Adam and Evelyn (28 page)

“MY GOD,” KATJA SAID
, pointing to the little folding table, “what’s all this?”

“That’s not all—there, the whole bed’s full, and there’s another box of them too.”

“And who did this?”

“Some crazies maybe or the Stasi, not a clue. Didn’t Marek come along?”

“He’s meeting with his professor, can’t get away. Did they tear up all the photographs?”

“You can see for yourself. Take your coat?”

“Are you two taping them back together?”

“That’s all we’ve been doing for two days now.”

Evelyn took Katja’s coat and hooked the hanger on the top edge of the wardrobe.

“If you put them in an album maybe it won’t be so apparent to people.”

“That’s what I’m doing right now, an album with all of his creations, at least those that are halfway useable. He can make a presentation when he applies for a job.”

“You’re nothing short of heroic.”

“If you’d ever told me I’d be restoring my enemies to their glory—”

“Well, at least pictures of them.”

“Those are my enemies, you know, the women and the photographs, maybe their pictures even more so.”

“Are they all black-and-white?”

“He’s always photographed just in black-and-white.”

“So tell me,” Katja paged through the album. “Attractive woman. Is she here too?”

“You mean—”

Evelyn nodded, took the album from Katja, and thumbed through it. “This one here, Lilli I and Lilli II, and she’s at the back again in an off-the-shoulder item.” She handed the album back.

Katja smiled. “Funny to picture it. Does he have a thing for pudgy ones?”

“They’re not all like that.”

“She’s not the youngest anymore either.”

“Doesn’t bother him.”

“He’s a talented fellow, your Adam,” Katja said, clapping the album closed.

“Want something to drink?”

“Hey, now this is wild.” Katja bent down over a photograph that was missing its lower half. “Did you ever see him like that, with long hair and a beard?”

“Before my time. He’ll be right back, a quick trip to the supermarket.”

“How awful!” Katja said, sat down on the edge of the bed, and slid a photograph, reassembled with cellophane tape on the back, from the table into the palm of her hand. “Barbarians!”

“You can say that again.”

“Are these his parents?”

“I think so.”

“Are you two talking again?”

“Now and then, the bare necessities. Want some tea?” Evelyn pulled a large tile from under her mattress and placed it on the carpeted floor just beneath the outlet. She filled a pot with water and set
it on the tile. Then she took an immersion heating coil from a hook beside the washbasin.

“Aren’t you allowed in the kitchen anymore?”

“Yes, we still are, but I’d rather be up here.”

“I’ve ordered an extra key for you. The security deposit just passes from me to you. Michael’s completely all right with that.”

“Except that Adam won’t go along with it.”

“Doesn’t need to know, you can tell him that Marek or my family is paying it.”

“Adam still has his car money.”

“He’d do better to use that for a new camera. Say! Is that still our jar of mustard, from the campgrounds?”

“The Angyals wanted to send it along with him.”

“Can I have it once it’s empty?”

Evelyn nodded. “Don’t you dare say a word to Michael about the baby, okay?”

“Wouldn’t think of it. But he’s going to find out at some point. And what if it’s his?”

“Let’s not, not right now. An alteration shop has responded. Adam can start with them, half days at first.”

“That was sure a throwaway line.”

“Let’s wait and see.”

“And? Is he going to take it?”

“With him, that’d make three of them, and the boss comes from Tehran, a Persian.”

“Adam needs to get out among people. Does he still play with it?”

She was looking at the windowsill, on which lay the two socks and the Rubik’s Cube.

“He keeps trying, over and over. Did you ever solve it?”

“No. But I never tried that hard. Where’s Elfi, by the way?”

“Under the radiator. Elfriede doesn’t like it here either.”

Katja edged three parts of a photo closer together.

“Adam is a very handsome man, short, but handsome.”

“Except he hardly eats anything now.”

“What I don’t get is that they let Adam back in.”

“They thought he had left that first night for the West and was only now coming back. All the people in his compartment wanted to know what it had been like.”

“When the wall came down?”

“Yes, where was he and what had he done.”

“Marek says that they could close things up tight again very quickly.”

