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Stuck

By Adam Wasserman

Henk van den Berg lived for many years in a small apartment in the Indische Buurt of Amsterdam. Of all the apartments he was to rent in his life (he never bought a place of his own), it was to remain his favorite. Not only because of the location and the relatively small rent he managed to secure for it, but also because one of the neighbors kept two cats who enjoyed stopping by for a look about and maybe even a bite to eat. Although, to be honest, they were never much keen on anything he had to offer except the occasional bit of canned tuna. Henk had an unusual diet, it seems. Either that or the cats were well fed at home, which was probably the case seeing that one of them was extremely fat. He was Henk's favorite of the two.

Most people in Amsterdam sneered privately at the thought of living in the Indische Buurt. This was before the city endeavored to fix up the neighborhood, which in those days meant knocking down a great deal of affordable housing and replacing it with expensive stores that no one who lived in the neighborhood could afford to shop at. The idea of the city council, however, seemed to be that the new stores would provide jobs for the thousands of people who took their social security from the government each month, and they were even right. But there is no doubt that after the Javaplein was made into a showpiece of furniture stores, electronic stores, and jewelry stores, the neighborhood changed irrevocably.

The Turkish men no longer sat on the benches in the center of the square laughing and being loud and trying to hide the fact that they were drunk. It wouldn't do with the new class of people the neighborhood was attracting during the day. People no longer held conversations through windows or shouting up to the fifth floor, either. The seedy dives serving a variety of delicious foods from Surinaam, where it had almost always been possible to carry on an hour long conversation with the woman behind the counter (regardless of how many customers she had) were bought up, the walls knocked down, and replaced by La Place cafeteria. The food was probably healthier and the kitchen more sanitary, but you were in and out within a half hour, and if not a curiously shy seventeen year old kid with spiky hair and a silly green uniform would start to hover about the table like a vulture. Yes, the relaxed atmosphere vanished, and with it a great deal of the ethnic diversity that once made the neighborhood so attractive to Henk. He moved away not long after all the work was completed to a smaller, more expensive apartment further away from the center of the city.

The building where he used to live had been built more than eighty years before by one of Amsterdam's most famous architects. It was a rather ugly building, very solid looking, made entirely of unadorned red brick and deeply set windows. The architect Berlage had incorporated some three- dimensional designs into the shell of the building, but by and large its architectural value lay more in the fact that it had been built at all. The original inhabitants were ordinary workers, at a time when few people of substance anywhere thought much about the lives of the people who labored in their factories and on their wharves, and whose blood and sweat earned them their fortunes.

The apartments themselves were brilliantly simple and wholesome. Henk's was on the ground floor, which was very convenient considering that he was fat. There was another advantage to living on the ground floor, which was of course the rectangular courtyard in the very center of the building. All the apartments on the ground floor had a small space in front of their bedroom windows paved with cement. And there was a lovely garden shared by all the residents that had access to it, with limber, twisting trees and bushes and flowers of differing hues and seasons. Some of the neighbors had children, or grandchildren that would come and visit, and it was not rare for Henk to wake up on Sundays - perhaps a bit earlier than he would have liked - to the delightful squeals that seemed to bubble up happily outside his window. Everyone had windows in his bedroom, but only the inhabitants of the ground floor apartments could eat outside. Henk rarely did, though, because he was embarrassed about his habits.

Henk was never able to determine exactly who kept the two cats that came to visit him. He was a shy man, you see, and if he ever managed to see anyone looking out their windows at him through the greenery or standing in the garden, he would quickly look away or retreat into the living room. It was the only room that looked out over the street. One of the cats was very small and thin, very shy, with a tiny head. Her name was Dina, and it was a long time after the fat one took to squeezing through the kitchen window that he was able to coax her inside. Oh, sure, there were times when he would come home and open the door and she would be frozen in the center of the living room floor staring at him as if caught in the act. But she'd run away as soon as he moved, darting between his legs and onto the washing machine next to the kitchen window and then she'd be gone amongst the shrubbery. If was difficult to say if Dina was black with white splotches or white with black splotches, but whatever it was she couldn't have looked - or behaved, for that matter - more differently than Fatty Lumpkin.

Fatty Lumpkin (his proper name was Bommel) was just plain fat, with a big head and an insolent stare. A big red brute with orange stripes who tormented some of the other cats who lodged in the building. He was the only one as far as Henk knew with front claws. Fatty didn't like to be touched much unless he asked for it, which was too bad because his fur was so warm and soft. He would never leap into Henk's lap, and even when he occasionally did rub against his foot he would then creep away as if he hadn't intended to. Henk never knew what to make of it, but he did know that Fatty Lumpkin's chief reason for coming into his apartment was to sit on the windowsill and watch what was going on in the street outside. Fatty Lumpkin was never allowed outside the confines of the building, you see, and it was a source of consternation to him. He would sit on the windowsill and try and peer through the blinds which Henk always kept closed. Fatty would look at him, and Henk knew that he was supposed to lift them. It was only when the cat was perched on the sill that Henk was allowed to pet him, and then only his ears and his back. Sometimes Fatty forgot himself and would turn his belly up, but Henk knew better than to try and touch him there. Fatty would get confused, you see, and forget himself and his front claws.

One evening just as the sun was going down, Henk was standing at the sink in his bedroom. There was a window to his left, but as it afforded such a public view of himself - and usually at a time when he appreciated his privacy - the shades were drawn. But the window was open as it was almost every day of the year (Henk believed in a constant flow of fresh air, even in the winter), and the shades could not obscure the noise of two cats fighting in the garden. Vicious, too, from the sound of it.

Drawing the curtain cautiously aside, he caught sight of Fatty Lumpkin tormenting a slender white cat just outside his window. He could have leaned out (if he wasn't so fat) and with difficulty cuffed the ears of the attacker, but in an instant he knew he couldn't bring himself to hurt Mr. Lumpkin, not even if he was being bad. Besides, it wasn't his cat, although another part of him knew even as he stood watching, riveted, that the fact that it was taking place under his nose imposed a certain position of responsibility upon him. But the real reason was that he was intensely curious. He was proud of Mr. Lumpkin, too, and wanted to see him emerge from the confrontation victorious.

It wasn't until she was staring at him that he realized the keeper of the white cat had finally come to put an end to the injustice. He didn't know that she was the cat's keeper except for the scum of ice that sat over the look with which she fixed him. Ashamed, Henk slid out of view and backed into the living room. He hadn't closed the door, though, and the square of light through the curtain of the bedroom window seemed to accuse him. Henk stood with his mouth slightly open, rubbing his tummy earnestly, trying to talk himself out of his guilt. It was at that moment that he heard a squeal. This time, it was not out of delight nor from the mouth of a small child. That was a cat, and it had been a yelp, not a squeal. There were heavy footsteps outside, but they receded.

Henk could easily guess what had happened. What surprised him is that Fatty hadn't come to him after whatever act of violence the woman had perpetrated against him. In fact, it is truer to say that he was hurt by it, since he imagined that it would have proven some small devotion the cat had for him. Alas, he was grasping for love wherever he could, and it was a blow to find that he could not even count on it there. But stand up tall, he told himself, and he did. A true man is a man of spirit and not of brawn. Or so he believed.

The curtain was covering the window. Of course, that's why Fatty hadn't leaped through it. He always had to part it for him whenever he looked like he wanted to jump out.

A brief image of the woman crouching outside his window with fire in her eyes, waiting for him to stick his head out so she could let him have a firm piece of her mind. And she probably wouldn't keep her voice down, he remarked to himself uneasily. But he knew it was just a taste of paranoia. If she was outside the window, he'd apologize to her like she deserved. And if she couldn't accept that, it would be her problem.

