On the night that has been haunting me for twenty years, I dreamed of him without really sleeping. Alfred Haffner. Anton’s father, of whom I knew only this one photograph, framed by cheesy painted china dolls and dried roses on his mother’s sideboard. Alfred Haffner’s head lay next to me on my pillow, and I could have sucked his breath to swallow it and spit it out again. Tiny white worms crawled in his hair, enough to look like a single boiling porridge that’s constantly being stirred so as not to burn. Even today I imagine I should have dropped my spoon into it, led it to my lips, licked it. A picture that strangles me, but still lets me dive deep into it and ignores my screaming as if it were just the howling of a hungry dog. They were nimble, ugly critters of the sort who love rotting fruit, the disgusting, insatiable brood I knew from my Aunt Vicky’s pantry. At that time I was convinced that the maggots were also in their stew, which she cooked on Friday and which I had to eat on Saturday too, because my mother pinched my neck hard, if only I poked it. The repulsive life in Haffner’s hair was as real as the fat cockroach tormenting from the corner of his mouth. And somehow it seemed to me she was speaking for him, not the head, separated from the trunk, with dead empty eyes that had long since stopped seeing what was so natural to me. “Help me, Nina.” I knew from my Aunt Vicky’s pantry. At that time I was convinced that the maggots were also in their stew, which she cooked on Friday and which I had to eat on Saturday too, because my mother pinched my neck hard, if only I poked it. The repulsive life in Haffner’s hair was as real as the fat cockroach tormenting from the corner of his mouth. And somehow it seemed to me she was speaking for him, not the head, separated from the trunk, with dead empty eyes that had long since stopped seeing what was so natural to me. “Help me, Nina.” I knew from my Aunt Vicky’s pantry. At that time I was convinced that the maggots were also in their stew, which she cooked on Friday and which I had to eat on Saturday too, because my mother pinched my neck hard, if only I poked it. The repulsive life in Haffner’s hair was as real as the fat cockroach tormenting from the corner of his mouth. And somehow it seemed to me she was speaking for him, not the head, separated from the trunk, with dead empty eyes that had long since stopped seeing what was so natural to me. “Help me, Nina.” if only I poked in it. The repulsive life in Haffner’s hair was as real as the fat cockroach tormenting from the corner of his mouth. And somehow it seemed to me she was speaking for him, not the head, separated from the trunk, with dead empty eyes that had long since stopped seeing what was so natural to me. “Help me, Nina.” if only I poked in it. The repulsive life in Haffner’s hair was as real as the fat cockroach tormenting from the corner of his mouth. And somehow it seemed to me she was speaking for him, not the head, separated from the trunk, with dead empty eyes that had long since stopped seeing what was so natural to me. “Help me, Nina.”
Anton and I had it on the day that this dream should follow, driven as always under the old cedar in Haffner’s garden, protected by the maple, which denied Anton’s mother the view of us from her kitchen window. We played clinging and teasing, spitting on the effervescent powder in our palms and reading forbidden stuff that the backward fat Willibald Gendszki gave us from the neighboring house. As a thank you, I stole cigarettes for him from the dresser in my parents’ bedroom, constantly in danger of being caught, because the drawer stuck and squeaked horribly when pulled out with the necessary force. I always thought that you could hear them up to the Sendeltupfer Badeeiher, which was just behind the Südhammerlinger outpost, about three kilometers from our house, but I was never caught. Presumably, my parents never counted. They were lovably lazy and ate the plum cake of my grandmother Daddy-Hanni covered with sugar cinnamon directly from the baking sheet because they did not want to fetch plates and forks. Anton’s mother did not smoke, so in return he took some groceries from the coffee tin that stood behind the salt and flour, never too many, but enough to buy us a small bottle of Coke, which we certainly did not share with Willi. He also did not want to, denied any politely offered sip and threatened us with Todesahnungen. “It gets lice in the stomach and becomes impotent.” I did not really like the lice thing, but after Willi told me what impotent means – “That’s where the tail drops off!” – My bigger concern was Anton. The whistle großkotzig on it. “I do not care.” Sometimes, of course, he betrayed himself, reaching between his legs and holding him like a particularly precious glass marmelade that could be stolen while he drank, his head back, his eyes half-closed under the too-long hair on his forehead, almost his to the tip of his nose, if he did not stroke his face. I never talked to him about