wasn't thinking of any action! On my honor, because I hadn't a condom with me – the day before I had thrown the damned things out of the window with those miserable seeds, and this morning the pack continued to lie there, in the grass, at the door and if I had taken it The Spy would have seen me; moreover I thought Hari was mad at me. How the hell could I have known she didn't care and that I would find her in bed? "Speaking of trust!" She said this considering me with disgust; only that, because of her brisk movement, the sheet went up and as she lay on one side, a hand on my chest, her nightie remained just a memory. "I do speak, why not! Don't you trust me?" …She did, she forgave me because she took a long and melancholy glance at me, and even caressed my face a little and… "I'd like to, believe me! I'd like to but I just can't. You know why?" "No…" Although I had a vague idea. Because she was a virgin, that was why, which meant that what I wanted was not possible. I'd destroy Mimi for lying… after all, I had guessed that much but the smart ass had insisted… "Because I don't even trust myself…" WHOOPLA! Oh, Hari, Hari! Why didn't you say so from the first, babe, we just lost time fooling around with jealousy and stuff! Really, if now and then she'd said to me a thing like that I'd no longer care about anything… after that she could have… wait a minute! That meant she was not a virgin? "What a skinny devil you are!" Yes, man, she was right, the devil in the nude! I wondered how many square yards of skin could be taken from me to make a sort of nice rug for the fireplace? …But she, too, had skin… on her neck, shoulders, on her… wow, God! A good thing I had told Bodi's father about the party, about Saturday… Geez! What did this broad do, where did she go?! She jumped from the bed and went to the window and… ouch! Careful, she pulled the blinds and… ZBANG! Jesus, she was demented: she took off her nightie, and remained standing in the middle of the room! She returned after a while, sat on the edge of the bed and began to entwine her fingers with mine, yeah, I swear. I would have liked to talk a little more, so… "…All right, let's entwine 'em but now I'll pull you to me because I long for you." "You don't want to? Well, then you say what we do, I'll do what you want, see!"BING-BANG!And she began to unbutton my skirt, man! I mean I understood she was naked, while I had everything on me like a hillbilly, but still, how about the trust, the fact I didn't have a condom and… "OK, I'll help you, it's faster. Look here! Hmpff! Like my muscles?" "Why you're laughing, man, you mean I don't have…" "Oh, I see, so that you caress me like this with the tips of your fingers, and my shoulders, chest, my wonderful skin, I'm kind of ticklish… wow, ouch, wow!" Then we kissed, we kissed like crazy. I say what could be the world kissing record? At this rate, I thought, less than an hour because my mouth already felt like rubber… she had started to bite and… Ouch! NO! I mean yes, sure, right, please, not with those tits that… AAAA! Why do they have such tits, mister? To lay your face against them, to shove your face, your nose between, to... but what the hell, do I imagine or the right is bigger than the left? …OH! So you like it! Thrills, right? He-he-he, that's me, girl, what can I do, you're now in my hands, so let's see, you know this? And this, with the back of the hand, a little more with the tips of the fingers… "It hurts, eh? You hurt, it's your turn, because…wow, why do you push, man?" What was she doing, man, wasn't she right in her head? Jesus, she passed her palms over my tits! "You feel anything?" "Sure. You tickle me." "That's all?" Hmmm, still they were getting hard… I say, I could never understand why men have tits too, small ones, as long as they are no good. And now, there she was. I close my eyes and if I come to think of it I actually like it. I tilt my head back, deliriously and… "My, that's terrific! Wow, take me, I'm yours!" Zbang! She dug her fingers into my hair and jumped on me, Greco-Roman wrestling! Well, then let's see you now, only that… OOOO! I no longer said anything because that darned youth was asking its dues. It stamped its fist on the table saying: "I don't care, I just want my right!" …Hmmm, not much, not much at all. I got you! I got you, man, read my lips! No, please, no, please! Beg your pardon?! I had just pushed my knee and… oh, GOD, I can't take it any more! Well, then here you are, I'm dead! Better like this? I turned on my back next to her and started looking at the ceiling because I had not even taken off my pants… who had started it, who had humped me? Guess she had an obsession, man, she did not think of anything else; even at school I had heard her once, I don't know about whom she was talking but she said "He likes to hump". Listen to that, man, as if them broads are like a honeycomb and us men buzz around them like flies! "What are you thinking?" "Nothing. I just have to go to the bathroom..." I was thinking of Captain John's Arrow, if you see what I mean …because Tuesday on the couch had been peanuts; now it was bad-bad. My head whizzed like hell, like an airplane. And a huge ball kept banging, demolition-like, on my head, dong-dong! "What, are you mad?" "No, man, I'm not! No sweat!" "Then what are you thinking?" "Nothing, Hari, I just want to go to the bathroom." Right, she looked at me offended and… ouch! I wanted to rise and when about to prop myself against the bed stand, I felt something bite on my finger and… IT WAS HER KNICKKNACKS AND TOYS! "HOW THE HELL CAN YOU SLEEP WITH ALL THIS SHIT AT YOUR HEAD?" Oh, Jesus, I swept them aside with a hand and they flew all over. Except for Otto, which, being heavier, dropped on the bed between us. Hari took it in her arms motherly, looked at me terrified and intoned: "They're not ssshitty, they're sssweet, and you're mmmeanie!" "OK. Whatever, but don't jolt me like that, please or I'll pass out!" "Meanie, meanie, meanie!" "Sure. Why don't you sew back its eye? Why did you pull it out?" "I didn't, smartie! The teddy fell from a tree with empty fists…" It did what, man? Oh, I see, she must have read that in a fairy tale book when she was little. It's possible, because if you fall from a few meters on your butt, and don't have something to clench in your fists, your eyes'd pop out because of the pain. Perhaps that&r
