Chapter 11
"Hey, Pavel!" Darek shouted from across the coffee shop.
Pavel looked up, saw Darek, smiled, and went over to where Darek was seated.
"It's been a while", Darek said as the two shook hands.
"Yeah, let's see, about four months or so, right?" Pavel answered, taking a seat. "How could I forget one of the worst nights of my life?"
"Yeah, sorry about what happened there." Darek replied.
"Geez, when I saw Iza walk through that door, I swear I nearly died of a heart attack. Fortunately, I don't think she said anything to anyone, or I would have heard the rumors."
"What benefit would she have had in telling anyone? She would only be exposing herself. Besides", Darek continued, "she's not that kind of girl."
"Actually", Pavel remarked, "I'm not really sure of what kind of girl she is. I mean, when she was in my class, I always took her for a serious, thoughtful student. I thought this may have been because she was a few years older than most of the other students. To be honest, she would have been about the last student I would have expected to be working as a prostitute."
"As an escort, you mean", Darek corrected him.
"Yeah, right. As an escort", Pavel repeated, apparently not convinced of the fact. "Anyway, how did that all turn out? Did she help you with your problem?" Pavel asked.
"Yes, I couldn't have gotten a better woman to do the job", Darek answered.
"I'm glad to hear it. I'm glad to hear that all that work you went through wasn't for nothing", Pavel noted with relief.
"Well, I had my doubts, but in the end, it was the best decision I ever made." Then, Darek smiled as he looked up over Pavel's shoulder. He stood up and spoke to someone that Pavel could not see. "Hi, you know Pavel." He said.
Suddenly, from behind him, Iza appeared. "Hello, Mr. Baranski", she said smiling and holding out her hand. Pavel was stunned. He had assumed their business arrangement was over. He shook Iza's hand. "Hello, Iza. Nice to see you again", he said, feeling uncomfortable because saying the word, 'again', indicated that awkward last time they had seen each other. Iza did not appear to notice.
Then, Pavel watched as Iza went up to Darek, raised herself up on her toes and kissed him lightly on the lips. Pavel would have thought that this was nothing more than a friendly kiss had they not gazed into each other's eyes a little too long and come away from that moment as two new people; Iza, exuding a radiance that he had never seen from her, and Darek, looking like a man who was finally at peace with himself.
"I think you just told me something you should have told me", Pavel remarked, after his surprise wore off.
Darek and Iza both laughed.
"I would have", Darek replied, "but, until recently, I didn't know myself. However, I know I owe you an explanation. After all, if it hadn't been for you, Iza and I would never have met."
"But I don't understand", Pavel said, looking perplexed, "I thought you said Iza had solved your problem."
"She did", Darek replied, "just not in the way I expected. Like I said, she did her job well. She made Helen's husband fall in love with her."
"Fall in love with her?" Pavel said, looking confused.
"Yes, completely." Then, turning to Iza, Darek continued. "Does he still contact you?"
"Sure", Iza answered. "I get emails, messages, or phone calls a couple of times a week. Of course, now he has a new phone number and email address. He can't risk losing the image he built as a reformed husband. I figure he keeps this second phone at work so that there's no chance his wife will ever see it. Yeah, he's always telling me how much he loves me and misses me, how he is going to leave his wife. All the same old stuff which I never reply to."
"You'd think he'd give up by now," Darek remarked.
"He can't", explained Iza, shaking her head. "His whole concept of himself is built around getting me. If he ever admits that he can't, his self worth will evaporate. Until I came along, he could probably convince most women to be with him. Of course, he probably chose women who were already insecure and needed attention, which was the last thing I needed from him. So, anyway, he won't ever give this idea up. He…"
"Just a second", Pavel interrupted, "I'm confused, are you saying his wife knows all about this and is still with him?"
