The fairy tale into which Anna fell was as bright and magical as the moment in which he’d spun Micha in his arms. But beneath his words, Anna sensed the darkness that lurked in the shadows, the ancient darkness of fairy tales.
Only later, much later, and too late, would Anna understand that this fairy tale was a deadly one.
They hadn’t seen him. None of them. He had disappeared, dissolved in the crowd of students; he had turned invisible behind his orange tray with the white plate and unidentifiable contents.
He smiled at his own invisibility. He smiled at the two of them sitting over there, so close and yet at different tables, back-to-back. They were here together and didn’t know it. How young they were! He’d been young once, too. Maybe that was the reason he still went to the dining hall from time to time. It wasn’t like back then of course; it was a different dining hall in a different town, and yet here he could visit his own memories.
He watched the two at their separate tables as if he were studying a painting. No, not two. Three. There was a child with Abel, a little girl. So here he wasn’t the school drug dealer; here he was someone else. And Anna Leemann, with her head scarf, which she thought would keep people from recognizing her; Anna, too, was a different Anna. Not the nice, well-bred girl. They were actors performing roles in a school play. And him? He had a role, too …
Some roles were more dangerous than others.
Anna lifted her head and looked in his direction; he hid his face behind a newspaper like an amateur detective. He’d stay invisible for a little while longer …
“TELL ME ABOUT THE ISLAND,” MICHA SAID. “TELL me what it looks like.”
“I’ve told you a hundred times.” Abel laughed. “You know exactly what the island looks like.”
“I forgot. The last story was so long ago! A thousand years ago! You told me about the island when Mama was still here. Where’s she now?”
“I don’t know, and I’ve told you that a hundred times, too. The note she left only said that she had to go away. Suddenly. And that she loves you.”
“And you? Didn’t she love you, too?”
“The island,” Abel said, “is made of nothing but rocks. Or should I say, it was? The island was made of nothing but rocks. It was the tiniest island anyone can imagine, and it lay far, far out at sea. On the island, there lived a single person, a very small person—and because her favorite place was the cliffs, the very top of the cliffs, where she could look out over the sea—because of that, they called her the cliff queen. Or, actually, it was only she who called herself that, for there was no one else.
“The birds had told her about other islands. They had also told her about the mainland. The mainland, the birds said, was an unimaginably huge island, over which you could wander for weeks on end without ever reaching the shore on the other side. That was something the little cliff queen couldn’t picture. To walk around her own island took only three hours, after which you’d be where you started. And so, for the little queen, the mainland remained a faraway, unreal dream. In the evening, she told herself stories about it, about the houses that had a thousand rooms each, and about the stores in which you could get everything you longed for—you had only to lift things down from the shelves. But actually the cliff queen didn’t need a thousand rooms, nor did she need stores full of shelves. She was happy on her tiny island. The castle in which she lived had exactly one room, and in this room, there was nothing but a bed. For the little queen’s playroom was the island’s green meadows and her bathroom was the sea.
“Every morning, she braided her pale blond hair into two thin braids, put on her pink down jacket, and ran out into the wind. Mrs. Margaret, her doll with the flower-patterned dress to whom she could tell everything, lived in the pocket of the down jacket. And in the middle of the island, in a garden of apple and pear trees, a white mare grazed all day long. When she felt like it, the little queen raced across the island on the horse’s back, quicker than a storm, and she laughed out loud when the mane of the white mare fluttered in the breeze and her scarf was carried away by the wind. The mare’s scarf, of course. The cliff queen didn’t need a scarf; she had a collar made of artificial fur on her pink jacket, but she had knitted a scarf for the white mare. She had learned to knit at school.”
“But there isn’t anyone living on the island! Did you forget? How can I go to school?”
“Surely there must have been a school,” Abel said. “There was exactly one teacher. She was the cliff queen herself, and one headmistress, who was also the cliff queen, and one pupil, who was the cliff queen, too. She had taught herself how to knit, and for the mare’s scarf—it was green—she had given herself the best grade possible. And …”
“That’s silly!” Micha giggled.
