Just Call Me Superhero (9 page)

He pointed the camera at me.

“Yes, I’m a spoiled only child,” I said into the lens but hadn’t even finished saying it before it occurred to me that it was factually inaccurate. Technically I wasn’t an only child. I had a little brother.

I’d never seen him except in photos that Claudia showed me years ago. A naked baby stumbled around in the pictures. I had refused to tolerate any of it. I wanted nothing to do with the baby because I didn’t want anything to do with my father, either, who’d had a heart full of love for our au pair and balls full of speedy sperm that destroyed my peaceful only-child existence forever.

My father came to Berlin a few times, supposedly to meet up with me. I figured he must have just had business meetings there. For Claudia’s sake I went with him once to the zoo and once to the natural history museum. We’d sat on a park bench and eaten ice cream, which even then didn’t taste very good to me, and he wanted to show me a picture of this other boy whose father he had become. I had asked him why he was sitting there with me if he had another son. Having more than one son at the same time seemed absurd to me. He coughed oddly and then took a big bite of his ice cream cone. It must have hurt his teeth given the way he had grimaced.

Later on he wrote me a letter and for my birthday and Christmas sent me first Legos and later money. I didn’t answer the letter because I was too polite to write the things I really thought. I accepted the gifts.

Then came the Rottweiler. Claudia told me that my father had come to the hospital immediately. Once. It had been hard for him, Claudia said.

“I’m a spoiled only child,” I repeated. But the guru was already walking down the stairs with the camera.

The guru had been bluffing. On the first night, he cooked. Veal cutlets wrapped in bacon, green beans, baked potatoes, and for dessert homemade panna cotta with raspberry sauce. I was so hungry that I nearly choked as I greedily wolfed down the delicacies. My stomach was cramping up.

“You should be a chef,” I said to the guru. “This is your true calling.”

He looked across the table at me with sad dachshund eyes.

I had seated myself between Friedrich and Richard. Janne was across from me. Although she seemed to be eating the whole time, the amount of food on her plate never actually diminished. We’d waited forever for this dinner and had basically not had anything else all day. When Friedrich had tried to complain about it the guru had answered that he should walk to the nearest grocery store and get himself something. Friedrich looked out at the woods with his eyes squinting skeptically. When nobody was willing to go with him, he stayed in the villa and bugged everyone with his grumbling stomach.

“Do you always eat so much?” Richard asked Friedrich over my head.

Friedrich shook his head. “Usually more.”

I took a second helping and thought with a full mouth that the guru wasn’t such a bad guy. Something was off about him, something major, but you could say that about almost everyone these days. With a full belly it was tough to concentrate on what a pain the coming week would be. I almost began to look forward to it.

Until my gaze fell on Marlon. He was sitting next to Janne. She had asked him to take the spot next to her as soon as he’d shown up. Me on the other hand she had not asked. He had only just then finally—and heroically—rousted himself from bed. Now he was sitting next to her and guiding small bites into his mouth with his fork while I waited for him to spill something on himself.

I tried to look at them in a relaxed, benevolent way, and was successful until Janne stroked Marlon’s arm and whispered something in his ear.

I’d had enough at that point. I threw my fork onto the table. It fell clattering to the floor.

“What’s the plan for the week?” asked Kevin.

“Do we have one?” asked Marlon, and I could see how Janne’s warm breath tousled his hair.

While the guru, still wearing his chef’s apron, explained the various outings to the churches and cow stalls of the area, I stood up and picked the camera up from the counter. I turned it on and walked around the table. I wanted to do it for Janne, so she could continue to think that she’d come out of this a star, or at least come out of her YouTube ghetto. If it made her so happy to have people look at her.

The truth is, I found it fun to shoot video. I zoomed in on the plates. On Friedrich’s greasy glistening lips. On Janne’s hand, which had wandered into the crook of Marlon’s arm. Looking through the display I no longer saw it as something that drove me crazy but rather as a thrilling visual motif. I zoomed in on Janne’s full plate. She’d eaten only the beans and cut off a tiny piece of her veal cutlet. It was the only plate that wasn’t eaten completely clean.

She’s anorexic on top of it all, I thought. Then I zoomed in on her fingers playing with Marlon’s arm, and my compassion had reached its limit.

