We hadn’t even showered. We smelled of chlorine. We lay in bed and warmed up. Simon stroked Roswitha and described the future in his deep voice: When the rat is gone, I’m going to get myself a bird. Actually, Roswitha’s not my type, I’m more of a bird-person, but a godchild is a godchild, what can I do? He gave her a kiss. My sweet. Your successor may well be a pigeon. He turned to Petrus: Assuming that I won’t have to succeed you! Petrus didn’t answer. He lay motionless. He loved to play dead and he was very good at it.
Twilight is falling. We’ll reach Basel soon. It gets light a minute later every day now and dark a minute earlier, until there will be hardly any daytime left.
What are the children doing now? Philipp is picking them up from nursery school right now. Dressing them in their snowsuits with reflective stripes. Taking them to the supermarket to shop for the boys’ night, chips and dip and popsicles.
Hello, I’m back! someone calls and a dark shadow flutters at the window. The penguin is back.
Where’d you go?
Where did I go? I had things to do.
Don’t you want in?
In? Gladly, if you open the window.
Oh right, no, the window doesn’t open.
Doesn’t matter. I’m fine. The fresh air is doing me good.
Petrus?
Yes?
So he did name you Petrus!
Who?
Simon, your creator!
Have you got a problem with that?
Yes! No. What will we do in Zurich?
What will we do? We’ll visit him.
Who?
Who? My creator.
It’s just before seven when he opens his door. The train pulled into Zurich’s main station at six o’clock on the dot. As I was getting out of the train, my dog yanked me onto the platform in one leap. I twisted my ankle. She tore to the nearest pillar on which, for the lack of a tree, she peed longer than she ever had before: I watched as the red hand of the station clock made a complete circle. The dark puddle spread strongly and rapidly over the platform. Goddamn disgrace, the passersby scolded.
Simon looks at me. Then at the dog. Again at me.
Hoi, I say. Hoi, the penguin echoes in my ear and it sounds stupid.
Simon looks at me.
I had eight hours to decide what to say, how to begin, but the only thing that occurs to me is hoi. He looks at me. He appears to be thinking. He has gotten old. His hair sparse, his lips thin, his cheeks hollow. Only his voice is unchanged. Dark, full, warm. Long time, he says.
I nod. I wrote you a letter.
He nods. He turns and walks away.
The door is open.
The dog is stretched out under the table. The penguin is in my ear. I stand there indecisively. Simon puts two cups on the table.
Sit down.
I keep standing.
He looks at me. Comes closer, stands right in front of me. He smells odd, but good. I know that smell, but I can’t place it. He pulls me to his thick sweater, I claw my fingers into it, a sob rises. Simon’s back shudders. I squeeze, he squeezes, it cuts off our breath. We breathe heavily, shaking, we weep because we can’t help it, weep until we can’t any more. What do you want to know? he asks.
Why he did it, I answer falteringly. He. Petrus’s name still hasn’t been said.
Simon looks at the cups. The tea has gone cold, he says. Doesn’t matter, I answer and sit down.
Simon reaches for his cup. I don’t know anything, he says between two sips. Only a little, he corrects himself. When did you last hear from him?
He wrote me at some point that he had stopped smoking, I say.
Simon nods.
Why would someone quit smoking if he’s going to jump out the window?
Simon nods.
Why are you nodding?
I’m nodding?
Yes.
Simon shakes his head. That was long before he jumped. I can still remember how Petrus called and said that he’d soon be forty, it was time to quit. And then there was a strange pause and I asked: Quit? Quit what? And Petrus laughed and said: Puff, puff, puff—smoking! Simon looks at me. Then he bends down under the table and asks my dog if she’s all right. He kneels next to her and starts petting her. You’re very soft, he says. I watch his hands stroke her dark fur. I remember the rat. Simon smiles. Roswitha? She’s been dead almost twenty years. Don’t look so horrified, fancy rats don’t have a long lifespan.
And now? Do you keep birds?
Simon gives me a long look. No, he says. No, I live alone, still, as always. Sometimes I think I should find someone to live here with me but—no, I stand alone. Walk alone, lie alone. My dog has rolled onto her back and is relishing being petted, now and then she grunts softly.
And Petrus? How did he live, and with whom? I ask.
Simon shrugs. We were rarely in touch all those years after you split up. He withdrew. I didn’t understand why, I still don’t.
I close my eyes. Hear the shrill blast of the lifeguard’s whistle. I watch Petrus, how he plows through the water with his long torso, it looks very easy. His arms swing up and down. As if he were flying. Simon sits on the edge of the pool. I can’t anymore, he says to me. But take a look at Petrus!
A bird calls. That’s the pied flycatcher, Simon says, that means it’s nine. The wall clock behind him has pictures of birds instead of numbers. The big hand is vertical, the little hand is horizontal pointing left.
I excuse myself, go to the bathroom, and write Philipp a message: Arrived safely, good night. Then I call my brother. My brother doesn’t pick up. I turn off my phone. When I come back into the kitchen, Simon takes a look at my sturdy boots and says: You have sensible shoes on! Is that because of age or wealth? Before you wore that pair of heels with straps all year long.
