Bad Wolf

by Nele Neuhaus

  He parked his rickety motor scooter next to the trailer, pulled the helmet off his head, and took the shopping bag out of the carrier.

  The heat was driving him crazy. It didn’t even cool off at night. In the morning, he would wake up soaked with sweat. In the miserable lunch stand of thin corrugated iron, it could get up to 140 degrees, and the stifling humidity made the stench of sweat and rancid fat settle in his hair and pores.

  The dilapidated trailer in the RV park in Schwanheim was supposed to have been a temporary solution, back when he still believed he could make a go of it and restore his financial situation. But nothing in his life had turned out to be as long-lasting as this temporary arrangement—he’d already been living here for seven years.

  He unzipped the awning, which must have been dark green decades ago, before the weather had faded it to a nondescript pale gray. A puff of hot air gusted toward him. Inside the trailer, it was several degrees hotter than outside, with a stifling and stuffy smell. No matter how much he scrubbed and aired out the place, the odors had settled into the upholstery and every nook and cranny. Even after seven years, it still filled him with disgust, but for him there was no other option.

  Ever since his plunge into the abyss, and as a convicted criminal, he belonged to the underclass, even among the residents of the slum on the outskirts of the metropolis. Nobody wandered in here on vacation or to admire the glitzy skyline of Frankfurt, the concrete and glass symbols of big money across the river. His neighbors were mostly blamelessly impoverished retirees or failures like himself who had landed on the down escalator. Alcohol often played a leading role in the story of their lives, which were depressingly similar. As for himself, he drank no more than one beer in the evening, he didn’t smoke, and he paid attention to his weight and grooming. He didn’t bother with the Hartz IV law of 2005, which combined unemployment insurance with social welfare, because he couldn’t stand the thought of having to show up as a supplicant and kowtow to the bigoted whims of indifferent bureaucrats.

  A tiny scrap of self-esteem was the last thing he possessed. If he lost that, he might as well kill himself.

  “Hello?”

  A voice outside the awning made him turn around. A man was standing behind the half-desiccated hedge that divided the property of his tiny plot from the neighbor’s.

  “What do you want?”

  The man came closer, hesitated. His piggy little eyes flicked angrily from left to right.

  “Somebody told me you would help anyone who was having trouble with the authorities.” The high-pitched falsetto was a grotesque contrast to the massive figure of the man. Sweat was beading on his balding head, and the smell of garlic overpowered the even less pleasant body odors.

  “Oh, really? Who says that?”

  “Rosi, from the kiosk. She told me, ‘Go see Doc. He’ll help you.’” The sweating hunk of lard glanced around again, as if he was afraid to be seen there. Then he took a roll of bills out of his pocket. Hundreds, even a couple of five hundreds. “I’ll pay you well.”

  “Come on in.”

  Right off, the guy seemed kind of disagreeable, but that didn’t matter. He couldn’t be picky about his clientele, his address was not in any phone book, and he certainly didn’t have a Web site. Still, there were limits to what he’d do, no matter how much money was offered, and people knew that. With his previous conviction and the probation that was still in force, he couldn’t get involved in anything that might send him back to the slammer. But word on the street was that he’d already helped tavern owners and operators of lunch stands who had come into conflict with official regulations, desperate pensioners who’d been bilked on promotional shopping trips or by door-to-door salesmen, unemployed people or immigrants who couldn’t understand the complex bureaucracy in Germany, and young people who were seduced early by the temptations of a life on credit and had fallen into the debt trap. Anyone who asked for help knew that he worked only for cash.

  He had long since gotten over any feelings of sympathy. He was no Robin Hood; he was a mercenary. For cash in advance, he would fill out official forms on the scratched-up Formica table in his trailer, translate complicated bureaucratic German into understandable everyday language, and offer legal advice for any situation in order to augment his income.

  “What’s the problem?” he asked his visitor, who cast an appraising glance at the obvious indicators of poverty and seemed to gain confidence.

  “Man, it’s sure hot in here. Have you got a beer or a glass of water?”

