The Greenhouse Read Free Page A

reach the airport, the black blanket begins to lift off the mountain range, uncovering the first rays of dawn below it, like light blue wisps of smoke. The horizontal February sun reveals the dirt on the smudged windshield.
    My brother and Dad follow me into the terminal.
    Dad hands me a wrapped package as we’re saying good-bye.
    —You can open it when you land, he says. Just a little something that might remind you of your old man at bedtime.
    When I say good-bye to Dad I give him a firm hug, but not a long one, just a brisk embrace and slap him on the back like a man. Then I do the same to my brother, Jósef, who immediately recoils toward Dad and takes his hand. Then Dad takes a fat envelope out of his back pocket and hands it to me.
    —I went to the bank and got some cash out for you; you never know what can come up when you’re abroad.
    I fleetingly glance over my shoulder and see Dad leading my twin brother out of the terminal, Dad’s wallet sticking halfway out of his back pocket. They’re both in the gray waistcoats that Dad recently bought; it’s impossible to say which of the two is the best dressed. Jósef is my total opposite in appearance, short, with brown eyes and dark skin, as if he’d just strolled off a beach. He’s so immaculately dressed that, if it weren’t for the color combinations of his clothes, my autistic twin brother could be mistaken for an air pilot. In the image I decide to store of him in my mind he is in a violet shirt with butterfly patterns. By the time it’s full daylight I will have left this brown slush behind me, and the salt of the earth will only survive in the form of white rings on the rims of my shoes.

     

Five
     
    It’s precisely at the moment when the plane is lifting off the runway and shooting away from the frosty pink snow that I feel a distinct jab of pain in my stomach. I lean over my neighbor to catch a final glimpse through the porthole, of the mountain below, like violet mounds of meat splattered with streaks of white fat. The woman in a yellow polo presses herself back against her seat to give me the full view of her window. But I soon grow tired of measuring her breasts against the string of craters and lose interest in the view. Although I should be feeling lighter, the pain in my gut prevents me from full-heartedly appreciating the sense of freedom that is meant to accompany being above everything that is below. I’m conscious of—rather than actually seeing—the black lava, yellow withered grass, milky rivers, corrugated terrain of tussocks, marshes, fields of wilting lupin, and beyond that an endless stretch of rock. And what could be more hostile than rocks; surely roses can’t grow in the middle of broken rocks? This is undoubtedly an extraordinarily beautiful country, and although I’m fond of many things here, both places and people, it’s best kept on a stamp.
    I stretch into the backpack shortly after takeoff to see how the rose cuttings are faring at an altitude of thirty-three thousand feet. They’re still wrapped in the moist newspapers, which I adjust around the green shoots. The fact that I accidentally chose an obituaries page is no doubt apt, considering my current physical state, and also a demonstration of how coincidences can work in subtle ways. At the moment in which I’m detaching myself from the earth below, it’s not unnatural to be thinking of death. I’m a twenty-two-year-old man and bound to sink into contemplating death several times a day. Second comes the body, both my own and that of others, and in third place there are the roses and other plants, although the exact order in which I ponder on these three things may vary from day to day. I put the plants down again and sit in the seat beside the woman.
    In addition to the pain, which is now turning into a throbbing ache, I feel a mounting nausea and bend over, clutching my stomach. The sound of the engines reminds me of the fishing boat and how nauseous it made me