Freak City (18 page)

“I wanted to play you the new songs!” she said suddenly, as if she hadn’t just said something kind of important, and jumped up from the couch. “The Colored Pieces. End of August is our first concert. You have to come! I’ve heard that a talent scout from the Pop Academy will be there, so I have to be good. I have to. I
have
to!”

I knew that—she had written it in her e-mail. I had already circled the date on my calendar with a fat marker. She shoved a CD into her brand-new stereo. Sandra had an old one and a new one, a record player, and Internet radio. Music was just about the most essential thing in her life. A hard guitar riff droned through the speakers, and then Sandra’s voice joined it.

“Incredible, isn’t it?” She jumped around the room, grabbed the pencil case that was lying on the desk, and held it up to her mouth like it was a microphone. Then she sang along at the top of her lungs.

The impromptu show was impressive; she had perfected her dance moves. And she knew exactly what effect her voice had on her audience. She could do things with her voice that were truly phenomenal. Every new sound gave the listeners chills along their spine. When the song was over, she swung her hips in circles, put her left hand on her hip with a yawn, and batted her eyelids seductively.

“Did you do an internship with Pink?” I laughed.

Sandra puckered her mouth for a kiss. She was so hot. I asked myself how that moron Daniel had managed to blow it with this incredible woman. He had every opportunity with her, and yet here she stood in front of me, sending me clear signals.

A new song began, a slow ballad, and Sandra swayed gently in time with it. She started to sing again, this time with a smoky tone in her voice, as if she were slightly tipsy and needed a guy like me in the worst possible way right then.

Heat moved up my neck. I leaned back on the sofa and watched her. She looked beautiful and that voice pushed me over the edge.

With Leah, I’d never experience anything like that.

Sandra danced closer. “So, what’s up with you and that . . . little miss?” She had stopped singing and stood in front of me with her hips swaying. I swallowed. “Well, nothing actually. We’ve had a falling out.”

Sandra grinned. “That was fast. Claudio was already afraid that it was something serious.”

I noticed a new photograph on the wall. Sandra and Daniel in a tight embrace. The picture couldn’t have been more than two weeks old.

“Why afraid?” Suddenly, the mood was shattered. Seconds ago, I had been turned on, and Leah had been banished to the farthest corners of my mind. But Sandra’s comment and that picture had catapulted Leah right into this room.

Sandra hunched her shoulders. “Be honest, how should that work, you and her? You could forget about just about everything. Disco, parties, movies, music. Everything that’s cool, you couldn’t do anymore.”

She was right, but then again not. I could do many cool things with Leah, too. But Sandra wasn’t finished. “And what a thing to do to your parents! Just imagine you bring this Lisa home with you. Should your parents suddenly take up sign language? Even you know better than that!”

“Her name is Leah,” I corrected her.

It was weird to hear Sandra talking so persistently like that—and in the background, her songs continued to play, one after another. It was as if there were two of her talking at me. Singing and talking in stereo.

My eyes scanned the many photos of her. The entire room was filled with Sandra; it was difficult to get away from her.

“You have to think of Iris, too. A girlfriend who just sits there as if she had swallowed her tongue? Who can’t tell little jokes and be part of the conversation? You could just as well go out with a mannequin.”

And then I’d had enough. Sandra’s voice coming at me from two directions, all those pictures on her wall, and Daniel looking down at me with a sneer. The perfume she loved so much hung in the air like an empty promise.

“I think I’ll be going now,” I said gruffly.

“Are you sure that’s what you want to do?” Sandra stopped with the hip swaying, gently pushed me back down on the sofa, and sat on my lap. Our faces were practically touching each other. “Let’s not fight!” Sandra’s voice took on a soothing tone. “It doesn’t matter anyway, now that we’re back together. Just don’t imagine for a second there could be anything between you and her!” She giggled like she had just made a joke.

She pulled off her tank top and scooted closer. Her bra was new, a fancy, lacy bit of lingerie with a silver plastic heart dangling between her breasts. Maybe she had bought it for Daniel, who had been too drunk to take it off her.

