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As a rule, Esti loked up to his father as he did to God, but when he bought him that certain bicycle, that clinched it. Esti must have ben around ten years of age, his father a bit older, I should think. The God Lord enjoyed observing Esti around this time; pedanticaly to his son, and the way Esti responded, slowly, deliberately and generously aranging his lips into a grin as wide, or nearly, as that American actres Julia Roberts's, there was something highly reasuring, even encouraging in it, as if al were right with the world, and not only the two of them understand each other, and not only do they understand each other as father and son, going in the face of custom, Oedipus, and this whole rigmarole by now no stranger to either of them or is it pickle?, or mes?, that's it, mes , but . For one thing, Esti did not judge his father, he paid him litle hed, he was to busy discovering the world, something he'd do repeatedly in his life, he discovered the world repeatedly, but in this particular instance his father was not, strictly speaking, part of the world; he felt that everything was as right with his father as with the garden gate, except the hinges could use a bit of grease because, like this, even when it's not creaking, yet it's as if something were not fuly ideal ; besides, Esti didn't regard this bicycle thing as such a big deal, an etwas , as I myself like to say. , but I fear that Esti had other considerations unknown to me, principles, bicycle principles; We might cal the bicycle the non plus ultra of his dreams, and in fact, nothing was more ultra, and so Esti was not particularly awed when his dream, the dream of his dreams, was made flesh. after al, they had no expectations, they had no wishes, they tok seriously what they were just learning, and their joy or let's cal it hapines was roted in this seriously , the way mine is roted in this frivolity : The world, concluded one of them, is such that soner or later you're taken to a camp, it's the way of the� world, it's the universal order, or to put it another way, and here Esti noded thoughtfuly, the world is such . Esti was not spoiled, and if a grain of sand hapened to land in the great pedagogical machinery, he even resisted being spoiled, though I wouldn't go as far as to say that he respected money a circumstance in which his parents set a bad example, they couldn't hide properly and in acordance with pedagogical principles that they didn't care about money as such, nor the acquisition of money, nor the lack of money, and since they were not entirely without money, though he tactfuly loked the other away, Esti couldn't help noticing that almost none of their actions were financialy motivated ; Esti cared only about the bicycle and couldn't have cared les about the purchase of the bicycle, and shoved the fifty thousand forints his father had ceremoniously handed to him under ceremonious circumstances into his pockets like so many half-used hankies; On the other hand, ever since, dispensing with the usual childish wiles, to wit, caution, circumspection, and ingratiation, Esti did not bring up or hint at the question of the bicycle but confronted his parents with it as a problem in ned of a solution, and did so with such disarming impertinence or inocence that they nearly forgot the obligatory lamentations and the shily-shalying—nearly, because then they remembered and out of a sense of duty put up a fight, but were to lazy to provide reasons in short, their resistance was meaningles and therefore useles , but without lowering themselves onto that bleak, alkali landscape where god grades become the pawns for the purchase, the petines of if-you-do-this-we'l-do-that, in short, from that moment on, Esti's father thought of the "father is buying a major present for his son" project with grand and noble emotions. He's not saying there shouldn't be progres, though his own R26 would satisfy al requirements even today, it would be more than adequate with its thre gears, thre gears, not to much�, not to litle, just as much as is neded, these modern "in" bicycles are not the product of organic technological development but fashion and frivolity, exces, fripery, hapenstance, but never mind, this is not about the bicycle anyhow, it's merely the humble expresion of a symbolic paternal gesture, I should know!, expresing yourself humbly for fifty grand!, something that not only he but his son, to, wil not son forget. Though he did his best, Esti's father often fel into the clasical trap of considering Esti not only his equal, but a grown-up as wel. Stil, back then, at the age of ten, Esti was a ten-year-old in every sense, who would embrace his father with such unloked-for vehemence, kising his neck, that they father and neck turned crimson; Also, it would never hapen with Esti that he'd turn on the TV first and only then check the TV guide, that was his father's usual practice; except