Bella Italia (13 page)

Although neither Hans nor she had said it out loud, small irritations in their relationship were also growing between them. Always about silly little things. Things you normally would move right past in a relationship. But this week Petra had reached her limit. She followed Liesbeth’s advice and scheduled a talk with Irene. There she let it all out. It had given her some relief, but had also left her feeling alone and vulnerable. What was going to happen now? Would they simply have to accept the fact that they may never know exactly what had happened? Would Niels continue to have problems because of this for the rest of his life, or would he be all better by next year? They didn’t want to pressure him, but because of that it seemed as if he was becoming increasingly distant. He acted pretty normal these days, so in fact they should be happy, and maybe he was far more resilient then they gave him credit for? But what happened on Christmas Eve seemed to prove the opposite. Irene had said that she wanted to see how Niels responded to the karate lessons, but that Petra had to talk to Hans and work on regaining each other’s trust in order to truly support each other. There was nothing more difficult than asking for help, especially for parents who took the responsibility of their child as seriously as they did. But there was no way to be there for your child if you weren’t also there for each other. Petra knew this, and for the first time she also felt that things needed to change. Irene had complimented her on taking the first step and coming to talk to her. Now she also had to do this at home.

She walked in to the living room, put the beer down in front of him on the table, and took a seat on the couch.

Hans looked away from the TV quickly, saw the beer, and said, “Nice, thank you.”

She took a sip of her water and took a long, deep breath. “What are you watching?”

Hans made a serious face. “A news show. It’s always the same thing. Politicians fighting with each other. A lot of whining. I’m going to turn it off in a minute.”

Petra nodded. “Okay, good.”

“Why?”

“I’d like to talk to you tonight.”

“Oh, okay.” He sounded a little hesitant. Hans had already turned the volume down, but now he turned the TV off. She had his full attention.

Petra cleared her throat. “So, I went to see Irene. You were right. I had definitely reached my limit. I don’t say that to place any blame on you. I know you also did everything you could, and yet, we talk about it but we are never completely honest with each other about it. I can only speak for myself, but I have a feeling you haven’t told me everything going on with you either? You’ve kept quiet to spare me the trouble. I wanted to be strong for Niels, for you. I am no good to either one of you if I am an anxious mother and wife all the time. But now I see that this way I’ve been doing it doesn’t work. When I said last summer that we would get through this together, I didn’t know then what that really meant. I’d like to work on that now. Together with you.”

Hans nodded. But somewhere deep inside it did bother him a little that she hadn’t told him she had made an appointment with Irene, though, at the same time, she had followed his own advice, and he couldn’t blame her for what he hadn’t done himself. He tried to shake the negative feeling and knew he needed to hear her out and that he needed to be honest with her now too.

“I can see how hard you work at trying to stay as positive as possible in this difficult situation, and I think I manage to do okay with it as well,” she continued.

“Not just okay!” Hans grinned. “You’re doing a terrific job. You are such a strong woman, Petra. I’m so incredibly proud of you!”

“But still, there is friction, Hans. You know that just as well as I do. Small irritations and frustrations here and there that we try to hide, something we manage to do sometimes, but other times we don’t.”

“But that isn’t really surprising is it? I mean we’ve had quite a lot to deal with. Now it’s karate lessons, which unintentionally brings some new tensions along with it. How will he respond to it? Will it be a success, or will it end in a drama?”

Petra shook her head in disagreement. “No, I think that’s the normal stuff. At least I think those are normal reactions. Obviously, I’ve never experienced any of this before. But I see the karate lessons as an extension of his therapy. He’s only just started, but for now he seems excited about it. I hold on to that. But it’s not enough. I now realize that we have buried our feelings in order to come across as strong as possible. Because above all, we don’t want to burden the other with the problems we are facing personally. But if we fall apart, we will accomplish exactly the opposite result of our original goal.”