“I’m home alone all weekend,” Sandra whispered. She kissed my forehead. “Mom decided to go off with one of her friends from work at the last minute. Visiting some other city.”

I could feel myself getting a hard-on. I definitely did not have this situation under control.

Sandra winked at me. “I thought you wanted it. You do know, don’t you, that there are plenty of guys who envy you for being with me?”

She reached behind her back and took off her bra herself. It slid off her body and her heavy breasts hung directly in front of my face.

“I’m sure there are,” I said. I tried to breathe slowly.

Sandra shook her head. “You know, it would be absurd somehow, if the next chick you went out with after me were deaf. When you were together with me before that. That would be a weird . . . such a weird feeling for me. As if you wanted to get back at me or something.”

“What do you mean by that?” I asked, irritated now.

“You know. How would it look if my successor was a girl who carries a handicapped ID in her wallet?” She giggled. “It’s obvious you didn’t really fall for her. You just went through the motions so I would feel like shit. To make me look bad in front of everyone and humiliate me. But it’s okay, I forgive you . . .” She kissed me gently on the tip of my nose. “You just made all that up because you wanted to get me back. But now you can admit it: that girl is in an entirely different league. She isn’t even close to being serious competition for me! And she never was.”

Gently, I pushed Sandra aside and stood up. It’s absolutely true that guys think with their dicks. But a few of my brain cells were still working in spite of everything. “I have to go now,” I said.

Sandra stared at me, bewildered. “You can’t be serious!”

I nodded self-consciously. “I’m sorry. But I don’t think it’s a good idea for us to end up in bed right now.”

Sandra laughed in disbelief. “Okay, if that’s what you want. I hope you’ll regret it in about five minutes.” Enraged, she put her bra back on. Her seductive look had disappeared; instead she glared at me accusingly. She sat in a sulky position on the sofa—it looked like she was freezing.

“I gave you time,” I explained calmly. My pulse hammered and it was hard to get my desire under control. For seven weeks, Sandra had left me wondering if there would ever be anything between us again. And since our one night in the tent, we hadn’t had sex with each other. At the sight of her naked breasts, I had nearly exploded. But I still couldn’t do it. Or didn’t want to. Not now, at any rate, after she had kept me at a distance for so long. Not while that picture of Daniel hung on her wall, and not after those nasty comments.

She didn’t know Leah at all. And she didn’t know me. This time she had judged me all wrong. “I gave you time to make a decision. And now I need some time, too.” I looked at Sandra. A few things were becoming clear to me now.

I went to the door and turned around to her one more time. “Why do you think we should get back together again, anyway?” My question sounded unusually aggressive. I wanted to believe that she had cried every night for seven weeks for my sake. I wanted to believe that she had truly missed me and knew now how deep her love for me was. But deep inside, I suspected this was all about her wounded ego.

Maybe Sandra just didn’t want to accept the fact that her competition was someone who couldn’t even imagine music. Everyone admired her for this great talent, but in Leah’s world, that ability didn’t even exist. From Leah’s perspective, Sandra was just one cute blonde girl among many. Without anything that made her special. Without a special gift. Just one part of a sweaty wave moving on the dance floor.

But maybe Sandra just wanted to make sure that she could still have me, anytime, anywhere. That she only needed to snap her fingers in my direction, and I would throw everything else away for her sake.

Actually, it did me good to turn the situation around for once. She was right, there were plenty of guys who would envy me for being in this situation. Almost every guitar player within forty miles had the hots for her. But there were also girls who were interested in me. I was done being the eternal booby prize. She had complained that I was so passive and didn’t take any initiative. She could hardly say that about me anymore.

“You can be so mean sometimes!” she said, and pulled her clothes on again.

“You, too,” I reminded her.

She got up from the sofa and gave me a kiss good-bye. “But you’ll come to my concert, okay?”

She kissed me again, and her right hand stroked my hair. She was right. Five minutes had gone by, and I regretted not having taken advantage of the opportunity. There wasn’t exactly an overabundance of sex in my life.

“Mika?” I looked at her. “You have to decide by the concert. I’m not someone to pine away after a guy or wait forever and a day. You know that.”

I knew it. There were exactly fourteen days until the concert.

