The Storyteller

by Antonia Michaelis

  She felt his hand on hers as he gave her something. A piece of paper.

  “Good luck with physics,” she said.

  “I’m not taking the exam.”

  She looked at him. He looked away. No one could take an exam with a sword hanging over his head. Anna felt rage build inside her. Lierski had really managed to mess life up for Abel. Now he was keeping him from passing the classes he needed to graduate.

  She looked at the paper during her next class. It was folded to form an envelope and closed with pieces of scotch tape. It was even decorated with a not-really-round red circle, which might have been meant to be a seal. In one corner, someone had written “ANNA” in pencil. She opened the envelope, carefully smoothed the paper, and saw little hearts drawn with an orange magic marker. The letter was from Micha; Abel hadn’t opened it.

  Deer ANNA,

  You hav to com agan soon so the farytal can go on.

  Love MiCHA.

  Deer ANNA 2

  kwestions that I do not no:

  1 were dus a persun go when he dies?

  2 is the red hunter gon now or will he com bak?

  3 kan you help Abel not be afrad any moor deer anna

  Love micha.

  Anna took a pen to write an answer on the paper. “Dear Micha,” she wrote. But she didn’t know what to say after that. She couldn’t answer a single one of Micha’s questions.

  On Friday after school, Anna rode her bike into town and wandered aimlessly down the main shopping street. Her legs wanted to carry her to the student dining hall, but she didn’t let them; instead, she forced them to walk in the opposite direction, to take her window shopping … as if she wanted to buy something, as if she had a reason for being there. She didn’t. She just didn’t want to go home. At the beach in Eldena, where she usually went if she felt this way, there were too many thoughts strewn in the sand near the frozen sea; it was too lonely there. And besides, maybe her stupid legs would win and carry her to the dining hall, where she’d find Abel and Micha, sitting at one of the tables, eating dead dog and drinking hot chocolate with five straws each.

  She wandered over to the old snow-covered fish market behind the town hall, where they hadn’t sold fish for a long time. Children were ice-skating on the shallow pond in front. She could, she thought, walk over to the fair trade shop on the other side of the square and buy a bar of chocolate, to at least do something that made sense. As she climbed the steps to the store, the winter scene at the pond swam in her head, a picture of children, in colorful snowsuits, laughing—and all of a sudden, she remembered a small pink down jacket. She turned around. Of course, there wouldn’t be a pink down jacket, and if there was one, it would belong to another child, one that Anna didn’t know and … somebody was running toward her from the pond. It wasn’t a child. It was someone in an open green military parka and a gray scarf, which was trailing behind. Someone without a hat, someone with snow in his blond hair. She thought of the scene in the schoolyard; she thought: he’s flying, flying like he did then; then he was there, sweeping her up the stairs with him, into the store, between the boxes of half-frozen leeks and bright orange pumpkins. Somewhere behind him, she saw the pink jacket now, playing on the ice with the other children.

  “They … they got him,” Abel gasped. He had snow on his jacket, snow on his sweater, snow in the folds of his gray scarf, as if he’d been playing on the ice with the children and fallen on his nose. He was out of breath and his eyes sparkled with laughter.

  The sword … the sword was gone.

  “Who?” Anna asked. “Who did they get? Who?”

  “The guy who shot Micha’s father.” He seemed to realize that he was still holding her arm and let go as he tried to catch his breath. “It’s … it’s almost certain it was him. I’ve been asking around a bit … maybe it will be in the papers tomorrow. Rainer shouldn’t have picked a fight with at least one of those three guys last Saturday. The police didn’t find just one gun in his apartment—they found a whole arsenal. It looks like he was trading in weapons. In any case, they’re holding him now for illegal possession; he had run away after they found Rainer’s body, but then he seems to have come back to his apartment to get something; the guy from the bar saw him, and now they’ve got him. And …” He stopped, panting.

  “That … that’s … great,” Anna said, smiling. “Did he confess?”

