Broken Glass Park

by Alina Bronsky

  Harry didn’t speak to her at all during that visit. He was too busy trying to make sure I was happy, despite the fact that I didn’t need anything. He looked intently at my face, searching for any sign of an emotion that might spell trouble for him, and occasionally turned to my mother to give her a look or a shy smile.

  I sat on his couch, drank rose hip tea—which I can’t stand—and nibbled on stale cookies, trying as best I could to seem comfortable so he would settle down. At some point he finally did. He stopped running around and sat down next to me. He told me about his studies and whatever job he was doing then—which, it goes without saying, wasn’t going well.

  He was exactly as my mother had described. A little difficult to be around at first because he was so unsure of himself. But as he gained confidence, he was kind and thoughtful.

  “So?” my mother asked as we were winding our way down the stairs toward the door of his building.

  “He’s definitely okay,” I said. “You can bring him over to our place.”

  “He’s a prince among men,” she said. She hadn’t worried at all about what I would think of him. Unlike him, she was usually sure of herself.

  “I could never go to bed with a guy like that,” I said gruffly to counter the uncharacteristically warm feeling the meeting had left me with. A lover who got on well with his new girlfriend’s kids was not part of the usual drill. “He’s kind of frantic.”

  “I don’t think he’d be into you either,” said my mother, with a bit of venom.

  “Do you find him at all handsome?” I asked.

  My mother huffed.

  “Tell him he should do something else with his hair,” I grumbled.

  “Tell him yourself,” she muttered. “Tell him exactly how he should do it.”

  “Then he’ll be insulted. And he wouldn’t listen to me anyway.”

  “You’re wrong there.”

  And she was right.

  He never moved in with us because our place was too small. But he slept there regularly. His toothbrush stayed in the bathroom and his slippers under the coat rack in the hall. He kept his robe in my mother’s closet. And I had no qualms about using the hair gel he did in fact buy on my advice and stored in our bathroom.

  He looked really cute once he stopped parting his hair. Light brown hair sticking up, funny eyes, a bashful grin. Alissa loved him, as did Anton—Anton most of all, in fact. A man who practically lived here, helped with the dishes, never shouted, held hands with mom and played memory games with the kids, a man who listened, buttered our bread for us, and happily stepped in as a babysitter if anything ever came up.

  And yet still not a man Anna would go for.

  Because he was a loser—and that’s just an objective fact. He was one because he felt like one. He had studied literature for twelve years and was still no closer to finishing his degree. He bounced from job to job because he wasn’t cutthroat enough to succeed at anything. He’d lived too long with his parents—even by local standards. He mumbled. And whenever he was nervous or unsure of himself—which was almost all the time—he talked so hurriedly and unclearly that you always had to ask him to repeat whatever he said. Which would in turn startle him and he’d start to stutter.

  When I was younger, I would never have believed a German man like this existed. So meek, so helpless. Never thinking of himself. Broke but still generous. Instead of a driver’s license a rickety girl’s bike. In his checkered shirt and bowl cut—until he met me, that is.

  My mother’s great love.

  I never asked either of them, but I am sure she was Harry’s first. At most his second. He was seven years younger than she was and would have been more inexperienced even if he’d lived two hundred years. What sane woman would take up with someone who was the very embodiment of helplessness? My mother. Nobody else would. I could certainly never imagine myself with someone like that.

  But I could understand what my mother liked about him.

  He was the exact opposite of Vadim, who left two and a half nervous wrecks behind when he finally moved out. My mother, Anton, and little Alissa. I was not a nervous wreck. I was a simmering cauldron of hatred. Once he was gone, my mother popped a bottle of champagne and she and I clinked glasses—her hand was shaking and she had tears in her eyes.

  “I’m lucky,” she said. “I’ve got a chance to really do some living now.” And she did start living, and she bumped into Harry. She met him in the offices of the little local paper in which her column on Russian-Germans appeared. She would write pieces on things like the fact that you could get Russian-language books at the local library, or that there was story time there every Thursday, or that there were cheap gymnastics classes available somewhere. She approached the column with real devotion. She liked helping those who were less knowledgeable or less capable than she was. She ran our phone number in the paper for anyone who had questions—and the phone rang a lot.

