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“I never want to see you again.”
The echo in my head wouldn't die down.
There I was, in the middle of the pouring rain, completely soaked, completely lost, completely alone, in the middle of a main road, in the middle of the night. And a basketball under my arm. Basically, I wished I could spontaneously get run over by a four-ton truck. Maybe a car would do, either way, but somehow I felt like dying. A fleeting thought, I certainly didn't want to die. But at that moment it seemed like a viable solution.
The rain had long since washed the blood off my left hand, and yet dark red threads sparkled on the wet ground - maybe it was just my imagination. Why on earth do people tend to short-circuit? I cursed all my emotions and gritted my teeth. Get out of here, or I would stand here until dawn, and then again until dusk, until I ceased to exist.
At home, I threw the door into the lock with all the strength I could spare. I don't really remember why I did that, but it felt incredibly good for a few seconds. As I wandered through my modest pad, more disoriented than determined, I slipped my boots off as I walked, letting my jacket slip off my shoulders and smacking it on the floor, adding a few muddy splashes to the wallpaper. The ball also went carelessly to the floor, bounced up repeatedly and finally rolled into a corner. It had been pretty stupid to just run blindly through the small wooded area and stumble countless times, in my right mind I would never have come up with such a stupid idea; but my mind was scattered in fragments over the past time and had to make friends with the idea of not being picked up again so quickly.
My long journey through the small apartment led me to the kitchen, or the battleground of the fattened souls, as a good friend used to refer to it. Ironically, given the situation, this term took on a whole new dimension. With an absent-minded movement, I opened the fridge and randomly grabbed the next best bottle from the corner with the high-proof drinks. I didn't care what it was exactly, I wasn't even thirsty or even craving it, so I brought the neck of the bottle to my mouth, thought better of it and simply dropped the container, causing it to shatter on the kitchen floor and the glittering crystal shards to further decorate the chaos. Unable to think straight, I pulled the rain-soaked pack of cigarettes out of my pocket, tried unsuccessfully several times to light a cigarette without watering it down and then absently threw the lighter into the corner and crushed the watered-down cigarette on the floor.
I exhaled sharply and tried to collect myself. My brain welcomed this suggestion and a wonderful stabbing headache promptly joined the rest of the pain. Fantastic. I don't know how long I stood there like that, but eventually I sluggishly crept into my bedroom, swept aside a pile of magazines, books, worn linen and whatever else you could store on a bed and dropped onto the mattress, which complained with an indignant creak. I sighed. I couldn't think of anything better. And then I started to cry. Without realizing it. There I was, the sad remnant of what I used to be. Had I ever actually cried? The last time I cried was when I was eight, when my father beat me up for the last time before my mother left him head over heels with me that night. I hadn't cried at the death of one of my best friends. And now I was lying here, putting my pillow under water. Selfish me. Self-pitying idiot.
Lo and behold, apparently my mind wasn't completely lost after all. At least it forced me to come to my senses and reminded me that lying here and blubbering wouldn't change reality. I overreacted. Me, of all people, Mr. Self-Control. No, that shouldn't be the case, so I suppressed my tears and rolled to my side. With one hand, I reached under the pillow and pulled out a crumpled, cut-out photo, stared at it, and finally tore it up, tossing the remnants into the air with a flourish and watching the scraps slowly sail to the ground. “As a reminder.” These words burned in my ears, although they referred to something else.
I had to systematically go through the story from front to back and look for the mistake.
It began as it often does in the morning. Just like every day starts before school. I was in the eleventh grade of a high school for boys and girls, the only one of three high schools in the neighborhood that was not an all-boys or all-girls school. It was the start of a new school year, eleventh grade, as I said, and therefore also the start of the upper school. I was planning to do my A-levels and then, well, something else. It's not that I lacked prospects, but I was undecided and didn't want to think too far into the future. My mother moved to Hamburg during the vacations so that she could pursue her job there, and I was left with the apartment we had shared for over eight years. Not big, two bedrooms (one of which now served as a junk room), a bathroom and a kitchen. But it was perfectly adequate for two people. And even more so for one person.
I didn't mind living alone. Quite the opposite. No one constantly nagging me to be tidier and take more care of the household. Admittedly, I am a slob, and not just too much of one. “If you keep things tidy, you're just too lazy to look for them” was pretty much my attitude, and for my part, I got on well with it. I was able to do the necessary household chores and, contrary to some opinions, I cleaned the toilet and kitchen regularly. Everything was clean. Just messy.
Messy. Good keyword. The alarm clock rang, I sluggishly peeled myself out of bed and staggered into the bathroom. If anything could really wake me up in the morning, it was the sight of myself in the mirror; an experience every time. I would have to do something about these dark circles. And my hair. And my face. And generally, I needed to be someone else.
I turned on the tap, washed my face, blinked the water out of my eyes. Jesus, how did the leaves get into my hair? I laboriously cleaned the long shaggy, red-colored strands from most of the botany. The rest would be removed in the shower. That was the next port of call.
What a night. Never again a vacation farewell party. No more alcohol. “Of course,” I heard my subconscious agree ironically.
Be that as it may, water is the source of life, and they probably say that rightly. When I looked in the mirror after showering, the image no longer seemed quite so catastrophic. In general, I was rarely embarrassed by anything, but I didn't exactly find myself attractive.
Enough self-deprecation, I dressed as usual, a plain yellow T-shirt and loose black jeans that were torn in several places, on purpose of course. If it hadn't been intentional, I would have been annoyed because I wouldn't have had the money to buy new clothes.
The small accessories were still missing, such as the silver necklace with an imitation razor blade pendant, the two silver earrings and a decorative bracelet made from paper clips. What can you do to look original, right?
One last look in the mirror, everything was there except for the shoes, so I added black Land Rovers (Deichmann shoes were still cheap back then), satchel over my shoulder, and then out of the house. Conveniently, I'm one of those people who always stow all their essentials in their single rucksack and therefore always have everything to hand. The man's handbag, so to speak. I take out my pack of cigarettes and light up the first cigarette of the day, partly to satisfy my addiction and partly to do justice to my image. And out of routine.
And the routine was to continue in other areas. The vacations had only just ended yesterday, but that didn't change the school routine. The same route, the same building, the same people. Just routine.
And as always, Pete and his three buddies (who no one seemed to know by name and who never said anything substantial enough to engage with) stood at the gate and mobbed anyone who came within range. Four idiots as they were in the picture book, wannabe fascists. Bald skulls, bomber jackets, brass knuckles in their pockets (which in most cases were used to open beer bottles). Plus a huge range of warnings from the school and several attempted reprimands, but Pete's father was sitting somewhere in Düsseldorf and so the authority of the oh-so-objective and uninfluenceable systems was once again circumvented.
As always, I walked past the four of them with a visibly feigned smile. The herd had been silent since the day I had broken one of their arms in a fight, unintentionally actually, but the effect had something to it. Big mouth, nothing behind it, and so the three sheep cowered behind Pete whenever I passed by. That was fine by me.
In the school playground, there was another big hello and reunion with people we hadn't seen since the vacations. And also with the people I'd had a run-in with yesterday. Sabrina, a pretty blonde girl from our class, stormed off, threw herself around my neck with loud screams and almost strangled me. She may not have been the conventional average girl considering this behavior, but I liked her exuberance and twirled her around in my arms several times before putting her back on the ground and then getting a sugary sweet “hello” that I returned imitating her tone of voice. It wasn't that easy, after all it was the first word of the day after a really long night.