I was so engrossed that I totally missed the guru’s lecture on what our collective purpose was here. I watched Janne’s face in the display. And it was clear as day that she didn’t like the sound of the plans. She wanted to stay at the villa. The guru said, no problem, then the others would be the only ones on camera.

Bull’s-eye.

I pointed the camera at the guru’s face. I zoomed in to get the little wrinkles around his eyes. He was older than I had first thought, and no longer as frantic as at the start. But he still didn’t look exactly relaxed, more like a nervous, tattered teddy bear. His lips were closed tightly and the corners of his mouth drooped. It wouldn’t have surprised me if he was just gone one morning and we found out that the rent for the villa had not been paid and all our valuables were gone.

I turned off the camera and sat down again at my place at the table. The platter of potatoes was empty. So was the pan with the veal. Friedrich, I thought angrily, and looked across the table at Janne’s plate.

“Are you finished with that? Can I have it?”

She pushed it across to me without looking at me. I ate it with her fork, which was still on her plate, and looked at her the whole time, until she shook her head contemptuously.

“What?” I asked.

“Nothing. You’re so young and yet already such an asshole.”

That summed things up perfectly.

T
here was a wood fireplace in the house but no dishwasher. So it fell to Friedrich to build a fire and to me to wash the dishes. We both protested, but the guru acted like a dictator and wouldn’t discuss it. He untied his apron and handed it to me. I took it and threw it on the table. Then I set up in front of the sink.

“It’s been ten years since I washed a dish by hand.”

“Then it’s about time.” He watched as Friedrich put a big, round log into the fireplace and pulled a long match out of the pack. It hissed, then broke off, and Friedrich dropped the box of matches and the long matchsticks went all over the floor.

I wasn’t sure if I would have done any better, which is why I didn’t laugh.

I let hot water run into the sink and dribbled in dish soap. Marlon was still sitting at the table. It was almost as if he wanted to watch me. The guru clicked his tongue in commiseration as Friedrich screwed up his fifth attempt to light a match and shoved a dish towel into Marlon’s hand.

“Help Marek dry the dishes.”

To my surprise, Marlon didn’t object. He came over and stood next to me, too near in fact, and I moved over a little. I put dripping wet dishes into his hand. He dried them and stacked them on the counter. The guru documented the cooperation between Blind and Deformed.

I dunked my hand into the warm foamy water and watched as Richard went over to the fireplace with a few sticks and a piece of paper. He pushed aside the nearly-sobbing Friedrich, kneeled down, and stacked the twigs into a sort of tent. Soon enough flames were dancing behind the glass doors, which Richard wiped clean with a damp cloth.

“Nicely done, Richard,” called the guru, and you could clearly hear the former kindergarten teacher in him. “Don’t worry about it, Friedrich.”

Richard gave him an annoyed look and the guru fell silent, embarrassed. Then suddenly a smile spread across Richard’s face. Behind me I heard the sound of Janne’s wheels on the wood floor.

“Are you cold?” asked Richard standing up to let Janne get close to the fire. She shook her head but did pull closer to the fire and stared at the flames. If she had stared at a lake the same way I would have grabbed her to keep her from jumping in. The guru turned the camera around. She straightened her shoulders and pushed a lock of black hair from her forehead.

Marlon had heard her, too. His whole body had tensed. I had the feeling he was vibrating.

“Will it take you much longer?” Janne asked him as if he were all alone.

He can’t see how much is left, I nearly said. Though he had probably been counting the plates. What did I know about how he perceived the world. What did any of us know about each other.

“We’re done,” we said simultaneously.

“Have you seen my room yet?” Janne asked Marlon. “Would you like to?”

“Yes,” answered Marlon, and then it got so quiet that we could hear the fire crackling.

I
didn’t get a wink of sleep that night. I thrashed around in bed, threw off the covers, picked them up off the floor, opened the window, closed it again. I barely managed to sit still for ten minutes. My heart felt as if it were beating in my throat and threatened to stay there. I turned to the wall so I wouldn’t have to look at Marlon’s empty bed. The bedspread with the lemons and parrots was still on it, the pillow was still indented in the shape of the back of Marlon’s head.