  My mother was very proud of that job. Next to each of her columns was a small photo of her, and she could never get used to seeing her name and face in print. The fact that the paper had a circulation of five thousand and was filled for the most part with ads for plumbers and beer gardens didn’t bother her. She sat and worked on her articles for hours, agonizing over each phrase, only to have me proofread everything and change it all around again.

  Harry was freelancing for the paper too. It was his latest job. He had just failed miserably as a waiter. The paper paid about ten cents a line and nobody who thought anything of themselves would write for that rate. Before Harry and my mother showed up, the only writers had been officers of sports clubs who wrote up pieces on things like their clubs’ end-of-season banquets—they would have paid to have their stuff published.

  I’m thinking about all of this as I ring the bell at Ingrid and Hans’s front gate. It takes a while before the door opens and Ingrid steps out into the yard, squinting and unsure, blinded by the sun.

  “Sascha?” she says when she finally hits upon the idea of using her hand to shield her eyes and is able to see me. “What a pleasant surprise. Come in, my child.”

  I walk across the moss-covered cobblestones that lead from the gate to the door. I had told her I was coming a week ago. Ingrid must have forgotten—but she’s always home anyway.

  She wraps her arms around me and holds me close for a long time—until my back starts to hurt. She’s short and I have to stoop.

  When she lets go, I can see in her face that she’s trying to suppress sobs. She’s not able to. I don’t look away. I’m feeling tired and indifferent. I don’t cry, either. I’m not sure why Ingrid does.

  “This is going to make Hans happy,” she whispers. “How nice of you to come see us again.”

  She quickly puts on a pot of coffee and sets the table in the living room. It’s become routine for me to eat in the living room. There’s almost nothing that can shock me these days. Ingrid has discreetly wiped the tears away with a cloth handkerchief—as if she could hide something like that from me—and returns upbeat, almost cheerful. She fumbles awkwardly with the coffee cups and they clink against one another, and all the while she smiles at me with Harry’s smile. I think she’s even humming a melody.

  The smell of the coffee fills the air.

  “Hans, Hans,” she calls, a little louder than necessary. “Can you look to see whether we have any cake in the freezer? The one with the crumb topping? Or the cheesecake?”

  “Please don’t go to any trouble,” I mutter, but she doesn’t pay any attention. Which is fine.

  “Sugar, cream,” she says, setting down the jar of sugar and a creamer on the table. She puts them right in front of me, as if I’m the only one who will be having anything. “How are your little sister and brother, my child? How’s their health?”

  “Anton’s never healthy,” I say, regretting it immediately as I see the look on her face darken. Her question wasn’t just small talk. Her gloominess had been lifted for a moment by my visit, but it disturbs deeply
her to hear about an unhealthy child. When someone hurts, Ingrid hurts with them. She can’t watch the news without crying.

  “Nothing serious,” I say. “Just nerves—just psychological.”

  “Psychological,” she repeats. “That’s the most serious of all, my child.”

  I don’t contradict her. But that stuff has never been an issue for me. A Russian children’s poem comes to mind: “My nerves are made of steel, no, actually I don’t have any at all.” It’s like it was written about me. I don’t have any.

  I wonder whether I should tell Ingrid that I want to kill Vadim. Maybe it’ll cheer her up the way it did me and Anton.

  Hans comes through the door.

  He’s friendly as he greets me, but seems emotionally distant. He holds my hand in his for a long time. I’ve stood up from my chair to greet him and it has apparently surprised him. He’s a bit unsteady on his feet, though he’s not really that old. Not even sixty, I don’t think. He’s become grizzled. The skin of his face hangs in flabby folds.

  He tries to put on a smile, but what he musters is more of a horrible grimace. It pains me to look at him. I would like to tell him he doesn’t need to smile on my account, but I can’t think of how to say it.