Because I still have no money, it must be because of my age, I reply. Simon looks at me: Are you spending the night?
Do you have room?
Yes.
We lay next to each other and stare at the ceiling, as if we could read the past on it. My sweet, Simon says in his bass voice and both of us listen: my dog next to the bed, me in it. He meant the dog. He strokes her. Then he asks: Where were you on November 17, 2008? What were you doing?
I was pregnant and suffering from nicotine withdrawal, I reply. And I thought of Petrus and how it was so easy for him to quit. Unlike me. The only sentence I could come up with was: Where can I get my next cigarette? The only sentence I could write was: I want to smoke. And that didn’t stop for almost an entire year. Petrus, however, has simply quit. And I thought: Everything always came easy to you, you wealthy snob. You pseudo-bohemian. You amateur smoker.
Simon shakes his head. Did you really think that?
I shrug.
In our last conversation, Petrus told me his apartment was above the city tree line, Simon says. He said he lived at the same level as the birds and they circled in front of his window. He was perched there like an albatross in the doldrums. I’ve got no wind under my wings. Although in reality he was in fact a flying wonder! If he could just get airborne, he could ride out the wildest storm! I told him that albatrosses were not only very good flyers, but also fantastic swimmers, even in the heaviest swells. I know, Petrus answered me, I didn’t choose the albatross arbitrarily.
Simon turns to face me. I no longer expected you to show up, he says, but I’m happy that you finally came. And now I recognize the smell. Strange, but good: Hay with a slight splash of urine. At the same time, cozy and unsettling.
10
Gray, a few degrees above zero
My son is on the line, the big little one.
Mama, are you there?
Yes.
Where are you?
In Zurich.
Where you lived when you were a child?
Exactly.
What are you doing there? Are you going to nursery school?
The connection is bad. I go outside. Gray, a few degrees above zero.
No, I’m
working.
But your computer’s here!
Yes, that’s true, but you know, I’m writing by hand.
How?
Well, with a pencil!
With your hand?
No, with a (I stretch lips and over-enunciate) penn-ssill!
It’s not cold, but I’m shivering. My jacket is inside the restaurant. I look in through the plate glass window. Only attractive people sit in the window. When the guests come in, they’re divided up. The unattractive ones are led straight to the back. If an unattractive one is sitting near the window, he must be extremely rich or famous. Without the slightest hesitation, we were shown to a table in the very back of the restaurant. At the table next to us was a pudgy glutton who paid as quickly as he ate and then left.
I’ve been in Zurich for twenty-six days and nights. Simon offered his bed on the first night—it was, in theater jargon, a reprise. He never asked how long I was planning on staying. He went to the museum with me to see the Giacometti. To see the collection on Sunday, like before. But now it’s no longer free. Fifteen francs. Simon paid for me. He walked inconspicuously at my side. As is his way. He says nothing, asks no questions, he doesn’t seem to be interested or bored, he’s simply there, at my side. I have looked for my favorite sculptures but not found them. Striding Man. Dog. Falling Man. All three are out in the world somewhere on loan. The falling man, my favorite from that time. I stood for several minutes in the spot where I believed it used to stand, in the middle of the room, stared into the emptiness, and remembered. The falling man is the size of a newborn, you could take him in one arm, but his proportions are different. A rail-thin, full-grown man as big as a baby, no orientation, swirling, at every moment about to fall into the void. The longer I stared at him the way I used to, unable to come to his aid, the more completely the room around me would dissolve, the more I myself had the feeling that there was no solid ground under my feet, that I was caught in a maelstrom and about to tumble with the spindly man.
My big little one (four-and-a-half) has handed the telephone to the little little one (two-and-a-quarter).
Mama? Are you?
I’m in (I stretch my lips again) Zuu-rich!
Here, give it to me, I hear my husband’s voice. There’s rumbling. Philipp’s on.
Hello?
Yes?
Where are you?
In the art museum.
Alone?
With my old love, Alberto.
What?
A joke. Alberto Giacometti. Of course I’m alone, Philipp!
I had a dream about you, at first I didn’t even recognize you.
Why not?
No idea. We’ve been together such a long time and I didn’t recognize you.
Maybe it was too dark.
I dreamt you weren’t coming back. You are coming back, aren’t you?
Of course.
When.
I don’t know yet. How’s your mother?
She sleeps. She’s weak. But when the radiation treatments are done, she’ll be better—
Give her my best.
She’ll get better, do you think so, too?
I take a deep breath. I hope so, Philipp.
I go inside. The waiter looks me over like he did earlier and gives me a confirming nod when I head toward my seat in the back.
Simon puts his cup down and waves at me. I smile at him. The table is taken again. The young woman who sits down is very pretty, what is she doing here? Someone that pretty belongs in the window! The old man with her is, at least from the side, truly hideous. Her beauty is no match. The old man turns his face toward me. Tadeusz! I drop my phone. I bend down, straighten up, and take another look: it’s Tadeusz! He doesn’t recognize me. Crazy. He looks at me—looks away—at me—away: He Doesn’t Recognize Me!!!! The knocking sets in. Brutal Morse code tapping. Hammering in my head: - / * * / - - / * : TIME, as so often, and again: TIME. Then, after a pause: SMOKE. I stand there like the falling man, at least it feels that way. What’s wrong? Simon asks and stands up, comes to me, takes my hand, blocking my view of Tadeusz. Nothing, I say, just the phone. I sit down.
