should just head off to bed, I suppose.’
‘Thanks again for letting me have the party here, Margo,’ I say, heading to the front door. ‘It went even better than I thought it would.’
‘Layla,’ she calls after me.
‘Yes?’
‘It eventually gets easier, you know, as long as you don’t try so hard to make everything better.’
I am uncertain of what she is trying to tell me at first.
‘Does it really?’ I ask.
She smiles and shakes her head.
‘Perhaps a time will come, my darling girl, when you will feel the release in simply accepting some things as they are without trying to change them.’
‘And rely only on happenstance?’
‘But isn’t that what it ultimately means to be trusting, Layla?’
I have noticed, once or twice, a man in our building who seems familiar, yet I cannot remember ever having met or spoken to him. He is of medium height and wears glasses and has a small beard that is flecked with grey and I am drawn by an air of resignation about him that I sometimes think might instead be an indication of humility.
Perhaps it is this impression of reticence that I recognize in him, I think one morning when we meet on the stairs. We nod at one another and I smile. The encounter, however brief, makes me determined to try to strike up a conversation with him next time we see one another, though I don’t really understand why that should be so, nor why this man should seem so appealing to me.
Margo and I often speak about lovers in our very different pasts, my experiences seeming more awkward than authentic, poor substitutes for what I imagine would be the real thing, the passion and the romance. Whenever she talks about her husband John, a picture emerges in my mind of the intensity of a love that, had circumstances been different, might not have lasted. Relationships that endure, I tell Margo, like those of my parents or my uncle and his wife, seem to have an element of the mundane about them that I know I would find unacceptable.
There is a professor of music at the university, a man with a mane of dark, thick hair and a voice so resonant that he seems sometimes to sing as he speaks, who intrigued me when we met. But the first time I went into his office and noticed the dust-free shelves lined with books in descending size, the neat desk and empty in and out trays placed at precise angles on its surface, and the general impression of tidiness taken to a disconcerting extreme, I longed to get out again.
Margo and I laughed about it afterwards. She said she was surprised I had not yet realized that men tended to be creatures of habit, surrounding themselves with a sense of security that is based on objects and rituals rather than emotions. Was your John like that? I asked her then. She fell silent for a moment. He probably would have been, if he had lived, she eventually answered. Would you have loved him still, I persisted. Perhaps even more, she said quietly, and I failed to understand what she meant at the time.
When she speaks about herself, Margo tells me it’s like peeling away the many layers of an onion to arrive at its essence. There is so much hidden away from view, she says, that even when I think I have finally arrived at some kind of truth, there is another lurking beneath it.
I watch her as she cups her hands, holds them together and opens them up again, and imagine the process as endless, hidden levels of meaning that once arrived at become instantly out of reach.
‘It never stops, this self-searching, then?’ I ask.
Margo smiles wryly.
‘Even for someone as old as I am, sweetheart.’
I long ago sensed Margo’s ability for detachment, not only because there are some things about her life that I will never know and am not in any case prepared to probe, but also because she manages to maintain a distance from the events and people she encounters that comes from being older and so far removed from immediate concerns.
Still, she is also marvellously adept at living in the moment, at making of everything and everyone around her a discovery.
‘We have lost the ability,’ Margo repeats again and again, ‘to simply stop and stare.’
I feel that with Margo I am encountering truths that would otherwise have eluded me, depths of being which I might not have been able to reach on my own. In accepting the people and circumstances that surround her, she shows me the way of compassion, and in being so steadfast, she gives me courage. Whenever I attempt to voice these feelings to her, I eventually find myself giving up because I know they would lose too much in the telling.
Once, standing together in the hallway of Margo’s flat, I tell her that she has remained innocent in her dealings with others, despite her age and all that had happened to her.
‘At times, you seem almost like a child to me, Margo,’ I say. ‘It’s almost as if at some point in your life, you simply gave up being certain about anything at all.’
I hesitate, suddenly unsure.
‘But perhaps I have been unable to fully understand you,’ I continue.
Margo leans against the wall and makes her way slowly towards the front door. When she eventually turns around to look at me, there are tears in her eyes. I reach out and touch her cheek with one hand.
‘Oh. Oh, my dear friend,’ I say, shaking my head.
I notice him at the butcher’s one morning, both of us waiting to be served. I catch his eye and smile but when I attempt to approach him, he is already on his way out of the shop. I cannot shake off the feeling that I know him from somewhere.
A few days later, I go to a bookshop not far from the university and my suspicions are confirmed. He is a well-known writer who is greatly admired in this part of the world and I have read three of his most celebrated books.
I choose a novel by him that was recently translated into English. On the back, there are quotes from critics who describe it as ‘moving’ and ‘one of this excellent writer’s best books yet’, as well as a head shot of him in his younger days when he did not have a moustache or a beard.
When I arrive at his doorstep, there are no plants outside the front door, nor any other sign of welcome. I ring the bell and hear a faint shuffling inside before he opens the door.
‘Hello,’ I say with a smile. ‘I’m Layla, your neighbour from upstairs.’
I put out my hand and shake his. He appears too surprised to say anything, his eyebrows are raised slightly and his lips are held tightly together.
‘I hope I’m not disturbing you,’ I continue, beginning to feel nervous.
He remains silent.
‘I’m sorry. I expect you must be working and I interrupted you.’
He begins to say something when he looks down at the book in my hand.
‘I wondered if you would sign this for me.’ I lift it up for him to see.
He nods but does not smile.
‘Yes, of course,’ he says finally. ‘Please come in.’
He leads me into the small entrance hall and turns to go into the living room.
‘I have one if you like,’ I say, handing him a pen.
A smell of burnt bread permeates the air.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says, opening the book and laying it on the hall table. ‘What did you say your name was?’
‘Layla,’ I say softly.
He bends down to write.
‘I hope you enjoy it.’ He hands the book back to me. ‘Although I have written two others since, you know.’
‘Yes, I know. I haven’t read this one yet, though.’
He