Julia Franck - Back to Back

It was true, survival at any price wasn’t worth it. Thomas never wanted to be like that. Footsteps die away, we have reached the house, / the house with windows always blind / She will not stay for ever / but she will stay for now, will stay for now / wearing the heavy yoke for years. / Life groans only slowly by. .

There was a kitchen window looking out on the yard, and he sometimes took the entrance gate into the yard. He stood in the back entrance and looked up to the second floor, where the light in the kitchen was still burning. Perhaps it would burn until morning. Weren’t there people who left lights on at night? The moans of lovemaking echoed down, from whose window, where from? Once he had seen her at the window, closing it. Did Marie want him stealing around her apartment? She would certainly be afraid he would be seen, would be sleepless and freezing. I know the leaves rustle in the wind, / it is cold, they fall from the trees. / I have walked long enough, long enough. / I will go home now to my grave. / Like me, lost armies / grope, searching, through the void / I see their desires but / there is nothing I can do.

While Käthe was away working in Leuna for weeks, only sometimes coming to Berlin on a Sunday, the twins were brought back from their foster-family. All anyone could say about them was that they told lies, stole things, and fought. It was the summer holidays, so they didn’t have to go to school. Thomas had no idea what they did when he and Ella were at work. On his free days, and whenever he and Ella had time, he sat on the veranda with her preparing her to take the final school exams. Her evening classes were over now, and the exams were at the end of the month. Ella didn’t know very much. Thomas kept patiently explaining mathematics to her from the beginning, over and over again. For chemistry, he built a model from balls of clay and matchsticks. The clearer something seemed to Ella, the less she could remember it. Historical dates had been difficult; she simply couldn’t keep them in her head. Not even the date of the founding of the German Democratic Republic. Thomas told her to write little notes for herself. After each of his questions, Ella rummaged among the pile of notes on the table in front of her. Now he asked: The founding of the Republic?

But instead of the date, Ella said: I heard just now on Radio Free Berlin that they shot someone at the border yesterday. He was just eighteen, the same age as you.

What else?

They left him bleeding to death. Our border soldiers watched, the Americans watched. No one helped him.

Maybe he was lucky. Thomas yawned. He had no time for digressions; in an hour he must set off to work the late shift. Ella had better spend her time studying, he thought, not indulging in pointless thoughts.

Lucky?

Free for ever.

And I’ve been thinking recently, the odd way you’ve sometimes been behaving, said Ella, chewing her pencil and stripping the paint off it with her teeth, I’ve been thinking that you may have the same thing in mind.

What, getting out of here? Thomas shook his head. He couldn’t suppress a grin. Why would I make other people into murderers? He took the little beaker out of his trouser pocket, held it firmly and unscrewed the lid, then screwed it up again. And I couldn’t lie around somewhere on the beach of the Wannsee, knowing I’d never see any of you again. Thomas tried to make the beaker disappear inside his fist, but it was a little too large, or anyway he couldn’t close his fist round it entirely. Perhaps his left hand was larger than the right? When he looked up he saw that Ella had put her pencil down on the table and was picking her nose with relish. Hey, stop that, he said, trying to grip Ella’s wrist with one hand. Thomas hesitated. He felt some excitement at the idea of letting Ella into the secret. The way she rolled her eyes showed how little she thought of any of his existential questions. Here — he held the open beaker in front of her nose — freedom can be for ever.

Ella narrowed her eyes. She firmly turned away. What is that? Poison, am I right?

Poison, yes. The two of them spoke at almost the same time. Thomas screwed the lid on again, and put the beaker back in his trouser pocket.

Keeping it for yourself? Her lips were narrowed, she had closed her eyes as if she had just fallen asleep sitting where she was. She said nothing for quite some time. She had seen nothing and heard nothing. As if the tension between them had to relax, she let her lips tremble. Thomas remembered the horses that used to pass through the garden, whinnying and snorting, their muzzles distending when they galloped. Ella bared her teeth, pursed her lips, rolled them and then squeezed them tight, and finally said, very distinctly: 7 October 1949.

Good girl, good student. It was a part that she played especially for him, as Thomas knew. She wouldn’t hold him back; her own happiness was no more important to her than his. When did Ulbricht become head of state?

1960.

More precisely. What happened first, how did he do it?

Ella’s eyes were still closed. She spoke like someone conjuring up spirits — first Wilhelm Pieck died — and as if some higher being were whispering the answers to her. Two new committees were set up, she tentatively suggested, as if the higher being was giving only cryptic answers to those questions, and she couldn’t really understand what it was telling her. The Council of State and the Council of National Defence. And hey presto, Ulbricht was the first President of the Council of State.

Hey presto? That made Thomas laugh. Maybe you ought to mention one or two of the aims of the construction of the Socialist state?

I could, she claimed, having briefly opened her eyes and squinted at him to make sure he was laughing, after which she closed her eyes again and gave him a lopsided grin. But I’m not going to. I’m not going to take those exams. She folded her arms and pouted, like a defiant child.

You will take them, we’ll see about that.

I have to go and bathe now. Coming with me? And I’ve finally got hold of a bucket of paint. I’m going to start painting this evening. Don’t you want to see my apartment? Now she was gathering up the notes on the table and stuffing them into a large envelope.

Sorry, I have to get to the suburban train. I’m on the late shift all weekend.

Ella took note after note out of the envelope again, studied them as if looking for a particular question or answer. She had written on both sides of many of the notes, the question on one side, the answer on the other. 13 August 1961? Baffled, Ella held the note. Did she really not know what the question about that date could be? Cautiously, she turned the note over, then she folded it, tore it in half, and wrote something on the blank half.

Thomas stood up. He wanted to find out where the twins were before he had to go to work, since he would not be home until tomorrow morning.

Wait a minute. Ella held the note she had written out to him. He didn’t read it, but put it in his trouser pocket and went down the steps into the garden, where he had heard low voices. The twins were sitting on the bottom step, playing at kissing.

Müggel Schnüggel Flüggel, the rising sun had set the lake on fire. Ella was swaying, and in her dizziness she put one foot carefully in front of the other to reach the water. The sand was soft, and still cool with morning. The long pine needles of the Brandenburg Mark gave way under her bare feet. Ella was thirsty, she wanted to wash the acidity off her face. Was it only the wine, or had she thrown up while half asleep?

She put her right foot in the water first. Thomas would have stepped in with his left; as a left-hander, he favoured his left foot. The lake was still warm from summer. Her legs didn’t want to walk, didn’t want to stand. Ella lay down in the lake.