  “No.” He made no effort to be friendly.

  Long gone were the days of mahogany-veneer conference tables in air-conditioned rooms, trays holding little bottles of water and fruit juice, and glasses arrayed upside down.

  With a snort, the fat man pulled out some rolled-up papers from the inside pocket of his greasy leather vest and handed them over. Recycled paper, small print. The tax office.

  He unfolded the papers, which were damp with sweat, smoothed them out, and scanned the text.

  “Three hundred,” he demanded without looking up. Rolls of cash stuffed in pants pockets always signified illegal earnings. The sweaty fat man could afford to pay a bit more than the usual rate he charged seniors and the unemployed.

  “What?” the new client protested, as anticipated. “For a few pages?”

  “If you can find someone to do it cheaper, be my guest.”

  The fat man muttered something unintelligible, then reluctantly peeled off three banknotes and laid them on the table.

  “Do I at least get a receipt?”

  “Sure. My secretary will make it out later and give it to your chauffeur,” he replied. “Now have a seat. I’ll need some information from you.”

  * * *

  Traffic was backed up at Baseler Platz leading to the Friedensbrücke. For a couple of weeks now, the city had been one big construction zone, and Hanna was annoyed that she’d forgotten all about that and driven into downtown instead of taking the route via the Frankfurter Kreuz and Niederrad to Sachsenhausen. As she drove along at a snail’s pace behind a bunch of rusty pickup trucks with Lithuanian license plates crossing the bridge over the Main River, Hanna replayed the unsatisfying conversation with Norman that morning. She was still pissed off about his stupidity and his lies. It had been hard for her to fire him with no notice after eleven years, but he’d left her no choice. Before he stomped off in a huff, he’d fired off a series of nasty curses and issued several vile threats.

  Hanna’s smartphone hummed, and she grabbed it and opened her mail app. Her assistant had sent her an e-mail. The header said “Catastrophe!!!” Instead of a message, there was a link to FOCUS online. Hanna clicked the link with her thumb, and her stomach lurched when she read the headline.

  Hanna Heartless, it said in bold letters, and beside it was a rather unflattering photo of her. Her pulse began to race and she felt her right hand trembling uncontrollably. She gripped her phone harder. All she cares about is profit. The guests on her TV show have to sign a nondisclosure agreement before they’re allowed to speak. And whatever they say is scripted in advance by Hanna Herzmann, 46. Bricklayer Armin V., 52, wanted to speak during the show about his hassle with his landlord (the topic was “My Landlord Wants to Evict Me”), but with the cameras rolling, he was labeled a transient renter by the moderator. When he protested after the broadcast, he discovered another side of the supposedly sympathetic Hanna Herzmann, and of her lawyer. Now Armin V. is unemployed and homeless after his landlord finally succeeded in evicting him. Something similar happened to Bettina B., 34. The single mother was a guest on Hanna Herzmann’s program in January (topic: “When Fathers Hit the Road”). Contrary to preliminary arrangements, Bettina B. was portrayed as an overtaxed mother and alcoholic. For her, too, the broadcast had unpleasant consequences: She received a visit from Child Welfare.

  “Shit,” Hanna muttered. Once something was on the Internet, it was impossible to delete. She bit her lip and thought hard.


  Unfortunately, the article was close to the truth. Hanna had a real knack for finding interesting topics, and she wasn’t afraid to ask embarrassing questions and stir up dirt. In doing so, she basically couldn’t care less about the people and their often tragic fates. She secretly had nothing but contempt for most of them and their urge to bare all in return for fifteen minutes of fame. Hanna managed to coax the most intimate secrets out of people in front of the camera, and she was a master at pretending to be sympathetic and interested.

  Besides, the true story was often insufficient, so a little dramatization was necessary. And that had been Norman’s job. He had cynically called the show Pimp My Boring Life and was happy to distort reality, regardless of how painful it might prove to be. Whether that was morally acceptable or not wasn’t Hanna’s concern; in the end, the show’s success in the ratings validated his tactics. Of course, the letters of complaint from disgruntled guests filled several file folders. They often didn’t understand until later, when they were subjected to public mockery, what sort of embarrassing things they’d said in front of a television audience. As a matter of fact, complaints arose only seldom, and that was due to the polished, absolutely airtight legal contracts that each person who wanted to speak on her broadcast had to sign in advance.

