Read Out of Mind for Free Online Page B

and now they are gone, you never see them any more . . . )
    As a child you often had that. You'd wake up in the morning and the walls of your room were all wrong around you. In your mind you had to swivel the room around so that everything would be in its proper place again and you were able to get up and go out of the door, into the day.
    With my hands clasped under my head I look at the azure-blue cotton bedroom curtains, while in my thoughts I put the rooms of the house back into place. Vera must already be up, although I can hear no sound. The light, even though muted by the curtain, is bare and hard. It must have snowed again in the night, I think.
    I get out of bed and open the curtains. It doesn't look as if any new snow has fallen. Robert's footprints lie sunk deep in the snow, less sharp at the edges than would have been the case with fresh prints. The tops of the pine trees point motionlessly into the sky like broomsticks. A narrow path has been trodden from the porch to the moss-green shed in the right-hand corner at the far end of the yard.
    I brush my teeth and search meanwhile for words, a formulation of what I feel. As if inside me there were someone who remembers another house, the interior arrangement of which sometimes cuts across that of this house. Rooms ought to be absolute certainties. The way in which they lead into one another ought to be fixed once and for all. You should be able to open a door as a matter of course. Not in fear and anxiety because you have not the faintest idea of what you may find behind it.
    I am standing in front of the clothes closet. For today I choose the black suit I bought at Rowland's in Lafayette Street. Because of its deep inside pockets. Even my desk diary fits in them. I can feel something in the left-hand inside pocket.
    A picture postcard of a dazzingly white-washed Mexican church. The sun must be straight overhead because there is no shade to be seen. The open door is a vaulted black hole. Love - Kitty. A six-year-old postmark. Clearly a joke on the part of some colleague. Wouldn't surprise me if it was Maurice Chauvas. Always full of tales about his escapades. He knows I don't like such jokes. Probably thinks Vera checks through my pockets when I come home from the office. I pull a belt through the loops of my pants, buckle it, and leave the bedroom. Since I have given up beer I have lost a good deal of weight.
    Vera must have left for the library by now. On Monday and Wednesday mornings she works there as a volunteer. Writing out tickets. They still do that by hand there. She has the handwriting for it. Small, upright and clear.
    I go to the kitchen and open the door of the refrigerator, which switches on at once as though wishing me a humming, throbbing good morning.
    Once you start eating there is no stopping. Chewing does you good. You should always chew well, slowly, until everything is mashed up small. Only then must you swallow. This chicken tastes moreish. Here you are, Robert. I toss him some cleaned-off bones. Let's have a look what else there is. Liver pâté and a slice of cool pineapple out of a can. Robert is still hungry too. He can have half of this packet of cookies, but no more. I'll eat the rest. It's bad to go to work on an empty stomach. Moreover, I am always afraid they'll hear my insides rumble during a meeting. Insides. When you think of that, and you look down the gleaming polished table and you see them all sitting there in their suits, with their papers in front of them, and inside those suits it is full of blood and metres of coiled intestines and a pumping heart, when you think of that, you can hardly stifle your laughter. Nice, this icy cold orange juice, straight from the bottle into your mouth. Some of it goes beside it, but who cares? A quick wipe with a kitchen cloth and you're spick and span again.
    'Come on, Robert, it's getting late. We'll clear up the mess later.'
    How often have I told Vera not to touch my desk? My briefcase is