The Vanishing of Katharina Linden (28 page)

In a way I could not blame them; it was too grotesque to be taken seriously—it was more like a made-up horror story. All the same, this did
not alleviate the distress caused whenever I walked into a classroom or into the girls’ toilets and heard whispered conversations stopping dead at the sight of me. It could only be a matter of time before they all started to refuse to sit next to me again.

My parents, meanwhile, were involved in planning the first year’s memorial Mass for Oma Kristel. My mother, who was Protestant, and lapsed at that, was somewhat removed from the planning of the church service, but the burden of the catering was to fall upon her shoulders, much to her disgust.

The great debate was when exactly the service should be held. Oma Kristel had died on the last Sunday in Advent, but to hold the service over Christmas was a depressing idea. My mother said that it was a good thing really; we could hold the memorial Mass in January. It would be just what we needed to cheer us up when Christmas was over. My father, who never could understand my mother’s gallows humor, was offended; but he couldn’t suggest a better time.

One afternoon I came home early and found my father’s car wedged into the paltry cobbled rectangle that served as a parking space for our house. When I saw the car I assumed my parents were embroiled in yet another summit meeting about which music to have, and whether to have white roses or lilies. Discussions could become surprisingly heated on such topics, but even so I was taken aback when I opened the front door and heard my father bellowing like an enraged bull.

I put down my schoolbag very carefully, wondering whether I should simply sneak back out again. The next second a gust of icy wind sucked the door shut, and it slammed with a sound like a gunshot. I was still standing there half stooping with the strap in my hand and a guilty expression on my face when the kitchen door opened and out came my mother. Her cheeks were rather blotchy and her dark hair was very rumpled, as though she had been raking her hands through it.

“What are you doing home at this time?” she snapped.

“Frau Wasser was off sick,” I stammered. My father’s bulk filled the kitchen doorway behind my mother.

“Don’t shout at her.”

“I wasn’t bloody shouting.” Now she almost was.

“You’ve done enough already.”

“I haven’t
touched
her,” said my mother, as though he had accused her of beating me.

“I’m not talking about touching.” My father was as literal-minded as ever, even in the heat of an argument. “You think it won’t have an effect on the children, when you—”

“Wolfgang!” My mother’s voice cut across his, a clear note of warning in it.

I glanced at the staircase, weighing up my chances of escaping.

“Pia.” My mother sounded calmer but her voice had steel in it. “Come into the living room with me.”

“Pia, stay where you are.” That was my father. He glared at my mother. “I’m not having you telling her
your
side of the story.”

My mother put her hands on her hips. “Well, I’m not letting
you
do it.”

“Do what?” I asked, bewildered.

“Go into the living room please, Pia,” said my father. Reluctantly I did so, picking up my schoolbag as I went; if they were going to insist I shut myself up in there while they argued, I might at least get on with my homework. I started to spread the files out on the coffee table, but it was difficult to concentrate; the muffled sound of raised voices was too clearly audible from the hallway outside. I selected the English exercise to do first. Opening my exercise book at a clean page, I carefully wrote “A VISIT TO ENGLAND.” Then I stuck the end of the pen into my mouth and stared at the page.

“… you owe me that …!” boomed my father’s voice from the hallway.

My grandmother
, I wrote, and stopped again. I had been going to write
My grandmother lives in Middlesex
, but the raised voices from the hallway had reminded me of the major row that was surely heading my way when Oma Warner got her phone bill. My flesh prickled uncomfortably at the thought. The bill
must
have come in by now; I had stayed with her in the long summer vacation, and now it was nearly Christmas.

The door opened. It was my mother. “Can I come in?” she said, as though it were my bedroom she were entering, and not the living room. She slid into the room and closed the door very carefully. Then she came over to the couch and sat down beside me.

“Where’s Papa?” I asked.

“Upstairs,” said my mother. “He’ll come down later. Then you can talk to him.”

She looked at me, flashed me a tight smile, and then glanced out the window. An old woman was walking along the street; she kept turning and stooping, and I guessed she was dragging an unwilling dog along with her.

I shuffled in my seat. “I’ve got English,” I said eventually, touching the open exercise book.

“Hmmm,” said my mother, and then: “That’s sort of what I want to talk to you about, Pia.”

“My English homework?”

“No, not that.” She folded her arms across her chest. “Pia, your English is really good, even though I know we don’t speak English at home as often as we should.”

“Charles and Chloe make fun of me when I speak English,” I said.

“Well …” said my mother, “try not to take any notice of your cousins. Your English
is
good.”

“They can’t speak German,” I pointed out, but my mother was not to be diverted down that route.

“You could manage—in England, I mean,” she said. “You did really well with Oma Warner in the summer.”

“Ye-es,” I said warily, wondering whether in some roundabout way this was leading up to a showdown about the telephone bill. But my mother didn’t seem angry with me; if anything she seemed nervous, as though she was afraid I would be angry with
her
.

“If you … I mean, if you lived there, you’d soon be speaking it perfectly. At your age, you’d be able to lose the accent. Then people wouldn’t laugh, they probably wouldn’t even notice.”

I picked up my exercise book and stared at the empty page with “A VISIT TO ENGLAND” emblazoned across the top. “Are we going to visit Oma Warner again?”

“Well, no, not exactly.”

“Mama?”

“Yes?”

“I don’t really like going to England. I really like Oma Warner, but …”

My mother sighed. “Pia, we can’t always choose.”

“What do you mean?” I said. An unpleasant realization was surfacing in my mind like some ghastly waterlogged thing that refused to sink however hard you pushed it under. When Aunt Liz and my mother had discussed our moving to England, the idea had not been hypothetical at all.

