Lindita ARAPI
PROSE
THE MUTE MAIDEN
He is dead now, and they have all
gone away. I am alone. Now that its spectre has vanished, I have
moved into mother's room. It was there that I wrote the tale
of the mute maiden and have resolved never to speak again.
In the beginning, I did not understand
what this decision really meant. I was actually only amused by
the thought that everyone else would have to work hard at trying
to understand me - that they would be frustrated and saddened.
I saw myself as a wall of impenetrable silence they would never
be able to break though. Later, the situation became unbearable
for me, too - so unbearable that I thought I would burst and
disintegrate. Sometimes I had the impression that my head had
been split in two and that my brains were oozing out without
my feeling it at all. This sensation became so strong on occasion
that I was convinced my head was finally empty... and I was relieved.
It was at that time that the words, which
used to flow out of me so profusely, began to wither and dry
up until there was no sound left in me at all. Perhaps as a result,
I began to put my thoughts to paper. One needs time for this
new form of communication and I am happy that I now have all
the time I need. Nothing that bothers and torments other people
in their daily lives, worries me. I watch the days go by out
on the veranda and puzzle at the forms and contortions of eyes
and hands. I am amazed that the passing bodies still move the
way they once did.
I don't know how long it has been. Quite
a few days must have passed because I have forgotten a lot of
what happened. The memories come back to me in fragments and
I cannot link them to one another or put them in order sufficiently
to make any sense out of them. Nonetheless, I will try to retrieve
what remains in the recesses of my mind and set the splinters
free. Perhaps they will come to life again.
* * *
Whenever father entered the room,
we girls would stand up and drop whatever we happened to have
in our hands on the bed - knitting or an apple with the first
bite taken out of it. I would always close my book and, because
I was the smallest, approach him to help him take off his jacket.
"Hi, daddy. How was your day?"
my elder sisters would say with a mixture of smiles, dread and
shyness on their faces.
I never managed to open my mouth at the
proper time when he was in the room. An incomprehensible murmur
lodged somewhere in the back of my throat whenever I gave him
a hand to prepare for his nap. It was all part of the family
rituals that began every morning when the door creaked open and
the huge shadow of my father appeared in the hallway. These rituals
were nothing more than a way of getting the stagnant waters of
family love and devotion flowing again. As far back as I can
remember, we always took the same posture. There were always
the same tokens of respect, the same fear and the same tardy
reaction on my part when my sisters greeted him. My habit of
not opening my mouth at all when father got back from work dates
perhaps from that time. I never managed to greet him properly.
All that succeeded in squeaking through my teeth was a meek 'How
was your day?' I would approach quietly to hang up his jacket
and then fetch some hot water to wash his feet.
Whenever I knelt in front of him and
massaged his feet swollen from his exhausting work, I would think
how strange his toes looked. I wondered if I would recognize
them if they were somewhere else. And then I would hear his deep
and gentle voice inquiring about me.
"How were your marks at school today?"
I was good at school and rarely got bad
marks. If I did, I did not try to conceal them, as my sisters
did, but rather showed them off to my father. It amused me to
watch him get upset, and I would listen to his tirade patiently
without letting it bother me at all.
I remember the secret pleasure I took
whenever I succeeded in putting him in a bad mood - whenever
I stopped being daddy's little girl.
"Where are your brains, child? You're
not concentrating in class. Look at the marks you're getting!"
he would shout.
"I never had any brains, daddy"
I would say, teasing him.
He would look nervous whenever the children
he had raised, like his own flesh and blood as he was wont to
say, began to use his words.
Every time I replied using his expressions,
I was severely punished. I would be locked in the bathroom with
nothing to eat until my father decided I had suffered enough.