“I told Adam that too. They’re going to lose all control.”

“And what did it look like?”

“Everything in shambles, just look at it.”

“I mean in the East, in general.”

“Not much different, nothing special.”

“Did he bring some books back with him?”

“Why books?”

“Well, I thought, since you’re such a bookworm.”

“He just packed up the photographs, a notice that his new Lada was ready to be picked up on September twenty-ninth, and my headband that goes with the summer skirt with the red polka dots. Not one pair of shoes, no coats, nothing.”

Katja stood up when Adam entered the room. They shared a brief hug.

“Am I interrupting something?” he asked.

“We’re not about to let anything interrupt us, right, Evi? Here, a little present, supposed to be good.”

“Cigarillos? Look like luxury goods.”

“Marek was in Amsterdam, bought them for you there. And from me you get your handkerchief, laundered and ironed, as promised.”

“And still blue checked, too,” Adam said.

“Katja wanted to know what it was like.” Evelyn removed the glue and cellophane tape from the shopping bag.

“Behold the mess,” he said.

“Did they break in?”

“You could call it that too. Some through the door, some through the window. Must have been quite a lively coming-and-going.”

“Those bastards,” Katja said. “Well, at least you can laugh at it.”

“I don’t know,” Evelyn said, “if that’s what I’d call laughing.”

Adam edged his way between the bed and folding table to the window and opened it. “Any objections?” He carefully opened the package and took a whiff of the cigarillos. “Nothing like going out in style,” he said. “I’ll be sure to offer Uncle Eberhard one. We’ll see if he knows a good thing when he smokes it.”

“At least Mona was able to deal with the mailbox, even without a key,” Evelyn said and pulled the plug on the immersion coil.

“I don’t get it,” Katja said.

“She claims she never got our letter with the key. At least that’s what she told Adam.”

“And your mother?”

“She won’t answer the phone. I don’t know what’s up there.” Evelyn took the butter and the shrink-wrapped cold cuts from the bag and laid them on the tray.

“And how did it look?”

“Beautiful, a blanket of leaves over the grass, flower beds, paths. The quince had lost their fuzz and were shiny, all the other trees were bare, and my old garden shoes were still standing side by side in their niche under the porch roof …”

Evelyn pushed reassembled photos and photo scraps onto a piece of cardboard and cleared a place for it at the foot of the bed. She had heard Adam’s story only once before, but as he retold it now it was as familiar as if she had been there herself. She could see all the things she hadn’t thought about till now, because she wouldn’t be seeing them ever again: the gate, the garden, the house, the three steps up to the door. She heard the adhesive seal being ripped open and felt the chill pouring out at Adam. The chill surprised her too. The washing machine in the guest bathroom was missing. The pane in the door to the hallway was cracked. How dark it suddenly was as he closed
the front door behind him. The fridge and the stove had been hauled away, the kitchen tiles were covered with broken dishes like from a
polterabend
the night before a wedding—she had to stop at the kitchen door and stare at it. And the mixer tap was missing from the sink.

Evelyn made sandwiches. The butter was soft. She had to put her shoulder to the living-room door. Something heavy scraped across the floorboards. As she worked her way through the crack, she could see what she already knew. Nothing was left untouched. Hoping to open the door wider, she first tried shoving the bookcase that held their records to one side, but it was wedged against the upended and plundered writing desk. Shredded photographs or crumpled letters and bills everywhere. She immediately began to gather things up. She picked up pieces of records only if there was something she could read.

It wasn’t until she had worked her way across the room to close the window that she noticed its crossbar was broken and sagging. It took her hours to collect the photos, or what was left of them. She even managed to get the desk back on its feet and shove it to the wall.

Now she poured the hot water over teabags in a glass teapot. Back in the hallway she opened the door to the cellar, reached into the corner behind it, found the flashlight, moved slowly down the stairs, and shined the light into the darkroom. It was empty. In the midst of all this devastation, this emptiness comforted her too. All that was left of the jars of preserves in the entryway were circles in the dust on the shelves.