"Yeah, that's what nearly drove me crazy", said Darek, entering the conversation. "It's not that she didn't know about him, she just didn't want to see it. When I confronted her with the idea that she might be in denial, she flew into a rage. Later, I learned why. It seems that when you confront people in denial with what they're denying, you're asking them to take down the foundations that they have built their imaginary life on. They feel threatened and are angry at you for threatening them. Logic doesn't work. I tried it. I tried everything with her." Darek took a deep breath. "I have to admit that I became pretty depressed for a while. I needed to talk to someone and the only person I could talk to about all this was Iza. She knew the whole story, and she was always able to give me a new perspective that I hadn't considered. Anyway, one day I realized I was thinking more about Iza than about Helen. To be honest, it scared me, really scared me." Darek looked over at Iza, and she smiled and put her hand on his. "I mean, first of all, I didn't want to forget about Helen and second of all, I didn't want to have any crazy romantic notions about Iza."
"I'm not sure I understand", Pavel admitted.
"Why don't you let me explain", Iza interjected, before Darek could continue. "Darek thought that I would have no interest in him. He figured that, at the university, I was around many guys closer to my age, and that I should prefer them. And he was probably right; at least logically. Maybe I should have preferred them, but my work as an escort had made that impossible. Think what you like of the job, it gave me the chance to meet a lot of interesting guys. They had a lot of experience, and they taught me a lot about life. Then I met Darek, and he had qualities that made him better than all of them put together. Our discussions on Helen would often lead us to talk of everything from philosophy to art to psychology. Of course, at that time, we were no more than friends. Yes, I had guys my age ask me out. Nice guys, handsome guys who would only be able to talk about their favorite rap song, teachers, exams, or the latest action movies. I felt more like a baby sitter than a woman. I saw the contrast between these guys and Darek and I began to think differently about him, but I figured he thought of me as only a friend and former employee. Of course, I realized my history may have been in the way as well. In any event, if he ever thought of me romantically, he never showed it."
"Yeah, that sounds like Darek all right." Pavel remarked with a smile. "So you two reached a kind of stalemate, then. Probably one that's pretty common. I know it's happened to me a couple of times. You both want to move from friendship to romance, but neither of you know how to make that first step, right? So, forgive me for being so curious, but how did you get to where you are now?"
"Should I tell him or should you?" Iza asked Darek.
"I'll tell him. He'd probably understand it more from a man's viewpoint." Darek paused to gather his thoughts together, then, continued. "We had been talking for a long time one evening and, as we were saying goodbye, I gave Iza a friendly hug and a light kiss on the cheek. Nothing too unusual, but when I pulled away to leave, I noticed Iza studying me with a look of consternation. I asked her if something was wrong and she looked me in the eye and said, 'is that any way to kiss a woman?' "Darek smiled and shook his head."It was like someone just turned on the lights in a dark room. I realized what an idiot I had been."
Pavel smiled and shook his head. "Who would have thought going to a brothel would lead to this?" Then, realizing what he had just said, he froze. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that. That's not what I meant."
"It's okay, Pavel. Iza doesn't work there any more. She hasn't for quite a while now. I got her a job as an accountant in my company, and, from what I've heard, she's doing pretty well."
"Darek and I have had to work thro
ugh a lot of things", Iza added. "Really, Mr. Baranski, I don't think you could say anything that would surprise us. In fact, if you have any questions, just go ahead and ask them."
"Okay, first of all, I think it's time to call me Pavel. I have a feeling we'll be seeing each other in, well, more informal situations from now on." Iza smiled and nodded in agreement.
"As for questions", Pavel stopped and considered whether he should continue. Yes, he had a number of questions, but did Iza really mean what she had said? "Well, there is, of course, one main question I have, but I'm not so sure you want to hear it."
"Please, Mr…, Pavel, ask it." Iza said, sincerely. "My guess is that we've probably already discussed it."
"Okay, but you have to remember that I've known Darek for years. I knew Anna, his ex, and I knew some of the women he dated, but, and forgive me for saying this, I never saw him feel so deeply about anyone as he did about Helen. I'm just wondering, Darek, what would you do if Helen called you now and told you she was ready to begin a real relationship with you, I mean, that she has finally chosen you over her husband?"
