ANNA STOOD IN THE street for a dumbfounded minute before walking away from the house and toward the Bahnhof. The neighbors had left, the postman had moved on, and Anna didn’t know where to go. But all journeys begin at the train station. She arrived at the Bahnhof just past 7:45. She’d missed the S3 by two minutes. Six more minutes and she’d catch the S8. She’d been awake for less than an hour. This had all transpired in less time than it takes for a minute hand to circumnavigate the face of a clock.
What a funny thing time is. It’s mutable. It speeds and it slows. It retreats and it attacks. But Swiss clocks boast the world’s most unflinching precision. Incomparable accuracy. Exactness. Exactness is a form of truth. But nothing is exactly true. Truth, like time, is mutable. Both are relative. Both are told. When it’s 7:45 A.M. in Zürich, it’s 2:45 P.M. in Tokyo. Each city lives in its own hour. Gleich und nicht gleich. The same and yet not. The earth turns on an earth-sized axis. Everything oscillates. No one and nothing’s exempt. The planet spins at an angled pitch. Therefore each day lasts as long as each day lasts. Hours are arbitrary. A minute may endure a thousand years. And an event can occur in an instant.
Anna rode to the Hauptbahnhof during morning rush. She stood near the doors and focused on looking through the window at the landscape. She kept her face angled to the ground. She didn’t want to show it. Anna hadn’t put on any makeup. The bruises weren’t full blown, but if anyone cared to examine her, he’d find them. But the safest thing about a city is how inscrutable you become when you step into it.
She got off the train at platform 53 and walked almost a half kilometer down the Sihl before she realized she’d left both the small suitcase Bruno had packed for her and her purse on the train. She stuffed her hands into her coat pockets. All she had was her cell phone. Now what? Anna’s purse and suitcase were now halfway to Pf?ffikon. Do I report this? Who to? Where? Everything seemed so complicated. Day of all days. She couldn’t think it through. But she tried and kept trying until something inside her shrugged oh well, whereupon she drew a deep, deliberate breath and kept walking south toward L?wenstrasse.
Anna wandered down L?wenstrasse without intent until she reached a tram stand. She took the last seat and when an elderly woman walked under the shelter, Anna didn’t rise and offer her place. It didn’t matter. A tram came and went and the elderly woman was gone as quickly as she had appeared. Anna took her Handy from her pocket and considered her legitimate options—there were so few. The obvious course of action was also the most correct and it presented itself first. Mary. I’ll call Mary. Anna called. The phone rang but Mary didn’t answer and Anna hung up before leaving a message. I hate the telephone. I don’t want to leave a message. What will I say? Anna didn’t have the luxury of neurosis that morning. She called again. Once more, the phone rang four times and then it went to voice mail. For the second time in a row, Anna did not leave a message. Quit being an idiot! she scolded herself. So rarely did Anna reach out for help that she wasn’t sure how to do it. Is that what I’m doing? Asking for help and failing? She closed the phone and pressed it between her palms, as if the posture of prayer alone might make it ring. A minute later the phone trembled and an SMS came through. Anna avoided letting herself believe her prayer had anything to do with it. Helping w/Max’s class—will call later. Hope you feel better. Am sorry you are sad. Am here for you. XO —M.