Almost Everything Very Fast (13 page)

At that she fell silent, and Albert immediately asked her the question he needed to ask.

Klondi answered:

Albert and Fred walked home as night fell. When they got there, Albert fixed them both some bread and butter, and nodded at everything Fred said without really listening. All he could think about was Britta Grolmann. A nurse who’d looked after Fred at the beginning of the 1980s, and afterward had gone to work at a nursing home near Hamburg, at the other end of Germany. Now Albert knew that much. Or rather: that little. Klondi hadn’t been able to give him answers to further questions. Did Britta Grolmann still work at the nursing home? Did she also live there? Alone? Did she think about him sometimes? Did she fear he might show up at her door unannounced? Would she recognize him? Maybe they’d take each other’s hands. Maybe they’d embrace. Maybe she’d smile. And invite him in. And want to see him again. Maybe every few days he’d take the overnight train to Hamburg. Maybe he’d move in with her. Maybe she’d kiss Fred. On the mouth. Maybe they’d all live together. Maybe she’d read to Fred daily from the encyclopedia. Maybe she’d congratulate Albert for passing his exams. And be proud of him. And talk with him about his future. And tell him about what it was like when she’d been pregnant with him. And about Fred. And about Anni. Maybe she’d tell Albert that she’d been waiting for him.

After they’d eaten the bread and butter, Albert and Fred dozed on the chaise longue, in front of the TV. Albert couldn’t help himself, and kept looking at the telephone; he knew that after everything they’d been through and learned today, it was best to sleep on it. He shouldn’t rush into making this kind of call, but do it with a clear head. He had to keep calm. At this point a few more hours wouldn’t make any difference.

Ten minutes later he locked himself in the bathroom with the telephone and dialed the number he’d gotten from information. It rang only once before someone picked up. “Hello, Golden Years Senior Living Facility.”

“Hi, I’d like to speak to one of your employees.”

“If you’d like to register a complaint, you should—”

“No complaints. Just questions.”

“Who are you trying to reach?”

“Britta Grolmann, please.”

“Speaking.”

“You’re Britta Grolmann?”

“I just said so.”

“…”

“Are you still there?”

“Yes.”

“What is this about?”

“I’m Albert Driajes.”

“Fine—and?”

“From Königsdorf.”

“And why are you calling, Albert Driajes from Königsdorf?”

“You don’t remember?”

“What don’t I remember? Is this a joke? I haven’t got time for this kind of thing.”

“Please, don’t hang up—I think you’re my mother.”

She hung up.

The telephone rang five times before someone picked up.

“Golden Years Senior Living Facility.”

“I’m going to keep calling until you hear me out.”

“You’re on the wrong track.” Her voice was shaking. Albert hadn’t expected that. And even less, the satisfaction it gave him. This woman knew who was on the other end of the line, and even if he couldn’t see Britta Grolmann, he was sure that, unlike the expression in the photograph that had been taken over nineteen years ago now, neither pride nor giddiness was on her face today.

“Have you ever worked in Königsdorf?”

“I’ve never even heard of the place.”

“I’m Fred’s son.”

“Fred who?”

“Frederick Arkadiusz Driajes.”

“Don’t know him.”

“You were his nurse, nineteen years ago. He calls you
the Red Lady.
”

“Must be a mistake.”

“I have a photo that shows you holding his hand.”

“You have no idea what I look like.”

“Maybe it’ll jog your memory when we come to see you.”

It was a bluff. Fred flatly refused to climb into a bus, and Albert had no driver’s license.

A short pause. “
Fred
take a bus?”

A little sigh. “Okay. Call back in half an hour. Then we can talk.”

The telephone rang eight times before she answered.

“Just so we understand each other: I’ll tell you what I know, but after that, you have to promise to leave me in peace. And don’t come up here. No calls, no letters.”

“Fred’s going to die soon.”

“Okay,” she breathed into the receiver, “that sucks. What am I supposed to say? That I’m sorry? I’m sorry.”

“Why did you go away?”

“That sounds pretty damned reproachful. Let’s get one thing straight right away: I’m not your mother. Even if I’m sure that you aren’t going to believe me so easily.”

