by JJ Marsh
Man, Berlin is something else. There’s an anarchic undertone to the efficiency of the place, a sense that anything could happen. Not surprising, I guess, for a city divided and reunited. Sixteen years after the wall fell, traces of its presence remained in a physical sense. But what of the people? Loved ones, friends and neighbours separated for years, until one night, the distance was removed. How do you adapt to such a monumental change? After the first flash of excitement disappeared, the adjustment can’t have been easy. People change while they are apart, coping with altered circumstances, growing used to the freedom, or lack of it. When people develop at different speeds, sudden reunification must come as a shock to both sides. I guess some people asked themselves if it was wise to expect two countries to become one overnight. Reunions aren’t always a happy occasion.
We avoided the tourist sights and hung out at quirky little art galleries and bars with live music. Gael’s sister, Orla, was a real shot in the arm, always proposing a detour to see a work of graffiti, some street performers or a poetry slam. We ate at a Bierkeller and hit the nightclubs till three in the morning, when we bought donuts as we wandered home. Juanita was an incredible dancer with such enthusiasm for life, she hypnotised everyone she met. The addition of two new faces to our group worked like seasoning in the soup. Seven was even better than five.
On New Year’s Eve, we cooked dinner together in the huge apartment I’d rented. Then we went out into the streets, wishing everyone a Guten Rutsch into the New Year. We counted down to midnight and danced in one of the squares. Later we split up. The party people, me, Juanita, Mika and Orla, wanted to go clubbing. The girls weren’t crazy about the idea and I was in no mood to persuade them. Trying to keep everyone happy is a thankless task. Simone’s sour expression had pushed me to the end of my tether over the last two days. Several times I asked myself why we bunch of misfits were doing this again, when I could be perfectly happy without them.
My point is, people grow. We were in our late teens when we met and over those three years, yeah, we formed a bond stronger than most. I reckon had Dhan not died that night, we would all have drifted apart. It’s only natural, you know? Maybe seeing each other once in a while, the gaps between getting longer, the quality of experiences getting poorer, until the physical connection just dried up. We could still keep up with each other’s lives via the sanitised version presented to social media. No guilt about a friendship gone fallow. Just the illusion of closeness with the reassurance of distance. Who wouldn’t sign up to that?
Maybe not all of us. Lovisa is our ‘Mom’, keeping our five-way relationship alive like an artificial lung. Birthdays, successes, moves, failures and love affairs all merit a reminder or a message. Without her, the connection would wither and die, like fresh-cut flowers in a cemetery.
Like all moms, she has her favourite. No one can deny that’s Simone. A favourite child earns her place through sweet-natured charm or helplessness. Simone uses the latter. Always needy, confused, fretful and vulnerable, Simone plays every trick in the book to make us all come running to her aid. Everyone falls for it, except me. Even Gael tolerates her shtick, but I reckon she sees through the act. How come Simone, as the local, couldn’t cope with one single practical action required for registration at university without one of us holding her hand?
The woman is pretty, that much is true. Heads turn when she enters a room. But she’s like dragon fruit. Appealing exterior, apparently packed with stuff that’s good for you, but the inside is bland. Maybe even a little sour on second bite. She’s manipulative and sly, playing people against each other. Classic youngest sibling behaviour, according to Gael, who should know. If that is not enough of a deterrent, I’m here to warn you, my friends, she’s the worst kind of European snob.
It’s a well-honed instinct I’ve developed to a high degree of precision, as an American expat. Or to look at it through their eyes, an immigrant. That sense of when I’m being judged. The glance from head to foot, zoning in on whatever displeases them most, the false smile, the compliment on how good my French is (with silent follow-up clause) ... for an American. The use of Swiss French slang to exclude me.
Yeah, been there, done that, got le T-shirt. I made up my mind to be civil to Simone but give all her negative crap a wide berth. Then what happens? She starts dating my flatmate. I come home, she’s there, draped around him like a foulard. The two of them on the sofa, her legs over his, her arm behind her head to lift her chest just so. And of course the nights. Noises of endless lovemaking. So irrelevant when you’re involved. So utterly disturbing when you’re forced to listen.
