Juli Zeh - Decompression

Until Antje was standing in the room. I’d heard neither her car nor her key in the door. Todd growled at Jola. I wasn’t able to react. I simply sat there blinking. As though Antje’s entrance had turned on a dazzling light, had subjected us to pitiless illumination. A diving instructor with his half-naked client on his lap, caught in flagrante by his domestic partner.

“Okay,” Antje said. “We can handle it this way too.”

In duty bound, Jola jumped from my knees, took a few steps away, and rearranged her clothes with downcast eyes. I’d lost all further interest in the scene before it got properly started. As soon as I stopped touching and smelling Jola, she looked like Bella Schweig again. The way she was staring at the floor, her hair hiding her face, her hands smoothing her T-shirt over and over. Maybe the actors’ curse was that they couldn’t stop playing themselves.

Antje stood three meters away, unquestionably identical with herself. She was quivering. I felt impatient. Where were you so long, I have urgent matters to discuss with you, I wanted to ask you a few things. Can we please call a halt to this nonsense and have dinner. A glass of wine, the warm lamplight on the table . In the actual situation, there was nothing to say. Once again, I’d let myself be caught off guard by a chimera. Jola was a mistress of her trade. I would have gladly gone back to the usual order of the day, even though I knew, of course, that such a thing couldn’t happen without further ado. Because it was becoming absolutely necessary for someone to speak, I asked the only question that interested me: “Why did you kill Emile?”

That worked as though I’d thrown a switch and activated a brand-new, hitherto-unknown Antje. She didn’t even raise her voice. In fact, she spoke rather softly, but with a sharp edge in her tone more penetrating than any volume. “Actually,” she said, “I was willing to let the whole thing rest. All this”—she made a sweeping movement with her arm that took in me, the house, and herself—“is more important to me than your childish affair. But I won’t allow myself to be humiliated. Bringing your lover here now is just outrageous.”

“Jola’s not my lover.”

The edge turned into hate. “Maybe,” Antje said, “I’ve made it too easy for you the past few years. I’ve let you withdraw further and further into your own world and lose all sense of reality. In the end, it’s probably all my fault.”

Her speech was seriously getting on my nerves. That wasn’t the Antje I knew. She didn’t sound like the girl who’d lain on the floor of my room at home, eating jelly babies with the first Todd. She sounded like a public prosecutor. Moreover, I now knew that she had Emile on her conscience. It was typical of female perpetrators to avoid answering the main question and to react instead with recriminations. I had no desire whatsoever to thrash the matter out. I didn’t want dinner anymore either. I just wanted to get in bed, pull the covers over my face, and sleep for twenty hours. After that, everything would be normal. Normality was the least a person could demand of life. But Antje wasn’t finished yet. She looked at me pensively, hesitating as though she had to make a decision. Then it came.

“Let’s put everything on the table,” Antje said. “I’ve got a lover too. His name’s Ricardo. We’ve known each other for a year.”

I stared at her, dumbfounded.

“It’s a draw,” she said, smiling painfully. “Maybe the only chance for a new beginning.” She swept her hair off her face and took a deep breath. “I love you, Sven. Unlike you, I have no problem saying so. The thing with Ricardo is purely sexual. You’re a pretty sporadic lover. And sex is very important to a young woman like me.”

When she came closer and put out a hand, I stepped to one side.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “I’ve always taken care to protect you. Nobody knows about this. We’re in Spain, after all. Only Valentina and Luisa are in on it, because I sometimes need help with logistics.”

I didn’t know any Ricardo. I was convinced she was lying, and precisely that was what hurt. Her wish to wound me wounded me. It was so important to her, she’d stooped to an absurd story that insulted us both. “I think you should go now,” I said.

She began to weep silently, nodding as she did so. While she was in the bedroom, stuffing some things into a travel bag, I realized that Jola wasn’t there anymore. She must have dissolved into thin air at some point during Antje’s lecture. In any case, I couldn’t remember when she’d left.

Antje came back in. She stood still in the middle of the living room, uncertain about what form to give her farewell. I would have liked to stand up, take her in my arms, and say a few nice words. But I remained on the couch, empty-headed and heavy-legged, unable to move. At some point, Antje turned around and left. I heard Todd’s paws clicking on the tiles in the hall. I heard the front door close and Antje’s Citroën start up. Then the sound of the engine faded into the distance. The ensuing silence was different from what I’d imagined it would be. Less restful.

JOLA’S DIARY, ELEVENTH DAY

Tuesday, November 22. Morning .

Life can be so strange. A naked nightmare one moment and wonderful the next. As Daddy used to say: Child, never forget you’re a girl. When you feel like shit, it’s because of hormones. Or Mama: The question isn’t how you feel, but how you look. Or Theo: You only feel lousy so I’ll feel guilty .

Sven said, I’ll kill the son of a bitch. Before that, he said, Everything’s going to be all right. Both times, he looked as though he meant it .

Sven as a murderer — unimaginable. Even though by now I can actually imagine just about anything. All I have to do is walk on the promenade and someone starts dying. A little spot out on the sea. It’s weird, the things that cross your mind at times like that. When I wanted to get in the water, I was thinking only about what a good swimmer I am, and that I could do it. And that such a heroic deed would get news coverage in Germany as well as here. And that in the end they’d have no choice but to give me the role of Lotte Hass. I could see it already: I’m sitting in my apartment, candles lit, music playing, and on a shelf the Silver Bear from the Berlin Film Festival. The cell phone’s switched off, because I can afford the luxury of being unreachable. I’m sipping wine and reading one of the scripts from the pile on my desk .

But the old man held me back. While we searched for a lifeguard, he was probably thinking about how he could use the scene in a story. Two desperate tourists run up and down the beach, and out in the sea a swimmer struggles for his life. Stark and brutal. Nothing kitschy. When someone’s dying, that’s always art .

One hour later we were on the promenade, standing a little apart from the other rubbernecks. We watched the swimmer’s body on a stretcher as it was raised up to a helicopter. There wasn’t much to see. It was completely covered by a tarpaulin. We couldn’t even tell if it was a man or a woman. Seeing that packaged corpse didn’t bother me. I don’t cry at funerals, either. Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Lukas, Aunt Miriam — the Pahlen family is numerous and given to drink. I never cried on any of those occasions, they didn’t matter. What’s the fuss about, when we all know we’re going to die? In the presence of death, everybody acts as though it doesn’t exist. It’s the opposite with love .

But when the helicopter lifted away, the tourists relaxed their necks, and the old man pressed me against him, I suddenly knew what I must do. Apparently I had to come here in order to realize it. I had to meet Sven. I had to see someone drown. You only live once. That’s something Daddy always says, but he just means you shouldn’t have any consideration for anybody else when it comes to making money. I watched the helicopter fly away and decided to live my life without Theo, starting now. Because I can’t do it alone, Sven will help me. Only four more days. Things have to be clarified before our time here is up. I must force Sven to come to a decision. I must tell him what the old man does to me. Then we’ll see how serious Sven is .