Katia (V-The End)

(cont. from posts below)

That was pretty much the end.

“Did you talk to Pascal?” Katia asked.

“Yeah.”

“How is he?”

“Not good.”

“Oh.”

She didn’t ask me about the rent money. She probably knew. The next two weeks were awkward between us. She knew I needed the rent money and she didn’t have it. I called Philippe and he told me he’d talk to Marie about it.

I came home from school one day and she told me she’d be moving out. I felt really bad about it. But that’s because I thought she was leaving because Pascal wasn’t going to pay the rent. It was something else. Some complex story that I barely understood. She was going back to Hungary. But only for a while. She told me the reason, but I didn’t understand it. Some family problem? Some visa question that she could only take care in Budapest? In any case, she couldn’t ask me to keep the room for her. It was getting to be late November. Great, I said to myself; not only did I not get November’s rent money, I won’t get any for December, either; it’ll take me at least a few weeks to find a new flatmate.

Katia and I kissed goodbye one afternoon and that was the last I saw of her. Philippe got the November rent from Maria and I swung by his office in Saint-Michel to pick it up one afternoon. A couple of weeks later, he had a get-together at his apartment in Versailles and invited me out. I brought him a Tom Verlaine record and he served snacks and wine and there was a lot of talk among a crowd of English teachers there about American politics. Ronald Reagan had just been elected president. Sometime during the party, Philippe asked me:

“Hey, did you hear about Pascal?”

“No.”

“He died.”

“He died?” It took a second to register. “When?”

“Oh, a few weeks ago.”

“You mean, right after I talked to him?”

“I don’t know. When did you talk to him?”

“About the rent. Early November. Before I called you.”

“A little after that.”

“Did he ever get out of the hospital?”

“I don’t know. Maybe they sent him home. Maybe not.”

So that meant: Maybe I had called him while he was on his deathbed to hound him about a hundred bucks in rent for Katia.

“What about Katia?” I asked. “Does she know?”

“Oh, she knows. She’s living at his parents’ house.”

“She’s back from Hungary?”

“Did she got to Hungary?”

“That’s what she told me.”

“Maybe. I guess. I don’t know. Marie told me, but I didn’t quite understand. In any case, her visa was temporary. So now that he’s dead, she’s no longer allowed to stay. She’ll have to go back.”

Katia did go back to Hungary. But the next year, at another party, Philippe told me that she found another Frenchman in Budapest and married him and they moved back to Paris. So Katia finally got what she wanted.

Pascal and Katia were in my life for just a few weeks that fall in Paris. We had a few conversations; really, Pascal and I just exchanged just a few sentence and Katia and I a few dozen. But I’ll always remember them both. Why is that? There are people I’ve known who’ve played bigger roles in my life, but they fade into the fog of my memory, emerging only upon some prompt, when I find some trace of them somewhere, somehow. Not Katia. She’s always there. I wonder if she still has that picture of me. Maybe it’s true, what the Native American mystics believe about images captured by a camera. Maybe it's true that they steal your soul.

Katia's Rent (IV)

(continued from posts below)

Before Katia moved in, I’d been dating Brigitte. She came over to see my apartment one night. My bedroom walls were covered with black fabric. The other bedroom had wallpaper with garish purple flowers, floor-to-ceiling. I told Brigitte I’d have to paint it white. She said, no, it would have to be blue. I said I didn’t know about that, being that the ceiling was purple. She said if I painted it blue, she would help. Promise? I asked. Promise, she said.

Once Katia had moved in, Brigitte came over for coffee one afternoon and met Katia and Jules. I had already explained to Katia that I had promised Brigitte she could help paint the walls blue. Katia said she wanted them to be white. I said fine, she could paint them white after Brigitte and I painted them blue. Katia said that was absurd. I explained to Katia that I had made a promise to Brigitte and I always kept my word. Katia wasn’t happy.

The next night she came into my room.

“You know, I was talking to Jules about painting the room,” Katia said. “And we think –”

“Yeah, I know, you want it to be white. I think white’s better, too. But –”

“That’s not what I was going to say.”

“Oh? What were you going to say, then?”

“We think – well, we think Brigitte’s too young for you.”

“Oh, really?”

“And is Brigitte going to move in here?”

“No plans right now.”

“So why should she decide what color the room is? It’s my room.”

“Look. I told you before. I promised.”

I bought the blue paint. I peeled the wallpaper off the wall, which was a huge mistake. The plaster had never been spackled, so that was another huge job I hadn’t foreseen. I did a minimal amount of spackling, just enough to cover the worst slices and holes in the plaster, and got ready to paint.

Brigitte didn’t show up. I took out my anger by painting all night. I had bought her a rose and I left it on my mantelpiece to remind me of how she stood me up and that I shouldn’t ever make a date with her again. Over the next few weeks, Katia acknowledged that the blue paint turned out OK, although we agreed that white would’ve been better. The rose shriveled up and turned black, and I stopped seeing Brigitte.

Pascal didn’t pay Katia’s rent.

“He’s very sick. He’s in the hospital,” Katia told me.

“I still have to pay the rent, Katia. I need your share. You promised he’d pay.”

“Yes, but he’s in the hospital.”

“I can’t tell that to the real estate agent. They won’t care. They need the rent. When will you have it?”

“I don’t know. When he gets out of the hospital.”

“When is he getting out of the hospital?”

“I don’t know.”

“Will you ask him?”

“I don’t want to talk to him. You can call him. Here’s the number.”

So I walked down the street to the pay phone and called Pascal at the hospital that Saturday morning. The switchboard operator connected me to his room and he answered the phone.

“This is Steve, Pascal. You know, Katia’s living at my apartment.”

“Oh yes.”

“How are you?”

“Not good.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Are they taking good care of you?”

“Well, you know.”

“Are you going to be OK?”

“Doesn’t look good.”

“Wow, that’s terrible. When do you think they’ll let you go home?”

“I don’t know.”

“Look, I hate to bother you with this, you being sick and all, but I’m calling about the rent.”

“You’ll get the rent. Don’t worry.”

“Great. Thanks. It’s just that it’s due now, and I was wondering when I’d have it.”

He got angry and yelled at me:

“Look, I told you you’ll get your rent and you’re going to get the rent! You’ll just have to wait!”

“Oh, OK, sorry man, I didn’t mean to upset you. I was just trying to find out when I’d get.”

He was still angry.

“I told you YOU’LL GET YOUR RENT.”

“OK, OK, I said it was OK. I know your ill. I feel bad for you. I was just trying to explain why I was calling. It’s OK. Hope you get better, soon.”

“Thanks,” he said dryly.

We said goodbye and hung up.