Singapore
After he had moved to Zurich to live with Sascha, Dan finished his studies there, which was tough. He didn’t know the language, and the Swiss, bless their hearts, spoke an incomprehensible German they called Alemannic. Although Dan tried hard to learn real German, he’d get angry glares from locals, who sometimes mistook him for a German.
Dan had realized soon enough that Germans were anything but popular in Switzerland, and the Alemannic-speaking Swiss had a bit of a complex about anything from the “big canton up north.” Sometimes they’d just mistake him for yet another immigrant there to take away jobs from the locals. Then he’d just switch back to English, and people would be much more friendly when they realized he was an American tourist.
Morons, Dan would think but say nothing.
Sascha, who was a year older, was already out of school and working at a local clinic as counselor. About a year after he had graduated, Dan saw a job advert for a physical education teacher in Singapore at a school for expats, and he applied. First he thought he’d have no chance, but then they called and wanted him to come to Singapore for an interview.
Sascha had raised both eyebrows at the news, not being aware that his husband had applied for a position abroad. Sascha had always assumed that they would live their lives in Switzerland, in Zurich, close to his parents, close to the airport and a flight to LAX to see Joanne.
They both flew to Singapore, and while Dan was having his interviews at the school, Sascha went out to discover the Merlion City, falling in love with the “Zurich of the Orient,” clean, green and with more malls than you could ever visit in a lifetime. Sascha had always had a soft spot for warm climates, and he felt immediately at home.
As it was, Dan got the job and they moved to Singapore, to a condominium in Holland Village where so many of the expatriates in Singapore lived. At the time, Holland Village wasn’t their first choice. Both would have preferred to stay elsewhere, on Orchard, for instance, if they could’ve afforded it, or anywhere else with a larger local populace, but the school offered them an apartment, and so they took it and eventually fell for the quiet charm of their new neighborhood. Besides, nothing was very far in Singapore, and after a couple of years, they were deeply rooted in their community.
Sascha had started to work for a clinic in the neighborhood. A Caucasian psychologist proved very popular both with the locals and the expats alike, and before long, he opened up his own practice.
* * * * *
Mike
Dan watched his husband and noticed that Sascha was studying his brother intently. He knew Sascha well enough to understand that he wouldn’t let Mike get away so easily. He had also noticed that Mike seemed more irritable than usual, and now he was almost gone, his mind far away. Dan knew that Sascha would find a way to discover what was going on. He trusted his husband implicitly, allowing himself to relax a bit after a long and strenuous day. He looked at his boys and smiled. I’m so proud and so lucky, he thought.
On the other side of the table, Sascha wondered what was going on in his husband’s head. He had seen that Dan had kind of drifted off there for a minute before focusing on their boys again. He had felt Dan’s look on his face, warm, loving, concerned. He smiled at him and focused his attention on his younger brother again. If only I knew what was bothering him.
“Say, Mike, can I talk to you for a second?” he asked. “Outside?”
Mike gave him a puzzled look but scooted off the bench where he sat and followed Sascha out of the restaurant. “Listen, how do you want to pay for this? Shall we split it fifty-fifty?” Sascha started off the conversation with a non-threatening topic.
“Yeah, that works,” Mike replied and lit a cigarette. “We can do that.” “What an ordeal. At least she got a sunny day for her funeral, right?”
Sascha nodded. “I’m glad it’s finally over. These past few years have been hard on all of us,” he said. “I hope Helene’s fine. I know she loved Mom very much.” Mike began to twitch. “You okay, bro?” Sascha asked.
There was an awkward silence that felt longer than it probably was, then Mike calmly said, “She’s leaving me.”
“She’s what?”
“Yeah. She left three months ago, took the kids, and moved back to her parents. God, Sascha, I don’t know what to do. I miss them so much…” He dropped his cigarette and began crying.
