Sisters of Berlin

by Juliet Conlin

  ‘I’ll just pretend you didn’t say that,’ Nina says. It’s costing her a huge effort to stay calm. ‘Now go and get your shoes on. We don’t want to be late.’

  Kai tugs at her waistband. ‘Can we take some of those muesli bars?’

  ‘For god’s sake!’ she shouts, then softens her tone. It isn’t his fault. ‘All right.’

  She opens the cupboard above the sink. ‘Here,’ she says, handing him a bar.

  ‘Can we take four? So there’s one for everyone?’

  His childish sense of fairness touches her. She reaches into the cupboard and takes out another three bars, presses them into his soft hands.

  They’ve decided on a small, private funeral; something Nina and her parents instantly agreed on. She’s grateful for this – the weight of others’ condolences and commiserations, the well-meant words that wouldn’t have made the slightest dent in her pain, would’ve been more than she could bear.

  In the car on the way to the cemetery, Nina turns in her seat to look at the children. They’re both wearing headphones, cut off from the outside world. Rebekka is nodding her head to music, Kai is listening to his favourite audio book on Sebastian’s iPod. He looks small and frail in his dark shirt and trousers. Children should never wear black, she thinks, and turns back around to Sebastian.

  ‘Marie was pregnant,’ she says.

  Sebastian says nothing, keeps his eyes on the road ahead.

  ‘You’re not answering.’

  ‘You didn’t ask me anything,’ he replies. He turns his head briefly to look at her and then fixes his gaze back on the road. ‘Did you read that in the autopsy report?’

  ‘No. I haven’t read the report,’ she says. ‘Kommissar Franzen told me.’

  Franzen had, in fact, asked if she wanted a copy of the report, but she was too frightened, too cowardly to say yes. There are things she doesn’t want to know, thoughts she doesn’t allow herself to think. Did Marie suffer? Was she knocked unconscious quickly, or was she fully, agonisingly aware of every blow to her face, her head, her torso? No, Nina doesn’t need answers to these questions. She flinches, then folds her hands in her lap, tightly. She breathes in and out until her heart unclenches. She might not be brave, but she is good like this, she is able to parcel off and compartmentalise; she is efficient, rational, in control.

  An old silver Mercedes suddenly undercuts them from the right and Sebastian has to hit the brakes.

  ‘Wanker,’ he hisses.

  ‘So whoever attacked her is responsible for two deaths, really,’ Nina continues.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Whoever attacked Marie. He has two deaths on his conscience.’

  ‘But you don’t even know whether she wanted to keep the baby,’ says Sebastian. ‘Maybe she was planning to get an abortion.’

  ‘And that is relevant, how?’ She snaps her head around to stare at him. ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘I’m just saying, we know what Marie was like –’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean? And why do you assume I would only find out about the pregnancy from the autopsy report? That she didn’t tell me herself?’

  The light ahead of them turns red. Sebastian slows down, puts the gear in neutral and then places a hand on her leg.

  ‘Why is this upsetting you so much?’ he asks softly. ‘Look, we only saw her a couple of days before she was attacked. And she was smoking, right?’ He gives his head a small shake. ‘Besides, if she’d told you about it, you would have mentioned it to me, wouldn’t you?’ The look he gives her is conciliatory. ‘Am I right?’

  She sighs and shakes her head. ‘Yes, you’re right. I – I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you. I’m just –’

  ‘It’s okay. It’s okay to be confused. You have every right to feel the way you do.’ He smiles. She tries to smile back. Then the light changes and they drive on.

  They turn into the road that leads to the cemetery and Nina keeps her eye out for a free parking space. On a nearby public lawn, a handful of nudists are enjoying the afternoon sun. It is a perfect late summer; the light is warm and rich, the sky an extravagant and unbroken blue. Nina watches the people on the grass. They are young, healthy, beautiful, carefree. She twists her head around as far as she can until they’re out of sight and catches herself thinking that perhaps one of them could have died in Marie’s place, so that she and her family would not be on their way to a funeral, but instead on some family outing, a picnic bag in the back of the car and her children dressed in patterns of reds and blues and greens. Not in a uniform of black. She senses the lump in her throat and the prickling of tears behind her eyes, her hummingbird heart, by now familiar, constant companions.

