Oranges for Christmas

by Margarita Morris

  Sabine

  I spend the whole of the afternoon in my room, watching the light outside the window changing from the bright light of mid-afternoon to dusk. I am permitted to sit on the edge of the bed. My one attempt to lie down results in the guard marching into the cell and forcing me to stand up for the next hour. After that I stay sitting in an upright position. I have a headache from dehydration and lack of sleep. Mother and Brigitta will be beside themselves with worry that I didn’t come home yesterday. I have to use the toilet in the room and hate the thought that the guard outside could be watching me through the spy hole. The evening deepens and eventually it’s dark outside. I know what’s going to happen now. I am taken back to the interrogation room. This time there’s no adrenalin keeping me awake. I’m a spent force. I hate what Frau Biedermeier is doing to me, but it makes me even less inclined to co-operate with her.

  We go over all the same ground as before until I’m falling asleep where I sit. When Frau Biedermeier feels she’s had enough she calls the guard and tells him to take me back to the room. She mutters under her breath, “She’s a hard one to crack.”

  I lie down on the mattress, determined to make the most of the two hours I’ve got before the light comes back on. I dream of nothing.

  Dieter

  I stagger into the kitchen on Monday morning feeling as if I’ve been run over by a Soviet tank. I did ten hours of digging yesterday and now the muscles in my arms, shoulders and back feel as if they’ve been pulverized. I can’t stand up straight, my lower back is so stiff. Scheisse, I think, I’m not used to hard physical labour. And we only managed to dig down about three metres yesterday. There’s still a hell of a long way to go.

  Harry is standing in the kitchen, dressed in his overcoat and swigging back a black coffee.

  “You look crap,” he says, laughing.

  “Thanks. Any coffee left?”

  “A bit.” He pours me half a cup. It’s lukewarm.

  “Going out?” I ask.

  “Sure am,” he says. “I’m going to see that gorgeous sister of yours again. I want to give her some instructions about contacting the other escapees.”

  “Well you better hurry,” I say. “She’ll be off to school early.”

  “Righto!” says Harry giving me a mock salute. To my relief he leaves and I collapse onto a chair at the table. Someone has left some bread and cheese out so I eat a hurried breakfast then, feeling a bit better, I make my way down to the cellar.

  Andreas is hacking at the earth with his pick-axe and shoveling mounds of rubble into the buckets which Werner and Thomas are carrying out to the back yard.

  “Hi guys,” I say, reaching for a spade. I can see they’ve already shifted bucket loads of earth this morning.

  Werner takes one look at me. “Why don’t you do lookout duty today?”

  I never thought I’d be so happy to hear him say those words. “Sure,” I say, dropping the spade. “I’ll go swap with Claudia.” After all, I tell myself, someone’s got to do it.

  Sabine

  The light comes on and I sit up like a robot. I’m dog-tired, but I don’t want the guard coming in, bullying me. I eat my bread and drink the water. I’m left alone for an hour or so, then I’m taken to the interrogation room. I assume it’s going to be more of the same but this morning Frau Biedermeier is in a different frame of mind. She informs me they have received new information from the school about the “enemies of the state” who defaced the portraits. She watches me closely, keen to see how I react. I’m surprised by this news but I try not to let it show. Has someone snitched on Matthias and Joachim or is Frau Biedermeier just trying to trick me into revealing what I know?

  But she doesn’t pursue the matter. Instead, she says she has a proposition she wants to put to me. She attempts a smile but it doesn’t work because it’s only her red-painted mouth that curls at the corners. Her eyes play no part in this charade of friendship.

  “You could be of great service to us,” she says. “I hear you hope to go to university and study languages. In return for a little co-operation from you, I’m sure we could arrange to make your future studies at university…how shall I put it…more congenial.”

  She slides a piece of paper across the table to me and hands me a pen.

