Chapter 13

Erik sat on the sofa, enveloped by the darkness of the living room, with only the faint glow and sound of the television in front of him.

“On the day the Berlin Wall fell, I did nothing but hold onto the TV and watch the news,” the old woman on the screen rambled. “Everyone I knew was also watching the news. I think they were all as excited and overwhelmed as I was.

“It was so bizarre. I thought I would never see such a thing in my lifetime, and yet it happened so suddenly, within just a day or two—who could have expected it?”

Yes, who could have expected it?

…The ZDF special on Unity Day ended. He picked up the remote and switched channels.

Pro7 was playing an action movie. What looked like the main character emptied a magazine of bullets in rapid succession. Then, whether they were good guys or bad guys, someone set off a bomb. Thick smoke rolled across the screen, and fireballs exploded one after another.

The protagonist weaved through a hail of bullets. “Are you crazy! Get back here!” his comrade shouted through the headset. Bombs streaked like meteors across the orange-yellow sky behind him, bullets crackled and sparked as they landed by his side, but nothing could stop him from running full speed into the abandoned factory or office building or warehouse… Finally, he found the child hiding in the ruins. “I’ve been waiting here for you,” the child said, eyes wide. “I knew you would come for me.”

“You know I couldn’t not come for you,” he replied. “And I would always find you.”

…The movie ended. He switched channels again. This time, it was a rerun of some Bundesliga match.

One o’clock. He finally realized this was futile and reluctantly turned off the TV.

He lay down on the sofa, staring at the ceiling. Fine. He said to the persistent thought in his mind. If you insist on popping up, if you insist on making me think about it, then go ahead.

A few hours earlier, he had confessed his dilemma to Felix. It seemed like a desperate and insane move, but who knew it was actually a decision he made after agonizing and unproductive contemplation. Anyway, he couldn’t come up with any plausible explanation, he thought self-deprecatingly, and things couldn’t get worse after what had already happened at the climbing center. Might as well lay it all out. Tell Felix. If he had to discuss this with someone, that person could only be Felix.—Since he had caused all of this, and his knowledge and experience in such matters were clearly greater than anyone else he knew.

More importantly, he intuitively felt that what he was about to say wouldn’t scare him.

Felix indeed wasn’t scared. In fact, he remained as calm and composed as he had been that afternoon when he listened to him talk about the arena debt, as if it had nothing to do with him. Only when he heard about his conversation with Fabian did he raise an eyebrow slightly, showing a hint of surprise—but it seemed more because of the context in which he had said it, not the fact that he was infatuated with him. Perhaps he had already known about the latter. Perhaps even before he himself had realized it.

…Looking back now, he realized how bizarre their conversation had been. Why on earth had he thought confessing to Felix (if it could even be called a confession) was a good idea? A little rational thought would have made it clear that the whole thing was insane: they had just met as strangers the previous afternoon, and only thirty-some hours later, he had publicly declared his infatuation with him as if he were on drugs.—If this had happened to anyone else, he would undoubtedly have thought that person had serious mental issues. Why wasn’t Felix at all surprised?

He remembered how, before they left for the climbing center, Felix had said “You like me” in a tone that seemed half-joking yet deeply stinging.—Now it seemed like a clear attempt to draw a line. A kind of warning. People are afraid of those with mental issues. Felix himself had said something like that. But he clearly wasn’t afraid of him. At least not to the point of leaving him because of it.

“People would never invite a complete stranger to stay overnight at their home unless they really liked them.”—But on the other hand, people also wouldn’t easily accept an invitation from a stranger to stay overnight.

Erik suddenly sat up from the sofa and looked toward his bedroom door. The door was tightly shut. Not a sliver of light seeped through the gap at the bottom.

He hugged his knees and rested his chin on them. He could feel his knees trembling. His arms were also shaking uncontrollably.

Admit it, you’re insane. You’ve been insane from the moment you first saw Felix.

As an insane person, any insane behavior now would be unsurprising. And the insane would find all sorts of excuses in their minds to justify their madness.

He had to go to him now. Because he was already consumed by thoughts of him and couldn’t let go. He must be asleep by now. Maybe not. If he was still awake, he could say a few more words to him. He had to talk to him again, or he would stay up all night thinking about him. If he rejected him… he has already rejected him once. No, not really. He said so much, but not a single word about his own feelings. He said he didn’t want to take on the problems of a stranger, which meant that in his eyes, they were merely strangers. But that wasn’t true; no strangers would act like they had. If two strangers could say the things they had to each other, it meant they were no longer strangers.

He stood up and walked toward the door. Each step injected a larger dose of trembling into his body. But he couldn’t help it. That insane force was pushing him from behind. Go, go.

Open that door. See if he’s still awake.

The door opened. He saw Felix. He was sitting on his bed, leaning against the wall, looking out the window. He hadn’t lowered the blackout blind, allowing the moonlight to flood into the room, casting mottled silver-gray and blue-black shadows on him and the bedsheet. His eyes sparkled in the shadows.

He turned to look at him.

Erik stood there, trembling. He couldn’t speak. All the words he had prepared earlier vanished. His mind was blank, as if he were a newly hatched android with no prior life experience. He had nothing but this moment.—Worse, he didn’t seem to care. He thought everything in his heart must already be written on his face, impossible to hide. But it didn’t matter. Felix was right in front of him. Let him see everything.

Felix silently watched him for a while, then he murmured, like a sigh:

“Erik, you fool.”

That whisper seemed like a command that restarted the stagnant world. Erik quickly walked over, embraced him without thinking, and almost immediately sank into it. He buried his face in the crook of Felix’s neck, breathing deeply, seeking the scent of his skin with his lips.

Then they were kissing. Lips pressed against lips, tongues touching tongues, breathing each other’s breath—because their own breath was already failing, and they had to seek it from each other. From between parted lips, from warm necks and chests, and soft, fine hair… their breathing was rapid and chaotic, occasionally taking a deep breath as if a drowning person had suddenly surfaced for air. Then they sank again, all the way to the warm, dark depths.

Everything was submerged. The world was shut out. All they could feel was each other’s breath and body heat. They wanted to keep getting closer, breathing deeper into each other, making their embrace tighter. Words weren’t needed, neither spoken nor thought. Everything they needed was only with each other, only he could give it.

Felix. Felix. Felix.