Julia Franck - Back to Back

Can we help? There it was, the caster’s deep and by no means agitated voice. Ella turned to him. He was trying hard to look into her eyes, but his glance kept slipping down to her breasts, at which his journeyman was also openly staring.

It’s okay. Not too bad. Ella sucked her thumb with a smacking noise.

A plaster? The man was still standing there rooted to the spot, but was now looking around him.

Nonsense, I don’t need a plaster. Ella took her thumb out of her mouth and held it proudly up. All there, I haven’t cut anything off. Sure enough, the thumb shone as rosy as a baby’s, except that there was still a crescent of red paint, not blood, under the nail. The cut was fine and only superficial; the skin was closing and looked almost white. Ella leaned forward again, her hair was hanging down into the drawer, and she fished in the dark depths with her fingers to where all she could feel was wood. She drew the huge, shallow drawer out almost to the point where it would go no further, stood close to the opening and stretched, swaying slightly and finally lying right over it, to get at the two tubes she had spotted at the very back. There was a glow of purple from the depths of the cupboard; her magnolia would have a blue tinge. Suddenly something cracked, the drawer sagged beneath her breasts. Quick as lightning, Ella took her arm out of the deep cupboard and braced it under the drawer, trying to hold the heavy thing in place, but next moment it crashed to the floor. Ella, bending over it, was swaying with the drawer against her knees, so that she slipped, she tried to regain her balance with her hands, the drawer dropped on her feet, and Ella propped herself up on it with her fingertips. The thin wooden bottom of the drawer had broken away from the frame opposite her, pencils, pens, brushes, paints, everything had been slipping about in it. Some of the contents had jumped and rolled out of the drawer. Only now did Ella feel her toes and the instep of her right foot hurting. The drawer had fallen half on the floor, half on her feet.

All right? The caster placed one hand on Ella’s back. Her voice was shaking slightly, but she said: Yes, fine, it’s okay. The warmth of his hand aroused her. Ella let out a cockerel screech: Cock-a-doodle-do, cackle cackle ackle, pant ha rh’ai, herbai, herbai.

Help me, will you? said the caster to his assistant, taking his hand off Ella’s back, and together they lifted the drawer slightly to one side so that Ella could move her feet freely. She wriggled the toes of her left foot, all of them, except for the second, her longest toe, which had swelled up dramatically within a few seconds. Little spots of clear red blood were seeping through the grazed skin of her instep. The foot hurt so much that Ella could hardly lift her toes.

Can you put any weight on it? The caster held his arm out to Ella to help her to support herself. But Ella tried to do it without support. A step, another one. Like a dancer, she spread her hands out, away from her body. She could walk, but the pain came in waves; if it seemed never to have been there at one moment it overwhelmed her the next, making her grit her teeth at the same time as she cried out. Her cries were shrill but not piercing. She didn’t want to bring Käthe down on them. Käthe would surely still be deep in an important discussion with the lodger of his possessions, the property of State Security, and as it was State Security and the people were the state, strictly speaking it was all about not just state-owned furniture but the rightful property of the people. Ella took a third step, the caster walked beside her, holding his arm at an angle in the air, so that she could catch hold of it at any time. Ella was lurching, but she was sure the caster didn’t notice. She imagined a silk thread holding her up like a puppet, no pain in her toe could affect her, as a puppet it was easy to walk with your head held high. Right — Ella hesitated — right, left. Something pricked the bare sole of her foot. Now she did lean her left elbow on the caster’s handsome shoulder, holding the back of his neck with her hand. She raised her left leg and looked at the sole of her foot. There was a drawing pin in the ball of it. May I? The caster wanted to help her pull the drawing pin out. He smelled of masculinity, of copper and of weight. Ella tried to think what the smell reminded her of. It was not a question of being able to take the drawing pin out, she could have done that for herself, it was only a harmless drawing pin pricking her, it didn’t hurt. But Ella liked the way he had asked permission. Liked it that he was finally paying her attention, without falling for her straight away when her bare breast lay against his shirt, against his shoulder, and when he bent down, her hair falling around his head, when he bent down and she saw the pulse in his throat, when he bent down to pull out the drawing pin. The man who never tried to talk to anyone but Käthe, who hung only on Käthe’s lips, well, she would open his blind eyes today.

The caster was red, red all over his face as he straightened up, and showed her the sharp little pin.

Pretty, said Ella. She was waiting for him to look at her, first at her breasts, then at her eyes, then at her breasts again. With slight pressure, she moved her hand from the back of his neck to his throat. It seemed to Ella that his pupils widened, his eyes shone. Was that lust in his eyes? His firm shoulders did not shake, that caster could hardly fall for anyone, at most maybe he might sink for someone a little.

Ella turned her head. The journeyman was standing in front of them, keeping watch, his arms hanging down, his hands, probably unknown to himself, clenched into fists.

Coffee time, master, said the journeyman. But Ella kept her hand on the caster’s neck.

Coffee time. There’s always cake on Sundays, master.

The master craftsman did not even nod, but turned his head, with Ella’s hand on his neck, and looked at Ella’s mouth as he spoke to her.

Want to come with us? My wife has baked a cake. She bakes a cake every Sunday.

Come where, to Schöneiche? Ella was amazed by this idea, and laughed out loud. What would she do in Schöneiche?

Wait a minute. The caster knelt down on the floor in front of Ella. He took hold of her ankle and told her to lean on him so that she could lift the foot. Ella did as she was told. She propped herself on the caster’s shoulder with both hands, and obediently raised her foot in the air. The caster held her ankle, bent the foot forward and back, forward and back. That one’s all right, now the other foot. Ella changed to stand on her other leg. The caster moved the swollen foot up and down, the sprinkling of blood was already drying up, no blood was flowing, a scab would form, that was all. The caster put his other hand round her ankle and placed her foot back on the floor. Involuntarily he touched her muscular calf, the back of her knee, and looked up, raised his face with his head tilted back. His mouth was level with her crotch, tiny dark stubbly hairs showed on his chin. There was a tingling in the pit of Ella’s stomach.

The journeyman noticed, he was watching. Ella was sure that there couldn’t be any noticeable contact between them. The journeyman believed in his master’s honour, he was standing guard over it.

Thanks, but I’ll just clear up here. Ella moved her feet. She saw her footprints in the white stone dust on the floor.

We’ll help you. The journeyman sounded relieved; at last his fists unclenched, and he moved to help Ella. He handed her a small tube with purple paint sticking to it. Ella read the label: egg tempera. She wasn’t going to mix watercolours and tempera, the tempera would absorb all the paints into it, there would be nothing light and watery and hardly any glow to her magnolia. While the caster tied his shoelaces with great ceremony, Ella and the journeyman turned to the drawer. With a small hammer that had been lying on the workbench along with larger ones, the journeyman knocked nails into the drawer so that the bottom of it fitted firmly into the frame again. Together, they lifted and slid the drawer into place; it took several attempts. As Ella was not looking at the journeyman, he probably thought she didn’t notice him glancing at her breasts.