I dressed hurriedly and sent messages to both Adriaan and Jana to say that I was running late. It was now dark, the streets full with the expectation of a night out. I took a taxi, I was already half an hour late and Adriaan would of course be on time. As the driver pulled into the full flow of traffic—it was unusually dense or seemed that way, perhaps because of my impatience, I was aware that Jana and Adriaan had been thrust together in circumstances more uncomfortable and intimate than intended—I leaned forward and peered out the window, it would take at least twenty minutes to reach Jana’s at this rate.
The traffic did not improve, by the time I arrived at Jana’s apartment it was nearly nine o’clock, and Adriaan had been there for an hour. You’re late, Jana said as she opened the door. Her tone was far from reproachful and she was smiling, she looked unusually relaxed. I was nonplussed by her appearance, she looked very different, so that I almost did not recognize her. She lingered before the door longer than was normal, as if to prevent me from entering, for a moment I thought there was something she needed to tell me. Behind her, I could see Adriaan standing in the kitchen, a glass of wine in hand. He was watching us with a curious expression, I wondered what Jana had been saying to him.
She finally said, Come in, and stepped back almost reluctantly. I looked at Adriaan again as I took off my coat and set down my bag, my expression quizzical, but he either didn’t notice or chose to ignore it, he came forward with his glass of wine and kissed me, his manner very natural. I was aware that Jana was watching, at the last moment I angled my cheek toward him and my mouth away, so that his kiss landed awkwardly. I felt my skin grow flushed. I’m sorry I’m late. He shrugged and said that it didn’t matter, he seemed amused, he was hovering over me in a way that felt oddly protective, and I wished again that I hadn’t been so delayed.
How have you two been getting along, I asked. They looked at each other and smiled, I was looking not at Adriaan but at Jana. She had put on lipstick and eye makeup, which she did not usually bother to do, and it might have been simply that I was not used to seeing her lips and eyes colored and delineated in this way, her features so emphatic. I realized, belatedly, that she had likely applied the makeup for Adriaan’s sake; certainly she had not done so for mine. I wondered then what it was like to be a man, so often surrounded by such deliberate features, more vivid than actual nature.
I looked at Jana, and then again at Adriaan. I saw that some intimacy had been established between them. It wasn’t surprising, in fact it was something that I should have predicted from the outset, they were both personable and even seductive people. I thought this must be the reason for Jana’s inexplicable transformation, in the end it couldn’t be put down to lipstick and mascara, that was only the physical manifestation of a more intangible shift. It suddenly occurred to me that they made sense as a couple, I thought that Gaby was probably a woman like Jana, confident and forthright, someone who was a mirror to Adriaan. Couples were often this way, even when the resemblance wasn’t there to begin with. Warily, I watched as Jana and Adriaan continued to look at each other, now much longer than seemed necessary. Jana was grinning foolishly, or so it appeared to me.
I felt a surge of jealousy. We did okay, Adriaan said, and his voice was casual. He turned to look at me, his gaze was warm and he was smiling, he did not seem as if he had anything to hide. She put me through the wringer but I’m fine, I survived. Although this sentence was spoken to me, and although Adriaan continued looking at me with his friendly and transparent gaze, I nonetheless experienced his words as further evidence of complicity between Jana and Adriaan. Jana was still looking at him and now she laughed too loudly, tossing her hair extravagantly, a gesture I was not familiar with, it was if she had remade herself entirely for the occasion.
I did not! she exclaimed flirtatiously. I did nothing of the sort. I only asked some questions, I’m very protective of my friend, you know she’s quite alone here—words that somehow made me feel as if I did not belong in this city or country or even in this room. She wrapped her arm around my shoulder, a gesture that was surely affectionate, but which came across as bizarre and out of character, she was not usually physically demonstrative. She squeezed my shoulder, an embrace that recollected my encounter with Kees at the party, when I had first learned that Adriaan was married. I must have looked uneasy, or perhaps he had himself observed the similarity between the two embraces, because Adriaan now frowned a little and after a moment Jana lowered her arm. I cleared my throat, I asked if we shouldn’t eat. Jana turned away abruptly, she said, Adriaan brought Indonesian takeaway, from a place I don’t know.