“Hi, Clark! If you’re hungry, we made cheese soufflés. There’s plenty left in the kitchen.”
You can stick your soufflés, lady, I thought. “Just eaten, guys, but thanks,” I said.
As for Dhan, he was under some sort of spell. On one of the rare occasions she wasn’t at our place, I asked him if he thought this fling had long-term potential. My timing wasn’t great. He was trying to reboot his computer and kinda distracted.
“Simone? No way. Too high-maintenance. What is wrong with this OS? Should have called it POS.” He scratched his head and then noticed I was still standing there. “No, mate, it’s just sex and a bit of variety. And when she gets the kit on, the fun begins ...” His whistle turned into a frown as he glared at the screen. “Forty minutes to restart? They have got to be joking.”
I could see his mind wasn’t on our conversation, so left it there.
A couple days later, I was heading toward campus in brilliant sunshine, gazing up at the mountains on the other side of the lake. Days like this, I couldn’t believe my luck. How long had I hoped to study languages in a cosmopolitan European city? Right here, right now, I was living the dream. Lac Leman reflected the mackerel-pattern of wispy clouds, filling me with an irrational joy. Something about water attracted me. Lakes, the ocean, rivers, whatever, I loved them all. I ran through my languages. L’eau, el agua, das Wasser and hesitated. Was it das or der Wasser? I should have known something that basic by now. Reminded of my intention to get some kids’ books out of the library to work on my German, I quit gazing at the lake and headed for the university.
Out of nowhere, Dhan appeared at my elbow. “Hey, big man, you got half an hour?”
His grin and bright eyes told me he was up to something. Time and time again, he would try to persuade me to cut lectures, skip a class and join him for a beer, a boat trip or some other thrill-seeking opportunity. Dhan was pretty hard to refuse.
“Depends. I don’t have to be anyplace till four, so I was on my way to the library.”
“The library? We can do better than that. Come shopping with me. I need your advice.”
He placed his hand on my shoulder and guided me off the university grounds. We took a bus a couple stops, Dhan talking non-stop about a comedy show he’d seen the night before and got off at Monthoux, at the heart of the Pâquis district. He led me up a side street I didn’t know, beckoning me to follow. Pâquis, like all European red-light districts, is a mixture of cool and scuzzy. This particular corner was definitely at the scuzzy end, with strip clubs and lap dancing joints every twenty metres. Dhan stopped and pointed. “Here we go!”
A sex shop. In the window, some PVC gimp suits which would give you an infection by just looking at them. I stopped, an uncomfortable tension in my shoulders. This was all wrong.
“And we’re coming here why, exactly?”
“For some kit. Simone’s Valentine’s present to me was a promise she’ll wear whatever costume I buy for her. That’s why I need your advice. My imagination is a bunch of soft-porn clichés so I’m leaning to the saucy French maid. Can you imagine, with her accent?”
My stomach turned toxic and I tasted bile at the back of my throat. “Sorry, man, this is not my scene. Not my scene at all. Maybe if you’re shopping for kinky outfits to spice up your sex life, you should take your girlfriend.” I spun on my heel and speed-walked my way out of there. Dha
n’s voice called after me but I didn’t, couldn’t turn around. What the hell was he thinking?
Maybe the reason I was recalling all that shit at six-thirty in the morning after three hours’ sleep was because I could hear people having sex. After tumbling out of a nightclub and getting a cab back to the Berlin apartment, Juanita and I fell into bed sometime after three am, in the words of The Dead Kennedys, too drunk to fuck. It was obvious to everyone that Orla and Mika were going to get it on and I was happy for him. For both of them. But the sounds of passion from the room next door in the pre-dawn darkness took me back to that small room in Geneva, listening to squeals and moans, clenching my fists and curling my toes, my pillow pressed over my head. That knot in my stomach returned for the first time in years.