“Oi, Daniel, my old man, what's new?” came a voice from the side that belonged to Jan, my best buddy and half-brother, so to speak, considering the time we spent together, mostly in the company of Sabrina and a few other people who were also milling around outside the entrance to the school building. Jan was simply hilarious: his straw-blonde mane, groomed by emphasized carelessness regarding a haircut, blew happily back and forth in the light morning breeze, and his blue eyes, as always, radiated an incredible cheerfulness that was simply infectious. To see him sad, the world would have to end or something equally bad would have to happen.
“You should know that better than anyone,” I replied with mock seriousness, ”You brought the stuff yesterday. You're lucky I didn't wake up in the ditch again, otherwise you'd have been due now.”
If he didn't have ears, Jan would have grinned three hundred and sixty degrees.
“Yeah-ha!” he resumed the conversation shortly afterwards, while I tried to wriggle out of Sabrina's grip, ”But while you were still coming out of your coma, I was already asking about the news here.”
He grinned again, either in pride at his news or at my desperate attempt to free myself from Sabrina. I looked at him quizzically, so eager to continue.
“Yep.” he started again, ”We're getting a new one. He's an import from another school, has been left behind and is repeating the year with us.”
“Wow, that's great,” I blurted out. I didn't exactly think it was a memorable event.
Just as Jan was about to broaden the subject, he was pushed down by an elbow on his head, which belonged to Alexander. The almost two-metre tall giant often liked to abuse Jan as a support, which wouldn't have been so bad for Jan if Alex didn't have a back like a battleship to match his height, so the weight of his muscular shoulders and arms on the other man's head wasn't exactly pleasant.
Alex was eighteen, a year older than average, so he even had a driver's license. Jan, Sabrina and I were seventeen. Alex's face, however, was more suited to a thirteen-year-old, which was obscurely at odds with his stature, and yet his patronizing smile radiated a certain maturity. However, he tended not to express that maturity through adolescent pratfalls. Well, be that as it may, despite all his silliness, the giant with the brown hedgehog hairstyle was a loyal friend when you needed him. Just like now.
Suddenly, loud voices rang out from the entrance gate, comparable to primate roars; Pete and his billiard ball clique were shouting something, or rather someone, with radical right-wing slogans. Civil courage is something that most people lack, but I picked out the people who also had this quality. So Alex, Jan and I sprinted over to the four fascists.
There we had the reason for their primitive outburst of verbal violence: a boy about our age, obviously of Asian origin, Japan, China, I don't know, I'm struggling to tell the difference. The poor guy found himself caught in the crossfire of the four thugs and their profanities as Pete was grabbed by a strong arm and thrown around until he found himself in a headlock under Alex's arm.
The other three backed away reflexively in response - Alex with their head monkey in his grasp, that was a pretty big tactical disadvantage for the pitiful guys.
“Listen, Pete,” Alex hissed at his captive, ”I've told you often enough that I don't want to hear any of that shit around here, alright friend?”
At these words, he squeezed harder and Pete went red in the face, stammering something that probably meant “Okay”. Then Alex released the bald man from his tight embrace with a swing and gave him so much speed that Pete stumbled forward and hit the asphalt. He picked himself up, stared angrily and visibly hatefully in Alexander's direction, muttered something insulting under his breath and left with his pack. Alex put his hands on his hips in triumph and grinned after the fascists, while I turned my attention to the victim of the four.
A handsome little fellow. Taller than me (not really much of a feat considering I'm about 175 cm tall), just over eighty-one. Exotic facial features with sparkling deep brown, almost black eyes and jet-black hair tousled in all directions with gel and decorated with blonde highlights. In addition, a stately figure with broad but shapely shoulders and bronze-colored skin, implied muscles, concealed by a light blue shirt and wide jeans, all this in a posture that was as upright and proud as a flagpole. Respect. Never before had I noticed so many positive characteristics in one person.
He eyed us as intently as I did him, with a frown that gradually brightened. Then he bent down briefly to pick up a school bag. When he was level with our faces again, he looked a little embarrassed and lost. Jan was the first to regain his composure and elbowed me in the ribs, then took a step forward and slapped the new guy amicably on the shoulder.
“Hey, man, that was dicey, wasn't it?” he joked, regaining his usual grin (didn't Jan's face ever hurt from grinning?).
The other boy looked down briefly, then back at Jan and smiled shyly.
“Yeah, I guess that's it.” he finally said, ”Thanks for your help, guys.”
“Well, you're welcome.” Alex's voice boomed down to us from several centimeters above our heads. “I'm Alex, this is Jan and the sweetie next to me is Dani.”
At times like this, I wished I could look deep into Alex's eyes and roast his brain with the heat in my gaze, but I would have needed a stool to be at eye level with him first.
“Yes.” I replied flatly instead, ”And Alex still hasn't been educated by his mom about the difference between cock and no cock.”
A short pause followed, then the new guy smiled more confidently.
“Aha, nice to meet you,” he replied in a chatty tone, ”I'm Myku. Micky for all I care, like the mouse.”
He turned to Alex and added dryly, “And I'm a cock.”
Even the Titanic couldn't have broken the ice any better. We all burst into silly laughter, it seemed to go on for an eternity until a certain sound, hated at times and idolized at others, reminded us of the lesson to come. So we finally settled down and Jan flanked Micky (as everyone was to call him from then on, because everyone broke their tongues trying to pronounce his actual name correctly) to the right, I flanked him to the left, Alex behind us, and we marched into the school building, chatting about all sorts of things.
At that moment, the prelude to the end began.
So his name was Myku. Myku Yue, called Micky by everyone, came from Korea, but moved here with his parents at an early age and therefore spoke perfect German and hardly any Korean. He had an older brother, Choi, who studied chemistry at university. Myku used to go to school in another district, but had to repeat the year due to poor grades, but the following year did not offer all of his electives, so he was transferred to our school. He acclimatized quickly - he got on very well with Alex because they both had roughly the same sense of silliness and stupidity. Logically, he also got on wonderfully with Jan, as everyone gets on with Jan, with the exception of Pete and his gang of monkeys. And Sabrina immediately took him to her heart.
And that was one of the things that bothered me. Micky was a terribly pleasant fellow, but whenever Sabrina came along, the rest of the world seemed isolated to her. They chatted, or simply spent the time making light-hearted and often cheeky jokes (and when I say cheeky, that's saying something), just like I usually did. So what exactly was bothering me? I don't know.
When he joined our group, I usually got quiet or distracted myself by starting conversations with other classmates or doing something else to avoid being around the others.
It's one of those moments when you condemn best friends. They don't miss a thing because they know you too well.
“What's wrong with you, dude?” Jan interrupted me in the middle of my thoughts, ”You're kind of out of character, Dan.”
“Hm.”, I murmured sullenly, ”I don't really know.” I hesitated briefly. “Probably ate something wrong,” I added humorlessly.
Jan chuckled, reached into his jacket pocket and offered me a cigarette from his pack. Of course, smoking was forbidden in the schoolyard, but that didn't interest us any more than most of the other rules of this sap store, so I accepted with a nod and let him give me a light, whereupon he lit a cigarette himself.
I took a drag, exhaled the tangy smoke and followed the gray-blue vapors that rolled lazily through the late summer air until my gaze lingered on Alex, Sabrina and Micky.
Jan giggled again, I stroked one of the red strands from my face with an embarrassed gesture and squatted down on the concrete edge of a flower pot directly behind us. Jan sat down next to it, tapped my upper arm and nodded her head in Sabrina's direction.
“Yo prima donna. Jealous?” he asked with a teasing tone in his voice.
“I don't know,” I hissed at him harshly.
His face became serious.
“Come on, colleague,” he restarted placatingly, ”We've built sandcastles together and torn them down again, you can't tell me that you don't mind the way they're messing around.”
