Ugly Girl
Copyright© 2026 by Han Jansz. van Meegeren
4. My Protector Whispering through Every Tear
Sandor looks tall and handsome as we stand before our cars. Sylvia and Jutta came with her son and the other one’s daughter. They both make preparations to get into his car.
“Girl, you belong to Zuzanna now. You will go with her. Say goodbye to your Mistress. From now on, she won’t be your Mistress any longer.” Both women latch onto each other like two magnets in a bear-hug contest, squeezing so tight you’d think their goal is to merge into one overly affectionate human pancake.
“I would like to get home today, if you girls don’t mind,” Sandor smirked. Sylvia is the first to release the embrace. Jutta gets into the car, and a few moments later they are at the end of the street.
“Come on, Syl. Let’s go.” It’s quite a change from Sandor’s new Toyota Land Cruiser to a Toyota Corolla from 2001.
Her voice is soft and bereft of emotion. “Thank you Mistress, for taking me in.”
“Oh, come on, Syl. It’s me. Zuzanna. Remember her? Your best friend since kindergarten? You can quit the Mistress stuff.”
“I am sorry if Mistress is displeased with me.”
“Oh, Lordy, lordy. Guess we’re taking the scenic route through chaos?” Sylvia kept quiet. She looked her age. Sylvia had always been the pretty one. Sylvia, the attention seeker, the other girls used to call her in school. A nasty, but accurate way of describing the friend I truly love. She was the beauty; I was the beast. We were inseparable those days. Fiercely loyal if anyone attacked my looks, not afraid to fight for me if needed. I had always been the voice of reason if she had a crazy idea. I think once a month I pulled her away from a minor disaster. She was afraid of nothing. Perhaps I had been a bit too much. Afraid.
“Sylvia, wake up. Koen is not with us anymore. He has given Jutta to Ilse and Sandor. That was a good choice. They will take care of her. If I have to, and if you still want to, I will find you someone new. For now, relax. Give yourself time to grieve. Be as kind to yourself as Koen was to you.”
“Girl. My name is Girl.”
“It has been a long time since you were a girl, Sylvia.” I said as gently as I could. No answer. We drove the rest of the way in silence to my house. I had spent the weekend preparing our guestroom into a cosy room for Sylvia. We — I often say ‘we’ where I should say ‘I’ — do not get visitors often. The guest room had been a laundry room for far too long. It would be nice to have Sylvia with me. Since my retirement, the days have been long and boring. Taking care of Johan had kept me busy for almost a year, but after he died, my days were empty. There is a limit one can go to the garden centre in a week. I kept myself busy making things. Sewing, Knitting, Croquet, making my own clothes from a simple piece of cloth. My mama had raised me to be content with what I have.
Most people live simple, uneventful lives. We work, and if we had kids (which we didn’t want), we’d look after them; otherwise, we spend our money on nice things. Once a year, we travel to different parts of the world. We have a pleasant house of our own (mortgage-free now). Johan went to see Ajax Amsterdam every weekend, and I would visit my mother on Sundays. When Mom started to forget things, she moved in with us. She had her own place in the extension Johan had built for her. He had been a good man to me, my Johan. A provider in the old-fashioned meaning of the word. Someone who worked hard and gave all of it to me, because we knew who was good at what on our team. Some of my friends called me frugal, but I was not. I just don’t spend money without thinking.
“Consider my house your own for the time being.” I said. “Feel free to eat and drink whatever you want, I will give you a key to the house so you can come and go as you like.”
No response. Not a smile, not a word. Never before in this life had I seen Sylvia filled to the brim with a mix of apathy and lethargy. Johan’s death saddened me, of course, but I don’t recall ever feeling this devastated. Perhaps I had a lot of time to get used to the thought that Johan would leave me. Perhaps the feeling that he was painless now comforted me enough to go on with life? I didn’t expect Sylvia singing and dancing in the rain a few days after she buried her husband, but that empty look in her eyes scares me to death.
Sylvia shut herself in her room and came out only to eat. I told her funny stories about us growing up, hoping to cheer her up, but it didn’t work. Exactly 10 days after the burial was Sylvia’s birthday, March 27th. I made her a birthday cake, of which she ate none.
“After our visit to the grave, I want to go to Peter’s place. I want to see my grandson.” We have visited the grave every single day for the last ten days. There was nothing to see there. No stone on it yet. Just a piece of land with some sloppy soil on it, between large gravestones on either side. And yet Sylvia spent at least an hour near the grave, carefully removing dead flowers from the bouquets and funeral wreaths.
Today, Sylvia seemed more lost than ever. It had been raining all night. It looked like new showers were about to come down at any minute. When she came to the grave, Sylvia fell to her knees and collapsed on the dirt, spreading her arms and legs into a grotesque X-shape. Sobbing so loudly and sadly it could break your heart. I did not have the heart to tell her to get up. I was glad Johan had been cremated because what do you find in a cemetery? Nothing but sand and dirt. When I felt the first drops coming down on my face, it was time to go.
“Sylvia, come on, let’s get going. Our first stop will be at the farm where Sandor and the women will be able to offer their birthday greetings, and then, if you still wish to, we can also stop at Peter’s location.”
After a few minutes, I lost my patience with her. I bit my tongue at the last minute. Getting angry with her was not a solution. I helped her up from the damp floor and tried to wipe some of the dirt off her coat. I just made it even dirtier. No way we could arrive at Sandor’s place with her looking like this on her birthday. First, we had to drive home to change. At home, I had to take her coat off and put another coat on. She just stood there, like a zombie Barbie girl, just staring at nothing. I hoped a visit to Sandor and her ‘Mistress’ would cheer her up a bit.
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