“No kidding.”

“Fine, you want more details. So you can convince yourself you know the whole truth. But I don’t believe I’m going to be much help to you.
In your memory, the past is always a story
, Anni used to say to me.
In your memory, the past is always true.
She churned out that kind of patter nonstop. You should be glad you missed most of her. There was a rage in her—she woke up with it first thing every morning, flailed it around her all day long, until she nodded off in the evening, so as to let it build again. Fred couldn’t take two breaths without her finding fault with him. Even when her voice gave out and she couldn’t manage more than this husky squawking, she never gave it a rest. On the contrary! Then she ramped it up even more. Spitting bile was her raison d’etre. Most of it landed on Fred. He completely knuckled under to her, indulged her every whim. Brought her tons of flowers, and quoted her at every opportunity.
Mama says
this and
Mama says
that. As if she’d rewritten the Bible. I felt sorry for him. I’d just finished my nursing exams and still hadn’t caught on to the fact that you can’t have sympathy for your patients. Sympathy only causes problems. But that’s exactly what Anni used to lure me in. She wanted me as a helper, because she couldn’t deal with Fred
and
you on her own.”

“Did she ever tell you who my mother was?”

“No.”

“People must have asked.”

“Of course. But that’s precisely why she picked me for the job. My red hair, not my references, were what decided it. She announced on the spot, during the interview, that she’d hire me. On the condition that, if anyone asked, I’d pass myself off as your mother. I should have simply walked out right then, but instead I explained to her that I had a bad feeling about the whole business. I figured she’d tell me to leave. Instead she listened to me, without interrupting once, and when I’d finished she gave me a hug, as if we’d come to some agreement. I was just the one she was looking for. Next thing I knew, she was ushering Fred and me outside so she could take a picture of us, demanding that we hold hands, which was awkward for both of us since we didn’t know each other at all, but I figured it would make the old lady’s day. Her excitement made me think seriously about the job.

“From then on she wouldn’t leave me alone. Day in, day out, she called me up, begging me to take the position.

“One day she actually posted herself in front of my door and implored me. I wouldn’t have to feel like a mother to you, just worry about Fred. She’d take care of you herself. No responsibility on my part. No burden. No stress. Though of course I’d always be welcome to change your diapers, if I felt like it. She assured me you’d be such a lovely son, a gorgeous son. And she said something else, which I still remember today: that you weren’t a Klöble. When I asked her what that was, a Klöble, she just shook her head—she had a tremendously persuasive way of shaking her head—and said,
Some other time.

“The next day, I decided to start. In the end, I believe it wasn’t so much a decision in favor of your family—on the contrary, it was a decision against not helping you.”

Albert didn’t want to believe a word of it. Britta Grolmann had ample reason to lie to him. But as hard as he searched for signs of it, this time her voice wasn’t shaking at all. An empty, anticlimactic sensation pervaded him. “How long did you stay in Königsdorf?”

“Not even three weeks.”

“What happened?”

“At the beginning I tried to keep Fred from going out to the bus stop. I mean, sometimes it was just coming down cats and dogs. It didn’t make sense to me, him standing around pointlessly out there, waving at cars and catching cold. Also, most of the folks in the village didn’t take kindly to it. They saw him as not right in the head, unpredictable. Hero or not. Parents didn’t let their children wait for the bus alone anymore. Naturally, nobody
said
anything. They all just stood around, more people than were actually planning on going anywhere, watching Fred from the corners of their eyes. Fred was pleased as punch.
Almost twice as many people are waiting for the bus, and if something happens again, I can be twice as much of a hero!
I didn’t have the heart to tell him the truth.

“Instead, I tried to distract him. Invited him to help me make breakfast, or polish shoes, or weed the garden. For a while, it worked perfectly. He isn’t as clumsy as people think. Thanks to him, everything went faster. But after nearly a week without any excursions to the bus stop, Fred wouldn’t get up in the morning. I didn’t know what to do. I tempted him with his favorite food, pancakes with raspberry jam. I promised him he could clean the dust out of the corners of the living room—he liked the sound the vacuum made sucking up dirt. I even offered to read to him from the encyclopedia. No dice. He burrowed down in the bed and didn’t shower anymore and couldn’t even be persuaded to eat anything. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say he was depressed.

