New Lives (77 page)

Up to that point it had all been quite clear, with nothing more to his visit worth describing. The garden, the house, the apartment, the studio—all of it a little peculiar and alien and seductive.

And then? Gunda Lapin had stared at him squinting, as if she had discovered something unique about him. He had held up under her gaze, but hadn't dared to reach for the chocolate or take a sip of his coffee.

The easel was positioned almost horizontal before her. Which was why her brushes had been bound to small rods that she held in her hands like magic wands. Instead of a palette she used bowls in which she hastily stirred her paints. This meant, however, that she had to hold the bowl in an outstretched arm so she could dip her brush in it.

Titus saw his reflection in the windowpane, outlined by the triangle of the water tower's red lights. All these superficialities, however, were merely holding him back now, they were irrelevant, a stage set. He wanted to concentrate on the essentials. Besides, he would never forget that studio, every detail remained fixed in his mind's eye.

But why didn't he write about what actually happened? The more precisely he tried to recall it, the more blurred and inexplicable the events seemed.

“Talk to me,” Gunda Lapin had said, applying the first brushstrokes to the grayish white canvas. Her lips had grown thin.

“What about?”

“What you're up to, what you're reading, what you've experienced over the last few days, what encounters were important to you.”

Should he tell her about school, about Petersen, Joachim? Why did all that send him into a panic?

Gunda Lapin had let out a little groan, as if she could read his mind. The features of her face seemed as sharply defined as in a sketch. Sometimes she squinted, sometimes she peered at him wide-eyed.

“So, that's good,” she had declared, “stay…stay just like that, very good, very, wonderful, really wonderful.”

He hadn't any idea what he was doing right, what had got Gunda Lapin so excited. The more hectic her movements, the more sure of himself he had felt.

And then?

He had told her about Joachim and about Petersen. Of course Petersen had it in for him. Yesterday Petersen had asked him what PMI meant, and, incapable of collecting his own thoughts, he had grabbed on to what a schoolmate had whispered and answered with: “People's Mass Endeavor.” And Petersen had said that he was no longer amazed that Titus had got an F in spelling, which he had at first found incredible, a big fat F like that, but which he now understood only too well and which left him highly dubious whether Titus should really be pursuing an academic degree, especially since he wanted to become a German teacher. But of course he was glad to hear that people were “indeavoring” to do good things in their Mass Initiative and they would all now assume that he, Titus, would be their model of an “indeavoring” citizen.

He had had to explain to Gunda Lapin what had been so dreadful about it: less the threat that he would be tossed out of high school at the end of tenth grade than how he had felt so naked and exposed. Of course he didn't want to become a German or history teacher. But he had once said it, back at the start of eighth grade, in order to increase his chances for the academic track, because boys who weren't prepared to become officers could at least become teachers.

But Gunda Lapin didn't react with real outrage until he told her about his cellar conversation, and then she called his teacher a sadist. She had struggled with her brushes as if wrestling with Petersen himself. And later she had said that a person has to build his own separate world. And you either do that as a young person or not at all. And that only the kind of thinking that determines existence is worth anything, and that you need first to find out for yourself what is prohibited and what is allowed.

Like two craftsmen they had sat down to an evening meal of deviled eggs and bread with cottage cheese and marmalade. He had been afraid she would send him home, and so had instantly agreed in relief to sit for her “nude.”

         

[Letter of May 16, 1990]

While he had undressed she had crouched in front of the stove and fed it more briquettes, and then placed her canvas behind him and traced his outline in pencil—and later asked whether he was in love, and wouldn't let him get away with his answer. Maybe meant yes.

“Is it a girl or a boy? Or a woman?”

“Why a boy?”

“Why not?”

“Her name's Bernadette.”

         

The first Sunday in July. He was hurrying up Schröder Strasse where it grew steeper and steeper, with each house set in a little park. He was sweating, and the paper wrapping the roses had long ago gone soggy where he held them. He at least wanted to be on time.