Fooling around. Something made my stomach twist at the word.
“You know, sometimes I hate you,” I replied, taking an uncertain drag on my cigarette.
“You see,” Jan triumphed, ”I can tell by the way you stare at them. You're jealous because Sabrina flirts with Micky all the time.”
Flirting. And another jab.
“Maybe so,” I muttered, ”She only has eyes for him.”
And he only has eyes for her.
So far, everything was fine with me. Every day went on as usual. Myku shared a lot of classes with me, including the ones I didn't have with Alex, Sabrina or Jan, like art, for example. In art it was always chaotic anyway, everyone preferred to talk to someone else instead of working on a painting, a sculpture or whatever other crap was on the schedule, or participating in any other way. Since Micky didn't know anyone else in the course at the beginning, and hardly anyone else in the class, it was natural for him to be my bench neighbor. I didn't really have anything against it in principle. In fact, I was actually in favor of it. But something inside me was resisting. A premonition or something.
Anyway, I scribbled listlessly on a black and white picture in ink without really knowing what I was doing. I was always very good at art, I was passionate about drawing. I probably had something of a vein for it. Anyway, I couldn't concentrate properly while Micky talked to me in a cheerfully naïve way, even though I had Greenday playing in one ear (MP3 players are a great invention - I was almost broke for months after buying one). Niagara Falls was harmless compared to him. I enjoyed listening to him, I didn't really mind. But I was far too busy thinking about something I didn't know what it was to answer him well.
“Yo, Dani,” he said, poking me in the side with his pen. I hated that kind of thing. So now he had my undivided attention after all. “I'm totally stuck here. Can you give me a hand?”
I sighed and rolled my eyes. “I've definitely shown you a hundred times.”
“Hm, yes, I have,” he replied, ”but a hundred and one is better.”
Okay, that was it. Once again, I couldn't say no. So I stood up, shuffled behind his chair, leaned over him and put my right arm on his so that I could guide his hand with the pen, I did the same with my left arm on his left flank and grabbed his wrist, although this had no significance for the lesson to come. Step by step, I explained to him how to hold the pencil, how to shade the outline and so on and so forth. In between, he kept looking up at me with a trusting dachshund look in his beautiful narrow eyes and nodded eagerly every time I asked if he had understood everything. His deodorant smelled great, maybe I should get some too.
“Good, thanks Dani,” he interrupted me after a while and shook my hands off, ”I think I can manage on my own now.”
He smiled and then turned his attention back to his picture. Somehow I thought it was a shame, even though I had been so reluctant to help him before. I could have slapped myself.
Several times, in fact. One weekend, our little clique - Alex, Jan, Sabrina, Micky and I - decided to take advantage of the last warm summer days before fall with two other friends, namely Nadine, Sabrina's best friend, and Kevin, Jan's younger brother, and throw a little garden party in Jessica's allotment. Jessica herself, Alex's girlfriend, wasn't there that day as she had to look after her little sister, which is why Alex didn't stay with us for too long. Understandably, and I thought it was nice that he skipped the party so that he could be with his girlfriend. Quite commendable, as many other guys would simply have preferred the party. Despite his shenanigans, Alexander had a sense of responsibility and empathy, and that's what made him stand out in my eyes.
It was really scorching hot that day, and shortly after Alex disappeared, Nadine and Sabrina battled for control of the garden hose, while The Offspring, Sublime, Eve6 and American HiFi pumped up the atmosphere from the stereo in the garden shed. Nadine, a petite-looking girl of sixteen with short copper-blonde hair and a temperament that put even Sabrina's in the shade, won the battle, but in the ensuing water fight, the winner's luck changed hands several times.
I had put on a simple white shirt and didn't button it up, but tied it in a knot at stomach level. Jan kept grumbling that it looked frumpy, and he was right, but somehow I liked to be provocative, even if it was only with one item of clothing.
Micky, on the other hand, had disposed of his soaking wet T-shirt by now, and was gyrating across the meadow like a grasshopper on LSD as he tried to avoid the water jet. Sabrina and I had withdrawn from the main event to take a breather and were sitting on a bench under a parasol. She laughed most of the time in her hysterical but amusing way, while I set about destroying my pack of cigarettes, smoking one cigarette after another without taking my eyes off Micky. I remembered the day I met him. At the time, I described him as handsome. Now I thought he was pretty. Pearls of water on his bronze-colored skin that glistened in the sun. His slightly protruding muscles when he tensed his body to get to safety from Nadine and the water hose.
Obviously. I'd never given a thought to anything like this before, girls or boys. While most were content to change relationships like underwear, it generally affected me rather less. I had almost resigned myself to the idea of being asexual and not finding anything really attractive. Micky was probably the exception. He was irrefutably attractive, I had to admit that to myself. And I didn't find that difficult at all. He was a nice boy, and handsome to boot. It would probably have been too early at that point to say for sure that these were homosexual feelings. The thought that I might be gay or bi was more amusing than irritating. What was really more irritating was how I now felt about Micky.
“He's totally cute, isn't he?” Sabrina grinned at me and tilted her head slightly in his direction, only then realizing what she had said to me, looking embarrassed and probably expecting a mocking response.
“Yep,” I replied completely seriously.
She stared into space for a moment, frowned and looked at me insistently.
“Really?” she asked incredulously, sure that she had misheard me.
“Yo.”, I replied simply and as a matter of course.
“Oh...” she said hesitantly. Either she didn't know exactly what to make of the situation or how to assess my comment. “Are you trying to tell me you're gay or something?”
“I don't know,” I answered her, and I wasn't lying at all. I didn't want to get involved in speculation at this point.
“Hm...” she followed up, ‘It's not really that normal for a boy to find someone else ’cute', is it?”
“Not necessarily,” I said somewhat absently, ”You can find something cute without there really being more to it than that. Your neighbor's cat is cute. So is your aunt's youngest. Maybe I only think he's 'cute' in that sense. It probably depends on what exactly you mean by that.”
“Would you want to sleep with him?”
This question was on point. Instead of engaging in a deeply philosophical discussion about the interpretation of words and human perspectives, she trampled on subtlety and forced me into a corner.
I pondered only briefly. “Not really.”
She looked at me. We didn't say another word to each other for the rest of the day.
I dreamt about it the following night. Of the conversation. Alternative answers. And what it would be like to sleep with Micky. Maybe my answer had been a bit premature after all. Maybe I was just being dishonest with myself at that moment. I would probably find out one way or another at some point.
Some time passed since that fateful summer day. Winter came. I celebrated my eighteenth birthday in a small circle. Ergo with Jan and a bottle of spirits. I didn't like to make a big fuss about birthdays. After all, we had them every year, didn't we? Jan was only there because he practically lived with me. Although he lived with his parents, he took refuge in my apartment most of the time so as not to have to put up with his younger siblings.
So I sat on the bed and strummed my guitar while Jan looked at my collection of various CDs. Completely relaxed, without any stress, in an everyday atmosphere. Still completely fascinated and holding an old Ärzte album in his hands, Jan blindly and completely unexpectedly attacked me with a conversation.
“Okay, I'll wait,” he demanded dryly. Unusual for the Jan I knew.
“To what?” I asked, completely unsure what he wanted now.
“Do you remember the conversation you had with Sabrina? During the garden party in the summer when Alex couldn't make it,” he replied, still looking at the back of the CD inlay, ”You ogled our new arrival the whole time like our dog ogles a pork knuckle. And after the conversation with Sabrina, it was even worse. I was really thinking about tying you up somewhere.”
I had to laugh. Jan's way of wrapping up serious things in a chatty tone was unsurpassable.
