Kris carries him into the house. Kris carries him upstairs to the bathroom. He washes him in the tub. He dries him. Then he carries him back downstairs and lays him on the sofa. Kris covers him up. He turns round and looks at Tamara. He just looks at her.
“Kris?” says Tamara. “Kris?”
“I’m here,” says Kris, “I can hear you.”
They sit on the floor by the sofa holding each other tight. The day eats itself. It grows dark around them. For a while Tamara thinks it will stay like that. Forever. She and Kris in an embrace. Hours, days, weeks.
Make it years
. Wolf on the sofa behind them, inches away, and outside a world that turns and turns and couldn’t care less what happens to them.
• • •
Tamara is woken by the noises from the kitchen. She is lying alone on the floor. It’s light outside. When she sits up her eye falls on the sofa. Wolf is still covered up to his neck, eyes closed, motionless. Tamara puts her hand under the blanket, rests it on his bare chest, and feels nothing under it.
Kris stands in the kitchen by the espresso machine. He has dismantled it into its constituent parts. The surface is a chaos of bolts and gaskets.
“Kris?”
He turns around. There are blue shadows under his eyes. Tamara doesn’t think he’s slept.
“What are you doing?”
Kris looks at the machine as if to see what his hands are doing.
“I wanted to clean it, but then I couldn’t stop. I wanted to really clean it. Every bit, you understand?”
Tamara goes and stands next to him.
“What’s this?” she asks, holding up one of the gaskets.
“No idea,” says Kris, setting down the screwdriver.
They drink tea. They sit at the kitchen table and drink tea in silence. Tamara doesn’t want to ask, but she knows she must. She gives Kris five minutes, then another five, and then she says:
“What do we do now?”
Kris looks across to the living room.
“Kris, we have to do something. We have to go and see Gerald.”
“I know.”
“We have to tell him everything.”
Kris looks at her.
“Do you think I don’t know that?”
They hear the ticking of the clock.
“When?”
“When what?”
“When will we talk to Gerald?”
Kris looks past Tamara again.
“How on earth could he do that?”
For a moment Tamara thinks Kris means Wolf, then she shrugs. How can she answer that? How could anyone answer that?
“I don’t know,” she says.
“We didn’t get in his way, and he broke his word even so …”
Kris says nothing, his hands grip the cup, his thumbs rub the ceramic rim.
“Shall I leave you alone with Wolf?” Tamara asks.
“Why would you do that?”
“I just thought you …”
She falls silent and realizes that she’s projecting. She didn’t have a single moment alone with Frauke. It all happened too quickly. She wishes she’d insisted on seeing Frauke one more time. Alone.
“Go on then,” says Kris.
Tamara goes to Wolf and stays with him for a while.
Later, when she comes upstairs, Kris is standing at his study window looking through the window. Tamara taps against the door frame.
“Am I bothering you?”
“No, it’s fine, come in,” says Kris without turning around. “I was just talking to Gerald. We’re meeting in his office at four.”
“That’s good.”
“Yes.”
For a moment they say nothing.
“Kris? Please look at me.”
Kris turns around.
“If you like I’ll stay with Wolf, you just have to say the word.”
“Please,” he says, “please, stay with Wolf. One of us should keep an eye on him.”
Tamara nods and goes back downstairs. In the kitchen she puts on some water for tea, and her eye falls on the components of the espresso machine. She makes a bet with herself.
If I can put that thing back together before Kris comes back, everything will be fine
. She waits for the water to boil and studies the parts. As she is pouring the water, she hears Kris coming downstairs. He says he’ll be back by six at the latest.
“I’ll call you when I’m on my way.”
Tamara looks at the clock above the door. It’s three. She strains out the tea leaves and hears Kris driving away from the property. After she has filled a cup with tea, she puts the components of the espresso machine on a tray and takes everything into the living room. She adjusts one of the chairs in such a way that she can see Wolf on the sofa. Then she calmly begins to assemble the espresso machine.