The courtyard was deserted. The trees were calm but imposing black sentinels in the peaceful twilight, exaggerated by the enclosing walls. Arms outstretched, heads turned on high, their crisp stillness echoed loudly of something distinctly profound, but nevertheless effortlessly evasive. The groomed lines of bushes, badly in need of a good snipping, that encased the cemented plots of ground outside the apartment doors were smudges of black in which only the faintest hints of anything resembling green could be seen. All were empty but of garden chairs, some purple and some brown, and some of which held an innocent puddle of electric blue water. The deep red, brick walls of the building rose straight up above him, an open container of rich summer air, and suddenly there was the sky, so carefully etched in its frame. The deepening colors were fantastic. Scattered rays of a dying sun, somewhere far off and distant and not at all to be seen or the location of which to be guessed at, wreaked havoc on the gigantic wads of cloud that pranced from one end to the other in wispy gaggles. The soft underbellies were dazzling and delicate. In them the intricate cotton folds shown gently and looked to be good enough to eat. As if taking a great bite out of them would produce the richest cake with the most luscious frosting. The swirls and bright dabs of orange and white were playing across a serenely throbbing blue stage. The sky seemed to be emptying from one end. The clouds were marching towards certain doom.

But more importantly, Fatty Lumpkin was not to be seen. The courtyard was deserted, yes, but even so Henk's eyes were drawn towards the guilty-looking open window to his right. No curtain or shade obstructed the grand entranceway to his neighbor's apartment. His neighbor! How could fate have been so cruel? The poor cat, trapped there amid the keepings of that foul mouthed man. Henk could hear him sometimes late at night during the weekends (and sometimes during the week) singing drunkenly. It was always the same tuneless melody. It was loudest when he was standing in the toilet taking a leak. The echoes were carried by the pipes, or promulgated by some other structural characteristic of the building, and seemed to be stretched out and magnified. Instead of a man singing drunkenly he heard a chorus of distant men, chanting dolefully through wet socks.

Still, he suspected his neighbor wasn't home. The lights were off, for one thing. And the man detested the cats as it was. No, if Fatty Lumpkin had taken refuge in the apartment next door, then he had found a welcome and fresh environment to explore. Henk found himself praying that Mr. Lumpkin didn't decide to spray for mates while he was there. If he was there. Yes, he had to remind himself of that possibility. But, really, if he wasn't then everything was honky-dory and he'd have a sympathetic word with Mr. Lumpkin the next time he dropped by, end of story. Even so, he found himself wondering into which of the other apartments he would have escaped. His own? It was the most likely, but Henk often chose to picture himself as a systematic victim, even of cats. In fact, he preferred to be the victim, in any situation. It was a familiar role for him, one he was comfortable with. And he had found over the years that it could prove quite an effective position for getting what he wanted. In the end, of course.

Despite himself, Henk yanked his head back inside, walked to the garden door next to the window, and pulled the levers at the top and the bottom. The door itself didn't close very well. As soon as it was released of the latches, it popped open, but its progress was halted by the overgrown shrubbery just outside. Henk tried to remember to clip the bushes during the summer and fall months, but he didn't like to do it and found a variety of excuses to avoid it whenever the opportunity presented itself. Like now. He pushed the door past the bushes and stepped out on the concrete. The light was quickly ebbing from the sky. The garden was filling with more and more shadows. Henk hardly noticed. He was looking about to see if anyone was watching, even in the upper stories, what he was about to do. Which was, naturally, to go over to his neighbor's window and see what he could find out. Because if Fatty Lumpkin had made his way in there, he would have to be coaxed out before the proper tenant came home. Otherwise there would be a lot of explaining to do, and Mr. Lumpkin might be treated to yet a second thrashing. That eventuality had to be avoided at all costs.

Brave, brave Henk. He was such a fat man, and in a country where to be fat was not only considered in incredibly poor taste, but broke a variety of unspoken social fiats as well. The Dutch are an incredibly sober people, and they have the fine sense to understand that ostentation is a disgusting fault. But they also despise waste and waist, if you take my meaning, because any manner of such gross self-indulgence will leave its mark. Henk had a glandular problem, but he couldn't very well wear a sign about that said it. Anyway, most people just nodded their heads silently at him when he mentioned it. Still, he was very sensitive of his weight. Many people looked at him in the tram or the train and especially when he was riding his bicycle. The sight must have provided the public with quite a spectacle. He would often catch sight of other people looking at each other, but they were usually much more handsome and slim, and the looks they exchanged were quite different.

The eyes in the back of his head were screaming at him that the whole building had come to their windows to see. Still, he refused to heed the call. He stood now before his neighbor's window. It was open about fifteen centimeters. Behind it was the inky darkness. The panes of glass reflected the swirling shadows of the evening. There was nothing left to do but open the window and stick his head inside, so he did. He hoped that his neighbor wasn't lying in bed masturbating, or engaged in some other private activity, and thank goodness he wasn't.

Henk found himself leaning across what looked to be the top of a wooden chest of drawers. That was the first thing he noticed. The second was the smell. Not because it was pungent or offensive, but probably because his eyes weren't as yet much use in the darkness. It was the faint but musty scent of another human being, trapped and ingrained in the bedding. It was at this moment that Henk truly felt he was invading someone else's home.

Not that he could see much of it. The canopied bed with its gossamer curtains, the wall hangings, the smallish, round rug lodged between the bed and the closed doorway, the sink with its adornments and all the paraphernalia gathered customarily about it - all these things were just ominous shadows lurking quietly in the soupy dimness. All the normal trappings of a bedroom caught in repose, in timeless stillness, awaiting the moment when the door would open and the light would turn on and then, yes then, life could continue.

Bommel was nowhere to be seen. Henk blinked his eyes and tried again. Perhaps his deep orange stripes had melted in to the background. That smudge in front of the bed, was it really a rug? Alas, it was. Ah, the bed! There was ample space enough, and Fatty Lumpkin was a very curious individual. Henk waited to see if he would emerge. The silence echoed in his ears. His eyes wandered the room absently, searching for more places where the cat could have got in to. Distantly, drumming, in the tranquil, airy spaces of his mind, Henk was wondering if indeed the cat had come in here at all. This had been the only open window. And he had heard him sprint in the neighbor's direction after that sudden squeal. Had he though? Had he really?

That was when he noticed that the door had tricked him. It wasn't closed. Oh, no, there was a thin wedge of grainy darkness there between the frame and the door itself, very small and easily overlooked, but wide enough, yes, wide enough even for a fat, insolent cat. Henk decided he should push himself through the window and investigate. But as quickly as possible! He didn't want to have any uncomfortable explaining to do. But to his astonishment, he found that he couldn't even as much as budge. Something terribly formidable and strong was holding him tightly by the lovehandles, something with wide, icy fingers, unflinchingly hostile. Try as he might, it would not give. For a moment he panicked. A wretched yelp tore past his lips. But as he only began to hurt himself, he stopped struggling and thought it might be best to examine the situation calmly. He had just leaned in the window and had a look about. Or had he? Actually, he seemed to remember wiggling in the window. Or hadn't I mentioned that? Perhaps it is because the awareness was lost among Henk's intense concern for finding Mr. Lumpkin and not getting caught doing it. Yes, he had been forced to thrust and squeeze and force himself through that open window, because the damned thing - well, he couldn't remember getting it to open farther than half a meter. He hadn't thought much of it.

Henk was rather fat, you see. Oh, I know, I mentioned it before, but perhaps because he's European you might have pictured Henk to be a little less robust than he actually was. You know, someone who likes to eat frites swimming in mayonnaise a bit too often. It's Americans who are always grotesquely fat. But Henk, he drew eyes. I think I already told you that. Remember? Riding along on his bicycle? Henk's weight was distributed fairly evenly over the vast, stout roundness of his hormone-deprived body. He was what you might have called a "tanker". In fact, he had heard some English tourists use that term in reference to him several different times. Different tourists, of course. Yes, even the English can be unoriginal. But Henk looked more like a sweaty German sausage than a truck, with a head much too small stuck on the top and four stiff appendages protruding at the proper angles.

