Verklärte Nacht

Dear reader,

In this story, music plays a big role, especially one piece I love dearly: Verklärte Nacht (Transfigured Night), a so-called symphonic poem by the German composer, Arnold Schönberg.

It might intensify your experience if you decided to hear it while reading the story (or before, or after.) There are a few wonderful versions on YouTube. The one I'd recommend is by RNCM String Orchestra.

Have fun.

Peter.

The Boston Symphony Hall bathed in a sea of light, sparkling off gilded ornaments and velvet chairs. The audience's murmuring mingled with the sweet chaos of musicians tuning their instruments.

For Peter Bridges going to a concert with his soon-to-be wife, Anne, had grown to be a very special occasion.

Dressing up, taking a cab, even doing small things like presenting their coats to the pretty girl in the cloakroom had become a beloved ritual of anticipation; as was walking Anne on his arm into the foyer where they had a drink before attending the concert itself -- he some wine, she a glass of mineral water, of course.

It was a treat to just be among people who did their utmost to look festive and elegant.

He knew Anne loved watching people, especially now that she didn't leave the house so much. She liked to comment on the way they behaved and dressed, laughed and talked; the older men in their smoking, wearing their distinguished silver hair; the young dressed-up girls, blushing with youth and excitement.

Peter loved watching Anne watching people -- the way her pale fingers held her glass, the red-lacquered nails arranged like a string of beads.

Could he ever not be a smitten schoolboy around her?

He loved to watch the effortless grace of her movements, even now; the sea-green jersey dress following the sweet contour of her swollen belly and prominent breasts -- only making her look even more sensual.

He loved the way her glossed lips stretched into a subtle smile, hardly exposing her white teeth; or the hushed throatiness of her voice as she whispered her comments, blue eyes sparkling with irony. He also admired the short bob of thick blond hair that left her neck free -- her pale swan's neck.

Kissable, so very kissable.

Standing there, watching her, he remembered; and remembering felt like swimming against a warm, bubbly stream filled with many fond occurrences until he reached their tumultuous first meeting -- just about six months ago.

Peter Bridges was a mild-mannered 32-year-old man with the ingrained reserve of an oldest son -- always looking for a reason behind things, and then trying to be reasonable about it with everyone involved.

It was why he excelled as a business mediator.

On that night, almost six months ago, he wasn't himself, obviously. He acted emotional and impulsive. Smiling at the memory, his hand automatically went to his jaw, rubbing it.

After closing a deal, a grateful client had taken him to a bar he'd never been to before. It was quite posh in a very brass-and-marble way -- not his taste at all.

He was with two women and three guys. Sitting down in a booth, they'd shared a bottle of celebratory champagne when he heard loud voices rising from behind the separation he rested against.

It was a woman's voice saying "no" and "It's over, I don't want to anymore" in an agitated way. A male voice was too deep and low to figure out the words over the music.

"No!"

It was almost a shriek and it tore Peter to his feet. Looking over the separation, he saw a woman wrestling to get herself free from a man's hands.

Her face was distorted, but it still struck him with its beauty.

Without realizing that he'd even moved, Peter found himself in the other booth, his hands on the man's shoulders, pulling.

Peter once more rubbed his jaw, right where the man hit him. He hadn't seen it coming, not being a fighter, let alone a trained one; but the blow unhinged something inside him, so he'd turned and hit the guy hard, right on the tip of his chin.

The man's knees buckled and his big body slid between the bench and the table -- his head bouncing off the edge.

All he knew was the pain in his hand and a soft body pressing into every square inch of his.

A mouth kissed him.

"Oh God," her voice whispered. "Take me out of here."

He had looked down on the unconscious body, then up to the faces of alarmed people gathering around.

"But," he'd said, reason returning to his dizzy mind. "Shouldn't we..."

There'd been no need to decide. The management had called an ambulance, and soon after came the police.

Returning to the present, he watched Anne's smile. Taking her empty glass, he suggested they should go inside for the concert.

***

Let's call it pride, the warmth Peter Bridges felt while steering his pregnant wife past rows and rows of chairs to find their place, somewhere in the middle of the hall.

