Page 59 of The Bookshop of Forbidden Books

In her first few months, she’d struggled to find her place within the brigade in the fine-dining restaurant that had hired her. She’d had to adjust to working with a chef who was as authoritarian as he was passionate – a man whose talent she deeply admired. After a year of hard work, the respect became mutual. Bit by bit, he gave her freedom to create – first with curiosity, then with genuine interest in her work. He taught her much, then encouraged her to strike out on her own.

“At least you had people around you,” Mitch commented.

“Well… it was a bit more complicated than it seems.”

She told him about the intimate relationship she’d developed with her own solitude: how people in exile, hurling themselves against the walls of their own minds and memories, could be difficult to live with. They missed the sun rising over their native lands and night falling on their hometowns. Prisoners feel a similar ache. Mitch saw himself in every one of her words – in her description of nights so dark they almost choke you; of days filled with hope; of the sadness that floods you without warning; of the anxiety that comes when you hear the echo – so close and yet so far – of your own voice as you talk to yourself; of the sense, when sleep won’t come, that solitude has taken root so deeply it may never leave again. And even when you resign yourself to that feeling, the night always returns.

Working in the chaos of a kitchen, in the cacophony of the dining room, blending into the crowd when the evening sidewalks filled with passers-by, grabbing a late meal at a pub surrounded by strangers… none of it changed a thing.

“Who did you think about when you were in prison?” Anna asked.

“My mother, in her nursing home. My father too. They knew what it was to be poor, but they never felt sorry for themselves. Dad was always fighting other people’s battles – he only found peace in books. He often had trouble sleeping because he was always worrying about other people’s pain. At night, in my cell, I used to wonder how he would have handled my situation – whether it would have broken his heart, or filled it with pride. Maybe both.

“I hated Salinas. I swore to myself that I’d never forgive him, that I’d keep him from harming anyone else. My father wouldn’t have liked that. He despised anger. But I would have argued the point with him, because I believe that if you let yourself be walked on once, you do so forever.

“I remember what he used to say when he read me bedtime stories – which he did a lot. He always said it only takes a single moment of cowardice to lose your dignity; that you have to be very careful in life; and that people who’ve lost their humanity carry a terrible pain, so they need to be healed. That’s what books are for: remedies against fear, prejudice and hatred. My father simply wanted to be human, and even though his life was too short, I know he succeeded.”

Anna, whose father had been an abusive tyrant, remained silent. Her eyes filled with tears. When Mitch took her hand, he knew it wasn’t sadness she was feeling, but the realization that her solitude was over at last.

She kept her eyes on the road for a long time without speaking. Mitch turned on the radio. A hundred kilometers later, she turned it off and looked over at him, her eyes twinkling mischievously.

“Was there really no one else you thought about in prison? Tell the truth!”

“Well… sometimes I thought about this girl I’d been seeing before my arrest. It wasn’t going anywhere, but it had the merit of being real.”

“Why wasn’t it going anywhere? Her choice, or yours?”

Mitch glanced over at Anna. Leaning against the passenger door, knees tucked up with her bare feet on the seat, she looked perfectly at ease – as though she were at home in her living room.

“We never talked about it,” he admitted. “We were okay with things as they were. We didn’t need to think about the future.”

“I see. And how did things end?”

“She mustn’t have been cut out for long-distance. After I got arrested and was sent to prison, I never heard from her again.”

“What about when you got out of prison?”

“It didn’t even occur to me to get in touch with her.”

“Were you still in love with her?”

“No,” Mitch admitted. “But for a while I held on to the memory of what we shared.”

“If she vanished so suddenly, she might have been the one who turned you in.”

“She was a student. Fiercely against the regime.”

“That’s what the Soviet spy girls used to claim. They were call girls who pretended to be university students and seduced men suspected of being traitors. Sexual espionage is alive and well these days, you know – and not only in totalitarian nations,” Anna added. “Not long ago, British intelligence discovered that one of their cabinet ministers had been spilling state secrets during pillow talk with his girlfriend… who turned out to be working for Russia.”

“Don’t. Please. I don’t want to think about Mathilde like that.”

“Do you know what happened to her, at least?”

“No idea. She must have finished university by now. She’s probably working in a lab somewhere. Maybe a pharmacy.”

“Or maybe she never really went to university at all,” Anna suggested.

“Why are you so set on the idea that someone betrayed me?” Mitch felt exacerbated now.