Broken Glass Park

by Alina Bronsky

No longer exist.

  The fire department says

  Your house

  Has burned down.

  “No way,” I say. “You listen to Nautilus Pompilius?”

  “What else am I supposed to listen to?” says Peter, annoyed. “The Lollipops? What’s your problem?”

  I have no problem. I stand there, try to breathe. Everything swims in front of my eyes.

  “You listen to that?” I say pointlessly.

  “For god’s sake,” Peter says, pissed off. “No, I don’t listen to it. I eat it.”

  The song hits me like a punch in the gut.

  There’s no way Peter really listens to the music of this long-forgotten Russian goth band. My mother liked them. She listened to a lot of rock and pop, as well as chansons and musicals and opera. She never got stuck in any one genre.

  How is it possible, I wonder, that here—in an apartment that reeks of coal, that’s scrubbed spic and span, a place where every piece of furniture is draped with a doily, where there are plastic flowers in vases on the windowsills, where the walls are covered with the type of horrible pictures of pink children that you can get three-for-ten-bucks at the supermarket, where red-checkered curtains flutter in the wind—that here of all places, this music is played?

  In a strange room

  With a white ceiling

  A right to hope

  And a belief

  In love.

  I stare at the checkered curtains.

  We never had curtains. My mother hated them. It might be the one thing she categorically ruled out. She always wanted to have the windows open. The sun should come in. “Let the sun in and the rain will follow.” That’s a line from Die Fantischen Vier my mother liked. Yep, she even liked German hip-hop. The first thing Maria did when she arrived was to sew curtains—loudly colored, with giant flowers all over them. She put them up and pulled them closed.

  Then I came home from school and she took them down again. Real fast. She made a blouse for herself out of the fabric. And one for Alissa.

  Then she quickly took apart Alissa’s and turned it into three tops for Alissa’s dolls instead.

  The drunken doctor

  Told you

  That you

  No longer exist.

  Peter reaches out with a bulging arm and taps me on the shoulder.

  “What?” I say, taking a step back.

  “Why don’t you come out to Broken Glass Park sometime?” he asks without looking at me. “You know, back in the woods.”

  “What—where you guys drink and smoke weed and tag-team girls three at a time in the bushes? What would I want to do there?”

  “Well, you just explained that yourself.”

  “I’ll pass.”

  “It’s not true about three guys doing girls at the same time. Where did you hear that? That only happened twice—and the girls wanted it.”

  “Yeah, well, I don’t want it.”

  “Are you scared?”

  I go right up to him and stand on my tiptoes.

  “Get something straight,” I say. “I. Am. Not. Scared. Of. Anything.”

  “Then come along. What’s the problem?”

  “You guys make me sick. That’s the problem.”

  “Aha,” he says calmly, lowering his head. “You want something better.”

  “Exactly,” I say, and watch as his face changes. As if he’s been stung.

  Then he gets his facial expression under control again.

  “I wouldn’t be saying that kind of thing if I were in your situation,” he says slowly. “It could come back to haunt you.”

  “I’m shitting myself. With fear.”

  “Wise of you.”

  “Alissa,” I say loudly. “How long do I have to wait for you? Let’s go home.”

  No answer.

  “Is he a good fuck?” asks Peter suddenly, looking me directly in the eyes.

  “Who?” I say, stunned.

  “The sugar daddy I saw here, the one who dropped you off. Some old guy with gray hair. I know how you are. You think we’re nothing but trash. But in reality you’re the worst of all, just a miserable slut. So is he a good fuck?”

  “Oh, yeah,” I say. “Amazing. I can hardly wait for the next round. Alissa! I’m leaving.”

  She comes shooting around the corner and grabs my hand with her hot, sticky fingers.

  “You can keep the bracelet,” she says to Katja, who waves goodbye somewhat lethargically. “I’m giving it to you.”

  In the elevator she asks, “Who is Vadim?” Then she shouts, “Wait! Let me push the button!”

