[2]
HE CALLED MAIKE IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE PROGRAM. He had not said good-bye to anyone, but had gone straight to the cloakroom to get his bag and wandered the corridors of the television studio looking for the exit. When he finally got reception, he called the apartment in Freiburg and listened, astounded, to Liam’s excited whoops and Maike’s cheerful voice. “That was really something!” she laughed, but changed her tone as soon as she realized the state Sebastian was in. She searched for words of comfort, but did not grasp the seriousness of the situation. The noise on the set meant that Maike had noticed nothing more than a heated scientific disagreement. Sebastian was giddy with relief. He decided to drive back to Freiburg instead of staying the night alone in the hotel in Mainz. For three hours he drove blindly on the autobahn, his brain churning relentlessly in an attempt, after twenty years, to analyze Oskar’s personality, Oskar’s character, Oskar’s state of mind, and his entire nature from a completely different angle. He did not get very far. He found it difficult to concentrate and kept arriving at the same conclusion, like coming up against a wall: people like Oskar see life as a game that they have to win.
Maike was waiting for him at the door to their apartment with a freshly poured whiskey sour and, to his surprise, a similar conclusion: it is not enough for Oskar to win—others have to lose as well. He doesn’t even love you as much as he loves the fight. It seemed that they had not talked about Oskar for years; but they came to the same conclusion that evening. For hours Maike listened to her husband’s hate-filled tirade, said over and over again that she loved him, and told him that an idiot like Oskar ought to just drop dead. When Sebastian was finally drunk, she put him to bed.
Now he is swerving into the oncoming lane to avoid driving over the flattened remains of a hare. A bird of prey is sitting on the guardrail, eyes dark.
Perhaps the whole thing was a stroke of luck, Sebastian thinks. A warning sign, a narrow escape, so that a real tragedy will not happen. Of course he realizes what he has in Maike. But since last night, he feels more keenly than ever before that he does not really deserve this gift. Wealthy patrons put their hands on her bottom by way of greeting, something he knows only because she tells him about it; he no longer attends her gallery receptions. When Maike stands in front of the mirror in the bathroom, painting herself a prettier face (or so she thinks), he leans into the doorway and says that physics is a hard taskmaster, by which he means that he, too, has to work over the weekend. As soon as she is gone, he sits down with Liam on the floor in his room and talks about the theory of the big bang. The walls of their apartment are hung with large, framed pictures, in which Maike sees things that he does not understand. Sebastian knows the young artists, who always seem too small for their trousers and their spectacles, and who speak in sentences consisting only of nouns, faces averted. He knows the collectors, who spend a fortune on suits designed to make them look impoverished. That Sebastian has no cause to feel jealous is due neither to the lack of opportunity nor to the respectable nature of the art world.
As soon as she had gotten to know Dabbelink, she’d insisted on introducing the two men. Sebastian had shaken the senior registrar’s hand at the cycling club, and felt pity for the thin, drawn man, who had limbs like twisted cable and a face etched with exhaustion. Two large full-stops for eyes, a comma for a nose, and a mere line of a mouth, even when laughing. Sebastian borrowed a bicycle from the club and ignored the looks from the other cyclists, whose faces reflected the exact number of times Maike and Dabbelink had met.
The senior registrar overtook them at the first steep section of the Schauinsland. Maike good-humoredly accompanied her husband as he pushed his bike on foot. They met Dabbelink again on the summit of the mountain, which he had conquered in an incredible thirty-five minutes. He was lying on the ground with his calves on the seat of a bench, lifting his torso and alternately touching his forehead to his left and then his right knee. While they were having coffee, he gazed impatiently at the view, as if he was thinking about how many mountains it would have been possible to conquer during that time. The last Sebastian saw of Ralph Dabbelink that day was a back covered in yellow polyamide, leaning dangerously close to the pavement as he sped downward in a tight curve. Maike and Sebastian had taken their time, and had stopped at a good restaurant for a meal on the way back through the valley of Günterstal.
