“Oh sure,” Anna said, bitterly; now that she had started she couldn’t stop. “And they’ve never broken a single cup in their lives, and they’ve never wanted two straws. And you, you’re perfect, of course. You never drop anything, right? And this cup, lady, is worth twenty cents at most.”
Now it wasn’t just the aproned woman who was staring at Anna, mouth open wide, but Micha as well. Anna was swimming on a wave of anger, and, though it felt good, she had an inkling that she’d be sorry in about three seconds. “I’ll pay for that hot chocolate and my coffee and another fresh hot chocolate,” she said. “And if you’d be kind enough to hand me a dustpan and broom, I’ll clean up the mess on the floor. And when you have a chance, you should see if adult ed offers evening classes in friendliness.”
“You don’t have to shout at me like that,” the aproned woman said as she took Anna’s money. “I didn’t do anything …”
Now Anna noticed the other students in line, impatient students with coffee trays and tired eyes, and suddenly felt embarrassed by her outburst. But then two guys behind her started laughing and both reached for the broom at the same time, trying to help her. “You’re absolutely right,” one of them said. “These people are impossible … there’s another piece of the cup over there …”
“What are you studying?” the other one asked. “I haven’t seen you before.”
“Gardening, third semester,” Anna murmured, and a strange thought popped up in her head. I’m collecting male students. Gitta’d be surprised.
When she finished cleaning up and went to put the pieces of the cup into the trash, someone took the dustpan from her. But it wasn’t one of the students she’d been talking to—it was someone in a green military parka.
“Abel?” she asked, sounding as surprised as possible. She looked from Abel to Micha, who stood next to him with her fresh cup of hot chocolate and a broad grin—and back to Abel. “What a small world. Are you … is this … your sister?”
One of the guys who’d been helping her placed a coffee tray in her hands. “You better take this and go now,” he said. “Otherwise, our friend at the counter will totally lose it.” Anna smiled a thank-you. Now I’m stuck with one of these students, she thought, and Abel will leave. Maybe that’s better anyway … but Abel didn’t leave.
“You’ll get the money back,” he said. “Thank you. I didn’t see what happened exactly …”
“Oh, some stupid thing with the straws,” Anna answered. “Forget about the money. You must be … Micha?”
Micha nodded.
“Is your doll okay?” Anna asked politely. “She was lost at our school. Underneath a sofa. I found her, accidentally.”
“Mrs. Margaret,” Micha said. “Yes, I think she’s fine. She’s at home now. We’re not allowed to bring dolls to school, and anyway she always wants too much dessert when we come to the dining hall. Can I keep my euro then, for ice cream?”
“Sure,” Anna said.
“No way,” Abel shook his head. “You’ll give that euro to Anna. Now.” And to Anna he said, “Take it. We’re against antiauthoritarian education here.”
“What?” Anna asked, confused, and then they both followed Micha, who’d worked the small wonder of discovering an empty table. And Abel asked, “Why are you wearing a head scarf?”
“Oh, this, well, um,” Anna said and took it off. “It’s … uh, kind of a replacement for a hat I lost and … um, it’s a long story. So, um, have you seen Gitta? We were supposed to meet here and she’s fifteen minutes late …”
Abel looked around, but of course there was no Gitta. “Hmm, I guess I’ll have to keep waiting,” Anna said. “Does Micha have enough straws for her hot chocolate now?”
“Five. I’ll tell her that she shouldn’t—”
“Tell her that she can bend them when they’re warm,” Anna said quickly. “You can curl them like hair. And make people, too. But I guess she knows that already.” With those words, she sat down at the next table—even though there was room for her at the table that Micha had found.
She took a yellow paperback from her backpack: Faust II, one of the books they had to read before finals. As she opened the thin pages with the tiny letters on them, she thought about a small island in a blood-red sea. She didn’t read Faust II. She hadn’t really planned to. Instead, she listened to the conversation at the table behind her, just as she’d done before. Eventually, Anna thought, her ears would turn around and slowly migrate to the back of her head. And what would that look like?
“Go on,” Micha said. “I will make a cliff with this straw. The island reappeared the next day, didn’t it? And the mare was still there and everything, right?”
“No. The little cliff queen sat on her cliff for a long time, shivering in the cold. When dawn broke, the sea was blue once more. But the sun that rose over the sea that day was a cold winter sun, and it didn’t warm the little queen.
“‘Mrs. Margaret,’ the little queen said. ‘Maybe we’ll die.’ Mrs. Margaret said nothing. She always listened but never spoke. ‘I don’t know what it feels like to die,’ the little queen went on. ‘Nobody ever explained death to me. Not the birds and not the white mare, either. I think they were afraid to talk about it …’ At that moment the water next to the cliff stirred. The little cliff queen grew frightened. A dark round head emerged from the waves, a head with whiskers and glittering sea eyes.
“‘Who are you?’ the little queen asked. ‘Are you death?’
“‘No,’ the something in the sea said, and then he laughed a deep, bass laugh. ‘Death is much bigger than I am. I am a sea lion. Or let’s say: I am the sea lion. The others swam away so long ago that I don’t remember if there were others.’
“‘What is a sea lion?’ the little cliff queen asked and leaned forward to see the creature better.
“‘A sea lion is something that knows the depths,’ the sea lion answered. ‘Something that can swim for miles on end without getting tired. Something that comes from the sea and always returns to the sea. But these descriptions are useless, for there are many creatures who can swim miles on end without getting tired. What a sea lion really is, a sea lion can never know. The others—they can learn it, but he cannot. You can learn it, maybe, if you stay with me.’
“‘But I can’t swim miles on end!’ the little queen sighed. ‘I will drown.’
“‘You don’t have to swim,’ said the sea lion. ‘You own a ship. It’s been lying in the water waiting for you since you were born; it lies hidden in a secret cove, and I have been watching over it. I saved it last night. I pushed it away from the edge of the cliff with my nose so that it wouldn’t be destroyed by the falling rocks. But even I couldn’t do anything to save the island or the apple trees or the poor white mare. I will bring you your ship now and show you how to catch the breeze in its white sails. You must trust me, though. We have to reach the mainland before winter comes. On the mainland, you will be safe.’
“‘Safe from what?’ asked the little queen.
“The sea lion didn’t answer. He swam out a little and disappeared around the next cliff and then returned, pushing the little ship with his flippers. It was green like the summer meadows on the sunken island had been; its three white sails were white like the bed covers of the sunken canopy bed; and the rudder was yellow like the pears on the sunken pear trees.
“‘Come aboard,’ the sea lion said.
“So the little queen jumped onto the ship’s deck. Its planks were golden brown like the floor planks of the sunken castle. From the water, the sea lion told her how to raise the sails and steer the ship, and, as the white sails gathered the wind, the ship moved out to sea.
“The little queen stood at the stern with Mrs. Margaret in her arms and watched the last cliffs of the island disappear.
“‘I’ll never see my island again,’ she whispered. ‘I’ll never lie in the canopy bed and watch the stars again. I’ll never ride through a field of summer flowers on the white mare again …’