When Leonie looks through the window across the street, she feels like she’s opening a picture book in which everything is as it’s meant to be. She indulges in a look at the holy family, as she calls her neighbors, almost daily. She suffers pangs of conscience when she turns back to her own life, partly because of her curiosity, partly because she fares so poorly in this undignified competition. Recently she tried to at least put out placemats and serve a salad, but her efforts ended in disaster: Felicia, delighted by the innovation, tugged her setting to the floor—plate, cup, and all—in order to observe it more closely. Lisa refused the dressing-soaked leaves with disgust and fished out the tomato wedges with her fingers. As usual, Simon arrived late, and Leonie congratulated herself by purchasing plastic dinnerware.
Leonie knows that the woman is named Judith, the boys Ulrich and Kilian. She remembers how her heart had beat faster when she first saw the woman coming out of the green-painted front door with the younger child, hand in hand and deep in conversation. In a single glance she registered the boy’s brass-colored ringlets, his obviously ironed white and blue summer shirt and light shorts. She saw the bulge of fat at his wrist and his mother’s lilac dress, her fair skin, her black hair pinned up over an oval, madonna-like face, a net shopping bag in her hand.
Leonie had put down the moving boxes and took a quick, critical sniff inside her track jacket. Luckily her deodorant hadn’t completely worn off yet. She combed through her sweaty hair with splayed fingers and took a deep breath. She left the box with the red logo of the moving company and Simon’s giant block lettered handwriting—CDs: ABBA, ELTON JOHN—under the streetlamp. She walked over to the two, who looked at her questioningly. Leonie sputtered her name and the story of the move, revealed the names and ages of her daughters, and asked if there was a playground nearby. She was offered a slim brown hand that was surprisingly cool for the hot summer day and a few sentences in the sing-songy upper-class Swabian that was so proudly spoken around here. Simon, whose mother had done everything to hide her Hohenlohisch upbringing once she got to the state capital, forbid the children from adopting even a trace of dialect. “I’m Judith, and this one hiding here—this is Kilian. Kilian, come out and say hey.” The boy peeped out from behind the folds of his mother’s skirt, squeaked out his greeting, and then remained beside his mother, his hands still clutching the fabric. This introduction impressed Leonie—at the very most, Felicia would have emitted a piercing “No”. The tiny wrinkles around Judith’s mouth and eyes suggested to Leonie that she was about five or six years older. Her thick black eyebrows were only slightly plucked.
Leonie bent down to the child. “My girls will be happy to hear about you, Kilian. When we’re all moved in, you can come visit us.” Judith wound one of her son’s curls around her index finger and smiled. “We’re going on vacation tomorrow, and we have to buy Band-Aids. For me and for Uli.” Leonie climbed up the stairs with her box to tell Simon of her new acquaintance. The stillness of this street, here in the middle of the city, Nâzim’s shop, and now kids to play with right across the street were just the puzzle pieces that could fit together and turn the unfamiliar surroundings into a gaily-colored picture, for both her and her girls, who had been loathe to leave the little Heumaden house.
A few weeks later they met on the street again. The neighbor’s face was very brown. Her full mouth, whose corners sagged slightly, glowed under bright lipstick. Lisa and the older boy started talking immediately, and invented a game with a long blue plastic tie that had probably once bound a package. Felicia and Kilian had quickly been drawn in. Leonie noticed again how quiet and gentle both boys were in comparison to her unruly girls. Judith talked excitedly of Italian grocery stores and the beauty of Lake Como. She did not extend an invitation for a play-date.
On a late afternoon in September, as she finally wedged the Volvo into a parking spot and was unloading a mountain of shopping bags onto the curb, Leonie saw Judith disappear with her husband and children behind their building. The grownups were carrying a tray of coffee and a basket; Kilian and Ulrich had stilts and a ball. Presumably there was a yard in the back, where one could spend the afternoon without having to lug the whole kit and caboodle to a public park. Leonie grew jealous, as behind their building there was barely enough space for the trash cans and a bike rack. She would have loved to go back there, but she restrained herself: the newcomers would have to be invited. Imposing was not an option.
The bright triad of the doorbell makes Leonie jump. The wine glass is nearly empty. She walks down the hallway to the intercom: “Trick or treat!” a scratchy voice comes through. “OK, come on up. Third floor!” she says into the receiver.