So there was Henk, sprawled across the top of his neighbor's chest of drawers and his ass filling up the space outside his bedroom window. Like two great big balloons stuck in his pants, trying to suck him up into the open space above the rooftop, and Henk himself wedged in the window trying desperately to maintain some grasp on earth. It was a battle that from behind he looked destined to lose. The light ebbed from the sky and died altogether while he attempted a myriad of methods and techniques for dislodging himself. Alas, to no avail. All his valiant struggling had earned him was a wedgie. Deep, deep into the crack of his ass his pants had snuck, and now that he was resting the fact couldn't cease to annoy him. His arms would not fit back through the window, and perhaps that was a good thing. So he would have to live with it, ignore it, put it out of his mind while he thought of something else.

Like the returning neighbor. Boom, crash, slam! A light turned on somewhere outside the door. Henk looked up, petrified. Shit, shit! The word was deflected about inside his skull, ricocheting back and forth like a bouncing bullet. A stream of imagery accompanied it. The strongest emotion associated with it was embarrassment, a deep, bitter shame that he would never be able to avoid because he lived next to this man. How would he explain it? Fatty Lumpkin! Perhaps he's exploring the living room and he'll be discovered.

Henk held his breath and listened. He waited. He heard his neighbor dropping things about here and there, on surfaces soft and hard and muffled. The out-of-key strains of some tune came to him slyly, evasively, as if trying to avoid his ears. And suddenly, words! "That's the way uh-huh uh-huh I like it." Despite his predicament, Henk smiled. The song brought back memories.

"Could you hold this for a moment?" The words hit him like a battering ram. Shocked, disturbed from his reverie, Henk realized first that the lights were on, and then that someone - yes, someone! - was standing in front of him. A deep shadow had fallen across his line of vision. "C'mon, take it, I don't want to damage the flowers any more than I already have."

Henk, as if shaken from a deep sleep, looked sharply up. Part of his mind was trying to refuse to believe this was actually happening, as if the sheer force of his will might still have some immediate and direct effect on reality. The man standing in front of him, the dark suit, the red tie, the splotch of dirty blond hair that was neatly perched atop his bloated face, the excellent posture, the white skin, the smirk - all these things were noticed in an instant, absorbed, and momentarily discarded. All of Henk's attention was fixed upon the two blue and white striped Albert Heijn shopping bags that were thrust out towards him. They were almost all he could see. The bags were barely suspended from the extremities of two fingers, the tips of which were very red and raw looking. Balanced precariously in the man's arms was a ski bag. Two meters long, one of its ends was protruding far more than its share to the right and was almost touching the wall. Henk's neighbor was standing tilted to the left to make up for the weight. Resting along the top of the ski bag were a few smaller items, including some flowers freshly wrapped in clear plastic.

Not sure what else to do, Henk reached out an arm and grabbed one of the bags.

"No, both of them. Please?"

Henk did as he was asked. "What would you have done if I wasn't here?" he grumbled as the man rushed towards his bed and unloaded his cargo onto the mattress. He wasn't very happy with the situation as it was. His neighbor's nonchalance seemed to be his own way of making fun of him.

"Well," answered the man, turning around and looking at him squarely, "you are here."

"Did you happen to see an orange cat when you came in?"

"I don't have a cat," answered the man. He leaned down and started to rummage through his new belongings. Occasionally, he would pick one up, look at very intently, as if waiting for it to tell him where it was supposed to go, and then put it back down again.

"Yes, I know. It's why I'm here. You see -"

"Aren't you my neighbor?"

"I'm stuck!"

The man looked at him for a moment, as if studying him. It was a look of such mockery as Henk usually only knew in the faces of the prettiest teenagers. "Are you enjoying this?"

Henk nearly shrieked with rage. His hands opened and closed, his breath would have come harder were it not for the clamp around his chest. "Has this happened to you before?"

The man leaned down and picked up the flowers. Standing half- turned, adjusting the arrangement with one of his hands, he answered, "No. You?"

"No! And will you stop making fun of me and help me out of this ridiculous situation?"

Henk's neighbor did look at him then. Only for an instant, though. "No," he answered, and before Henk was able to make sense of the answer, he was moving across the floor and out the door and now he was gone into the hallway.

No?! Henk was alone once again. He panted, staring at the blue-grey rug between the bed and the door, and took a moment to think before opening his mouth again. And in that instant he realized that he was not angry at all. He was, in fact, quite pleased that his neighbor wasn't upset at his usual intrusion. He found it a bit odd the way he had answered, but then again, Henk thought he understood. The man was just taking advantage of an amusing situation. He would get his fill of entertainment and then set him happily on his way. And Henk, well, he only had an empty apartment and a scarce agenda to go back to. Besides, Henk was more than a little curious about this man whose leery verses kept him up at night. But he also decided not to let on just yet that he wasn't angry. It might win him a small advantage. "Hey," he shouted, "what am I supposed to do with these?" He shook the bags as best he could. They rattled loudly.

"Just hold them for a moment!" his neighbor called from someplace far-away sounding. "And be careful! There's glass in there!" A brief pause and heavy footsteps. He had entered the adjacent room. "You want some coffee?"

"Ja, lekker!" shouted Henk, and then he chastised himself for sounding so merry.

There came then the sounds of heavy objects clanging together, and many smaller, lighter objects being picked up and put down again on a hard surface. Clicking and clanging and the creaking of wooden cupboards and the striking of a match. These were the crisp, urgent sounds of the kitchen. They came through the doorway, but also from outside through the window. It seems that even Henk's formidable abdomen wasn't enough to block out all light and sound.

Henk took a moment to look about the room now that there was light. It wasn't very remarkable. There was more color, of course, and that made the wall hangings in particular more attractive. There were the typical artistic designs, and the football posters of his favorite teams, a print of a map of Amsterdam from the seventeenth century - Holland's Golden Age - and a Van Gogh. It was The Potato Eaters. Looking at it, Henk thought it didn't seem much different in the light than in the dark. But he had overlooked the desk in the corner to his right. It was hard for him to look in that direction because of the angle at which he body protruded from the window, but on it he could see a computer and at the other end a fairly expensive stereo with several components stacked one atop the other. The faces looked to be made of plastic and were silent, black, unresponsive.

From the CD cases he saw lying scattered about, he could see that apart from the usual collection of dance mixes, his neighbor had quite a taste for American and British rock 'n roll from the sixties and seventies. Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, The Rolling Stones, these were all amply represented. But there was also Deep Purple, and Donnovan, and Janis Joplin, and Alice In Chains, and wasn't that the cover of one of Guar's albums? Weren't they the ones that carried on with those big penises? But it was hard to tell from so far away, even with the light on. But that most certainly was the Thrill Kill Kult. Their Confessions. And Skinny Puppy? Henk had never heard of that before. Joy Division? Well, sure, but Henk didn't know anyone who listened to them anymore. Or The Stone Roses. Henk had a few of their albums when he was a kid, but he had hid them away. Beethoven's Ninth was tossed in the corner, and next to it some violin concerto's of the elder Bach. But open, on top of the highest layer of the stereo itself, upside down, was the square plastic album cover with a man's very familiar, very unexpected face -

"Howlin' Wolf?" The words had just slipped out. How could he?

The herrie in the kitchen had ceased. There were footsteps in the corridor outside and now the door was pushed open and in stepped - well, his neighbor. He was stone-faced and carrying a wooden tray with low handles. On it were two cups of steaming coffee, sugar cubes and tiny spoons resting across the saucers, a small metal container with that special coffee milk you can leave standing out for weeks and that you had better not sniff, and a plate of some kind of sweet biscuits. "What?" he said as he came to a halt just a meter from the chest of drawers where Henk was trapped.

Henk was staring at his neighbor with a vaguely bewildered but accusing look. "You like Howlin' Wolf," he stated coldly.

Henk's neighbor shrugged indifferently. "From time to time."