it, but I was secretly asked how we would have taught our mothers if he had actually fallen away from him. And if Anton would have become a girl, just as a lousy caterpillar turns into a butterfly. He reached between his legs and held him in place like a particularly valuable glass marmot that could be stolen while he drank, his head back, his eyes half-closed under the too-long hair on his forehead that almost reached to the tip of his nose it did not stroke his face. I never talked to him about it, but I was secretly asked how we would have taught our mothers if he had actually fallen away from him. And if Anton would have become a girl, just as a lousy caterpillar turns into a butterfly. He reached between his legs and held him in place like a particularly valuable glass marmot that could be stolen while he drank, his head back, his eyes half-closed under the too-long hair on his forehead that almost reached to the tip of his nose it did not stroke his face. I never talked to him about it, but I was secretly asked how we would have taught our mothers if he had actually fallen away from him. And if Anton would have become a girl, just as a lousy caterpillar turns into a butterfly. I never talked to him about it, but I was secretly asked how we would have taught our mothers if he had actually fallen away from him. And if Anton would have become a girl, just as a lousy caterpillar turns into a butterfly. I never talked to him about it, but I was secretly asked how we would have taught our mothers if he had actually fallen away from him. And if Anton would have become a girl, just as a lousy caterpillar turns into a butterfly.
That afternoon, which promised us a brief, exciting moment that we carelessly forgot too quickly, we chewed liquorice snails that we had pocketed because old Pit Knufferson had once again fallen asleep behind his counter. He drank too much, and in the early morning he poured himself a yellow, stinking swill into the coffee, and we treated him to his nap by sneaking silently into his grocer’s shop, serving us quickly, and keeping him snoring. We did not have a guilty conscience, we never pocketed much, and sometimes we offered it to Willi, who gratefully accepted it with a big grin on his silly face and was distracted by the fact that I had run out of stolen cigarettes.
Anton read in a titmice magazine – that’s what Willi called it – and we agreed to that because we could not think of anything better – poking a stick in the ground and making patterns, spotting one of our neatly stolen liquorice snails and putting it under his nude Foot sole stuck. “Eat ’em without taking your hands.” He did not move, just said, “Grab a hole and stick your head in it.” I scraped the firm topsoil with my fingernails, making a small heap, big enough to throw it in his face in response to his stupid reaction that had offended me as he kept reading and looking at mighty breasts that I did not owned. And then I held it between my thumb and forefinger. Haffner’s ring.
In fact, I did not realize that Anton’s father had been wearing it, and examining the inside surface after engraving did not come to mind. We did not know anything about the silly quirks of adults scribbling names and dates to keep in mind how in love they once had been.
I felt deceived by my find. I would have liked to find a ring with a fat sparkling stone, something very special, filigree, as fine ladies like it. But there was only this flat black stone, of course, set in gold, but too rough to please me. My father had a similar one, not nice enough for me, so I gave him to Anton, curious to know if he would simply throw him over the fence, or rather sell Willi for a few marks, as I would have done. Ungern he looked up, only distracted himself for a moment by the half-naked fat-breasted women who licked his fingers for him and spread his legs, without even knowing how it really works out. He freed the ring with the tip of his shirt, He peeled awkwardly out of his pants, from dirt tracks, looked at him like a beetle he could not assign, and pocketed him. Just because. “And now?” I was offended because he paid no attention to me because he did not praise or amaze me about my discovery. He just said, “I ask mother.”
Alice Haffner was a woman who, although roughly the same age, looked much older than my own slightly chubby, always laughing mother, who pulled a turquoise eyeliner and bleached her hair. Once I’d heard my dad call her “awesome piglet,” and to my astonishment, she had not gotten angry, but jumped on his lap, as if she’d enjoyed comparing herself to a pig , I was nine and was supposed to learn the little differences later on, but even at this early stage I could well imagine that no one would ever have dared to say “Piglet” to Alice Haffner without immediately slapping her hand brush on her behind to get. Just as she did Anton, if there was anything what she did not like. And that happened very often, even in my presence, so I was especially polite to her so as not to get a bludger.