“You’re half English,” said my mother, as though that explained everything. “We’ve lived in Germany for years, but there was always a chance … you need to get to know the English side of yourself.” Her tone was pleading.

“I don’t know what you mean,” I said stubbornly.

“We’d see lots more of Oma Warner. She
is
my mother, you know, and I’d like to spend more time with her. It would be nice for you, too, now that Oma Kristel isn’t …” She paused, and rubbed her palms together as though suddenly embarrassed. “You might even find you like your cousins.”

I won’t ever like my cousins
, I thought, but I did not say anything out loud. I just looked at my mother fidgeting and smiling nervously. I felt cold, as though she had been a complete stranger offering me stupid lies, lies designed to hurt.

“You know what I’m saying, don’t you,
Mäuselein?”
I registered the endearment with a faint stab of irritation; it was years since she had called me her
little mouse
—why was she doing it now? “We’re … well, we’re probably going to live in England.”

“Probably?”

“Well, we
are
going, but there are a few things to sort out first, and—”

“What about Papa’s job?”

“Papa …” My mother paused, and once again she was rubbing her hands together, rubbing and rubbing as though she were trying to brush something off them. “Papa probably isn’t coming.” She realized she had said
probably
again, and amended it to: “Papa
isn’t
coming with us.”

“But he can’t stay here without us,” I protested. “And, anyway, I don’t want to go to England.”

“Pia.” My mother sighed. “I know you think you don’t want to go there. But we really can’t stay here.”

“Why not?” I demanded.

“Because … well, because I need Oma Warner and Aunt Liz nearby. Sebastian’s still very little and I’m going to need help, otherwise I don’t see how I can go back to work.” She sketched a quick smile on her features, and reached out to touch my shoulder. I drew back, still trying to assess whether my mother was in earnest or making some horrible joke. “Why don’t you go back to work here?”

The smile vanished in a twitch.
“Why?”
She exhaled heavily through her nostrils. “Pia, this isn’t easy, you know. Do you have to keep picking me up on everything I say?” She glared at me, and then her face relaxed again into a defeated expression. “If we’re going to be on our own, I need to be near the family.
My
family.”

“We’ve got lots of family here,” I pointed out. “Onkel Thomas and Tante Britta and—”

“They’re Papa’s family.”

“But …” My voice trailed off. I was not sure how to put into words the feeling I suddenly had that the family was splitting into two halves, like medieval armies arranging themselves at either end of a battlefield. My mother seemed to be telling me that I had to be on one particular side, the one flying the English flag, but she might as well have told me I was fighting for Outer Mongolia.

“I could stay here with Papa,” I said with a sudden flash of inspiration.

“Pia, you can’t—”

“Oh, yes, I can.” I could feel my mouth thinning into a hard line.

“You can’t.” My mother’s voice was harsh. The ugly truth was coming out: like a hare breaking cover it streaked across the landscape of my mind. My mother had done with
Mäuselein
and
getting to know the English side of yourself
. “You have to come to England, Pia. End of story. I’m sorry.” She didn’t sound sorry, she sounded furious. “That’s just the way it is.”

I stared at the words on the crumpled page before me. “A VISIT TO ENGLAND.” A hot feeling was welling up inside me. It felt like dough in a pan, rising and rising until it burst out over the top. My face, my shoulders, my fingers were rigid, but I could not stop the scalding tears from leaking out of my eyes. A drop fell onto the page, blurring the letters ENG. I could not prevent it now; a sob like a roar was breaking out of me. My mother tried to put her arms around me,
but I fought my way out of her embrace, arms flailing. The exercise book ripped and fell to the floor, leaving me with half a page in my fist.

“Pia—”

“I hate you!” I shouted at the top of my voice, the words scouring my throat. “I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!”

“Pia, calm down,
Schätzchen
, it’s going to be all right, it
will
be all right, you’ll see …”

My mother’s voice was now gentle and reassuring, but even through my rage I was aware that she was just trying to soothe me. She was not saying,
All right, we won’t go to England, we’ll stay here
. She was just trying to get me to calm down sufficiently to accept the unpalatable truth, just the same as a person might try to calm an animal down before administering an unpleasant medical treatment.

I broke away from her and actually
ran
to the door. She followed me to the threshold, still offering broken blandishments, but I was determined not to hear, and when I ran up the stairs she did not try to follow me. I went into my room, locked the door and put my bedside chair up against it as an extra barricade, and then I threw myself on the bed and howled like a baby.

M
uch later my father came up and knocked. At first I didn’t answer, but when he spoke and I knew it was him, I got up and opened the door.

“Can I come in?” he asked. I nodded. He came into the room, dragged the chair out from behind the door, and sat down heavily on it. I sat on the bed and looked at him, through eyes that felt like puffy slits from crying.

“Ach
, Pia.” My father sounded tired. “I’m so sorry.”

I trembled. “Papa, we’re not
really
going to England, are we?”

He sighed.
“Doch
. I wish I could tell you otherwise.”

“I don’t want to go.”

“And I don’t want you to go,
Schätzchen
.”

“Then can’t I stay here—with you?”

“I don’t think so.” My father’s words were uncertain but they had the ring of doom in them.

“Why not?”

“It’s not settled yet, but your mother wants you to go with her.”

“She can’t make me.”

“Well, maybe she can’t, but the courts can. She wants—Pia, do you know what
custody
is?”

I shook my head.

“It means that one of the parents is allowed to take the children with them … after a divorce.”