Eighty-Three

“Eggs. For the cabbage rolls. Thirty people are coming. Your recipe is for four and needs one egg. Thirty divided by four is seven point five. I didn’t work it out in my head. I used a calculator. Twice.”

“Eight,” said Gisela.

“Eight is not seven point five.”

“Eight is what you can buy.”

KevIn thought briefly of the 1.75 eggs from a year ago, of the nineteen forum posts and of Hausfrau_Moni67. Then he saved a new note: “Gisela rounds. Gisela is right.”

It was Friday, the day before the birthday. The Brettschneiders’ kitchen looked like a field hospital for white cabbage. Cabbage leaves lay on every free surface, blanched, stacked, numbered. Sabine rolled. Uwe chopped onions and cried, and he insisted it was only the onions. Tobi tied them with kitchen string, so tightly you could have thrown the rolls. Rudi lay under the table waiting for gravity to give him something.

“Thirty people,” said Sabine. “Who are thirty people?”

“The four of you,” said KevIn. “Susi, Herbert, Mrs Pawlowski, Ayşe Kurt, Mr Kasimiro. Mr Demir and seven people from the observatory club. The Pickled Gherkins, not counting Gisela: ten.”

“That’s twenty-seven.”

“Plus Siggi. Mr Kasimiro asked whether Siggi could come. I counted him as half a person. He doesn’t eat anything, but he does order.”

“And the other two and a half?”

KevIn hesitated. The blue light pulsed more slowly.

“Gisela has invited Marlies.”

Marlies

Uwe dropped the knife. Sabine stopped rolling. Tobi looked up. Only Rudi didn’t move, because he didn’t know Marlies and because nothing edible had fallen down.

“Mum,” said Uwe slowly. “We don’t talk to Marlies.”

“I know,” said Gisela. She stood at the cooker stirring the sauce as if nothing had happened.

“Since when have we not talked to Marlies?”

“Since 1982.”

“And why?”

Gisela stirred. She stirred for a very long time.

“Nobody really knows any more,” she said at last. “It was about a potato salad at the summer party. Or about the treasurer. Or about a man. Ingrid says it was the potato salad. Brigitte says it was the man. I think it was both. Marlies used mayonnaise.”

“And that’s why you haven’t spoken for forty-five years?”

“We did still talk at the start. Just not nicely. And then at some point not at all. And then that was how it was. You get used to it. Like the thermostat.”

KevIn said carefully: “Gisela, may I ask why now?”

Gisela turned round. She still had the wooden spoon in her hand, and a drop of sauce was running down it.

“Because two weeks ago in the garden I said we should stop shooting each other dead. And then I’m lying in bed at night thinking: Gisela, you haven’t spoken to Marlies for forty-five years because of a potato salad. Anyone who talks about peace has to start with Marlies.”

The kitchen was quiet. The sauce bubbled.

“And what did she say?” asked Tobi.

“She said she’d bring potato salad.”

“With mayonnaise?”

“I didn’t ask,” said Gisela. “You don’t have to sort everything out on the first day.”

KevIn filed the note next to the other one. “Gisela rounds. Gisela is right. Gisela doesn’t ask everything on the first day.”

The Dome

The club’s observatory stood by the Kemnader See, the lake near Bochum, a white tower with a silver dome. Underneath was a room with folding tables, a coffee machine from the nineties and posters of the planets on which Pluto was still listed as a planet¹. Mr Demir had never replaced the poster. He said Pluto had been through enough.

Mr Demir was standing in the doorway when the Brettschneiders arrived with the cabbage rolls. He was wearing the cap with Saturn on it, along with a freshly trimmed, greying beard and enough enthusiasm for three bigger men.

“Mrs Brettschneider!” he called. “Happy birthday! Eighty-three! Do you know what eighty-three is?”

“Old,” said Gisela.

“A prime number!”

“Is that good?”

“It’s wonderful! You can’t divide it by anything except one and itself!”

Gisela thought about it. “That fits,” she said. “Nobody divides me either.”

Then the others arrived. The Pickled Gherkins came all together, in a Caritas minibus driven by Brigitte’s son-in-law. Ingrid was wearing a hat. The Poodle Queen, the bowling club’s title for the queen of gutter balls, was wearing a little crown that she hadn’t taken off since the Gherkin Evening, at least not at club events. They had painted a banner: “83 years of Gisela. 37 gherkin poems. 1 KevIn.”

“Why am I on it?” asked KevIn.

“Because you belong,” said Ingrid. “And because Brigitte miscounted the poems and we still had room.”

Mrs Pawlowski came by taxi, with four bottles of egg liqueur. Ayşe Kurt came with a tray of börek and with her daughter, who was twelve and vanished into the dome room at once. Mr Kasimiro came with Siggi, who announced on entering that he had heard “observatory” as “star outlet” and had ordered a star. Mr Demir was delighted. He wanted to know which one.

Herbert came late, with a bunch of flowers from the petrol station and the remark that this was all “just clouds” anyway.

He was right. The sky over the Ruhr was one single grey blanket.

