little finger. You start out fine, raising your voice, sounding firm, until she looks straight at you and you melt."
"There's nothing wrong with being kind."
"And what exactly do you win by being kind? It's as if she's living in a hotel. She comes out of her room only to eat. To speak to her, you practically have to e-mail her. Or phone her. I read somewhere that it's not good to let your children have computers in their room. Who knows what they can access."
You wish you were with Carla, letting her rest her head on your chest and fall asleep in your arms. The unmistakable expertise of her tongue can't compete with the vulnerability that hides behind the aggressive façade. You picture the marks on her forearm, fascinated. You've tried to help her, even paying for her to check into rehab; she didn't last long, just three days. The first night she got out, a silly argument pushed her over the edge and soon she was throwing glasses and cans of Cuba Libre at the wall, insulting you as if she didn't know you. You would like to do more than you already have, but you know that addiction, any kind of addiction, winds up capturing whoever dares approach it.
"I was at the doctor's today. I've been getting nosebleeds, all the time."
"Really? I wonder why."
"Worry, maybe. Anxiety. Or something worse. My mom died of cancer. Well, she killed herself before the cancer could. I guess that's what worries me."
"You think a few drops of blood mean you have cancer? Let's not overdo it..."
Her face has aged. When you first met, her complexion was so smooth that a geisha in her prime would have envied her. Now her skin is losing its elasticity; it is a mask that no longer fits her skull. So many years have passed since the day you were introduced, in the cafeteria at the university. If you hadn't come in out of the rain that afternoon, into that smoke-filled room, and if you hadn't run into a friend who was chatting with Ruth...
"What're you thinking about?"
There she is, sitting next to you on the sofa, the woman who had shared her passion for cryptography. That woman who snored as if she had the hiccups, whose skin smelled of moisturizers, was the person responsible for the course your life had taken. And to think that when you met her, you were studying biology...
"Someone found a way into my private e-mail account this morning. They sent me an easily decipherable code. I spent the whole day worrying about the message, when I really should have been worrying about how they accessed my account. Who? And why?"
"Maybe they chose you for a particular reason. What did the message say?"
"That I'm a murderer. That my hands are stained with blood."
"Aren't they?"
"They aren't."
"Then you've nothing to worry about."
That tone of voice ... When Montenegro returned to power in 1997, Ruth asked you to resign. Despite the fact that he returned by democratic means, she had only seen Montenegro as he had once been: a pathetic dictator. She had never been able to separate, as you had, the work from the ends that had been achieved by means of it: the defense of governments with doubtful morals. So scrupulous, so attuned to ethical questions, she had threatened to leave you more than once if you didn't resign. And yet she was weak; you didn't do what she asked and she is still with you.
"I'm not worried," you say, somewhat agitated. "I've never shot anyone. I've never even touched anyone. I never left my office."
"The same old argument. Only the one who pulls the trigger is guilty."
She stands up, stubs out her cigarette in the ashtray, and leaves the living room. She's angry. Should you have been more sensitive when she mentioned her nosebleeds? She is such a hypochondriac that you don't know what to take seriously anymore. If she has a headache, it's a fatal tumor. If she cuts her leg, it'll become infected and she'll lose it to gangrene. Ruth has become rigid over the years, has lost her soft edges. What a contrast to those endless
"There's nothing wrong with being kind."
"And what exactly do you win by being kind? It's as if she's living in a hotel. She comes out of her room only to eat. To speak to her, you practically have to e-mail her. Or phone her. I read somewhere that it's not good to let your children have computers in their room. Who knows what they can access."
You wish you were with Carla, letting her rest her head on your chest and fall asleep in your arms. The unmistakable expertise of her tongue can't compete with the vulnerability that hides behind the aggressive façade. You picture the marks on her forearm, fascinated. You've tried to help her, even paying for her to check into rehab; she didn't last long, just three days. The first night she got out, a silly argument pushed her over the edge and soon she was throwing glasses and cans of Cuba Libre at the wall, insulting you as if she didn't know you. You would like to do more than you already have, but you know that addiction, any kind of addiction, winds up capturing whoever dares approach it.
"I was at the doctor's today. I've been getting nosebleeds, all the time."
"Really? I wonder why."
"Worry, maybe. Anxiety. Or something worse. My mom died of cancer. Well, she killed herself before the cancer could. I guess that's what worries me."
"You think a few drops of blood mean you have cancer? Let's not overdo it..."
Her face has aged. When you first met, her complexion was so smooth that a geisha in her prime would have envied her. Now her skin is losing its elasticity; it is a mask that no longer fits her skull. So many years have passed since the day you were introduced, in the cafeteria at the university. If you hadn't come in out of the rain that afternoon, into that smoke-filled room, and if you hadn't run into a friend who was chatting with Ruth...
"What're you thinking about?"
There she is, sitting next to you on the sofa, the woman who had shared her passion for cryptography. That woman who snored as if she had the hiccups, whose skin smelled of moisturizers, was the person responsible for the course your life had taken. And to think that when you met her, you were studying biology...
"Someone found a way into my private e-mail account this morning. They sent me an easily decipherable code. I spent the whole day worrying about the message, when I really should have been worrying about how they accessed my account. Who? And why?"
"Maybe they chose you for a particular reason. What did the message say?"
"That I'm a murderer. That my hands are stained with blood."
"Aren't they?"
"They aren't."
"Then you've nothing to worry about."
That tone of voice ... When Montenegro returned to power in 1997, Ruth asked you to resign. Despite the fact that he returned by democratic means, she had only seen Montenegro as he had once been: a pathetic dictator. She had never been able to separate, as you had, the work from the ends that had been achieved by means of it: the defense of governments with doubtful morals. So scrupulous, so attuned to ethical questions, she had threatened to leave you more than once if you didn't resign. And yet she was weak; you didn't do what she asked and she is still with you.
"I'm not worried," you say, somewhat agitated. "I've never shot anyone. I've never even touched anyone. I never left my office."
"The same old argument. Only the one who pulls the trigger is guilty."
She stands up, stubs out her cigarette in the ashtray, and leaves the living room. She's angry. Should you have been more sensitive when she mentioned her nosebleeds? She is such a hypochondriac that you don't know what to take seriously anymore. If she has a headache, it's a fatal tumor. If she cuts her leg, it'll become infected and she'll lose it to gangrene. Ruth has become rigid over the years, has lost her soft edges. What a contrast to those endless
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