To Paradise
- Автор: Yanagihara Hanya
- Год: 2022
- Язык: английский
- Год: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
- Жанр: Современная русская и зарубежная проза
Электронная книга - «To Paradise». Краткое содержание книги:
In an alternate version of 1893 America, New York is part of the Free States, where people may live and love whomever they please (or so it seems). The fragile young scion of a distinguished family resists betrothal to a worthy suitor, drawn to a charming music teacher of no means. In a 1993 Manhattan besieged by the AIDS epidemic, a young Hawaiian man lives with his much older, wealthier partner, hiding his troubled childhood and the fate of his father. And in 2093, in a world riven by plagues and governed by totalitarian rule, a powerful scientist's damaged granddaughter tries to navigate life without him--and solve the mystery of her husband's disappearances.
These three sections are joined in an enthralling and...
“We understand,” David said. “You don’t need to apologize.”
And then I remembered the notes. “Wait,” I told Fritz, and I went to the closet and took out the box and opened the envelope, and removed the notes. “These are yours,” I said, as I gave them to Fritz, and he looked at them and began crying again.
“Thank you,” he told me, “thank you.” For a moment, I thought he would touch me, but he didn’t, because it wasn’t done.
And then he opened the door and slipped out. We listened to him walk down the stairs, and down the hallway, and then there was the sound of him opening the front door, and letting it fall shut behind him, and then he was gone, and everything was silent once more.
Then the only thing to do was wait. At 23:00 precisely, I was to be waiting at the banks of Charles and Hudson Streets, where a boat would meet me. This boat would take me to another boat, a much bigger boat, and that boat would take me to a country I’d never heard of, called Iceland. In Iceland, I would be placed in isolation for three weeks, to make certain I wasn’t carrying the new illness, and then I would board a third boat, and that boat would take me to New Britain.
But David would not be meeting me at the shore. I would have to do it myself. He had some things to finish here, and so I wouldn’t see him again until I landed in Iceland. Hearing this, I began to cry once more. “You can do it, Charlie,” he said. “I know you can. You’ve been so brave. You are brave.” And finally, I wiped my eyes and nodded.
In the meantime, David said, I should stay inside and try to sleep, though I must be careful to leave with enough time. He would make sure my husband’s body was picked up and cremated, although not until after I had left. We were lucky the weather was cooperating, he said, but he still fit my husband into his cooling suit and turned it on, though he left his helmet off.
“It’s time for me to go,” he said. We stood at the door. “Do you remember the plan?” he asked. I nodded. “Do you have any questions?” he asked. I shook my head. Then he put his hands on my shoulders, and I flinched, but he held on. “Your grandfather would be proud of you, Charlie,” he said. “I am, too.” He released me. “I’ll see you in Iceland,” he said. “You’ll be a free woman.”
I didn’t know what that meant, but “I’ll see you,” I said in return, and he saluted me, as he had saluted the officer on Thursday night, and then he left.
I went back to my husband’s and my room, which was now my room, and which tomorrow would be somebody else’s room. I took three of the remaining coins from the drawer beneath my bed. I remember Grandfather telling me that certain cultures put gold coins over the eyes of their deceased, and some put coins under the dead person’s tongue. I can’t remember why they did this. But I did the same: One coin over each eye, one beneath his tongue. The rest of the coins I put in my bag. I wished I had remembered to give the extra chits we had to Fritz, but I had forgotten.
And then I lay down next to my husband. I put my arms around him. It was a little difficult because of the cooling suit, but I was still able to do it. It was the first time I had been so close to him, the first time I had touched him. I kissed his cheek, which was cold and smooth, like stone. I kissed his lips. I kissed his forehead. I touched his hair, his eyelids, his eyebrows, his nose. I kissed and touched him for a long time. I talked to him. I told him I was sorry. I told him I was going to New Britain. I told him that I would miss him, that I would never forget him. I told him I loved him. I thought of Fritz saying that my husband had cared about me. I had never imagined that I would actually meet the person who had written my husband those notes, but now I had.
When I woke, it was dark, and I was anxious because I had forgotten to set my alarm. But it was only just after 21:00. I took a shower, even though it was not a water day. I brushed my teeth, and put my toothbrush in my bag. I was afraid if I lay back down I would fall asleep again, so I instead sat on my own bed and stared at my husband. After a few minutes, I put his cooling helmet on, so his face and head wouldn’t begin to rot before he could be cremated. I knew it didn’t make a difference to him, or to anyone, really, but I didn’t want to think of his face turning black and soft. I had never spent so much time around a dead person, not even Grandfather—it was my husband who had overseen his cremation, not me, because I had been too upset.
At 22:20 I stood. I was wearing a plain black shirt and pants, as David had instructed. I put my bag over my shoulder. At the last minute, I added my papers, which David had said I wouldn’t need, but which I thought I might if I were stopped on the way over to the western banks. Then I took them out again, and put them under my pillow. I thought of the petri dish of pinkies I would now never be able to retrieve. “Goodbye, pinkies,” I said aloud. “Goodbye.” My heart was beating so fast that I was having trouble breathing.
I locked my apartment for the final time. I slid the keys beneath the door.
And then I was outside and I was walking west, almost like the walk I had taken just two nights ago. Above me, the moon was so bright that, even when the spotlights had arced away, I could still see where I was going. David had told me that after 21:00 the majority of the Flies would be diverted in order to form clusters around the hospitals and monitor high-density zones, in anticipation of tomorrow’s announcement, and, indeed, I saw only one or two, and instead of their normal drone, there was only silence.
I reached the banks by 22:45. I sat on a dry patch of land to keep myself from pacing. Here there was absolutely no light. Even the factories across the river were dark. The only sound was of the water slapping against the cement barriers.
Then, very faintly, I heard something. It sounded like a whisper, or like wind. And then I saw something: a faint blob of yellowish light that seemed to float over the river like a bird. Soon it grew bigger, and more distinct, and I saw that it was a small wooden boat, the kind I knew from pictures that people used to row across the Pond back when it had been an actual pond.
I stood, and the boat drew to the shore. There were two people inside it, both dressed completely in black, one of them holding a lantern, which he lowered as they approached land. Even their eyes were covered in thin pieces of black gauze, and I struggled to see them in the poor light.
“Cobra?” one of them asked.
“Mongoose,” I replied, and the man who had spoken reached out his hand and helped me into the boat, which rocked beneath me, and I thought I might fall over.
“You’ll stay down here,” he said, and helped me crouch into the space between him and the other oarsman, and once I had made myself as small as possible, they covered me with a tarp. “Don’t make a sound,” he said, and I nodded, even though he wouldn’t have been able to see me do so. And then the boat began to move, and the only noise was the sound of the oars slicing through the water, and the men’s breathing, in and out.
After David had told me he wouldn’t be meeting me at the banks, I had asked him how I would know that the people coming to get me were the right people. “You’ll know,” he’d said. “There’s no one else at the banks at that time. Or ever, really.” But I had said I needed to know for certain.
Two weeks after my husband and I were married, there had been a raid in our building. It was the first raid I had experienced without Grandfather, and I was so terrified that I hadn’t been able to stop moaning, moaning and batting at the air and rocking. My husband hadn’t known what to do, and when he tried to reach for my hands, I slapped him away.
That night, I had a dream that I was at home after work, making dinner, and heard the sound of keys turning in the lock. But when the door opened, it was not my husband but a group of policemen, shouting and ordering me to get on the floor, their dogs lunging at me and barking. I woke up, calling for Grandfather, and my husband had gotten me a glass of water and then had sat next to me until I had fallen asleep again.