“All right,” I say, “then I know where you stand.”
“Heiko—” but Jojo’s mother calls from below: “Jojo, our crime show is about to start. Does Heiko want to watch?”
I respond myself: “No, thanks, Mrs. Seidel. I have to get going.”
One after the other, we walk down the stairs in silence.
“You don’t need to see me out,” I whisper to Jojo, and he looks at me with his face like a sad fucking dog, and I could just about spew. Then he sits down on the sofa next to his mother.
“Take it easy, Mrs. Seidel,” I say.
She waves and smiles and says, “Nice that you came by again. You boys all have to come around for coffee when Kai’s feeling better again.”
“We sure will,” I say and nod, but don’t mean it.
I’m already on my way out, but something makes me pause again between the hallway and the living room. I turn around. The show’s intro is playing on the television. For the two remaining Seidels, I’m already out the door. Now that they assume they’re alone again, the two of them seem to deflate. Their cheeks sag, as if they’re filled with gravel. Both appear powerless. Mrs. Seidel’s hand moves over and for a moment strokes her son’s hand lying between them on the sofa. All around them, shelves and cabinets are filled with Dieter’s carved figurines. Joel’s trophies. The whole thing reminds me somehow of a documentary I watched once with Yvonne when nothing else was on TV. It was about ancient Egypt. Specifically, the pharaohs and how they had themselves buried with all their nearest and dearest possessions. Sometimes, even with their most loyal servants, who were simply tossed into the graves alive, together with the mummified rulers. That’s about how that living room seemed. Or Joel’s old room, which is more like Jojo’s private altar. All at once, the air in here feels too heavy. I have trouble breathing and the sight of the leftover Seidels marinating amid their memories drives me right out the door and into the cold night. I look up. The first snowflakes of winter are falling from the dark-blue sky but hardly touch the ground before they melt to water.
I’m already pretty wasted when I get up from the bench in the locker-room, stumble over the beer cans on the floor, leave the gym without locking up, and climb into the VW hatchback. In the night, the thick clouds look like steel wool dunked in ink. I drive to the hospital parking lot, piss next to my car in the shine of the lights, and climb back inside. The digital clock under the speedometer says it’s ten till two. An ambulance drives by with flashing lights and sirens and stops in front of the hospital’s main entrance. I could try to slip inside. Wake up Kai. Hear him ask what the hell I’m doing here in the middle of the night and if I’ve completely lost my mind. I slam into reverse and drive from the parking lot. I myself don’t really know why I got up in the first place and drive through the night like a madman. Maybe because I wanted to arrive someplace where I had the feeling I belonged. I don’t know. Maybe I was just too drunk. Definitely to drive. But I was lucky. And have enough experience at inconspicuous drunk driving. Which is why I arrived safely in Wunstorf. I let the car roll slowly while I drive past the country road that leads to Arnim’s farm and try to spot lights through the trees in the woods and the darkness. But there’s nothing. Just a dark splotch in the middle of barren fields. I drive past and into town and end up in front of Yvonne’s apartment. The light is on in her bedroom. I turn off the car, and before I can think twice, I open the glove compartment and remove the set of spare keys.
It still fits in the front door. I climb the stairs without turning on the light. Two steps at a time. I press my ear to Yvonne’s apartment door. Not a sound behind the door. I bend down to the lock and place two fingers around it so the key doesn’t slip in my state and betray me. This key also fits. I carefully push it all the way in and turn till it clicks and I can push open the door. The lamp from the bedroom, on the other end of the hall, casts a beam of light down the hall. Something scurries across the floor, and I remove the key and shut the door. The cat prances around my leg and nudges with its head and purrs like a model-sized moped. It smells of litter box from the kitchen. I crouch down for a second and pet the cat. Once she’s had enough and I want to get up again, I feel dizzy. The beam of light splits before my eyes, and I have to steady myself against the wall. I walk into the bedroom. Taking care to place every step very consciously and quietly roll off the balls of my feet. Not so easy when you’re that drunk. I push the door open and whisper so quietly I’m definitely the only one who can hear it, “Sweetheart, I’m home.”
