Chapter 17: Where You Stand

By February, the building was in my bag every morning.

Peeters’ summary had been folded into the folder behind the bank papers, Van Acker’s counter-scribbles, two notary questions I had copied in red ink, and Mrs. Claes’ list of documents she expected before she would allow anyone to mistake money for stability.

The ninth had passed without ceremony. Nothing had been signed in the final sense, which meant everyone could still ruin the deal while pretending to protect it. Van Acker’s wife had stopped saying no in ways that mattered. The notary had asked for contract copies. Mrs. Claes had asked for cleaner proof, more reserve, fewer surprises. Peeters had found enough wrong to keep the price honest and not enough wrong to kill the purchase.

It came to lectures in the weight of the folder against my ribs. It came to the library when I opened anatomy and found myself calculating roof work in the margin before I noticed. It came to tutoring when Mathis asked a question about cardiac preload and I heard Koen asking whether he would have to leave before exams. It came to sleep late and left before dawn.

The January results arrived in pieces. No one announced them with trumpets. Scores appeared on boards, in office windows, on paper lists pinned with drawing pins that had already given up twice and been replaced. Students stood shoulder to shoulder in cold corridors pretending not to care who was watching their faces. Some laughed too loudly. Some became quiet. Some walked away and came back because believing paper often requires a second attempt.

I passed.

Well enough.

The old part of me wanted to turn the result into fuel, another proof, another column that could be made to hold. The younger body wanted to sleep for a day and eat fried potatoes until the world softened. I did neither properly. I wrote the numbers down, sent my mother a short message, answered Mathis when he asked, and went to training because Hugo disliked students who treated exams as injuries.

My mother replied after lunch.

Then, two minutes later:

I read the second message twice in the hallway outside physiology and then pocketed the phone before it could reach my face.

Hugo had a new boy on the mat.

He was not actually a boy. He was probably twenty-two, broad in the shoulders, with hair cut short at home and the careful politeness of someone who had come to training because fear had begun showing in places he did not like. He wore borrowed trousers that were too long and a white T-shirt already dark under the arms. His name was Marc. He listened hard to every instruction and then forgot half of it when a hand touched his collar. Panic makes poor notes.

“Vandael,” Hugo called.

I was taping two fingers together on the edge of the mat. “Yes?”

“Take him.”

Marc looked at me with immediate apology. “I’m very new.”

“I guessed from the trousers.”

He looked down. “They’re too long.”

“They will teach humility before Hugo does.”

Hugo heard that from across the room. “My humility is expensive.”

Marc smiled because he did not yet know whether smiling was allowed here. I showed him the grip again. Thumb out. Fingers in. Elbow close. Do not reach with the shoulder unless you want the shoulder borrowed by someone else. He nodded. I placed his hand back where it belonged. He nodded again.

Then the drill began and his body abandoned the conversation.

He stiffened the moment I took his collar. His breath climbed. His hips went square. He tried to solve the whole exchange at once, which meant he solved none of it. I felt the old impulse in my hands: correct everything, give him the structure, make him safe by making him efficient. The impulse arrived dressed as kindness. I let one mistake remain.

“Only the foot,” I said.

“My hand is wrong.”

“Yes.”

“And my shoulder?”

“Also.”

He looked alarmed.

“Foot first,” I said.

Marc moved the foot. Badly. Then less badly. The third time his weight changed enough that the grip became possible instead of hopeful. He looked surprised.

“There,” I said.

“That was it?”

“That was one it.”

He laughed once, relieved and embarrassed. We did it again. Foot. Grip. Breathe. Foot. Grip. Breathe. I did not give him the whole machine. When he asked about the shoulder, I let him ask twice before answering. When he apologized for being slow, I said nothing until he stopped apologizing and moved the foot again.

Hugo watched without appearing to. After ten minutes, Marc managed the entry with enough honesty that he unbalanced me by accident. His eyes widened.

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

“I nearly made you move.”

“You did make me move.”

He looked at Hugo for confirmation. Hugo ignored him. Good. The correction would not belong to Marc if Hugo gave it ceremonial weight. We changed partners.

Hugo put me with Pieter, who had been training long enough to smile before causing trouble. He was my height, thicker through the torso, with good hips and the relaxed cruelty of a man who enjoyed grip fighting the way others enjoyed cards. He slapped my shoulder and said, “Be gentle with me.”

“Of course.”

“I hate when you agree.”

We took grips. The first exchange went cleanly. Pieter drove in, I framed, cut the angle, cleared the line, and reset. He came again. I let the pressure pass over my hip instead of meeting it. His balance opened by a hand’s width. Enough to take, if taking had been the point.

I did not take it. He came a third time and I was late.

The throw did not look dramatic from the outside. It never does when it is correct. The floor left my feet and found my back. Air left me in a short hard line. Pieter held the control for a breath, then released and offered his hand. I took it.

Hugo stood above us with his arms folded.

“Better,” he said.

“At falling?” I asked.

“At not eating the beginner.”

“That sounds like praise.”

“It is not.” He pointed at Pieter. “You carried those hands into this round and got thrown.”

Pieter grinned. “I felt cherished.”

“Be quiet,” Hugo said.

I rolled one shoulder, testing the bruise beginning under the skin. “I waited too long.”

“You disappeared politely,” Hugo said.

I stopped rolling the shoulder.

“Again,” he said.

So we went again. This time I did less for Marc and more for Pieter. The difference was not aggression. It was attention pointed at the right man. Pieter pressured my collar, I broke the grip before his elbow settled. He moved for my sleeve, I took his wrist and turned the line into an angle. He smiled because he felt it coming too late. I did not throw him hard. I only made the floor more believable than his feet.

He slapped the mat and laughed. Hugo gave no praise. He moved to another pair and corrected someone’s knee.

After class, Marc came over while I was putting on my shoes.

“Thank you,” he said.

“For the trousers?”

“For not explaining everything.”

I tied the second shoe before answering. “You would not have been able to use it.”

“I know. That’s why I said thank you.”

He left with his bag held too high on one shoulder. Hugo appeared beside me.

“You heard him?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Good. Students tell you what they can carry if you stop admiring your own bridge.”

I looked up. He had already turned away.

I had eaten half a bowl of soup while Marieke dissected why my answer to her question about collateral circulation had been technically correct and socially useless. We were in a café near the faculty because her room had become too full of papers and my room had become too full of the building. Her coffee had gone cold while she talked.

“You do that sometimes,” she said.

“Answer correctly?”

“Arrive with a complete object when someone asked for a piece.”

I lowered the spoon. She looked tired. The tiredness had lived in her for weeks, gathering at the edges of her mouth and under her eyes, but there was energy beneath it too. Her work had that effect on her. It used her and fed her at the same time.

“I am trying to learn the size of the piece,” I said.

“I know.”

“You dislike that answer.”

“I dislike that it helps.”

She took the coffee, found it cold, drank anyway, and made a face.

“There is a seminar Friday,” she said.

“Cardiology?”

“Reperfusion injury. Measurement windows. Two visiting people from Rotterdam, one from Zürich, and De Smet will pretend he is less excited than he is.”

“Am I invited?”

“No.”

I waited.

“I am inviting you.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Because you ask better questions than you allow yourself to ask in public.”