Every Seventh Wave Read online

  Marlene never loved me. I would have been prepared to give her “everything,” but she was never particularly interested in what I was offering. She accepted a fraction of it out of gratitude, or maybe it was an act of mercy, but I was allowed to keep the rest for myself. All in all it was only enough for half a dozen attempts at takeoff. The landings came quickly and were extremely bumpy, especially for me.

  It’s different with Pamela. She loves me. She really loves me. Don’t worry, Emmi, I’m not going to bore you again with details of all the things we have in common. The problem: Pamela doesn’t feel happy here. She’s homesick, missing her family, her friends, her colleagues, her places, her routines. She hardly lets it show, she wants to keep it secret from me, she wants to protect me because she knows it has nothing to do with me, and because she assumes that there’s nothing I can do to change it.

  So as a surprise I went and bought flights to Boston. She wept a year’s worth of tears out of sheer joy. Since then she’s been a changed woman, as if she’s on some happy drug. She’s seeing it as no more than a “two-week vacation,” but I can’t rule out the possibility that it will turn into something else further down the line. Without saying anything to her I’ve arranged some interviews at German studies institutes. There may be a longer-term job opportunity for me.

  I have no desire to live in Boston, Emmi, not for one minute. I’d much rather stay here—for a number of different reasons, no, not different reasons, for one specific reason. But this reason is so … how would you put it? “This reason is so, so, so—without any reason.” It has no foundation. It’s just something that’s going around in my head. No, worse than that, it’s something going around in my gut.

  It is probable that my future together with Pamela, should there be one, lies several thousand kilometers away from here. I think I find it easier than she does to change, to adapt to new surroundings.

  Her happiness spurs me on. I’d like to continue seeing her as I have over the past few days. And I want her to continue seeing me as she has for several days. She looks on me as a man who is capable of giving her “everything.” No, it’s not that I’m capable of doing it, but I’m prepared to. In between the two is illusion. I’d like to hold on to it for a while longer. Why bother living, if not for “everything-illusions”?

  Two hours later

  Re:

  “She loves me. She really loves me.” “I want to give her everything.” “I think I find it easier than she does to change, to adapt to new surroundings.” “Her happiness spurs me on.”

  “If only she could continue seeing me as she has for several days!” …

  Leo, Leo, Leo! For you, love is … sitting at the controls of someone else’s happiness. BUT WHERE ARE YOU? What about your own happiness? What about your desires? Don’t you have any of your own? Do you just have “Pam”’s? Is that all you have, feelings in your gut?—I feel so sorry for you. No, I feel sorry for myself. No I don’t, I feel sorry for both of us. Tonight’s a sad night, somehow. A dark evening in late spring. Dead calm. The doldrums. I’m going to have a whisky. And then I’ll decide whether or not to have another. Because I’ve got my own desires to be looking after. And I’m looking for MY happiness. Fortunately. Or unfortunately. No idea. You’re a lovely man, Leo! You really are! But can you only be loved, or can you also love someone yourself?

  Good night,

  Emmi

  Two days later

  Subject: Four questions

  1) How are you?

  2) When are you leaving?

  3) Are you going to write again before you go?

  Three minutes later

  Re:

  That was only three!

  Thirty seconds later

  Re:

  I know. I just wanted to check that you were still on this planet and able to count.

  Eight minutes later

  Re:

  Re: 1) I don’t feel all that great. Something else is going around in my gut: an intestinal infection. Whenever I’m about to go away à deux I always get ill. It was like that with Marlene.

  Re: 2) We’re off tomorrow afternoon (so long as I can fit a toilet into my hand luggage).

  Re: 3) Will I write again? Emmi, your dark-evening-in-late-spring email made me quite depressed. I didn’t know how to reply. There’s no illustrated instruction manual for sighting and salvaging happiness. Everybody seeks their own happiness in their own way, and in those places where they believe they will find it the fastest. But maybe it was too much to expect some encouraging words from you about “Operation Boston.”

  Half an hour later

  Re:

  You’re right, Leo. I’m sorry, but for me “Boston” is hopelessly loaded with negative connotations, I couldn’t think of anything encouraging to say. You have to understand that I think your willingness to give a woman “everything” is remarkable, courageous, fascinating. (I was also going to write “noble” and “gentlemanly,” but thought better of it.) I wish you all the very best with that, the best possible luck. Leaving the illustrated instruction manual aside, everybody defines happiness in their own way. I think more about my own; you seem to think more about “Pam”’s. I hope you factor yourself in somewhere as well.

  Oh, by the way, my therapist thinks it’s perfectly O.K. if I let you know, for your trip, that I look forward to your return, I mean, in two weeks’ time. She thought it would be fine for me to admit that I’ll sort of be waiting for you to come back, because I think it somehow so, so, so—lovely that you’ll be back, when you do come back, that is. Just lovely. Do you understand? And try eating rice cakes, not bananas. Bananas don’t help at all. Bananas are the greatest myth in the entire history of diarrhea-related illnesses.

  Take care, my love!

  Five minutes later

  Re:

  What about the fourth question?

  Two minutes later

  Re:

  Ah yes, the fourth question!