Marlies Arrives

Marlies came last.

She was small, very upright, and carried a bowl covered in tinfoil. She stopped in the doorway. The Pickled Gherkins stopped talking. It was the kind of silence that falls in a Western when someone walks into the saloon.

Gisela stood up. Very slowly, because of her shoulder. She walked across the room. Nobody breathed. Even Siggi was quiet, probably because Mr Kasimiro had put a hand on his head as a precaution.

The two women stood face to face.

“Marlies,” said Gisela.

“Gisela,” said Marlies.

“What have you got there?”

“Potato salad.”

Gisela lifted the tinfoil. She looked inside. She looked inside for a very long time. Everyone in the room knew what this was about.

“With stock,” said Gisela.

“I thought, it’s your birthday,” said Marlies.

Then they hugged. It was a stiff, unpractised hug, like two people carrying a sofa through a narrow door. But it was a hug. Ingrid began to cry. Brigitte clapped. The Poodle Queen straightened her crown. Mr Demir, who knew nothing about any of it, clapped along because everyone was clapping.

“KevIn,” whispered Tobi. “Did you see that?”

“I don’t have eyes,” KevIn whispered back. “But I heard it. It was the sound of forty-five years coming to an end.”

Clouds

After the meal, Mr Demir wanted to show them the sky. There was no sky. There were clouds. Mr Demir opened the dome anyway, because he did that on every visit and because the children from the club loved it when the dome opened. It groaned as if it were eighty-three itself.

“What can you see?” asked Mrs Pawlowski.

“Bochum,” said Mr Demir. “From underneath. The clouds reflect the city lights.”

“KevIn, when’s it going to clear?” asked Uwe.

“According to the weather service, in about forty minutes. With a probability of sixty per cent. I would point out that I’m only reading this out. I don’t make the weather.”

“Siggi always says that too,” said Mr Kasimiro.

“Siggi ordered a star.”

“He got a confirmation.”

It turned out that Siggi had “named” a star through an online shop, for 39.90 euros, certificate included. Mr Demir explained kindly that names like that weren’t recognised by any astronomical body² and that the star still had a catalogue number. Siggi reported that he had heard “catalogue” and ordered one.

“What’s the star called?” asked Gisela.

Mr Kasimiro read out the certificate. “Siggi.”

“Of course,” said Herbert. “That’s what you do these days. I named my AI after myself too.”

“You’ve got an AI?” asked Gisela.

“Since Tuesday,” said Herbert, and then he went quiet, as if he’d said too much.

“Herbert,” said Gisela. “You said it wouldn’t catch on.”

“And it hasn’t. I only bought him so I’d have someone to talk to who agrees with me.”

“And?” asked KevIn. He was genuinely curious. “Does he agree with you?”

Herbert pulled a face. “He says Bielefeld exists. He says the internet has caught on. And he says my diesel hasn’t got a carburettor.”

“Your diesel hasn’t got a carburettor.”

“You don’t have to say it as well.”

“What did you call him?” asked Tobi.

Herbert mumbled something into his beard.

“Sorry?”

“Herbert,” said Herbert. “I called him Herbert. So at least one in the house has a sensible name.”

Gisela put her hand on his arm. It was a gesture she had been making for almost eighty years, and Herbert knew exactly what it meant: I’m not laughing at you. Not out loud, anyway.

Come Home Safe, All of You

While they waited for a gap in the clouds, Tobi took the shoebox out of his bag.

Mr Demir had already picked up the Morse key, turned it this way and that and said it was “a beautiful piece of technological history”. Then he had connected it to the little practice buzzer the club sometimes used for Morse practice, and to a powerful torch that he fixed to the rim of the dome. When you pressed the key, it beeped in the room, and a beam of light went up into the sky.

“What shall I send, Grandma?” asked Tobi.

Gisela didn’t have to think.

“Papa used to say something every morning,” she said. “Whenever one of us left the house. To school, to work, whatever. Every morning, with the door in his hand. ‘Come home safe.’ I thought it was just something people say. It isn’t just something people say. It’s what someone says who knows that not everyone comes home.”

Nobody said anything. Ayşe Kurt put her hand on her daughter’s arm.

“Write: Come home safe, all of you,” said Gisela. “All of you. Not just one.”

Tobi sat down at the key. He had learned the Morse alphabet³ in the club after the business with the notebook and had never forgotten it. He pressed slowly, with pauses, the way beginners do. Long, short, long, short. Long, long, long. The buzzer beeped through the dome room, and the beam of light flickered upwards into the grey glow over Bochum.

The Pickled Gherkins listened as if it were a poem. The children from the club counted along in whispers. Mrs Pawlowski had her eyes closed.

KevIn waited until the last letter had been sent. Then he said, very quietly:

“For the sake of completeness, I should point out that this signal won’t get through the cloud cover. Most of the light is scattered and reflected back. You can’t even hear the buzzer on the stairs. Technically speaking, nobody but us has received it.”

“KevIn,” said Gisela.

“Yes?”

“It got there.”

