Adam and Evelyn (16 page)

“An excuse? Because somebody stole my passport, I decided to cut and run? Not even Austies would buy that.”

“Who?”

“The Austrians.”

Evelyn stared straight ahead. When Michael tried to put an arm around her, she squirmed out from underneath.

“What’s wrong? You mad at me?”

“I’m just trying to picture it, with you in a refugee camp, and both of us starting from scratch. And when things get tough, we’d remember running hand-in-hand over the border.”

“Evelyn, you won’t have to go to a refugee camp, and you don’t have to cross illegally somewhere.”

“But I think it’d be so beautiful to do it with you.”

“Things will turn romantic enough in due time. Just wait till we’re in Brazil.”

“It has nothing to do with romantic.”

Michael took a deep breath. “Right now at least, it’s going to be plenty unromantic.”

“Maybe Adam can drive us to Budapest.”

“And why Adam?”

“I thought you were broke?”

“I’ll borrow some money.”

“From who? From the Angyals? And then with a smashed window and no driver’s license all the way to Budapest?”

“I can take the train or a bus, if you like that better.”

“And why just you? My papers are gone too!”

They looked at each other. Michael was about to say something when the hotel’s exterior lights went off.

Before their eyes could adjust to the darkness, a blue police light pulled slowly into the parking lot. Holding hands, Evelyn and Michael groped their way down the stairs and made for the blue light.

“I’LL SIT
in the back,” Evelyn said when Adam opened the passenger door for her.

“Then Michael should sit up front, long legs have more room up here.”

Michael hesitated and cast Evelyn a questioning glance.

“We’ve got to pick somebody else up, come on up front,” Adam said.

“Who, Pepi?”

“No, Katja, from the campground.”

“Who, might I ask, is ‘Katja from the Campground’?”

“The girl I gave a ride to.”

“Taking a little excursion together?” Michael asked as he got in up front.

“She hasn’t got her PP either, and you need your PP whether on our side or yours.”

“Your what?”

“Personal papers. She doesn’t have hers anymore. Otherwise our German brothers and sisters might take her for a Hungarian, or a maybe even a Russian who happens to speak very good German.”

Adam started the engine and gave the dashboard three raps. “Hang in there, Heinrich. Budapest or bust.”

“He always does that, don’t pay any attention.”

Michael watched Adam put the car into gear, release the brake, and pull away.

“Adam’s superstitious. He’d like to have his horoscope done every day.”

“Doesn’t sound all that bad, your Heinrich. How many cylinders?

Four?”

“Three. He’s a sixty-one. My father pampered and coddled him. Only drove on Sundays or now and then to the theater. He wanted to go easy on him, it was always easy does it.”

“It rubbed off,” Evelyn said.

“Makes sense to me. An old-timer like this can be worth more now than it was new.”

“This is no old-timer. I drive it like I would any other car, as you can see.”

“It’s earned the title after thirty years’ service.”

“Drives like a dream.”

“Well now,” Evelyn said. “Let’s hope so.”

“You can trust me.” Their eyes met briefly in the rearview mirror. “He’s never let me down so far.”

Evelyn smiled a derisive smile and leaned her head against the window.

Katja was waiting beside the road.

“Whoa! Is she planning to move out?” Michael asked.

“She’s wearing my hat!”

By way of greeting Katja patted the right headlight before picking up her plastic sacks, Adam’s sleeping bag, the air mattress, and the tent. Adam opened the trunk and packed it all in as she handed it to him.

“That’s one big girl,” Michael whispered.

“Has a nice figure though,” Evelyn said and smiled as the door opened and Katja sat down beside her.

“Hello. I’m Katja.” She gave Evelyn her hand and reached forward to shake Michael’s as well. “Thanks for letting me come along.”

“We’re all in Adam’s hands, like it or not. Isn’t that right, Adam, you have to put up with us now.”

“Like it or not.”

“Oh, come on, you’re enjoying this.”

“I’m not sure ‘enjoy’ is the word I’d use for having to cart you guys back and forth in this glorious weather.”

“Fate has destined you to play the role of our knight in shining armor,” Katja said. “But I can’t think of a better one.”