Hans had put his hands under his chin while he listened and stared directly at her. He broke the sudden silence in the room. “I’m so glad you brought this up. I’ve been struggling with it myself, and I’ve been keeping everything to myself all this time. I thought that was the way to do it. But now I see that I was fooling myself. I have tried to discuss it with you, but I wasn’t exactly sure how to go about that, especially during those moments when you retreated. So let’s just be honest with each other from now on. How bad are things with you?”

Petra shrugged her shoulders. “I will survive, but I think I would do much better if I could talk to you about all of it. I can see clearly now that it doesn’t work this way.”

Hans got up right away, took a seat next to her, and put his arms around her. “I have so much to tell you and to share with you, sweetheart,” he whispered.

“I have a lot to tell you, too.” She felt the first tears forming and didn’t try to stop them.

Ben Holdinga called his students together. He wanted to spend the last fifteen minutes of class on sparring, free-form dueling using a variety of techniques. The twelve students stopped their exercises and gathered right in front of him. The discipline was seeping in slowly but surely, which did him good. This was just a beginner’s class, with the students’ levels ranging from white to orange belts. You couldn’t expect them all to have the same iron will and discipline that you would find with the students in the advanced classes.

“During the last fifteen minutes of class we’re going to do some sparring,” he said in a very relaxed manner. “In doing so, I only want to see you use the techniques we have learned during the past few weeks. Try to use everything you know, but only from what you have learned. Do not freestyle.” He mentioned that explicitly because there were a few students in this class who had changed over from different fighter sports to karate. Unconsciously, they used techniques from the other sports, which didn’t coincide with his sport and teaching technique.

He divided the group into six pairs standing across from each other. When he clapped his hands, they took their starting position quickly.

“Good luck,” he said and took a few steps back to create enough room for the beginners who, caught up in their enthusiasm, would probably give it their all.

“Semi-contact,” he responded sternly after a few seconds, when a boy pounced down on his opponent’s body a little too hard. “The intention is not to hit air or injure someone. Your movements should be controlled and effective.”

Things in the advanced classes might be far riskier and tougher, but because of the lack of control or any real experience the chance for injuries in this class was far greater. His attention was drawn to Eelco and Niels, two quiet boys, similar in stature and technique. Eelco was two years older than his opponent and a few inches taller. Eelco’s kick was technically very good. The ball of his foot touched Niels’s left shoulder. But instead of taking a step back, Niels stayed frozen in place for a moment. Eelco responded well by placing his weight forward and delivering a straight hit to Niels’s right shoulder. By doing so, Eelco had scored two points in no time at all, but suddenly Niels surprised him by stepping forward and delivering a series of superfast punches with his fists. By doing this, he not only violated the agreements about what techniques could be used, but his punches were also way too hard.

“Stop!” Ben yelled out and walked toward Niels. Niels stopped immediately and looked at him, seeming slightly embarrassed, as if he wasn’t quite sure why he’d done it.

Niels looked at Eelco for a moment, then at his own fists with a real sense of amazement and apologized.

Eelco put up his thumb and smiled sheepishly. “It’s nothing to worry about.”

Ben had to make it very clear that he didn’t tolerate this kind of behavior in his class, but he could also see that Niels had not responded maliciously. It was more a type of instinctive reaction. He could clearly see the boy relax and feel relieved, but was that because he hadn’t hurt Eelco, or because he had surprised himself with his technique? He wasn’t sure. He thought about the conversation he had with the boy’s father. The man had explained to him that Niels had developed his own defense system and that his mood could change quickly. That he could get very angry, but could recover from it almost immediately. They hoped that karate could teach him a different type of self-control. He hadn’t noticed anything different during the other classes so far, but here he had seen a different side of Niels. He was going to have to keep a closer eye on him. Ben took a step back and clapped in his hands.

“Okay, let’s go, gentlemen. Continue. This time no unauthorized techniques, or you can go hit the showers right away.”

The boys bowed to their teacher quickly and took their starting positions again.