  “I don’t know,” Abel said. “But even if he doesn’t … it’s got to be him, don’t you think?”

  She nodded, slowly. “Yeah. It’s got to be him.”

  Micha came toward them now, swinging her turquoise backpack. And she was carrying something else, too, a bag that looked as if it was from a bookshop. She tried to wave with the bag and the backpack, dropped both, and picked them up again. “What are you doing in the vegetables?” she asked, grinning, as she entered the store. Her face was red from cold and excitement, and she was beaming.

  “You didn’t see us,” she said to Anna. “I was skating on my shoes! You just walked past me … I waved to you, but I was so out of breath, I couldn’t call your name right away … why didn’t you see us?”

  “I was … lost in thought,” Anna replied.

  “What were you thinking about?”

  “You,” Anna said. “Isn’t that strange? I was thinking of you two so hard that I didn’t see you.” The leeks were astonishingly green. The pumpkins were unbelievably orange. The tomatoes had never been so red and the lettuce never so lettuce-colored. Never before had Anna realized how beautiful vegetables could be.

  “Are we gonna buy something here?” Micha wanted to know. “We already bought something at the bookshop. A book, see! To celebrate. Because there won’t be any policemen coming now.”

  “We won’t buy anything here,” Anna said. “But next door, we can get something, in that café. What’s it called? Gleam of Hope? Gosh. Whatever … they do have hot chocolate. Do you have time for a cup of hot chocolate? Am I allowed to … I mean … just today … to treat?”

  Micha looked at Abel, and Abel seemed to be thinking. Finally he nodded. “Just today,” he said.

  The “gleam of hope” didn’t sell just hot chocolate; it also carried clothes made of felt as well as wooden toys. Half the people working there were mentally handicapped, though there was probably a more correct word for it. When Anna was in town with Linda, they always stopped by. The air there seemed blue, like the air at home, but maybe that was just because of all the handmade blue dishes.

  “We’ve never been here,” Micha said. “I like it. We could come every day.”

  “Down the road,” Abel said. “When I’ve finished school and am working more … then we can come here every day.”

  “Are you going to stay here?” Anna asked when they were standing in line at the counter while Micha admired the cakes. “For university?”

  “We’ll see,” Abel said. “Maybe we’ll go away. I don’t know yet.”

  And Anna imagined him moving, with Micha. It was always “we” and never “I,” but how would Abel take care of Micha when he was going to school and working at the same time? And what about custody—would he get custody rights when he turned eighteen?

  “This cake is very pretty,” Micha remarked.

  Anna pushed away her doubts about the future and paid for the hot chocolate and a piece of the very pretty cake, and they carried the blue plate and the blue cups over to a table. Outside the window, the sun was shining and turning the snow into silver. And Anna wished everything could stay like this—wished that she could sit at this table forever, with Abel and Micha, with the sun shining outside …

  “In the sky above the green ship,” Abel said as he drank a little of his chocolate, “the sun was shining brighter than before. The black ship had fallen behind. But it never vanished completely. And despite the sun, the air didn’t get any warmer. The rose girl’s leaves withered, one after the other, and one night as she stood on deck all by herself, the last one fell. She was completely naked.


  “‘Oh, if only I could spin a thread of moonlight! If only I could spin a thread of the froth on the waves to make clothes!’

  “Single snowflakes fell from the night sky and snuggled in her dark hair, and she sighed and said, ‘Oh, if only I could spin a thread of snow to make clothes!’

  “Then she sat down on the deck and waited to freeze to death.

  “At that moment something dark emerged from a corner—something very big—and the rose girl was frightened. It was the wolf. The big gray wolf who had killed the red hunter. She had seen it, even though she hadn’t told the little queen. Now the wolf approached her slowly; she saw that he was limping, dragging his right front paw. And she saw his teeth. When the wolf was very close, she realized he was still bleeding from a wound on his flank. ‘From the rapier of the red hunter,’ the wolf said, looking at her with his golden eyes.

