He shoves his papers in his bag and looks at her out of the corners of his eyes. She smiles. A blow in the face, seldom has he seen such beauty. Women, he thinks morosely, how to arm yourself against them? He'd thought it would pass away with age, but it doesn't. She's been looking at him like that for a while now. It can't be accidental. He fumbles with his bag and when he sees her trailing behind the others to the door, he goes after her. At the door she turns around abruptly and says with a trembling smile, "Can I ask you something?"
"Go ahead," he answers with mud in his throat.
"It's about the course," she says. "Can we go and talk about it over a cup of coffee somewhere?"
"Yes, why not?" he answers magnanimously. "Do you have a place in mind?"
In the coffee shop her questions turn out embarrassingly shallow. He offers her another drink, a real one, some place else. She agrees as if she expected nothing else. But Christ, how beautiful she is!
When, not many hours later, he starts awake in her bed, his mouth is so dry that he doesn't reach for a cigarette immediately. He holds his head under the tap in the bathroom and looks in the mirror. "Oh, bloodshot eyes," he hums. He walks over to the bed and slaps her on the buttocks.
"What's the matter?" she asks languidly.
"I'm leaving," he says and starts dressing.
"Aren't you going to stay the night?" she asks surprised. "Why not?"
"Because I have come," he answers and takes his bag. At the door he turns to look at her. "Remember, you're having an exam next week."
The night before the exam she is at his door, in tears. "Come in," he says. "What's the matter?"
"I've had a nervous breakdown," she says sobbing. "I can't go on any longer. It's too much, all those exams one after the other. And I am nervous as it is. I know I can do it, but right now it is too much. It's inhuman, inhuman."
"Come, come," he soothes and sits beside her on the couch. He is overcome by pity and desire. She puts her arms around his neck and cries on his shoulder. "You've got to help me," she wails. Her body heaves. He strokes her head and gazes at the maddening hair line in her neck. He sucks the salt tears from her cheeks. "Yes, I'll help you," he promises. "Everything will be alright, Hush now. Go lie down." And he carries her to the bedroom.
The next day he sits at a table in an empty classroom with a full ashtray in front of him. Nervous students walk in repeatedly. After a few harsh questions he waves them away.
Then she comes in. Shining. Beaming. Self-assured. A walking flash of lightning. He can feel the hard lump in his stomach melting again. How big an asshole can you become? he wonders.
"Sit down," he says, not unfriendly. "Slept well?"
"Excellent, thanks to you," she whispers and takes his hand.
The melting feeling spreads, but then, thank God, disgust and hatred erupt like molten lava. He pulls his hand back and fires the first question. An easy one, because he is not such a bad guy after all.
"Are you serious?" she asks incredulous.
"Of course," he says. "This is an exam, you know. What do you think you came here for?"
"Er ... I don't know," she says haltingly. "I haven't prepared the exam, you know that, don't you?"
"Then you shouldn't have come here," he says. "You have a right to three questions." And he asks the next one.
Her face grows pale. She looks at him, bewildered.
He leans back and asks the third question.
She doesn't answer and casts down her eyes.
"You should have studied instead of fucking around with your professor the night before the exam," he says evenly.
She gets up and struts to the door.
She'll wet her pants, he thinks as he watches her leave the classroom.
But no, that's not what she does. Just outside the door she starts vomiting with complete abandon.
Copyright © 1986 Jos den Bekker.