Even though I couldn’t admit it back then, a part of me knew that feeling. As the man who’d slept with pretty much half of the people in our year and some above and below, I had a reputation. But on hearing my flatmate and his girlfriend role-playing master and servant, I was jealous.
Chapter 7: Simone, 2007
I have no idea what I would have done without Lovisa. She has been there for every significant event in my life since 1997. How I managed before we became friends I no longer recall. It is bizarre to think we met just ten years ago, so deeply woven together are our lives. True, not many people have been through so much so young. The death of my lover and her friend, my terminated pregnancy, Lovisa’s split with Mika, our graduation, our shared flat as we started our careers. She was a witness at my wedding and a shoulder to cry on through the divorce. The sister I always wanted. My biological sisters, both older than me, are superficial and selfish. I don’t think they care about anyone else but themselves, although they are on very good terms with the bathroom mirror.
The biennial New Year’s Eve gatherings were Lovisa’s idea. Even though I resented the concept of sharing my grief as the anniversary loomed, their company comforted and reassured me. In 2003, in Kefalonia, we had laughed more than we cried. For a Swiss, there’s something magical about an island. In spite of the fact it was too cold to swim, we spent most of our days on the beach. The sunshine, the sea and the extraordinary light acted as a therapeutic treatment, lifting us all, smoothing out wrinkles and focusing our attention on the present rather than the past. We were, as they say, in the moment.
Berlin in 2005 was not as much fun. The presence of two strangers made me uneasy, and drugs cause me problems. Clark has always been an experimenter with pharmaceuticals. Perhaps he is searching for something to make him happy. Personally, I don’t like losing control. In addition, if everyone around me is stoned or high or whatever they call it, I am excluded. Then Gael’s overbearing sister hooked herself on to Mika and the party split into singles and doubles. On top of all of that, I dislike German food.
Another thing that spoiled the trip for me was Mika having a one-night-stand. I thought he was better than that. We all know Clark cannot keep it in his trousers, but Mika? Very disappointing behaviour. It didn’t seem to bother Lovisa, or if it did, she hid it well. I often wondered why she hadn’t tried to repair their relationship. On a positive note, I knew his interest in casual sex meant he wasn’t seeing anyone seriously. Mika’s not the kind of guy to cheat on a girlfriend.
2007 should have been Gael’s turn to organise the New Year event except that we all met up in September for our Ten-Year University Reunion. I was reluctant to attend, despite the fact Lovisa and I were the only two people in our year who did not have to travel. Reunions are basically a competition. Who has succeeded best, aged well and achieved the most? Everyone compares, compliments and after the event, criticises. I was not looking forward to it at all. To tell the truth, I was dreading every minute. As it turned out, I should not have concerned myself, because Lovisa was there.
For the first few years after university, Lovisa and I had shared an apartment. When I decided to buy a place, she moved further out of Geneva to save money. That first apartment I owned was small but large enough to accommodate a guest in my study. Lovisa’s place was bigger, but too far out of the city for me. Because she had a spare room and a sofa bed, she offered two places to stay, first come, first served. My relationship with Clark had never been easy and Gael tended to drink more than made me comfortable, so I reached out to Mika. Just a friendly gesture. He thanked me but said he’d already booked a hotel so he could get some work done. So I went out to buy a dress instead.
The five of us agreed on a pre-reunion apéro, sitting in Lovisa’s living room, browsing through photographs and reminding each other of our classmates’ names and related scandals. We drank cocktails and hypothesised about the evening ahead. Lovisa looked stunning in a black velvet dress with long gloves and a gauzy cape, her blonde hair piled high. The other three wore black tie, including Gael. While I understood the refusal to conform to gender stereotypes, I cannot say her curvy body shape is ideal for the sharp lines of a suit. My own dress was vintage Dior in champagne-coloured silk, and I borrowed my sister’s diamonds, a Cartier necklace and earrings to catch the light.