He had met Bernadette at Graf Dancing Academy—Bernadette, who, if she had had a choice, would never have picked him as her partner for the Graduation Ball. But just as he had, she had missed the class where students were asked to chose partners. She hadn't been allowed to turn him down with a flat no, but she had known how to nod without smiling, how to not say a single word while they danced, how to stare blankly out over his shoulder. He had had to ask her for her address twice. Bernadette Böhme, Schröder Strasse 15.

Half the yellow stones on the path leading to the house were cracked, to the left and right were large circular beds of red flowers. The view to the Elbe was blocked by fruit trees. A loud jumble of voices was coming from the open windows.

He recognized her mother right away. She had the same hair, black and smooth and parted in the middle, and wore it just like Bernadette did, falling in a last little curl at her neck without touching her shoulders. And he had first taken her brothers for girls too as they descended the stairs to greet him in the entryway, because their faces were framed by the same black hair and because they all had that same way of abruptly raising their heads to get a better look.

Her mother's friendly manner calmed him down, and having to wait helped as well. She brought him a glass of water and set it on a green coaster in the living room. When she smiled all you saw of her eyes were her lashes. He found it pleasant to sit there alone, he saw it as a vote of confidence. Of all the valuable items placed openly about the room, he was especially attracted to the dark wooden bas-reliefs of nude or seminude women. Gazing out the large window to the city in the distance was like looking out of an aquarium. Chaise longues were strewn about the yard, plus sun umbrellas and a grill.

Just when he started to think he was being put to some kind of test—he hadn't touched or picked up anything—her mother stepped into the room again. As if completely transfixed by the inscrutable smile of a Chinese figurine, he didn't turn to look at her. But that made the fragrance of her perfume seem all the more intense.

“Do you like him? He's made of soapstone,” she said as she placed the vase of his roses on a long table. The way she opened her old-fashioned lighter and placed the cigarette dead center between her glistening lips reminded him of the way some men drink schnapps from the bottle. She cocked her head to one side to reattach an earring. Her lilac dress left her tanned shoulders bare. The skin was sprinkled deep into her décolletage with freckles. As she tilted her head in the other direction, she asked him to hold her cigarette with its red-smudged filter. At that same moment Bernadette's aunt came in. “Am I interrupting?” she asked, approaching Titus with her hand extended. And one after the other they entered the room to greet him. Even Bernadette's brothers came in to say their hellos. Martin and Marcus kept off to one side, while the adults formed a circle around him.

“Bernadette had her hair done just for you,” his mother whispered to him. “Don't say anything to her about it. We rescued what there was to rescue.” Out loud, however, she declared it was probably time for a few petits fours. Rising above a flat porcelain serving plate were pale pink, marzipan white, and yellow towers, which you put on your own plate along with a little paper coaster and then divided vertically with your fork. Even the children were masters of the technique. Her mother poured tea. You could choose between red and white china cups as thin as paper or larger shallow bowls decorated with women with pointy breasts and shaved heads.

Bernadette's permanent made her look like she had a bird's nest atop her head. Only her mother continued talking. The boys giggled. Without blushing, he got up and walked toward Bernadette. They shook hands, and the first thing Bernadette said as she turned slightly to one side was, “My father.” He entered, taking hurried, short steps.

Titus did not recognize him. At first he looked like Bernadette's father, nothing more, and only when the great Böhme simply introduced himself as “Böhme” was Titus aware of who was standing before him—“Ah,” he responded, it just slipped out of him, “Ah.” And they all knew what he meant. He almost added that given the address he should have realized, or something of that sort. But he held his tongue, because nothing could have a greater effect that his “Ah.”

“What did he say?” Rudolf Böhme asked, and now the two women repeated his “Ah,” but without either striking the right tone, so that they both chided and corrected each other, then broke into laughter and measured Titus with glances he didn't know how to interpret. All the same, he tried to hold his own when Bernadette linked her arm in his as if she wanted to claim him for herself, and assuming that the waves of life would simply carry him along, he deserted half a petit four and his bowl of tea.