  “Vadim?” I say, hoisting her up so she can reach the button. “Nobody.”

  I’ve started running again. My favorite time to run is evenings, when it cools off a little. I run past the supermarket, past a sad old man’s pub, through a grove of sycamores, once around the local school, and then into the park and under the underpass. There’s almost always a train rushing past overhead.

  It’s dark and moist under there even in the middle of the day at the height of the summer. Kids Anton’s age are always lighting little fires under here. I always come across little holes in the dirt filled with ash and charred twigs or burnt strips of newspaper.

  I saw Anton down here once, too, and I was glad to see there was no fire burning near him. But my relief was premature. Anton was squatting down, busy doing something back in the bushes together with a black-haired boy. He flinched as I came closer and looked over his shoulder.

  And I flinched, too, because at his feet was something that looked like a raw steak with fur and tiny feet.

  And I thought to myself: I need to toughen up. How am I going to fulfill my mission if this is making me nauseated?

  The thing that surprised me most was that Anton was clearly leading this odd operation. The other kid was just watching, and rolled his chocolate-colored eyes as I angrily lit into my little brother.

  “Why did you kill this little creature?” I yelled at Anton, who just shrugged and shook his head.

  “It was already dead,” said the other kid. There was a strange hostility in his pretty, brown saucer eyes, though he looked past me rather than right at me. As if I was too disgusting to look at directly.

  “What is that thing anyway? And who are you?”

  “I’m Ilhan.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “A hamster. Are you blind or something?”

  “No,” I said. “I’m not blind.” Though I wouldn’t mind it when faced with this bloody clump of fur.

  “Did you kill the hamster, Anton?” I asked in a weak voice. “I don’t believe it.”

  “It was already dead,” he mutters.

  “Died last night, I’m telling you,” said the other boy. “It’s my hamster. It belongs to me.”

  “What the hell are you doing?” I asked with disgust. There was no other way to react—Anton was holding the handle of our kitchen knife in his blood-smeared hand, and the blade was buried in the lump at his feet.

  “I’m trying to skin it,” Anton mumbled without looking up at me. It was taking every ounce of effort not to throw up on my shoes.

  “With your bare hands?” I said.

  “How else would you do it?” asked Anton as he gripped the lump with his skinny fingers and tried to pull it open, as stuff oozed from the carcass. The other boy leaned over him, his brow wrinkled with concentration.

  “What’s that?” asked Anton curiously. “Do you know, Sascha? Have a look.”

  “I’d rather not,” I said faintly. “Maybe another time.”

  “Is that the heart?” asked Ilhan with interest. I pulled myself together, kneeled down, and took the knife from Anton’s hand, gulped, bit my lower lip, and tried to turn the hamster carcass carefully with the blade. Quite a bit of stuff fell out of the body cavity.

  Crazy how much fits into such a small animal.

  “The heart is very small in a hamster like this,” I said, rummaging around inside the carcas
s with the knife. “This is probably it here. No idea. That big thing there is the intestine.”

  “And that?”

  “Not sure. Probably the kidneys.”

  “Cool.”

  “Yuck. All right, Anton, get home, wash your hands. This thing is full of germs. Dead animals are poisonous. Remember that. Wash your hands three times with soap. How can you guys be so stupid and so savage?”

  “It was already dead,” Anton mumbled.

  “We just wanted to dissect it,” said Ilhan.

  “Look at me when you talk to me—even if your father doesn’t look at your mother when he talks to her,” I said. To my surprise he obeyed.

  “We were going to stuff it,” he explained grudgingly, looking me in the eyes. “Anton said he could do it. I brought gauze from home. And he brought a needle to stitch it back together.”

  “You thought you could do that?” I asked, perplexed, looking at an increasingly unhappy Anton, who pushed a few strands of blond hair out of his face with his blood-smeared hand. “For the love of god, get your fingers away from your hair.”

  “Why don’t you think I could do it?” asked Anton glumly.

  “Aren’t you disgusted by it?”