The look on Mika’s face told me everything I needed to know. Not only would I be the best-dressed woman in the room, but also the most popular, surrounded by genuine friends. The evening ahead began to seem less of a chore. We toasted each other with Cosmopolitans and took a taxi to the venue, a hotel on the lake. The evening was quite lovely. Even in late September, it was warm enough to sit on the terrace. I drank champagne, embraced old friends, accepted compliments, asked polite questions and even danced a couple of times. Gael hardly sat down, twirling, jitterbugging and demonstrating her skill at Irish dancing. She looked like she was having enormous fun and every time I saw her, I had to smile.
As the party began to wind down, Lovisa and I found a table on the terrace and Gael managed to source an unopened bottle of Piper-Heidsieck. Tired and happy, we sat there grinning at each other and the lights of Geneva reflected in the water.
“You were great fun this evening,” I told Gael. “Really the life and soul of the party.”
Lovisa agreed. “You were. It must be a British thing. To me, your energy fills a void.”
We paused for a moment, considering the word ‘void’. It could have dampened the scene but then Gael spoke.
“Thank you. I had a ball. OK, so I didn’t pull but the night is still young and I have already asked what time the barman gets off work. Looks like Clark got lucky with that Danish Glamazon. He’s punching above his weight there, but good luck to him.”
Gael and Clark were constantly pursuing sex. Neither seemed to have an agenda other than simply getting laid. I shook my head, curious at why it seemed so important to them. I looked back at the hotel ballroom, emptier now as people left or moved on to the after parties. Mika, usually easy to spot in a crowd, was nowhere to be seen.
“Where’s Mika? Did he leave already?” I asked, with a yawn.
Gael shook her head. “Typical bloody Mika. He’s sitting in the corner talking shop with some equally boring men. Lovisa, you’ve probably noticed already, but Bernadette – the redhead in the jumpsuit – told me she has the mad hots for Mika. Should I tell her to lay off?”
Lovisa lifted her head and laughed, releasing her hair from its clip. “Of course not! My relationship with Mika is history, but I still love him, as I love all of you. I want him to be happy. He should have fun, dance, laugh, have sex. God knows, somebody should. I’m not exactly setting the world on fire.”
I laughed, but guilt dragged at the corners of my mouth. Mika had ended their relationship because of me. In my grief and panic in the first weeks of 2000, I was hopeless at anything practical. That was why I carried Dhan’s baby for sixteen weeks, despite knowing I was in no condition to have a child. Lovisa arranged the termination and ensured I attended all the subsequent counselling. Mika’s Catholic conscience couldn’t stand that. All the cracks after Dhan’s death, the inquest and the grim months of uncertainty gradually mended, but mine and L
ovisa’s decision to abort an unwanted pregnancy shattered their relationship into a thousand pieces.
“Nor me,” said Gael. “I don’t usually make New Year’s resolutions, but this year, I am determined to have more sex.”
“What happened to that Dutch woman you liked?” I asked. “She sounded perfect for you.”
“Marieke? She was perfect for me. Sexually speaking, 2006 was a vintage year, what with her in Amsterdam and Stefan in Brussels. He was the classic office romance, editor of the paper, with that kind of sexy intelligence I can’t resist. Snogging in the lift, knee-tremblers over the desk, the whole nine yards. Then they both went back to their wives.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. Gael’s attitude always surprised me. She never looked at the menu and made a considered decision. She treated love as fast food, snatched when she was hungry and the waste discarded.
“I’m not. Hot sex for a good seven months with a fit woman and a steamy three-month liaison with the boss? Here’s to 2008 bringing plenty more where that came from!”
We bounced our flutes against each other’s and repeated her wish, then fell silent amid the noise of revellers cheering as they left the hotel. My questions itched at me and in the relaxed, companionable mood, it seemed fair to ask.
“Gael, you don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to, but I’d like to understand how you identify. Do you describe yourself as bisexual? Or are you straight but curious about lesbianism? Or vice versa? It doesn’t matter either way; I’m just trying to understand how you see yourself.”
