Eleven Minutes

by Paulo Coelho

  "Oh, I will, including his. I came to say goodbye. I'm leaving."

  Milan appeared not to react.

  "Is it the painter?"

  "No, it's the Copacabana. There's a limit to everything, and I reached mine this morning when I was looking at that floral clock near the lake."

  "And what is the limit?"

  "The price of a farm in the interior of Brazil. I know I could earn more money, that I could work for another year--after all, what difference would it make?

  "Well, I know what difference it would make; I would be caught in this trap forever, just as you are and the clients are, the businessmen, the air stewards, the talent scouts, the record company executives, the many men I have known, to whom I have sold my time and which they can't sell back to me. If I stay another day, I'll be here for another year, and if I stay another year, I'll never leave."

  Milan nodded discreetly, as if he understood and agreed with everything she had said, although he couldn't actually say anything, for fear of infecting all the other girls who worked for him. He was a good man, and although he didn't give her his blessing, neither did he try to convince Maria that she was wrong.

  She thanked him and asked for a drink--a glass of champagne, she couldn't stand another fruit juice cocktail. She could drink now that she wasn't working. Milan told her to phone him if ever she needed anything; she would always be welcome.

  She made to pay for the drink, and he said it was on the house. She accepted: she had, after all, given that house a great deal more than one drink.

  From Maria's diary, when she got home:

  I don't remember exactly when, but one Sunday recently, I decided to go to church to attend mass. After some time, I realized that I was in the wrong church--it was a Protestant church.

  I was about to leave, but the vicar was just beginning his sermon, and I thought it would be rude to get up at that point, and it was a real blessing, because that day I heard things I very much needed to hear.

  He said something like:

  "In all the languages in the world, there is the same proverb: 'What the eyes don't see, the heart doesn't grieve over.' Well, I say that there isn't an ounce of truth in it. The further off they are, the closer to the heart are all those feelings that we try to repress and forget. If we're in exile, we want to store away every tiny memory of our roots. If we're far from the person we love, everyone we pass in the street reminds us of them.

  "The gospels and all the sacred texts of all religions were written in exile, in search of God's understanding, of the faith that moves whole peoples, of the pilgrimage of souls wandering the face of the Earth. Our ancestors did not know, as we do not know, what the Divinity expects from our lives--and it is out of that doubt that books are written, pictures painted, because we don't want to forget who we are--nor can we."

  At the end of the service, I went up to him and thanked him: I said that I was a stranger in a strange land, and I thanked him for reminding me that what the eyes don't see, the heart does grieve over. And my heart has grieved so much, that today I'm leaving.

  She picked up her two suitcases and put them on the bed; they had always been there, waiting for the day when everything would come to an end. She had imagined that she would fill them with presents, new clothes, photographs of snow and of the great European capitals, souvenirs of a happy time when she had lived in the safest and most generous country in the world. She had a few new clothes, it was true, and a few photos taken in the snow that fell one day in Geneva, but apart from that, nothing was as she had imagined it would be.

  She had arrived with the dream of earning lots of money, learning about life and who she was, buying a farm for her parents, finding a husband, and bringing her family over to see where she lived. She was returning with just enough money to realize one of those dreams, without ever having visited the mountains and, worse still, a stranger to herself. But she was happy; she knew the time had come to stop.

  Not many people do.

  She had had only four adventures--being a dancer in a cabaret, learning French, working as a prostitute and falling hopelessly in love. How many people can boast of experiencing so much excitement in one year? She was happy, despite the sadness, and that sadness had a name: it wasn't prostitution, or Switzerland or money--it was Ralf Hart. Although she had never acknowledged it to herself, deep down, she would like to have married him, that man who was now waiting for her in a church, ready to take her off to see his friends, his paintings, his world.

  She considered standing him up and getting a room in a hotel near the airport, since the flight left early the next morning; from now on, every minute spent by his side would be a year of suffering in the future, for everything she could have said to him and didn't, for her memories of his hands, his voice, his loving support, and his stories.

  She opened one suitcase and took out the little carriage from the electric train set that he had given her on that first night in his house. She looked at it for a few minutes, then threw it in the bin; it didn't deserve to go to Brazil, and it had proved useless and unfair to the child who had always wanted it.

  No, she wouldn't go to the church; he might ask her something about tomorrow, and if she was honest and told him that she was leaving, he would beg her to stay and promise her everything in order not to lose her at that moment, he would openly declare all the love he had already shown to her during the time they had spent together. But their relationship was based on freedom, and no other sort of relationship would work--perhaps that was the only reason they loved each other, because they knew they did not need each other. Men always take fright when a woman says: "I need you," and Maria wanted to take away with her the image of a Ralf Hart who was utterly in love and utterly hers, and ready to do anything for her.

  She still had time to decide whether or not to go and meet him; at the moment, she needed to concentrate on more practical matters. She looked at all the things she couldn't pack and which she had no idea what to do with. She decided that the owner could decide on their fate when he came to check the apartment and found all the household appliances in the kitchen, the pictures bought in a second-hand market, the towels and the bedclothes. She couldn't take any of that with her to Brazil, even though her parents had more need of them than any Swiss beggar; they would always remind her of everything she had risked.