  We have coffee and a crumb cake Ingrid has thawed in the microwave. For the first fifteen minutes Ingrid talks nonstop. It’s all a bit muddled: geraniums, the neighbors, water pipes, a broken vacuum cleaner. I nod throughout. Then she stops. We sit there silently. The clock ticks. It seems quite natural to me.

  Hans has a faraway look on his face, Ingrid stirs her coffee, and I look at the photos on the walls. I’m already pretty familiar with them. All shots of Harry, or nearly all, at least. Harry as a boy, with matted blond hair and freckles. Harry with a wiener dog. Harry in a sun hat, sitting in the passenger seat of an antique car. Harry building a sand castle. Harry with his book bag. Harry with a young Ingrid and Harry with a young Hans. In a tender hug with his mom, looking serious standing stiffly next to his father.

  Harry as a child, but never with friends. Or girlfriends. In a lounge chair, in the woods, on a bike. A portrait of a somewhat older Harry. White teeth and freckles. A good photo.

  How can something like that happen, I think to myself. Harry had loving parents, a sheltered childhood in a prosperous country, a dog, a house with a garden. This house, where I am sitting right now. And yet Harry was unhappy, because he was never any good at anything. What did his parents do wrong—were they just too nice to him?

  If I had grown up here, I would be a completely different person, I think. I wouldn’t be so combative and I probably wouldn’t be so obsessed about my grades in school—especially in subjects I’m not interested in, like medieval history. I would have been born to succeed, and I wouldn’t have to bust my ass all the time just trying to prove to everyone that I’m a somebody.

  At the Alfred Delp School they wouldn’t risk snickering about me behind my back or scrutinizing my no-name sneakers out of the corners of their eyes. I would be somebody. Even if I wore the exact same shoes I do now it just wouldn’t matter.

  I’d be easygoing, fearless, and nonchalant.

  Okay, I’m like that now, too. But then I’d be confident, too.

  To my right, at the farthest end of the wall, is a photo I haven’t seen before. I can’t quite make it out. I squint. Ingrid and Hans don’t notice—they’ve probably forgotten I’m here.

  I push my chair back and stand up. I walk over to the picture and about halfway there I recognize it and stop abruptly.

  It’s a photo I took. With Harry’s new digital camera. At our place, on the balcony. It’s the only picture on the wall with a few people in it besides Harry—all of three people, all together with Harry. My mother, around whose shoulder he has one of his arms. Alissa, who is balanced on his right knee and my mother’s left. And Anton, who is sitting next to Harry, squeezed up against him on the narrow bench.

  It’s pretty stupid to stand in the middle of a room and stare at a wall. I must have been standing here like this for quite a while. Ingrid and Harry have come to and turn their heads toward me.

  “What happened, my child,” asks Ingrid, unsettled. “What is it? What are you looking at? Why are you crying?”

  There is no sense in telling her I’m not crying.

  Ingrid squints, too, and peers in the direction I’m staring. Then she realizes what I’m looking at.

  “You’re sad because you’re not there? Not in the picture? Is that it?”

  Ingrid gets up and hurries over to me, but then stops and stands just behind me, unsure of herself.

  I shake my head and head back to the table. Ingrid follows me.

  “We didn’t find any shots of you on his camera,” says Hans. They’re the first words I’ve heard out of his mouth today. “There were only a couple of pictures on it—it was brand new.”

  I know. I showed Harry how it worked.

  “Give us a picture of you, my child. We meant to ask you for one anyway.”

  I shake my head again.

  “Why not? Do you have any nice big ones? I’ll buy a pretty frame for it.”

  I jump up, excuse myself, and run to the bathroom. I know where everything is in this house. From the bathroom window I can look out at the lush garden, rustling in the breeze. All the way at the back is an apple tree. The apples on it always ripen early and seem to glow milky white from the inside. I can hear Ingrid and Hans’s flustered voices from the living room. I bite my lip for a few minutes, then flush the toilet and give my hands a good wash.

