The Invisible Circus - Jennifer Egan [52]
“Hey,” Karl said, moving his long body to one side of Phoebe. “Hey, so relax.” He touched her bare thigh. She saw the shape of his penis through the Turkish pants and began groping for support, wanting to stand now, certain even in her murky state that no redemption awaited her. But she couldn’t stand, Karl was making it hard to balance. “Hey,” he said, as if Phoebe were a cat lost among the cushions, and even now she felt a longing to believe he was somehow good, if she could just … find her balance … Karl’s breath at her ear—No. She clawed the cushions, the struggle giving her focus; for an instant the murkiness cleared and she felt a charge of bright terror—No! She had to stand up, a sound was moving through her, up toward her throat. It emerged painfully, like a bubble breaking. “Stop,” she cried, a strangled sound, then louder, “Stop!” fighting him now, fumbling to her feet, but Karl just laughed and leaned back looking up at her, not even trying anymore, his laugh not cruel so much as surprised that a stupid, meaningless thing was costing him this much trouble.
“Get out of here,” he said.
Clutching her purse, Phoebe tottered down the narrow hall, past photographs, drawings under dusty glass, the shadowy kaleidoscope of Karl’s life. She opened the door and careened down the curving staircase to the lobby, half expecting him to pursue her, but no, he wouldn’t. Outside, the light broke painfully against her eyes and she reeled, thinking she might be sick. There was a pain between her legs, a burning, as though he’d chafed her.
Phoebe rounded a corner, half ran, half fumbled alongside the canal until she was gasping for air. When she noticed people watching her, she slowed to a walk. She felt a horror of being discovered, as if fleeing the scene of her own crime. For some time she wandered without direction, trying to still her panicked breathing. She thought of going to the police, but she’d forgotten where Karl even lived, had never known in the first place—doubtless the reason for all the twists and turns she and Nico had taken on their way. And anyhow, what did she have to report? Drugs were legal in Amsterdam as far as she knew, and Nico hadn’t robbed her—she’d given the money freely. But why? Why not leave the apartment right then, when things started to turn? Why go there at all? It was her own behavior, more than theirs, that Phoebe couldn’t bear to recall—so vulnerable, so easy. She saw this now with a painful clarity. And of course they’d seen, too. To people like them, a weakness like hers must be obvious, must cling to her like a smell.
Beneath everything else lay a single, terrible fear, worse than the needle or what Karl had done to her: the possibility that he’d lied about Faith, had not really known her at all. Phoebe’s mind touched this thought and instantly veered away. It wasn’t possible. She’d seen in his eyes that he was serious.
Still, the adventure had been a failure. An unmitigated disaster. It would never have happened to Faith.
After nearly an hour of aimless wandering, Phoebe asked directions back to the train station and managed to find it. Discovering her backpack still in its locker seemed to her nothing short of miraculous. It was seven o’clock; she’d missed the youth hostel check-in by hours. She prayed that Diana and Helen had saved her a place.
The youth hostel was full. “First come first serve,” said a kid behind the desk, and place-saving was not allowed. The travelers lounging near the check-in desk looked like advertisements for happiness. “There are many hostels in Amsterdam,” said the kid behind the desk.
Phoebe headed back to the street. Her hands shook as she turned the pages of her guidebook, circling names of other hostels, finding their locations on her map. She marked three spots, then rested on the curb, overwhelmed by the prospect of carrying the heavy backpack even one more step. Her mind reeled again and again back to Karl’s apartment, as if to lessen the horror through repetition, find some new redeeming aspect of the memory.