Sascha took his brother into his arms and hugged him. “It’s okay, bro, let it out, let it out. Shhhhh…” Mike was sobbing now, his entire body shaking, his taller frame almost hanging onto Sascha. “Come on, buddy, let’s take a walk.” Sascha turned out from underneath him.
“Okay,” Mike said, but continued to cry.
Sascha went into the restaurant, grabbed his and Mike’s coats, gave Dan a shrug and an “I’ll tell you later” look and said to him, Aunt Clara, and the kids, “We’ll be right back.”
Mike was still outside, waiting. This proud man was barely a shadow of himself with red eyes and shoulders so slumped that he looked a lot shorter than he was.
Sascha handed Mike his coat, and they started walking slowly toward the center of the village and the church they had left a couple of hours earlier.
“Tell me,” Sascha said. “What happened?”
They walked in silence for a while, and Sascha understood how difficult it was for Mike to put his pain into words. Finally, though, Mike began to speak.
* * * * *
Helene
Mike and Helene had met at the University of St. Gallen, one of Europe’s leading business, economy, and management schools. She, the daughter of a rich German industrialist, and he, the cocky and determined business major, found each other quickly. They dated all through their university years and married after Helene had graduated. She was already pregnant at the time. Her parents weren’t exactly thrilled at the prospect of the child being born into sin, so they agreed to have an ”emergency” wedding, small and intimate.
Sascha remembered arriving in Darmstadt with Dan. They had been together for a couple of years then. Sascha had been stunned by the sheer size of the wedding reception. The two hundred guests included the minister of the interior of Germany, an old political friend of Helene’s father. Sascha had laughed and wondered: if this was a small wedding, what a large one would look like. They’d have to host it at the local soccer stadium, the “Böllenfalltor.” What a silly name, Sascha had thought at the time. Oh well, maybe Helene’s younger sister would behave so their parents could organize a real wedding.
Two months after the wedding, Paul had been born, and Mike was relieved that it was a boy. His father-in-law, also named Paul, had been giving him grief about providing a male heir for their family business. Helene’s family was old money, rich, loaded with traditions and strict rules.
After Paul, Helene gave birth to two more children, a girl, Susanne, eighteen months after Paul, and a boy, Heinrich, named after her grandfather, three years after Susanne, just a couple of months after the twins had been born, Sascha recalled.
The five cousins seldom saw each other. Helene’s parents kept their distance from Sascha and Dan and never invited them to any family gatherings. After the death of Mike and Sascha’s dad, with their mom in the nursing home, there were few chances to meet up. Besides, Sascha was under the impression that Mike agreed with his father-in-law.
Yet here they were, walking through the streets of their home town of five thousand inhabitants who knew every secret about everybody. After all these years, he and his brother were finally talking again.
“Paul had been trying to get me to take over his factory for years,” Mike said, “but I always knew that if I did that, he’d control my every move, and I just didn’t want to do that to myself. I know Helene’s been saying that it would work out, but she’s so much stronger than I am, and she knows him better than I do. She can play him. I cannot. We’ve been arguing a lot about that, more and more over the past few months, and with Lottie now married as well, Helene
was afraid that Paul might offer the position to Rudi, and that we might lose the company.”
“But you make good money, bro. You can provide for your family.”
“I know, but sometimes, Helene is so stubborn. Her family name, the heritage, and all that bullshit. I get so tired sometimes. Why can’t she just accept me for who I am? It was never like this in the beginning, you know. We loved each other, had fun, traveled with little Paul. We were good enough for each other, but lately…” Fresh tears welled up in Mike’s eyes.
Sascha felt that this wasn’t the whole story yet, and so he just followed his brother, waiting and listening.
After a long pause, Mike sighed. “There was something else, you know.”
I knew it, Sascha thought.
“It happened at the Christmas party at the office. Cliché, isn’t it?” Mike shook his head, and a crooked smile broke across his lips. “We had a new intern from India, Parvati. She had studied in Frankfurt and joined us for a couple of months—highly recommended from our HR department. Did great work. She had helped me on a complicated deal with our plant down in Bhopal, and we got to know each other. Fuck, what do you care?”