Henk just looked at him. He couldn't bring himself to say anything, because he knew there was nothing he could say, or wanted to say. After all, no one he knew had ever heard of Howlin' Wolf. Well, he purposely avoided asking. But he certainly hadn't heard him playing at random anywhere in years. Years and years and years. And now, after all this time, here's a man living ten meters away listening to the same dusty chords, probably at the same fucking time. It was his pain.

"Are you surprised?"

"No," Henk replied, shying away from the challenge. He was in damage control mode now. "I just never heard it coming through the walls. That's all."

"You hear all my music?"

Henk tried to shrug but found it surprisingly uncomfortable. "I guess not."

The man leaned down and pulled one of the top drawers of the chest open. It extended out in front of Henk's face into the gulf of air between himself and the rest of the room. It created a large and sturdy enough surface for the saucer with its cup to be placed. A few lonely biscuits and a trail of crumbs found their way next to the cup. Henk asked him to put one cube of sugar in (no milk) and to stir the coffee with three (and precisely three) rapid circular motions of the little spoon.

"What's your name?" Henk asked after his neighbor had sat down on the bed and placed the tray beside him.

"Anton," the man said energetically, and such a smile invaded his face that for an instant he looked like a skeleton in a Rumanian circus, calling out to the alarmed guests. The smile was genuine, as was the inability to understand why they were all shrieking and trying to flee.

Anton, Henk repeated to himself. He thought he should have remembered something. But, no, the man sitting on the bed in this room with the mustard colored wallpaper was just a man, and his name was Anton. "I'm Henk," he intoned, hoping at the same time that the smile would evaporate from Anton's wide face. He extended an arm out into the open air. Hestitating only a moment, Anton stood up and bridged the gap. They shook hands.

"So, Anton," Henk asked after a moment, biting lightly into a biscuit.

"Do you have any intention of helping me out of this window?" At that, he tried to redistribute the weight between his legs because his ass, well, the deep tingling and prickling sensation was fading away into pure numbness.

Anton studied him for an instant. "Well, now, you can't stay there forever. If you're lucky someone will find you before tomorrow."

Henk chuckled nervously. "Well, at least I'm not alone."

Anton didn't reply. He hadn't said it, but he was in fact in the grips of a sadistic impulse to keep him trapped there. Because that man - this fat, ugly man - was relatively unperturbed at his condition. Well, at least he was far less upset than Anton thought he deserved to be. It was a plain, obvious fact. How could that be? What secret did he possess that Anton did not? His days were filled with high, towering crests and lost, dismal valleys. What he said was this: "You're too smug."

Henk grunted and looked away. The steam from his little cup of coffee rose before his eyes. Twisting as much as he could, he managed to snake a hand forward, clasp the handle, and bring it to his mouth without spilling any. "I think I understand," he said. "Thanks for the coffee, by the way."

Anton did not reply. He thought he understood, he repeated to himself. Bah! He had met people like this before. They think they know everything and keep it to themselves. That way, they can pretend they have a secret reservoir of wisdom. An illusion, he thought bitterly to himself, because by keeping it to themselves they avoid the trials of reality. "I've got an appointment tonight," Anton told him soberly. "With a girl."

Henk looked up. "Oh, I see. So I guess I will be stuck here by myself for a while." His thoughts returned to the chances of being spotted by neighbors. His voice could no longer penetrate the window, but perhaps if he farted loud enough... Inwardly, he shook his head, trying to dispel the silly thoughts. They shuddered like cobwebs inside his brain. But he loved those silly thoughts.

"Actually, she's coming over here. I can't say what will happen, but there's a fairly good chance we'll stay in. I rented a movie." Anton picked up one of the packages next to him.

It was at this moment that Henk realized he had to piss. He wondered distantly if the fact was the result of a suggestion. For some reason, going to the movies always reminded him of pissing. "Ah - "

"Oh, don't worry," Anton continued. "If we leave, I'll arrange somehow to get you out of here."

Why not now? Henk thought to himself, and wondered how he was going to relieve his bladder.

They sat together a long moment in silence. Henk wriggled. The pressure below his belly was not particularly great, but it seemed all the more urgent because he wasn't in a position to relieve it. Anton nibbled a cookie, looking off deeply somewhere beneath the floor. "Do you think it was a good idea to rent a movie? I should have rented two or three, just in case. I mean, she might not like this one."

Henk greeted the question with disdain. If he had been capable of shrugging, he would have. As it was, it was difficult to scratch his nose. "How the hell should I know?" Indeed! The last time he had a girl in his bedroom, or been in girl's bedroom, was before he had moved to the Indische Buurt.

"I'm not going to mention them. It might be too presumptuous, you know? But if she asks, or wants to stay in, then they're there."

"Great," Henk mumbled. He really didn't want to be talking about this.

Anton sensed it and glanced quickly at Henk. He could taste the resistance. It only made him want to pursue the conversation. He pounced on the opportunity like a cat on prey, muscles flexed and lathered with tension. But he kept his outward demeanor as calm and nonchalant as he could, studying Henk from behind a darkened window, as it were. "She's a real special girl. Don't want to ruin it or anything. Can you hear anything else in your apartment besides music?"

The grin on Anton's face appeared lecherous to Henk. But he did the best he could. "No," he said. But he lied. "Listen, I have to go to the - "

"Second time we're getting together."

Henk, resigned, let his chin rest on the top of the chest of drawers. One hand hung limply over the edge, dangling over the extended drawer upon which the remains of his coffee and biscuits lay piled. Anton was still leisurely sipping his. "I've tried internet dating a couple of times. I can't play that game I catch a glimpse of now and again, on the tram or crossing the street or in the kroeg. I'll bet you play it." You're not so bad looking, he thought to himself. "Where'd you meet her, anyway? In a disco? At the Albert Heijn? I've heard the Albert Heijn is a great place. Anyway, it's not for me."

Anton was nodding his head.

"So I tried it over the internet. Still do. I figure it's the best shot I have for meeting people genuinely interested in me." Now it was Henk's turn to grin lecherously. "You ever try it over the internet?"

Anton didn't respond immediately. He was looking straight into Henk's eyes, one of his legs tucked neatly over the other and bouncing and trouncing the carpet. A thickened hand gripped the coffee cup from the very bottom. But after a moment, Anton suggested, "I'll bet you like science fiction. Read those kind of books. One of my housemates at university used to read them all the time..."

"Which university?"

"Leiden," Anton responded off-hand, still trying to recall the particular science fiction author he had heard of.

"Were you in a vereniging?"

"Of course. Minerva."

Henk smiled. "I shouldn't have asked," he said dryly.

"Why?"

"Doesn't matter."

Anton made a face. "Philip Q. Asimov, or something like that," he announced finally, and with some relief.

Henk laughed. "You got them mixed up. There was Philip K. Dick. And there was also Isaac Asimov. And there were lots more. But the greats are all gone. Science fiction was a product of the new physics, and now the new physics is, well, not so new."

Anton smirked. "Whatever. I've tried reading that stuff before, but it puts me to sleep. Give me something real, something I can work with."

"Like what?"

"Like Veronica!"

Henk snorted. "That trash? It's just hype and pictures of pretty people and what Britney Spears likes to eat for dinner."

"Well, I'm interested in what Britney Spears puts in her mouth." For a fraction of a second, they stared at each other. From the tone of his voice Henk wasn't sure how to take him. But then Anton's face widened and all of a sudden they both burst out laughing. It was a good moment.

"So what do you do?" Anton asked after they had fallen into another bout of silence. He had finished his coffee and put it down on the floor in front of him.

"I work at the foreigner's police."

"You're a civil servant?"

"Private industry always laughs at us. But we're actually doing something useful. You guys are just after cash."

"We're all after cash," Anton said pointedly and stood up.

"You know what I mean. What do you do?"

Anton began to strip off his suit. He kicked his shoes into the corner and began unbuttoning his shirt. "I'm a salesman for World Online. E- business unit."

"Oh. So you're in it for the money and the status, eh?"