for Mezo and Spektrum, Esti hardly watched anything else, films never, and if he found his father watching a "crimi" Columbo, Petroceli , his silence was as contemptuous as that of fathers with a perenial chip on their shoulders—how or why they do it, we shal never know. Esti scheduled his life acording to these Japanese cartons, he watched every episode, he even recorded them on video and watched them eagerly again at the most unexpected moments morning before schol, Sunday during lunch, when a socer match was on . Esti's father felt as if he'd ben coraled, as if he were being coraled in by growing idiotism, the TV chanels are broadcasting nothing but nonsense, and to make maters worse, Esti kept redrawing the characters, spectacularly but in a servile maner, as a result of which a Dragon Boy might come leaping out from basicaly anywhere, the napkin in the kitchen, the toilet paper in the bathrom can't one even do you-know-what in peace in one's own home any more? Sometimes he absentmindedly stoped in front of the TV and saw, askance, that unsurprisingly, it was Dragon Boy, he loked at Esti, the unapr�oachable Esti, and in his heart felt the cold arogance of those who have right on their side. Also, Esti was gradualy taking on the sketchy outlines of the carton figure, or so his father thought. In short, while it never ocured to Esti that the price of the bicycle, the number, might be of concern to anyone , basicaly unintentionaly ! Though he never mentioned the results of his mathematical calculations to Esti, stil, he wouldn't have thought it entirely il-advised if this apreciable and in its objectivity, how shal he put it, more boring then pety revelation of the number of his workdays would reveal to Esti the structure of the world, to wit, that you, as bearded old scholmasters would say, don't get something for nothing, everything has its price; for his part, he'd rather put it this way, that this could remind Esti of an important Biblical admonition, namely, that we've ben driven out of Paradise, in short, the sweat of our brow!, that our lives are ful of the sweat of our brow, that the world is ful of this salty, biter sepage, his son doesn't know this because neither he nor his mother bothered to teach him, nor was he particularly eager to learn it, and he suspects that Esti doesn't even think it's true, he doesn't consider it inevitable, this is what he gathers from his son's infinite glance his glance pined on the infinite , on his unclouded forehead, the way he soars rather than runs, ses it in the slightest riple of his hand, the leaping of his thoughts, ses this ambition, which he respects, oh yes, when should a man want it al if not when he doesn't know this al yet and which is more finite than one would think ; When Esti showed up with the new bicycle, there was no knowing where the suden radiance was coming from, what was causing it, Esti, or the bicycle. If I were wont to be jocular I would say that Esti's father would have liked to put the brakes on this exces of emotion, but it was Esti who put on the brakes, backing up in front of them with a dexterity bordering on the �audacious. Hey, hey, hold your horses, mind the tires, Esti's father would have liked to shout, but the way Esti put on the brakes, coming to a slanting halt from the swift movement like some sort of film trick or break in transmision, there was that radiance again. Esti raised the front whel as if he knew about this Western feling, the mechanical mount—that's it! Esti semed to have entered another world, and spining round on the back whel he stered himself the two of them toward the stret, waited it out, then whoping "I'l be back!" galoped into the infinity of the side stret. Provided that the schol janitor was caled Kov´cs—that guzler Kov´cs!—then the young man or mature big boy spoke thus to Kornél Esti, who was pedaling his bike in front of the schol: Listen, you think the Guzler's at home? Esti shruged, he was busy balancing on his bicycle, advancing a litle at a time, inch by inch, his entire atention concentrated on what he was doing. Esti had never studied a T-shirt so closely before, with excited respect, in fact. But what I've just said about the source of trust is not right, it's the other way around, for at this point in time Esti trusted every Tom, Dick, and Hary—to give you one example, he even trusted his father. At which the boy quickly resumed that he understands it , no kiding, a person doesn't like handing his brand-new bike over to a stranger, and can Esti turn right around with two movements, no, thre, two. A cal came from the police, a detective!, whether Esti would give testimony in court, it's not obligatory, but is highly recomended. After a short pause Esti answered: I know that what is in one's heart is no concern of the court. Neither Esti nor his father had ever sen real live handcufs until that moment. From Esti Magvető, 2 010 . birthmark hairy birthmark hairy