  “‘But how is it possible that you’re still bleeding?’ she asked. ‘It’s been a long time since we threw the red hunter’s body into the sea. And the sea lion that swims along next to the ship in daytime doesn’t have any wounds.’

  “The wolf didn’t reply. ‘You’re shivering,’ he said. ‘Do you believe that you could spin a thread of my blood? To make clothes from?’

  “The rose girl tried hard to believe. And the moment she did, the wolf’s blood turned into a red thread that started weaving itself into a soft, red fabric. The thread was pouring out of the wound, yard up yard, and the fabric’s folds covered the rose girl, covered her and warmed her until she didn’t feel the cold of the winter night anymore. A piece of fabric draped itself around her face, and when she swept it aside, she saw that the wolf had gone.

  “The rest of the night the rose girl spent sewing. Her needle was a rose thorn she had taken from one of the dried branches. There was enough fabric to make warm clothes for all of them—for the rose girl and the little queen and the lighthouse keeper and Mrs. Margaret. Only the white cat, who constantly slept, didn’t need warm clothes. She was much too disinterested in the world to feel the cold.

  “When the morning came, they stood on the deck of the ship, clad in red velvet, and the lighthouse keeper looked through his glasses and called out: ‘There! I can see two islands, very close! We can go ashore on one of them and stretch our legs a little!’

  “The little queen wondered where he had found his glasses. Hadn’t she gone back to the ship alone, to get those glasses? And hadn’t she almost been caught by the red hunter because of it? She pushed the thought away and watched as the lighthouse keeper and the rose girl secured the ship’s lines to a pole on one of the islands. The island was full of people, waving and shouting questions: ‘Where does the moon come from?’ ‘What’s the meaning of life?’ ‘Why is it impossible to turn a yogurt container inside out to eat the last bits?’

  “‘This,’ the sea lion explained, ‘is the island of questions, little queen.’

  “The little queen jumped ashore, and the asking people caught her in their arms. But they didn’t set her down. They lifted her up, above their heads, and carried her away, all the while shouting more questions. In the end, they started shaking her impatiently in hopes she would answer.

  “‘Where does someone go when he dies?’ ‘When does fear end?’ ‘Where are all the single socks that disappeared in the washing machine?’

  “The little queen didn’t know the answers to any of their questions.

  “‘Help me!’ the little queen cried fearfully. ‘They will tear me to pieces!’

  “Then the silver-gray dog appeared between the asking people. He snapped left and right with his teeth, and the asking people stepped back. ‘Why is he doing that?’ they asked. ‘Where does he come from? Is he good or bad?’

  “The silver-gray dog plucked the little queen from their arms, like a bird from the air. Suddenly, she was sitting on his back, and he was running toward the ship, running through the passage the asking people had opened for fear of his teeth. Soon, the little queen was back on board. On the island, there was a crowd of asking people, who were still stretching out their dozens of arms and shouting hundreds of questions.

  “‘Cast off!’ the sea lion called from the waves. ‘Quick! Too many questions can be dangerous!’

  “So they pulled away from shore and headed over to the second island. But one of the asking people had managed to jump aboard and climb over the rail. ‘Can I come with you?’ he asked. ‘Are you sailing toward the mainland? What does the mainland look like?’

  “‘Shut up,’ the white cat said. ‘How is anyone supposed to sleep when you’re asking so many questions!’

  “They now approached another island, where there was also a crowd of people waiting and waving. The travelers could see that they were shouting something, but their words didn’t reach the island of questions.

  “‘I wouldn’t be too surprised,’ the lighthouse keeper said, ‘if that was the island of answers.’

