Tom Jones’s song “Delilah” was a hit in 1968.
What could the name Delilah mean? Maybe Liliya, or Lili. Not knowing English gave my imagination free rein. Perhaps it was about Tom’s love, a lad from a poor family, while Lili had chosen to marry a better-off man.
Years later I learnt English and discovered there was nothing of the sort in the song.
When I graduated from the railway college in Sofia, I went back to the village to live with my parents.
Two options were on the table: an office job in town, or – the crossing keeper at our station was retiring soon, and that job was mine for the asking.
My father was a railwayman too and approved of the second, while Mum preferred the job in town – the work here, she said, was beneath my education.
Still, I chose the crossing keeper’s lodge. I did it up, painted it, and moved in a fridge and my book collection. I hung little curtains in the windows. I dug over the garden out front and planted flowers and tomatoes. Naturally, I also brought my battered little tape recorder and my tapes, among which “Delilah” shone brightest.
Looking after the safety of the line, the signal, the points and the barrier even kept things interesting, and I felt useful and important. I borrowed books from the village library – it had a lot of them back then. I helped Mum and Dad out with money. I didn’t smoke or drink. They’d give me the odd jar of preserves, and I’d give them some of my tomatoes. The lodge was cosy and pleasant. And so a few happy, carefree months went by.
Soon a new girl appeared in our village and became a waitress at the restaurant, which was unusually good for its time. She rented a room at Granny Ganka’s. Her name was Lili, and men started circling around her – me included. Late at night I dreamt about her and told myself with conviction:
“She’ll be my Delilah!” I was free from 22:00 to 24:00, and I started going to the restaurant more and more often.
I pondered how to catch her eye.
One evening I came to an arrangement with the other waitress there, an old classmate of mine:
“Mimi, let’s keep this between us. When I give you a sign, put ‘Delilah’ on your sound system, a bit on the loud side. Here’s the tape.”
“Zhoro, what’s with all the secrecy?” I hesitated, but confessed my goal to her – her colleague Lili.
“I wouldn’t if I were you. You’ll regret it!”
“You’re my best friend. Can’t I just ask you a favour?”
“And what’s the sign?”
“I’ll scratch my head when you’re where I can see you.”
When the customers had drifted off, I signalled to Lili that I wanted the bill.
She soon came over with it, but I simply said:
“Would you sit with me for a bit?”
“Is there a problem?”
“No. Please, just stay for a minute!”
“All right.”
“Would you like to hear a lovely song?”
“Are you going to sing it?”
“Good one,” I replied, and scratched my head vigorously.
Mimi put the song on loud enough, but not blaring.
“Well, did you like the song?” I asked Lili. My eyes were brimming with tears – I’d rehearsed that beforehand.
Her answer was distinctly lukewarm:
“Well, it’s all right. Who’s singing?”
I told her importantly:
“Tom Jones, an English singer. I can even translate the song for you!”
“Not now – I have to finish my work.”
“I’ll wait. Will you come back to my table?”
I paid her and waited for Mimi and Lili to clear the tables.
In the end Lili sat down with me, but as if out of duty.
“May I ask you for a dance?” I asked her, and scratched my head again. My pulse must have been over 200.
“All right, but just one!”
After the song she said:
“I’m really tired now.”
The next evening I was back at the restaurant. At the end of her shift I offered to walk her home.
She accepted, but without enthusiasm. The way to her place partly coincided with the way to my lodge. At the fork in the road I plucked up the courage to say, my throat dry:
“I could play you the song at the crossing keeper’s lodge too – I work there.”
“Well, I’m not so tired today, and the song really is lovely.”
Inside, she was surprised at how clean and tidy it was.
“I imagined a crossing keeper’s lodge would be like a pigsty.”
“As long as I work and live here, it’ll be clean. Shall I put the song on?”
“Oh, yes!”
During “Delilah” I “translated” with authority, and I think I impressed her.
“Oh, it’s got very late. Could I sleep here?”
“Take the bed, the sheets are clean. I’ll sleep on the sofa.”
She fell asleep. I waited for the train due in 20 minutes to pass, and after that there was a whole two hours until the next one. I summoned the courage to lean over her and started kissing her. At first she pulled away a little, but after a while she gave in.
Good Lord, I didn’t know which heaven I was in! I was like a mineral spring – everything inside me was bubbling. She fell asleep again, and I stayed awake all night. In the morning I picked flowers and put them in the vase. I made breakfast and coffee.