“It’s okay,” Sascha said. “I’m not going to judge you. God knows, I’ve made my fair share of mistakes.”
“Anyway, we had been to India a couple of times. Remember last fall I had texted you? Nothing ever happened. We each had our room, we worked, and after dinner, I had all the executive reports to read, and I had a board meeting. Hell, I never even thought about it, but then when we had our Christmas party, you should’ve seen her, all dressed up in her sari, so vulnerable. She had never attended anything like it, so she just stood there, in the middle of the crowd, all by herself, in that amazing gown, her long black hair all the way down to her waist. I couldn’t help it.”
Sascha had to bite his lips not to laugh. His brother had a heart. Who knew?
“We talked all evening, and then I drove her home,” Mike said. “Picture the rest.”
No thanks, Sascha thought. He had never really been comfortable thinking about lady parts or the idea of straight sex. That is one image I don’t need in my head right now.
“So how did Helene find out?” Sascha asked, not able to connect the dots.
“I told her the minute I came home. I’ve never lied to her, and I’ve never had a secret from her. I looked at her and couldn’t help but tell her. She left the bedroom and slept in a guest room that night. The next day, she packed her stuff, took the kids, and left for her parents. I haven’t seen her since. Paul won’t even let me talk to her, and she doesn’t pick up her cell or answer my texts.” Mike began crying again.
Sascha hugged him, and Mike clung to him for support.
“I miss her, Sascha. God I miss her so much. Help me. I want to fix this, I want her back. I can’t live without her.”
“Well,” Sascha began. “I’m not sure what I can do. It seems a bit out of character for Helene to just leave you without a fight, without killing you first.” At that, Sascha had to chuckle, and Mike stiffened in his hug. “Listen bro, here’s what I’ll do. I’m going to talk to her, I’ll try to text her tonight. Okay? Maybe she’ll listen to me. Maybe I can get her to talk to you. But why haven’t you told me before? Christmas was months ago. You could’ve come to Singapore. Spent time with us and the boys…”
“I felt so bad, so ashamed for having fucked up. Literally. I just needed space, time to think. Besides, work doesn’t stop just because your wife and kids leave you.”
Sascha looked at his brother, pale now, with puffy red eyes and wet streaks on his cheeks. “Come on, don’t be an asshole,” he said. “We’re family. We may not be close, but you have to know that Dan and I are always there for you if you need us, capish?”
Mike flashed him a faint smile. “Capish, bro. Thanks. I appreciate it.”
“Come on, let’s walk back to the restaurant before Clara and Dan start to worry about us, okay? We can talk more about this later.” Without waiting for an answer, Sascha turned and started walking back toward the restaurant, pulling his brother along.
They said nothing on the way back, just walked quietly, both lost in thoughts about the news they had just shared.
* * * * *
The Restaurant
When they got back to the restaurant, they were greeted by worried looks from both adults. Shane had fallen asleep, his head resting on Dan’s lap, Pascal was coloring something.
“You guys okay?” Aunt Clara asked. “What happened?”
“Oh, just boy talk, Clara. We’re good. What do you think? Are you ready to call it a day? I don’t think this party is going to get any better.” Sascha was trying to lift the spirits and crack a joke, failing miserably as always.
“Sounds good to me,” Aunt Clara replied. “My train leaves in forty minutes. I still have to get back to Berne.”
“We’ll walk you to the station,” Dan volunteered, eager to get out of the restaurant and find out what his man and his brother-in-law had been talking about.
Sascha and Mike paid the small bill. Dan tried to wake up Shane, who wouldn’t budge. Finally, he lifted the little boy and carried him. Shane hugged his dad and rested his heavy head on Dan’s shoulder.
“Hon, can you take Pascal?” Dan whispered.
“I’ll take care of him,” Mike replied.