“Well, who is the cliff queen, you or me?” Abel asked. “It isn’t my fault if you’re giving yourself grades! By the way, it was always summer on the island. The little queen was never cold. When she was hungry, the cliff queen plucked apples and pears from the trees, or she fetched her butterfly net and climbed to the top of one of the cliffs to catch a flying fish, which she fried over a fire. She made flour from her field of wheat, and sometimes she baked apple cake for herself and Mrs. Margaret. The cake was decorated with the island’s flowers—blue forget-me-nots, violet bellflowers, and red and yellow snapdragons …”
“And the tiny white flowers that grow in the woods?” Micha asked. “What’s their name—anemones? Were they there, too?”
“No,” Abel said. “And now it’s time for the story. But, Micha? Do you remember all those other stories I’ve told you about the little cliff queen? The story about the empress made of froth and the one about the melancholy dragon? The story about the sunken east wind and the giggling whirlpool?”
“Of course, I remember. The cliff queen makes everything turn out okay, doesn’t she? She always does.”
“Yes,” Abel answered. “She does. But this story is different. I don’t know if she’ll manage this time. I don’t know what will happen to her. This story is … dangerous. Do you still want to hear it?”
“Of course,” Micha said. “I’m brave. You know that. I wasn’t scared of the dragon. Even though it wanted to eat me. I solved all its problems, and then it was happy and flew away and …”
“Okay … if you are sure you’re ready to listen, I will tell you the story. It will take some time.”
“How long? As long as a movie? As long as reading a book?”
“To be exact … till Wednesday, the thirteenth of March. If everything turns out all right, that is.” He cleared his throat, because all storytellers clear their throats when their stories are about to get interesting, and began: “One night, the little queen awoke and felt that something was happening outside. Something big and meaningful. She lay motionless in her bed—it was a canopy bed, the canopy being the night sky itself, for there was a big hole in the ceiling above. Usually the little queen saw the stars when she awoke at night. This night, however, the sky was empty. The stars had run away, and she felt a pang of fear in her heart. She felt a different kind of fear than she had with the melancholy dragon or the empress made of froth. And all of a sudden, she understood that her adventures up to now had been nothing but games. But this—whatever it was—was serious.
“She owned two dresses—one nightdress and one day dress—and that being so, she was the person with the most dresses on the island. Now she put the red day dress over the blue nightdress, because if something important happens it’s better to wear warm clothes. In the end, she put the down jacket on, too, with Mrs. Margaret sleeping in one of its pockets. Then she pulled up the collar of artificial fur and stepped out into the night. It was very quiet. Not a single bird was singing. Not a single cricket chirping. Not a single branch rustling its leaves. Even the wind had died down. The little queen walked to her pasture, and there the white mare stood, looking as if she had been expecting her. Later, the little queen did not know how she could see the white mare
in the starless darkness, but see her she did. If you have known someone your whole life, you can see her in the dark.
“The mare laid her head against the little queen’s neck as if trying to console herself. ‘Do you feel what’s going on?’ she asked. ‘Do you feel how afraid the trees are? They’re going to die. Tonight. And I’m going to die with them. I will never see you again.’
“‘But why?’ the little queen cried. ‘Why should that be so?’
“In that moment, a tremble rolled through the island, and the little queen grabbed onto the white mare so as not to lose her balance. The ground trembled a second time, a dark gurgling noise came from the depths of the earth, a dangerous rumble …
“‘Take good care of yourself,’ the mare said. ‘Should you meet a man with a blond mustache, a man who is wearing your name, turn around and run. Have you got that?’
“The little queen shook her head. ‘How can a man be wearing my name?’
“A third earthquake made the ground shake, and the first trees fell.
“‘It is the island,’ the mare said. ‘Run, my little queen. Run to the highest cliff. Run quick. The island is sinking.’