Anton tossed an icy glance at Henk. The usual reaction was grudging respect, or even carefully hidden jealousy. Anton was very good at recognizing carefully hidden emotions. Coming from a Germanic culture, he was constantly trying to hide his own. "I like what I do."

Henk didn't seem to have heard. "See, that's a perfect example. All these people running about in suits talking shit and selling each other air. I mean, what's all this e-crap anyway? E-billing, e-commerce."

"It's the new economy," Anton interjected.

Henk snorted. "The virtual economy is more like it."

"Maybe you should take a look."

"I don't want to buy anything on the internet. Well, some things, like books and CD's, but certainly not clothes! And I still like to go to the bookstore and the music store."

"See," Anton said, "you're human. You like the people." But Henk was on a roll. "I don't even want to use those stupid search engines because every time I look for something all I get is some company trying to get me to type in my credit card."

"You don't get it, do you?" The shirt had come off. Anton had a slight scum of light hair in the center of his chest that stretched down to his bellybutton. His stomach was rich and happy with its beer-heavy diet. "It's a revolution."

Henk couldn't help but laugh. "What revolution? E-mail is the only useful thing I've heard about, and they had that ten years ago."

"And pornography, Henk." Anton couldn't help but smile. It was a condescending smile, one that accused him of having only pictures of pretty women and men for company each night. Not that Anton didn't enjoy pornography. In fact, it was one of the most useful tools these days in his business unit. "You can't forget pornography."

But Henk didn't like talking to others about the pornography he liked to look at. He just fell silent and looked at the floor. He felt he hadn't really said what he wanted to say. It was like shouting at everyone that the sky was really blue. If there are enough of them running about telling you, no, that it's green, after a while you'll start to wonder.

"They had email a lot longer ago than that," Anton said finally. "Listen, cheer up. You just got to have patience. Right now there's a lot of companies trying to recover their investments. But the internet has a lot of potential. Most of the money is in B-to-B, so people like you wouldn't notice what's really going on." Anton smiled to himself. He felt that his response was appropriately confusing.

"World OnLine? I think that's the perfect example of the greed. In the end, Nina Brink was just a greedy wench. Her career - it had nothing to do with anything more than money."

"What else do you expect it to have to do with? You don't go to work because you enjoy it, even if you do. You go to score points." Anton had had this conversation before, and frankly he was getting tired of it.

"I absolutely do not agree. What about trying to do something useful?"

"Oh, and what I'm doing isn't useful? Working at the foreigner's police is?"

"Absolutely. And I can make people happy. Really happy."

"And really miserable. Look, haven't you ever wanted to just go off somewhere for months at a time? Thailand, India, South America? If you are independently wealthy, you can do things like that. No one can tell you what to do." Anton's blood was racing now. He stood, frozen in the process of unbuttoning his pants.

"Not really. Everytime I go somewhere, I feel uncomfortable and out of place."

"Where you been?"

"Well, last time it was to France."

"Camping?"

"Of course."

"Who'd you go with?"

"Oh, some friends."

Anton smiled and pulled his pants down. His boxers were white with red stripes and looked to be quite old. "From the office," he suggested. He couldn't keep the smile from his face. "Is that what you call the place where you have your two hour lunches?"

Henk ignored the comment. "I guess in the end the economy is about spending money. It doesn't really matter what on, or if it actually has any value. Just that the money changes hands." Henk stopped and appeared thoughtful. Anton, in his boxers and socks, had approached the sink and was brushing his teeth. "I forgot where I saw it, but it was on TV. I think it was CNN. Anyway, there was this guy and he was talking about the 20's, and about how in that decade the telephone and the automobile - amazing new inventions at the time - were finally making it to real people. It was a revolution that changed the way we thought. I mean, before you pretty much had to be able to see someone to talk to them." Henk shook his head in wonder. "Well, you know where that led to."

Anton frowned into the mirror and spat. "What are you saying?" he demanded, a long, obstinate line of drool dropping from his bottom lip into the sink. "That the telephone caused the depression?"

"I'm not sure. But that guy was saying that the excitement that caused the stock market to rocket up so high was generated by the automobile and the telephone."

"And so the same thing's going on now with computers?"

Henk didn't respond. His head rested on top of the chest of drawers and he was watching Anton wipe his mouth.

Anton turned around and laughed again. How he was enjoying this! "There are a lot of people who want to spoil a good time. You're just jealous. I like the challenges. I don't care about Nina Brink. And there's nothing wrong with money. Lots of money! As long as you don't let it get to you."

To a degree, Henk agreed, but he couldn't let that on. Working at the foreigner's police didn't pay nearly as well as he would have liked, but then again he didn't have to work overtime, he got plenty of vacation, and there was virtually no risk of losing his job, whatever the economic outlook. Perhaps most importantly, his boss was required to treat him with some decent amount of respect.

Henk lay in silence, wondering how he was going to keep himself from pissing his pants. The thought sparked a brief flash of anger, but after it had flooded through him it dissipated. Anton, for his part, got quickly dressed. He sprayed some cologne on his body and began digging through his wardrobe. Every once in a while, he would scratch his ass. Henk couldn't help but notice because it was a freedom that at the moment he was not permitted. In the end, Anton chose some kind of red, synthetic looking pants with no pockets, a thin, tight-fitting black shirt with no collar, and a jacket that extended below his waist. He greased his hair up, too, and pushed it back with a comb. "Did you say something about a cat?" he asked suddenly as he put the final touches on.

Henk was disturbed out of another reverie. "Huh?"

"I hate cats. Did you say there's a cat in here?"

"How can you hate cats?" Henk demanded incredulously.

"Sneaky bastards. Always looking at you like they know something you don't."

"That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard."

"No it isn't. So, is there really a cat in here or did you come climbing in my window looking for something else?"

Henk swallowed. Of course, he knew why he had tried to climb through the window. But somehow, for some reason, he could imagine a parallel universe where there had been no cat but he was stuck in the window nonetheless. Which was this? Surely, Anton wouldn't know the difference. In fact, if Fatty Lumpkin was in his apartment surely they would have noticed by now. His absence - at least in Henk's mind - diminished the believability of his story. It was a hopeless situation, this being caught between parallel universes. He wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

Anton spun around crisply, as if presenting himself. "Well?" he asked, putting his hands on his hips.

The doorbell rang. Henk started and glanced towards the door to the bedroom. Anton smiled and turned back towards the mirror to dust himself off. "Finally," he remarked contentedly to no one in particular.

But Henk was feeling sorry for himself. "What am I supposed to do now?"

Anton shrugged. "If we go out, I'll knock on the neighbor's door and get him to help you out."

What if he has the same sense of humor as you do, thought Henk. What he said was: "And if you stay in?"

"Then you've got nothing to worry about."

"But I've got to go to the -" But poor Henk. He already knew that Anton would never find out about where he had to go.

"Sorry, gotta go." Anton was moving rapidly towards the door.

"Can you leave the lights on?" Henk asked, his mind scrambling for last minute requests.

"Sure."

"Can you bring me something to eat?"

"No."

"Not even chips?"

"No."

"Where did you meet her, anyway?"

"Huh?" Anton paused by the door and looked back at Henk, stopped up in his window.

"Where did you meet her?"

There was only a moment's hesitation. "The internet," Anton told him, at the same time thrusting the door open.

"But you said you didn't -"

"I never said that," Anton, the consummate salesman, interrupted, and then he had pushed himself through. Henk was all alone.

Henk was trying not to listen to them laughing and giggling in the living room. He was, in fact, quite consumed by jealousy, but as long as he didn't concentrate on the muffled voices he was able to prevent it from squeezing any hardened resolutions out of him. How many times had he thrust his life in a new direction out of bitterness and frustration? How many times had jealousy finally propelled him into taking the rash steps that led to some new theater of ridicule? Actually, sometimes the results had been favorable, but no matter what the outcome he knew that to act out of bitterness was to pile heavy stones upon the spirit. He had seen many older people who were just walking heaps of stones, frigid, rigid, unbending, ready to snap. They walked lecherously, zombie-like, in their own tiny little worlds, occasionally banging up against someone else's tiny little world and not liking it one tiny little bit. Henk didn't want to become like that.

