The drawer containing the bags for waste packaging is stuck, and makes a grinding noise when I open and close it. One of the screws holding up the guide rail has probably come loose. I’ll take a look at it over the weekend.
After turning off the kitchen lights at the entrance to the living room, I remember that my phone battery is almost empty. So I go back and attach the device to the cable lying on the waist-high cabinet just inside the kitchen. I turn around and jump, startled. Joanna is standing right in the middle of the living room. I didn’t hear her come in. But at the sight of her, I get that warm, pleasant feeling again, and from one second to the next my tiredness and irritation are forgotten.
It looks like she hasn’t seen me yet. I use the brief moment to take a look at her from the darkness of the kitchen. She’s only wearing her bathrobe. It’s tied only loosely and is hanging open a bit, revealing the swell of her small, firm breasts. Another sensation, a different one, joins the pleasant feeling, and all of a sudden I feel like a peeping tom who’s been caught in the act.
I step out of the darkness and approach her. She hears my footsteps, turns toward me and … freezes. The cheerful hello I was about to say sticks in my throat.
I search for a possible explanation for the horror I can read on her face. “Hi, darling,” I say carefully. “What’s the matter? Are you unwell? Did something happen?”
Joanna doesn’t react; she just stands there and looks at me like I’d spoken to her in a foreign language. I’ve never seen her like this. My God, it looks like she’s having a panic attack. Now I feel scared too. Something terrible must have happened.
“Darling,” I try again, as gently as I can. I take one careful step toward her; now we’re only an arm’s length apart. Then she jolts out of her paralyzed stance, her eyes fly open, and she shrinks back from me. One step, then another.
“Darling, please…” I whisper involuntarily. As cautiously as I possibly can, I edge forward, trying to reduce the distance between us. The expression on her face suddenly changes; her features contort. “Get out,” she screams at me, with such force that I stop in my tracks. “Get out or I’ll call the police.”
Get out? What the hell’s wrong with her? It seems like she’s completely lost her senses. A million different things shoot through my mind all at once, and I struggle to put them into something even halfway resembling order.
Is it drugs, alcohol, shock, did someone attack her … did someone die? Joanna takes another step backward, and bumps into the floor lamp. It tips over. The glass shade shatters into pieces on the floor.
“Please,” she whispers, “Please don’t hurt me.”
I try to keep my voice even and calm. “For heaven’s sake,” he says. “What’s wrong?”
Another step toward me. I duck down a little, as if it could help, as if I could hid inside myself.
“I don’t have much money in the house, but I’ll give you everything I’ve got, OK? Take whatever you want.”
For a brief moment I feel irritation flaring up inside me, despite my bewilderment. “Is this some kind of joke?” My voice sounds harsher than I’d intended; I raise my palms to indicate she has nothing to fear. “Are you feeling unwell? Should I call a doctor?”
She shakes her head. “Just go, please. I promise I won’t call the police.”
I resist the fierce impulse to grab her by the arms and shake her and scream at her, to get her to stop all this nonsense. To be Joanna again. But I need to stay calm, it’s important that at least I keep a clear head. I take a few deep breaths, looking right into her eyes all the while. “What is all this? Why are you talking to me like this?”
“Because I’m scared,” she says hesitantly. “You know?”
“Of me?”
“Yes. You really scared me.”
“Joanna…”
Her expression changes in an odd way as I say her name. It’s as though she’s trying to read my face to find out what I’m thinking.
“Go away. Now.” I can feel she’s trying to make her voice sound firm. But it doesn’t work. She raises her hand slightly, and it’s only now I see that she’s clutching something. I try to make out what it is. The paperweight from the hallway. This whole thing is getting crazier and crazier. “Joanna…” I look deep into her eyes, trying to convey that she has no reason to fear me. “I don’t know what you’re doing, but please, stop it.”
“You stop it,” she responds, like a small brattish child. “Stop acting like we know each other and just go, please.”
This can’t be happening. I’m starting to worry Joanna might have completely lost her mind.
I take another careful step toward her, not knowing how I’m supposed to deal with this bizarre situation. I have to be careful not to lose control. “Will you give it a rest already; of course we know each other.”
Joanna shakes her head. “You’re mistaken, really. How, in your opinion, are we meant to know each other?”
I’ve had about enough of this, damn it. “Either you’re playing some twisted game with me, or I should get you straight to the hospital. We’re engaged, Jo. We live together.”
Her features crumble. This isn’t a game. She really doesn’t recognize me.
Suddenly, her hand shoots up without warning and something flies through the air at me. I turn sideways by reflex, but it’s too late. The glass cube strikes my shoulder, and a firework of pain explodes in my entire upper body. I hear myself groaning. I suddenly feel nauseous and, at the same time, like someone has kicked me in the back of the knees. My legs buckle; I crash down to the floor and groan again. Joanna flits past me, just a dark shadow, and, in the next instant, disappears from my field of vision.
Carefully, I feel around my shoulder.
I thought I knew Joanna well by now, but suddenly she seems like a stranger to me, so much so as if it were another woman in her body.
The pain in my shoulder is slowly subsiding. I prop myself up and struggle onto my feet. The living room sways. I take two, three careful steps, until I’m able to lean against the back of an armchair. My eyes wander over to the open living room door. Did Joanna run outside? Maybe she’s going to call the police.
She’s sick; I have no more doubts about that. Maybe she always has been. Maybe she knows it and just never told me. Maybe … yes, maybe I never knew who the real Joanna was until now. No, that’s not possible, it can’t be. I straighten up and take a scrutinizing look around. Nothing’s swaying. I’m standing firmly again.