The next day, the weather was better, and I took a bike ride with Iris. Our mom had gone to some gardening exhibition with Aunt Vera and wouldn’t be back until late in the evening. Dad was still away with his hiking friends.

I hadn’t heard anything from either Sandra or Leah. By now, I was seriously asking myself if it hadn’t been the biggest mistake of my life to leave Sandra sitting there half-naked yesterday.

“I’m in love now, too, you know,” Iris said. We had pedaled around the lake once and sat at an outdoor café right on the water eating soft pretzels and drinking lemonade.

“What do you mean, you, too?”

“Just like you and Sandra!” Iris explained. “We want to get married and maybe even get a dog.”

“Sandra and I split up,” I explained for the hundredth time. My little sister would never understand it.

“And who’s the lucky guy?” The family at the other end of our picnic table stood up and walked away toward the bike stands.

“Amira,” Iris said proudly. “She and her family come all the way from Turkey, and her dad has a restaurant.”

I took a sip of my drink. Great. If Iris was a lesbian now and brought home her gastronomical Turkish lover sometime soon, maybe it wouldn’t be so noticeable that my girlfriend hardly ever talked. But Iris was seven. She obviously had no idea what she was talking about.

“Have you kissed each other yet?” I asked, teasingly.

Iris gave me an irritated look. “No! We play house. But we always fight about who has to be the dad.”

“Are these seats taken?” A man looked down at me. Next to him stood a woman and behind her . . .

“Hey, dude!” It was Kevin, Franzi’s brother who had translated for me and Leah at the pool. I stood up. I could see Franzi and Marcel coming toward us, too. When the two of them spotted me, they seemed happy to see me, in spite of the argument Leah and I had gotten into after the concert.

“Do you know each other?” Franzi’s dad turned around and addressed his daughter in sign language. She nodded. Somewhere in the jumble of flying fingers and hands, I thought I recognized the name sign for Leah.

“Do you mind if we join you?” Franzi’s mom asked in a friendly voice.

“Oh, yes!” Iris slid over to make room. I noticed immediately that she was making mooneyes at Kevin. So I guess that was the end of the Turkish/lesbian phase.

Franzi and Marcel sat across from me. The entire table spoke in sign language all at the same time, and Franzi laughed. Occasionally, Franzi’s mom translated a few phrases for me. It was about a trip to Berlin that Franzi and Marcel were planning to take at the end of summer vacation. Marcel had an aunt there who owned a tailoring shop.

“H-i-c-k-e-y,” I heard Kevin explain to my sister. His hands made a rather obvious sign, and Iris copied his gestures. The prompt for the sign was unmistakable: Franzi had a hickey on her neck that looked like she had scalded herself with a pitcher of hot water. My mother wouldn’t have let me leave the house looking like that.

“Why did you learn sign language?” I asked at some point.

Franzi’s mother thought about it. “Maybe it was because Franzi was our first child,” she answered. “She learned sign language in preschool and then taught it to her little brother later. It was wonderful to see how perfectly the two of them could communicate. My husband and I took lessons then, too.”

I nodded. Franzi’s father turned to me. “But it wasn’t an easy decision back then. Even some of the experts advised us to use as little sign language as possible. They thought it was more important for Franzi to learn to talk and read lips. Deaf kids are taught mainly through reading lips. Until recently, sign language wasn’t even allowed at schools for the deaf, and almost none of the teachers knew it! Franzi is quite good at reading lips, but it’s been our experience that serious conversations are only really possible in sign language.”

“How do you learn to talk if you can’t hear your own voice?” Now I had gotten curious.

“There are special education centers,” Franzi’s dad said. “All through her childhood, Franzi had to go to a special audiology center. The therapist showed her what it had to feel like in her throat when she pronounces a certain letter. How the tongue has to be positioned, how the air has to flow. It’s incredibly hard work. And in school they worked on articulation. Franzi hated that. They constantly had to touch each other’s mouths, and the teacher was tough on them.”

I stole a glance at Franzi. Her family obviously brought out the best in her. There couldn’t have been a starker contrast to my frustrating experience at Leah’s house.