They were the last couple to arrive at the ball in the Elbe Hotel, to which no one raised an objection—on the contrary. Bernadette's girlfriends had kept two chairs free, so they could take their seats like a bridal couple. They danced with each other—and one of them always knew the right steps.

Later he made the rounds with Bernadette and introduced her to his mother and grandfather. And everyone realized who she was when he said, “Bernadette Böhme.” And finally, just as his dance card required, he asked Bernadette's mother to cha-cha with him, but had no success in correcting the way she held her arm.

Bernadette and he came in third in the dance contest—the best of the beginners. But that wasn't the half of it. There was something “magnetic” about them. He meant that literally. They were the pole by which people oriented themselves. Not a word, not a gesture, not a glance that failed to provoke some sort of response from the others. Even Martin, her brother, came over to him. Titus realized by the way Martin corrected the sit of his tie that he was not younger, but quite possibly older than he. “You'll be going to Holy Cross School in September?” Martin asked. “To our school, I mean.” The three of them toasted.

         

Sitting at his desk, Titus recalled how uneasy he had felt when Gunda Lapin pressed him to go on with his story. He had merely remarked that Martin was a Holy Cross boy—in the same grade, but in a different class—and that they had sports in common.

“And Bernadette?”

Titus had looked at Gunda Lapin as if it surprised him to hear that name on her lips.

“Bernadette is in tenth grade.”

“Do you run into each other often?”

“No.”

“And tomorrow?”

Had he mentioned the invitation? But how else could Gunda Lapin have known about it?

         

After the ball he and Bernadette said good-bye without arranging another meeting, because it was clear they would see each other over the next few days in any case. While he and his mother and grandfather waited for the streetcar, the Böhmes and their relatives drove past in their cars on their way up to Weisser Hirsch. Summer vacation began that weekend.

Since there was no Rudolf Böhme, Schröder Strasse
15,
in the telephone book, he took a streetcar to see her three days later. The place was as deserted as a theater during summer break. Once or twice a week he took the same number 11 to Weisser Hirsch. He stormed the mailbox every day, but not even photographs from the ball ever arrived.

In early August the gate was at last unlocked, and he could once again breathe in the odor of the house. Martin seemed happy to see him. Titus assumed Martin would lead him to Bernadette, and once he was left alone, he expected Martin to knock on Bernadette's door. But Martin returned with nothing more than a pot of lukewarm coffee—Titus, it turned out, was Martin's guest.

Bernadette was in Hungary, with or staying with friends—he didn't quite catch which. He would have loved to see the living room and her parents. Titus drank too much coffee. He emptied one cup after the other, as did Martin, without asking for cream or sugar, without really tasting what he was drinking.

That night he couldn't sleep and had a fever. Maybe Bernadette's letter had got lost in the mail. Did she even have his address?

A couple of days before school began he was received once more by her mother.

         

[Letter of May 19, 1990]

“How nice to see you, Titus,” she cried, and led him into the house, where he had to let her take a good look at him. Did he perhaps have time for afternoon
tea
? She sent him out to the veranda and returned with a table setting. “Bernadette will be so sorry. The girls have gone to Potsdam. Didn't she write you?”

A no would have been impolite, a betrayal of Bernadette, in fact. Besides, it eased his mind to hear her speak of “girls.”

“What an attractive woman your mother is,” Frau Böhme said. Titus had been on the verge of replying that his mother was almost forty, but then maybe Frau Böhme was even older—and was definitely someone his mother would have called an attractive woman.

“At thirteen, fourteen, children are on their own, it's the end of parental influence—on the contrary, the more you preach the more quickly you lose them.” Frau Böhme slid her wicker chair closer to his and poured him tea. There were the same large circular beds of red flowers on this side of the house too.