“I wasn't drooling at all. Completely harmless,” I replied.
“That would have been even nicer.” He put the CD back on the shelf. “But to be honest, that wasn't normal anymore. Especially that it's been going on since that day. Last week, you almost tore your arm off to take him home after he'd had a bit too much to drink.”
That was quite embarrassing. We were all young and liked to play hard to get. Micky had been so blue that he could barely find his way around Sabrina's apartment (her parents were away for the weekend, you know, the partying kind). I had offered to take him home, as our route was almost the same, I only lived fifteen minutes further in that direction. The thought of not having to share him with others for a very short time took a back seat. It was more about collegiality. But only in the first instance. In his drunken state, Micky had of course vehemently resisted and insisted that he would find his way without help - so the whole thing degenerated into an estimated thirty-minute discussion, at the end of which I had almost literally dragged him home by the collar.
“So what?” I said, ”I just didn't want him to get lost or worse. I remember you lying downstairs in front of the door once, during the vacations, after you had made a big noise about finding the way so you wouldn't have to sleep here.”
“Yeah.” Jan replied, raising an eyebrow, ”Except that you didn't try to hold me back for ages and everything.”
That was true again. But instead of realizing the difference, as he had probably intended, I felt remorse. Apparently Jan noticed that too.
“Ah, come on, I didn't mean it like that,” he said placatingly, ”I'm not angry with you or anything like that. Nah, I just mean that Micky is something else. It's like when I really wanted to take Nadine home. That's probably why I noticed it.”
Sunk. I remembered how Jan had acted after a similar incident with Nadine and him in the lead roles about three weeks ago. He was right. My behavior and his were more or less the same. Somehow that made me grin.
“Heh, probably.” I admitted, feeling caught out all at once, ”I guess that's how it is.”
“Well-ha.” he started again, ”So, if you're in love with Micky, you just had to say so. I might look at you a bit funny, I won't share the bed with you in future and I'll avoid showering in your presence, but otherwise.”
“I'll punch you right in the face,” I said without seriousness, ”But maybe you're right. Maybe I really am in love with him.”
“Are you or aren't you?”
“I'm just not sure.” I resigned myself a little to the thought. Somehow, everyone around me seemed to be better at interpreting my behavior than I was.
“Man...” Jan said after a while, ”It's really not easy to figure you out, you know that?”
That was the end of the conversation.
We spent the rest of the evening emptying the bottle and sharing the music with the neighborhood so that everyone could enjoy it.
The following week, my mother came to visit. We never talked much, everyone lived their own lives. Apart from a bit of small talk, which in my case concerned school and friends, in her case mostly work and finances, nothing special came out of it. As quickly as she arrived, she left again, not without leaving some money behind. I hated it, but I could still use the money. I had the impression that she thought she could make up for everything with a bit of money. As if it was an excuse for her absence and her distance from me. Maybe it really was. But if it was, then it was a miserable excuse.
And so winter went, so spring came, and a school year came to an end.
I forced the memories aside for a moment. My hand hurt. A few splinters had probably penetrated it and now that the numbing feeling in my head was beginning to subside, I remembered the pain.
I walked into the bathroom and rummaged through the mirror cabinet above the sink for a pair of tweezers. I couldn't find any. I probably didn't really need any. So I picked up my pocket knife and heated the blade with the now dry lighter.
I started to pick the shards out of my palm with a knife that was far too rough. It hurt, but something inside me was more painful. This was no comparison, and it was done quickly. A little alcohol on top to increase the pain and prevent infection.
When I finished the operation, it was almost a shame I didn't take longer. It distracted me and eased the other nausea somewhat. So I put a CD in the record player. When I promptly heard “So I need you” by Three Doors Down, I knew it wasn't necessarily a good idea. Nevertheless, I left it at that. Basically, I didn't really care anyway.
Call me childish, call me wrong, but I dug out a soft toy, a little black and white fluffy cat that had kept me company since I was three years old whenever I was upset. It felt good to hold the worn, inanimate creature in my hand and sit back down on the bed, leaning my back against the wall, eyes closed.
My mind plunged back into the past.
At some point at the end of the school year, just before the start of the vacations, I had decided that I felt more for Micky than just friendship. Yes, it was more. I couldn't say whether it was love, but I realized that it really was more than what I felt for Jan, Alex or Sabrina or anyone else.
Micky was passionate about sport. With a particular focus on basketball. It was something where he really excelled over many others, if not everyone. He wasn't a superhero or even a superhuman. He made mistakes, his grades weren't exactly exemplary, he often allowed himself to be embarrassed and was sometimes a little slow on the uptake. But he could play basketball. And on top of that, it was one of the few areas in which he was not overshadowed by his older brother. Choi was now twenty-one and had two semesters behind him; in general, he was quite an ace at anything to do with education. On the other hand, he was less interested in physical activity.
Alex also played from time to time, but in contrast, his successes had less to do with technique and skill, but his advantage was simply that he was tall.
In any case, now that the weather had improved, we often all played basketball in the courtyard after school. Jan also joined in from time to time, but his small size and strength usually made him the worst player on the court and he often got injured. So he usually preferred not to take part. Basketball wasn't exactly my cup of tea either. But Micky was enough reason to overcome any reticence and join in. Sabrina often just watched.
Once we played late into the evening. The others had already left, so I was left alone with Micky in the yard. There seemed to be no end to his energy, while I was on the verge of collapsing.
“Okaaaaaay...”, I shouted breathlessly to him, ”I think I've decidedly had enough for today.”
He laughed. “Sure. Smoker and fit as a guinea pig.”
“At least I lasted longer than the rest,” I replied, a little piqued.
“But that's only because they had plans and you're stuck to me like a limpet anyway, Dani.”
“Good,” I conceded, ”it's really the case that I'm a bit on your heels. Sorry.”
“Oh,” he waved me off, ”it's no big deal. I think it's okay, at least I'll always have someone to practise with.” I smiled. It was good that he didn't find my presence disturbing or annoying.
“But yes,” he added, ”you really hang out with me a lot. How come?”
That was unexpected. I'd thought the subject was over. Was this the moment of decision? Could I tell him what I thought about him? How would he react if I told him the truth? How would he react if I lied to him? Thousands and thousands of these questions flashed through my mind in nanoseconds. My mouth was dry.
“Maybe because...” I started, ”... maybe because I admire you.”
That seemed to irritate him. “What's that supposed to mean?”
“I like watching you. The way you play, for example.”
That didn't seem to dismiss his astonishment either. “What's there to admire?” he doubted, ”I don't understand what you mean.”
“You don't really have to,” I replied.
In passing, I decided to stop smoking.
This was not a one-off situation. He repeated the question several times, only to receive similar answers from me again and again. Apparently he was dying to know what the real reason was. Whenever the opportunity presented itself, he would ask again and again. Even at his house.
And slowly I understood why. Micky's mother died of cancer when he was only six - I felt sorry for that somehow, although I was rarely touched by such things in a deeper way and the sympathy was hardly more than formal. His father was not unlike my mother. Always anxious to get on with business so that the family was well off, he was rarely to be found, and not exactly talkative either. Whether he liked me or not was not easy to say. In any case, Choi assured me that he was generally very cool and reserved. And Choi probably took after his father.
Maybe Choi was just distant, but I didn't like him. And I was convinced that he didn't like me either. I was about to find out why. In contrast to his younger brother, Choi seemed to know how to read the signs. Every time I looked at Micky too intensely, I got a nasty look from Choi.
At one point, I remarked this observation to Micky after Choi had left the apartment to go out with some friends from university.
Micky was making himself a sandwich and didn't interrupt this activity when he replied.