“Are you OK?”
Liam is too quiet.
[3]
SEBASTIAN ADJUSTS THE REARVIEW MIRROR so that he can see his son. Liam is leaning against a corner of the backseat with his head tipped to one side. His body is held in place only by the safety belt, a broad band across his neck and torso. The travel sickness pills are obviously working. When they left the house, Liam had waved as if they were off to sail around the world. Sebastian closes his window and reaches out to switch off the radio, which isn’t even on. Sleep is definitely the best thing for his son at the moment.
The farther they get from Freiburg, the more freely Sebastian’s thoughts flow. He locks his arms; a yawn pushes air into the farthest corners of his lungs. He will have plenty of time to be angry with himself over the coming weeks. He is angry not only because he had once again found it necessary to accept a challenge from someone stronger, but also because he had not felt himself to be above accepting a challenge from someone weaker. He writes articles such as the one in Der Spiegel because the scientific journals do not publish his work. He tells himself that there is nothing dishonorable about wanting to bring his ideas to a wider public. But when he thinks about Oskar reading these pieces, he flushes.
The Many-Worlds Interpretation, Sebastian wrote, was nothing less than an escape from the central paradox of human existence. From the viewpoint of classical physics, it was still impossible to explain why the universe was arranged for the needs of biological life with such astonishing precision. For example, mankind would not exist if space had expanded at a speed that was only the tiniest bit faster or slower. At the time of the big bang, the probability that a universe with the necessary conditions would come into existence had been 10-59. That meant the existence of the earth was as unlikely as winning the lottery nine times in a row. From a stochastic point of view, mankind could be viewed as nonexistent. Man was completely overwhelmed by the improbability of his own existence, and this was precisely the cause of his urgent longing for a Creator.
Those who did not believe in God, he’d posited in the article, had to call upon statistics. If not just one universe had been created in the big bang, but 1059 different universes, then it was no wonder that one of them could support life. The only logical, non-theological explanation of human existence lay in thinking of space (and therefore time) as an enormous heap of worlds that was expanding minute by minute. A growing time-foam, in which every bubble was its own world. “Everything that is possible happens”—Der Spiegel had liked the caption.
Nothing in the article is wrong. Rather, such thoughts belong to a realm where “wrong” and “right” barely play a role. But that is exactly what provokes Oskar’s biting mockery. That’s exactly how stupid people behave! Sebastian hears him say. They take a question of some kind, any old “why,” hurl it against the world, and are amazed when they do not get a sensible answer. Cher ami, every bird on the branch that just twitters and refrains from this ridiculous questioning is cleverer than you!
SEBASTIAN LIFTS A HAND FROM THE STEERING WHEEL and wipes the beads of sweat off his upper lip. Even worse than Oskar’s contempt is the fact that his work on these theories is taking over his life. He has started shutting himself in the study almost every day after dinner. There he broods over his papers until some fragment of an equation starts whirling through his head like an abandoned LP. Some nights he does not dare go to bed, because the noise of his thoughts can increase to an intolerable level in the dark stillness of the bedroom. Maike came to him once, long after midnight. Her bare feet in the hall sounded like the footsteps of a little girl. When he looked up, she was s
tanding in front of him in her nightdress, looking small and fragile. Stay with us, she said. Before he could reply she had turned away and vanished. Sebastian did not follow her, because he was not sure if he had really seen her at all.
After nights like those, he barely knows which world he is in when morning comes. At breakfast, he sat down not as a husband next to his wife, but as someone who is shocked to find two strangers in his own home. Liam suddenly seems far too old, his childish laughter false, his beloved face unfamiliar. Sitting with his family, Sebastian feels as if he has stumbled into an unknown universe by mistake. This terrible feeling of being a guest in his own life has been with him for a long time. Since Liam’s birth, there have been many moments when he has felt like an impostor, as if he has cheated his way to some good fortune which was not his by right, and for which he would be severely punished. At times like this, he wants to put aside his skin like a borrowed coat, and destroy everything he loves before it can be taken away by some counterbalancing force of justice. It is only recently that he has begun to think that this feeling is not a personal problem, but a matter of physics.