"Actually, if I could say something first", Iza remarked, interrupting Darek just as he was getting ready to speak, "that was the biggest worry I had when we started our relationship. You see, I, more than anyone, knew how much he loved Helen. I saw what he was doing in order to be with her. It was this that actually attracted me to him in the first place. I didn't understand this feeling he had. It was a mystery to me. Yet, I wanted to understand it; to understand if it was real. Still, I wondered if Darek would ever be able to love me as much as he loved Helen. For me, it was the most difficult obstacle to overcome."
Pavel was silent for a while as he thought about Iza's answer. "Well, Darek, what's your answer to this?"
Darek shrugged. "I could have lied, of course. I could have said I really never loved Helen or I don't love her as much as Iza, but I know it wouldn't be true. I loved Helen and I think I always will. No one will ever replace her."
Pavel was stunned by Darek's honesty. He glanced at Iza to see what impact those words had upon her, but she simply sat there, quietly listening.
Darek continued. "But no one is ever loved equally by any of us. Parents will say that they love all of their kids the same, but that's not true. Yes, they do love all of their kids but they love them for what makes them individuals. They may love them all with the same intensity, but for different reasons. There is no one-size-fits-all for love. Different people will bring out different things in us. Some loves bring us peace, some bring us drama, some bring us passion, some bring us despair. They all bring us different blends of feelings."
"Okay, I think I could agree with that", Pavel remarked.
"You know, it is often said that one person is left for another." Darek continued. "That's not really true. No person ever replaces another. At certain points in our lives, assuming we grow and change, we need certain types of people. Our dearest childhood friends, whom we could not wait to play with everyday, may appear dull to us when we meet them later in life. If you had simply replaced them with identical friends, your current friends would seem just as dull."
As Pavel listened and looked at the intensity in Darek's face, he could see that Darek had thought about this for a long time.
"We all want relationships to last forever. That's part of the idea behind marriage. But that's unrealistic unless both people are evolving in the same way. Marriage is based on hope and not logic. People promise to stay together no matter what, but how do they know how they'll really feel when 'no matter what' actually comes along? Helen could never have known how she would react to her husband's cheating because she had no experience with it. If she had known how devastating that would be, she would never have made that naïve promise when she was married. If she had known the full impact of this on her and if the priest had said to her directly, 'will you promise to stay with him even if he cheats on you?' she would never have said 'yes'. But no priest can say this. Everything is bundled into the phrase, 'for better or for worse'. Otherwise, you'd have a marriage with a menu. 'I'll accept this, this, and this, but not that.' The truth is that the priests' main goal is to hold the family together 'no matter what'. They really don't care about the toll that that suicidal promise takes on the individual who is trying to be moral while everything they believed in withers away around them. Here is where the difference between Helen and Iza lies. Iza refuses to let others think for her, Helen accepts that others' opinions are superior to her own. What Iza does takes bravery; what Helen does takes a leap of faith; a leap from logic into the abyss of self-destruction."
"Well, all right, you make some good points", Pavel conceded. "But don't you think you're being a little harsh on Helen? After all, she's just doing what every Polish child has been taught from childhood. We were taught that if you were good, you'd go to heaven. Helen was just trying to be good."
"Good? That's good? Denying herself a chance for happiness is good?" Darek said, becoming animated. "That's really my point. All of religion is built on a foundation of denial. No wonder its practitioners find that denial is the easiest way to escape from reality."
"I don't see your point", Pavel confessed.
"Okay, think of it this way. Everyone dies. Dying is not good. I don't want to die. So religion tells us there's no problem. When you die you don't really die. You just go to some place in the clouds where you are eternally happy. What is this but denial?" Darek shook his head in disgust. "Helen chose to leave me not because she didn't love me, but because someone she paid to think for her, namely, a priest, told her that this was the road to her salvation, the road to that happy place in the clouds. She may suffer now but she'll be rewarded later, after she dies. She put all her money in a bank that will not give it back to her until after she's dead. That's what I call an unbeatable business model. You tell me that this makes any sense."
