Friedrich Ani. "The Underground Sun" ["Die unterirdische Sonne"]

Transcription

1 Friedrich Ani "The Underground Sun" ["Die unterirdische Sonne"] English sample translation by Anthea Bell 2014 by cbt Verlag, München a division of Verlagsgruppe Random House GmbH, Munich, Germany

2 Opening chapters of The Underground Sun, by Friedrich Ani 1 I m not afraid, I am not afr L-liar! not afraid, I m not, shit-scared maybe but not really afraid, definitely not. On the ski slopes I always went straight down, zoom! I can still do it. My father always says: go on, take the next step, don t think about it, just do it! He knows what he s talking about, he was a pro, my father was, League Two, played regularly in every game, scored four goals in the Cup, always picked for the team, the manager relied on him. Nothing would have gone right without my old man, they d never have been promoted from League Three but for him. I ve seen films that C-can t you sh-shut up f-for once? When he celebrated they showed the best games of his career as a running loop in the background, no sound. But I know them all with sound, of course. We watched them again and again down in the cellar, my father and me, the cellar where he gave parties. Relaxing evenings watching my old man in the Federal League. Then he had that run of bad luck with his cruciate ligaments and adductor muscles and torn muscle fibres, but for those he d still be playing today, in League One at that, bet you anything he would. That s where risk comes into it, see? If you re going to take the crucial step you have to reckon on someone bringing you down from behind, and you do reckon on it, only it doesn t do you any good. He tried everything, right to the last minute, the best doctors, rehab with a personal trainer. My ma did all she could to support him. I often went to see him, fetched the balls. An iron man, my father. At his fortieth birthday on well, a little while ago, they were all there, they drank his health and swigged beer, they boozed the way only old pros can. I was proud of my father. I guess my ma was proud of him too. He s gone in the hire-car business now, did I tell you that before? Anyone wants to hire a top-class car, my father s your man. I ve thought of opening a hire-car place like that myself some day. You earn good money hiring out cars, businessmen and tourists always need a good quality car, it s a good solid trade, you can have a future in it. P-please d-do be quiet for a b-bit, p-please. Yes, exactly, Maren. Get it? Maren s right, listen to her, will you, man? Now I ve gone and forgotten your stupid name. Conrad. 2

3 I m hungry. You re getting on my nerves, Sophia. It s none of your business. Car hire! Tourists? Might as well start here on the island, there s billions of tourists every day, each more idiotic than the last. Are we on an island, then? Conrad, was it? Take a deep breath. Are we on an island, you ask? How do you think you got here, then? Y-you m-mustn t ask things like th-that, Eike, it s f-forbidden. Relax, Maren. Just lie there and relax. I want something to eat. There won t be any more to eat today, you silly cow. S-Sophia isn t a silly c-cow, she s m-my friend. Yes, okay, Maren. Hey, Conrad! I asked you a question. Are you deaf? Your ears made of scrap-metal or what? Are we on an island? Where else do you think, scrap-dealer? They gave me something to drink, and then I went out like a light. Dead to the world. Didn t get to hear anything else, honest. Now and then they took me out of the trunk of the car so as I d get a breath of fresh air. They gave me something to drink and sandwiches. That was it. And then they blindfolded me D-didn t you s-smell the s-sea, C-Conrad? Nope. I was in the trunk of the car all the time, and then in the room up there until until yesterday or thereabouts. How long have I been down here with you lot? Since yesterday? Since yesterday, is it? Or isn t it? M-maybe, said Maren. If you want to talk, go ahead. I ve forgotten your name. Sophia. I m telling you, he has scrap-metal for ears, said Eike. The scrap-dealer with scrapmetal for ears. We get your drift, Eike. Listen, Conrad, if it does you good, talk away. But don t get on our nerves. The important thing to remember is, not a word about up above. So they told me, over and over again, before before Don t talk about it. Okay, Maren. 3

4 I m Sophia. Sorry Calm down. Take it easy, Conrad. There s still some water in the bottle, drink a sip. Good. Now, sit down. Relax. Think of something nice. You didn t realize that you re near the sea? Never mind, mastermind. It s not forbidden to say the name of the island. We ve all heard it. Except you. The island s called Vohrland. I know. Have you been here before then, Conrad? Nope. Vohrland. I didn t know that, Sophia, honest. That s okay. Drink a little more water. You ought to drink, that s important. Good. Take it easy. Have a rest. We know what it s like, we re here with you. Look around you: TV set, toilet. They bring us food. Filthy food. Starve, then, Eike, there ll be more for the rest of us. You ll get used to it, Conrad. Don t think about it. Don t think about tomorrow. Tomorrow can look after itself. Right? Now you re here. Since yesterday, to be precise. You talk, so you re not mute. You breathe, you have eyes and ears. You re a human being. Like all of us. Any moment now I m going to howl. Sophia leaned down to Eike and slapped his face so hard that he began to cry, but only for a moment. He was eleven years old, and a fierce dog lived in his heart. Sophia was fourteen years old, and had hands that didn t wave at anyone. Maren was thirteen, and her stammer was only the way her voice smiled. Conrad was sixteen, a genius with penalty kicks, and for the last week he had been coughing up his dreams. When the heavy iron door opened, Maren, Sophia, and Eike turned to the wall. Conrad did the same, because Sophia grabbed the nape of his neck with her cold hand and hauled him round beside her. Then, like her, he closed his eyes. Whoever it was bringing Leon back took the linen bag off his head, waited a moment, and then bolted the door on the outside. Leon was wearing green trousers and a yellow sweat-shirt. He was twelve years old, and every time he smelled his blood he was glad that it was his own. 4