  “No, why?”

  “Anton!”

  “What?”

  “I said to get home.”

  “What are we supposed to do with the hamster?” asked Ilhan.

  “Nothing. You can’t stuff it. You have to be trained to be able to do that. It’s complicated. It’ll just rot if you guys try. Disgusting. Throw it away and off you go.”

  They looked at each other for a long time, Anton and Ilhan. Then Anton sighed and Ilhan looked up with disappointment in his eyes as a train rushed past overhead.

  “Let’s at least bury it,” said Ilhan.

  So I squatted down and watched as they dug a hole a few yards deeper into the brush and Anton collected the hamster and its innards with his bare hands and chucked it all into the hole. Ilhan didn’t seem to want to touch it. Then they filled in the hole again and decorated the mound with dandelions and lilacs. I watched as Anton then found two sticks and made a cross, with Ilhan helping him.

  “Three times with soap,” I repeated as they started up the embankment toward broken glass park and the Emerald.

  Now I always run past that spot. The dandelions have long since withered and been blown away. I always look off to the side and wonder what the carcass looks like now.

  Every time I have to fight the unnatural urge to dig up the hamster and have a look. And every time I tell myself it’s probably not even there anymore, as a dog or fox or something will have found it long ago.

  Then one time I give in and start to root around in the dirt with a stick.

  Just as I’m thinking I must have the wrong spot I find the hole—and its contents exceed all my expectations.

  It is full of fat maggots, dozens—no, hundreds. They are all moving, creating a dirty-white writhing mass. It’s disgusting. But I count it as a victory of an odd sort.

  Because I don’t feel nauseated, and that makes me happy.

  I’ve seen enough and I scrape the dirt back over the body, throw the stick into the bushes, and run on.

  Beneath the train overpass I see them.

  I recognize Peter immediately. He’s the biggest. His two buddies are my size. I don’t know them. They flank him like two stunted bodyguards.

  “Siamese kitty,” they say in unison as they block my way. It almost sounds as if they have rehearsed it.

  “Let me by,” I say. When they don’t move, I try to push my way through. But they stand close together, and I can feel their sweaty bodies on my bare arms. Then I feel their fingers as they restrain me.

  “Paws off me,” I say. “Wash yourselves before you touch me.”

  One starts to laugh. He sounds drunk. Sure enough, he can barely stand up straight.

  “What a bitch,” says the other one to Peter. “I love bitches.”

  “Go fuck yourself,” I say. “And before you do, take your paws off me.”

  “Fear?” asks Peter, smiling at me. Actually in a fairly friendly manner. “Paws off,” he says to the one who is still standing up straight. “She’s a good girl.”

  The guy lets go of me.

  But then Peter blocks my way. I take a step to the right and he steps in my way. I take a step to the left and he steps in my way. He follows me like a mirror image. And he won’t stop smiling. His shoulders gleam as if they are oiled up.

  “Why haven’t you come to broken glass park?” he asks. “I invited you, after all.”

  “It stinks too bad for me there,” I say. “Everything stinks there.”

  “Even me?” asks Peter, getting right in my face. I wrinkle up my nose. He seems to use the same cheap cologne as Maria. A pint at a time. The Emerald scent.

  “You?” I say. “You stink the worst of all.”

  I duck just in time to avoid his fist. One of Peter’s buddies sits down on the grass. The other snickers.

  “Hitting a girl,” I say. “How very courageous of you.”

  “Girls like you need to be smacked around,” he says, breathing heavily. “And ones like your mother. It’s fucked up that you’re not scared of anything. I think we need to change that.”

  He motions to the buddy who is still standing. He moves without a word. In an instant he’s right behind me and I can feel his breath on my neck. His hot hand reaches under my hoodie and a wave of nausea washes over me.

  I ram my elbows into his ribs, rip myself free, jump to the side, and bend down. I had already seen it gleaming—an empty brown beer bottle. I grab it and brandish it above my head.

  The guy lying in the grass whistles.

