There are four bricks across and seven down in the window – that’s twenty-eight in total. I’ve counted them over and over. What is twenty-eight? Not my age, not yet. Will I even reach it? Days in February, that’s it. That’s Hugo’s birthday too. Hugo. Could he have told them? He knew, maybe he was threatened – his job that he loves. No, he wouldn’t. Would he? There’s Oskar too – his odd behaviour, a black-market trader to the East elite. Poor Gerda. Someone knew I was there, with Karin. Right there. Erich? Then why would he defend me, go and get himself shot? Who else knew? Walter? They haven’t mentioned him. He’s a doctor, they might have threatened to take away his position, force him into farm work – they can do that, can’t they? And he loves Karin, wants her to stay in the East. Maybe at all costs. Otto too – he might be more loyal than Karin knows, a member of the Party, one of them. A Stasi man. Karin said it herself – they’re everywhere. Was that a warning? Did she mean me to stay away, does she mean it’s her? It’s not grumpy Frau Lupke who’s their block informer but her, the pretty flighty girl from the West being blackmailed. So many times Karin could have come home. And yet she didn’t. Why? Is she just pretending? Now one of them? Enough to give up her own sister. No. Surely, not Karin. Not my Karin. Not to her Ja-Ja. But she might, for her own freedom with Otto. She just might. But then there’s our thread. I know it’s there. I can feel it. Can I? Really? Or is that me dreaming, wanting it too much?
Yes, I AM lying on my back. Just let me sleep. PLEASE. I will give you anything, the nylon shirt off my back, my blanket, my hunk of tasteless bread if you’ll just LEAVE ME ALONE. Let me escape from these thoughts, shut down, roll over, curl up, let me sneak under my coverlet of dreams and smell the stale eiderdown on Karin’s bed, draw in her scent so that I can fill my nostrils with joy and memories. Let me run a hand over her rounding belly, kiss the soft, downy top of her baby’s head. But you animals won’t let it happen, will you? You deny us, because you want something that we have, that you will never ever own. Because you want to know it all, but you will never know the love. The love that’s possible, between sisters. Between people. Her and me. Her and Otto. Me and Danny. Oh Christ, Danny. He’s so nice and yet I’ll never see him again. I’m soured, tainted, forever to reek of this sweat-brown place and they’ll keep me here until I’m old and wizened and my hair is matted and grey and I squawk like a mad old crow, and they can because there is another one of me out there and her name is Karin and so no one will ever know.
Oh Christ, when will this ever end? If I say anything and everything, can you promise to let me sleep?