“I guess there's a reason for that,” he said, putting a knife to one side, ”A bit of a sore subject. Well, I think we've known each other long enough. I don't think you'd tell anyone.”
I certainly wouldn't, no matter what came next. I always showed respect for secrets that were entrusted to me. As I remained silent, he continued.
“He's been a bit weird since he had a thing with that guy.”
Now I became more perceptive than was perhaps good. “Uh-huh?”
“Yo. Pretty unfortunate thing. Apparently it didn't go the way he wanted it to. Anyway, the guy must have hurt him terribly.”
“And what does that have to do with me?” I hadn't quite digested what I'd been told. The idea that his brother might be interested in men was a bit unexpected.
“It's quite obvious,” Micky replied, turning around and rolling his eyes, ”He probably thinks there's something going on between us. He's always trying to convince me how unhappy it can make me and so on and so forth.” He turned back to the bread. “As if that's necessary.”
Ambivalent. That's how you could describe the impression that took hold of me. On the one hand, he didn't seem to mind talking about his brother's experience. It didn't sound derogatory, but more like sympathy - and that wasn't a bad sign. However, he was talking about his brother. And the last sentence burned itself into my eardrums. As if that was necessary. I heard this part over and over again, as if in an endless loop. Although, maybe he meant it differently?
Of course he didn't mean it any differently. That was to teach me what was to come.
There were various lessons I had to learn. For example, not to neglect everyone else because of one person. Quite complicated. I lost most contact with Alex and his girlfriend. I rarely saw them at any community activities. Many other people I knew more or less from school were almost forgotten. Sabrina and Jan remained loyal to me, even if I didn't deserve it. Well, Jan was always there anyway. He had fallen out with his parents and was now living with me. He was toying with the idea of dropping out of school and getting a job. I advised against it, but was never completely on board when it came to such serious topics. So he went through with it and left school in the twelfth grade. However, he didn't have a job.
Sabrina was a completely different matter. I spent most of my time around her only pro forma, to prove that I didn't suddenly not care about her. I tried to distance myself a little from Micky and spend more time with her again. On the other hand, some compromises resulted in the three or four of us doing things together (with Jan in tow).
At school, the bickering between Micky and her had calmed down a bit, but she continued to watch us play basketball and seemed to really appreciate the small group activities. Or rather, Micky's company, who seemed anything but uncomfortable. The two of them got closer. Too close for my taste.
Year twelve almost flew by. I kept myself busy with all sorts of things, from one thing to another, and lived for the day. During the vacations, I tried to polish up my drawing skills and achieved many personal successes.
But all that only temporarily distracted me from the fact that Sabrina and Micky were now a couple. And a very successful one. When you saw them together, you got the impression that nothing could ever come between them. Except maybe me. But I forced myself to be reasonable, at the end of the day I liked them both. I could have hated myself just for the thought of standing between them.
But what was the point of feeling sorry for myself? So I put a brave face on it and just let everything take its course. I had no other choice anyway. Despite all my intentions, I had started smoking again.
Pete and his pack continued to make the schoolyard unsafe and eyed the relationship between Sabrina and Micky with great reluctance - Sabrina was indeed quite pretty, for a girl of course, and as much as Pete denied it, he had had his eye on her for a long time. And the fact that his beloved was now with this “foreign scum” displeased him greatly. In any case, Alex was always nearby, so Pete immediately stopped his nagging when Alex turned to him and demonstratively cracked his knuckles. At least I had some peace and quiet from these idiots. At least there was one bright spot in the whole story.
We were still all teenagers, and a new summer was heating up into a myriad of more parties for no particular reason. Jessica's garden seemed predestined for most of the celebrations, as her parents often cleared the field and the plot was big enough to accommodate a lot of people. And the neighborhood also seemed quite liberal in the face of a horde of rowdy teenagers.
Maybe I was too sober. Or too drunk. Or the pain threshold had simply been reached. Seeing Micky and Sabrina together and kissing was never easy to bear, but that evening every glance in their direction felt like a punch in the gut.
Jan (who, despite no longer being at school, was dragged along by me) was making a noisy monkey of himself in another corner of the garden and I was glad for a bit of distraction, so I popped two fingers in my mouth and whistled at him. Jan turned around, took a quick look around the crowd, spotted my location and grabbed two bottles of beer from a nearby crate as he passed. When he reached me, he tossed me a bottle and we clinked glasses.
“Oh, shit,” he grumbled after he'd scrounged a fag from me and looked around, ”All these people and not one girl interested in me.”
I had to laugh. Nadine had already explicitly turned Jan down more than once. Unlike me, he probably wasn't fixated enough to simply move on from being alone and was constantly looking around for other opportunities. A mentality I couldn't quite understand, but after all, he was Jan and I was Daniel. So it didn't seem to matter much to me.
“Should I give you this as a consolation?” I said as I rummaged in my pocket and held out a chewing gum wrapper with a cell phone number that some girl had previously pressed into my hand with a wink. The name “Janine” was written under the number in beautiful letters. I had no use for it, so I played the operator.
“Man!” protested Jan, ”Why do you always get the numbers of the nice girls?” He put on a mock sad face and pulled down the corners of his mouth. All that was really missing was a pacifier. Really adorable to look at. “That's really mean. Every night you get at least one, if not two, and I'm left empty-handed again.”
Good. He was actually right about that. At every party, some girl from our class or from a classmate's circle of friends would give me her number. It must have been a set-up for rivalry between girls. I kept an eye out for Janine and found her with two other girls and two boys near a cherry tree decorated with garlands. A pretty creature with dark brown hair tied into a plait and bright emerald green eyes that flashed in our direction from time to time. Somehow I had the feeling that she was really looking at Jan more intently than at me. I suspected that she might have given me the number to play a little game with Jan. After all, it wasn't exactly a secret that no girl had ever had anything to do with me and that probably no one would ever be my girlfriend.
In nudged my elbow into Jan's side as she looked back over at us and he smiled, to which she returned his gesture.
“Best wishes,” I said encouragingly and took his hand, put the paper in it and gave him a gentle push in Janine's direction. Embarrassed, he trotted over there.
I took a sip from the bottle of beer while my gaze wandered around and naturally lingered on Micky and Sabrina. I carelessly placed the bottle on a nearby table, which was piled high with all kinds of food, from potato chips to cheap cakes from Aldi.
Sabrina must have noticed that I was staring at them, and just before their lips touched, she whirled her head around and looked me in the eye. At first she smiled at me. It wasn't a gloating smile, nor was it a hint of triumph or anything like that. It was simply a sign that she was happy - but after a moment it disappeared from the corners of her mouth and she suddenly looked sad. It broke my heart.
I took a short, sharp breath, turned around quickly and walked to a low part of the garden fence, swung myself over nimbly and walked along the middle path of the garden. I didn't know where I was going. I just wanted to get away, far, far away from them. It was now dark at night, crickets were chirping in the bushes and the sky was clear. Pale moonlight cast bizarre shadows, moths danced around street lamps. I stopped and stared at the moon. I was pretty stupid. Everything around me was peaceful and exuberant, and I buried myself in worry. Something was about to change.
Someone called my name. A female voice, bright and cheerful for the most part, well known - Sabrina's, in fact. I turned my head slightly to the side and saw her sprinting across the path towards me, almost in a panic. I looked ahead again.
She gasped as she came to a halt next to me and wiped her hair out of her face.
“I'm sorry, that was mean,” she said after a moment of silence.
That too. It wasn't enough that I was sorry myself. Now she also felt remorse. I had handled everything pretty badly.
“Shit,” she finally said.