Today I see her as a haggard, joyless woman who had done horrible things and bore her guilt like a tormenting hump between her shoulder blades, too heavy and too ugly not to have to grope for him every hour. At the time, she seemed to me to be a not life-threatening, yet cautious witch, with her tightly knotted pale red hair and the dark hues she wore as a stark contrast to her white sun-kissed skin, never really smiling, never make-up, so thin that a serious storm would probably have it cut off at the waist like a straw, smooth in half in half. Probably to avoid this and other annoyances, she spent most of her time in the shelter of the house, reluctantly spoke more than the bare essentials and stared into the TV, if she did not make it in the kitchen. Sometimes, thank God, not too often, she invited me to supper, in her usual cool way, asked, “Do you still want to stay, Nina?” Smeared slices of liverwurst and gherkin-I did not like the glassy smelly cheese-and worked always restless, as if I were disturbing despite her invitation. I ate hastily and regularly scalded my palate by the steaming cocoa, trying to bring it to an end quickly.
My parents allowed me these extended visits, which I never really liked, what I kept to myself. Otherwise I would have had to explain how uncomfortable I felt being in a room with Alice Haffner, having to sit at a table. I was only nine, almost ten, and I was convinced that my parents did not understand my dislike, called me stupid and naughty and naughty, and told me – a terrible idea – about Anton’s mother.
Haffner’s garden was directly adjacent to ours, and so Anton was often with me, too, but rather with my father, so my secret suspicion, because he liked to be useful, helped with small handicrafts, was allowed to climb on the forbidden ladder and tinkered around our bikes with my dad, while helping my mother with weed picking. “Great boy, you’re a real guy,” my dad said, patting his shoulder and beaming. Those were the few moments when my mother did not laugh, and her strange look unsettled me, because basically she liked Anton. From my father’s grief over the son he would have liked so much, next to me, his princess, I learned only years later and shared it with my mother without jealousy and without anger, because he died when I was eighteen, and I kept his image in me because he had never let me feel he was missing something. Someone. A patenter guy like Anton, whom he lost unceremoniously with our move to the city, close enough to Südhammerling that you could have gone there, far enough to forget. Nothing drew us back. After the death of my ever-vital father, who had suddenly grown gray and thin and terribly old before he died away from the doctors under my fingers, my mother remained alone for four years. I studied at the university, which I could spit on from our balcony, stayed with her and looked for her own little apartment, as she became more and more serious with Georg, her new one. because he had never let me feel that he was missing something. Someone. A patenter guy like Anton, whom he lost unceremoniously with our move to the city, close enough to Südhammerling that you could have gone there, far enough to forget. Nothing drew us back. After the death of my ever-vital father, who had suddenly grown gray and thin and terribly old before he died away from the doctors under my fingers, my mother remained alone for four years. I studied at the university, which I could spit on from our balcony, stayed with her and looked for my own little apartment, as she became more and more serious with Georg, her new one. because he had never let me feel that he was missing something. Someone. A patenter guy like Anton, whom he lost unceremoniously with our move to the city, close enough to Südhammerling that you could have gone there, far enough to forget. Nothing drew us back. After the death of my ever-vital father, who had suddenly grown gray and thin and terribly old before he died away from the doctors under my fingers, my mother remained alone for four years. I studied at the university, which I could spit on from our balcony, stayed with her and looked for her own little apartment, as she became more and more serious with Georg, her new one. Close enough to Südhammerling that you could have gone, far enough to forget. Nothing drew us back. After the death of my always vital father, who had suddenly turned gray and thin and terribly old before he died away from the doctors under my fingers, my mother remained alone for four years. I studied at the university, which I could spit on from our balcony, stayed with her and looked for her own little apartment, as she became more and more serious with Georg, her new one. Close enough to Südhammerling that you could have gone, far enough to forget. Nothing drew us back. After the death of my always vital father, who had suddenly turned gray and thin and terribly old before he died away from the doctors under my fingers, my mother remained alone for four years. I studied at the university, which I could spit on from our balcony, stayed with her and looked for her own little apartment, as she became more and more serious with Georg, her new one.