  “When they were halfway between the two islands, a whirlpool took hold of the ship, turning it around and around in a circle, and they all lost their balance and fell down onto the deck. Finally, the lighthouse keeper managed to steer the ship out of the whirlpool and back on course toward the second island. The sea lion stuck his head out of a wave. ‘That was the place,’ he said, ‘where all the shouted words fall into the water. They’re too weak to make it from shore to shore. I saw the words underwater, millions of them; they’re lying there on the bottom of the sea, a whole load of wrecked sentences, sentences that never reached their destination, questions from one side and answers from the other …’

  “‘How sad!’ the little queen exclaimed. ‘A cemetery of words!’

  “‘Some are swallowed by the fish,’ the sea lion said, ‘and they start sprouting the strangest things. Sunfish and electric eels and even crossopterygians …’

  “‘I do hope the answering people allow us to go ashore for a bit,’ the little queen sighed. ‘I’d really like to walk on solid ground again, just to feel that something exists.’

  “But the shore of the island of answers was packed with too many people, too, all of them wanting to get rid of their answers.

  “‘Seven o’clock!’ someone called out.

  “‘That adds up to 529.7!’ another one shouted.

  “The rose girl pushed the asking man gently to the rail. ‘Here, you will find answers to your questions!’ she said.

  “‘But how will I know the correct questions if there are so many answers in my head?’ the asking man asked, his eyes full of tears. And he ran into the cabin and hid between the polar bear skins.

  “‘To do good!’ one of the answering people shouted without being asked.

  “‘Boil it for three minutes, then let it simmer in the hot water for ten more minutes,’ another one answered.

  “‘I don’t think we want to go ashore here,’ the sea lion said. ‘We’ll go ashore when we reach the mainland.’

  “Before they sailed away from the island of answers, one of the answering people jumped aboard the ship. He went straight to the cabin, where the asking man was hiding, and for a while all you could hear were questions and answers shooting back and forth: ‘Is he telling the truth?’ ‘On the thirteenth of March.’ ‘Is he good or bad?’ ‘Beneath the beeches, where the anemones grow in spring.’ And then the cabin door flew open and both the asking man and the answering man came running out, in a state of confusion. One of them fled to the stern and the other to the bow, and they climbed over the rail and clung to the ship’s hull from the outside, like two figureheads. Obviously they hoped never to meet again.

  “In the meantime, the green ship set course once more for the mainland. The shipmates laughed for a good while about the asking man and the answering man. Then they turned and noticed that the black ship was very close now. So close that they could clearly see the four dark figures aboard. And they stopped laughing.”

  • • •

  Abel looked into his cup, stirred the
cold chocolate, and then looked out the window, as if his thoughts were still lost inside the story.

  “Those glasses,” Micha said. “I guess the lighthouse keeper just had them in his pocket. That happens to a lot of people. It happens to my teacher. She isn’t even really old or anything, just kind of old—thirty or something—but she always forgets where she puts her glasses. By the way, she asked me again when she can talk to Mama. I wonder why. But, Abel … when the red hunter came aboard the ship … I let him in, didn’t I? I mean, in reality?”

  Abel nodded. “You did.”

  “And now … now I shouldn’t let anyone in, right?”

  “That’s right.”

  Micha nodded. “I didn’t let that man in,” she announced in triumph. “Yesterday. I forgot to tell you.”

  Abel sat up straight. “Who didn’t you let in, Micha?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” Micha replied, “since I didn’t let him in. He’d already come up the stairs, he was on the landing, talking to me through the door.”

  “What did he say?” Anna asked.

  Micha thought for a while. “That he’s from some kind of office. Something with a shell and a sister. He said it several times, real clear, as if he thought I was half-deaf. Wait … it started with so … shell … a sister office? I think he was from an office for shells and sisters. And he wanted to talk to Mama, too. I didn’t say anything; I was perfectly quiet, as if I wasn’t there at all.”

  “That’s good, Micha,” Abel said.

  “Possibly … possibly I did say hello, very quickly, at the beginning,” Micha murmured, and Anna laughed, although she really didn’t feel like laughing.

  “So-shell-a-sister-office,” she said. “Social assistance office—that’s it!” Micha exclaimed. “That’s where he came from.”