The ceiling spotlight next to the bed is on and produces a gentle humming sound. She’s lying there. In nondescript, pale underwear, the color of which disappears next to her skin. Her not-at-all knobby knees she’d always been ashamed of and that I’d always kissed, precisely for that reason, to wake her up when I was allowed to sleep at her place. Between her narrow thighs, her vagina is visible under her underwear. The childish belly button. She has one of those belly buttons that don’t go in, pushing out in a little ball of skin instead. I only saw something like that with her. I can count her ribs from the door, and the bones of her collarbone can be clearly seen, shimmering under the skin. My breathing is shallow. The cat purrs behind me in the hallway. She cut her hair. A strand of her bangs is dyed red. Her eyelids are closed. She sleeps like a corpse. Her eyes don’t move beneath her eyelids. Her cheeks, flat as saucers, don’t budge a fraction of an inch. Her mouth is open a crack and I can see the white of her front teeth. And above it her closed eyes. On the brows I love so much there are two thin, black dashes, and they disfigure the beautiful face. Why’d she do that? Why’d she scrawl those lines? I’d like to pounce on her. Press her arms down with my knees so she can’t fight it, lick my thumbs, and rub those ugly black dashes off. Till she looks like she used to. Till she’s my Yvonne again. And then I’d lay my finger on her lips and say, “Hush,” and then we would fall asleep next to and inside each other. And early in the morning I’d wake up before her and throw away all the empty vacuum packs and morphine syringes and I’d make her a strong coffee she’d have to finish completely, and then we’d look through furniture catalogs and mark things, but never buy them, and at some point, before we’re old and gray, we’d die together.
I turn on the light in the living room next door and sit down at the coffee table. I smoke slowly but can’t enjoy the taste of the tobacco and quietly cough into my fist. Before I go, I take a look in the fridge. Behind the plastic door of the fridge compartment where the eggs go lies a handful more disposable syringes. How lucky it is for you, Yvonne, that you work at a hospital. And how lucky you are they haven’t caught you yet. I close the refrigerator door again. The door sucks tight. I place the spare keys in the bowl in the hall and pet the cat, which was just coming out of the kitchen looking satisfied, one last time. There’s cat litter still hanging on its fur. I block its path out of the apartment with my foot and then step back into the dark staircase.
We spent a lot of time at Grandpa and Grandma’s place during vacation. That was only great when Grandpa was feeling good and he wasn’t lying up in bed all day, his thin strings of hair sticking to his head, and tossing and turning like a walrus because of the pain. Because that’s when Grandma was in charge of the place any you couldn’t touch anything, couldn’t be loud, and only drank that disgusting sweet fruit tea. I think that’s why Gramps was usually back in the garden, when he was fit. When he didn’t want to hear Grandma’s nagging, preferring to have his ears cooed full by his pigeons, and didn’t have to answer, Yeah, I’ll do it in a second. No, I haven’t yet. Just putt, putt, putt, come my bird, putt, putt, putt. There was nothing happening with Manuela. She’d quickly found friends her age down the street. I didn’t have anyone and was far from knowing Jojo, Joel, and Ulf. We were only allowed to bring Kai along sometimes, but then it was also too boring in the small town. It was surrounded by fields that blandly flowed into the horizon. I liked it. Mainly because of my Grandpa. When we played football in the garden and he was in goal and I was easily able to dink the ball past him. Then I ran my rounds in front of him, across the lawn, and he provided the play-by-play and yelled, “Bandura in possession. Ladies ’n’ gentlemen, feast your eyes on that technique. Takes it round the center-back. Passes to Heynckes, who’s kept up with play. Takes a look, sees Rodekamp, he’s calling for the ball. Great position. Heynckes back to Bandura. What are they planning? Cross. Rodekamp has it, shoots, and goal, goooooooooal!”