  “Come on,” says Peter, trying to sound nonchalant. It’s hard to pull off with his teeth gritted. “Don’t play games. You’re not stupid—you can see you don’t have a chance. Come on, just once, then we’ll let you go. You only have to do me. Even a rich sugar daddy gets boring after a while. If you want, the guys here can take a little walk while we’re at it. This is a one-time offer.”

  “Why me?” I ask. “Where are all your blondes with their huge tits? Have you already nailed them all?”

  “Pretty much,” he says. “A man needs variety. There’s something about you I like.”

  “I only sleep with guys who can read,” I sneer. It’s like I’m possessed. “Which means you’re out, dear Peter. I’m afraid welfare checks and broken German just don’t get me off.”

  His mouth clenches tightly. It’s very quiet. Just a few chirps in the background.

  “You are fucked now,” he says.

  “No, you are, Peter. I’ll do it. Anybody who comes near me I’ll cut open their face.”

  “I’m going to make your life a living hell,” he says quietly.

  “Too late,” I say. “It already is. Let me through, you fucking asshole.”

  He puts out his arms. I slash at his face with the bottle.

  But I’ve misjudged it.

  The bottle doesn’t break. It’s still whole. And it flies out of my hand, slipping between my sweaty fingers. I’ve barely hurt Peter at all. He just grunts, puts his hand up to his face, and then lunges at me. I’m thrown back by the weight of his body and my head hits the wall.

  That’s when I begin to scream. At first I don’t know myself what I am screaming. It’s a word. A name.

  I am screaming for Volker.

  He’s startled on the phone. Probably because he’s never experienced me in a state like this. I can’t even say a word. All I can do is cry. My pillow is soaked with tears and snot. I think I’ve been grinding my teeth on it, too.

  “I’m on my way,” he says finally, sounding unsure. It snaps me back together a little.

  I wipe my face and press the phone to my ear.

  “Not a chance in hell,” I say. “It’s too late anyway.”

  “I don’t understand what happened,” he says helplessly. “Were you atta
cked? Did somebody do something to you? Are you crazy—walking around there by yourself at night? What are you thinking?”

  “Stop yelling at me,” I say.

  “What happened?” he asks again. “Would you tell me?”

  “They let me go,” I say. “I called your name. Really loud. Did you hear it there in Bad Soden? Maybe they thought someone was coming. They tried to cover my mouth. I bit that hand so hard it bled. The bottle didn’t break, Volker. Those fucking bottles are so strong.”

  “You should go to a doctor,” Volker says. “I think you might be hurt.”

  “No, I’m not,” I say.

  “I’m on the way,” he says. “I’ll pick you up. It’s been a while since we saw each other anyway.”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I can’t leave my children alone.”

  “Then they should come, too.”

  “I still can’t.”

  “Why, for god’s sake?”

  “You know why.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  “No,” he says rigidly. “I have no idea.”

  He always says that—he doesn’t know what I’m talking about. He’s never uttered a word about what happened between us. He is very thoughtful and caring. But he doesn’t want to acknowledge that night.

  “Don’t cry,” he says quietly. “If nothing happened . . . you’re very lucky. Thank god. Promise me that in the future you’ll be more careful. That you won’t go wandering around that ghetto at night. I understand that you’ve had a shock. You should talk to a therapist about it.”

  “Volker,” I say, “you’re talking bullshit.”

  “True,” he says. “But I can’t think of anything better to say. I’d love to give you a hug. But my arms aren’t long enough to reach. I don’t know what I can do for you.”

  “You saved me tonight,” I say.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Your name saved me.”

  He is quiet for a suspiciously long time.

  “Don’t tell Felix about this,” I say.

  “I wasn’t planning to,” says Volker.

  “Do you know why I’m crying?” I say. “Listen to me. I didn’t save her. Not her and not Harry. But I could have. If I had gotten between them. If I hadn’t just stood there in the door with my arms crossed, annoyed. I should have done something.”