“Wait, wait.” I commented, ”Why? It's pretty stupid that you're sorry. Why would it be?”
Silence followed for a moment and we both looked at the bright moon, whose curved crescent was being obscured by a few wispy clouds.
“Because you like it too,” she began again, ”I didn't want to take it away from you.”
“Why are you apologizing?” I asked her without looking at her, ”It's okay. You and him seem happy. Don't let me spoil it for you. And, at the end of the day, he doesn't care about me, but you do.”
She fell silent. Now I turned my gaze to her and looked at her profile. “That's the way it is. Isn't it?”
She looked over now too. “Well, he...” She faltered and looked down, then back up at me. She knew that I had made up my mind. And that I wouldn't accept an unclear answer, just like she had when Micky first became the subject of a deeper conversation.
“Yes.” she finally said, ”That's right.”
“Besides - it would be unfair the other way around, too,” I noted, looking at her. She nodded reluctantly. That was the unfortunate thing about such situations. One person always won the bad lottery and the other won the jackpot.
“You're brave,” she said after the short silence, then turned around and walked back.
Apparently. I wanted to see her happy rather than drag us both down, so I would continue to play the role of the brave loser.
The CD had reached the end. I didn't feel like getting up and putting on another one, so I preferred to let the silence work its magic on me.
If I had known then that it was the last time I would talk to her, I would have said so many other things. Everything you want to get off your chest before someone leaves you.
She flew off on vacation with her parents the next day. Spain was on the program. She never came back. Sabrina, her parents and the estimated three hundred other passengers on board were victims of a plane crash on the way home. It was unreal.
Imagining someone talking to the person is not difficult. Imagining that the person was no longer there was too unreal.
I wish Jan had been there. My apartment felt incredibly empty. And dead. Like everyone else, Jan suffered from the loss. He had never been completely averse to drugs, you have to admit that much. Whether it was Sabrina's death or not, it became extreme shortly afterwards. Jan isolated himself and became more and more intoxicated. The day we found out about Sabrina's death, it hit us all. Jan, it seems, killed it with her. I had no idea she was so important to him.
And then there was Micky. Sabrina had been taken from him at the rising point of their relationship. No one could say what was going on in his head. Even I could only guess. He became very taciturn and introverted, every trace of his original zest for life seemed to have been wiped out. And he hardly let anyone get close to him. I didn't even try.
To distract myself, I took a job in a bar over the vacations. It wasn't much, but it helped to avoid thinking at times. I bought a laptop with the money I earned and my mother offered to set up a contract with an internet provider. Before that, I had sometimes browsed the net with Alex, but having my own connection provided further distraction. Until I got the email.
It was from Choi and was limited to a few words: “Where the hell are you, you idiot? Talk to Myku. Jerk.”
The devil knows where he got my email address. But he was right. It was just before the end of the vacations and the start of A-levels. Micky was letting himself down, and it was probably going to cost him his A-levels. He needed someone to cheer him up. And I suddenly had a task.
I popped in the same day. Choi opened the door for me. He seemed clearly changed, his original aversion to me had disappeared without a trace. It was just one facet, I realized at that moment. He had never had anything against me. His dislike was skillfully played.
“Hey. That took a while,” he greeted me.
I said nothing and stepped inside. From the kitchen, we reached Myku's room. The door was open.
“Don't bother, he's not here,” came from the hallway. It was true. The room was empty.
“Where's Micky gone?” All of a sudden I was very worried.
“Not the slightest idea. He left just before you came. I don't know where he went. He didn't say anything,” Choi replied as he strolled towards the fridge. Choi didn't share his younger brother's impetuous youthfulness. His hair was shoulder-length and straight, he was taller than Micky, by a few centimetres anyway, but more petite and slender in stature. There was a certain grace and calmness to his movements, full of purpose that you rarely find in younger people. Even though he no longer scowled at me, his face still looked very serious. His tone when he spoke was always cold and dismissive; at least I had never seen him laugh.
“Something to drink?” he asked as he helped himself to the fridge.
“Ah, no, thanks,” I replied politely.
“I'll get you a Coke instead,” he returned, and something about Choi prevented him from being contradicted. He set a can down on the table. “Myku says you like this stuff. Sit down, cost the same.”
He sat down and I did the same, staring at the can of drink.
“I think he'll be back soon,” he broke the silence shortly afterwards, snatched the untouched can away, opened it and slammed it back on the table in front of me. Reluctantly, I took a sip. Was there a little bit of worry in his voice?
“I hope so,” I said, ”The wait is unpleasant.”
“Would you rather I go away if you don't like my company?” Choi replied, again in his usual indifferent tone. Something about that suddenly made me laugh. At first I thought Choi was really bad-tempered. Now I realized it was his personal brand of humour. And something about it radiated a certain charm.
“Sure. It would be so much more pleasant to sit here alone, counting the cobwebs on the ceiling and completely lost in gloom.”
In that one moment, Choi's frowning face changed for a few seconds. He was very handsome when he smiled. Too bad it was probably far too rare.
“I'm sorry I was unfair to you at first,” he said in response, ”I'm too impersonal and hostile sometimes.” He grabbed his own drink from the fridge. “For whatever reason. I don't even realize it most of the time.”
“It's fine,” I assured him, somewhat disarmed by his comparatively casual demeanor.
“It's not.” He came back. “Just because I was disappointed once myself, I try to keep everything and everyone away from my brother. To spare him something like that.”
I waited until he was sitting at the table again. He looked at his drink and seemed a little sad.
“Myku is much more sensitive than you think. His light-heartedness and naivety is not always genuine.” He took a drink. “He talks to me a lot and confides in me a lot. With others, he finds it very difficult. It's probably because I'm the person who had to replace his mother and father.”
He continued, looking up at the ceiling. I kept quiet so as not to interrupt him. It almost seemed to me that Choi needed someone to talk to as much as Micky did, wherever he was. Her father was once again far away for the entire vacation period, I remembered.
“Sometimes I really do look at the little one more like a pupil than my brother. He's my problem child. When I started dating a boy, it must have been a big blow for him. I was a bit blind at the time and didn't think too much about it. When it ended, I felt I had to protect him from then on. And especially to keep everything male away from him.”
At this point, things started to get confusing. “Why?” I asked him.
“Because he's not as straight as he'd like to be. Your case isn't the first time he's been interested in a boy. He likes girls too, though. He's somewhere in between.”
That was new. And it was shocking. Had I been fooled all this time?
“He was interested in me?” I replied hesitantly.
Choi looked a little annoyed. “Of course.”
“But then why didn't he ever say that?” My confusion couldn't have been greater.
“Because you're an idiot,” Choi said, taking a big gulp, ”Because he thought you were unapproachable. No other girl to interest you, no other boy to interest you. He thought you were someone who had no feelings for anyone. Why do you think he kept asking why you liked being around him?”
It was like being slapped in the face with the flat of my hand, once left, once right. It wouldn't have taken more than a simple 'because of you'? The irony of the situation seemed to mock me. “And Sabrina?” I asked doubtfully.
“Oh, he liked that girl too, a lot, but not as much as you. There's no question that her death is bitter. For him, though, in more ways than one.” Choi stood up and walked to the window, looking out at the darkening evening sky. “She was some consolation. And he hates himself for it now. He thinks he cheated on her, that he took advantage of her to straighten out his emotional world. Well, and now she's dead.” With these words, he turned around again and clapped his hands together.
Unbelievable. He talked about the accident like it was a sporting event. He noticed my critical look.
'Don't look at me like that,' he replied dryly, 'It was crap, no doubt about it. I liked the girl too. Yes, it's tragic what happened. But what's done is done and nobody can undo it. Right?”