Still, it was hard not to try and listen. Perhaps it was because the voices were just barely audible. Murmurs, rising and falling, the occasional stressed syllable slipping through. Those tones often said more than words. He may not have been able to hear what they were saying, but he could hear that she was purring, and that he was reacting properly distant. It's their second time, Henk thought to himself.

To shake himself from this torturous situation, Henk thought about something else that made him miserable. His bladder. Oh, how it ached! If only he could squeeze a hand through the window he would be able to unbutton his pants and then oh so sweet relief.

Actually, that's not a bad idea, Henk thought. But he wasn't sure if it would work. Cranking his head around, he saw that the only sufficient space was in the upper corners. That was hardly useful, even if his arm had been able to bend at that awkward angle. Still, any space scrunched at the very top of the window could be transferred to the bottom. It was only a matter of lifting himself up. And he was in a pretty good position to do that if he used the heavy chest of drawers as leverage.

The problem was that Henk was not lying exactly flat. He had been too wide for the window, and the only possible way to wedge his shoulders through had been to twist himself diagonally. If only he had stayed diagonal! Unfortunately, after his shoulders were through he had found it easier to try and lie flat. He hadn't been quite successful, but he hadn't entirely failed, either. The result was that he was lying in quite an uncomfortable position, a situation he should have remarked more closely had his aching bladder not taken precedence.

The end result was that it was not possible for him to lift himself anywhere. But in trying he did notice that a small space in the lower left corner opened tantalizingly if he shifted and twisted in a certain way. He wasn't sure if it was space enough, but what would be the harm in trying?

Of course, there was a harm in trying. An unforeseen and dangerous harm. This is what happened: Henk used all his strength to create as much of a space as he could. This involved much huffing and puffing and quite a few funny faces. It required, in fact, quite an exertion on his part, because the space never seemed to be quite wide enough for him to get his thumb through. No matter how hard he pushed (and he was pushing quite hard!), the space would open no more than a handful of centimeters. Realizing that his strength was about to run out, in a desperate bid to steal victory Henk tried to shove his hand through, praying that somehow he could force it.

It seemed for a moment that he would succeed, but his knuckles were still catching the window frame. And then bam! his strength ran out. Henk's body collapsed. His hand was stuck.

Great! Henk thought to himself. And before the negative emotions were able to completely overrun his optimism, he forced himself to laugh out loud.

He heard the scuffling of small children in the garden. The noise hardly registered. Accompanying it was the fleeting thought that they might help him, but Henk by experience distrusted children. They seemed to think he was funny, even when he didn't want to be seeming like he was funny. In fact, they would openly point and laugh when most adults would wait until he wasn't looking. So he let the thought go. But the children didn't. They saw his ass pouring out the lighted window and beckoning in the wind, and took to whispering among each other under the shadows of the worshipping trees.

Henk was thinking about his hand now. The pain in his bladder was quickly being superceded by the tingling in his hand. Soon, he would think of nothing else. Soon, he would feel nothing, and it would be the most alarming feeling yet. How long could his hand be deprived of blood before it had to come off? He didn't like that thought at all.

He didn't hear them approaching because he was busy struggling to free his hand. It was Anton and his girlfriend for the night. Their shadows darkened the translucent panes in the bedroom door, and then suddenly the room was invaded by loud, slightly drunken voices. A rush and a whir of activity. Henk's mouth dropped open. It appeared to him that they were everywhere at once, engaged in several conversations at the same time. A blur of images passed before his eyes. They were standing at the door laughing. Now she was lying on the floor grasping her knee, exchanging harsh words with Anton as he helped her up. She was brushing her hair in the mirror. Anton was brushing his teeth in his underwear, talking to Henk about the internet. She was looking through his CD's. "Howlin' Wolf?" she asked with a skeptical eye cocked in his direction, holding one of them up. Henk wanted to tell her to be careful. Now they were lounging against each other by the doorway, mouths almost touching, speaking softly. Now he was turning off the light.

Henk could have said something at any time, but he didn't. There you have it. He hadn't asked to be placed in this situation, and he didn't know if Anton was doing it on purpose, but now that he found himself there he didn't exactly wish to pass up the opportunity. Oh, he didn't put it to himself like that. In fact, he didn't put it to himself at all. That was the best part about not having to do anything. The truth was that over the last few years if Henk wanted sex he would go visit Soesje. She was a prostitute on the Ruylsdaelkade in Oud Zuid, far away from the annoying globs of barbaric British tourists that at all hours clogged de Wallen. So Henk simply lay sprawled out on the chest of drawers, quickly forgetting about his aching bladder.

They were not beautiful people, Anton and his lover. Despite his square face and handsome features, Anton appeared haggard in Henk's eyes. He had a light tuff of hair on his chest and a thick, sausage-like body that spoke of too many plastic tubs of mayonaise and frietjes, and beers in the kroeg with his friends. She, on the other hand, was far too thin for Henk's taste, although from the skimpy clothes that were hardly visible crumpled up on the floor she was quite eager to flaunt the fact. As a result, her head appeared a bit too big for her body, but she seemed to have realized the fact and trimmed her hair short. Other than that, she was appealing. Obviously, Henk didn't get a good chance to look into her eyes, but he suspected her look was sharp like a French cheese, and yet sometimes he thought she looked like one of the cats. Staring intently, waiting, not willing to utter a word. Her breasts (which Anton seemed to keep coming back to) were in good proportion to her body and heaved as she threw her head back.

In the darkness, what Henk saw were luscious curves and hard lines tumbling together, united in a fantastic symphony of sights and sounds. A light sticatto flute punctuating the night and a powerful, thrumming base that rose and fell, and between them both heavy bands of breathing like percussion. And smells. Henk drew a deep breath. He loved the smell of other humans. It made them seem real. As if otherwise they would only be images, the specters of a dream world concocted by the mind to amuse itself - or torment itself, as the case may be. When people are fucking the air becomes tangy. Henk breathed in again.

Penetration. It was what he lived for. In that moment his purpose was defined with crystalline clearness, like a bell ringing in his mind and across the heavens and throughout the entire present. In that moment and those to come, his penis felt as large as himself, and all the feeling of every other part of his body combined could only hope to equal the warm, encompassing sensation from below. He was hard. He was happy. He was inside.

But, alas, not for long. She lay under him, legs drawn up and hands on his chest, eyes closed as she received him, when through her own soft moaning she heard Henk's tattered breathing from the window. At first, she incorporated the sound into their own, but glancing through half open eyes towards the window she distinctly saw a fat, ugly man leaning in, picking his nose and watching her intently, as if at the theater. It was a very quick moment, but very succinct, and one she would not forget for a very long time. She screamed. First from fright and then very quickly from rage. She punched Anton a few times, who fell back against the wall with a strange, hurt look on his face.

Henk, too, had nothing to say, because in that very instant the children whom he had heard playing in the garden sprung their plans. The large, bulbous ass protruding out the window was a temptation too great to resist. From the shade of the trees they had noted how loose his pants were. Yes, as odd as it sounds, Henk's pants were too large for him. It was difficult for Henk to acquire trousers with the right girth, so he often had to resort to outrageously expensive specialty shops where the ware he found was approximate at best. And belts, well, unless he went to America or Britain he wasn't going to find any the right size. So, in the very moment he felt he should be saying something - apologizing, perhaps - the very words were stolen from him as he felt his pants slip from his waist to his knees. The first, overriding sensation was one of fresh coolness where normally it was stuffy. It felt refreshing.

