I remember walking with my girlfriend and her father along the crowded streets of Hamburg one winter evening many years ago and seeing a young man in an unbuttoned shirt with short sleeves lying prostrate on the frozen pavement and vomiting upward. Yes, upward. His skin was purple. Everything about him was purple. Livid. It was Christmas Eve and the passers-by were leaping over the… But, who was that man? Do you, dear reader, remember him, too? Yes, it was Christmas Eve and it was very cold. Some fifteen years ago in Germany. My God, could it have been you?

Addendum I (December 16, 1983)

My ex-girlfriend wrote to me recently: “[…] you will forever remain a part of me.” I replied immediately: “Same here!” And I added mysteriously: “My God, could it have been you?”

Addendum II (March 28, 1994)

Darja was my first “real” girlfriend. She was my first “real” wife, too. We were together from 1963 to 1969, when she left me while I was in the military service. I know that she has always felt a bit guilty about abandoning me during such a dire period in my life, but I do not bear any grudges because of her ill-timed infidelity. Besides, I believe that she was telling the truth when she told me just before I went to the States in 1970 that she had left me because she had realized that I had no conception of marriage whatsoever. Of course, who needs marriage if one is already married. But let us not rush too far ahead.

Darja is perhaps the most beautiful woman I have ever seen, let alone touched. The last time I met her—most likely in 1983 or 1984, in Belgrade—she was positively radiant. I remember waiting for her by an open window in Majestic, one of the classier joints in the city, and then being simply blown away by her beauty when I saw her approaching me from the street and smiling at me, her hand raised to her mouth in embarrassment. There was not a trace of vulgarity in that woman, not a trace of boastfulness on account of her looks. Later on, as we were strolling around our old haunts close to Kosmajska Street, where she used to live when we were together, people would stop on the street to see her better.

Parenthetically, Kosmajska was renamed in the late 1960s after General Biryuzov, who was killed around that time in an airplane crash near Belgrade together with an entire Russian delegation visiting Yugoslavia. Who knows, Darja’s street may have been renamed back to Kosmajska in the recent years.

I guess I got lucky with Darja because I started courting her exactly at the time when she began to blossom. She was sixteen and I was seventeen. I remember several envious comments from my friends and acquaintances in later years to the effect that they were blind to her beauty when she was still available; all of a sudden, she appeared to them in all her glory like Venus out of her shell, but by that time she was already spoken for. At any rate, Darja and I soon fell in love and soon afterwards started to explore our bodies. As both my parents and her mother were extremely liberal by any standards, let alone by Belgrade standards, we were allowed to spend as much time alone as we wished. A year or so into our relationship my parents were perfectly happy to have her sleep over in my own bed! This is still one of the reasons why I love and respect these people.

However, Darja did not want to make love to me before she was eighteen, and I respected her wish. I adored her. She was madly in love with me, too, but she had her ideas of propriety. This adolescent love affair was so wonderful that I still cannot read The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night or watch Zeffirelli’s “Romeo and Juliet” without shedding a tear, or even weeping.

When her eighteenth birthday was behind us, we spent several nights learning how to make love. I do not remember much blood when I finally entered her, but I remember her pain. I cried with her. I would repeatedly lose my erection because of her pain. I just could not let myself hurt my beloved. But gradually the pain subsided and she started feeling some pleasure. Soon afterwards she had her first orgasm with me inside her. By and by, our lovemaking became quite wonderful, albeit somewhat uneventful.

Strangely enough, I now remember that I was about to enter Jelena on that very same bed, in the very same room on Jovanova Street, several years before I made love with Darja. But Jelena pleaded with me to “spare her” on account of her virginity and her impending departure for Tokyo, were her father was about to take a diplomatic post. We were already naked and I was already on top of her, but I let her go. I must have felt quite a bit of friendly affection for Jelena, but she was simply too unattractive for me to have been in love with her, too. We must have been about fifteen, and we corresponded for a few years after her departure.

It is lovely to harbor in one’s heart a memory so sweet, so humane, as is my memory of Darja. My love for her was truly boundless. I remember with some longing my tenderness toward her, as well as my desire for us to remain together for ever and ever, until death would part us.

For years I had maintained that I was fortunate to be introduced to lovemaking in this way, with a woman I had loved so much and so purely. But I am not sure about that any longer. Perhaps this experience has locked me into a desire to repeat it over and over again—from one ecstatic love affair to another, always in search of purity and sweetness where it cannot possibly be found. Perhaps my mates from those years in Belgrade, who would probably have some difficulty remembering their first fucks because of their drunkenness, are better off today, for they can approach every woman they meet with fewer debilitating expectations.

Addendum III (October 10, 1995)

I remember lying on top of her in the dark. We always made love in the dark. I would always be on top of her. I remember our long, long kisses. I remember her sweet smell. She would always be so very clean. I remember our gentle movements. I do not remember ever fucking her, but always making love to her. I would grow very big in her. I remember rubbing against her pubic bone and getting bigger and bigger. I remember that it took her a long while to reach an orgasm. We would climb toward it slowly, ever so slowly. I remember her sighs and her hushed squeals. I remember her hands gripping my back. She would come only once, but she would be coming for a long time, in several waves. I remember caressing her long afterwards. She would fall asleep in my arms. She would melt in my arms. But all my memories are melting, too. They are thinning, paling. They are dissolving in my mind’s eye. To my horror, my memories of Darja are ebbing away. They are turning into sentences, words.