That was true. But it still sounded terribly heartless to my ears. Even though I hadn't shed a tear over Sabrina's passing, there was still a deep pain over the loss. “Maybe” was all I could come up with.
“There you go.” He came back to the table. “And since we can't undo it, we can at least try to make it more bearable for all of us, can't we?”
It certainly made sense. I just nodded.
“So. I'm not asking you to take Sabrina's place or get your old position back. I just want you to talk to him. That he can tell you all this. That will make it easier. It's actually a good thing he's not here right now. At least you'll be prepared.”
I got up and went to the window like Choi before. The sun had just set. I remembered the sight of Micky's room. There seemed to be something missing besides him, which I only realized now.
“I'm worried,” I confirmed, turning to the window. “I'll go and look for him.”
“Do you know where he might be?” Choi asked from the table, a little incredulous.
“Just a hunch.” I turned around. “And if he's not there, I'll come back and wait here. All night long because of me.”
I imagined I saw him smile for the second time that day.
“Then why are you still standing there?”
Yes, I had a hunch. Or maybe it was just a hope. In my time with Micky, I noticed that he poured a lot of his thoughts and feelings into the basketball game. If he was grumpy or pensive, he played more reservedly. If he was angry, disappointed or frustrated about something, he played with exuberant aggression. And in all cases, he seemed much more balanced afterwards.
The basketball that always lay like a sacred icon in the middle of the table in his room was missing before. Hopefully it just hadn't found another place.
So I ran and ran as if the incarnate being was after me. Completely out of breath, I finally reached the schoolyard. The sound of a ball hitting asphalt gave me confidence. I did indeed find Micky on the basketball court in the school playground. Not a soul for miles around. Just him, the ball and the basket. And me.
I slowed my pace and used the rest of the walk to catch my breath. Either he didn't seem to notice me coming or he ignored me. So I sat down on one of the benches nearby and watched him. I took out a cigarette and waited. For a good hour.
At some point, he too seemed exhausted and the ball slipped out of his hand and rolled in my direction. I stopped him with my foot.
“What do you want?” Micky finally said.
“Watching you, it's obvious.”
“Ha!” he groaned and spread his arms wide, ”In the middle of the night. Right here. Just by chance.”
“In the middle of the night. Here. Even if not by chance,” I replied and stubbed out the cigarette.
“Okay, I give up, Dani,” he said after a short pause, ”I won't win anyway if I try to chase you away. So you might as well get rid of it.”
“Agreed.” I nodded. “I'm here because I like you.”
“We've been there before, mate,” Micky reminded me, visibly annoyed.
“Yo. But this time I wanted to answer your question honestly.”
“What question?” he replied, a little lost. The anger on his face was still dominant.
“Why I've been around you so much.” It was now or never. “Because I love you.” That was it.
In seconds, a multitude of expressions flew across his face. But in the end it stopped at annoyed again. More than that. He looked angry.
“Tell me, are you stupid?” he snapped, and kicked the ball away that was still resting under my foot, ”All of a sudden you turn up after you've withdrawn. After I was with Sabrina. After she died! I just can't believe it.”
“No. You're wrong,” I said, trying to keep my tone calm. “But I think I owe it to you to have said that.”
“Yes, damn it, you owed it to me.” His voice was more of a husky whisper.
“I didn't realize it was necessary at the time. I thought I was doing damage with it.” I lowered my head and looked at the remains of the crushed cigarette butt. “I now know that I caused damage by not saying it.”
“The realization comes a little late, old man,” he replied. But he no longer sounded angry. More like desperate. “All this time you've been playing the lone hero, the great untouched one. And now you're telling me it's completely different.”
I remembered the verse of a song he liked very much. “Even heroes have the right to bleed. I may be disturbed, but won't you conceive, even heroes have the right to dream. And it's not easy being me. “*
I felt like I was on the verge of crying. “That's true. But it's not easy being me either.”
“Yes. And that's why I think you understand,” I said calmly.
“Don't expect me to fall around your neck now. It's a bit too late for that after what happened with Sabrina.” Impulsive as ever.
“No, that's okay.” I couldn't look him in the face and continued to stare at the floor. “That would probably be far too dramatic, too.”
“Dramatic.” He gave a short, contemptuous laugh. “Daniel, look at me for a second.”
I complied. The next thing I saw was a fist towards my face. And the next thing I felt was a dull pain in my left eye and nose. The blow had thrown my head to one side. I remained in that position. I certainly couldn't look at him.
“Are you feeling a bit better now?” was all I said instead.
“Yes,” was his reply. His tone was no longer angry. “Much better.”
I stood up and strolled along the edge of the yard, letting my eyes wander through the bushes that were planted there. Micky stayed where he was. Eventually I found what I was looking for. I came back with the ball under my arm. Micky looked embarrassed. The way he was standing there, I now realized that I loved him. I didn't hold anything against him. Neither the time of uncertainty, nor the anger, nor the punch in the face. He was beautiful. But I also realized that being above doubt couldn't fix it now either. It would never be able to be between us the way I wanted it to be. Our relationship had taken a wrong turn. It would never heal completely.
As I was about to put the ball in his hands, the tranquillity of the moment was disturbed. Cheering and yelling from the goal caught our attention. I knew one of the voices. Far too well.
Pete and two of his bald-headed cronies turned into the schoolyard, looking very drunk from the way they were walking. He spotted us much sooner than I would have thought possible.
“If it isn't the faggot and the pissed-off foreigner,” Pete mocked. Apparently he wasn't as drunk as he originally appeared. Although he was the one waving a bottle of vodka around in his hand, his companions were definitely less under his control. Their comments were accordingly slurred and almost incomprehensible.
We stayed put. Running away had never been an option for me. It would only have given Pete's ego a boost. I hated this guy, and hatred brought courage. Maybe it was also foolish. But this time I felt like it was up to me to protect Micky. Alex wasn't there to knock us out this time.
“You're alone, huh?” speculated Pete, looking around, finishing his inspection of the surroundings and flashing a disgusting, gleeful grin. “I guess you're due then, you bastards.” With the words, he dropped the bottle on the floor. It broke in two.
I ducked just in time to avoid the first blow. Laughable. Even though Pete had been hit umpteen times before, his movements were those of a bloody beginner. They were so predictable and bumbling that it was relatively easy to anticipate them and avoid his blows. So it was I who landed the first hit, a well-directed blow to the pit of his stomach that sent him staggering back. I looked to the side for a moment.
Micky was being harassed by the two henchmen at the same time. They were each a good head taller and stronger than him, but they were also pretty drunk. Micky was well-trained and had good reflexes thanks to basketball, so it didn't seem too dangerous at the moment. I couldn't let myself get too distracted, because Pete recovered from the hit quicker than I would have liked.
He charged at me again, roaring in a way that would have made Tarzan jealous. A full-force frontal attack with no sense of stability. Easy for an idiot like Pete; jumping to the side and avoiding the onslaught, I slammed my leg into one of his. Pete staggered and fell on his nose with an almost comical thud.
A grim sound of pain from the side negated the small sense of achievement. One of the two thugs had given Micky a good left and the Korean went down. Just as the other was about to charge at him, Myku pulled up both legs and caught the attacker. His chest couldn't spring back like the legs of the one on the ground, and the impact took his breath away for a moment, which Micky took advantage of to push through his legs and push the guy away. Almost simultaneously, he jumped up to face attacker number two again. Good, he was fine.
And there Pete was on his feet again. His lips had split open. “That's it. I'll stab you, you bastard,” he snarled. My eyes fell on the broken bottle, which he was now gripping tightly by the neck, the sharp edges of the splintered base of the bottle pointed at me. That was not good. Not good at all.