“‘The island is … sinking?’ asked the little queen. ‘How can an island sink?’
“But the mare just inclined her head, silently.
“‘I … I will run to the highest cliff,’ the little queen said. ‘But what about you? Aren’t you coming with me?’
“‘Run, my little queen,’ the mare repeated. ‘Run quick.’
“So the little queen ran. She ran as quick as her bare feet would carry her; she ran like the wind, like the storm, like a hurricane. Mrs. Margaret woke up and peeked out of her pocket fearfully. As the little queen reached the bottom of the highest cliff and started climbing up it, the night was torn open and a light came crashing through. The light swept the little queen off her feet, but she kept climbing on her hands and knees, higher and higher on the bare, rocky cliff, and when she arrived at the top, she turned and saw that the light was coming from the island. It rose from the middle like a column of fire, and she covered her face with her hands. All around her, the other cliffs broke; one after the other, she heard the pieces fall into the sea. Her heart was paralyzed with fear. Finally, after an eternity, the earth stopped quivering and the little queen dared to look up again.
“The island had disappeared. Only a few cliffs were left, sticking out of the sea. In the sky, though, there hung the memory of the light that had risen from the middle of the island like a flame. In that nightmare light the little queen saw the sea. And the sea was red with blood.
“It was made of crimson waves, carmine froth, splashing color. It was beautiful, like a field of poppies on a day in spring, though spring was far away. The little queen realized that she was shivering. And in that instant, she understood that winter had come.”
• • •
Anna heard a chair scraping the floor, being drawn back. She blinked. The dining room was nearly empty. Two women in striped coats were wiping down the tables with wet rags and throwing angry looks at those who hadn’t yet left. The handsome student was no longer sitting at Anna’s table. When had he left? Had she said goodbye to him?
“And then?” she heard Micha ask. “What happened then?”
“Then it was time to go,” Abel replied. “You can see they want to close. Is there any space left in your tummy for chocolate milk or an ice cream?”
“Oh yes,” Micha said. “I can feel an empty space right here, see … there’s actually space for ice cream and chocolate milk.”
“You’ve got to choose,” Abel said, and Anna heard him smile. “Let’s go back to the kitchen, shall we?”
Anna got up in a hurry. She wanted to leave the room before Abel saw her face. She put the orange tray with the barely touched potato-dog onto the conveyor belt, where it was sucked into a hole in the wall on two moving rubber strips. Gitta’s mother would have liked the tray and the rubber strips—they were probably easy to sterilize.
Anna pulled the head scarf tighter. Then she remembered that she wasn’t the one sitting on the edge of a cliff in soaking-wet clothes; it was somebody else, and for the millionth time that day, she felt extremely stupid.
She reached the kitchen without being seen or recognized. Abel and Micha took their time—the kitchen was crowded with people. Anna felt herself becoming almost invisible in the crowd; she dissolved into the anonymous mass of students and pretended to study the party flyers lying on the windowsill. And then she heard Micha’s high, childish voice behind her. She let the voice pass and then turned and followed it between glass shelves laden with cake and sandwiches. Suddenly too close to the voice and its owner, she busied herself with the complicated procedure of getting coffee from a machine without flooding the whole place. But somehow she ended up standing at the counter behind Micha and the pink down jacket. Micha stood on tiptoes, pushed a slightly sauce-smeared strand of hair out of her face, and said, “I think I’d like to have hot chocolate. But if you have vanilla ice cream with hot chocolate, I’d take that.”
The woman behind the counter straightened her white-and-blue-striped apron and stared at the child blankly. “Excuse me?”
“Um, maybe you have something like vanilla ice cream plus hot chocolate for less money? Like they have at McDonald’s. You can buy coffee and a hot dog there for just one euro fifty.”
