by Paula Bomer
“Come on, Tante Eva. You have to be kidding me! What doesn’t Hans deal?”
“What a thing to say.” Eva closed her arms over her chest. “And leave Tom to rot in jail.”
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Maggie bent over, her arms wrapping around her waist. “Please don’t be angry at me. You’re the only one I have. You’re the only person I can trust.”
“How is it you’ve held down your job in this condition?”
“I’ve called in sick once. But I manage.”
Eva looked at her hard; she looked like death. “I find that hard to imagine.”
“My job means a lot to me. It’s my freedom from my parents. It’s not like I’m running a company. Or even being a nurse, like you were. I’m just trying to teach English to some desperate immigrants. As long as I show up and hand out some worksheets, it’s all fine.”
“That’s terrible, Maggie. I thought you would care more, care more about the people you teach. They need to learn German to make it in this country.”
“I do care. And most of the time I’ve been a good teacher. All I’m saying is, on a bad day, I still show up and manage, that’s all. Please don’t be angry at me.” But it was true, the feelings of disappointment and shock kept coming back to Eva. The worst was when her thoughts returned to herself. How could Maggie do this to me? thought Eva. Immediately, she was ashamed. Maggie didn’t do anything to Eva. She did this to herself. Not that it didn’t affect everyone around her, but still, it wasn’t about them. It was about Maggie.
“We are going to get you to a hospital.” And then she thought of what she didn’t want to think. How the mind works, how it goes to where it goes, regardless of our hearts’ desires. Hans and his mysterious packages near the Polish border. Hans. Her Hansi. Her everything.
“How could I have loved him?” Maggie bawled. “How could I have loved someone so awful?”
Eva felt a calmness again. Like the calmness she felt on coming here. Bitte, mein Gott. Bitte hilf uns. “You’re not to blame for having loved anyone. All you did was love. It is not a crime, not even to love someone awful. People think love can change others. Sometimes, we love awfulness thinking we can love it away. This isn’t a bad thing.”
In the cab, Maggie said, “I can’t do it.”
“Yes you can. I’ll help you. Your mother will help you. There’s medication they can give you, too. To make it less painful,” Eva said.
“My mother help me? Seeing my mother will make me want to shoot up ten times more than usual.” Maggie looked away from Eva, out the window of the cab. “I know a place that has good drugs. Different drugs. Better ones. If I can get some good stuff in me, then I’ll get clean.” Maggie grabbed Eva’s arm. “I’m going to do drugs today no matter what. It’s not your fault. It’s mine. But nothing you do can save me from myself.”
Maggie began scratching herself all over. Her eyes bulged and she said very quietly, “Heroin is my love, my one true love. Not Tom. Not my family, even. No one can tell me what not to love. Didn’t you say that to me, Tante Eva?”
What could Eva say? Eva fumbled in her purse for a sleeping pill, just one, to calm her nerves. She quickly swallowed it, without any water, dry and chalky in her throat. She wanted to say, Then why did you call her and not me? Why did you call her? “You tell the cab where to go, if that’s what you need to do.”
Twenty minutes later, Eva found herself in Kreuzberg, outside a building not unlike the one Maggie and Tom lived in, just busier, drug addicts coming and going. She waited in the cab while her niece bought drugs. She’s an ingrate, thought Eva. My niece, who thinks so much of me, who has some of the socialist spirit, is really a spoiled and ungrateful child, thought Eva, as she watched the sad, stumbling people come and go, the door always opening and closing, opening and closing.
Chapter 29
It had been nearly three decades, or longer—Eva’s mind began to hum with panic that she wasn’t quite sure; how was it she wasn’t sure?—since she’d seen Liezel. Now, in this fancy hotel lobby on the Ku’damm, Eva waited nervously. It was far earlier than she usually woke, never mind actually being somewhere. She was so anxious she almost didn’t feel tired. The receptionist had called up to Liezel’s room; she was coming down. Eva wore the red dress and had carefully applied lipstick. But she was sweating from nerves, and she felt she could smell herself. Maybe she’d put on too much cologne, but at least it might cover up her smell, the smell of fear.