“Could you turn on the radio, Radio Danubius,” Evelyn asked. “Or is it still on the fritz?”

“Let’s have a sing-along instead,” Adam said, adjusting the rearview mirror. Katja was smiling.

“Are you planning to stay on in Budapest?” Evelyn asked.

“I thought that if we don’t get this taken care of today—a person’s got to sleep somewhere.”

“Our guys will take care of it right away,” Michael said.

“Do you have passport photos?” Katja asked.

“I haven’t got anything left, barely four hundred forints.”

“That’s not so bad, that’ll last you two, three days.”

“I don’t even have a watch.”

“That get stolen too?”

“I had to leave it at the hotel, as a deposit for all the calls I had to make.”

“To your family?” Adam asked.

“To credit card companies. I needed to block the accounts.”

“Two weeks ago people still needed baby-sitters, I was making twenty Westmarks an evening sometimes, that’s six hundred forints. But the work’s thinning out now,” Katja said.

“You running short?” Adam asked.

“Around a hundred Westmarks, but the families from the West are almost all gone.”

“Five evenings baby-sitting, and she has more than we’re allowed
to exchange,” Evelyn said. “Do you really think it’ll take the embassy more than one day to deal with our papers?”

“I have no idea how it’ll go. The important thing is that you guys don’t desert me.”

“In Budapest?”

“In the embassy. I don’t have a visa. If they find out that I’m actually not allowed to be here—”

“Merde,” Michael said and turned around. “How did that happen?”

“Didn’t Adam tell you? He smuggled me across in his trunk.”

“Really?”

“I thought you all knew that.”

“This may turn out to be loads of fun.”

“If the three of us go in together and you don’t leave me all on my own—”

“I’ve heard they hire taxi drivers to kidnap people. And you’re going to the embassy voluntarily?” Evelyn said. “Where are your papers?”

“I tried to swim the Danube. Turned out not to be such a great idea.”

“People have drowned trying it,” Michael said.

“Can’t say.”

“If things start getting sticky for you, you tell them the truth, simply the truth and that you’ve since reconsidered. They’ll buy you a train ticket back,” Adam said.

“Suddenly they’ll take good care of you,” Evelyn said.

“They’ve always taken good care of us,” Adam said.

“You sound like a Party nabob.”

“What do you mean?”

“ ‘Taken good care’? They treat us like their property.”

“I mean the train ticket. You need to get back home. They’ve always seen to that. Every embassy does that.”

“Except that ours likes to let a few people vanish along the way,” Evelyn said.

“Don’t believe those fairy tales—”

“They’ve even disappeared some of our people,” Michael said.

“And not just a couple.”

“But not anymore.”

“Oh yes, still happens.”

“At any rate they won’t make Katja disappear.”

“Yes sir, comrade Adam.”

“I was a comrade at one point, in fact.”

“What? A Communist?” Michael said.

“For almost two years, joined before I was drafted, and right back out again on release. Meteoric career.”

“Don’t worry. Adam didn’t even bother to show up to vote last May.”

“And what happened?” Michael asked.

“Nothing, there was nothing they could do to him. Me—they would have tossed me out, from my training course.”

“They didn’t make any trouble for you?” Katja asked.

“Adam’s got powerful girlfriends who need a good tailor.”

“Bull. What are they supposed to be protecting me from?”

“No shame in admitting that a couple of nabobs’ wives are among your clients.”

“What do I care about their husbands?”

Evelyn laughed. “Nope, you don’t care about their husbands, it’s definitely not them you want to get back home for.”

“When are you two leaving?” Katja asked.

Adam downshifted because he couldn’t pass the truck ahead of him. The road was windy and narrow.

“Not certain yet,” Adam replied. “How long are you staying?”

“Me?” Michael asked.

Adam nodded.

“Three more days. I’ve already used up more vacation time than I have. But I’ll be back, every weekend.”

“Well yes, that’ll depend on the weather too,” Adam said.

“Thanks to you both for thinking of those things,” Evelyn said, took the straw hat from Katja’s lap, and put it on.

All four stared straight ahead, as if hypnotized by the truck’s antistatic strap dragging along the asphalt, bouncing at times like a hand waving.