Lili woke up and asked anxiously what time it was.
“Good God, my landlady will tell the whole village about me!”
“Don’t worry, she’s probably told them already. Now have your breakfast!”
She enjoyed the breakfast, but left looking worried.
“Will you come to the lodge again tonight?”
“We’ll see!”
To my mind, that meant: “Yes!”
I rushed about my tasks, but my head was pounding. I ran home, had a bath and put on some of my “snazzier” clothes. I went shopping and cooked – more lavishly this time.
I also bought some decent cutlery and plates, and even two big candles from the church, to make our dinner cosier.
For the next month Lili came every other evening, and life was wonderful. We learnt a lot about each other. Between us there was what I had always dreamt of. In the mornings she left on her own while it was still dark, to avoid needless gossip, but the village was already talking.
One evening I went a bit mad and decided I couldn’t wait until the next one.
The moment I walked into the restaurant, I saw her boss flirting with her, and her flirting back, and the two of them laughing heartily. He was an old friend of mine. He was handsome, and rich too.
My sick imagination ran wild, and I left without them seeing me. The next evening, when Lili came to the lodge, I was sulky and acted coldly. She quickly picked up on it and left. I didn’t stop her. I was eaten up with jealousy.
After a few days in which she didn’t come, I went to the restaurant all spruced up. I was hoping Lili would appear so I could apologise, but it was Mimi who stood in front of my table and asked ironically:
“What can I get you?”
“Is Lili carrying on with the restaurant boss? That’s what I want to know most of all!”
“Well, that’s been going on for a while!” she answered straight away.
“Bring me a large rakia!”
“All right, but don’t get drunk! As far as I know you, you and alcohol don’t get along!”
My eyes were fixed on the boss’s table. Lili was serving only his big party. After one more rakia I think I paid Mimi and staggered off to my lodge. In the morning I got stuck into my usual chores to take my mind off things.
That day, for the first time, I didn’t play “Delilah” – the song was getting on my nerves by now.
The following evening I waited in the dark outside the restaurant for the boss to leave and quietly set off after him. Just before his house I stepped out in front of him:
“Hi!”
“Oh, it’s you! Why don’t you ever call, so we can have a drink? I’m so glad to see you!”
Without saying a word, I smacked him one in the teeth and yelled:
“Friends don’t pull stunts like that on each other – you had it coming!”
For a few days I barely managed to look after the railway line; I was drinking quite a bit by now. One evening there was a knock at my door. It was Mimi, who came in and said right from the doorway:
“Play me ‘Delilah’!”
She felt like a sister to me, and I did as she asked; I seemed to sober up in an instant.
“Mimi, what’s going on?”
“Ask me to dance!”
During the dance, for the first time that week, I felt calm, and I told her so.
To my surprise, she replied that she didn’t find that particularly flattering.
“But why? Have I offended you? Please, explain!”
“Think about it!”
I didn’t think for long, and took her to bed. I was so hurt by Lili that this seemed a fitting revenge. As she was leaving later, Mimi said:
“I want to know soon how you feel about me. As a woman, and in general.”
“Right now I don’t know exactly what I want even from myself.”
“Well, learn to know what you want!”
My thoughts circled mainly around Lili. From the village gossip I heard that the restaurant boss had thrown her out and she had gone back to her home town.
Mimi didn’t come, which was even for the best, because I still didn’t know what I wanted from anyone. After a week I felt very lonely and went to her house with a bouquet. Her parents invited me to dinner. The four of us raised a glass, but I didn’t drink. Soon Mimi and I got married, and she moved in with me at the lodge.
When we were already about 50, with the children grown up, one evening she said, rather nervously:
“I’m going to confess a sin of mine that weighs on me. Hear me out and keep quiet!”
She told me that the first thing she had tried, to keep me away from Lili, was to “warn” me that I’d regret it.
But her bigger sin was that, when I asked whether Lili was carrying on with the restaurant boss, she had lied that it had been going on for a while. There had been nothing of the sort. If I could, would I forgive her.
After a day full of heavy thoughts, late in the evening I put on “Delilah”, this time from my laptop, asked Mimi to dance, and after a while whispered to her:
“You’re my Delilah!”
She pressed herself tightly against me, and I felt, even quite physically, how in that moment Lili flew out of my soul for good.