  “I’ll wrap up some cake for you to take home, okay?” says Ingrid.

  I don’t tell her that Maria bakes a cake every other day and that I can’t stand cake.

  I clear my throat and say, “That would be nice.”

  “But you’ll stay for a bit longer, won’t you, my child? I know it must be boring for you here. We don’t want to keep you.”

  “Unfortunately I’ve got to get going.”

  “You could do your homework here sometime.”

  I look at Ingrid, stunned. Her suggestion doesn’t make any sense to me.

  “We’ve got lots of books, and Hans could help you,” she says. “He knows a lot.”

  Hans isn’t listening. If he were, he would have contradicted her.

  I stifle a grin and thank them for having me.

  When Ingrid goes into the kitchen to get some tin foil, I decide to try a little shock therapy.

  “Hans,” I say quietly, “you know what, Hans? I’m going to kill him.”

  Hans looks at me.

  “I’m going to kill Vadim.”

  “Vadim?” he says, struggling to repeat after me.

  “Yes, Vadim. The murderer. I’m going to murder the murderer.”

  He looks at me.

  “Just like in the Old Testament. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. Justice.”

  “Vadim who?” Hans asks, his voice a bit hoarse.

  “There’s no way you could have forgotten Vadim, Hans. I’m going to avenge them. My mother and Harry.”

  Hans looks at me. I can’t read his facial expression at all. He’s just completely blank. He doesn’t say a word.

  I want to smack myself. What got into you, you stupid cow, I think.

  If my words even registered with Hans, he still won’t believe them. I wonder what he will think when he hears I’ve actually pulled it off? Will he come back to life, if just for a second? Will he feel a sense of satisfaction? Something even approaching happiness? Will his eyes light up? Will Ingrid’s?

  She comes back in and slides a silvery package into my hand.

  “Don’t crush it—that’s the cake,” she says earnestly.

  “Thanks,” I say. “I’ll call you again soon.”

  I start to turn the door handle and feel Ingrid’s hand on mine. Her touch is cold and fleeting. I open my fist and find a 50 euro bill that wasn’t there before.

  “Please take it, child. We have no use fo
r our money anyway. Buy something for the little ones. You have such a good heart.”

  I stick the bill into my jeans pocket. Ingrid looks almost happy. I bet she’s wondering now whether I would have accepted more. I was expecting her to do this since I didn’t turn down the money last time. Right before that last time, Ingrid told me how sad it was not to have anyone to give gifts to.

  “If you ever need anything . . . ” Ingrid says.

  “I’ll holler,” I say as I hop out onto the walkway before Ingrid can think to hug me goodbye.

  In the tram I press my forehead to the window. I shouldn’t fool myself—there’s no way Ingrid and Hans are going to be excited about my plan. They’re not like Anton.

  They’re going to be appalled. Horrified. They are nice and naïve. They can never understand why unemployment is so high or why some people take drugs and others leave their newborn babies in dumpsters. They’ll be just as mystified at the fact that the girl they used to slip money and cake to could kill another human being. Or rather, an inhuman being.

  They’d probably be hurt if I stepped on a dog’s paw in their presence. They consider the fact that their son will never return some kind of inexplicable, nightmarish misunderstanding. That’s why ever since it happened they’ve been operating in a dreamlike haze. At first they seemed to be counting on waking up one day and finding everything back the way it had always been. Then at some point they resigned themselves to the fact that there was no way out of this nightmare.

  But since they don’t read the papers anymore and don’t talk to anybody, maybe they wouldn’t even find out I’d killed him. If they’re even still alive then.

  Don’t know whether you can even say they are alive now.

  Anyway, I’m not ready to do it yet. Logistically speaking.

  I have a bunch of books on criminology at home. But so far they haven’t inspired the perfect plan yet. Sometimes I imagine breaking a bottle over Vadim’s head. But I’m pretty sure that wouldn’t kill him—it would just get his blood all over me. And that’s not enough. Not for me. No way.