K
RIS RUNS THROUGH
the city until five o’clock, trying to clear his head. He’s glad Tamara doesn’t know how close he and Wolf got to Meybach two days ago. Shortly after five Kris sits down in a park and calls Tamara. He tells her everything’s gone well with Gerald so far. He finds lying easy, it’s always easier to lie when you have nothing to lose.
“He wants to come and see us tomorrow.”
“And Wolf …”
“We’ll take care of Wolf as well,” Kris finishes her thought for her.
Tamara asks him when he’s coming home.
“I need another moment to myself. Otherwise everything OK with you?”
“The espresso machine’s working again.”
“Brilliant.”
“Kris?”
“What?”
“Please come back soon.”
“I promise.”
He hangs up. The second big lie of the day has been easy for him too. He turns off his cell phone. It’s done. He’s unreachable now.
It’s nine in the evening, the restaurants are crowded and spring is a phony summer. Kris doesn’t know what interests him less. He sits in his car opposite Meybach’s apartment and looks at the building. Three hours is enough to find a parking space even on Leonardstrasse. The windows of Meybach’s apartment are dark. Meybach’s neighbor came home at eight. Kris has forgotten what his name is. Thomas or Theo. Kris wonders whether he should speak to him, but then thinks that in this state he’d rather not see anyone. The gun lies in his lap like an insistent erection. He doesn’t know why he’s holding on to it. And he doesn’t know what he’ll do when he’s standing in front of Meybach.
At ten to nine the front door opens and Meybach’s neighbor comes out. He is wearing a tracksuit, and does a few stretching exercises outside the building before jogging off toward the park. Kris knows what Wolf would say now.
What on earth are you doing? I thought you had a plan
. Kris rests his forehead against the steering wheel and shuts his eyes, then he stirs himself, picks up the gun and stuffs it into his jacket. He has a plan.
• • •
The front door isn’t locked. Kris goes up the stairs, stops by the door to the apartment, and rings the bell. He knows Meybach isn’t there. He rings again. Better safe than sorry. Five minutes later he sits down on the steps and calls the emergency key service. He has written down the number. The key service is around the corner in Kantstrasse. The man says he can be there in ten minutes. Kris tells him the front door is open and he should just come upstairs.
“Which floor?”
“The third. Meybach.”
He comes in seven minutes. Kris tries to look guilty and depressed. The man takes a look at the lock and asks if Kris wants to keep it.
“Costs extra,” he warns.
“Extra’s OK.”
The man takes less than five minutes to crack the lock and open the door.
“The key will stick a bit at first because of the metal filings and stuff, but that’ll go away. If it doesn’t, give me a call and I’ll take care of it. Do you want an invoice?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
Kris pays in cash and adds twenty.
“Enjoy the rest of your Sunday,” says the man from the key service. His steps ring out on the stairs. Kris stands in the doorway for a moment before going inside and closing the door behind him.
Whatever happens now
, he thinks,
Meybach belongs to me
.
And he doesn’t come.
And he still doesn’t bloody come.
Kris sits in the dark. He has taken a look around the apartment. He’s taken a flashlight from a drawer. He has found photographs of Meybach and now he understands everything. Twice he’s tempted to call Tamara. To calm her down, to tell her what really happened.
But he decides not to.
The chair is placed in such a way that Kris can see the apartment door. It’s like in one of those thrillers. Guy comes home, and his killer’s sitting there. They talk a bit, then the killer says that’s it. The camera wanders to one of the windows, we hear the shot offscreen, and that
really is it. And on a distant soundtrack we hear the thoughts of our main character. The same three sentences over and over.
I know I’m not a killer
.
I know I can do this
.
I wish Wolf were here
.
A
ND AGAIN AND AGAIN
the question arises of where we made our mistake. I don’t know, I don’t get it, and it’s killing me and it hurts all the way into my bones that I don’t know, because we must have made some sort of mistake.
I just woke up breathlessly, grief flooded over me in my sleep, the inside of the car is filled with an acrid smell. My face is wet with tears. I think
Wolf
. I think
Frauke
. And my fists hammer against the steering wheel, again and again.