Marlon was with Janne. The whole night. I forbid myself to leave the room and creep around the villa. To put my ear to Janne’s door. To storm in there and smash everything to bits. A few times I couldn’t hold back the tears and I cried for a couple minutes like a wounded animal—until I stuffed a corner of the blanket in my mouth. Outside it was quiet and I felt like the last human being on earth.

Marlon’s bag sat there still unpacked next to his bed. On his nightstand was an iPod with headphones. I couldn’t think of anything better than to throw it out the window. It smacked with a dull sound into the flowerbed.

An hour later I felt bad. I pulled on my pants and slipped out of my room. To get out I had to go past Janne’s room. The floor creaked under my feet. It was silent all around. Everyone but me was asleep.

I carefully pushed open the heavy entrance door but couldn’t keep it from closing behind me with a dull thud. I crawled around the roses beneath my window but couldn’t find the iPod. I looked everywhere, it was just gone. I laid down on the lawn and stretched out all four of my limbs. The grass was moist and the cold crept under my skin. I closed my eyes.

And opened them when the door closed again. On the steps stood Richard in tight sweatpants and a tank top. It was suddenly light out, too light out. I must have fallen asleep. I quickly shielded my face with my hands. Richard looked at me at that same moment. His legs, aside from his prosthetic, were knotted ropes of muscle. His long hair was held back with a headband.

“What time is it?” I asked from the lawn.

“Six-thirty.” He waved and set off. I struggled to my feet and stumbled up the steps.

The next person I saw was Kevin. His friendly face with the lurid lipstick was looking down at me.

“Don’t growl, it’s only me. Breeeeeaaaakfast,” he sang melodically and pulled on my blanket. I grabbed it, too, and held it on me. I didn’t want to be naked in front of him.

“Ten o’clock,” said Kevin. “Everyone’s waiting.”

He stood next to the bed, nodded his head, and looked at me as if he would only leave the room together with me. I pulled the covers up to my chin.

“Get out.”

“You’re welcome.” He stomped out, hurt.

I leaned my head over the edge of the bed and looked at the floor, where my dew-soaked clothes were lying. Then I looked at Marlon’s bed. There was a damp towel there now. His bag was still in the same spot but the zipper was open.

He’d been there, I thought, grinding my teeth. He’d showered and seen me sleeping.

Bullshit, he can’t see.

My head felt so heavy that I just wanted to fall back onto my pillow. My eyes felt like somebody had poured half a sandbox in them. I closed them and imagined my fist smacking Marlon’s face. I licked my lips, and suddenly they tasted salty.

T
hey were indeed sitting around the table, which was already set. They were all in a better mood than I’d ever seen. The guru was telling a joke that I only caught the end of, and there was simply nothing funny about it. The camera was nowhere to be seen. Kevin was standing at the stove frying eggs, sunny-side up. The place smelled of butter and burnt wood.

I straightened the sunglasses on my nose. They were all sitting in the same places they had yesterday. Janne was wearing a white dress and her black, still slightly wet hair fell to her shoulders. She didn’t look up when I came in. She was distracted. Marlon was leaning down to her and whispering something in her ear, and she nodded and laughed. I shoved my balled fist in the pocket of my pants.

“What happened to you?” the guru asked cheerfully. “Sleep poorly?”

“Slept great.” I poured myself a glass of orange juice.

“I found an iPod in front of the building, who does is it belong to?” The guru held up the little silver device.

“Marlon,” I said as everyone looked at the stupid thing blankly.

“How did it get there?” The guru put the iPod on the table in front of Marlon. Marlon silently slipped it into his pocket.

The plan for today was to go someplace together. The guru said he wasn’t there to lug groceries around for six big guys—or rather five big guys and one lady. We needed to decide what we wanted to make and then go shopping for the ingredients together and bring it all home. Who wanted to go first?

Kevin was the only one who spoke up.

I drank the juice, which sat uncomfortably in my cramped stomach, and studied Janne and Marlon. I wanted to know whether their faces had changed since yesterday. If they themselves had changed. I devoured them with my eyes. I wondered whether the marks on Marlon’s face were the imprint of Janne’s pillow. I wondered why the guru was permitting this Sodom and Gomorrah. Whether he even noticed what was going on here. Whether Janne’s mother would think it was cool that Janne was in such demand here that she could pick out her companion for the night.