He had once described these confused feelings to Oskar as the side effects of a big idea. Oskar had pointed an index finger at him sternly. Don’t trouble yourself with your neuroses, he said. You’ll never be a great man. Everything that has meaning for you bears your surname. That’s how you can recognize it.
Sebastian was incandescent with rage about this remark at the time. Now he finds Oskar’s words calming. As a child, he often lay in bed tortured by the question of whether, faced with a barbaric murderer, he would save his father or his mother. Now, if he had to choose between Maike and physics, or even between Maike and the rest of the world (with the exception of Liam), his wife would have absolutely nothing to fear, despite all his scientific and other obsessions.
He took her to the station in the afternoon. When the train drew alongside the platform, he grasped her arm and told her he loved her. She patted him on the back like a good horse, told him to take care of himself, and passed her lightweight racing bike to the conductor. She blurred into a light patch behind the carriage window, and Sebastian’s arm started to ache with waving. He felt himself getting smaller, shrinking constantly until he disappeared behind the long curve of the tracks.
This holiday is an exception, he thinks now. After this, he will not endanger his family’s happiness any longer in pursuit of a frenzied obsession. He will forget last night’s pathetic TV program and complete “A Long Exposure.” And he will ring Oskar and ask him not to visit on the first Friday of the month any longer.
As soon as he has decided this, he feels free, as if a thorn has been pulled from his flesh. He checks on Liam in the rearview mirror and looks at his peaceful sleeping face for a long time. A wide-tailed buzzard is tearing white intestines from the next piece of roadkill by the edge of the pavement. Since Sebastian started noticing birds of prey, he has counted more than fifteen of them. They sit in the trees, or even by the roadside, staring at the traffic with eyes unadorned by lashes. It seems to him that there are an unnatural number of them. Or, worse still, it is always the same one.
At Geisingen the Volvo leaves the country road and moves onto the A81.
[4]
THE PUMP GURGLES AS IF IT IS SUCKING PETROL out of the tank instead of filling it. While the digits race over the price display, Sebastian uses a sponge to scratch the yellow and purple bodies of flies from the windshield. He buys a chocolate bar at the counter and drops it into the side pocket of his door when he gets back to the car, as Liam is still asleep. He turns the key in the ignition gingerly, as if this will dampen the noise of the starting engine. The car moves slowly around the petrol station.
The parking lot behind the building is almost empty. A couple is sitting on camping stools next to a caravan, having their dinner. A young woman is walking her dog on the strip of grass, a light wind blowing her hair across her face. The sun is slanting through the tops of the trees; as the light hits the branches it breaks into mawkish stars. Sebastian stops the Volvo once again, next to some dirty trucks. He has started out of an empty blackness several times over the last few kilometers. Asleep for a split second. He needs a rest.
The air smells of axle grease and cooling engines. Swinging his arms and hopping from one leg to another, Sebastian goes over to the edge of the service area. The wind sings in chorus through the railings. In the valley there is an insignificant little south German town—its roads shine like rivers. Lake Constance is not yet in sight, but it will appear between the trees in half an hour at most. They will drive its length and cross the invisible border to Austria at the easternmost end before they reach their destination near Bregenz. Latitude 47°50′ N and longitude 9°74′ E. He has looked up the coordinates in an atlas with Liam. There is always a vast amount of information in the world, just not the information you might need in order to know what will happen in the next second. To avoid having to stop again, Sebastian decides to go to the toilet.
He is washing his hands when the phone rings. He dries his hands on his trousers hurriedly, wedges his mobile between shoulder and ear, and leans against the door to push it open. In the hallway a fat woman in a surgical green housecoat points at a plate with a single coin lying in the middle of it.