Adam laughed. Katja said something. Evelyn had finished the open-face sandwiches, and now cut them into quarters, garnishing them with chives, horseradish, and mustard, and between each an alternating pattern of cornichons and mustard pickles. Arranging them carefully, she took her time, as if Adam’s story would last only as long as she kept busy.

She just glanced into the bath and other rooms. It was the same everywhere. She was afraid of going upstairs to the studio.

Evelyn handed the platter to Katja and Adam.

Through the open door she could see the smaller of the tailor’s dummies hanging on the hook that held the Christmas star. The larger one lay slashed open on the floor. Something stinky had been poured over the rolls of fabric. As she turned around to descend the stairs, she couldn’t help noticing the large snow-white bra draped on the door handle. She had picked it up herself that day. She had been certain that it would in fact be there glistening white amid the wreckage, as shiny as the quince in the garden. She took it with her.

But did she really still not know what to do with it? She held a lighter under it and once it caught fire, hurled it like a torch into the living room.

Adam laughed again. No, it wasn’t laughter, but “laughter” was the only word Evelyn had for it.

Adam tossed the butt of his cigarillo into the yard and closed the window. Evelyn wanted to hear more, she was also prepared to make more sandwiches, to wash and dry dishes. What mattered was that he went on speaking. And it was only now Evelyn realized that she could believe Adam again.

STEPPING FROM
the subway car, Evelyn let the others overtake her. For a moment she stood there alone on the platform. It belonged to her now, to her route back from the university. It was still unspoiled by worries, untouched by bad memories. And she herself was not the person she knew, but the someone she had always pictured when she thought of the future.

Startled by Adam at the top of the subway stairs, she stopped for a moment. Although she was happy to see him waiting for her.

“Where have you been?” he cried once only a few steps separated them. He looked at his watch and waved Katja and Marek over.

“Am I too late?”

“Actually we were on our way to a pastry shop, so we wouldn’t arrive empty handed.”

“I thought Gabriela and Michaela were going to bake something for us?”

“Who?”

“Our new apartment mates.”

“For the pupil’s first day of school—well, belatedly,” Marek said and handed her a small traditional cardboard cone full of goodies.

“Congratulations,” Katja said and gave her a hug.

“Thanks,” Evelyn said. “But all I have for you is this.” She extracted the half-full mustard jar from her pocket.

“That’s hardly all,” Katja said, holding up her hand with its ruby red ring. “Besides, there’s only one of these!” She snapped the glass with her finger, eliciting a bright, echoless tone.

Evelyn hooked her arm under Adam’s. They crossed the street and walked along beneath the chestnut trees.

“Michaela and Gabriela,” Adam said.

“Nice monikers,” Marek said.

“And from excellent family,” Katja said.

“What do you mean, ‘from excellent family’? What are you talking about?” Adam said.

“But it’s true, you’re now members of a very upscale shared-apartment community. Also known as a SAC.”

“We used to call them a kommunalka.”

“Right!” Marek exclaimed. “The old kommunalka.”

“I’d rather have something of our own, doesn’t have to be so special, but with our own bathroom and toilet, if only because of the baby.”

“In this neighborhood you won’t find anything like that.”

“Or a cellar,” Marek said. “I once lived in a cellar apartment.”

“Would be my choice.”

“But not with a pregnant wife, Adam. You can ask them both to be godparents.”

“And there really is a garden?”

“You look out onto a garden, but it’s only for the people on the ground floor, who also own the place. They’ll definitely have no problem if you want to set the buggy out on the lawn, or let Elfi scramble around a bit.”

“And the security deposit? Can you cover it?” Adam asked. “We’ll spoon-feed you that as quickly as we can—”

“Spoon-feed?” Marek asked and smiled.

“Pay me back bit by bit, in installments. No problem, really it isn’t,” Katja said and thrust her arm under Evelyn’s, so that the four of them now took up the width of the sidewalk.

Evelyn was moving as if in a dream. She heard the voices of the others, but wasn’t about to let anything disrupt this new life of hers. With each step that brought her closer to her own room with its hardwood floors and a ceiling of fine plasterwork and that huge kitchen, the more certain of herself she felt.