They had a perfect view of the stage; the orchestra was already seated, waiting for their conductor. They were all dressed in black, and he saw only strings: violins, cellos, basses -- no flutes or copper, not even percussion.

On first violin was a cute Asian girl in a long silk dress, amazingly young for her position.

Opening the program they'd received, Peter read the title of the first piece to be played: "Verklärte Nacht," a composition by Arnold Schönberg.

He knew the piece and had grown fond of it -- hearing it on CD and radio, but never live, so, when he saw it would be played at the concert hall, led by one of his favorite conductors, he'd bought tickets at once.

Anne wasn't into classical music, really, but she seemed to love the wider experience -- just being there together to mingle with a festive audience, having a bite and a drink in the city.

Of course, there were the odd popular pieces she appreciated, like Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake or Beethoven's Pastorale symphony -- some Mozart too.

And she loved opera, especially Verdi and Puccini.

Tonight's opening piece wouldn't be easy listening, he knew, but it still was more accessible than the composer's later, atonal works. Peter had googled the exact translation of its title, Verklärte Nacht, and had found it to mean transfigured, or glorified, rather -- a night turned blissful.

It seemed a good omen.

A short applause welcomed the conductor. He bowed, and then turned around to lift his baton, causing silence amongst the audience.

The sound of deep strings, cellos and basses, crept into the hall, spreading a sensation of darkest night in a forest, a silver moon against a black empty sky.

Peter knew that Schönberg had been inspired by a poem with the same title, written by a Richard Dehmel. It had been printed in the program he held, both in the original German and in English, giving the piece another layer of meaning and an unexpected modern feeling -- lifting it out of the mere romantic into a new, much more personal reality.

At least, for him it did.

So, as the violins added a greater urgency to the music, he handed a second program to Anne, pointing out the text.

Returning his attention to the orchestra, he let himself be transported by the wonderful intricacy of the composition -- all the different instruments doing their individual dance; marionettes tied together by the conductor's magic wand.

Images flooded his mind.

They showed dark trees and silver moonlight, as they always had done, ever since he heard the piece a first time. There were stars in the vast stretch of the night's sky, but this time there also were two lonesome, vulnerable people walking hand in hand, lost in an awkward, halting conversation. They exchanged looks, he imagined, that turned from loving to desperate, from hurting to intensely loving again.

And then he heard her sobbing.

He turned away from the orchestra and saw Anne leaning forward, one hand to her face, her eyes fixed on the program.

"Are you all right?" he whispered.

She looked at him. The rims of her carefully made up eyes had a pink hue. Her blue irises shone, and he saw moisture build in the corners until one fat drop rolled down her cheek, leaving a trace of gray.

"I'm fine," she said and sniffed, trying to force a smile through her obvious misery.

Looking down, she opened her purse and found a small white handkerchief. Dabbing her eyes, she said:

"It... it is just so heart-rending."

***

Anne.

The poem was heart-rending, oh, it certainly was, but that wasn't the reason she cried -- not the main reason. Neither was it caused by the music that swelled and subsided, sending waves to drown her.

She felt lost -- very alone.

Through the blur of her tears she reread the first lines of the poem:

"Two people walk through a bare, cold grove;
The moon races along with them, they look into it.
The moon races over tall oaks,
No cloud obscures the light from the sky,
Into which the black points of the boughs reach.
A woman's voice speaks:

I'm carrying a child, and not yours,
I walk in sin beside you."

Anne's eyes wandered to the German version; she didn't know why, as she didn't speak the language.

"Ich trag ein Kind, und nit von Dir," it said.
"Ich geh in Sünde neben Dir."

Peter reached for her face, turning it his way. His gray eyes were in the shadows of his frowning brow.

"Don't you feel well?" he whispered. "Shall we leave?"

She shook her head.

"No. No, darling, no. It's all right. I'll be all right."

She forced a smile through her tears and sat up, putting her purse on top of the program in her lap -- the program with the poem.

Stupid poem.

Anne became aware of the music again. It sounded different now, as if it gained a new meaning, and it did, of course.