My dream, which had awakened me one night after Antons and my discovery under the old cedar in Haffner’s garden with a wet face, had always been my secret. I could not have told him, let alone explain, any more than I could have said with certainty that the wetness in my face had been tears, dreamily pushed out, and spilled in sleep. Or just sweat, because I remember that when I woke up I was hot and that I had given everything for a glass of ice-cold milk. And that I had wanted nothing more than to lie now and then between my parents on the crack in their bed, because they seemed strong and smart enough to protect me. In fact, I did not move. I did not dare To breathe louder than required was just stiff and sweaty as my mouth grew drier. I did not dare to look at my side, fearing there was still that dreadful head with the worms in the hair talking to me through the cockroach, and I stayed awake and completely rigid, pinned to my mattress until dawn, for sure Packed in my much too heavy bedding, until it was light enough in my room to see that there was nothing waiting for me. From my second pillow, the one-armed Fred guarded me, and I took him and called him “good teddy,” letting him hold me until I heard it rumbled in my parents’ bedroom. My father had got up, the night over. while my mouth was getting drier. I did not dare to look at my side, fearing there was still that dreadful head with the worms in the hair talking to me through the cockroach, and I stayed awake and completely rigid, pinned to my mattress until dawn, for sure Packed in my much too heavy bedding, until it was light enough in my room to see that there was nothing waiting for me. From my second pillow, the one-armed Fred guarded me, and I took him and called him “good teddy,” letting him hold me until I heard it rumbled in my parents’ bedroom. My father had got up, the night over. while my mouth was getting drier. I did not dare to look at my side, fearing there was still that dreadful head with the worms in the hair talking to me through the cockroach, and I stayed awake and completely rigid, pinned to my mattress until dawn, for sure Packed in my much too heavy bedding, until it was light enough in my room to see that there was nothing waiting for me. From my second pillow, the one-armed Fred guarded me, and I took him and called him “good teddy,” letting him hold me until I heard it rumbled in my parents’ bedroom. My father had got up, the night over. there was still that dreadful head with the worms in the hair talking to me through the cockroach, and I stayed awake and completely rigid, nailed to my mattress until dawn, safely packed in my much too heavy bedding until it was light enough was in my room to find that nothing was waiting for me. From my second pillow, the one-armed Fred guarded me, and I took him and called him “good teddy,” letting him hold me until I heard it rumbled in my parents’ bedroom. My father had got up, the night over. there was still that dreadful head with the worms in the hair talking to me through the cockroach, and I stayed awake and completely rigid, nailed to my mattress until dawn, safely packed in my much too heavy bedding until it was light enough was in my room to find that nothing was waiting for me. From my second pillow, the one-armed Fred guarded me, and I took him and called him “good teddy,” letting him hold me until I heard it rumbled in my parents’ bedroom. My father had got up, the night over. to see that nothing was waiting for me. From my second pillow, the one-armed Fred guarded me, and I took him and called him “good teddy,” letting him hold me until I heard it rumbled in my parents’ bedroom. My father had got up, the night over. to see that nothing was waiting for me. From my second pillow, the one-armed Fred guarded me, and I took him and called him “good teddy,” letting him hold me until I heard it rumbled in my parents’ bedroom. My father had got up, the night over.