Leonie recognizes the four boys from Wren House. One of them has pushed a silent, frozen Scream mask back over his thick black hair. Another hides behind the rapacious countenance of a pumpkin-zombie; his neighbor rubs eyes that are smeared with black makeup. The group’s spokesman has dirty-blond hair. He isn’t dressed up, as if he has more confidence in his pale face, crooked blue eyes, and provocatively twisted mouth than in any costume. He addresses Leonie: “It’s cool of you to let us up. You’re not scared to be home alone like this? We could come in and have a drink.” The eyes in his entourage widen, and they chew on the insides of their full cheeks. In this moment, there’s nothing to distinguish them from Lisa and Felicia’s friends from St. Anton. Leonie props her right foot on her left calf and holds on to the doorframe, a ballerina in green tights. She feels at least as old as Mrs. Robinson. What would they do if I actually asked them in? Turn around and flee, most likely. She grins. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you. My husband will be home any minute, and he knows karate.” She wishes Simon really would come up the stairs and spout a few of his dumb proletarian Heslach phrases: “Do you have any idea who you’re messing with? She’s had two children—the four of you together wouldn’t be enough for her.” And they’d all break out in baboonish man-laughter. And then Simon would pick her up and take her into the bedroom and they would have sex, more dexterously and more carefully than fifteen years ago, always aware that a cry of “Mami, Papi!” could interrupt them at any moment.
Leonie says goodbye to the boys and returns to the kitchen. Nearly all the windows across the way are dark; there’s still a light on at the Posselts’, but they have heavy drapes—old school. The little gang continues onward. They punch each other in the ribs, prance around, and tug each other’s jackets. One jumps onto another’s back and lets himself be carried a little way while the others rush behind. They disappear into the darkness.
A light-yellow envelope lies on the sideboard in the foyer. Leonie removes the invitation. “Even though it’s on a weekday, I’ll only turn 35 once. Come and celebrate like in the good old days—like there’s no tomorrow, with ‘80s tunes and your good friend Conny. Scene of the crime: The Hexle, Tübingen.” Conny was the last survivor from Leonie’s old tennis clique. She has her heart set on going to the party, and not just for Conny’s sake. She wants to wear her new turquoise zigzag skirt, she wants to dance with Simon and have sex with him in a hotel room in broad daylight. Frau Kienzle, the cleaning lady, will take care of Lisa and Feli and has agreed to stay overnight. Everything is set. Leonie dials the office number.
He picks up immediately and growls a clipped hello. Leonie knows she’s interrupting something. She can hear a printer rattling in the background. “It’s just me. Will you be long?” “I can’t tell. Probably.” His voice sounds tired and annoyed. She knows it won’t do any good to keep talking but she does anyway. “I wanted to ask—Conny’s party . . . is it going to work out for tomorrow night?”
Simon sighs heavily—not impatiently, but as if he’s struggling with some hidden affliction. “Tomorrow’s going to be tough. Gündert scheduled a meeting—something to do with the evaluation. I’ll do what I can, baby. I have to go now. Ciao.” He hangs up without waiting for her answer. Leonie hears the dial tone. She feels like joining in with the phone’s monotone wail. She
knows Simon hung up to avoid hearing her repeat her question: Will you be long? She knows she’ll be asleep when he gets back to the apartment. The bedside lamp will be on and Leonie will feel him slipping into bed next to her through closed eyes, pressing her to him wearily and without desire. She goes to the kitchen and pours herself another glass of wine.
Judith
“Mama, my bucket is full!”
“Mine too!”
Ulrich and Kilian run over to Judith and dump the foliage they’ve raked into their metal pails onto the mountain of leaves in the middle of the lawn. She looks at her boys and takes pleasure in what she sees. They wear colorful knit caps, felt jackets with wooden buttons, and sturdy leather boots. Their eyes shine and their faces are still tan, enhanced with the redness of excitement, movement, and fresh air.
They’ve been working in the little garden for almost two hours. Judith is sitting on the bench near the roses. The bushes are old, with woody stems: even the smallest shoots have thorns. The rosehips hang between them like tiny lanterns. Judith has spread a checked tablecloth over the folding table—a plate of apples and Judith’s dented thermos rest on it. In the Hackstraße days it had been filled with strong coffee, and it was her constant companion through long days at the university. Today it’s filled with fruit tea. The children run through the leaf-mountain. The foggy morning has yielded to a sunny afternoon. In nine weeks it will be Christmas, and the sky is a translucent bright blue, as if snow clouds are already lurking behind it.
The garden isn’t large, perhaps two thousand square feet, situated between the back of the building where Judith and Klaus and the children live and the next row of houses on busy Olgastraße. This garden is the only green place in the gap between the buildings—the rest is concrete courtyards with parking spaces and trash cans. Warmth lingers in the square between the high sandstone walls. In the summer it’s cooled by long shadows. Judith feels protected down here, like in the courtyard of a castle. The walls keep her gaze from wandering. She can see only one small section of sky, with clouds, birds, and airplanes. A sky that spreads over everything and betrays nothing. It could just as easily hang over another city, another country. Sometimes Klaus makes fun of the “prison yard.” Judith laughs with him and doesn’t let on that a grand plot of land, bordered only by horizon, could never match the sense of security she feels in this city garden enclosed by old five-story buildings. Again she’s the mummy from Hackstraße, eager to hole up and close the sarcophagus on herself. Though Klaus has learned much about Judith since then, she’s never told him about that. She’d disguised her withdrawal as circulatory collapse, and let Klaus bring her water, camomile tea, and crispbreads in the bed with the shiny green spread, only to emerge pregnant and on a lower dose of Tavor. She keeps the pills in the medicine cabinet in the bathroom with the homeopathic capsules, seawater nose drops, and Band-Aids. She takes some every night—sometimes more, sometimes less. The bottle is labeled Biotin: for hair, skin and nails.