  ‘Here, on the left.’ She gestures towards a free parking space.

  ‘We’d better try a little further on,’ Sebastian says, ‘or Bekka will be moaning all the way there. And back.’

  Sebastian continues driving slowly, his right indicator on. ‘Do you know who the father is?’ he asks suddenly.

  Nina frowns. It takes her a minute to understand what he’s asking. ‘No, not yet,’ she says. ‘They’ll probably do a DNA test, or something.’

  ‘D’you think they’ll go to that much effort? It’s probably Robert’s.’

  ‘Perhaps. I’ve got an appointment to see Kommissar Franzen tomorrow. I’ll ask him.’

  ‘What does he want?’

  ‘I have no idea.’ She shakes her head. ‘More questions about Marie, I suppose.’

  She spots a parking space some ten metres from the entrance to the cemetery.

  ‘Quick, take that one,’ she tells him.

  5

  She’s there, constantly, and most acutely in the memory of the last time Nina saw her. It was nothing out of the ordinary, that Wednesday night, a run-of-the-mill evening meal that Marie happened to drop by for. Yet it won’t leave Nina alone, and she spends hours trying to extract some meaning out of it. Marie arrived just as they sat down to dinner, casually getting herself a plate from the kitchen and helping herself to the lasagne Nina had cooked.

  She and Bekka had chatted about a film that had just come out – some horror movie that Bekka was far too young to watch – while Sebastian ate in the kind of silence that screamed his disapproval at Marie’s presence.

  After dinner, Marie went outside for a smoke, while Sebastian and Nina cleared the table. He was still in a mood, she could tell, but she wasn’t going to rise to it. He’d snap out of it soon enough.

  Outside the kitchen window, Marie stood leaning against a birch tree, chatting into her phone, her lovely lean back illuminated by the light from the house.

  Nina rinsed the plates and Sebastian stacked them in the dishwasher. ‘She needs to watch her language,’ he said. ‘And she shouldn’t be smoking in front of the kids.’

  ‘It’s nothing the kids don’t hear every day in school,’ Nina replied as she dried her hands on a tea towel. ‘And she’s just being herself. But I’ll talk to her about the smoking.’

  But Sebastian hadn’t finished. ‘And I don’t like her just dropping in like this. It’s presumptuous and inconsiderate.’

  ‘Oh come on. She’s my sister. That’s what family does.’

  He opened his mouth to contradict her, but then apparently thought better of it and brushed past her.

  She turned back to see Marie crushing her cigarette butt under her foot, then bending over to pick it up. As she straightened up, she caught Nina’s eye. Sorry, she mouthed at her through the glass, then blew her a silly kiss.

  Nina thinks about this as she sits at her desk, filling in a twelve-page form the accountant has sent her for occupational disability insurance, one of many insurances he considers essential. Marie can’t have known she was pregnant. She wouldn’t have been smoking if she’d known, would she? Or perhaps she just didn’t care. But if she knew about the baby, why hadn’t she told Nina?

  Nina puts down the pen. Her hand is shaking. How long will it be like this? How lon
g will everything always come back to Marie? To her and Marie and the tangle of shared memories. Will Nina have to relive her grief all over again, every time she thinks of her sister? And if not, if the pain really does get better over time, that would mean that from now on, every experience, every memory, will be Nina’s alone. It’s a desolate thought.

  Anita buzzes the intercom twice to let her know that the next patient is on her way in. Nina gathers herself and rises from the chair as a young woman enters.

  ‘Please, have a seat,’ she says and gestures towards the chair facing her across the desk. ‘How are you today?’

  Frau Thiel – Nina’s eyes flick down to the open patient file; she’s thirty-two, the same age as Marie – is dressed in a denim skirt and a blue silk top that is cut to expose a neat circular tattoo and a sun-tanned left shoulder. She smiles a greeting and hesitates briefly but then sits down slowly, using the arm rest as if to alleviate the pressure of her weight. This action reminds Nina of the new mothers who come in for their first postnatal check-up and have difficulty sitting down due to the stitches and soreness. But on the form Frau Thiel was required to fill in on arrival, she has written N/A next to the question of pregnancies and live births.