“We’re not McDonald’s,” the aproned woman said. “And we definitely don’t sell hot dogs here. So you need to decide what you want, young lady. You’re not the only one waiting in line.” The tone of her voice was at least as cold as ice cream, but it didn’t taste of vanilla. It tasted of scrubbing powder and a white-and-blue-aproned disappointment in life. Around the woman’s mouth were wrinkles, carved by bitterness, in which Anna read: You! All of you! You don’t know nothing about nothing. You’re eating and drinking and wasting your parents’ money. Upper-class brats, you haven’t worked a day in your educated little lives. Bah. Nobody’s ever given me anything for free.
But it isn’t our fault, Anna wanted to reply. Whose fault is it? Can you explain that to me? I want to understand, to understand so many things …
The aproned woman put a white cafeteria cup with pale hot chocolate onto Micha’s tray. Obviously the little girl had decided on hot chocolate. Micha nodded, reached out her hand for the straws on the side of the counter, straws surely not meant for hot chocolate—they were the grass thin, brightly colored kind—and took two, a green one and a blue one. “Well, young lady, I’d say one is enough,” the aproned woman said, as if those straws were her own personal ones and she had to take special care of them. In reality, there were thousands of straws; Micha could have taken a dozen and nobody would have noticed. The aproned woman now tried to retrieve one of the straws from Micha’s grip, but Micha held onto both of them. The struggle took place just above the counter, just above the tray with the cocoa. Anna shut her eyes and heard the cup fall. She opened her eyes again. The floor was covered with hot chocolate and broken pieces of cup.
Micha just stood there, both straws in her hand, looking at the aproned woman with big blue eyes filled with terror. The people in line were shuffling their feet.
The aproned woman lifted her hands. “I don’t believe it!” she exclaimed. “How clumsy can you be? Young lady, that cup … you’re going to have to pay for that cup. Now look what you’ve done. What a mess! And I’m the one who has to clean it up. You hurry up and pay for that cup now and leave. The hot chocolate and the cup, that’s two euro fifty; the cup is one fifty.”
When she said that, light rain began to fall from the sweet blue eyes. A small fist—the one without the straws—was held out, and in it, lay a single euro coin. “I only have this,” Micha’s voice said through the rain.
“Don’t tell me you’re here by yourself!” Now the aproned woman was nearly shouting. “There must be an adult somewhere who can pay for this!”
“No,” Micha said, brave
ly, fighting against her tears. “Nobody has to pay for me. I’m all alone. On the cliff. All alone.”
“Oh my God, would you leave her alone! She’s a kid! Just a kid! Don’t you have kids?”
Anna looked around for the person who’d said this and realized that it was her. Damn. She’d sworn she wouldn’t interfere, wouldn’t draw attention to herself, wouldn’t give up her invisibility …
“I do have children, as a matter of fact,” the aproned woman said. “Two, if you must know. But they know how to behave.”
“Oh sure,” Anna said, bitterly; now that she had started she couldn’t stop. “And they’ve never broken a single cup in their lives, and they’ve never wanted two straws. And you, you’re perfect, of course. You never drop anything, right? And this cup, lady, is worth twenty cents at most.”
Now it wasn’t just the aproned woman who was staring at Anna, mouth open wide, but Micha as well. Anna was swimming on a wave of anger, and, though it felt good, she had an inkling that she’d be sorry in about three seconds. “I’ll pay for that hot chocolate and my coffee and another fresh hot chocolate,” she said. “And if you’d be kind enough to hand me a dustpan and broom, I’ll clean up the mess on the floor. And when you have a chance, you should see if adult ed offers evening classes in friendliness.”
“You don’t have to shout at me like that,” the aproned woman said as she took Anna’s money. “I didn’t do anything …”
Now Anna noticed the other students in line, impatient students with coffee trays and tired eyes, and suddenly felt embarrassed by her outburst. But then two guys behind her started laughing and both reached for the broom at the same time, trying to help her. “You’re absolutely right,” one of them said. “These people are impossible … there’s another piece of the cup over there …”