The weak sunbeams warm Judith’s face. This is probably the last day they’ll be able to sit outside like this. She hears the children’s voices. They’re acting out a fairy tale they’ve learned at the kindergarten: “Rumpelstiltskin.” Uli is playing director and Kilian readily complies. “Perhaps your name is Shortribs, or Sheepshank, or Laceleg?” They laugh at the names, try out new variations. The boys go outside even when it’s cold and drizzly, hacking up the thin sheets of ice that form on the rain barrel after the first frost, stirring mud soup in old pans with wooden spoons, or digging caves in the sandbox. They could never do such things at the children’s farm around the corner. The grounds are nice, but Judith is suspicious of the clientele at Wren House. The garden, on the other hand, is practically an extension of their apartment. Here Kilian and Uli can watch crocuses, snowdrops, and tulip leaves emerge from the earth, pointy as witch’s hats; they can watch the leathery knobs unfold into sticky green leaves on trees and bushes; they can wait for the starlings to return. The scrubby lawn is bordered by a narrow flower bed in which veteran roses display their last blossoms. A frail fruit tree stands in each corner: apple, damson, and pear, as well as a magnificent elderberry bush whose black-draped clusters attract an astounding number of blackbirds and other songbirds every September. Their violet droppings make a mess on the wooden rim of the sandbox and the roof of the little hut—the children use it as a playhouse, laughing among the gardening tools and watering cans. There’s a faucet on the wall of the building, directly under the Posselts’ living room window, where Judith or Klaus can fasten a red hose in the summer to water the plants and let Uli and Kilian splash around. Each child has his own little bed. There are still a few marigolds in Kilian’s—thanks to the shelter of the wall, they have escaped the nightly frost.
Judith closes her eyes and tilts her head back. Neighbors come to the windows to look down at her and the children. She waves to the few she knows and ignores the others. She can feel their jealousy, and remembers how she too had once looked down greedily at this walled bit of paradise from the third floor.
She conquered the garden for her children, proceeding strategically from the moment when her belly had begun to swell over the still amphibian-like Uli. She’d sat for hours at the bedroom window, arms propped on pillows, staring down into the greenery and imagining herself swinging in a hammock, the leaves casting green and gold shadows on her face, an infant at her breast. She saw marveling eyes following the flight of bumblebees through blooming ivy, bare feet taking their first steps on grass instead of asphalt and stone.
Judith’s idyll was disrupted by Herr Posselt, who made regular attempts to pare the knee-high grass with a mechanical mower. He wore light Bermuda shorts and braided sandals on his callused yellow feet. Varicose veins crawled over his scrawny calves like blue earthworms and tangled into nests in the hollows of his knees. It was disrupted by Frau Posselt’s birthmark-blotched, limp flesh hanging out of her sleeveless summer dress, and by her phlegmy coughing over a tray of cookies and mugs of Nescafé. The worst was when they fell asleep in their deck chairs. Their heads would sink to the side or flop on their necks like crash victims, their limbs hung slack, their mouths gaped and drool dripped. The background hum of traffic on Olgastraße absorbed the garden’s subtler noises, but Judith was sure they both snored.
Frau Posselt’s complaints about the arduousness of gardening found a sympathetic ear with Judith. Klaus’s sporadic help mowing and weeding turned into regular garden duties. When the old woman criticized contemporary society—“The way kids grow up these days, there ain’t a solitary corner fer ‘em ta romp around in. ‘Twas better in ma day”—Judith enthusiastically concurred. Finally Frau Posselt said: “Frau Rapp, when yer wee babe comes, we’ll make a deal, you’n me. If ya don’t bring half the neighborhood ta holler around ma winda, then I says, and the mister agrees, ya can use the garden fer yer family.”
Judith kept her promise to the old woman and invited other children to play in the garden once a week at most. The only exception was for Ulrich’s and Kilian’s birthdays, both of which fell at the beginning of September. Then they threw a party in the garden. They borrowed long benches, hung paper lanterns from the trees, and invited grandparents, godparents, and siblings, who all came in delighted droves. Judith cooked and baked. There was fruit punch, apple pies, and huge trays of quiche and pizza. From the windows above, one could see white tablecloths, balloons, and colorful lights among the shrubbery. Schlamper and the Posselts came too, wandering through the swarm of partiers and looking a bit lost. They felt their way hesitantly among the once-familiar things—“Look, Luise, the russet is finally bearing!”—like emigrants returning to their homeland after half a century to find it strange and foreign.
Shorter Days Page 7