Page 89 of The Storyteller of Krakow

She duly called me a taxi and I was ferried back to the home. And just in time too. Minutes after arriving, I felt the pain. This time reaching all the way up my back, to the base of my skull.

I popped two out of their foil home, and then decided on another two. Couldn’t hurt, could it?

The following day, groggy from my slight overdosing, I stayed put in the home and knew at some point Kasia would come, would be back at work, and I could give her the ending to the story that she so desperately wanted to hear. I too wanted to hear it – wanted to hear how it all ended because for so long it had just been in my mind. Saying it made it real – made me real.

I spent the morning in the common room, where I found Grażyna’s attempt at knitting and decided I would try to finish it myself – a baby blanket perhaps, or a small scarf, and would place it back so that when she found it, she would think she had done it.

As I sat, my gnarled fingers making a hash of each stitch, Stanisław appeared, sat down and began to read the newspaper. The crinkling of the pages, and his constant little coughs, did little to help with my concentration so that eventually, I stopped what I was doing. He immediately saw and placed his paper down – I knew he wanted to talk. Men are so funny that way.

‘Ah, Lena, knitting, I see,’ he said.

‘Not mine, Grażyna’s.’

He nodded. ‘It won’t be long for her I don’t think.’

‘Perhaps. But it’s not long for many of us.’

‘Indeed. Indeed.’ He looked about him as if trying to find the conversation in the room, then back at me. ‘Say, Lena, are you scared?’

‘Of what?’

‘Dying, of course. I only ask because there was this talk here the other day. Some new-agey person came to talk to those of us who don’t believe in God and heaven and all that. They tried to tell us not to be afraid. And to be honest with you, I never really thought about being afraid until they mentioned it. So I thought about it a little, and then I thought, do you know who wouldn’t be afraid? You, Lena.’

‘Well,’ I said. ‘I’m honoured you think that.’

‘So are you? Afraid, that is?’

‘Not a bit of it,’ I said. ‘Seen enough of it over the years as a doctor, and even before that. It’s a part of life. Just a part of it. No point focusing on just one part. There are lots of parts.’

‘Like the past,’ he said. ‘I’ve found myself focusing on that too much. This new-agey person said to think only of the present. But you see, Lena, my past is far more interesting than my present.’ He grinned at me.

‘Well, I suppose when we get to this age, the past seems to be filled with more. But it’s like rose-coloured glasses – the past isn’t to be trusted completely.’

‘Ah, now, Lena,’ he said, leaning back in his chair, clasping his hands over his stomach. ‘I could tell you a thing or two about my past that would make your hair curl. I mean, you know about my many wives?’

That I did. Everyone did. Stanisław had been a catch in his day and he went from wife to wife as if simply buying new clothes. Not that it had seemed to bother his wives all that much, as most of them still visited him and said they had had a lovely marriage with him.

‘I knew this one girl – did I tell you about her? Infatuated with me, she was. I moved to London, and wouldn’t you know she turned up. Thought we should be together. I’d only spoken to her a handful of times before that, didn’t even realise she felt that way. But she’d made it all up in her head you see. Or I had done that to her. I was quite a catch back then.’

‘I’m sure you were,’ I said, placing the knitting back on the arm of the sofa. I didn’t particularly want to hear more about Stanisław’s exploits and began to stand.

‘Not now though,’ he said, his voice low. ‘I’m not sure who I am now. I tell you, that new-agey person has made me think of too many things – the past, who I am, who I was. Regrets and all that.’

I lowered myself back down. ‘You’re a kind man,’ I said. ‘Kind with Grażyna and the rest of us. You make us laugh. You’re a good dancer.’

‘Better than Bogdan,’ he interrupted.

‘Yes. Better than Bogdan.’

He nodded, smiled, then stood.

‘Thank you, Lena,’ he said, and then left the room without a backwards glance.

Aren’t men funny? I thought. Here’s a man, faced with questions about his mortality, about age, regrets, guilt, and he begins by telling me about his wives and girlfriends. And then, he’s told he’s a better dancer than Bogdan and poof! All mended.

Men were definitely funny.

‘Who are?’