why were people not entirely surprised at her inexplicable attitude towards them? Ah, one could expect everything from her, the viper, even what appeared strange, the viper, ah the pain, the happiness that was paining her.
The couple stood out from the shadows, motionless before her and only in the teacher's expression was there any hint of surprise.
— I felt dizzy, she told them in a hushed voice and the display-cabinet continued to shine like an enshrined saint.
She had barely spoken, her vision still clouded, when Joana sensed an almost imperceptible movement coming from the teacher's wife. They looked at each other and something mean, avid, and humiliated in the wife made the stupefied Joana begin to understand... It was her second attack of vertigo that day! Yes, it was her second attack of vertigo that day! Like the sounding of trumpets... She stared at them intently. I must get out of this house, she called out in her excitement. The room grew increasingly darker, and any moment now, she would arouse fury in this man and woman! Like an outburst of rain, like an outburst of rain...
Her feet sank into the sand and when they emerged once more, they were leaden. It was already night, the sea tossed, dark and restless, its waves lashed against the shore. The wind had nestled in her hair and blew her short fringe in all directions. Joana no longer felt giddy, a rough arm now weighed on her bosom, a consoling weight. Something will come soon, she thought in haste. This was the second attack of vertigo on the same day! In the morning, when she jumped out of bed, and now... There is more and more life in me, she vaguely realized. She started to run. Suddenly she was freer, more enraged at everything, she felt triumphant. But it wasn't rage, it was love. A love so strong that it could only release its passion in a violent outburst of wrath. Now I am a viper all on my own. She remembered that she had left the teacher for good and that after their conversation she would never be able to return... She felt that he was far away, in that setting which she now remembered with horror and estrangement. All on her own...
Her uncle and aunt were already sitting at the table. In which of them should she confide: I'm getting stronger every day, I'm growing up, am I about to become a young woman? She would confide neither in them nor anyone else. For she could not bring herself to ask of anyone: Tell me about things? Only to be told: I don't know either, just as the teacher had replied. She could see the teacher reappear before her as in those final moments, leaning towards her, terrified or ferocious, she couldn't say, but backing away, that's it, backing away. The reply, she felt, was not so important. What really mattered was that her question had been accepted, that it could exist. Her aunt would retort with surprise: what things? And should she begin to understand, she would almost certainly say: like this, and this, and this. With whom would Joana now speak of the things that exist as naturally as one speaks of those other things that simply are?
Things that exist, others that simply are... She was surprised at this new and unexpected thought which would live from now onwards like flowers on a grave. That would live, that would live, other thoughts would be born and would live, and she herself was more alive. Wild happiness cut into her heart, lit up her body. She pressed the glass between her fingers, drank water with her eyes closed as if she were sipping wine, bloody and glorious wine, the blood of God. No, she would not tell anyone that everything was slowly changing... That she had put away her smile like someone who finally switches off the light and settles down to sleep. No human beings could now be permitted to enter her inner world and merge therein. Her relations with other people became increasingly different from the relations she maintained with herself. The sweetness of childhood disappeared without trace, no more
The couple stood out from the shadows, motionless before her and only in the teacher's expression was there any hint of surprise.
— I felt dizzy, she told them in a hushed voice and the display-cabinet continued to shine like an enshrined saint.
She had barely spoken, her vision still clouded, when Joana sensed an almost imperceptible movement coming from the teacher's wife. They looked at each other and something mean, avid, and humiliated in the wife made the stupefied Joana begin to understand... It was her second attack of vertigo that day! Yes, it was her second attack of vertigo that day! Like the sounding of trumpets... She stared at them intently. I must get out of this house, she called out in her excitement. The room grew increasingly darker, and any moment now, she would arouse fury in this man and woman! Like an outburst of rain, like an outburst of rain...
Her feet sank into the sand and when they emerged once more, they were leaden. It was already night, the sea tossed, dark and restless, its waves lashed against the shore. The wind had nestled in her hair and blew her short fringe in all directions. Joana no longer felt giddy, a rough arm now weighed on her bosom, a consoling weight. Something will come soon, she thought in haste. This was the second attack of vertigo on the same day! In the morning, when she jumped out of bed, and now... There is more and more life in me, she vaguely realized. She started to run. Suddenly she was freer, more enraged at everything, she felt triumphant. But it wasn't rage, it was love. A love so strong that it could only release its passion in a violent outburst of wrath. Now I am a viper all on my own. She remembered that she had left the teacher for good and that after their conversation she would never be able to return... She felt that he was far away, in that setting which she now remembered with horror and estrangement. All on her own...
Her uncle and aunt were already sitting at the table. In which of them should she confide: I'm getting stronger every day, I'm growing up, am I about to become a young woman? She would confide neither in them nor anyone else. For she could not bring herself to ask of anyone: Tell me about things? Only to be told: I don't know either, just as the teacher had replied. She could see the teacher reappear before her as in those final moments, leaning towards her, terrified or ferocious, she couldn't say, but backing away, that's it, backing away. The reply, she felt, was not so important. What really mattered was that her question had been accepted, that it could exist. Her aunt would retort with surprise: what things? And should she begin to understand, she would almost certainly say: like this, and this, and this. With whom would Joana now speak of the things that exist as naturally as one speaks of those other things that simply are?
Things that exist, others that simply are... She was surprised at this new and unexpected thought which would live from now onwards like flowers on a grave. That would live, that would live, other thoughts would be born and would live, and she herself was more alive. Wild happiness cut into her heart, lit up her body. She pressed the glass between her fingers, drank water with her eyes closed as if she were sipping wine, bloody and glorious wine, the blood of God. No, she would not tell anyone that everything was slowly changing... That she had put away her smile like someone who finally switches off the light and settles down to sleep. No human beings could now be permitted to enter her inner world and merge therein. Her relations with other people became increasingly different from the relations she maintained with herself. The sweetness of childhood disappeared without trace, no more
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