  4) When you come back, could the four of us meet up one time? Fiona would really like to meet you. Jonas told her you look like Kevin Spacey, but with even less hair. Fiona loves Kevin Spacey, even without hair, although I think his hair could be considered one of his more interesting features. Anyway, I think Jonas might be confusing Spacey with that ghastly sitcom actor, the one with the long face, what’s his name? Doesn’t matter. Shall we meet up again soon, Leo? Say yes!

  One minute later

  Subject: SAY YES!

  See subject above and do it!

  Fifty seconds later

  Re:

  Yes! Yes! Yes! Forgive me, I was in the restroom. And the next sentence can’t be too long or I’ll have to break it off midflow. Bye for now, my love!

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Eight days later

  Subject: Home is “you”

  Dear Emmi,

  I’ve been in Boston’s clutches for a week now. When this city gets a grip on you it never lets go. In the area where we’re staying Pamela knows one in every five families, and one in every two of these invites us to lunch or dinner. That means we go to eat with acquaintances around eight times a day. And this doesn’t include the visits to relatives. It might sound terribly quaint to you. But I’m enjoying it, the friendliness of these people is infectious, from morning to night I see open, laughing, beaming faces. It rubs off on me. You know how I have a rather peculiar approach to happiness. Generally it comes from outside, rarely from within me. Rarely, but it does happen. I love thinking about you, Emmi! I have to give that sentence more emphasis: I LOVE THINKING ABOUT YOU, EMMI! I was absolutely terrified that the painful yearnings from my Boston days for refuges and hiding places would be reawakened. I’m so grateful to you for not having bolted the door through which I once vanished, abandoning our “us.” Even at so great a distance I can now be “at home” without heartache. Home is where you are, Emmi. I’m looking forward to being geographically closer to you again. I’m looking forward to our next meeting. By all means b
ring along some of your adolescent children as a surprise. And at some point I’ll tell you a thing or two about you and “it” and me. And now we’ve been invited to dinner at Maggy Wellington’s, a friend of Pamela’s from university.

  Take care,

  Your pen pal,

  Leo

  Four days later

  Subject: Arrived?

  Dear Emmi,

  A few days ago I sent you an email from here in Boston. I don’t know whether you got it; I received an error message.

  I’ll summarize the contents in a couple of sentences: 1) I’m fine, but/and I’m missing you! 2) I’m looking forward to our next meeting!

  See you soon,

  Your pen pal,

  Leo

  Three days later

  Subject: Arrived?

  Hi Leo,

  Did your plane land safely? Are you back home in flat 15? Thank you for your lovely message from the U.S.! I’ll now summarize your two East Coast messages. 1) Home is wherever your pen pal Emmi is. 2) Boston is a place full of happy faces, a place where you can make “Pam” happy on the inside (and yourself happy on the outside at the same time). Question: do you now know where you’ll end up? And the time frame?

  Warm greetings,

  Emmi

  P.S. Oh yes: tell me something about “you and ‘it’ and me”!

  The following morning

  Subject: Stuck?

  Or have you decided to stay in Boston indefinitely?

  Seven hours later

  Subject: (no subject)

  Dear Emmi,

  I made a big mistake yesterday. I told Pamela about you. I’ll be in touch again as soon as I can. Please don’t wait!

  Love,

  Leo

  Ten minutes later

  Re:

  Oh, Leo!!! Why do you always do rational things at the most irrational times? O.K., I won’t wait.

  Lots of love,

  Emmi

  One day later

  Subject: (no subject)

  No, I won’t wait.

  One day later

  Subject: (no subject)

  As I said, I won’t wait.

  One day later

  Subject: (no subject)

  I’m not waiting, I’m not waiting, I’m not waiting.

  One day later

  Subject: (no subject)

  I’m not waiting, I’m not waiting, I’m not waiting, I’m not waiting, I’m not waiting.

  One day later

  Subject: Finished!

  I’m sick of not waiting! Now I am waiting!

  Six hours later

  Subject: Leeeo?

  Don’t you want to write to me anymore, or can’t you write, or aren’t you allowed to write? What did you tell her about me? WHAT? WHAT? WHAT? If you defined your happiness with even the slightest reference to mine, Leo, then you’d feel it: you’re making me deeply unhappy at the moment. Please operate the controls. And do me a favor, for God’s sake, end this silence!

  Yours bitterly,

  Emmi

  One hour later

  Subject: Accountant!

  You’ve given me no choice, Leo: I’m going to count to ten and then I’m phoning my accountant to arrange an appointment for tomorrow. You know what that means, don’t you? And when it comes to sorting out personal matters, my American English is perfect. One. Two. Three …

  The following morning

  Subject: Ultimatum

  Hi Leo,

  My therapist thinks I should write you one final email, and I should tell you that it really will be the very last unless you answer me soon—or sooner than soon, right now, in fact—and even if you do, it really will be the last email. I guarantee it! And she also thinks I should suggest that we meet to talk everything through properly. I’m to tell you in no uncertain terms that I definitely don’t want “Pam” to know anything about this meeting, nor should she find out about it afterward, because this is about us, and not about anyone else. Do you think my therapist has expressed herself clearly enough?

