“Do you know what I miss the most?”
“What?” I ask, but can already imagine the answer.
“Being on coke.”
Crap! I’d guessed watching porn.
I pull off my shoes and sit on the other bed in the room, which has remained unoccupied the whole time. At least we’ve had our peace and quiet. We’re watching the draw for the round of sixteen in the German Football Association Cup. I mean, I’m watching the draw. The sound on the television can’t be turned on so the other resident patients aren’t disturbed. Even if no one else is in the room. And sharing the earbuds was a little too stupid for us. So I’m watching the draw and commenting on it for Kai. Steffi Jones, the star goalie for the women’s national team, has been hired as lady luck to pick the pairs of teams up from a jar in the tiny TV studio.
“FC Lucky Bayern,” I say, “against Team ‘Peg-Leg’ Kiel.”
The moderator takes the little ball with the club crest from Jones and makes it disappear into a tube. I picture a gigantic cellar under the studio building where all these little balls for the draw are sent with pneumatic dispatch and land on the pile of balls from years and decades past.
The draw continues and I comment, “The football division of Tennis Club Hamburg.”
Even if we have good relations with the boys from Hamburg, I still can’t stand their club.
“Matched against Naked Baghdad!”
“Oh, come on, Heiko, knock it off. Against who?” Kai asks while he tugs at his rustling bedding and holds his head toward the ceiling.
He looks a little like Stevie Wonder, and I ask myself if people automatically get that head posture when they’re blind. Or temporarily blind, I mean.
“Against Cottbus,” I correct myself.
“Dude, hopefully Hamburg will knock the East Bloc bitches out of it,” he says. It sounds deadly serious somehow, too serious.
“Yeah,” I say, “and hopefully they’ll fling feces at them. Next match…”
Steffi Jones runs her hand around in the bowl as if she were making cake dough or something with it. Then she removes the next ball and gives it to the moderator. He opens it, leaving two halves. He tosses the lid into another bowl and holds up the half with the club crest.
I swallow and say, “Hannover 96.” We simultaneously sit up a little in the beds. There are still some attractive teams in the bowl. Jones picks the next ball. Passes it on. It’s opened. Lid gone. The moderator looks at the logo and pulls up his lower lip in appreciation, which makes his chin protrude slightly. Now, hold the thing up to the camera already! “Against,” I start, and then I briefly catch my breath. I stare at the television, mesmerized. It can’t be true! They made a mistake, or I didn’t see it right, or it’s another club. The computer graphics for the selected pair appear onscreen. In fact!
“Against? Against who, Heiko?” Kai presses me.
I let the two words melt on my tongue slowly and with pleasure: “Eintracht. Braunschweig.”
“If this is just shitting me again, Heiko, then—”
“No, really!” I yell, and choke on my own spit. Two messages, one right after the other on my phone. The first from Ulf: “Oh my God! Epic!”
The second from Jojo: “You watching this???”
I can’t believe it. I really have to control myself so I don’t suddenly scream and tear up the bedding for joy. Then I look over at Kai and the euphoria sticks in my throat like a fat, slimy toad. He’s slipped from his upright position back onto the bed. Lying on his side. His back to me. My palms radiate sweat. My neck goes cold, as if there was a draft right behind me. I bite my tongue, till the stabbing pain becomes a feeling of numbness. That lizard is gonna suffer so bad!
I didn’t catch a wink of sleep all night. Then I drove my car to Wunstorf and sat in front of Yvonne’s building till morning, watching her shadow move across the sheet covering her window. At some point the light went out. I was completely awake and went over a thousand things in my head. Made plans for how I’d make the guys from Braunschweig pay. Considered whether I should talk it over with my uncle this time or just fuck it and continue doing my own thing. I smoke till I feel sick. I go to the all-night market at the gas station and drink till morning light.
Then I helped Arnim feed the tiger. It seems to have slowly gotten used to its pit. Or maybe just resigned to its fate. At any rate, it doesn’t even try to jump out to tear Arnim to pieces. You couldn’t blame it. But it slips down the aluminum walls anyway. Animals can get tired of that pretty quickly. At least Arnim’s having fun. He’s in the basement almost all day preparing food for his favorite. He’s reactivated his rusty butcher skills and hacks away happily, whistling to himself. The stench of blood from the basement has already spread over the entire ground floor. Since the tiger’s been there, Poborsky and Bigfoot have grown unusually quiet. They probably sense something bad for both of them. I hope Arnim doesn’t get the idea of having a test run with the tiger before the next fights. I haven’t told anyone about all of this. Not even Kai. I’m saving it for a day when he’s slipped back into himself and his thoughts and we’re sitting across from each other in the clinic cafeteria and I can’t think of anything else. I climb into the car and slam it into reverse, turning in front of the house. I hope this isn’t the day.