5 It s me, he told the backs of the others. His voice sounded mechanical, like the whisper of a talking doll. As always, it was some time before those who had stayed down in the room dared to turn round. Leon simply stood there. Then he fell to his knees, tipped over sideways, and began sobbing. So they knew he was still alive, and took each other s hands. Conrad wished he never had to let go of those hands again. Sometimes Leon felt sure that Philip Lahm was his brother. He would wake up, and although he hadn t been dreaming of the footballer, he thought he remembered conversations with him. About tactical manoeuvres, movements, the tricks of confusing your opponent by unexpectedly opening up a space and changing your position. When his mother told him for the second time that he d better get up, he would keep his eyes closed, saying, I have some dreaming to finish. You and your dreaming, his mother would say, letting him stay in bed another five minutes. She was brilliant at planning a timetable, and her son was in the classroom at five to eight on the dot every day. It didn t take him ten minutes to walk from their apartment to school. And if he wasted more time dreaming in the bathroom, which luckily didn t happen too often, she drove him to school in the car. It was better for Leon not to think about his mother now. He lay on his mattress in the dark and listened to the others. Not a sound. They seemed to be asleep under their wool blankets in the dark, each of them close to the wall. Although he didn t really want to, he thought of his first day in this house. Perhaps it came into his mind because upstairs the place had smelled of freshly baked plum tart today. Like back then. Back then, he thought, and was immediately sure that he was thinking that phrase for the first time. Normally it was something his mother said. She often told him: Back then, microphones still had long cables. Or: If only I d shaken off my heavy cold properly back then, I wouldn t have lost my voice. She had told him all those things when he was six, and later she kept embarking on them again. Once she apologized, explaining that she had no one else to talk to about such things. And he decided he would always listen to her in future, whatever happened, never mind whether he knew all those things about back then already, or didn t entirely understand them. There was no one Leon was so happy to listen to as his mother. His father had been a rather silent man. He didn t want to think about him at all now. He couldn t even remember 5

6 exactly what his father had looked like. There was no photograph of him in the apartment, and his mother had stopped mentioning him ages ago. On the first day of school, Leon did remember, his father had failed to turn up for the first time. A month later he and his mother moved into the little apartment where they still lived. Although I m not living there any more, thought Leon, straining his ears again. Someone was grunting louder than the others. That would be Conrad. Everyone had to listen to him all day long, there was nothing else for it. Conrad was the new arrival, he could do it, he could talk till the cows came home. It had been the same with the others. As soon as they came, they had all begun telling their stories, starting at eight in the morning and beginning all over again the next day. Talking was good. Talking was better than crying. By now Leon was used to the fact that, all the same, every last one of them spent a good deal of time crying. However, he would never get used to all the rest of it. Leon often thought that he ought to have gone past the little green house on his eleventh birthday, and straight down to the river where no one would have noticed him behind the dense growth of trees and bushes. However, he probably wouldn t have held out as long as that. Indeed, he felt sure he wouldn t. But if, as he had been thinking almost all the time since getting up today, a Sunday, if he had remembered what his mother said in time, if he had turned back when he heard the strange sound at the door a sound that had immediately struck him as suspect he could have become a great footballer living in a villa in lush green surroundings. Instead, here he was imprisoned in a cellar. Sometimes he felt such pain that he couldn t even hold a ball. Not that he had a ball to hold, but when he looked at his trembling hands and shaking arms, he knew what kind of state he was in. His mother always said: Don t go there, it s a dreadful place. Why hadn t he thought of that? It was so easy to remember such a short sentence, particularly when his mother had always repeated it. There was no one else there for her to say it to. Only him. And he had listened to her. Every time. And then he forgot what she said. However, he had heard the sound. And all the same he had gone in. Although he had been a little frightened. 6

