“We just have to earn the spot over there. What do you wanna do?”
He looked at me. His tongue moved inside his cheek impatiently, back and forth.
“My god, then all right, I’ll ask. Just knock it off.”
“Excellent, Heiko, thanks,” Jojo said.
I looked over at the group that had gathered around my uncle. It reminded me of the days when I was still a little twerp and my father brought me along every now and then. Back then it was exactly the same, except I was standing around with Hans somewhere instead of with the boys now, while people were gathered around Axel as if he was some kind of tiny solar system that only existed in the Curve. I looked at Jojo again and said, “Won’t accomplish a thing.”
And I was right, of course. I had barely stepped up to the group surrounding Axel and Tomek when my uncle snarled at me, wanting to know what I wanted. I tried to somehow acquaint him with the concept that we couldn’t see anything and all that shit.
“Go back to your spot,” Axel barked.
When I got back to the boys, Jojo asked, “Well?”
“Shove it, Jojo,” I said and drained my beer in silence.
“Manuela, please don’t bust my balls. I’ll find him already! Yeah. Sure, bye.”
I chuck my phone on the passenger seat. It bounces off like a rubber ball and lands on the floor.
My father’s caregiver wasn’t able to give me any useful clues about where he might be when I’d spoke with her. Just said he must have disappeared sometime around lunch and moans something like, It’s so awful, we’ve never had anything like this happen before. Thanks, a lotta help you are, you old hag, I thought and turned the key. Then my sister had to bitch me out. As if it was my fault he wanted to step out of the rehab clinic. I mean, here I am, and all this craps lands on me, typical. She couldn’t leave. Because of classes, and all that.
The car’s running, and I’m steering from the clinic parking lot onto the street. Trying to make my way to the middle of town.
It’s windy. I pull the zipper up on my windbreaker. Then I shove my fists into my jacket pockets and walk randomly down an unfamiliar street. Hans doesn’t have a phone. Even though Manuela bought him one once, as far as I know he never used it. My dad’s just old-school. Real old-school.
I arrive at a square paved with cobblestones, a kind of a market square. Maybe it’s the middle of town. Clueless, making the rounds. Mostly there are pensioners sitting outside in front of the cafés, holding down their napkins against the wind. Deep, snow-white tumors of clouds stream over the rooftops. The aroma of fresh cake and pastries seems to emanate from everywhere. It’s making me slightly nauseous. That and how perfectly arranged everything is here. Like a typical spa town. The old farts watch me walk by, mouths agape. Probably asking themselves what kind of shady customer I am, decked out in a black jogging suit. And in a place like this, I truly do feel as out of place as a right-wing extremist at a gypsy wedding. I go down a narrow, one-lane shopping street leading away from the square. A couple of teenagers are sitting in front of the supermarket and sucking energy drinks. They’re laughing, kidding around. Calling each other “son of a bitch” and that sort of thing. Acting like they’re Turkish or something. Even though they’re just stupid nobodies. I walk past the driveway to the parking lot belonging to the supermarket, which is located behind the row of residential buildings. A ruined, elderly guy with a gray flowing beard is sitting against the wall. His facial hair has taken on the typical color of tobacco-yellow above the lip. He’s wearing a dirty sweater that basically screams the 90s. A gray threadbare denim vest on top of that. His blue cap, which he wears loosely over a wide mop of hair, has attained a kind of batik pattern from years of sweat. The cap is labeled MODERN DRUNKARD – EST. 1986. I approach him and he looks up at me with a tired gaze. The bags under his eyes look like washrags.
“Hey pal. Maybe you have a little spare change?”
I pull out my wallet, say, “Sure,” and give him a two-euro coin.
He holds it up for a second, depositing it in his breast pocket of his vest and says, “The company expresses its gratitude.”
I crouch down next to him, silently offering him a cigarette, which he also raises in thanks. Then I pass him my lighter, but just for him to give back to me. He offers his hand. His fingers are rough and rutted like the bark of an oak tree. The fingertips have long gone beyond tobacco yellow to take on the color of morning urine.
“Heiko,” I introduce myself.
“Pit, but my friends call me Osaka Pit.”
We smoke a while in silence. Then the next cigarettes. At some point I say, “Let’s assume I’m treating you to a beer, straight from the tap. Where would we go?”
He strokes his invisible chin with his fingers, making a rustling sound. He’s pondering as if I’d asked him the meaning of life.
“There’s not a lot around here. We’d probably go to Schüssler’s. It’s right around the corner.”
I stand up, pat down my butt, and say, “Let’s go then.”
Schüssler’s reminds me a lot of Timpen back home. A typically rustic, old-time tavern that, from the outside, during the day and when none of the lights are on, gives the impression it’s closed. Hans isn’t there. Doesn’t show up either while I pay for a couple rounds of draft with Pit, who everyone seems to know, and we chat. Better than running around without a plan.
“Hannover 96, right?” Pit says, and the suds he’s licked off fizz in his beard. “I don’t know much about football. Was more interested in cricket. Seemed more complex. But you don’t get very far with that in German-speaking countries. My dream was to watch a top Indian match. But that probably doesn’t interest you.” He tapped against the bill of his cap and turned toward the barkeeper. “Gisbert, which one of those Hannover 96 players came from here, from Bad Zwischenahn?”
Without having to think very long, Gisbert, whose left eyelid twitches incessantly, answers, “Carsten Linke.”
“What do you know,” I say, astonished, “our defensive rock. What a coincidence! Well, then, at least now I can claim that I was once in Carsten Linke’s hometown.”
Pit nods, satisfied he was able to gratify me with that bit of information, and looks into his glass. Preparing for the next sip. He has yet to ask what brought me to Bad Zwischenahn in the first place, and I don’t really feel like talking about it.
We move from straight beer to a couple rounds of boilermakers, which reminds me of the liters of black beer and vodka mix at the Marksmen’s Fair. We clink the shot glasses. Down them and say, “Ahhh,” as if we were drinking an isotonic beverage after running a marathon. Gisbert flips the light switch on. I glance at the clock. It’s getting close to evening. One more, I say, and order another round.
“Hey, why do they call you Osaka Pit, anyway?”
“Well,” Pit waves me off, chuckling, “old story. I smuggled opium for a couple years. I was around your age. Far East, to make a long story short. Then they nabbed me in Osaka. Was trying to sail to Taipei. I was sentenced to four years in Japan. Then it took me two more to get back to Europe.” He chuckles again, as if he was telling a joke. “Got lucky. If they’d grabbed me somewhere else—like Singapore or Taiwan, for example—I wouldn’t be sitting here today. Even if you’re just courier, they send you into the sunset before you know it. They don’t fool around.”
We empty our glasses. I gradually remember why I’m here in the first place.
“I have to keep moving,” I say and ask where there’s another bar around here.
Pit directs me to the Twüschenkahn, a bar that’s closer to Zwischenahn Lake, the local pond. I pay and get up. There’s still one last generous splash of backwash.