  A car honked behind her, startling Hanna out of her reverie. The traffic was moving again. She raised her hand in apology and stepped on the gas. Ten minutes later, she turned down Hedderichstrasse and then into the back courtyard of the building where her company was located. She put her smartphone in her shoulder bag and stepped out of the car. In the city, it was always several degrees warmer than out in the Taunus region; the heat built up between the buildings until it felt like a sauna. Hanna fled into the air-conditioned foyer and stepped into an elevator. On the way to the sixth floor, she leaned against the cool wall and took a critical look at herself in the mirrored surface.

  In the first weeks after her breakup with Vinzenz, she had looked terribly harried and exhausted, and the girls in Makeup had had to muster all their professional skill to make her look the way the television viewers expected. But now Hanna found her appearance quite passable, at least in the dim light of the elevator. She’d colored her hair to cover the first silver strands, not out of vanity, but from a sheer instinct for self-preservation. The TV business was unforgiving: men could have gray hair, but for women, that would mean eventual banishment to the afternoon cultural and cooking shows.

  Hanna had hardly stepped out of the elevator on the sixth floor when Jan Niemöller appeared out of nowhere. In spite of the tropical weather outdoors, the manager of Herzmann Productions was wearing a black shirt, black jeans, and even a scarf around his neck.

  “All hell has broken loose!” Niemöller trotted along beside her excitedly, waving his skinny arms. “The phones are ringing off the hook, and nobody can reach you. And how come I have to hear from Norman that you fired him with no notice? Why didn’t you tell me? First you give Julia the boot, now Norman—who do you think is going to do the work?”

  “Meike is going to fill in for Julia during the summer; that’s already been set up. And we’re going to be working with an independent producer.”

  “And you don’t even ask me about it?”

  Hanna looked Niemöller up and down.

  “Hiring and firing is my job. I took you on to deal with the business stuff so I wouldn’t have to worry about it.”

  “Oh, so that’s how you see it?” He was insulted, of course.

  Hanna knew that Jan Niemöller was secretly in love with her, or, rather, with all the glory surrounding her, which also spilled over onto him as her associate. But she viewed him solely as a business partner—as a man, he was not her type. Besides, he’d been acting so possessive lately that she needed to put him in his place.

  “That’s not just the way I see it; that’s the way it is,” she said with a tad more coolness. “I appreciate your opinion, but I’m the one making the decisions.”

  Niemöller opened his mouth to protest, but Hanna cut him off with a wave of her hand.

  “The network hates this sort of publicity. We’re no longer in a very strong position. With the shitty ratings in recent months, I had no choice but to kick Norman out. If they take us off the air, all of you can go scrambling for another job. Do you get it?”

  Irina Zydek, Hanna’s assistant, appeared in the hallway.

  “Hanna, Matern has called you three times. And almost every newspaper and TV news desk, except for Al Jazeera.” Her voice had an anxious undertone.

  The rest of the staff appeared in the doorways of their offices, and their concern was palpable. The news had obviously gotten around that she’d fired Norman without notice.

  “We’re meeting in half an hour in the conference room,” Hanna said as she walked by. First, she had to call Wolfgang Matern back. She couldn’t afford any trouble with the network at the moment.

  She stepped into her office at the end of the corridor; it was flooded with light. She dropped her shoulder bag on one of the visitors’ chairs and sat down behind her desk. As her computer booted up, she leafed quickly through the callback messages that Irina had written on yellow Post-its, then picked up the phone. She never liked to put off unpleasant tasks for long. She hit the speed-dial number for Wolfgang Matern and took a deep breath. He picked up in a matter of seconds.

  “It’s Hanna Heartless,” she said.

  “Good to hear you’ve still got a sense of humor,” the CEO of Antenne Pro replied.