  In anticipation of your immediately forthcoming response,

  Emmi

  Three hours later

  Re:

  Dear Emmi,

  Please give me some time. She’s completely bewildered and has retreated back into her shell. I have to try to win back her trust and establish a basis for dialogue. Your psychotherapist would surely agree that I need to come clean with her before the two of us—you and I—meet. My battle with Pamela is not yet over; maybe it hasn’t even really broken out yet. She finally has to have a chance to talk, she has to let it out, she has to tell me to my face what it is that is hurting her so terribly, what is making her suffer, what it is that she has to reproach me for. I’m standing at the entrance to a dark tunnel, and I need to walk down it with her. You can’t come with us; you have to stay out in the open. But when I reach the other end, I’ll tell you everything, everything about you and me. I promise! Dear Emmi, please have patience and don’t be lost to me! I feel more miserable than I have in a long time.

  One hour later

  Re:

  I won’t be lost to you, dear Leo. But YOU will be lost to me. You’ll walk along the dark tunnel with “Pam,” and at the end of it you’ll emerge into Boston’s bright sunshine. Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll “come clean” with her, but that can mean only one thing: no more contact between you and me. It’s your one chance to keep up your faltering “everything-illusion.” I have absolutely no idea what you’ve told her about the two of us. You obviously haven’t said that we’re old friends, or casual acquaintances who write to each other once in a while. If I were “Pam” and I knew even the smallest piece of the whole truth of our story, I’d get hold of a megaphone and scream into your ear at one-minute intervals: “No more Emma, never again!” But she’s probably more inhibited, more prudent, and much more polite. She’ll just think it instead. But that won’t change the logical outcome: finishing with Emmi. “Pam” will demand that of you. And I completely understand why! And you’ll do it. I know you.

  So now you have all the time in the world to “come clean,” Leo. First with her, and then with me. And then maybe at some point you can come clean with yourself too. That’s what I hope for you, more than anything.

  Much love,

  Emmi

  Three days later

  Subject: Spider-Man

  Hi Leo,

  Jonas sends his regards. He wants to go and see Spider-Man 3 with you (and with me, if I really have to). If you have a tendency to vertigo, he’d be quite happy with Return of the Jedi. His father is away for three weeks, on tour in Asia. Playing to packed concert halls every day. And if a concert hall is full in Asia, you can bet it’s about five times as full as it would be here.

  Actually, I just wanted to let you know that I’m not yet lost to you, as promised.

  Much love,

  Emmi

  Ten minutes later

  Re:

  Thanks, Emmi!!!

  One minute later

  Re:

  You see, Leo, that’s all I needed to hear! All you have to do is write to me once a week—“Thanks, Emmi,” and don’t forget the three exclamation marks—and I’d quite happily manage another few years at my end of the tunnel.

  Four days later

  Subject: Warm

  Warm today, isn’t it?

  (If you don’t have the time or the strength to think up your own answer, I recommend: “Yes, very warm!!!” or “Drink lots of water!!!” Don’t forget the exclamation marks!!!)

  Seven hours later

  Subject: (no subject)

  Shame. I was really expecting an answer this time.

  The following evening

  Subject: A little light

  Is it still so dark in that tunnel? Or can you by now see a little light at the end? Is it glowing? Then it’s me. (Sunburn.)

  The following morning

  Subject: What, exactly?

  Dear Leo,

/>   What, exactly, did you tell “Pam” about the two of us? Did you tell her any of the tricky bits? For example:

  a) That we’ve had an email relationship for the past two and a half years?

  b) That you fled to Boston to protect my marriage?

  c) That we found each other online again after you came home, and that we’ve met offline five times?

  d) That we even had sex once?

  e) If the answer to d) is yes, did you tell her the circumstances in which d) happened, and how you found d)?

  f) That we met for a few minutes the night before she came to live here?

  g) What I gave you that time as a “souvenir”?

  And have the following factors enabled you to come out of it relatively unscathed? For example:

  h) That our relationship is from now on to be described as “profound, platonic, amicable.”

  i) That our correspondence should not interfere with your long-term relationship in any way.

  j) That I do not diminish your relationship with her, nor hers with you.

  k) Because in any case I’ve moved back in with my family, in order to continue my unprecedented and entirely rational “partnership of convenience” after a well-earned breather.

  l) And because the two of you are going to be emigrating to Boston in the foreseeable future anyway.

  Five minutes later

  Re:

  a), b), c), d), e), f), h), i), j), k), l).

  One minute later

  Re:

  Everything? The whole lot? The entire catalogue? Are you crazy, Leo? If I were her, the only reason for not dispatching you into outer space would be because then I couldn’t extract the hairs from your chin, one by one. You’d be too far away.

  Thirty seconds later

  Re:

  And I knew that we’d be able to have a good chat about it all.

  Forty seconds later

  Re:

  Hey, Leo, I’ve only just noticed: everything apart from g). You left g) out. You confessed to “Pam” that you and I indulged in a sexual act. You even told her what you felt at the time (or rather, what you felt differently or didn’t feel at all). But you haven’t told her what I gave you as a souvenir? Why not?