Only twenty years later did she bring me back. Only once. That was when I wanted to read in the ring Alice Haffner had put in the kitchen drawer, careless as it seemed to me at the time, with her rigid and emphatically grown-up expression that betrayed nothing to a child. Today I would have watched her, every hesitant twitch of a lid, a cheek muscle registered, would have counted the fine beads of sweat on the upper lip, on the eyebrows. Twenty years ago everything was different. “He will belong to Tom-Thimm.” She said then, put our ring away, and we just looked at each other bleak. No reward. Packed away. Just because. Because Tom-Thimm had probably lost him digging. Thomas Thimmpolt, who was staying at Kottersbecken at the end of the road just before Wittelbach’s knitting and craft shop and offered for gardening in the neighborhood, was a foul smelling toothless guy with a stomach like a sack of wet leaves that was constantly drunk and us “Lausepack” called. But he was what my mother called a good soul, gave us cherry-flavored chewing gum and did his job well. That’s what the big boys said, and that’s why we paid tribute to him. He was Thom-Thimm, the South Hammerling gardener. A harmless fellow, filled with schnapps, who had trimmed roses and cypresses and lost a signet ring under Haffner’s cedar. We believed that, as we also believed, we never had to part,
I was barely thirty, worked part-time in a hospital administration, and repeatedly cursed my inability to hold my hands upright as one roared, “Which of you dwarfs wants the big ticket?” Still in my free time, I squatted over my drawing pad, painted funny ugly gnomes, wrote angry children’s stories and annoyed me about the Spaniard on the corner, who spoke German too well for an Andalusian cook to somehow pack him with my foreign language skills. At “Los amigos” I met with former fellow students from time to time, we ate and drank typical and somehow still hoped that the university would open our way to the sweet wide world. Only the right door, nobody found it.
Anton will not have found her either. This is now becoming clear to me, after what has happened in my cursed normal existence has suddenly spilled like a disgusting boil, then burst like a bubble in which the colors of a rainbow are reflected. I know, I sound kitschy, maybe I’m just still so upset and sad, maybe happy, too salty, that may be the whole thing. In fact, I’ve never seen a rainbow before. I remember that my father, who became a child when he saw puddles and piles of leaves, had always pinched my arm when he thought he was discovering a miracle: a swarm of fireflies, a shooting star, a three-legged dog who passed a fat poodle, the woodworms in Grandmother’s bedpost, the naked neighbor in the hammock. A rainbow. “Look, Nina, do not you see that?” I never saw, just stared at the wrong point where his finger pointed, blinked, saw nothing. “Off again,” my father said, probably more disappointed than myself, his little unfocused princess, who unfortunately always missed the unique moments in life. Except for my meeting with Anton’s father, who dreamily begged for my help twenty years ago, after finding a ring under an old cedar in the sleepy Südhammerling and entrusting it to my best friend: Alfred Haffner’s Ring. I never saw, just stared at the wrong point where his finger pointed, blinked, saw nothing. “Off again,” my father said, probably more disappointed than myself, his little unfocused princess, who unfortunately always missed the unique moments in life. Except for my meeting with Anton’s father, who dreamily begged for my help twenty years ago, after finding a ring under an old cedar in the sleepy Südhammerling and entrusting it to my best friend: Alfred Haffner’s Ring. I never saw, just stared at the wrong point where his finger pointed, blinked, saw nothing. “Off again,” my father said, probably more disappointed than myself, his little unfocused princess, who unfortunately always missed the unique moments in life. Except for my meeting with Anton’s father, who dreamily begged for my help twenty years ago, after finding a ring under an old cedar in the sleepy Südhammerling and entrusting it to my best friend: Alfred Haffner’s Ring. which unfortunately always missed the unique moments in life. Except for my meeting with Anton’s father, who dreamily begged for my help twenty years ago, after finding a ring under an old cedar in the sleepy Südhammerling and entrusting it to my best friend: Alfred Haffner’s Ring. which unfortunately always missed the unique moments in life. Except for my meeting with Anton’s father, who dreamily begged for my help twenty years ago, after finding a ring under an old cedar in the sleepy Südhammerling and entrusting it to my best friend: Alfred Haffner’s Ring.