  “I’ve just fired my producer without notice because I learned that for years he’s been doctoring the bios of my guests if he found the truth too boring.”

  “You mean you didn’t know that?”

  “No!” She put all the indignation she could into this lie. “I’m stunned. I couldn’t check out every story, so I had to depend on him. That is—or was—his job.”

  “Please tell me that it won’t turn into a bloodbath,” said Matern.

  “Of course not.” Hanna leaned back in her chair. “I already have an idea for how we can turn this thing around.”

  “What is it?”

  “We’ll admit everything and apologize to the guests.”

  There was a moment’s silence.

  “Retreat disguised as an advance,” Wolfgang Matern said at last. “That’s precisely why I admire you. You don’t run and hide. Let’s talk about it tomorrow over lunch, okay?”

  Hanna could almost hear his smile, and a weight lifted off her heart. Sometimes her spontaneous ideas were the best.

  * * *

  The Airbus had not yet come to a stop when people started undoing their safety belts and getting up, ignoring the instructions to remain seated until the plane reached the gate. Bodenstein stayed in his seat. He had no desire to stand in the jammed aisle and get jostled by the other passengers. A glance at his watch assured him that he had plenty of time. The plane had landed precisely at 8:42 P.M. after a forty-five-minute flight.

  Ever since this afternoon, he’d had the feeling that he was finally putting his life in order after two turbulent, chaotic years. He’d made the right decision to attend the trial of Annika Sommerfeld in Potsdam and draw a line of finality under the whole matter. He felt that a load had been lifted off his shoulders. He’d been carrying it around since last summer—no, actually from that day in November two years ago when he’d been forced to acknowledge that Cosima was cheating on him. The breakup of his marriage and the fling with Annika had thrown him for a complete loop emotionally and caused serious damage to his self-esteem. In the end, his private misery had affected his ability to concentrate on his work and led him to make mistakes that he never would have made before. Although in the past few weeks and months, he had also recognized that his marriage to Cosima had not been nearly as perfect as he’d convinced himself it was during their twenty-year relationship. Far too often he’d backed down and acted against his will for the sake of harmony, the children, and outward appear
ances. Now that was all in the past.

  The queue in the aisle finally began to move. Bodenstein stood up, retrieved his bag from the overhead compartment, and followed his fellow passengers toward the exit.

  From Gate A49, it was a real hike to the terminal exit. At one point, he followed the wrong sign, as he often did in this gigantic airport, and ended up in the departure hall. He took the escalator down to the arrivals level and stepped outside into the warm evening air. A few minutes before nine. Inka was supposed to pick him up at nine. Bodenstein crossed the taxi lane and stood in the short-term parking area. He spotted her black Land Rover in the distance and smiled in spite of himself. Whenever Cosima had promised to pick him up somewhere, she would always show up at least fifteen minutes late, making him very annoyed. Things were different with Inka.

  The SUV pulled up next to him and he opened the back door, heaved his roller bag onto the seat, and then climbed in the front.

  “Hi.” She was smiling. “Have a good flight?”

  “Hello.” Bodenstein was smiling, too, as he fastened his seat belt. “Yes, wonderful. Thanks for picking me up.”

  “No problem. Anytime.”

  She put on the left-turn blinker, glanced over her shoulder, and merged back into the line of slow-moving cars.

  Bodenstein hadn’t told anyone why he’d gone to Potsdam, not even Inka, although in recent months she’d become a good friend. He leaned back against the headrest. The episode with Annika Sommerfeld had undoubtedly had one positive result. He had finally begun to think about himself, which had proved to be a painful process of self-realization. He had come to understand that very seldom had he done what he really wanted to do. He’d always yielded to Cosima’s wishes and demands, because of his basic good nature, because it was easier, or maybe because he felt a sense of responsibility, but none of that mattered. The end result was that he’d turned into a boring yes-man, a henpecked husband, and with that he’d lost all his sex appeal. No wonder that Cosima, who hated routine and boredom more than anything, had fallen into an affair.