The two seemed to be struggling on the bed, but after the woman had managed to control her urge to beat on Anton, she scrambled out of the canopy, arms protectively around her, and without throwing so much as a glance in Henk's direction gathered up her clothes. It was yet another opportunity for Henk to try and say something - explain, perhaps - but at that moment the children who were still behind him struck him very hard across the buttocks with a wooden plank. The sound was very sharp and very loud. Henk winced at the sudden sting, and the tip of his hard-on jiggled uncomfortably against the exterior of the apartment. Henk's face went white, not so much from the pain as from the embarrassment. The children, who merely wanted to see the flab quiver and shake, fled off into the shadows squealing, apparently satisfied.

The woman looked up at Henk with a terribly accusing look, bra and panties on, not entirely sure what had just happened but certain that whatever it was he was still mocking her.

The lights were on and Anton was sitting across from him on the bed, half dressed. Lounging was more like it. Henk was laughing at something he had said. Both arms extended once more over the edge of the familiar chest of drawers, fingers clasping and releasing over and again. Anton had helped him regain possession of his hand. Even better, now that his pants were straddling his knees he had been able to relieve himself without endangering anything more than the very tips of his shoes. Ah, the pleasure he had felt! There is nothing more gratifying than the sudden absence of pain.

"We saw them both go in," Henk continued eagerly, seasoning the words and bolstering them with unexpected bravado. "Anyway, we didn't think much of it until about fifteen minutes later a crowd began to gather around the cabine. Naturally, we were curious."

Anton smirked and thought about the times he had been to de Wallen. When he went, though, it was usually at night.

"We left the kroeg with about four other people who had noticed the same thing outside: people staring into a prostitute's cabine, laughing and pointing."

"Sounds to me like they forgot to close the curtain on the way in." Henk started to shake his head and brusquely refute Anton's attempt to steal the story away from him. It was an instinctual reaction. But in an instant he realized he couldn't. Perhaps it wasn't really such a funny story after all. He was momentarily at a loss for words. He had been doing so well!

"Oh, I'm sorry," Anton said after a moment, crossing his legs. "Was that it?"

"Yes," Henk answered, but then he couldn't help but adding, "but no." Henk started to smile again because, well, the memory was far better than he could ever have expressed. To be standing there in the rain with a crowd of English and German tourists, more than half what you would call respectable couples, well past the prime of youth and fattened up by age and a gentle sense that being pleasing to the eye is a pleasure far inferior to luscious food and a less energetic lifestyle. Yes, yes, there was Karl und Hilga on their way to have a few sausages and schnitzel with the other members of the superior race. And, look! How they would have something to snicker about!

"No?" pressed Anton.

"Well, yes." Henk sighed resignedly. "One of the guys who went in - I don't know, got bored or something, and on his way out left the curtain open. His friend didn't notice."

Now Anton was outright laughing. "Could you see anything?"

Henk tried to shrug but only succeeded in scraping his back. "Just somebody's bare ass moving around. Somebody's hairy ass."

"I've never heard of that before!" explained Anton, as if he should have heard of reasonably everything. "It must have been painful for him coming out! Do you think his friend did that on purpose, left the curtain open? How do you know he got bored?"

"Well, we saw both of them go in and the curtain was open and there was only one of them in there afterwards and only one came out."

"Maybe he got off quickly."

Henk shrugged again. "Maybe. Didn't seem that way to me. I didn't see any money lying around and, well, his friend didn't seem to be having such a good time."

"Maybe his friend was going to pay."

"Maybe."

Anton looked at Henk for a long moment. Finally, he said in a softer voice Henk hadn't heard before, "Well, I wasn't there. I'll take your word for it."

"Were your grandparents involved with the Nazi's during the war?" Henk put the question bluntly, as he found was best to do in uncomfortable situations. The lights were off and Anton had lit some candles. Their shadows danced like tall, thin avatars against the walls and along the floor and ceiling, shoving into their faces with cold, cold hands.

Even though he had introduced the conversation himself, Anton instinctively went on the defensive. Why did he put himself in this situation? Henk could see the question on his face. "It's not my fault what they did or didn't do. I wasn't there. Anyway, who wasn't involved?"

Henk didn't say anything.

"After the war, everybody was in the resistance," Anton went on quickly.

Still, Henk said nothing.

"Anyway, in a situation like that you make the best you can for yourself without getting your hands dirty. My family didn't get their hands dirty."

"Okay, then, so you've got nothing to be ashamed of," commented Henk, "except that some people are going to have a problem with your name."

But Anton wasn't really listening. His face was hard and lined and grim and staring off somewhere. "Look," he said, "we're German, too, and I don't see that it would have been bad to have had a German Europe. Back then, I mean. I mean, now it's completely different. People are supposed to work together. You know, be part of a world community that's made up of the very best of each independent part."

"I'm surprised to hear you say that!" said Henk.

"But back then," continued Anton, ignoring Henk - he seemed to be resolving some of his own personal thoughts right there and then, at that very moment - "it was different. I mean, once Alexander the Great was lauded for conquering the Persians - "

"He adopted many of their ways," interjected Henk.

"And Julius Caesar was regarded as the greatest Roman until the very end because of his conquests, and yet he was the one who struck the final blow to the Republic - "

"Actually, I would say it was Marius."

"And Napolean is still a French hero. Why not Germany, then? It was their turn, and for many of us our turn as well." Anton stopped then and shook his head. "It's just all the killing. They thought it all through, every step, very carefully and methodically. Not impulsive decisions, these! This was no Domitianus or Commodus or Elagabalus, this wasn't even Caligula or Nero in our own time, because those were men who, being weak, were consumed by the possibilities of their own limitless powers and after a time saw no reason to suppress their every compulsion or desire, their every hatred. No, as terrible as that was at least it was human. Hitler was not consumed by any passion. The bureaucrats who helped devise those pretty names to conceal the various arms of their governmental killing apparatus, they executed their functions in cold, passionless motions, like zombies. Empty of meaning, of anything resembling humanity."

Henk agreed and didn't agree. Yes, he found it difficult to fathom which passion was being served by the monolithic killing machine, but he also thought it was dangerous to look at it as somehow inhuman. Because to distance one's own nature from the event is to ensure that it will repeat itself. Anyway, was there really a difference between Nero and Hitler, except that the technology available in Hitler's day allowed the scope of his madness to affect far more people far more quickly and far more completely? "Were your grandparents in the NSB?" he finally asked.

Anton didn't look up. "No," he answered solemnly.

But from what he had already said Henk wasn't sure if he believed him. Yes, it must have been hard to learn about the war and separate all the emotions. And to understand that one's ancestors had a part in that, even if it was passive.

"Do you think they knew what was going on?" Henk asked.

"Who, my grandparents?"

"People in general."

Anton didn't answer.

"People must have wondered where they were taking all those people when they took them to the central station."

"True," Anton answered softly. "But you can be aware without being aware. Choose to disbelieve what you don't want to believe. My grandparents had Jewish friends, or so they told me. They didn't reject them. They weren't that kind of people. But they did support the idea of a German Europe, and back then part of that meant that foreigners - including Jews - had to be moved somewhere else. So they didn't think much of it when their friends disappeared, except to assume that they were beginning their lives in a new state of their own."

"Unmixed with us."

Anton shrugged. "Hey, look, those were different times."

"And not altogether gone."

Anton didn't respond.

The lights were back on. A half-empty bottle of good Russian vodka sat on the floor between them. Anton was sitting on the floor, too, flush against the side of the bed, eyes lolling and tongue hanging a bit out of his mouth. It was late, even for a Dutchman.

"Well, I think Americans are weird," Henk stated flatly - and hiccuped.

Anton giggled. "You're the one stuck in my window," he was reminded.

"But don't you agree? Have you ever hung out with them?"

"Sure, I've been to the States. Lots of fun. We rented a car and drove from Miami, Florida to Houston, Texas."

"Okay, so you've been there. Driving, even. I don't know, wasn't it a big prison or something?"

Anton's face adopted an appropriately condescending stare.

"You know what I mean. Well, maybe you don't. But I see all those cop shows on television, and you watch the people they harass, and the comments they make about them to the camera. It's as if everybody were a criminal and the law a safe harbor for criminality. I mean, they seem to me just like big brutes who can't get arrested for beating people up they don't like."