Why fear? On the one hand, it seemed natural. It had been so long, it was just a big moment. But on the other hand, it seemed wrong. This was her sister. Her sister. Eva began humming to herself that Billie Holiday song she liked, “Long Gone Blues.”
“Talking to yourself!” Liezel was there suddenly.
Eva stood. There she was, immediately with the criticism, pretending it was all in good fun. They hugged, and then it was all so sudden, the feel of her body, how it was the same body and yet different, very much older. The hug was tight but trembly. It was awkwardly long. Eva wasn’t sure when to let go, so she decided to wait for Liezel to. Finally, they looked, really looked, at each other. Liezel was middle-aged. Her eyes were the same brown doe eyes, but so much harder. How could this happen? Eva patted her own hair, all the nerves in her body lit.
“I was humming a song. From a record Maggie gave me.” Eva began laughing nervously. She covered her mouth, self-conscious of her nervousness, the feeding cycle of it all. She was nervous, then ashamed of being nervous, which made her do things that made her feel more nervous. Her sister was still beautiful, but her mouth had deep creases and her hair was gray. Eva wondered why she didn’t color it. That seemed odd, to not color your gray hair. Especially in America, where coloring your hair must be easy, like everything else. Like buying food, and driving a car, and having a big house.
Liezel was wearing a soft cotton blouse and thin wool trousers, both in subdued grays. Eva immediately felt loud. Her dress was loud. She’d done it again, thought things through the wrong way. She thought the dress would make her feel glamorous. But it was her sister who was glamorous, in her subtle, fine fabrics.
“Let’s have a coffee, Eva. You look great. I love your dress.”
She followed her sister into the dining room at the hotel. The tables were set with white linen, and waiters in vests and bow ties walked around. Eva couldn’t help but be excited to sit here, in this lovely place. She had brought some money, but she was hoping Liezel would pay.
The menu was small and very expensive. Even more expensive than Café Einstein.
“I feel I should ask all about you, but I really want to talk about Maggie,” Liezel said.
“You don’t need to ask all about me,” said Eva. “My life is very simple. So there wouldn’t be so much to say. Talk to me about Maggie.”
“She claims she won’t come back. Maybe you could help me convince her otherwise. She immediately has to disagree with anything I say. She has to make it look like she doesn’t need me. And believe me, I wish she didn’t. I had a child at her age. What is it with young people these days? It’s as if they stay teenagers their whole lives.”
“She’s a good girl, too. She’s not all bad.”
“She’s a drug addict.”
“Yes, but she’ll leave Tom, I think. I don’t think she’ll be taking him back.” Eva immediately thought of Hans and then banished the thought. She looked around the beautiful room. Mozart played gently in the background. Liezel stared at her.
“You knew.” Her sister’s face burned slightly. Anger, thought Eva. How it makes us glow. Like when we make love.
“You knew, Liezel. I want to help with Maggie. I want to help Maggie and help you. At first, I just had my suspicions and they weren’t strong enough to risk saying something that could or could not be true.”
“Okay,” Liezel said. “I’m sorry. I’m just so frustrated.”
Eva looked at her baby sister and saw her for what she was; an angry, desperate woman in middle age. Dry-skinned, jowly with worry, a life that hadn’t turned out as it should’ve. A mentally ill husband. A drug-addicted, childish grown daughter. But whose life does become the life of their dreams? Then, fleetingly, Eva saw her as a little three-year-old, laughing and hugging her. And then, as the young woman she became—that combination of innocence and sexuality that is irresistible to most men, and many women, too. It is not just time that changes people. We go away. We become wholly different.
“I understand,” Eva said. Was she responsible? Because of Hansi? Now her face burned red, too. “I think I’ll order a schnapps.”
“This early?”
“Yes, this early. It’s very good for the digestion.”
Liezel looked at her watch.
“I need her address. Maybe even you can take me to her house?”
“I’ll give you her address. I don’t think I should go there with you.”
“Why? I need you!” Eva didn’t want a scene, but Liezel seemed not to care. She was being loud. “You know she likes you better than me.” Tears welled in her eyes. “And I’m scared of your neighborhood. It’s a ghetto.” Then, gathering herself, she said, “You’re used to it. I don’t want to go alone.”
