*
Rebecca was crushed. She left the building and stood at the bus stop. Whichever way she looked at it, she was forced either to lose her family or lose her freedom.
Despondent, she took the bus to the school where she used to work. She was unprepared for the nostalgia that struck her like a blow when she walked in: the sound of young people’s chatter, the smell of chalk dust and cleaning fluid, the noticeboards and football boots and signs saying: ‘No running.’ She realized how happy she had been as a teacher. It was vitally important work, and she was good at it. She could not bear the thought of giving it up.
Bernd was in the head teacher’s office, wearing a black corduroy suit. The cloth was worn but the colour flattered him. He beamed happily when she opened the door. ‘Have they made you head?’ she asked, although she could guess the answer.
‘That will never happen,’ he replied. ‘But I’m doing the job anyway, and loving it. Meanwhile, our old boss, Anselm, is head of a big school in Hamburg – and making double the salary. How about you? Take a seat.’
She sat down and told him about her job interviews. ‘It’s Hans’s revenge,’ she said. ‘I never should have thrown his damn matchstick model out of the window.’
‘It may not be that,’ Bernd said. ‘I’ve seen this before. A man hates the person he has wronged, paradoxically. I think it’s because the victim is a perpetual reminder that he behaved shamefully.’
Bernd was very smart. She missed him. ‘I’m afraid Hans may hate you, too,’ she said. ‘He told me you’re being investigated for ideological unreliability, because you wrote me a reference.’
‘Oh, hell.’ He rubbed the scar on his forehead, always a sign that he was worried. Involvement with the Stasi never had a happy ending.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be. I’m glad I wrote that reference. I’d do it again. Someone has to tell the truth in this damn country.’
‘Hans also figured out, somehow, that you were . . . attracted to me.’
‘And he’s jealous?’
‘Hard to imagine, isn’t it?’
‘Not in the least. Even a spy couldn’t fail to fall for you.’
‘Don’t be absurd.’
‘Is that why you came?’ Bernd said. ‘To warn me?’
‘And to say . . .’ She had to be discreet, even with Bernd. ‘To say that I probably won’t see you for some time.’
‘Ah.’ He nodded understanding.
People rarely said they were going to the West. You could be arrested just for planning it. And someone who found out that you were intending to go was committing a crime if he failed to inform the police. So no one but your immediate family wanted the guilty knowledge.
Rebecca stood up. ‘So, thank you for your friendship.’
He came around the desk and took both her hands. ‘No, thank you. And good luck.’
‘To you, too.’
She realized that in her unconscious mind she had already made the decision to go West; and she was thinking of that, with surprise and anxiety, when, unexpectedly, Bernd bent his head and kissed her.
She was not expecting this. It was a gentle kiss. He let his lips linger on hers, but did not open his mouth. She closed her eyes. After a year of fake marriage it was good to know that someone genuinely found her desirable, even lovable. She felt an urge to throw her arms around him, but suppressed it. It would be madness now to start a doomed relationship. After a few moments she broke away.
She felt herself near to tears. She did not want Bernd to see her cry. She managed to say: ‘Goodbye.’ Then she turned away and quickly left the room.
*
She decided she would leave two days later, early on Sunday morning.
Everyone got up to see her off.
She could not eat any breakfast. She was too upset. ‘I’ll probably go to Hamburg,’ she said, faking good spirits. ‘Anselm Weber is head of a school there now, and I’m sure he’ll hire me.’
Her grandmother Maud, in a purple silk robe, said: ‘You could get a job anywhere in West Germany.’
‘But it will be nice to know at least one person in the city,’ Rebecca said forlornly.
Walli chipped in: ‘There’s supposed to be a great music scene in Hamburg. I’m going to join you as soon as I can leave school.’
‘If you leave school, you’ll have to work,’ their father said to Walli in a sarcastic tone. ‘That will be a new experience for you.’
‘No quarrelling this morning,’ said Rebecca.
Father gave her an envelope of money. ‘As soon as you’re on the other side, get a taxi,’ he said. ‘Go straight to Marienfelde.’ There was a refugee centre at Marienfelde, in the south of the city near Tempelhof airport. ‘Start the process of emigration. I’m sure you’ll have to wait in line for hours, maybe days. As soon as you have everything in order, come to the factory. I’ll set you up with a West German bank account, and so on.’
Her mother was in tears. ‘We will see you,’ she said. ‘You can fly to West Berlin any time you want, and we can just walk across the border and meet you. We’ll have picnics on the beach at the Wannsee.’
Rebecca was trying not to cry. She put the money in a small shoulder bag that was all she was taking. Anything more in the way of luggage might get her arrested by the Vopos at the border. She wanted to linger, but she was afraid she might lose her nerve altogether. She kissed and hugged each of them: Grandmother Maud; her adoptive father, Werner; her adoptive brother and sister, Lili and Walli; and last of all Carla, the woman who had saved her life, the mother who was not her mother, and was for that reason even more precious.
Then, her eyes full of tears, she left the house.
It was a bright summer morning, the sky blue and cloudless. She tried to feel optimistic: she was beginning a new life, away from the grim repression of a Communist regime. And she would see her family again, one way or another.