Did something happen at home? To your children?
No, I dropped it.
Simon takes my phone from me and examines it. I peek at the next table. Unbelievable, the right name, the right man at the right time. Wonderful, Tadeusz is saying. Yes, that was his word, it was then and it still seems to be today: wonderful. The beautiful, the accomplished, the artistically inspiring: wonderful! With his Polish accent that he still has after forty years. Wonderful. What is he doing here? And who is the young woman? Why ask? I know all too well. She’s his student. He’s the famous director who also vorks on acting and directing as a professor. (It was never clear if Tadeusz was playing up his accent or not.) But why in Zurich? He was teaching in Berlin. Years ago, when I last heard from him. When he called me up and asked me to send him my play. He sounded impatient, greedy, as he always did when he wanted something; he had stumbled, he told me, on a review of the premiere in the newspaper. I’ll send it to you, I said but I never did. He asked for it again two times and two times more, I promised to send it right away. Two more times after that, the secretary of the university wrote to remind me, then I was left in peace.
The student laughs. She has a high, clear, sparkling laugh. Tadeusz leans toward her and murmurs something to her. Conspirators. Tadeusz was born the same year as my father, a fact I found so unpleasant when I was his student that I haven’t forgotten it. His students are always the same age, next to them he’s geriatric. At the time, he was twice as old as I was, now he’s three times as old as she is. Grandfather and granddaughter. Don’t these artists ever retire, not even when they’ve become professors? Sitting there, over seventy and murmuring into a student’s ear. Why is this beautiful young woman wasting the best time of her life, throwing away thousands of precious moments in her young life on this worn-out, washed-up old man? Apparently he’s still worth it.
She’s making time for him. Did he say: Hello, this is Tadeusz. Would you have a little time to spare this afternoon? Did she answer: I’ll just make time, Tadeusz?
Simon has disassembled my mobile phone. He rubs each part, even the tiniest piece with a cloth handkerchief and blows the dust away from every angle. That should help, he says, and starts to put the device back together again. The hammering in my head hasn’t changed.
Does Tadeusz not recognize me or has he not seen me? I think back to the train yesterday, when I retraced the route I took to school. It was Saturday morning, aside from me, only new recruits were up and about. They used to be a reason to wait for the next train. Today I can safely sit next to them, they look right through me. They can keep trading their misogynistic banter at the top of their voices, why not? I’m invisible.
For Tadeusz, too, it seems. Only Simon can see me, his smile is a clear sign, apparently I still exist.
Tadeusz and I last saw each other more than seven years ago when I’d just met Philipp, at about the same time we decided to get married, almost exactly two days after Philipp and I called the registry office and applied for a marriage license. He ran into me by chance at the Bahnhof Zoo station, just before slipping into insignificance (the station, that is), the morning after I’d done a reading from my first book. In those days, I was so deeply in love that I gave just about everyone I met an enthusiastic hug. Even Tadeusz, when he unexpectedly appeared right in front of me. We hadn’t seen each other for a few years. He didn’t hesitate long, seized the offer and grabbed me, kissing me on the mouth. I pressed my lips together. After I’d wrenched myself free from his embrace, he said, Forgive me, with a grin I can only imagine he thought was irresistible. Forgive me, grin. Then he immediately tried again, another frontal attack on the target, tongue out.
Stop it, Tadeusz!
Now you sound the same as before, too bad, he retorted curtly.
The telephone won’t turn back on. There’s no response, no matter which button yo
u push, no matter how hard or how long you press it. Simon, patient, plucks it apart again, examines the parts, cleans them, almost mechanically, with his blue checked handkerchief, concentrating intently. I’ll figure it out, he murmurs.
Tadeusz waves at the waiter. Another round? The beautiful student nods. Tadeusz puts his hand on her. His hand lies there—I count to five—then she gently pulls hers out from under it.
Later he claimed that he had seen me at Bahnhof Zoo, run after me, but missed me when I boarded the Intercity-Express to Munich, the doors will close automatically, please exercise caution before departure.
I told my friend Nathanael about it. Your professor is dreaming, he said, or else he’s hallucinating: Long distance trains haven’t stopped at Bahnhof Zoo for quite a while! That was five years ago.
Now he sits there and doesn’t recognize me. Have I changed that much? I’ve gained weight since I quit smoking. I tried to avoid this humiliation, I tried to fast while I was dealing with the withdrawal, but I was pregnant and hungry, and I failed. I gained weight constantly, inexorably. So much that I’m unrecognizable? Despite similar clothing, the same hair cut? Not likely. It’s more a question of age than weight. I’m seven years older. I’m not a young woman anymore. Keeping the same haircut makes no difference: I’m neither seen nor recognized.
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