The groundswell of the cellos felt threatening. The violins mocked her. Even the gestures of the conductor seemed more aggressive, stabbing the air.

Six months, she thought.

One fist strangled her moist handkerchief; the other pressed into the side of her belly. She'd stopped crying; at least: there were no more tears.

Her eyes flashed in his direction.

"I walk in sin beside you..."

The words echoed inside her head. Then she looked down again, moving the purse to the side and exposing the text.

"...so, shuddering, I allowed my sex
To be embraced by a strange man,
And, on top of that, I blessed myself for it.
Now life has taken its revenge:
Now I have met you, oh, you."

Once more her eyes turned to him, as she felt the threat of new tears.

"...met you," she mimed without a sound.

Her free hand found his and she squeezed it without thinking. He smiled and looked at her.

"Isn't it beautiful?" he whispered.

"...I allowed my sex to be embraced by a strange man," she thought. "And I blessed myself for that."

The music was at its loudest now, as if it wanted to smother her thoughts. But they struggled to be heard anyway -- they insisted.

"I blessed myself for that."

Unspoken lies and spoken half-truths paraded past the dark screen of her memory. Once precious moments became smeared with treason. The way he listened at her belly for sounds and movements, how they held hands while going in for her first echo, thinking up names, finding the new house, baptizing their new bedroom...

All garbage.

How could she have thought it would all end up right if she only kept quiet, hoping that hijacking this wonderful man's loyalty -- even his love -- would turn a lie into a truth?

Almost four months of lying now. How could she believe she could keep doing that for the rest of her life? How could she live happily alongside a man she'd turned into an unwitting clown?

Her eyes wandered back to her lap, and through the haze new words popped up:

"She walks with a clumsy gait.

She looks up; the moon is racing along.

Her dark gaze is drowned in light."

"...drowned in light." Such mockery when there can be only darkness.

"Ihr dunkler Blick ertrinkt in Licht." Not much better in German, she guessed.

But she'd been innocent, hadn't she?

She hadn't known.

When he brought her home, that night of the fist fight six months ago, after going through an awful roller coaster of questions by the management of the club and the police, she truly didn't know what happened inside her body, did she?

She still didn't know when he asked her out, the next Saturday, and when they made love that first time, two weeks later, she did not know.

Remembering their first time was like immersing in a warm bath, covered in perfumed clouds of steam. It had been so different from what she knew -- so natural and complete; so incredibly loving and sweet.

So right, and so all-embracing important.

His mouth had traveled her entire body, and when it found her crotch, she'd offered him a swamp of shivering moisture -- so wet she'd been, so open.

She came, even before his tongue touched her, but it had been much more than a mere orgasm; it had been an overwhelming, omnipresent sensation that had no beginning it seemed, nor an end, really.

Could a woman come like that just from wanting a man so badly?

When his cock finally slid into her, they rode a tropical storm, drowning and rising together -- like desperately clinging swimmers lost in an endless sea.

And now -- reading this horrible poem, how did she presume it could ever feel like that again? How could it ever not feel like treason?

"Now life has taken its revenge..."

Anne missed her period two weeks after their first sex, but she didn't mind much. She was on the pill, wasn't she? She always had irregular and very weak periods while on the pill -- sometimes not even at all.

No, there wasn't much reason to be anxious -- yet.

But when she missed the next period, she bought a pregnancy test. She felt no doubt about wanting a child with Peter, even this early. But what would he think? Would he be angry? Would he dump her?

Well, it wasn't her fault, was it? Anti-conception pills weren't known to be infallible. It was still a matter of luck -- either good or bad.

And it wasn't just her doing.

That night her heart pounded as she showed him the positive test. He'd smiled widely, picked her up from her chair and carried her to her bed. Exposing her belly, he'd started talking to their unborn child, making funny noises and kissing her stomach.

She was truly blessed with this man, wasn't she?

She was, until she visited her doctor, who said she was almost three months pregnant. It didn't take rocket science to know Peter couldn't be the father. And yet it took her a while to realize what had happened; the bliss of the last two months had totally eradicated her memories of Gus Schroeder.

He'd been the man Peter knocked unconscious at the club.