Hans had to restrain himself from honking his horn as the car in front of him pulled away from the traffic light at a painfully slow pace.

“Hurry up, man,” he growled, clenching his jaw tightly. “I don’t have all day.”

It was a quarter to twelve in the afternoon and from the moment he’d gotten up he had been on the go constantly. It was one of those days that had started off chaotic and continued that way, and there seemed to be no end in sight to the madness. His patience was being tested again when the car ahead of him slowed down at the next yellow light, but he managed to keep his temper under control. “Good job, man! What a responsible driver you are. We need more of those. Preferably somewhere else, though, far away from Holland.”

He knew he was being unreasonable, but he didn’t care. He needed to let off some steam. Grumbling at other people from the inside of his car seemed fairly safe.

What a crazy day
, he thought, not for the first time. After a fun and relaxing Easter weekend, during which the he, Petra, and Niels had spent a lot of quality time in the woods, they had overslept this morning. It was only fifteen minutes, but those fifteen minutes had a sort of domino effect on the rest of the day.

Quickly eat some bread and gulp down some coffee. Wash up fast, no time for a shower, brush teeth, and get dressed as fast as humanly possible
. Petra had brought Niels to school, and he had raced to his practice. No time whatsoever to read the paper, watch morning television, or check the Internet.

Just before eleven thirty, Petra had called him at his practice, which was very unusual in of itself, because she rarely ever called him at work during office hours. This was because he was usually working on a patient and any interruption was a great disturbance. If she did call, he assumed something was terribly wrong. When his colleague told him that his wife was on the line, he had quickly wiped the massage oil off his hands and raced to the phone. His biggest fear, if Petra called him at work, was always that something was wrong with Niels. But Petra was at home with Niels now; she told him this immediately after he answered the call. He had been suspended for the rest of the day after a fight in the schoolyard. The only other thing she wanted to share was that Niels was okay. He hadn’t suffered any physical injury. That was a relief to him, but Petra insisted he come home right away, nothing more. Clearly something was very wrong.

Fortunately, his colleagues offered to help him out, and moments later he was in his car on his way home. But what was waiting for him there? This question kept spinning through his mind.

When he parked the car in front of his house, he was glad he had gotten there so fast. But now what?

Petra and Niels were both seated on the couch. He noticed their awkward body language first. Petra made an attempt to look neutral, but Niels’s face spoke volumes: he looked gloomy and guilty.

Hans sat down in the chair across from them. “Okay, so what’s going on?” he asked, straining to sound as calm as possible.

It took a few seconds before Petra took the initiative. She had waited a moment to give Niels a chance to answer first. “As you know, I was supposed to go to Utrecht this morning to purchase supplies for the store. On my way back I received a phone call from Wim Kuipers. He said there had been an incident with Niels in the schoolyard, a fight, and asked me to come and pick him up as soon as possible. Niels had been suspended for the rest of the day and that after you and I had a talk with him, he would be allowed to return tomorrow.”

Hans frowned. “A fight in the schoolyard? What happened?”

Niels didn’t respond. He stared blankly ahead, not looking like he was planning on clearing any of this up.

“Apparently, Niels fought with Chris Bakker during their lunch break,” Petra explained. “But Niels was the only one who hit, which is why he is suspended.”

“This Chris,” Hans wanted to know, “is he in your class, Niels?”

Niels looked at his father for a moment and shook his head.

Petra went on. “He is one grade below him.”

Hans turned to Niels again. “So, you hit a boy who is younger than you, and I’m guessing he is also smaller than you? You must have had a very good reason to do that?”

Niels remained silent.

Petra grabbed him by the shoulder. Hans could tell from her body language that she felt insecure. She seemed unsure on how to handle Niels. “Tell your father why you hit Chris.”

“No.”

“Okay, well, I happen to know the reason why you hit him, because Mr. Kuipers told me. So, shall I tell your father then?”