Sometimes the little pleasures I took with him were so severely
punished that I spent the whole night in the bathroom, without
light and heat. The bathroom was a terrifying place. Cowering
in a corner in the dark, I would whine, afraid all the time that
the neighbours would hear me. Abandoned in my little corner of
the world, I remember praying fervently to a star I could see
through the window, hoping that God would be there and heed my
plight. I later took revenge by not talking to my father at all
for days on end. My silence lasted even longer when I came to
realize that he fully understood what fear and trepidation I
suffered in the bathroom, and continued to hold me captive there.
My rebellion as a child went so far that I dreamt of running
away, of forcing my desperate parents to search for me and comprehend
at long last just how much they had hurt their little girl. My
daydreams always ended like fairy tales. I would return home
to my smiling and caring father who would stroke my hair, and
we would all live happily ever after.
* * *
I often recall the words of my mother.
She held the view that I had long been my father's pet. Whenever
he got back from work, he would always bring me a piece of chocolate
or cake. Later, when he noticed that I was showing signs of maturity,
he would talk to me as he would to a guest in his house - to
someone he had to take care of.
After the death of my mother, my elder
sisters got used to him and his melancholic silence. They accepted
him the way he was and laughed at my worries when he changed
his behaviour towards me. They tended to his every need like
two guardian angels, for whom the word of a man was absolute.
I had only gotten used to his eternal
silence and, whenever he did utter a word, I would take fright
and drop what I had in my hands. I was amazed at how artificial
he sounded when he spoke. I felt alright when he wandered about
the house in silence, but I only really felt safe when he was
in his own room. Then I was free to do whatever I wanted, to
try on a new dress or to use my mother's lipstick.
The dark blue door to his room was usually
kept locked, even when he was not at home. I had such a longing
to sleep in that room again, as I had done when mother was alive,
when she would let me snuggle up to her breast.
When I was forbidden from entering the
room, it turned into a magic place. I would glance stealthily
at the door whenever it opened and I would look inside whenever
my sisters entered to take my father his tea in the evening.
At the time, I puzzled over why one sister would go in one evening
and the other sister the next evening to take father his dinner
or to help him get ready for bed. Later I got used to the idea.
It became a daily ritual, something which was simply done, in
particular now that mother was no longer alive. After all, someone
had to look after my father. My sisters were grown up now, ready
to 'take husband,' as my aunt would say. They would spend their
time knitting for their dowries and pondering about their future
spouses. Their conversations were interrupted only when my father
entered the room, when the subject immediately changed. It was
unheard of in a house of girls to talk about men - that I knew
- and for virgins, it was considered quite shameful.
"Father is the shame of the house,"
I would say, teasing them to drive them out of the room. But
I was in fact the shameless virgin of the house, inspired by
all the books I had read.
My view of men at the time was one of
a suit of clothes, cut out in coloured paper. They were more
intelligent than girls. That is why I drew them with two heads.
I remember, when I showed the drawings to my sisters, they groaned
and predicted I would have a hard time with men when I grew up.
"Meander from man to man, she will..."
"I'm going to have three husbands:
one in a green suit, one in a blue suit and one in a black suit
like your girlfriend's husband." I would tell them all about
my future husbands and make them laugh.
"Look at her, she still has milk
dripping from her lips," my eldest sister Lily would shout
to tease me.
And this did infuriate me because I had
been doing my utmost to appear older, especially with my friends,
to whom I would reveal the love stories I had overheard from
my sisters. "What do you mean by milk on my lips? Alright,
then, I'm going to have one husband, just one husband,"
I stammered and ran out into the yard.
"Quiet. You'll be the shame of us
all. Everyone is listening. Be quiet!"
But I paid no attention to them. The
more they told me to keep quiet, the louder I would become.
"I want a husb..., husb...,"
my voice trembled until I lost control of it completely and stammered,
"housebird."
I looked up and suddenly saw my father
staring at me. I lowered my head and waited for retribution to
follow. But instead, he passed me by and went into the house,
muttering, "Can't we find that girl a budgie or something?
Otherwise she'll whine all day."
