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A Glance Out of the Window
She was sitting on the tram when she sensed the man by her side.
He stood quite close to her since it was four o'clock in the evening and the tram was packed full of tired people, making the journey home from work.
She considered her luck in getting a seat, one of the perks of having a job on the outskirts of
Prague ... perhaps the only one.
She wondered if he was reading the book on her lap - in her peripheral vision all she could see was a big pair of baggy jeans.
She turned her concentration back to the book, stories by Ivan Klima, whilst at the same time something inside her swelled with importance, on the grounds that she was undoubtedly reading the right book for that
moment. She was reading a book that would undoubtedly make her attractive to the discerning book lover, the sort of man whom she desired, whom she so desperately needed to fall in love with.
She forgot the bustle and hubbub of the tram and started to think dreamily about the conversations they would have about art, the long walks in the woods, his strong arms enfolding her at night.
The tram stopped suddenly, pitching her forward and she realised where she was.
She glanced up angrily at the man, as if it was somehow his fault that he was not the one to save her from all this pointless, unfulfilled dreaming.
She chanced to gaze deeply into his blue eyes, which were looking down directly at her.
Then both participants in this unexpected showdown looked away hurriedly.
The man took a sudden interest in a baroque church which the tram passed as it entered Karlovo Namesti.
The woman tried again to read her book, secretly hoping the owner of those eyes would cherish her for something.
Had he noticed the book she was reading?
The man cherished her for something indeed, but not in the way she might have hoped.
He had been struck by her strong resemblance to his sister, who had died three years before. Until she looked up at him, he had been lost in a reverie which was sparked off by observing how intently the woman had been reading the book when he got onto the tram.
He loved to
read but, although he had indeed been peering over her shoulder, he had no idea what book it was.
He didn't speak Czech, and the author's name was concealed.
The book was borrowed from the city library and she had carefully wrapped it in newspaper to protect it.
Ironically enough, he had enjoyed the two short story collections by Klima, which he had read in English translations lent from the same city library.
Seeing how she held the book, how all her attention appeared to be focused on the precious object cradled on her lap, the man had recalled how he used to
revere books. Some of his earliest memories were of reading into the early hours with a book hidden under the cover of his bunk bed.
He smiled as he remembered opening a new book, holding it up to his nose, and inhaling deeply the clean woody smell.
Back then, he was accustomed to washing his hands before touching a book, afraid to pollute such a special thing.
When he grew older he asked for books as Christmas presents and saved up to buy items he'd circled in catalogues or
magazines. He started to build up a small library, which held pride of place in his room.
Others soon found out about it. He was unable to keep it a secret, but he was wary of lending a book to any of his friends, despite their entreaties, for he sensed that they would not treat the book with sufficient reverence.
A memory rose up of playing with his sister, of performing a strange rite full of repressed sexual feelings with her naked Barbie dolls, which they ripped apart and buried in a shallow grave between two low bushes in the garden.
It had been his idea, this mutilation of the image of woman and when, in response, his sister had dared to suggest they bury one of his books, probably a Willard Price novel, he had not hesitated to refuse, enraged at the very suggestion.
Nowadays, it seemed that books were like nothing.
You even had pulp novels. And slowly, somewhere along the line in becoming an adult, he too had lost his
respect for books. He still loved them, but in a different, more carefree way.
He still gave them as presents, and hoped to receive them in return, but now he was cavalier in his lending, once he had read a book.
Another thing he had done as a child was to catalogue all the books he had read.
Title, author and ISBN all neatly slotted into a painstakingly drawn table in one of his many notebooks. Now if someone asked if he had read a book, he wasn't even sure if he had or not.
Like life in general, his literary memory was blurry nowadays - perhaps that was a sign of getting older.
He was thinking these thoughts when the woman he was absent-mindedly looking at stared up at him, and the resemblance to his sister struck him powerfully.
Now, he had to blink back the
tears and, as the tram eased to a halt, he turned and pushed his way out of the doors.
It felt like he could not breathe so, despite the snow on the ground, he headed into the park and sat down on the nearest bench.
The woman glanced out of the window at him and then considered what she would eat for dinner.
She put her hands on her book reverentially, and the tram moved off.
As dusk fell, a few snowflakes lazily precursored the night's snowstorm, and he watched the pedestrians struggling home hunched up in their
coats. He was trying to hold his mind together, trying hard not to think about what he could not bear.
The man tentatively cracked his knuckles one by one, and then scratched his head. The snow was falling more heavily, but he did not feel a thing.
He was a child again, playing hide and seek with his sister.
My Brother
Satterberg, Heidi
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Reviews
(applause received) 
Arella
Canada
"I
like this story! It reminded me of my holiday in Prague last year and I
think Jack has a good style! Keep it up!"
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