Addendum IV (September 2, 1997)

How liberal was Darja’s mother? One time Darja and I made love in a dark doorway not far from her home. The next morning her mother noticed a large spot on the back of her coat, where the paint had rubbed off the wall. Having cleaned the spot, Darja’s mother admonished her: “Next time turn him to the wall.” That is how liberal she was.

Addendum V (January 22, 2000)

A few days ago I heard from Jasna and Rade Kronja, old friends from Belgrade who had remained in touch with Darja, that her father had recently committed suicide. He shot himself with a rifle. I immediately told my mother, who had been in touch with Darja, as well, albeit sporadically. Tonight my mother told me she wanted to write to Darja, but I persuaded her it would be best to simply call her. And she did. She found Darja at home, but her mother, Zdenka, picked up the phone. “Hey,” she exclaimed after the greetings, “have you heard that he blew his brains out!” They were divorced for many years, but I remembered them as very good palls. Darja took the phone from her mother. She was delighted by my mother’s call. They turned to the suicide at once, as the subject had been broached already. Her father died on January 12, ten days ago. She said he was long obsessed with his age and that he had become pretty impossible to be with on account of this obsession. Horrified by his eightieth birthday next month, he pulled the plug ahead of time. Apparently, he tried to kill himself before, but I am not sure exactly when. He had cut his wrists, but he was found in time and brought back to life. A gynecologist of renown and a great womanizer, as the ugly expression goes, he struggled with ageing for decades. While Darja and I were still together, both of us in our early twenties, he was very much against our relationship because she was only two years younger than I was. He tried to persuade her that I would leave her by the time she was thirty, by when she would be too old for me, and I would still be young for even younger women. He thus wanted her to find an older man, who would love and cherish her much longer. Back then, I considered him a nuisance, but he was perhaps correct. The purity of my love for Darja would have vanished without a trace had we not split up so many years ago.

Addendum VI (August 27, 2000)

In a half-hearted attempt to re-establish contact with Darja, I sent her a copy of the 1996 edition of my book about a month after her father had committed suicide. I knew her birthday was sometime in February, too, and I must have thought of my book as an appropriate present. However, I think I sent it without a word of explanation. Although I was a bit apprehensive about Darja’s feelings concerning the pieces about her, as well as about the people she knew, I eagerly awaited her response. By now, full six months later, it is clear that there will be no response. I hope that I have not hurt her, but it is clear that I have confused her and alienated her with my outlandish birthday present. She is not likely to make a move after such a long silence. Chances are I will not be trying to get in touch with her again. The end of the road…

Addendum VII (January 3, 2001)

My mother told me over dinner this evening that the iron bed in my room on Jovanova Street was one of the several pieces of furniture that were shipped from Zagreb in 1948, when my parents moved to Belgrade. For some reason, she specifically mentioned that bed, too. That very bed. The bed on which a number of Yugoslav revolutionaries slept while hiding in Zagreb during World War II. The bed on which I almost made love to Jelena, a fine and clever woman I remember fondly. The bed on which Darja and I first made love so lovingly. And the bed that was ultimately abandoned, left to someone or other, when we moved from Jovanova to Kosovska Street in 1965. I still remember its bulky ends made of rather thick, round steel pipes finished in off-white enamel, which had chipped off in a few places, leaving stark, rather deep, pitch-black blemishes. I still remember its dark-green upholstery. The overall appearance of the bed, and especially its ends, was that of an old-fashioned but well-endowed and well-kept hospital. Everything about it was prim, round, and clean. Minus those chips, that is.

Addendum VIII (September 25, 2001)

This afternoon Darja called again. It was clear she was eager to talk. We had a long and unhurried chat. Having received my last letter, in which I urged her to come over to Reading for a few days, she felt she needed to explain how difficult that would be to arrange. However, she offered to meet me in Belgrade, where she could travel much more easily than to London. In particular, she can justify such a trip to her husband, while a trip to London would draw his suspicion. He knows how important I remain to her. As we were talking, her father came up in conversation. I do not remember why she brought him up, but I was simply stunned by the next thing she said. “You know,” she said out of the blue, “I feel that my father had had a great deal of influence on you while we were together.” I agreed at once. Indeed, I must have been fascinated by him, and especially by his way with women. Her father was a champion by any account. “Jesus,” I sighed, “we must get together to talk about this and other things of this kind!” She agreed. I am sure she, too, has a great deal to learn by exploring our past. And now I have one more reason to get to Belgrade as soon as possible.

Addendum IX (February 24, 2005)

After a long pause, Darja called this evening. If I am not mistaken, this was her first call since my move from Reading to Motovun. She wanted to thank me for the postcard I sent her for her birthday on February 19. And it arrived on the day, too. I did not send her any old postcard, either. The sepia photograph on its front showed me in military uniform. Minus my hair, too. I was twenty-four, only months after she left me, as well as only weeks before my departure for the States. Her betrayal is something that still pains her, I know. Deep inside, she believes that we were meant for each other. And I was thus not surprised by the leitmotif of her call: we will get back together sooner or later, for the first love never dies. The first love is sacred. Even at seventy, she said several times, it would not be too late for us. It would not be too late for us even at eighty or ninety, I kept teasing her. But it was still wonderful to hear her laugh. And she laughed and laughed, as she always does when we talk on the phone.