"It's belief, Darek. It doesn't have to make any sense." Pavel pointed out.
"I agree. Belief is a denial of logic, a denial of reality. It is impervious to logic. If it weren't, Helen would be with me now. If one person is in denial, it's a psychological problem, if thousands of people are in denial, it's a religion, and we are all supposed to pretend that this is fine. Well, I don't think it's fine." Darek took a deep breath. There was a note of anger in his voice. "I don't know, Pavel. In the end, I realized my rival for Helen was not her husband but God. You can't fight an opponent who won't show up for the bout. Helen built herself on something that never existed. She built a model of herself based on someone else's blueprint. She never let herself be who she could have been. I think Iza was partially right when she told me that I was in love with someone I had only imagined. I was cursed with the ability to see what Helen could have been. The difference is that Iza knew who she was and fought to preserve her integrity. Would you rather be in love with a woman who was unsure of herself and mistrusted everything she did, or a woman who was honest to the person she was? Which would you trust more? Which would you respect more?"
"I see your point", Pavel said, "but isn't there more to love than logic? I mean, people seem drawn to one another despite all logical obstacles against it. Look around when you walk down the street. Don't you ever wonder why that beautiful girl is with that shiftless guy or why that handsome guy is with such a plain woman? If you ask people why they are attracted to someone, they would be hard pressed to give you an answer. They simply don't know. Love has always been described as something magical and beyond logical explanation."
"Nothing that occurs on this earth is beyond logical explanation. Perhaps, love is nothing more than a series of chemical reactions in our brains over which we have little logical control." Darek concluded.
"Isn't that a bit depressing?" Pavel asked.
"Is a salmon depressed because he has to go upstream to spawn and die?" Darek remarked.
"Yes, but that's just instinct; something done without thinking", Pavel pointed out.
"A
nd we are not animals?" Darek asked. "Iza refers to men as biological robots. I would have to agree."
"Yeah, it's true." Iza remarked. "In my opinion, men respond by pure instinct in certain situations, not unlike our friend, Mr. Salmon."
"I disagree", Pavel objected. "Men can decide to do something or not. Salmon can't. Logical thinking can control any impulse or instinct."
"Well", said Iza, "I'd like to think so, too, but, from my experience, I haven't seen it. Take married politicians who get involved with other women when all logic tells them they should not. Many people probably tell them to be careful. Many people tell them they're endangering their careers. They know it, too. But do they listen to this logic that everyone else understands? No, they do something stupid because they are, in fact, biological robots. I mean, look at Michael. How did I make him fall in love with me? I used his own biology against him. I attracted him physically, held out the possibility of sexual gratification, but never delivered it. It drove him mad. Logically, he understands that he is risking his marriage and his family for me, but logic isn't involved in these emails and messages that he writes."
"Okay, then what about Darek?" Pavel persisted. "Isn't he, also, controlled by biological reactions?"
Darek and Iza both laughed. "Of course, I suppose we all are." Iza continued. "Complex chemical, physical, emotional, and psychological interactions are probably at the root of all of our behavior. They are probably at the root of love."
Pavel was not convinced. "But aren't you just demeaning the whole idea of love by making it just another scientific process?"
"I don't think so", replied Darek. "I can understand the science behind clouds and the refraction of light, but I can still appreciate a beautiful sunset or a rainbow. I may be driven by impulses beyond my conscious understanding, but I can still enjoy the mysterious feelings they induce in me. Yes, I may even appreciate these 'magic feelings of love', as you say, more than understanding the reasons behind them, but I don't see a conflict between logic and emotions here."
"So are you saying that you logically understand why you loved Helen, or not?" Pavel asked, confused.