  I glance at the paper and two words leap out at me: Inoffizielle Mitarbeiter. Unofficial collaborator. She wants me to sign up as an informer, to spy on my family and friends, to pass information to the Stasi which could be used against other people. The thought disgusts me. How could I do such a thing? I wouldn’t be able to respect myself if I was spying on my friends. What sort of a person would that make me?

  “Lots of people help us,” she says, “including young people like yourself.”

  I don’t believe her. None of my friends would ever stoop so low. I shake my head.

  “You will not sign?” All the mock friendliness has vanished from her voice.

  “No, I will not.”

  She takes the paper back, looking sterner than ever. I have disappointed her and I’m glad.

  She walks to the door and calls the guard. I assume I will be taken back to the cell, so I can hardly believe it when the guard escorts me to the main door of the building and lets me leave.

  I walk out of the Stasi Headquarters into the bright morning light and take a deep breath of air. The pale green Wartburg that brought me here is parked outside, but Herr Stein and the driver are not around. I wasn’t expecting them to drive me home and I’d rather be on my own. I walk as quickly as I can away from the complex of buildings.

  They have let me go, but I know that life will be very different from now on. The Stasi have a file on me. I have been marked as a suspicious person; someone not to be trusted; a traitor to the cause of socialism. They will be watching me from now on. I must be careful who I’m seen with and who I talk to, otherwise they too will come under suspicion.

  I take the S-bahn from Frankfurter Allee to Prenzlauer Allee, then walk the rest of the way home. I can’t shake the feeling, though, that I am being followed. I keep glancing over my shoulder. Why is that woman in the red coat looking in my direction? Why did that man with the newspaper under his arm just cross over to my side of the street? Why is there a white Trabant parked on the corner? Normally I wouldn’t have given any of these people a second thought, but forty-eight hours in Stasi custody has made me paranoid.

  I turn into Stargarder Strasse and see someone I recognise walking towards me. It’s Harry.

  This is the worst possible timing. If I am being followed then I mustn’t speak to him. It could spell the end of the tunnel project.

  When I see him looking my way, I give an infinitesimal shake of my head and then cross the road very deliberately. I hope he gets the message. The white Trabant that was parked on the corner is crawling down the road behind me. I think Harry must have understood because he turns and walks into a bar. I wonder what he wanted to see me about.

  By the time I reach my building I’m shaking from the strain of being followed. I feel like a hunted animal. I wish I could have spoken to Harry, but it was out of the question.

  It has never been more effort to climb the stairs to our apartment. By the time I reach the top I’m almost in a state of collapse. I open the door and walk in.

  Mother and Brigitta rush to meet me.

  “Komm, Sabine,” says Mother leading me to a chair in the living room. “You don’t have to say anything now.” I’m too distraught to speak and sit in a state of shock, not quite able to believe that I’m home.

  Brigitta runs into our bedroom and comes back waving a piece of paper.

  “This was in the post box,” she says giving it to me. I unfold it and glance down the page. I can’t take it all in now, but I can see it’s a letter from Harry. It contains instructions on what he wants me to do.

  I feel an overwhelming sense of relief. There was no need to speak to Harry after all. Everything I need to know is here in this letter.

 
; It’s only then that the tears start to fall down my face.

  Dieter

  I push open the skylight, climb out onto the roof and look for Claudia. She’s about three metres away, crouched behind a low stone parapet, peering through the binoculars. There’s a narrow walkway between the parapet and the main roof space. I crawl along it now.

  “Hi,” I say, tapping her on the shoulder.

  She puts the binoculars down and turns to face me. “God, you look awful.”

  “You’re not the first person to point that out today.”

  “Sorry.” She gives me a warm smile.

  It’s the first time I’ve been up here and I’m amazed at what a good view we have into East Berlin. I can clearly see the border guards on the other side of the Wall with their metal helmets and rifles. I can also see the house on Schönholzer Strasse that we are aiming for.

  “What’s happening over there?” I ask.

  “Not a lot. The guards just patrol the Wall. Every few hours a truck turns up and new guards take over.”