There I stood in the middle of the yard
with a finger in my mouth, not at all relieved that I had not
been punished. Father had looked at me as if he had seen me for
the very first time, I thought to myself for a moment, wondering
at the strange father I had. Then I went off to the rabbit hutch
to play with the animals I so loved. I could while away the hours
there, talking to my tiny friends, as everyone called them. Whenever
I was sad, I would go out to the rabbit hutch and tell them my
problems.
I would have long forgotten this minor
episode, had it not been the prologue of what was later to come.
* * *
I got up early that morning and was
full of energy. No one else was at home and I was glad that there
would be nobody there to push me around. The fact that the day
started out well was actually more related to events of the night
before than to the fact that it was one of my rare mornings alone.
On the evening before, my aunt had given
me some white lace panties, like the underwear the older girls
wore. It was the first time that I had ever worn such clothes.
I put them under my pillow and could hardly wait for my sisters
to come home so that I could unfold them piously on the bed like
a flag.
It was 9:00. I shuddered every time the
metallic clang of the clock echoed through the house. Somehow,
I hated the sound. It made me shiver, like a cold shower. I looked
up automatically and saw a key turning in the doorlock. It was
my father.
He smiled when he saw me with some books
in my hand. I acknowledged his presence curtly, as I was waiting
for my sisters to arrive. I wanted desperately to show my new
secret to someone and a novel, mysterious instinct made me speak.
I watched my father's steps as he went
into the bedroom. He said nothing, obviously not wanting to make
me nervous. I hesitated for a moment and then... walked towards
the bedroom. Pushing the door ajar, I entered the room for the
first time. He turned around, looking somewhat perplexed. "Hey,
little girl, what are you trying to hide from me? Have you got
a piece of candy or something?" he said jovially.
"No," I replied coyly and spread
my new panties out for him to see. "Look what aunty bought
me. Look how nice they are. I'm going to wear them tomorrow for
my birthday. Sonya wears them, and now I'm going to wear them,
too," I beamed. "Like they wear when they get married,"
I added, posing with the panties in front of me.
I blabbered on and did not even notice
the change in the expression on his face. It had flushed.
"Come on over here so that I can
see you," he whispered.
"They're not like the clothes they
show on TV," I said, approaching.
"This is the day you have been waiting
for," he murmured, stroking the panties I was modelling.
"You're on the lookout for a man. It won't be long now,
I see. But before that..."
I stood back. "What are you doing,
daddy?"
Without warning, he threw me onto the
bed with his hands of iron and began to rip off my clothes one
by one. I cowered, petrified that he would choke me to death,
and tried to push him away. "No, no, daddy, no!"
"Listen, I was the one who gave
you life... I gave you your life, you know, and I am the first
one to stroke you, to touch you and make you ready for a boyfriend."
He could hardly breathe.
"I want to be the first one. Then
you can have the others, I..." He foamed at the mouth and
forced his way between my thighs.
"No, you mustn't, daddy!" I
screamed, full of shame, despair and disgust.
The ceiling began revolving like the
globe in a geography class. The last things I saw were the oceans
and continents spinning out of control.
* * *
When I opened my eyes, I was drenched
in tears, all down my neck. There was a whisper in my ear. It
was cold, so very cold. I got up slowly, pushing off his arms
which wanted to help me.
I did not know whether I still had a
body or whether it had been blown away like the autumn leaves
in the wind.
I turned to look at him once again. The
distorted expression on his face struck me like a knife through
the heart. He was so far away now.
"Father, I worshipped you. You gave
me the gift of life and will always be first. But the day will
come, father, when you will pass away. And you will have to die
soon, for if you don't, I will kill you with my bare hands. I
will kill you, father!"
These were the last words I ever spoke.
[Memecja, written in May 1996.
Translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie] |
Albanian Literature in Translation
Modern
Authors from Albania (late 20th - 21st centuries)