It was a case of continuing to dodge and looking for a way to disarm Pete. To my advantage, he was no more skilled armed than he was with his bare fists, but a stab or cut with the broken bottle could be devastating. Keeping an eye on the bottle and Pete's movements at the same time wasn't easy, it was dark after all.
Fortuna seemed to like me though. Before I tired too much from dodging, a good opportunity presented itself when Pete swung a little further than necessary for a punch (instead of a stab). I kicked at his hand with all my might in a semi-circular motion. Blessed be my sturdy footwear; I hit, and the bottle flew in a high arc towards the bushes. Pete was disarmed, but either he was finally starting to think, or it was beginner's luck - the moment I kicked, my own footing became unsteady, and before I had regained my position, a powerful swing hit me in the side, causing me to stumble, and Pete followed up, kicking at my back. I fell forward to the ground, catching the fall with my knees and hands, when an unspeakable pain suddenly shot through my left hand. I had landed with the palm of my hand in the broken glass where Pete had originally dropped the bottle. I gritted my teeth. If it had been my right hand, the fight would probably be over.
Adrenaline was boiling inside me. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw one of the two guys hitting Micky go down. Micky looked weak. He wouldn't last much longer.
Pete was completely intoxicated with victory, and again he allowed himself to make a mistake. Instead of waiting for me to get up on my own, he grabbed my collar and pulled me up with a jerk. I took advantage of the momentum, half spun around and smashed my elbow into his face with all my strength. Something cracked. Pete screamed and released his grip to press both hands to his face. Blood oozed from between his fingers. Judging by the previous sound, his nose was broken. He sank to his knees and whimpered. His desire to attack seemed to have been blown away. Pete had probably never had to endure serious pain from a fight before, because he usually took on weaker opponents. So he was out of action for the time being. And just in time as Micky went down. I grabbed the closest of the two attackers by the collar of his jacket with my left hand. Burning pain pulsated as I managed to grab him. I overcame the urge to let go, but kept gritting my teeth until it hurt and pulled the guy towards me with a yank. Fittingly, his inebriated state caused him to stagger and spin around so that the blow from my right hand penetrated deep into his stomach. With a twist, I pulled the dazed man with me and flung him in Pete's direction. It was wonderful when my left hand no longer had to bear the pressure. The bald man came to a halt next to his pack leader, swayed, fell over and stayed down.
One down. Micky then gave the last remaining one the necessary blow himself. The chin hook was right, and this thug no longer seemed to pose a threat. With a kick, he also pushed him in the direction of the two knocked out.
In the meantime, Pete had managed to regain his composure. Blood was pooling on the ground in front of him in a tiny puddle. Micky made a move on him, I grabbed him by the arm and shook my head. The fight was won anyway.
“If you dare do it again, it won't just be your disgusting face that's affected, Pete,” I threatened and walked out of the yard, dragging Micky behind me by the arm. When we reached the gate, I paused briefly and let go of his arm. “Wait a minute,” I said and walked back into the yard.
As I passed, I noticed Pete flinch. Maybe he thought I wouldn't put off my threat for the future after all. Instead, I just picked up the basketball that Micky had logically dropped at the beginning of the fight.
Then we left.
I looked at Micky on the way. He had suffered terribly in the fight. One eye was swollen, the corner of his mouth was bleeding and there were countless abrasions on his arms. If the bruises were to be added tomorrow and the eye also started to swell, it would look pretty bad. But he was still able to walk normally and only had a barely noticeable limp. Only now that it was over did I realize that almost everything hurt. Throbbing and pulling pains in my limbs and joints. A sinking and pinching feeling in my stomach, followed by stitches with every step. And of course the burning sensation in the palm of my left hand.
Somewhere in the distance, a dog barked. Then thunder rumbled. And suddenly, from one second to the next, it started to rain.
We didn't say a word until we were at the front door of the multi-storey house where Micky and Choi lived. Once there, I held out the ball I had been carrying all the way.
“Keep it. As a memento. I'll buy myself a new one.”
“As a reminder,” I repeated.
“Yes. I don't want to see you anymore.”
I couldn't believe my ears. Why did he suddenly say that? Why on earth didn't he want to see me anymore? I had thought it would have worked out somehow, apart from the fight. On the other hand, I'd also messed up quite a lot during the conversation. Maybe it was better that he wanted it that way. Still, I couldn't think of a real reason. I was in a trance. My head started to hurt.
“So this is goodbye, then,” I said hesitantly.
“Yes.” He unlocked the door, stepped into the hallway and turned around. “Take care.”
I wanted to say so much in reply, but my throat was dry. I just stared into space.
The door clicked shut.
So the rest is history. This is where I got to where it started. Or where it ended.
I couldn't find the mistake.
The silence was oppressive. I still couldn't understand why he said that. I put the stuffed animal down and struggled to get up. The rain had stopped by now and the monotonous pattering at the window could no longer be heard.
I went out of my bedroom and picked up the jacket and shoes that I had carelessly thrown away earlier. My eyes fell on a ball lying in a corner of the hallway. As a reminder.
Another fragment for the collection.
I dropped out of school just before my A-levels. Another one of those big mistakes in my life, but somehow it didn't matter. I had a technical college entrance qualification and I would manage somehow. As always.
The time leading up to my civilian service is quickly recounted. How a year flies by. Alternating shifts, early and late, made the days fly by, and the work was good. It distracted me, and in the little time in between I tried to improve my drawing techniques even further. I familiarized myself with digital media, got myself a graphics tablet and a new PC.
Choi and I became good friends during that period. We often saw each other and went out, and he kept me informed about Myku. He never mentioned why Myku didn't want to see me anymore and avoided the question. As for the rest, Micky graduated from high school and then decided to study at the University of Düsseldorf. He was anything but down on himself and passed his exams surprisingly well, not counting the oral exam in philosophy. The reason given was that he was unable to concentrate. But it was enough, and the advanced courses met the required numerus clausus.
I tried to get to know a few other boys, which Choi clearly disliked. He was still single himself. However, it didn't work out anyway. No one appealed to me enough for me to take a closer look at the person. So I slowly became myself again. The untouchable.
I spent some time looking for Jan. No one knew about his whereabouts. Absolutely no one I knew and could have asked could tell me what had become of him. His parents were nowhere to be found. Apparently the rest of the family had moved away at some point without me noticing. I still don't know what he's doing or if he's even still alive.
Alex and Jessica wanted to get married at some point, but not yet. They took an apartment together and each started an apprenticeship.
My life took a rather lonely turn. I bought a second-hand VW Polo with the wages from my community service. Driving around aimlessly did me good for a while. But it made me even lonelier. So I made another decision that I couldn't say whether it was right or wrong. In any case, I didn't want to be my old self anymore. I still hadn't found the mistake.
The next day, a somewhat sleepy Choi opened the door for me. It was six o'clock. Still the dead of night for a student. He was dressed only in a very interesting pair of boxer shorts. I would never have believed that Choi had such bad taste in underwear.
“Dani? What's up?” he mumbled, still half asleep, and beckoned me in. I stayed where I was.
“Micky's moved to Düsseldorf, right?” I simply said, and Choi suddenly perked up a bit. “I need the address of his apartment.”
There I was, heading for the highway exit to Düsseldorf. Yes, I had made up my mind.
My eyes wandered to the side for a second. There was an old, battered basketball on the passenger seat.
Time to put the fragments back together again.
* American HiFi - It's not easy being me.
“Even heroes have the right to bleed. Maybe I'm disturbed, but can't you imagine that heroes can dream too? And it's not easy being me.”