  “Well I can take over here if you like,” I say. “You can go and dig. Show Werner that you’re up to the job.”

  “Great,” she says grinning at me. She hands me the binoculars.

  There’s not much space on the roof and as we exchange places we find ourselves squashed up against one another. She looks so delicate, I’m suddenly overcome with an urge to take her in my arms. She shouldn’t be risking her life in this dangerous project.

  “Sorry,” she says, squeezing past.

  “Don’t apologise.”

  She looks at me with her big hazel eyes, and then she’s gone, through the skylight.

  I sit down by the edge of the parapet and prepare to spend the next few hours watching the guards on the other side of the Wall.

  Sabine

  I spend the rest of Monday morning and half the afternoon in bed, catching up on my sleep. When I wake up, Brigitta, who has refused to go to school today, brings me a hot drink and something to eat. But on Tuesday I return to school. Life must go on and I think it would do me good to see my friends.

  A white Trabant is parked outside our building. As Brigitta and I walk along Stargarder Strasse the Trabant’s engine coughs into life and the car pulls away from the curb. I can hear it trailing us in a low gear. I tell Brigitta not to look but she turns and stares anyway. She informs me there are two men in the car. I sigh. Have these people nothing better to do? Before I enter the school building I can’t resist turning to look. The Trabant is parked about twenty metres away. Are they planning to stay there all day?

  I make my way to the classroom, looking forward to chatting with people, but there’s hardly anyone there. Astrid hasn’t arrived yet. Matthias and Joachim are not in. Neither is Hans. Or Monika. Where is everyone? The few people who are at school are talking quietly in small groups. Conversations fall silent as I walk past. I sit down at my desk and wonder what on earth is going on.

  Just then Astrid breezes into the room. She sees me sitting at my desk and comes straight over.

  “Am I glad to see you,” she says, giving me a big smile. “You weren’t here yesterday and so obviously we all thought…” her voice trails away.

  “What did you think?”

  She looks over her shoulder then turns back to me. “That you’d been arrested.” She speaks the last word sotto voce.

  “I was,” I say. “I was questioned by the Stasi. They locked me up overnight.”

  Astrid looks horrified. “No way! Was it to do with the portraits?”

  I nod.

  “What did you tell them? Did you say it was Matthias and Joachim?” She mouths their names.

  “No, of course I didn’t.” I wonder how she knows that. I didn’t tell her. Maybe she saw them leaving the classroom.

  She pulls up a chair and sits down next to me. “But what was it like?” she asks. “It must have been horrendous for you.”

  I can see she’s desperate to hear the gory details, so I tell her about the men turning up at the apartment, the cell at Stasi HQ, the interrogation room, Frau Biedermeier. All the time Astrid looks at me with wide eyes and nods her head in sympathy. Then I mention the cloth on the chair and the way Herr Stein shouted at me when I tried to remove it.

  “You know what that was for?” she asks.

  “No, what?”

  “It was to collect your smell, your personal scent. They’ll put the cloth into a sealed jar with your name on it and if they ever need to track you down they’ll give the cloth to a sniffer dog.”

  I think of how I sat on that cloth, sweating with nerves and the strain of not giving anything away, and I feel physically sick.

  “Anyway, don’t worry about it,” says Astrid. “You told them you didn’t do it and it looks like they believed you because they let you go. They’ve got the culprits now.”

  “How do you know?” I ask. “And what’s happened here?” I indicate the classroom with a wave of my hand. “Where is everyone? Where are Matthias and Joachim? And Hans? Why is everyone so quiet?”

  Astrid rolls her eyes. “Of course, you don’t know.”

  “Know what?”

  She leans closer and whispers. “They’ve all been expelled.”

  Her words hit me like a thunderbolt. For a few seconds I just stare at her in disbelief. “Expelled! But why?”

  “For wearing black. For protesting against the Wall. As the ringleaders, Matthias and Joachim have been arrested. They’ll be charged with defacing the portraits.”