Liezel, needing her. Rich, American Liezel. Pretty Liezel, what had she ever done for her? Besides fuck her husband? Coolly, she took out a small notebook from her purse and wrote down the address. “Here,” she said. “You’ll be fine if you take a cab. Have the driver wait until you are in the building.”
“What if she doesn’t want to go home with me?” Liezel asked.
Eva saw in her mind the dark hallway of the building she’d taken Maggie to so she could buy drugs, smelled the wet burning stink it omitted, a sharp, painful smell that stung her nose even from the cab.
Liezel continued. “I already know she doesn’t want to come back with me. But it doesn’t matter what she wants anymore. What is she going to do? Stay here and die? Have you look after her?” Liezel let out a short, mean laugh. Then she leaned across the table. “I’ll win. I’ve won. I was right, all along,” she said, shaking her head. “Children. They think they know everything. They’re all so stupid.” Liezel stared sharply at her, straight at Eva, taking a sip of her coffee.
Eva looked away from her sister. Hatred, that oily blackness—hatred was what Eva felt for this woman, this person her sister had become. She hated her for getting old and pathetic. For wielding her little bit of power so shamelessly. Eva sat back, holding her tiny schnapps glass. She downed it. And what did her sister think of her? Even less than what she thought of Liezel?
“I have a daughter too, you know.” She looked back at her sister. “You’d be surprised how quickly everything changes. Someday, you’ll need Maggie. You might want to consider that.”
Liezel leaned back. Eva could see her breathing heavily. “I think I’ll first worry about my daughter,” Liezel said. “Then she can worry about me when the time comes.”
And then it was as if Eva felt nothing. “I need you to pay me back for all the money I’ve been spending on taking care of Maggie. I took her on cab rides when she wasn’t well.”
“Cab rides?”
“Yes, it was then that I became suspicious something was wrong,” Eva lied. “Because normally she could take the U-Bahn.”
“How much?” Liezel asked.
“Two hundred marks.”
The two sisters looked at each other.
“Konnen wir zahlen, bitte,” Liezel asked the waiter as he walked by. She reached in her expensive, large bag with some logo on it that Eva didn’t recognize, and took two hundred marks out of her wallet. She put the bills down in front of Eva, and Eva took them.
“You have Elena’s number and mine,” Eva said. “Call me at either of those places and let me know how it goes. If you need us, we will do what we can.”
“I tried calling Maggie,” Liezel said, as they both stood. “The phone was disconnected.”
“Tom didn’t pay the bill as he was supposed to,” Eva said. “Bis später, Schwester.”
Chapter 30
After she returned home on the U-Bahn, Eva sat at her table, thinking, trying to quiet her breath. She drank a brandy, then she left, straight back to the U-Bahn, this time straight to Elena’s.
She had a key to Elena’s apartment—just in case, an emergency backup key. Elena had one of Eva’s as well. Neither had ever used her key to open the other’s door. This time, Eva let herself in, turned on the hallway light, went into the living room, and immediately went to the shelves holding endless boxes of film and thick stacks of photo albums, all meticulously labeled. Her daughter often acted and appeared as a sloven, dissolute bum—goodness, she begged on the U-Bahn for laughs—but she was actually a very organized person—a hardworking, dedicated craftsperson, a brilliant student of the arts. A talented, ambitious artist.
And so without much effort she found the photo album, and she took it out, dust free—Elena dusted all the time, kept everything so clean—and sat on one of the low cushions next to the low, round table with ashtrays and matches. She pulled out all of the photos of Liezel. Holding them was breathtaking. They stole her breath. They were of a lost time, a time of such beauty, of such horror and pain. Carefully, barely shaking, she lit a match and burned one, holding it up to the flame over an ashtray full of cigarette butts. It caught easily and turned purple, to orange with licks of yellow, then back to purple and disintegrated into ash. Ashes to ashes, Eva thought, with great satisfaction. She took another photo of Liezel and then she heard the door open. She hadn’t locked it behind her.
