Necessary Lies by Eva Stachniak Page B

parsley. And something else. Marjoram.
    â€œSit down,” Käthe said. “Before it all gets cold.”
    â€œDoesn’t she mind living alone?” she kept asking William. “Shouldn’t we ask her to move in with us?” She thought of
Babcia
who came to live with her parents the day
Dziadek
died. But William only laughed.
    â€œOf course not. She lives her own life. I told you she doesn’t need anyone else.” He was right, Anna thought, in a way. Käthe had her own friends, former nurses like her. At the time when she was less fragile, they went out to concerts, for walks. William recalled the times of her treks to the Rockies, to the Sierra Mountains, to the Grand Canyon, but Anna only saw pictures of these trips, Käthe in shorts and sweatshirt, knee-high woollen socks, a green knapsack on her back, leaning on a walking stick. Behind her were the mountains, the canyons, the springs.
    Later, when her arthritis made hiking impossible, Käthe’s friends came to play bridge with her, leaving behind them full ashtrays and greasy aluminium trays from store-bought hors-d’oeuvres. “Buy and lie,” they called them. Alice Woolth, Bernice Camden, Vicki Norton. Old, wrinkled women, sitting around Käthe’s dining room table, smoking, remembering old patients. The woman who called Bernice at four thirty in the morning asking for the result of her pregnancy test from two months before. The man who looked up at Alice as she was wheeling him down the hall to surgery and asked if those three little donuts counted as food.
    â€œOpen it, Mother,” William urged her. Käthe unwrapped the golden wrap carefully, folding it, putting it away for later. “Come on, play it,” he said and she did, listening to the chiming notes of the Viennese waltz as if it were a funeral dirge. These were William’s words, said to Anna after they had left, for at the time she thought he was hiding his disappointment so well, navigating the conversation past the usual points of no return.
    The first signs of trouble came soon enough. “Have you talked to Julchen?” Käthe asked, and Anna stopped eating, waiting for William’s reply.
    â€œNo, I haven’t heard from her for a while,” he said, and she relaxed for his voice was still normal, still ready to take this question as an innocent inquiry about a granddaughter, nothing else.
    â€œYou haven’t?” Käthe asked, her voice raising slightly, the first sign of a reproach she was still trying to cover. She hurried to the kitchen from which she emerged with a bottle of soya sauce, even though no one asked for it. William shot Anna a telling look, “See,” he seemed to be saying, “I told you.” But Anna averted her eyes. She was not going to encourage him.
    â€œSo what have you been up to, Mother?” William asked when Käthe sat down again. There was this false cheerfulness in his voice, the cheerfulness Anna did not like. It was a sign that he had been hurt and was now putting on a face.
    â€œYou should try to see her more often, Willi,” Käthe said. “I’m not going to interfere in your affairs, but a child is a child. You have to call her. She needs guidance,
nein
?
Ya, ya
, you will do whatever you want, you always did.”
    â€œLovely soup, Mother,” William said, and Anna nodded. “Yes, excellent.” On white china plates the broth looked pale, but it was strong and fragrant with herbs.
    Käthe gave William a stern look as if he were still a little boy learning his lessons. A fork in the wrong hand, a drop of wine staining the tablecloth were no mere slips; they justified her suspicions that there was more at stake. His character, his entire life.
    When they had finished the soup, Anna picked up the plates and carried them to the kitchen. From there, she could hear Käthe’s voice asking William what used to be so important that he