“Maike?” Sebastian ignores the toilet attendant and walks down the corridor with his head bent. “Did you get there all right? How is the hotel?”
“I’m sorry to disturb you. I’d like to ask you to stand still for a minute and listen to me.”
The voice in the distance sounds familiar to Sebastian. It is young enough to belong to one of the few female students in the institute. He takes the phone from his ear so he can look at the display. Unknown number.
“Who is this?”
“Vera Wagenfort.”
In his head, Sebastian goes through all the women in his faculty. There is no Vera. “Listen, this is not a good moment for me. I’m just leaving a public toilet, if you must know.”
“I’m saying this for the last time. Stand still. For your own sake.”
This woman is not trying to sell anything; she has also not dialed the wrong number. A cold shock cements Sebastian’s legs to the tiled floor. There is a glass case in front of him, filled with colorful stuffed animals, watches, and toy cars. Liam loves these machines. One euro sets in motion a claw, which can be steered and lowered with two buttons. It’s generally possible to grab hold of something, but when the arm moves back, it bumps into the edge of the chute, and the prize almost always falls back into the case. Liam never lets lengthy explanations of the chances of success spoil his fun. If he were here now he would certainly be cajoling a stray coin out of Sebastian.
“First, I must ask you to keep calm at all costs. My employer thinks that you can do that.”
The woman sounds as if she is reading from a piece of paper.
“The most important thing is: tell nobody. Do you understand? No-bo-dy. Leave the building now. I’ll call you back immediately.”
The line goes dead. Sebastian shakes the phone as if he is hoping an explanation will fall out of it. His eyes meet those of a pink toy dog, which seems to be looking at him pleadingly. He finally tears himself free, clears the final stretch of tiled floor, and opens the door to the outside.
Inside the air-conditioned service station, he has forgotten how warm the evening is. Images from the journey still fill his head. When he closes his eyes, the broken white line flies toward him, a bird of prey looks on, a dead cat is at the side of the road. Sebastian walks around the building and stands on the spot surveying the parking lot. There are the trucks. The caravan is gone. And the space where the Volvo was is also empty. Sebastian does not wonder for a moment if he might have parked elsewhere. He knows exactly where he left his car. The space is unbearably empty, emptier than anywhere else on the planet. It takes several seconds for him to understand this.
He walks in an arc across the asphalt divid
ed by white lines, and although his stride gets longer with every step, he feels unable to move from his spot, as in a nightmare. It is only when he gets to the exit ramp, and is looking at the autobahn with its shiny cars disappearing at high speed over the hill, that the rise and fall of the occasional horn brings him to his senses. The frequency of sound waves, Sebastian often explains to his students, depends on the relative motion between the observer and the source. The Doppler effect. It’s the same with light. If Sebastian’s senses were a little sharper, he would register that the vehicles moving away from him are red while those coming toward him are blue. Every one blue, like the Volvo that he has lost.
He runs across the grass, past overturned bins and crudely made picnic tables. Some distance away, two truck drivers are standing next to the raised hood of an engine, cradling cups of coffee in front of their stomachs, watching him. For some reason, Sebastian has his hands in his trouser pockets, which slows him down as he runs. His mouth is already open and he wants to shout, but something clicks in his brain. Tell no-bo-dy.
“Lost something, mate?”
The fat one’s voice is too high for his girth. Sebastian waves the question aside and forces himself to slow down to an innocuous stroll. He has to dictate every movement to his limbs and he almost stumbles; he must look like a madman. He comes to a halt again in the middle of that ghastly void where his car had been. His heart feels constricted in his body—it is looking for a way out through his left lung. Growing in the hollows of a manhole cover is a fleshy plant that Sebastian has seen in Japanese rock gardens. The parking lot swims around him in a blur. This is what the world looks like from one of the roundabouts that Liam preferred over everything else in the playground before he grew too old for them.