Elena came in, in her jeans, throwing her coat off, braless in a sweatshirt. “Mutti? Was ist hier los? Was zu Teufel! Was machst du da!? Stopp! Stopp, Mutti!” She ran to her mother, but Eva had already lit another photo, her mouth set. Justice. Justice, not revenge. Sometimes one seems like the other. Sometimes they are the same.
Elena lunged for the photo album, but Eva dropped the burning, ruined photo in the ashtray and grabbed the album and stood, holding it to her chest.
Elena sat, her head in her hands, and wept. “Mutti, Mutti. Das ist alles, was ich von Vati habe.” She looked up at her mother. “How can you?” she screamed and threw herself at her mother. They struggled over the book. Eva held it fast, even after Elena knocked her down. Then Elena grabbed the book, and it ripped in half. Elena sat again, weeping.
“Du,” Eva said to her daughter, “du hast so viel von deinem Vati. Diese Fotos brauchst du nicht.”
She left then, with half the photo album in her arms and her daughter weeping on the floor.
On the train back to her apartment, she clutched the album to her chest as one phrase from the burial prayer ran through her mind over and over again: earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
When she got out, it was dark and the air was so dry, it was like it wasn’t even there. She walked toward her apartment without a thought in her head. At the corner were two of the skinheads. The little one wasn’t there—the baby skinhead, and she laughed for a quick beat at her thought. Then she remembered the number she carried in her wallet. The two looked so sick, sick like Maggie, sicker than that. One was coatless.
She walked up to them and said to the coatless one, “Wo ist deine Lederjacke?”
He looked up, his face blue. He probably had hypothermia. She should call an ambulance.
He said, “Die hab ich verkauft.” Then, “Bitte, Fräulein, haben Sie ein bisschen Geld für uns?” The other one looked up at her now, his face covered in snot.
“Ich habe kein Geld,” she said. “Aber hier, nimm das.” Then she opened the album. She flipped through the book, and with God’s help quickly found the photo she wanted, the one in which Liezel clearly was in ecstasy on top of Hugo. She took it, then h
anded the book over to the boy, his arms outstretched to receive it.
Chapter 31
Back in her apartment, Eva put on the Nina Simone. She poured herself a tall brandy; she hadn’t had any lunch. She’d been too embarrassed to eat in front of Liezel, and she didn’t eat anything after leaving, either. It burned her stomach, the brandy, but she was hoping it would calm her nerves. After another tall brandy, her stomach no longer burned, but her hands still shook, her teeth were gritted tightly, and her mind was wild with thoughts. Prayer? She took four sleeping pills and tried to pray.
She woke later in her chair. The apartment was dark; it was early morning now. There she sat where she’d been drinking, an open bottle of pills on the table in front of her. Her head throbbed so hard it scared her. And her legs. They felt on fire. After turning on the table lamp she took off her dress and stockings and her left leg in particular burned and went numb. She looked down at it; it was red and mottled, swollen at the joints.
A loud knock on her door startled her. She grabbed for her robe. “Moment! Moment!” She hobbled to the door, wiping at the dried drool glued to her cheek as she opened it. It was Krista’s mother. Eva nearly fell—she couldn’t feel her leg—but she managed to lean against the door, catching herself.
“Frau Haufmann, wie geht es Ihnen?” Eva asked.
“Ich habe Krista seit zwei Tagen nicht mehr gesehen.” She was shaking. She gave off a terrible odor. Her head was dirtier than ever; her clothes, soiled. It must have taken a huge effort to leave the apartment.
“Kommen Sie herein. Wir besprechen das jetzt und rufen dann vielleicht die Polizei.”
“Die Polizei? Die Polizei?”
Eva looked at the clock. It was almost 6:00 a.m. She wondered if they should wait an hour or so, in case Krista would return. But her mother said Krista had never spent the night away before. Only once or twice with a school friend, but it was all planned beforehand, and that had been years ago now, anyway. No, something was wrong. There was no need to wait longer. Calling the police was something that invoked fear in Eva as well, not just Mrs. Haufmann. Before the Wall was down, one would never call the police about anything. Ever. They were always there, lurking. Everyone was the police, the regular police or the Stasi. No one called them, too, because there had never been any crime to speak of. When people went missing, well, that was different. That was usually at the hands of the police. It was a different world now.