  She left the apartment and went to the bank and asked to withdraw all her money. The manager--who had been to bed with her in the past--said that this really wasn't a good idea, since her francs would continue earning money and she could receive the interest in Brazil. Besides, what if she were mugged, that would mean months of work wasted. Maria hesitated for a moment, thinking--as she always did--that he really was trying to help. However, after reflecting for a moment, she concluded that the point of the money was not that it should be transformed into more paper, but into a farm, a home for her parents, a few cattle and a lot more work.

  She withdrew every last centime, put it in a small bag she had bought specially for the occasion and attached it to a belt beneath her clothes.

  She went to the travel agency, praying that she would have the courage to go through with her decision. When she said she wanted to get a different flight, she was told that if she went on tomorrow's flight, she would have to change planes in Paris. That didn't matter--all she needed was to get far enough away from there before she had second thoughts.

  She walked to one of the bridges and bought an ice cream, even though the weather had started to get cold again, and she took one last look at Geneva. Everything seemed different to her, as if she had just arrived and needed to visit the museums, the historical monuments, the fashionable bars and restaurants. It's odd how, when you live in a city, you always postpone getting to know it and usually end up never knowing it at all.

  She thought she would feel happy because she was going home, but she wasn't. She thought she would feel sad because she was leaving a city that had treated her so well, but she d
idn't. The only thing she could do now was to shed a few tears, feeling rather afraid of herself, an intelligent young woman, who had everything going for her, but who tended to make the wrong decisions.

  She just hoped that this time she was right.

  The church was completely empty when she went in, and she was able to examine in silence the splendid stained-glass windows, lit from outside by the light of a day washed clean by last night's storm. Before her stood an empty cross; she was confronted not by an instrument of torture, by the bloodied body of a dying man, but by a symbol of resurrection, in which the instrument of torture had lost all its meaning, its terror, its importance. She remembered the whip on that night of thunder and lightning; it was the same thing. "Dear God, what am I saying?"

  She was pleased too not to see any images of suffering saints, covered in bloodstains and open wounds--this was simply a place where people gathered to worship something they could not understand.

  She stood in front of the monstrance, in which was kept the body of a Jesus in whom she still believed, although she had not thought about him for a long time. She knelt down and promised God, the Virgin, Jesus and all the saints that whatever happened that day, she would not change her mind and would leave anyway. She made this promise because she knew love's traps all too well, and knew how easily they can change a woman's mind.

  Shortly afterwards, she felt a hand touch her shoulder and she inclined her head so that her face rested on the hand.

  "How are you?"

  "I'm fine," she said in a voice without a trace of anxiety in it. "I'm fine. Let's go and have a coffee."

  They left the church hand-in-hand, as if they were two lovers meeting again after a long time. They kissed in public, and a few people shot them scandalized looks; but they both smiled at the unease they were causing and at the desires they were provoking by their scandalous behavior, because they knew that, in fact, those people wished they could be doing the same thing. That was the real scandal.

  They went into a cafe which was the same as all the others, but that afternoon, it was different, because they were there together and because they loved each other. They talked about Geneva, the difficulties of the French language, the stained-glass windows in the church, the evils of smoking--both of them smoked and hadn't the slightest intention of giving up.

  She insisted on paying for the coffee and he accepted. They went to the exhibition and she got to know his world: the artists, the rich who looked richer than they actually were, the millionaires who looked poor, the people discussing things she had never even heard about. They all liked her and praised her French; they asked about Carnival, football, Brazilian music. They were nice, polite, kind, charming.

  When they left, he said that he would come to the club that night to see her. She asked him not to, she had the night off and would like to invite him out to supper.

  He accepted and they said goodbye, arranging to meet at his house before going to have supper at a delightful restaurant in the little square in Cologny, which they had often driven past in the taxi, and where she had always wanted to stop, but had never asked to.

  Then Maria remembered her one friend and decided to go to the library to tell her that she would not be coming back.

  She got caught up in the traffic for what seemed like an eternity, until the Kurds had (once more!) finished their demonstration and the cars could move freely again. Now, however, she was the mistress of her own time, and it didn't matter. By the time she reached the library, it was just about to close.

  "Forgive me if I'm being too personal, but I haven't anyone else, any woman friend, I can talk to about certain things," said the librarian as soon as Maria came in.

  She didn't have any women friends? After spending her whole life in the same place and meeting all kinds of people at work, did she really have no one she could talk to? Maria had found someone like herself, or, rather, like everyone else.

  "I was thinking about what I read about the clitoris..."

  Didn't she ever think about anything else!

  "It's just that, although I used to enjoy sex with my husband, I always found it very difficult to reach orgasm during intercourse. Do you think that's normal?"

