The Boy in the Suitcase - Lene Kaaberbol [3]
At first he refused on the grounds that it was best not to alter one’s own pattern. People remembered. Only as long as one did what one always did would one remain relatively invisible. But then he realized this might be his last day in Lithuania ever, if everything went according to plan. And he didn’t really feel like spending that day selling security systems to middle-range businessmen in Vilnius.
He called the client he was due to see and canceled, telling them the company would be sending someone Monday or Tuesday instead. Barbara called in sick with “the flu.” It would be Monday before anyone at Klimka’s realized they had been playing hooky at the same time, and by then it wouldn’t matter.
They drove out to Lake Didžiulis. Once, this had been a holiday camp for Pioneer children. Now it was a scout camp instead, and on an ordinary school day at the end of August, the whole place was completely deserted. Jučas parked the Mitsubishi in the shade beneath some pines, hoping the car wouldn’t be an oven when they returned. Barbara got out, stretching so that her white shirt slid up to reveal a bit of tanned stomach. That was enough to make his cock twitch. He had never known a woman who could arouse him as quickly as Barbara. He had never known anyone like her, period. He still wondered why on earth she had picked someone like him. They stayed clear of the wooden huts, which in any case looked rather sad and dilapidated. Instead they followed the path past the flag hill and into the woods. He inhaled the smell of resin and sun-parched trees, and for a moment was back with Granny Edita on the farm near Visaginas. He had spent the first seven years of his life there. Freezing cold and lonely in the winter, but in the summer Rimantas moved in with his Gran on the neighboring farm, and then the thicket of pines between the two smallholdings became Tarzan’s African Jungle, or the endless Mohican woods of Hawkeye.
“Looks like we can swim here.” Barbara pointed at the lakeshore further ahead. An old swimming platform stuck into the waters of the lake like a slightly crooked finger.
Jučas stuffed Visaginas back into the box where it belonged, the one labeled “The Past.” He didn’t often open that box, and there was certainly no reason to mess with it now.
“There are probably leeches,” he said, to tease her.
She grimaced. “Of course there aren’t. Or they wouldn’t let the children swim here.”
Belatedly, he realized he didn’t really want to stop her from taking her clothes off.
“You’re probably right,” he said, hastily.
She flashed him a quick smile, as though she knew exactly what he was thinking. And as he watched, she slowly unbuttoned her shirt and stepped out of her sand-colored skirt and string sandals, until she stood barefoot on the beach, wearing only white panties and a plain white bra.
“Do we have to swim first?” he asked.
“No,” she said, stepping close. “We can do that afterwards.”
He wanted her so badly it sometimes made him clumsy like a teenager. But today he forced himself to wait. Playing with her. Kissing her. Making sure she was just as aroused as he was. He fumbled for the condom he always kept in his wallet, at her insistence. But this time she stopped him.
“It’s such a beautiful day,” she said. “And such a beautiful place. Surely, we can make a beautiful child, don’t you think?”
He was beyond speech. But he let go of the wallet and held her for several long minutes before he pushed her down onto the grass and tried to give her what she so badly wanted.
AFTERWARDS, THEY DID swim in the deep, cool waters of the lake. She was not a strong swimmer, had never really learned how, so mostly she doggy-paddled, splashing and kicking. Finally she linked her hands behind his neck and let herself be towed along as he backstroked to keep them both afloat. She looked into his eyes.
“Do you love me?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Even though I’m an old, old woman?” She was nine years older than him, and it bothered her. He didn’t care.
“Insanely,” he said. “And you’re not old.”
“Take care of me,” she