7 Not frightened enough. When he could think again, the first thing he thought of was what his mother had told him, and then he started crying. The car in which he lay, tied up and half anaesthetized, was racing along the autobahn. Even though he couldn t have sworn that it was an autobahn and not a roller-coaster ride in a nightmare. The kind of nightmare he used to have back then, when he was still small and his mother had to dry his sweating body at night because, in his dream, the headlong racing movement simply did not stop. Suddenly he held his breath. He heard a noise, or was he imagining it? Not heavy breathing. Footsteps? With his mouth wide open, he breathed in and out silently. Maybe he d been wrong. He squeezed his eyes shut as hard as he could. It was pitch dark in the room, which had no window. The light was switched on and off automatically. Leon had no idea how late it might be, but he didn t think anyone would be coming down from upstairs at this time of night to fetch one of them. They d been fetching him and then bringing him back regularly for the past year. No one must ever know what happened to him in between. Not ever. Anyone who talked about it would die. He was absolutely sure of that. Leon forgot the sound, which had probably just been his imagination anyway, and pulled his blanket a little further up. Before Eike and the others joined him, he couldn t have talked to anyone about it anyway. He didn t talk to himself, either. In fact he really liked talking to himself in bed at night, when he woke up and his heart began thudding because everything was so quiet. That had been at home, in his soft bed with its coloured pillows, and the elk and the lion keeping watch over him, although he was really too old for cuddly toy animals. Ever since coming here, Leon had fallen into a leaden sleep for sheer weariness every evening, and never woke until the light came on, or Eike knocked on his head as if he were knocking at a door. When Eike and the others arrived in the course of the year, Leon might perhaps have whispered something to one or another of them. Like talking, whispering was forbidden. Anyone who whispers will die, one of the men had said. Then he had gone away, bolting the heavy iron door after him. It looked like the doors in TV films set in prisons, only without a peephole in it. 7

8 They didn t go hungry. Leon licked his lips. Today there had been half a grilled chicken and chips for everyone. Eike had left his chicken and had eaten only the chips. Sophia and Conrad had shared Eike s chicken, and they would have given him, Leon, some of it if he d wanted. But he was so deep in thought that there was no spare air left inside him for food. Then someone had come to fetch him, and the others had watched a film on television. Are y-you as-sleep yet? The voice was quiet, the words breathed rather than spoken. All the same, Leon let out a scream and began trembling all over. In reality he hadn t screamed, his voice had simply exploded inside his head. The fear of punishment that, he assumed, would be even worse than everything else he had to bear kept watch over Leon like one of those cuddly toys. He would never have uttered a sound at night, or done anything else forbidden. S-sorry, whispered Maren. Leon wasn t sure when she had come to lie down beside him. He clutched the blanket and pressed his head down on his pillow. At some point Maren did the same, right beside him, with her own head on his pillow. When she placed her hand on the back of his head and touched his ear with her lips, he held his breath again. Held it until he thought he would suffocate. Then he was aware of her mouth touching his ear, and he didn t move a muscle. Nor did Maren. After a while, which seemed to last for ages, he thought that the touch of her mouth was the best thing to have happened to him for a year. He would never tell anyone that, not even Maren herself. If the men were to kill him because he made a mistake, or they didn t need him any more, or just because they wanted to he would think of Maren s lips touching his ear in the last second of his life. P-please c-can I ask you s-something? Leon did not reply. It seemed to him as if he could feel her breath right down inside him. She cupped his ear in the hand that had been on the back of his head just now. P-put your h-hand on my t-tummy, p-please, Leon. He didn t understand what she meant. Or rather, he did, but his imagination wasn t keeping pace with her words. 8

9 Cautiously, he turned his head towards her. He kept his eyes closed, as if Maren wouldn t be so close then. With a slow, deliberate movement, he bent his left arm so that he could shield his mouth with his hand. I don t understand, he said softly. He didn t think that Maren knew what he meant. L-like this. She took his hand, which was still trembling, in her cold fingers and guided it down to her stomach, under her sweatshirt. He immediately felt ashamed of himself. She held his hand firmly down where it was, with hers on top of it. For the third time he didn t dare to breathe. He managed to hold his breath for only a few seconds this time. His heart was beating so wildly that he thought it must be audible through the microphone and all the way upstairs. Th-thank you, L-Leon. I f-feel b-better now. Leon dismissed his fear of what would happen if one of the adults upstairs was watching this scene on the monitor by thinking of Maren s lips against his ear. Her stomach was warmer now than it had been, he thought. After a while he wondered whether to make a tiny movement with his hand. As if there were suddenly an idiot inside his head who insisted on having a say in all this, he found that tears were running down his cheeks. Leon suppressed a sob and pressed his lips together. This stupid crying put an end to what his hand wanted to do. But he didn t take it away. Maren s stomach rose and fell. Leon almost thought she had fallen asleep right there beside him. back again. Th-thank you, she whispered again. It d-doesn t hurt s-so much n-now. I ll g-go b- She moved away from him, but he pressed his hand down on her stomach. Wait. He strained his ears. Someone was breathing noisily. That would be Conrad. Otherwise it was quiet. He bent over Maren s head and touched his lips to her ear. If his nose wasn t mistaken, it smelled of delicious plum tart. I ll tell you something. Only you. For several seconds he dared not go on whispering. It s my birthday today. As if the situation wasn t confusing enough for him anyway, Maren turned her head, and before he could even catch his breath she kissed him on his mouth. Next moment she had disappeared into the dark, as silently as she had come. Leon lay on his back, breathing in the aroma of her hand, and thinking that he had never had so many presents on his birthday for ages. 9