"There were a lot of police. That's true."

"Could you imagine living like that?"

"Like what? With lots of police?"

"Where you can't do anything! Look, even I have talked to a few Americans here and unless they are from New York they tell me that after one o' clock there's nothing to do."

"There sure are a lot of churches," said Anton, and then he belched loudly.

Henk laughed. "The only acceptable activity in America."

Anton shook his head. "Naw, that's not true."

"But close enough!" insisted Henk with a gleam in his eye. He reached out and picked up the glass sitting on the open drawer in front of him. The remnants of a vodka and cola pooled at the bottom.

Anton stared at Henk only a moment before he finally replied, "Okay, close enough."

Henk smiled even wider and waved his glass insistently at Anton.

Anton lurched to his feet and loosely grabbed the bottle of vodka, almost knocking it over in the process.

"You see, the problem with Americans is that they are feeling guilty most of the time."

"Enough about the Americans!" exclaimed Anton as he placed his glass next to Henk's and began to pour over them both, not really paying attention where the liquor was actually falling.

"Okay, okay," agreed Henk. "Then this next drink is to the Dutch. The happiest people alive!"

"I'll drink to that," Anton slurred, and without adding the customary cola he raised the glass to his lips.

They both slurped.

"And next," continued Anton bravely, his face clenching and unclenching from the sordid afterburn of the liquor, "to the most unhappy people alive!"

Henk pounded the top of the chest of drawers with his fist. "To the Russians!" he hollered.

They both smiled and drank.

It must have been a dream. Nothing but a shiftless, endless series of open-ended conversations between various shades of himself. Dreams are mostly impressions, really, and during the vague instants that presaged his newfound awareness, he was acutely aware of a roadmap of both untried and satisfied emotions, a myriad of them assembled before in some mysterious formation him like an army of soldiers, helmets and spear-tips glimmering in the sun. On some fronts he was square, he could see that. Perfectly compact emotions like boxes whose connections to their associations were perfectly perceived and perfectly understood. But there were other fronts where the lines could not so decisively be drawn. What was that uncomfortable brooding? What lay behind it? But the question would never be answered, because with each passing moment the soldiers were disappearing one by one in a sudden puff of smoke. Poof! All that was left in its place was a cloud that, with a little more time, would be torn away by the wind. He knew he had dreamed something, and it had given him a certain feeling, but he was now neither sure of the substance nor the feeling itself.

The first thing Henk truly sensed from the outside world was the pool of cold drool that lay between his cheek and a hard surface. It was light. The cool, soft tones of early morning. Henk blinked and considered himself for a moment. Clearly, he was bent over. He could not feel his legs over the carpet of tingling that extended from his waist. Something tight gripped him there, something unforgiving...

That damned window! It all came back to Henk at once, and he grimaced. Looking up, he saw that Anton's clothes were scattered on the floor, and there he was wrapped up comfortably in his sheets, blissfully unaware. Fucking bastard. He couldn't help but think it, even as he realized there wasn't quite any steam to the sentiment. After all, as Henk thought back he couldn't quite remember Anton going to bed and refusing to set him free. Maybe he had fallen asleep first? For the life of him, Henk could not remember. His memory of the night before trailed off into a vast cloud of uncertainty.

It was cold. Henk's ass was still exposed to the elements. How he wished he could rub it. How he wished he could get free! He tried to shift his weight about, to test once again the limits of the situation, but he found that he was almost devoid of strength. Twisting his head this way and that, it was only after a few moments that he noticed someone staring at him. Someone close by. Standing a meter behind him and to the right, in fact. The two men had much the same look on their faces. Mouths parted slightly, a vacant look behind the eyes. As if neither had seen anything like this before. As if it weren't a normal, everyday occurrence to find an exceptionally large person with his pants around his ankles leaning into someone's bedroom and not appearing to be trying to go anywhere. Someone who had obviously been asleep, at that.

The man was, in fact, one of the residents of the ground floor. He was one of the few Henk could recognize, because he was often in the garden trimming the bushes around his plot of concrete. Aside from being caught by his neighbor, this was the moment Henk had most been dreading. But, just like before, he found that his reaction was not filled with the terror and humiliation he had been expecting. Maybe if he had been given advance notice and had had time to brood over the event, then perhaps, yes, he wouldn't have been able to look at the man, and would have taken instantly to thoughts of moving out of the building, but to be honest considering the present situation he was glad to find someone in a position to help him.

"After I've had a good sleep," Henk said to his fellow resident, "I'll take the time to explain this."

"I'd be very interested to hear." The man slid his hands into his pockets and tilted his head, as if considering Henk from a different angle.

"I got caught in Anton's window."

"I can see that."

"He didn't seem to mind."

The man grunted and continued to stare at him stonily.

"Do you think you could help me out of this?"

"How?"

"Try lifting the window."

Together, they managed it. Henk's fellow resident, with more than his share of grunts and noises, was able to provide the few centimeters of wiggle-room that Henk required. Within a few moments, Henk was lying on the ground, pants bunched up around his ankles, breathing heavily. His eyes were closed, because he was trying not to cry out from the pain. The pain that washed and ebbed and flowed from above his ass to below his knees, like very hot water being spilled upon him from above and running first this way and then that over his body. His legs had been so weak that he couldn't even stand on them. They had given out the moment he had put any weight on them and he had tumbled to the ground. But that didn't matter much. Right now he was simply glad to be free, to be staring upward into a lightening sky and - as soon as his legs agreed - to be able to walk back to his own apartment and go lie in his own bed.

"Why are your pants down?" he finally heard a voice above him. Henk opened his eyes and saw his fellow resident standing over him, hands back in his pockets. He became instantly aware of his exposed penis.

"Could you help me?" Henk asked as he reached down to pull them up.

The reaction was immediate and swift. A look of stark terror and disgust - a most insulting mixture - appeared on his fellow tenant's face. In an instant, he was gone, gone not only from view but in a matter of moments from the garden entirely. Henk watched him go and did not call out to him. After all, how can you really hope to explain something like this to someone? Eventually, of course, Henk was able to drag himself back into his apartment. He threw himself down on his bed, belly down, and rubbed his ass and legs. He was exhausted. But no wonder.

As Henk lay thinking, he couldn't make up his mind about Anton. Clearly, he was the sort of person he generally didn't like. Self-absorbed, materially-oriented, always having something to say, always having to be right. But then again, he was fun to talk to. Henk had certainly enjoyed their conversations! He wouldn't have wanted to repeat last night's fiasco, but he also couldn't say that, looking back, it was the miserable time it should have been.

Henk wasn't sure how long he had been staring at Mr. Lumpkin sneaking across the bedroom floor towards the window before he realized it was him. The cat threw him the occasional sardonic glance, as if to ensure himself that Henk wasn't going to rise up from the bed and harass him. Henk knew that look well and smiled to himself.

Eventually, he fell asleep. And eventually, he woke up. Over the next few days, he thought less and less about Anton and his adventure in the window. Oh, sure, occasionally he would hear his neighbor singing, or standing in the kitchen he would hear the man come home. Now, he could match a face and personality to the noises. Evidence of a real human being, the sounds somehow became more colorful, more revealing. And after a few weeks, Henk knew that the extra color was a more valuable addition to his life than Anton himself. They rarely saw each other, and then only once every few months when they happened to go out at the same time. A quick 'Hoi!' and then they were off, with perhaps a sideways glance, and never in the same direction.

And eventually, they both started to receive letters from the city and the building owners telling them that the building was going to be leveled. At first, there was considerable debate about whether the plans would actually go through, but there was a lot of money involved and socialism was dead, so after a period of uncertainty they were all given a year to find new apartments. Anton moved out very quickly. Henk stayed until almost the very end, partly because it was cheaper than his new place but also because he knew he was going to miss Fatty Lumpkin's attentions. He never did meet his keeper.

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