  Nina smiles at her and give her a moment to speak first. But she just smiles back uncertainly and flicks a loose curl of bleached, almost white hair that has fallen forward into her face, back over her shoulder. She reminds Nina of the youngest of her patients, teenage girls coming for the first time to get the pill, or because of heavy, painful periods, or just because they have questions or anxieties about their youthful, developing bodies. Their embarrassment and acute vulnerability showing in their body language, letting Nina know they would rather be anywhere but here.

  Her job involves the most intimate of contact, and she’s profoundly aware of the responsibility this entails. In fact, this was one of the reasons she left behind the busy, noisy, rigidly structured Ob-Gyn department at the Virchow Clinic to set up her own practice. She has since come to realise that this is a job she does well. She draws an emotional strength from her patients’ trust, which she repays by affording them the time and individual attention they need. Frau Thiel, she thinks, needs some gentle coaxing, to let her know she’s in safe, kind hands.

  ‘You’ve a lovely tan there,’ she says with a smile. ‘Have you been on holiday?’

  Frau Thiel shrugs. ‘Tanning studio,’ she says, almost apologetically, then falls back into silence.

  Nina picks up the file on her desk. ‘You’re overdue a smear test,’ she tries, encouragingly.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘But that’s not why you’re here?’ Nina suggests gently.

  Frau Thiel lets out a nervous laugh. ‘No.’ Then her face turns serious. ‘But I guess we could – you could, now that I’m here?’

  ‘Well, you wrote here that it’s been three years since you last had a test done, Frau Thiel, so I’d say it’s probably a good idea.’ Nina puts down the file. ‘So, what else can I do for you?’

  Frau Thiel rolls her eyes and lets out another tight laugh. ‘It’s a bit embarrassing,’ she says. ‘And you can call me Jessica.’

  ‘Don’t be embarrassed, Jessica, please,’ Nina replies. Her initial guess – from the young woman’s nervousness and the way she lowered herself onto the chair – is that she has inserted something she can’t remove herself. It doesn’t happen frequently, but more often than people might think.

  When Jessica doesn’t speak, Nina says: ‘Why don’t you let me have a look?’

  Jessica looks down at her hands and her expression collapses, but then she forces a smile and eases herself out of her chair.

  ‘Just remove your skirt and pants behind the screen,’ Nina says, adopting a gentle but assured tone she hopes Jessica will respond to, ‘and then you can lie down over there.’ She points to the examination table under a frosted-glass window. ‘Or, if you’d rather, you can put on one of the paper gowns,’ she adds, as Jessica disappears behind the screen. ‘They’re on the shelf.’

  Jessica busies herself getting undressed, and Nina slips on a pair of latex gloves. Anita accidentally ordered a dozen packs of gloves in the wrong size – L –, and the pair she’s wearing wrinkle horribly and impractically around her fingers, making her hands look like those belonging to some nuclear disaster victim. She knows she has to be extremely careful with her budget, but wearing gloves she can hardly work in seems a ridiculous way to avoid any additional expenditure.

  As she makes a mental note to tell Anita to re-order smaller gloves, Jessica comes out from behind the screen. She has opted for the patient gown, something the younger patients normally don’t. She climbs onto the table and lies down. Before Nina can speak, she says: ‘I cut myself shaving. I think it must have got infected or something.’

  ‘You poor thing,’ Nina replies. ‘Well, just part your legs, knees up, and I’ll take a look. I’ll be gentle, I promise.’

  Jessica raises her knees and opens her legs. Nina almost flinches at the sight. The entire genital area is a raw, purplish mess. Just by looking – she is reluctant to touch at first – she can see that the left labium majus is infected and swollen. She looks up at Jessica through her knees, but she has placed her forearm over her eyes. Nina uses her fingers to pull the labia minora to either side, gently, gently, and hears her gasp.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Nina says. ‘I’ll be as gentle as I can.’

