I offer half the bread and cheese to Ivo, but he shakes his head. Good, I think, as I eat the whole thing in three bites. We make our way back down the narrow alley and onto to the wide thoroughfare of Severin’s Strasse, making small talk about how my arm is feeling and predicting what had set his mother off this morning. It is a short walk from his house to the tree-lined city wall. I find the tallest tree and hope we aren’t in the middle of our climb when the church bells strike noon.
“You climb first,” I order.
“Why?” He asks. I think if I stay silent for long enough, he shall just start climbing, but he doesn’t.
“Come on. Just go,” I grumble, pushing him forward.
“Fine…” he shrugs, shaking the hair from his eyes as he grabs a limb. But rather than climb, he looks to me one more time. “Is this a trick?”
“No! If you don’t hurry, we’re going to miss it!” He turns and hoists himself onto the branch. Before I am even onto the lowest branch, he has climbed three. The muscles and veins in his arms swell, though he never struggles with the climb. I am much slower, for my wounded arm hurts. He pauses on a limb ten feet above me, turns, and swings down from the branch he’s on, shaking his head with a gloat.
“It’s my arm.”
“Sure it is.”
I eventually reach a place in the tree where we can see all the way to St. Laurentius and all the streets that wind around it. I motion for Ivo to come down a few branches. Before I am even seated comfortably, he is sitting on an opposing branch, watching me nervously.
“Scared of heights?” I quip.
“I’m scared you’ll fall, and I’ll have to explain it to your father.” His foot twitches nervously. “I’m coming over there. Scoot forward.”
Gripping the trunk, he slides over to my branch and sits behind me. He wraps an arm around my waist and pulls me close so my back rests against his chest. I gasp, startled from the pull and from being so close to him.
“What are we looking at?” he asks nonchalantly, as though being this close is ordinary for us.
“Well…” I forget. I lose myself in the warmth of his chest on my back and his arm around my waist, but I recover quickly enough. “Actually, we are listening for something.”
The timing could not have been more perfect. The first dongs of the dozen church bells echo through the city. Although I’ve anticipated them, they startle me, and Ivo grips me tightly.
The bells chime noon, and there should be a flock of Christians filing out of St. Laurentius, slowly making their way back to their homes in Airsbach for dinner. Only a few parishioners walk through the doors.
Ivo rests his chin on my shoulder as we stare out over the city. The slow steady flow of his breath tickles my neck, raising goose bumps on my arms. Luckily, they are covered by my sleeves, so he does not notice.
I expect him to gasp or curse or react in some way, but he does not even seem to notice that no one has attended Mass at St. Laurentius, that Soren has been humiliated, and, soon, all of Cologne will hear about it.
“Don’t you see?” I turn to look at his face.
“See what?” he asks in a daze.
“Look at the streets of Airsbach! At St. Laurentius!”
“God’s teeth! It’s Sunday,” he laughs. Parishioners from the other churches of Cologne fill the surrounding streets, but only a handful of people come out of St. Laurentius. They look very confused.
“No one went to Mass this morning,” I laugh.
“Good.”
The few confused parishioners who’d attended St. Laurentius disperse and make their ways home. My eyes stay on the doors of the church like a cat would keep his eyes on an unsuspecting mouse. I want Soren to walk through those doors and into the empty street. I want to see the embarrassment, the anger, the bewilderment on his fat, ugly face, but he doesn’t come out. It doesn’t surprise me. It doesn’t even disappoint me. Soren is a coward, and I am sure he shall spend the rest of the day sulking like a spoiled little boy.
For the rest of this lazy afternoon, we sit and watch the streets of Cologne. Ivo rests his chin on my shoulder. Though I know it’s forward of me, I lay my head back on his shoulder so our crowns are touching. Time passes quickly, I imagine, as it always does when one is happy.
~
The church bells chime three times more, and I know supper nears, but I don’t want to go home. I’ve had time to think of what worried Father this morning, and I think I know what it is.
Perhaps, this is not over. Father Soren isn’t a gracious man. He isn’t likely to learn his lesson and beg his parishioners’ forgiveness. He won’t learn to treat the people of Cologne better. He shall want to find a way to make us fear him, obey him. He’ll find a way to punish us. And what makes it worse is we do not know how, nor when, nor to whom this punishment shall come. Why hadn’t I thought of this?
“Ivo, what do you think he’ll do?” I ask, knowing he will understand what I am talking about. He always does.
“I don’t know,” he sighs, his breath blowing a strand of my hair out of place.
“My father looked worried this morning.”
“Your Father? Really?” His head pulls back with shock.
“Does your father… did he look worried?” I ask.
“I haven’t seen him much today.” He leans back against the tree and pulls me with him. I lean my head on his shoulder again.
“Are you worried?” I ask.
“Nah, there’s only one of him and hundreds of us.” He rests his chin on top of my head.
“Do you think that is why your mother is angry? Maybe she’s just worried we shall all be punished?”
“Nah, I think she’s mad because you were trying to sneak into my bed,” he chuckles.
“That’s not what I was trying to do!”
“You should have seen your face when she caught you,” he laughs.
“Mine! You should have seen yours.” I push forward and turn to sneer at him, but lose my balance. I tip and nearly fall. His eyes widen with fright, and he catches me. My heart pounds from the shock. He climbs around the front of me and pushes me back up against the trunk of the tree.
“There, now you cannot fall,” he says. I nod and look down because I am embarrassed by my clumsiness. I shift with discomfort. Our faces are so close.
His whole face relaxes as he looks down briefly, then back up, as if he were looking directly through me. “I’m going to kiss you.”
“Right now?” I laugh.
He looks down. “Yes. Now.” He laughs.
I giggle nervously. He slides closer, slipping his hand around the small of my back. Our cheeks nearly touch, and I freeze. My heart quickens, and I look into his eyes permissively. He shifts his head, and I close my eyes.
THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!
My eyes shoot open, and we turn toward the city. Ivo sighs and his head drops. Airsbach is filling with guards carrying heavy sacks filled with rolls of parchment.
THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!
The guards weave their way from St. Catherine’s Strasse, Witschen Alley, and Filzengraben onto the smaller alleys that make up our parish. They are nailing something to all the doors. The sound of hammers smacking nails echoes through the city, ruining the quiet I had so appreciated. People open their doors and rip off the notices, struggling to decipher them as few of them are able to read.
At best, the parchments are a warning. At worst, I assume they are an issuance of punishment.
But the guards pass the boundaries of Airsbach and head into the other boroughs of Cologne whose inhabitants had attended church. We saw them exiting the churches at noon, so why are notices being nailed to their doors? Now, I do not know what to think, but the guards march soberly, and I know the news cannot be good.
Ivo rests his head on my shoulder again. I reach up and brush the hair out of his face.
“I’ll walk you home,” he sighs.
###
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