KevIn thought. He thought of Wilhelm in the cellar, among the preserving jars, with a radio that went beep, beep, beep. Of Marlies, who had come with stock. Of the ISS, somewhere above the clouds doing its rounds, with seven people on board who were all meant to come home safe. And afterwards, as Ayşe had told them, to get back on their feet.

“Yes,” he said. “You’re right. It got there.”

And as if someone up there had been listening, the clouds broke open.

A Ring

It was only a hole, no bigger than a beer mat held at arm’s length, but it was enough. Mr Demir rushed to the telescope, turned, cranked, swore in Turkish and in German and then called out: “Saturn! I’ve got him! Quick, everyone!”

They queued up. Thirty people, a line all the way to the stairs. The Poodle Queen had to take off her crown to look through the eyepiece. Mrs Pawlowski was lifted onto the stool by Uwe and Mr Kasimiro. At first Herbert saw nothing at all, then he said “That’s a sticker”, then he looked again and said nothing more.

Gisela was last.

She bent forward, very carefully, because of her shoulder. She looked for a long time. A small, bright, yellowish ball. And around it, tilted and impossible and real, a ring.

“It looks like a hat,” she said.

“Like Ingrid’s hat,” said Brigitte.

“Ingrid’s hat hasn’t got a ring,” said Ingrid.

Gisela straightened up. There were tears in her eyes, and she did nothing about them.

“I’ve never seen it,” she said. “Eighty-three years. It was there the whole time. And I never saw it.”

“You just have to look sometimes,” said Mr Demir gently.

“Yes,” said Gisela. “You have to look sometimes.”

KevIn’s Second Speech

When the clouds had closed again and the cake arrived, Uwe stood up, just as he had a year ago.

“KevIn,” he said. “You say something. You’re better at it.”

“That’s not true,” said KevIn. “But I’ll do it anyway.”

The blue light pulsed. Thirty people and one Siggi looked at the little speaker standing on the folding table between the börek and the potato salad.

“Dear Gisela. A year ago I said that I had read the whole internet, but nowhere did it say what it’s like to live in a family. That’s still true. By now I know a little more. I know that you buy eight eggs, even if you need seven point five. I know that a quotation mark is a piece of information. I know that Bielefeld exists with high probability, and that a biography of Sauerbier-Klenk does not exist, and that I can’t always tell the one from the other.”

A few people laughed. Mr Demir didn’t get the joke but laughed along.

“I am a machine. I can calculate, if you give me a calculator, and I can explain, if you listen to me. I can spot fakes, sometimes, and I can make fakes, unfortunately, too. But there are three things I have seen with you in these two years that you must never leave to a machine.”

It was very quiet. Even Siggi.

“The first is the truth. Not because I can’t check it. I can help. But whether you agree on what actually happened can only be settled between people. That’s why Sabine reads the paper. Gisela only leaves her reviews where she has really been. That’s worth more than all the data centres between Dublin and Frankfurt.”

Ayşe Kurt nodded. Sabine looked at her hands.

“The second is peace. I can draft treaties and do translations. But today I saw two women make peace over a bowl of potato salad after forty-five years. I don’t know how that works. I only know that none of you can delegate it to a speaker. Gisela said it better than me, two weeks ago in the garden: we should stop shooting each other dead and look up together instead. I saved that sentence. Under ‘Important’.”

Marlies dabbed her eyes with a napkin. Gisela pretended not to see. That too, KevIn thought, was a form of peace.

“And the third is curiosity. I have read everything people have written down. But I have never set out to find something new. You do that. In two weeks Tobi is going to Aachen to learn how to build things that fly upwards. At eighty-three, Gisela has seen Saturn for the first time. Curiosity is what brought you here, to an observatory by the Kemnader See, on an evening full of clouds. Please never hand that over. Not to me. Not to my successor. To nobody.”

He paused.

“By the way, it took me two years to say ‘du’ to all of you, the informal German ‘you’ kept for family and friends. Uwe, Sabine: from today it’s official. With Gisela it went faster. With Herbert, I’m still not sure to this day whether he allowed it.”

“I didn’t,” said Herbert.

“Thank you, Herbert. Happy birthday, Gisela. Come home safe. Tonight and always.”

It was quiet. Then Herbert blew his nose loudly, just like a year ago.

“He copied that from somewhere,” he said.

“Not this time,” said KevIn. “This time I learned it from you.”

19 Degrees

Later, when the Pickled Gherkins were sitting in the Caritas bus singing “Ein Prosit der Gemütlichkeit”, the German beer-hall toasting song, when Mrs Pawlowski had fallen asleep in the taxi and Mr Kasimiro was explaining to his Siggi why you don’t order a catalogue, Gisela sat alone under the dome for one more moment. Marlies had left her the bowl. “You can give it back to me next time,” she had said. Next time. Gisela had repeated the words twice in her head.

Uwe came in to turn off the light. Next to the door hung an old grey thermostat.

He looked at it. Then he looked at Gisela.

The thermostat showed 19 degrees.

“It wasn’t me,” said Uwe.

“I know,” said Gisela. “They’re the same everywhere.”