Sascha shrugged, and Dan gave him a puzzled look. “I’ll explain later, darling. Trouble on the home front.”
With that, their small party exited the restaurant, Dan carrying a sleeping Shane, Mike holding Pascal by the hand, and Sascha and Clara taking the rear, arm in arm.
“Thank you so much for coming and helping us with everything,” Sascha told her. “I know that you and Mom weren’t close, and I appreciate your help. It’s so difficult to arrange these things when you’re thousands of miles away. Both Mike and I are very grateful.”
“Oh hush, boy, of course I help. It’s what we do, right? What’s with Mike anyway. Is he okay?”
“Yeah, he will be. It’s personal. He’ll tell you when he’s ready.”
They walked quietly to the station where they had to wait for the commuter train to take Clara back to Zurich for her connecting train to Berne. In the meantime, Pascal had also collapsed and was sleeping, snuggled around his uncle’s shoulders. When the train pulled in, Aunt Clara kissed both boys on their foreheads, trying not to wake them.
“Tell them I love them, okay?” she told Sascha as she climbed on board the train, fighting tears. “And thank you for everything.”
* * * * *
Clara
Clara sat down in the second-class compartment of the train that would take her to Zurich. She was alone in the entire carriage, which was fine by her. At the age of sixty-nine, she was used to being alone. She had lived her entire life that way.
There was a time when she was young, looking forward to joining the world, a world full of people, full of pretty girls, but alas, those were different times. Instead, she obeyed her upbringing and lived her life alone, far away from the temptations that might’ve gotten a girl into trouble in the fifties and sixties. By the time society had changed enough for a girl to meet a girl and be happy, Clara was too old, a spinster, dried up, emotionally and physically.
Clara looked out the window, waved at her nephews, and smiled. Secretly, she envied Sascha, this most stubborn of her nephews, always going his own way, head first, fighting any resistance, living his life fully as a proud gay man, marrying this beautiful American, even becoming a father against all odds, including her own brother’s explicit wishes.
As the train started moving, she was grateful, after all, because when she looked at her relatives, she could see that there was hope for humanity, even though it may have been too late for her. If only I had been as brave as Sascha, she thought.
Lara. The name came to her suddenly, and she remembered the only woman who had ever caught her eye and stolen her heart for all eternity.
/> * * * * *
Lara
After having moved away from her parents, Clara had gone to Berne, where she gained employment at the Federal Offices, the Swiss government. She was only a secretary, but to her family, she was a bit of a star, working for the federal government. Clara felt lonely and alone in Berne, away from her childhood friends, new to the capital, new in this city, with no friends.
One day, as she went from the east wing of the “Bundeshaus,” as the capital of Switzerland is called, to the main post, she met Lara, another young secretary, who had moved to Berne at about the same time as Clara. Lara hailed from Savognin, a tiny village in Grisons, the mountain state of Switzerland famous for skiing resorts such as St. Moritz and Davos. Back then, Savognin was only a small farming village in the middle of nowhere, its only notoriety being the fact that it was located along the road to St. Moritz.
Lara had the longest, darkest hair Clara had ever seen in a girl. Her eyes were as green as the grass of her mountain meadows in spring, her features lean. She stood as tall as Clara. Simply a beautiful woman, she was almost like a classic Greek statue. Clara also noted her full lips, with a bit of lip gloss on them. No more was permitted by the dress code of the federal bureaus. She also noted Lara’s pointy breasts pushing gently against the thin fabric of her blouse. Not very big, but firm.
Clara blushed, as the train rushed through the landscape toward Zurich. She hadn’t thought of Lara in years.
And I haven’t seen her for more than forty years. I wonder how she is, what she does.
When the two girls met in the post room at the Bundeshaus, they hit it off immediately, giggling and chatting about their work, their bosses, and particularly about Federal councilor Friedrich Wahlen, Switzerland’s Minister of Justice, who didn’t appreciate giggling girls in the building.
Family Ties Page 6
