Sven will believe him. Sven’s had no experience with lies. The way he gawked when we were down at the port! The loneliness without end that spoke out of his eyes. A ship will come in, but it won’t be his. Meanwhile he’s the one asking for more time. Let’s not rush things. Let’s make no waves. He still hasn’t told Antje. But I know what to think about that. It’s not for lack of love. Men are simply cowards. That’s why they make such good perpetrators. No, stop: Sven’s no perpetrator. Sven’s a victim himself. All you have to do is listen to him to know that. He didn’t leave Germany as a winner, he left as a loser. And now he likes to drone on about the war zone.
“Are you going back to Theo?” That’s what his eyes said down at the port. My silent reply: “Have I left him, then?”
Sven didn’t stand under the window and call me last night. All the same, after the old man went to sleep, I walked down to the edge of the rocks overlooking the sea. Down to our spot. But the pounding of the waves scares me. It’s as if the bit of rock I’m sitting on could be ripped away at any time.
I don’t dare to think about how I behaved in the van earlier. How I sat between lover and life partner and sucked up to both of them. I made jokes about Bittmann’s guests to please the old man. Because he’d acted friendly for a few minutes. Because he’d tried to fight for me by throwing Sven in the water. The perpetrator acts, zing, and the victim’s back. If I could look at it from the outside, I’d have to puke. I’d turn the music loud out of sheer nausea so no one could hear my screams and punish me for being not only a disgusting whore but also a disgusting ass-kisser.
The truth requires only a few words: I’m at the end of my rope. Taking a lovely trip together, maybe even turning myself into Lotte, trying for happiness with someone new — rubbish, all of it. I’ll always go back to the old man, again and again, until he destroys me. I need help. Sven has to make a decision. This isn’t your standard case, where the man can take his sweet time deciding which woman he prefers and in the meantime amuse himself with both. What we have here is an exception. If Sven really wants me, he has to do something.
13
“Hold on, Sven, I have a confession to make,” said Theo, standing inside the door on the driver’s side of the van. I was behind the wheel, having just dropped him off, and about to drive over to the Residencia. I’d put the van in gear, reached out to close the door, and there he was. It was about seven thirty in the evening and had been dark for a good hour already. Theo leaned across me and switched off the engine.
Jola hadn’t come diving with us that morning. Her monthly visitor, Theo had explained. After our second dive, he’d talked me into doing a third and then a fourth, speaking so urgently I wondered whether he wanted to go home at all. It was already dusk when we climbed out of the water for the last time. Now my main thought was dinner. Antje had called to tell me she was cooking paella.
“I’m really sorry. It was stupid, but I don’t want you to think we’re wrecking your whole guesthouse. It was an accident, truly, I have no idea how it could have happened. Maybe too much good island food. In any case, I’ll obviously pay for the damage, no matter what it costs.”
“What did you break?” I asked.
“Oh, I haven’t told you yet?” He laughed.
My expression didn’t change. I’d been thinking about the situation all day long, but I hadn’t made any sort of progress. I’d persuaded myself I wasn’t even sure whether there was a “situation.” The answer to the question of what was going on, if indeed something was going on, kept slipping through my fingers. I felt ashamed and didn’t want to know what I was ashamed of. In a way I’d even been glad to see that Jola wasn’t going to come diving with us. My head felt like an overheated engine. Maybe I was just exhausted. What I needed was a tranquil dinner with Antje, preferably with candlelight and soft music. A miniature paradise.
“Absolutely vast,” Theo said. His head was tilted back, and he was looking up. “You can’t see this in Germany. There’s the Milky Way, directly above our heads. The starry sky you’ve got here is a work of art.”
He looked at me admiringly, as though the firmament were a result of my efforts. “All right, then,” I said. “Good night, Theo.”
“I hope it wasn’t an heirloom,” he said. “The chair, I mean.”
Obviously Theo wanted to be asked what had happened. I bit my lip. And then I put the question anyway: “What happened?”
“Don’t have a clue, man.” Theo was looking up again. “Maybe I dropped down on it too hard. The thing just came apart. Mind-boggling, all these stars.”
“Were you … dancing?”
Theo removed his gaze from the universe and contemplated me pensively for a while. “Let’s say the evening got a little wild.”
“Is it possible that the chair … went flying?”
“I threw it across the room in anger. It hurt pretty bad at first. Maybe you noticed the bruise on my thigh.”
I could have said with some certainty that there was no bruise on Theo’s thigh.
“But not to worry, nothing else got broken.” Theo laughed. “Then we heard the dog barking and turned off the music. I hope our rumpus didn’t wake up you and Antje.”
“No,” I said.
“So don’t look like that.” Theo nudged my shoulder. I immediately raised a hand to fend him off. I didn’t want him touching me.
“I’m not allowed to have fun with her anymore? Look, she’s not your property, got it?”
“She’s my client, Theo. That’s all.”
“That’s the correct attitude.” He nodded gravely. “She’s paying you to see to her every need while she’s on vacation.”
“She’s paying me for diving lessons.”
“Okay.” He folded his arms. “Let’s clarify things, once and for all. We’re alone, nobody’s listening. We’ll talk man-to-man. Understood?”
I nodded. I felt an enormous need for a thorough clarification.
“I’ve allowed you to give her a little pleasure,” said Theo. “But my relationship with Jola is none of your business.”
Exactly my take on the matter. I relaxed a bit.
“So I’m asking this for the last time: stop denying the obvious. It’s bad form.”
“But I’ve …,” I began, but then I fell silent at once. It wasn’t worth the trouble. He wasn’t about to believe any assertion of mine.
“Good boy. Just keep your trap shut.” Theo lit a cigarette. “The whole thing may seem weird to you. Believe me, I don’t find it so great either. But Jola refuses to go back home, and I refuse to leave her here alone. So we’re going to stay through the remaining six days, and after that you’ll never see us again. Maybe you and she will exchange a couple of e-mails, but before long the correspondence will die out and the thing will be forgotten. You’ll get on with your life and I with mine.”
I felt sudden relief. Even though Theo was proceeding from false premises, he was speaking to me from his soul. It was almost as if I were listening to my own thoughts. Rational and clear. Free from the strenuous and, all things considered, totally superfluous confusion of the past few days.
“We can get along extremely well in the time we have left,” he continued. “Provided we behave like adults.”
He drew so deeply and appreciatively on his cigarette that I had a sudden urge to smoke one myself. Apparently reading my mind, he held out the pack to me and gave me a light. I inhaled and coughed, enjoying the slight dizziness.