asleep with his hand between my legs and his face in my hair. He is weeping in his dreams. I stay awake, considering. He said that he wants to marry me now, that we must always be together. But now that I know he can lie to me, what comfort can there be? His turning to me in such need is not a true statement of his feelings; there is nothing to make of it, really, except that I am near and willing to stay. After a short while, he wakes again, and turns to me and I am there. The night is very black, there is no moon, and I am glad that I’ve put the drum outside my room, on a table at the end of the hall.
When I wake in the morning, he is gone. I roll over, put on my robe, and go down the hall. Not until I’m brushing my teeth do I notice that my face is smeared with blood. Red-brown streaks mark the back of my hands, my arms, my body. I walk back into my room and see that the sheets are splotched and rubbed with signs. It isn’t, somehow, horrifying. I conclude he’s slashed himself, and it seems to me that this is what people do. Later that day, when I walk up the road to see him, and when I find him staring quietly at a certain stone he has been thinking about for years, I touch his shoulder.
“Where have you cut yourself?” I ask.
He shrugs.
“Kurt, I should look. They might be deep. You’re bleeding a lot.”
He raises his eyebrows and looks into my face.
“Leave it alone,” he begs.
I return to my house.
As in French novels when the scheming Marquis boasts of a lover I have made her my creature , so I begin to understand that Kurt Krahe is making me his own. His grief is sucking me into an old persona, one I have forced myself to leave behind. Yet I must admit, and this shames me, his tearing need is a thrill to me, and I am convinced that he is mine alone. I am reduced, but I need him, too. And as with all matters of too serious nature, there is absurdity. One morning, instead of contemplating the heft and soul of his sculpture, or driving twenty miles for his favorite dark roast coffee beans, or fixing his garage door, or sitting by his daughter’s grave, he is cutting the dead grass in my yard. Davan Eyke’s job once. Krahe is pushing the finicky red mower now.
I bought that mower for myself. The mower was the first birthday present I ever bought for which I would be the recipient. By which might be assessed the level of self-indulgence I commit. Who buys oneself a lawn mower for her fiftieth birthday? Shouldn’t I have given myself a spa package, a new bathrobe? Shouldn’t I have had someone else to give me a present, perhaps? Of course, I did get one from mother—a cameo strung on a velvet cord. Circa 1910. Italian, with exquisite detail, pink and white shell. I hung it over my bed and have never worn it. But I used my lawn mower last summer. It made me feel good, even when Davan nearly wrecked it, until now. I realize I am dismayed to see Kurt working on my lawn, though I am pleased to see that the machine is holding up well.
Kurt is cutting at a pretty good speed. He prefers the side-to-side strip pattern. I, on the other hand, am the type who cuts the lawn in ever smaller squares. He marches back and forth across the yard. But here’s the thing. The grass doesn’t need cutting. It hasn’t even started growing yet. It’s still practically winter. There is green beneath the unraked thatch, but not a shoot that reaches past the toe’s tip.
I call my mother to the window. We stand together watching our road’s resident artist. He is dressed out of character, like a student’s preppy dad, in dull orange pants, a white golf jacket, thick white socks, and cushiony walking shoes, also white, now mud-stained.
“How did this come about?” I ask.
Elsie gives me the suspicious and assessing look that she should be directing at Krahe. It is not my fault that he’s here. “I have no idea,” she says. “He just appeared.”
“Appeared?”
“And began to tinker with the lawn mower.
When I wake in the morning, he is gone. I roll over, put on my robe, and go down the hall. Not until I’m brushing my teeth do I notice that my face is smeared with blood. Red-brown streaks mark the back of my hands, my arms, my body. I walk back into my room and see that the sheets are splotched and rubbed with signs. It isn’t, somehow, horrifying. I conclude he’s slashed himself, and it seems to me that this is what people do. Later that day, when I walk up the road to see him, and when I find him staring quietly at a certain stone he has been thinking about for years, I touch his shoulder.
“Where have you cut yourself?” I ask.
He shrugs.
“Kurt, I should look. They might be deep. You’re bleeding a lot.”
He raises his eyebrows and looks into my face.
“Leave it alone,” he begs.
I return to my house.
As in French novels when the scheming Marquis boasts of a lover I have made her my creature , so I begin to understand that Kurt Krahe is making me his own. His grief is sucking me into an old persona, one I have forced myself to leave behind. Yet I must admit, and this shames me, his tearing need is a thrill to me, and I am convinced that he is mine alone. I am reduced, but I need him, too. And as with all matters of too serious nature, there is absurdity. One morning, instead of contemplating the heft and soul of his sculpture, or driving twenty miles for his favorite dark roast coffee beans, or fixing his garage door, or sitting by his daughter’s grave, he is cutting the dead grass in my yard. Davan Eyke’s job once. Krahe is pushing the finicky red mower now.
I bought that mower for myself. The mower was the first birthday present I ever bought for which I would be the recipient. By which might be assessed the level of self-indulgence I commit. Who buys oneself a lawn mower for her fiftieth birthday? Shouldn’t I have given myself a spa package, a new bathrobe? Shouldn’t I have had someone else to give me a present, perhaps? Of course, I did get one from mother—a cameo strung on a velvet cord. Circa 1910. Italian, with exquisite detail, pink and white shell. I hung it over my bed and have never worn it. But I used my lawn mower last summer. It made me feel good, even when Davan nearly wrecked it, until now. I realize I am dismayed to see Kurt working on my lawn, though I am pleased to see that the machine is holding up well.
Kurt is cutting at a pretty good speed. He prefers the side-to-side strip pattern. I, on the other hand, am the type who cuts the lawn in ever smaller squares. He marches back and forth across the yard. But here’s the thing. The grass doesn’t need cutting. It hasn’t even started growing yet. It’s still practically winter. There is green beneath the unraked thatch, but not a shoot that reaches past the toe’s tip.
I call my mother to the window. We stand together watching our road’s resident artist. He is dressed out of character, like a student’s preppy dad, in dull orange pants, a white golf jacket, thick white socks, and cushiony walking shoes, also white, now mud-stained.
“How did this come about?” I ask.
Elsie gives me the suspicious and assessing look that she should be directing at Krahe. It is not my fault that he’s here. “I have no idea,” she says. “He just appeared.”
“Appeared?”
“And began to tinker with the lawn mower.
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