  "Do you find it normal that there are daily demonstrations by Kurds? That women in love run away from their Prince Charming? That people dream about farms rather than love? That men and women sell their time, but can never buy it back again? And yet, all these things happen, so it really doesn't matter what I believe or don't believe; all these things are normal. Everything that goes against Nature, against our most intimate desires, is normal in our eyes, even though it's an aberration in God's eyes. We seek out our own inferno, we spend millennia building it, and after all that effort, we are now able to live in the worst possible way."

  She looked at the woman standing in front of her and, for the first time, she asked what her name was (she only knew her surname). Her name was Heidi, she was married for thirty years and never--never!--during that time had she asked herself if it was normal not to have an orgasm during intercourse with her husband.

  "I don't know if I should have read all those things! Perhaps it would have been better to live in ignorance, believing that a faithful husband, an apartment with a view of the lake, three children and a job in the public sector were all that a woman could hope for. Now, ever since you arrived, and since I read the first book, I'm obsessed with what my life has become. Is everyone the same?"

  "I can guarantee you that they are." And standing before that woman who was asking her advice, Maria felt herself to be very wise.

  "Would you like me to give you details?"

  Maria nodded.

  "You're obviously too young to understand these things, but that's precisely why I would like to share a little of my life with you, so that you don't make the same mistakes I did.

  "But why is it that my husband never noticed my clitoris? He assumed that the orgasm happened in the vagina, and I found it really, really difficult to pretend something that he imagined I must be feeling. Of course, I did experience pleasure, but a different kind of pleasure. It was only when the friction was on the upper part...do you know what I mean?"

  "I know."

  "And now I know why. It's in there," she pointed to a book on her desk, whose title Maria couldn't see. "There are lots of nerve endings that connect the clitoris and the G-spot and which are crucial to orgasm. But men think that penetration is all. Do you know what the G-spot is?"

  "Yes, we talked about it the other day," said Maria, slipping into the role of Innocent Girl. "As you go in, on the first floor, the back window."

  "That's right!" And the librarian's eyes lit up. "Just you ask how many of your male friends have heard of it. None of them! It's absurd. But just as an Italian discovered the clitoris, the G-spot is a twentieth-century discovery! Soon it will be in all the headlines, and then no one will be able to ignore it any longer! Have you any idea what revolutionary times we're living in?"

  Maria glanced at her watch, and Heidi realized that she would have to talk fast, in order to teach this pretty young woman that all women have the right to be happy and fulfilled, in order that the next generation should benefit from all these extraordinary scientific discoveries.

  "Dr. Freud didn't agree because he wasn't a woman and, since he experienced his orgasm through his penis, he felt that women must, therefore, experience pleasure in their vagina. We've got to go back to basics, to what has always given us pleasure: the clitoris and the G-spot! Very few women enjoy a satisfactory sexual relationship, so if you have difficulty in getting the pleasure you deserve, let me suggest something: change position. Make your lover lie down and you stay on top; your clitoris will strike his body harder and you--not he--will be getting the stimulus you need. Or, rather, the stimulus you deserve!"

  Maria, meanwhile, was only pretending that she wasn't listening to the conversation. So she wasn't the only one! She didn't have a sexual problem, it was all j
ust a question of anatomy! She felt like kissing the librarian, as if a gigantic weight had been lifted off her heart. How good to have discovered this while she was still young! What a marvelous day she was having! Heidi gave a conspiratorial smile.

  "They may not know it, but we have an erection too. The clitoris becomes erect!"

  "They" presumably meant men. Since this was such an intimate conversation, Maria decided to risk a question:

  "Have you ever had an affair?"

  The librarian looked shocked. Her eyes gave off a kind of sacred fire, she blushed scarlet, though whether out of rage or shame it was impossible to tell. After a while, though, the battle between telling the truth or pretending ended. She simply changed the subject.

  "Getting back to our erection, to our clitoris, did you know that it became rigid?"

  "Yes, I've known that ever since I was a child."

  Heidi seemed disappointed. Perhaps she had just never noticed. Nevertheless, she resolved to go on:

  "Anyway, apparently, if you rub your finger around it, without touching the actual tip, you can experience even more intense pleasure. So take note! Men who do respect a woman's body immediately touch the tip, not knowing that this can sometimes be quite painful, don't you agree? So, after your first or second encounter, take control of the situation: get on top, decide how and when pressure should be applied, and increase and decrease the rhythm as you see fit. According to the book I'm reading, a frank conversation about it might also be a good idea."

  "Did you ever have a frank conversation with your husband?"

  Again, Heidi avoided this direct question, saying that things were different then. Now she was more interested in sharing her intellectual experiences.

  "Try to think of your clitoris as the hands of a clock and ask your partner to move it back and forth between eleven and one, do you understand?"

  Yes, she knew what the woman was talking about and didn't entirely agree, although the book wasn't far from the truth. As soon as she mentioned the word "clock," though, Maria glanced at her watch, and explained that she had really come to say goodbye, her job placement had come to an end. The woman seemed not to hear her.