“NORMALLY YOU JUST
hold up your passport and they let you in. But in this case …”

“They’ve figured that trick out,” Adam said and took a sip of his beer. Michael was having a bottle too. They were sitting on Margaret Island in Budapest, not far from the green tent—pitched close to the water but hidden by bushes—where Katja and Evelyn lay asleep.

“How late is it?”

“Somewhere between one and two, I’d say. You’re the one with a watch.”

“I forget to wind it sometimes, and then I can’t be sure of the time.”

“Mine’s an automatic, self-winder.”

“At home I don’t need a watch. This one is a present from Evi.”

“A man always needs a watch.”

“Actually all I want now is my new Lada, and maybe a second garage, but otherwise …”

“My ex always says—”

“Who?”

“My ex, my former wife. I was married once, about as long as you were a Party member.”

“And what does she say, your former wife?”

“If you love someone, she says, you always know what to give them.”

“Do you believe that?”

“That’s her best quote. I really couldn’t think of one other thing to give her.”

“Maybe she had everything.”

“It used to be I’d just walk along the street and instantly see something.”

“What I’d most like to give Evi is admission to a university.”

“That’s easy for us, you give it to yourself as a gift and can study forever.”

“No limits?”

“There are people who’ve stretched it out for ten years and longer.”

“Over here you first have to be selected for admission, and if you aren’t—Evi got such a stupid evaluation her senior year, because she was the only one in her class who smoked, and showed up late sometimes, even though she lived just around the corner. Her grades were good, but she was turned down twice to study art history.”

“Art history is a good way to starve.”

“What do you mean? They don’t earn less than anybody else.”

“Maybe on your side, but you need to find a job first.”

“Once you’ve been admitted to study, then at the end you’ll get a job too. The university even has to make sure you’re taken care of.”

“Why the university?”

“It’s better if you find a job yourself, but if you can’t, they have to find something for you, or let you continue studying.”

“Now that’s strange.”

“Ask Evi.”

“How long is your provisional whatchamacallit good for?”

“Till the thirteenth,” Adam said and pulled the four-page, six-by-eight-inch document from his shoulder bag. “ ‘Provisional Travel Pass A 08969, for Hungary, the Czechoslovakian Socialist Republic, and the German Democratic Republic (Bad Schandau).’ What do you think—could I find work on your side?”

“If you really want to, why not?”

“It can’t be that easy.”

“Anybody who wants to work can find work.”

“But not necessarily the work you want.”

“No problem. You need an idea, an idea, and elbow grease and a little luck. Sometimes all it takes is being friendly.”

“Isn’t everybody friendly over there, at least the ones who want to sell you something?”

“Any of you folks who are good at what you do will find work on our side. There’s always room at the top. What makes you ask?”

“We can’t live with the Angyals forever.”

“They idolize you, you’re the ideal son-in-law.”

“Erszi isn’t all that bad either.”

“Her mother? Are you serious?”

“Why not? She might be even younger than you?”

“Well, I certainly wouldn’t put it past you.” Michael held his beer out to him, Adam tapped the bottle with his own.

“Were you ever here before?”

“No, the East never interested me much. It got left behind twenty years ago.”

“You mean in terms of economics.”

“Any manufacturer who calls his bus the Icarus,” Michael said with a laugh. “How do you think that’s going to turn out? Progress is at home in the West.”

“I don’t live badly.”

“If your nabobs would release the cancer statistics, you wouldn’t say that. Take Rositz, just a few miles from your doorstep, spews filth that would be forbidden in the West. Inconceivable! Mona showed me that tar pit once. A plague pit. It’s criminal.”

“What is it you do actually?”

“Cellular biology.”

“Okay, and?”

Michael smiled. “We’re trying to figure out why we get old and die, so that someday we won’t get old and die.”

“And why do we get old and die?”

“Do you really want to know?”

“Yes, of course.”

“When cells multiply, when chromosomes are copied, a little something always gets lost, a piece gets lopped off every time. At some point so much information is missing that the cell goes bad, that’s after about fifty cycles. But that doesn’t have to be the case. If cells could reproduce without any loss, we would continue to live, which is to say, we don’t have to die.”