  At that moment Herr Keller enters the room and Astrid moves away to sit at her own desk. I realise that I’m trembling like a leaf.

  Dieter

  There’s a noise in the street directly below me. I look down and see a woman with a small boy of about eight and an older boy, a teenager. The older boy is carrying a wooden step ladder under his arm. It has five steps and is the sort of thing you would use to decorate a room or reach a high shelf. They stop a short distance from the bakery and the older boy sets the step ladder up next to a lamppost bearing the sign Bernauer Strasse.

  The younger boy can hardly contain his excitement. When the ladder is ready, he climbs up the five steps, the woman standing behind him, holding onto his legs to make sure he doesn’t fall. The little boy is now higher than the street sign. With one hand he leans on the sign and with the other he stretches up as far as he can and waves towards one of the buildings in Brunnenstrasse.

  I pick up my binoculars and look in the same direction as the little boy, trying to see who he’s waving at. At first I don’t see anything, but then I notice a movement at a window. I focus the binoculars and an old woman comes into view. She is standing by an open top floor window in one of the five-storey houses. She is waving a white handkerchief.

  “Da ist sie!” shouts the little boy. “Da ist Oma.” There’s Grandma. It must seem like a game to him, waving at his grandmother who is on the other side of the Wall.

  “Shhh,” says the woman. “Remember we have to be quiet.”

  The child’s shout has attracted the attention of the guards who turn to look at the old woman at the window behind them. She disappears in a flash, slamming the window closed. Then a helmeted head appears above the Wall. The guard looks in disbelief at the family with the step ladder. Then he seems to focus his attention on the bakery. We have a sign in the window that reads Closed for renovation.

  “She’s gone!” wails the little boy, pointing towards his grandmother’s house.

  “But we saw her, didn’t we,” says the woman, injecting her voice with forced cheerfulness. She turns to the older boy. “Bring the ladder please Axel. We have to go home now.”

  “But mummy,” wails the little boy. “Just one more…”

  “No,” says his mother, her voice cracking. “We’ll see Oma again one day.”

  I doubt it.

  Sabine

  I can’t concentrate on anything all day and I sit at my desk like a zombie. Almost half the clas
s has been expelled. Those who remain are understandably subdued. I understand now why people were surprised to see me this morning – they must have thought I’d been expelled as well when I didn’t come in yesterday. I hope they don’t think I’ve turned informer and been allowed back to school for “good behaviour.” Astrid stands by me as if nothing has happened and I’m grateful for her unflinching support.

  But I keep thinking about Hans. He’s never been in any sort of trouble with the authorities before despite his tendency to rash behaviour. But this expulsion means the end of his school career and his university prospects. He’ll want to get out of East Berlin more than ever. I must go and see him as soon as I can and tell him about the tunnel project.

  As for Matthias and Joachim, I shudder to think what the Stasi is doing to them. Were they arrested just for being the ringleaders of the “black protest” or was it because of the portraits? No matter how many times Frau Biedermeier asked me who had defaced the portraits, I never told her, so how would the Stasi know it was Matthias and Joachim? Astrid seems certain of the facts, but is that just through idle gossip? Did Herr Schmidt know the truth all along and did he inform the Stasi? But if he knew the truth, why was I arrested? These questions chase each other around my brain until my head starts to hurt. I start looking at my classmates with suspicion and realise that I’m becoming like the Stasi – paranoid.

  After morning break we have Marxism-Leninism with Herr Schmidt. I don’t want to go back into that classroom, I’d rather be anywhere else, but I force myself to arrive early so I can sit next to the window and not right under his nose. The offending portraits have all been removed and the wall is now blank, the only clue to their former existence being the brighter patches of paintwork where they used to hang.

  I just want this lesson to be over.

  Herr Schmidt enters and looks around the room, noting who is still here and who isn’t. I can hardly bear to look at him. His lips curl in a smile of satisfaction at the sight of the empty chairs. I strongly suspect him of informing on Matthias and Joachim and I despise him more than ever.