Anton called me when I had already said goodbye to him from my own world. It was too long ago to think of him with a certain curiosity, and I thought he was far away from the tangible, not knowing that and how I existed as a woman in which he no longer recognized his girl. On this point, I was wrong: After his call, which had made me on the phone to a confused stammering idiots – I was completely beside me when he called me Nina as only my father and he too an eternity, for the rest I was called Carolin – it was natural for me to meet his request to be able to meet me immediately. How else should I have reacted, say what without regretting it? Only minutes later he stood in my living room, upright as a duty tin soldier, as if he had to give me a message that requires attitude. Instead, he just looked at me, as if he wanted to memorize every freckle, every curl, every laugh line to be able to blindly draw me, remained wordless and finally hugged me like the girl who had become a woman. I clutched at him, said nothing to him, and because this silence made us nervous and unexpectedly, we kissed helplessly and naturally, and as a consequence we loved each other on my lemon-yellow carpet, on which no one else could have left its mark. It was that easy. remained silent and finally hugged me like the girl who had become a woman. I clutched at him, said nothing to him, and because this silence made us nervous and unexpectedly, we kissed helplessly and naturally, and as a consequence we loved each other on my lemon-yellow carpet, on which no one else could have left its mark. It was that easy. remained silent and finally hugged me like the girl who had become a woman. I clutched at him, said nothing to him, and because this silence made us nervous and unexpectedly, we kissed helplessly and naturally, and as a consequence we loved each other on my lemon-yellow carpet, on which no one else could have left its mark. It was that easy.
When I handed him a glass of red wine, he gratefully took it and became aware that I had not asked a single question yet, I saw the ring on his finger. It’s hard to explain, even though I find it bizarre, maybe quirky despite my not really significant age, but I swear I immediately identified this ring as the one I found in Haffner’s garden twenty years ago.
“Why are you wearing it? Just this one.” I touched his hand, strong, slightly tanned, stroking his fingernails, smooth as mine, remembering how he had chewed them before the blackness could have taken the innocent. “He belongs to my father.” Only these words. Another silence that told me how reluctant he wanted to explain what was so hard to explain. For him, the son who never really met his father, because his mother stole experiences, experiences, memories from him. For me, my girlfriend, who had grown up and no longer wanted to believe in pink elephants, which in march 1899 were to be beautifully decorated and marched over the Kurtitz bridge in Südhammerling. And who did not want to know anything about severed heads,
I smoked and drank to avoid talking, and there was his voice crackling like a lurking log fire that made a December night memorable. “He’s dead, Nina, I do not want to spare my mother anymore, she took what she thought she deserved, he kept me silent, but now he needs a grave, help him, Nina, help me with it I too can sleep soundly, just like him. ” He groped for my temples, massaging them softly, and though I felt almost unbearably awake, I still thought I would spend that last night of my life with a madman who had once been my Anton, licked the effervescent powder out of my palm and his I had to fall asleep in front of Coke. That’s so absurd, that I want to refuse to think through anything that happened that night. I know that we loved each other on my precious fine rug, which I would have burnt by myself, if only Anton had been with me, my companion through the summer of past love that I had felt for him, even though we were children who were tenderly pulled by the hair and almost drowned each other in the Sendeltupfer bath egg almost naturally, only to the friend at the last moment to bring to light and gasp for breath. I never thought to be able to feel a man so intense and yet gentle, as if I were precious filigree porcelain. Anton was beautiful, his body was muscular, his hair as soft as that of a young cat purring under my hands. I dreamed of Haffner again that night – his head looked decent, peaceful, he did not want to frighten me again, he said: “Nina, the cedar is growing.” and “Alice, it’s time.”, and I dreamed of Anton, my muddled childhood friend, whose sock had slipped down to the shoelace and sticky sticks of liquorice hung in the corners of his mouth. He looked at his mother, holding out his left hand. A strong man’s hand with a signet ring. He looked at her. And she died. She fell over and was dead. whose sock had slipped down to the shoelace, and where sticky liquorice remains hung in the corners of his mouth. He looked at his mother, holding out his left hand. A strong man’s hand with a signet ring. He looked at her. And she died. She fell over and was dead. whose sock had slipped down to the shoelace, and where sticky liquorice remains hung in the corners of his mouth. He looked at his mother, holding out his left hand. A strong man’s hand with a signet ring. He looked at her. And she died. She fell over and was dead.