  Pus has begun to form on a cut, or tear, of the perineum. The pubic hair has begun to grow back; there is about a week’s worth of black stubble, but it can’t hide the nature of Jessica’s injury. There is a pattern of small, semi-circular teeth marks on her labium majus. A bite mark.

  The sight stuns her and she’s momentarily paralysed. She clears her throat to try and dispel the feeling of horror. ‘When did this happen?’ Her voice is thick.

  Jessica lifts her head off the table a fraction. She has tears in her eyes and her face is taut with misery. ‘About a week ago,’ she says in a small voice. ‘I was shaving my, well, down there, and I slipped in the shower and cut myself.’

  ‘A week ago,’ Nina echoes. She wants to ask why Jessica waited so long before coming to see a doctor, but instead, she says, ‘I’ll have to clean the wound for you. It looks infected.’

  She walks over to the cabinet where she keeps the gauze pads and disinfectant. Jessica lies completely still on the table.

  ‘This will be a bit uncomfortable, Jessica,’ she says as she squirts some antiseptic fluid onto a gauze pad. Her hands are shaking slightly. ‘If it’s too painful, please let me know and perhaps I can give you a local anaesthetic.’

  ‘Okay.’ She squeezes her eyes shut, her hands clenched against the sides of the table.

  Nina is as gentle as possible as she cleans the wound. Jessica doesn’t complain, just takes a few sharp breaths every now and then.

  ‘Okay,’ Nina says when she’s done. ‘You can get dressed again. There are some sanitary towels on the shelf, next to the gowns.’

  As Jessica disappears behind the screen, Nina asks, ‘Have you had a raised temperature at all?’

  ‘Um, I don’t know,’ Jessica says from behind the screen. ‘I was feeling a little hot yesterday, but that might have been the weather.’

  ‘I’ll prescribe an antibiotic, just to be on the safe side. The infection should clear up within a couple of days. If it isn’t any better by Thursday, I’d like you to come back and see me. Or go to the emergency room if you like.’

  Jessica reappears, dressed again, and sits down gingerly. ‘Will I need stitches?’ she asks.

  ‘No. The cut should heal on its own. I’ll give you some antiseptic to take home.’ Nina begins to write out a prescription. ‘You need to apply it three times a day. No baths for a week please, only showers. Keep it nice and clean and you should be fine.’

  She hands Jessica the prescription, waits a moment and then finally asks, ‘Do you want to tell me how this happened?’

 
Jessica looks down at her lap. ‘I cut myself shaving.’

  Nina doesn’t reply straight away. Years ago, when she was completing a four-month residency at A&E, a heavily pregnant woman presented with severe bruising to her arms and legs, implausibly claiming an accident on the stairs. The senior physician bullied her into pressing charges against her partner – the patient was found dead in her flat two days later with thirty-seven stab wounds, of which twenty were to her abdomen. Nina’s mind still lurches at the memory.

  She opens a drawer, takes out a card and hands it to Jessica. ‘Here. This is the number of a counselling centre. For women. They have a twenty-four-hour hotline.’

  Jessica sits there, looking down, unmoving.

  Nina takes a pen and scribbles her mobile number on the card. She slides it across the desk. ‘Please,’ she says, then adds force to her voice. ‘Take it. My number’s on the back.’

  Jessica swallows and reaches out for the card. She doesn’t look up. Then she gets to her feet and swings her bag over her shoulder.

  Nina also rises from her chair. ‘Come back next week,’ she says. ‘Just to make sure the cut is healing properly. Anita will give you the prescription.’

  Jessica nods and leaves. Nina remains standing, motionless, her emotions a sickening swirl of horror and despair, anger and shock. Despair wins. She sinks to the floor, curls into herself and bursts into tears.

  6

  The door of Franzen’s office is slightly ajar, but still Nina knocks before she enters. Franzen is sitting behind his desk. On the other side of the office, next to an identical desk, is a man – fat, red-haired – retrieving some papers from a filing cabinet. The office smells musty, as though it hasn’t been aired in days, with a faint trace of something vinegary.

  ‘Yes, hello, Dr Bergmann, do come in,’ Franzen says. He gets up and wipes his hands on a paper napkin before holding his hand out.