"I'm saying I can understand logically why I loved her up to a point, but beyond that, I can't tell you why we felt so close to each other. Some may call it a spiritual connection, but I don't really care what you call it." Darek said, with disgust. "It doesn't matter. In the end, what mattered was that she was willing to give it all up, especially this spiritual connection. Logically, she needed me. She knew I could bring out the best in her. She knew that she would be happy with me, but she still gave that up. Something must have been more important to her than me. I don't care what that something was, whether it was her family, her husband, or her god. Those things, those logical things, we could have somehow worked out, if she really wanted me. We had even discussed working those things out. My mistake was thinking that the other side, the spiritual side, was as important for her as it was for me. That she could so easily give this up was, for me, nothing more than a form of betrayal. She was as unfaithful to me as Michael was to her. It was simply another form of infidelity. Call it infidelity on a spiritual level." Darek looked disheartened when he finished saying this, and Pavel looked at him with sympathy. Still, he needed to ask one more question.
"And Iza? How do you explain your feelings for her?"
Darek looked over at Iza. They looked intensely at each other for a number of seconds, during which time, Pavel could see the unspoken words that flowed between them. He realized, at that moment, that he needed no other explanation, but Darek continued to give one, nonetheless.
"Iza needed me, too. She saw her life as going nowhere. Yes, she was smart. She would have a good career. Yes, she's very beautiful, finding men would never be a problem for her. But, why don't you ask her why she chose me? Because if you ask me, I'd think she could have found someone better."
Pavel looked over at Iza and waited for her answer.
"The short answer is that I love Darek because he is Darek, but I know that's not the answer you want to hear so I'll try to explain. When I have a hard time at school or work, when life seems too stressful, all I have to do is think about seeing Darek and everything seems better. When I'm with him, I feel safe. All my problems seem so insignificant. He's my guardian angel. We produce a feeling together that is more than either of us could produce alone. I've never felt more like a woman than when he holds me in his arms."
Darek leaned over and kissed her softly on the cheek. "You're a wonderful girl", he said to her.
Iza smiled at him, touched him lightly on the cheek, and looked into his eyes. Pavel felt somewhat uncomfortable. He had never seen Darek behave like this and it unnerved him. Iza continued.
"You know, I never believed in love. I thought these movies and songs about it were nothing more than wishful thinking. I thought people were trying to make a big deal out of nothing. Now, I realize how foolish I was. You cannot exaggerate enough about such a feeling." She paused looked over at Darek and continued. "I know, as a man, you think Darek is probably lucky to get a girl like me, but I think that I'm the lucky one. He may not have realized it, but he could have chosen any number of women. But you know him. You know that he refused to choose someone just because he might have been lonely and wanted companionship. He refused to take the easy way out. He didn't realize it at the time, but he was waiting for me. This makes me feel special." She paused and seemed to be collecting her thoughts. "You know, I finally understood that I was glad that Darek was with Helen. She was too weak to truly love him. She could never appreciate the kind of man she could have had. But she brought out some good qualities in him. In the end, the road to me had to go through Helen. It was the only way it could have been. Darek found in me those things that Helen lacked. He was able to value those things more than he would have, had Helen never been in his life. She brought us together just as much as you did, Pavel. When you accept someone, when you love someone, you have no choice but to love their past as well. If that history led them to you, and you are happy, you have no right to complain about it."
Darek put his arm around her shoulders. "Didn't I tell you she was something special?" Iza leaned her head onto his chest and Darek kissed her hair. For an instant, Pavel saw the incongruous image of his best friend with one of his former students. Then, a moment later, it all came into focus. He saw two people who had earned the right to be with each other by being true to their own characters in the hope, no, in the knowledge that someone, someday would appreciate them for their integrity. He had nothing else to say to them. "I'd better be getting home", he said. They all shook hands and Pavel left. At the door, he looked back at them, but they had already forgotten his existence. Darek was holding both of Iza's hands and was speaking to her while she gazed in adoration at him. They were both lost in the intoxication of their astonishing coalescence.
Now Available
Book 2: Pavel
(Iza talks with Helen; Michael confronts Darek)
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