It’s the fifth or sixth day. I can’t remember. Like drifting through fog. Disoriented, uncomprehending. Outside dusk is falling, and there are a number of cars at the rest sîtop. I’m beginning to get careless. It’s exhaustion. Thoughts are weary of constantly thinking the same thing.
Show me the mistake and I’ll give up
. I’m lying, I won’t give up. I’ve got to do something. I’ve got to finish this story, or it will finish me.
I start the car and drive away from the rest stop.
Two hours later. Off the highway. Into the patch of forest. If only I had a spade with me. If only I had a gun. Or an axe. I open the trunk. He doesn’t wake up. He doesn’t hear me. I don’t want to touch him. I stand there and can’t touch him. He’s no longer a human being. No eyes, no mouth. The tape turns him into a thing. Only his nose is free, and his nostrils are flaring. He’s breathing, he’s still breathing. And I can’t touch him. I can’t end it. The trees are moving over my head. Always in one direction. Nothing but signposts.
That way
. I sit down in the grass, I lie down in the grass. Now I know where my path is taking me. I understand. The knowledge is such a relief that I close my eyes and go to sleep.
That way
.
Yes
.
W
E HAVEN’T HEARD
from you for so long that we’ve almost forgotten you exist. How many days ago is it? Three? Or is it four already? You’re aware that you’ve created a lot of confusion, and then you seriously thought you could just disappear invisibly back into your life and disconnect the line? You were probably really pleased to be allowed to disappear like that.
Forgiveness and peace and goodbye
. But that’s not how things work. You can’t conjure up ghosts and then turn away when they’re suddenly standing in front of you. That’s just not how it works.
They all made mistakes. Really, all of them. Trivial things, false steps, wrong decisions. Your mistake was to think it was over. The brothers came closer to you than ever before. During that time your existence reached a new level. A level of freedom. It’s that exquisite taste of freedom that makes you feel every moment differently. The freedom to be you. The freedom to be. You.
But let’s not leap ahead. Let’s take a look at your Saturday, before it turns into Sunday and we can welcome you back into our circle.
On Saturday you gathered your papers together and terminated contracts. It was a lot of work, but you sorted everything out and began meticulously erasing clues. In the evening you went into a bar and met Natascha. It was your farewell present. You took her into the apartment, you had sex, and later you watched a film on television. It was a good finale.
On Sunday you caught up on the work of the last week and went into your office. At about eight o’clock in the evening you realized you’d forgotten your gym bag. You wanted to go to the new fitness center after work, and now you had no option but to go home. In your apartment you walked uneasily through the rooms and felt uncomfortable. Farewell
is farewell. You were like a junkie who has to do without his fix for a day and tries to distract himself with trivia. At that moment you decided to go running.
Movement will be good for the restlessness
, you thought. Perhaps it would have been cleverer to yield to grief. Grief at the fact that the imprisonment is over. Honesty with yourself would have kept you at home. In grief. But you’re not really that honest. And no one can help you if you’re not honest with yourself.
It’s late now. There are no joggers in the park. There’s something reassuring about being the only one running through the darkness. Energy turns to peace, you’re nothing but breath and rhythm, your head feels clear and free. You remember Frauke. How she sometimes ran along the water of the Wannsee. Self-contained. You watched her from a distance, and once you were on the point of running alongside her.
Am I disturbing you?
But then your courage failed you, and you stopped watching her running.
After the second circuit you decide that’s enough for today. You walk down the pedestrian underpass, the traffic on Kantstrasse throbs above your head. You run to the end of the park and are about to leave it when you notice the man.
He’s sitting slumped on a park bench, chin on his chest, arms in his lap. He reminds you of your grandfather, who could sleep anywhere and left the world like that—in his chair by the window, one arm on the armrest, the other on the windowsill, as if he were about to get up and cast one last glance.
You stop in front of him. You’re not one of those idiots who have to dance up and down on the spot like restless horses every time they take a break.
“Is everything OK?” you ask.