“It was only when Anni kicked him, literally, out of bed, and forced him to get dressed and tramped out to the bus stop with him, it was only then that things got better. She pointed her finger at me, said I shouldn’t meddle with him anymore. I tried to explain to her that I’d only meant well. To which she replied, only she knew what was good for Fred. Conceited old witch. But she wasn’t so wrong about that.

“After two or three days Fred was back in his old rhythm, counting green cars, and had found his smile again. It was the worst thing that could have happened. If Fred hadn’t been happy again, then we wouldn’t have had so much fun together, and if we hadn’t had so much fun together, then …

“In the handful of days that I was with them, the two of us spent a lot of time together. Fred took me with him on walks and counted green cars, which I noted in his diary. Or he’d lift me up so I could clean the top panes of the windows, so easily, as if I weighed nothing at all. And he introduced me to a horse that he visited all the time, and fed her fresh weeds.

“And one Thursday, I still remember perfectly, he showed me his Most Beloved Possession. It was dark, and we sat in his BMW, the Speedster, as he called it, which was already more or less in ruins. I don’t even want to imagine what it looks like now—if it even exists anymore. Fred showed me a tin box where he kept a lump of gold. An enormous thing. He held it up to the light, gently, as if it were a premature baby, and he seemed so happy that he was able to share this secret with me. I liked that, that closeness. Fred made me feel like I was the only other person on the planet. I didn’t care whether or not the gold was real. It seemed real to me. I could have asked Anni, of course, but after that night I barely had an opportunity.

“I shouldn’t have settled in so well, I shouldn’t have let myself believe that Anni’s house could somehow be my house, too. I shouldn’t have taken it on myself to tidy up the attic, and I certainly shouldn’t have opened that leather-bound portfolio. Anni said,
It’s just his imagination, pure imagination.
But Fred, who’d overheard us, tore the drawing out of my hands:
I made it, it’s all
true
imagination!
At first glance, the drawing simply showed a hand. But somehow it made me so afraid—it was like I was four years old again and lying alone in the dark, listening to noises outside my window, I couldn’t look at it for long, I felt queasy. I asked,
What’s with this hand, what does this picture mean?
, and he said:
It’s my Most Beloved Possession!
Anni, who was holding you in her arms, stepped between us.
He’s confused
, she said, as she set you down in your crib, and tried to take the drawing away from him. And he hit her in the face, he hit her in the face, full strength, and she fell. She hit the floor. And Fred just stood there, saying nothing, breathing as loudly as if he wanted to suck all the air out of the room. And I didn’t move, I didn’t dare look at him, I just listened to his breathing and closed my eyes. I don’t know how much time passed before I opened them again. Fred was gone. His drawing lay on the floor. Anni lifted herself up, blood dripping from her nose onto the paper.
All well
, she said. I wrapped a package of frozen vegetables in a dish towel, handed it to her, and called an ambulance. When the medic arrived, she claimed she’d tripped. Our eyes met. She smiled. And I looked away. At that moment it became clear to me that I wanted nothing, nothing more to do with those people. I stroked your head one last time, and left. You must have sensed that something wasn’t right, you screamed like you’d never screamed before. I can still hear it today. Sometimes, when I’m not feeling well, it’s suddenly right there again, and I almost can’t stand it. I’ve been to every possible doctor, and nobody can explain it to me. The only thing that helps is counting. Fred taught me that if I can’t sleep, I should simply imagine I’m at a bus stop and count the green cars. And that’s just what I do, when the screaming rings through my head. I count and count and count.”

Albert dozed in wine-red light. The red beech casting its shade over him was the only remaining tree in Königsdorf’s cemetery. The town had felled the rest, for lack of room.

Sweat ran down his forehead. The makeup compact lying on Albert’s chest stirred a bit with his every inhalation—he would have liked to open it, to run the red hair within over the scars on his hands. But that would be too risky. One gust of wind and the hair would be gone. Instead, he tugged at his earlobe.