Gus was a friend from college. Back then he'd dated her on and off, mostly to accompany him at parties or functions -- or vice versa. They once even went to the beach for a weekend.

There always was a lot of alcohol involved, and having sex afterwards was as common as it was unimportant.

She dated a lot in college; all her friends did.

Almost a year after graduation, as she'd settled in Boston where she found a job, Gus called her. He told her he'd moved to Boston as well and proposed a date 'to relive old memories and make new ones' as he put it.

Life in an unfamiliar town had been rather lonely for Anne, so she was glad to see a familiar face.

She remembered Gus as an uncomplicated and entertaining friend; in college they'd had a lot of fun together. This time too he didn't disappoint her. Over dinner and dancing -- and quite a generous amount of drinking -- he easily recreated their comfortable past, ending up in her bed.

Not expecting much sex in this first half year of her new existence, Anne had stopped taking her pill, so she told him to use protection. He produced a rubber and they had their usual uncomplicated, athletic bout of sex -- twice.

The next day Anne started taking the pill.

She turned down Gus at his next phone call, only three days after their first date. He kept calling, though, so they went out again two weeks later.

That night they fucked without protection.

It should have been more of the usual no-strings-attached recreational fun, but it wasn't. Gus seemed different. Maybe it was the things he said, and the way he said them.

Possessive, might be the word.

He wanted to stay the night. He wanted to know about her sexual life, her plans, her relations, and the next morning he called for a new date that same evening.

She turned him down three times; all fun seemed to have disappeared. Then, finally, she agreed to see him at the club they'd been to twice before, intending to break it off with him.

It was where Gus got knocked down by Peter. And where her life changed.

Back at the Boston Symphony Hall, Anne realized she'd missed quite a part of the concert, floating away in her memories of Gus Schroeder, and the cause of her misery.

When she returned to the present, her eyes started looking for the text in her lap.

"Her dark gaze is drowned in light," she re-read, before going on:

"A man's voice speaks:

May the child you conceived

Be no burden to your soul;

Just see how bright the universe is gleaming!

There's a glow around everything;

You are floating with me on a cold ocean,

But a special warmth flickers

From you into me, from me into you.

It will transfigure the strange man's child..."

Really?

Such bullshit, she thought. Who could believe any man would say that? Accept a strange man's child?

A sigh stuck in her throat.

Peter surely wouldn't -- not anymore, would he? He shouldn't; no man should, not after four months of being kept in the dark.

Why didn't she tell him at once, as soon as she knew it herself? He often enough asked her to trust him, saying that he loved her; that they should tell each other everything... "never be afraid," he said.

But those were lover's words, weren't they? Blind words.

He would have left her, and it would have killed him as much as it would have killed her.

He totally embraced the idea of having a child, this child, with her. He made plans that same evening. They moved into a real house in a real family suburb. He bought things, created a wonderful baby room. They planned on marrying next month, and with less than three months to go, the child was already deeply woven into the pattern of his fate -- their fate.

They even had a name already: Eva.

Wouldn't marrying him like this be the ultimate betrayal? Shouldn't she at least give him the choice?

No, it was better not to tell; better for him, for her, for little Eva. She tried to imagine what she would have said, had she told him back then -- and the words made her shiver.

"Listen, Peter, I'm pregnant, but I'm sure it can't be your child. I had sex with the man you knocked down, and the child must be his."

Imagine telling that. Could she take the risk, hurting everyone, destroying everything, just to be honest?

How could Peter not abandon her? He loved her, but could he ever act like the man in the poem? Would she even want him to be like that man?

Could she even respect him for it?

"You will bear the child for me, as if it were mine," the man in the poem said.

He really said that. My God. A man accepting the child another man put in the womb of his willing wife? What kind of man is that?

And what kind of woman?

Well, anyway -- she didn't give him the chance, did she?

A new feeling flooded her. What was it? Self-pity? Desperation?

Regret?

***

Peter.

Her hand squeezed his.

He wondered: was it the music that upset her so? Or the poem, maybe? He remembered how she cried at the final aria of Madama Butterfly, when the betrayed Japanese woman takes her life.