Anton was gone when I woke up. Haffner’s ring lay on my bedside console, next to the photograph my parents and I are showing in Fantasialändle in front of a colorfully lit water slide with small boats that look like dilettantisch spotted dolphins with plate-sized eyes. We eat green cotton candy, a man in a penguin costume has photographed us, and tiny in the background in front of the enclosure with the plastic piranha stands Anton and urges a frightened dove to try his cotton. We had taken him along then, my dad had invited him to “show you real whales, boy,” but we only saw fake rubbers.
The same day, I took off to ride the ring to Südhammerling, and I did not care if the administration or I understood myself, I just knew I had to go there. Alice Haffner wore her topknot, which had become insignificantly thinner and grayer, with the same incomprehensible pride that had unsettled me as a child. I had not really matured, I looked into the eyes of this woman with her skinny waist and almost transparent skin and lowered my eyes like a frightened schoolgirl waiting for the cane. Then I straightened my body, it was as if a deep male voice were admonishing me to finally have to be tall and strong, and it was liberating to be able to grasp so quickly that I was not the one who should have been afraid. I did not greet her,
She swallowed sleeping pills after informing me about Anton’s death and throwing me out. Not without taking the ring that she slept the next night in the Hammerling guesthouse, which was never fully booked and only remembered as a wet pillow, under the cedar in the frozen room Earth buried. There she was found, stiff and poisoned, wearing a flowered dress, housewares made of kitschy embroidered velvet and a black shoulder stole, far too little for the season. I learned about it, crossed and cursed myself, then applied for digging under the cedar in Haffner’s garden the same day. I was probably explained as crazy as I felt myself, but they dug and found him. Anton Haffner. Finally he will get his grave. One right. It was no longer worthwhile for him to lurk there and remain silent for his son, because he was dead. I am satisfied because everything has found its rightness.
Alice Haffner killed her husband Alfonson twenty-six years ago out of jealousy, parted his head and buried him under the still young cedar in her garden, which grew to a respectable, evergreen beauty. How the dainty woman had discreetly removed the ninety-foot burly bricklayer who had definitely wanted to leave her for Britta Ebbers, a newcomer with gypsy blood, who had quickly made off again, remained a mystery. Some whispered in a hurry, the feeble-minded Tom-Thimm, who in his comfort never knew what he was doing, would have helped her then, for that she would have him drooling in her bed.
The official version after Alfons Haffner’s disappearance was that he had secretly made it, wife and son in the lurch. Nobody had ever wanted to believe that at the time, because one knew how dreadfully the Alfons loved his Anton, it was rumored that he had wanted to take the child away from Alice to go with him and Britta to northern Germany, to where the fish-heads of Alfonso could have been a good man who drinks his herbal liquor to the good of his ancestor.
In fact, Alfred Haffner has not been a drunkard. He drank to hear Alice, and one night, when he heard very badly, she turned on the ugly in her anger. Why she cut off his head remains a matter of speculation, but she also cut off the scrotums for him, perhaps she was in her very certain element that would have allowed no voyeurs.
Anton Haffner died on wet roads in the evenings before he visited me. My almost wordless night with him will leave me a life-long bed for him, without there being anyone who pushes my chin up for a kiss that tastes like licorice. The idea of course I like only to a limited extent to have been visited by a dead man, although it is more exciting than to spin from a passing fuck with my Spaniard from “Los amigos”.
Shortly before, Anton must have learned of the origin of the ring his mother kept in the kitchen drawer, because he wore it when his body was taken away. Whether he knew that Alice Haffner had killed his father remains to me just guess. For me, only one thing is clear: Anton was with the motorcycle on the way to me when he crashed. He would have to drive another fifteen kilometers.
Tom will be buried tomorrow. Alice is still cold and waiting. But I’m not waiting for her. I’ll put a rose on Anton’s coffin lid, scoop up a pile of earth and wonder what it would be like to stick a licorice snail under his sole with a spit. “Eat ’em without taking your hands.” And he says, without taking his eyes off Willis’ tits magazine: “Grab a hole and stick your head in it.”
Maybe I should have pulled my head out again. Because I can not swear it was like this. Haffner’s ring remains my secret. We should have thrown him over the garden fence. Or sell the stupid Willi. For a few marks innocence.