Anika was a near-stranger to Dagmar now, and they hadn’t clicked for what seemed like an eternity. They had met at school after Anika failed her final exams for a second time. She was two years older than Dagmar and had sat next to her in the last year of classes, during which time she benefitted immensely from the fact that Dagmar’s handwriting was easily legible, even from a distance. As a thank you for letting her copy difficult answers in several exams, Anika, who had started growing breasts at the tender age of nine and had had a following of hormonal teenage boys ever since, had taken Dagmar under her wing, introduced her to lipstick, eye liner, cigarettes, canned beer, and, equally importantly, to the ‘graveyard shifts’ at Anika’s favourite spot for hanging out with the boys. Until then, Dagmar had been fatally introverted, shy and lacking all kinds of self-esteem. She had a huge complex about the size of her nose on her otherwise symmetrical face and would never forget how Anika, with the help of a little make-up and not a little magic, brought out the vivacity of Dagmar’s eyes and the sensuous fleshy quality of her mouth. Under her friend’s guiding hand her nose actually seemed to retreat, at least in noticeability.
But all that was now at least four years in the past, in which time Anika had stagnated in her interests and hobbies while Dagmar moved on. She would always be grateful for the push her confidence had received when the boys and men – and even the women – started looking at her face before checking out her smallish boobs, but she knew that Anika would always be Anika. She knew this because Dagmar had tried and failed to help ‘work on her brain’ in Anika’s words.
‘Brain in vain. Men don’t really want a brain in a woman, babes. They want something they can grab, hold on to, squish and nibble on.’
‘Brains are squishy,’ Dagmar said.
‘Brains may be squishy, but they’re not sexy,’ Anika said.
‘I wonder,’ Dagmar said, but now she was long beyond wondering. She knew she liked sex, but she also liked using her brains, even if she hadn’t done much of that in school. She had drifted through with the least possible effort and in the shortest possible time in order to achieve independence from home such as she knew it – although that in itself had taken some kind of brains.
At fifteen and a half she was free from it all, free to start a dead-end apprenticeship for a dead-end sales clerk position in a dead-end village. The money had been surprisingly good, all things considered – good enough to feed her growing interest in photography and home movies. Using black out curtains and candlelight she had built a small darkroom in her studio flat and had even acquired a JK Optical Printer to allow her to duplicate eight-millimetre film. All her spare time was now dedicated to photography and home movies.
Being a foundling – somebody left her on the steps of the local Catholic Church when she was about two – and having grown up in the care of the local priest and his sister, she still felt slightly uneasy about the circumstances under which she had moved out of the vicarage. Being a girl had barred her from becoming an altar boy. When she was eleven, Father Thomas had gifted her with her first camera to take pictures of church-related events, and Dagmar took to it immediately. She never stopped taking photographs and her aptitude had given her a first taste of success and recognition within the community. Her innate eye for strong compositions and her acquired technical know-how had attracted the ire of the village photographer Rainer Werner who feared for his livelihood when he learned that Dagmar didn’t charge for her pictures.
But Dagmar was never interested in becoming the local portrait snapper. Reluctantly Rainer Werner ended up trusting her and occasionally even asking her advice. He paid her by passing on unused film stock and equipment he no longer had use for. Life continued unstoppably and sometimes unnoticeably. All in all the small community had been good to her, and she wanted to repay that kindness as best she could.
*
Dagmar hadn’t moved from the window since she’d watched Anika get into Carsten’s VW Polo and drive off. For now, at least, her sexual appetite was forgotten. Sometimes when she heard her lover’s steps on the stairs, she would be so hungry for the act of sensual physicality that she’d leap onto him, into his arms the moment the door closed behind him. There was no single surface in the room that they hadn’t used for lovemaking, not one. And positions, let’s not get started on positions. When coupling, Dagmar liked to display the one part of her anatomy she was proud of – her eyes. Her unknown biological parents had also gifted her with plenty of hip and torso flexibility. She had yet to discover a position where she couldn’t twist around far enough to glimpse into the mirrors of her partner’s soul during coitus.
Her love affair had begun years ago, when she still spent time with the graveyard shift gang, soon after she had laid eyes on the man for the first time. Well, she had seen him uncountable times before, at mass, but somehow those times didn’t count, hadn’t affected her. No, the first time that did count was a little over three years ago. She had lost her virginity to Detlev, Carsten’s older brother, days after making out with Carsten at a birthday party. She had been tempted to make it with Carsten too, just to see what it was like. In hindsight she was glad she’d resisted the urge. Detlev was four years older than her and more experienced with girls, probably more than Carsten would ever be. He had been reasonably gentle and attentive. However he had also been too immature or square or macho-brained to entertain the thought of a prolonged, no-strings sexual affair after that first time. By nature or nurture he was the hit-and-run type. Dagmar was never in love with Detlev, but would have happily continued experimenting with him.
That is, until she saw Albert Hoffmann. She never quite understood why he’d had such a devastating effect on her that day when she watched him saunter up the Hüschebrink, chatting with a neighbour on the way before walking over to their little group rather than continuing up the path towards his house.
‘He’s going to chase us away,’ Stefanie said.
‘Let him try,’ Carsten said, feeling manly with his can of beer, spitting on the ground.
Occasionally people passing by, on the way to or from the graveyard, gave them judging looks, muttering something disparaging about youths drinking and smoking and spitting a lot and generally disrespecting the dead. But hell, there wasn’t much else for youths to do in Eschershausen.
‘Babes, if that Herr Hoffman, the neat one there, wanted me badly enough he wouldn’t have to chase me much,’ Anika said and laughed dirtily.
All told, the adolescent group on that day consisted of three girls and five boys, a big enough number to intimidate most passersby. Not so Albert, who approached with firm steps and a serious, though not unfriendly face. Carsten and Thorsten took deep breaths to make themselves appear bigger. The two smaller boys hid behind them, and Heinz got busy with his shoelaces.
Albert got close.
‘Good afternoon,’ he said and smiled right at Dagmar. The smile was interrupted by a brief frown when he glanced at her company, but reignited it almost at once.
Birds were chirping and the air took on a sweet spring scent that Dagmar hadn’t noticed earlier.
Nobody spoke at first, and Carsten deflated his puffed-up chest with a cough.
‘I was going to ask you a favour, Dagmar. It’s to do with those fabulous pictures you take. I wanted to speak to you in church, but then I haven’t seen you much lately,’ Albert said.
‘I…I have been busy,’ Dagmar said.
It was all she could do not to faint. What was wrong with her? Or rather, what was wrong with him? He was being so nice and in front of her friends. He’d even called her photos ‘fabulous’.
‘I see. Well, maybe next Sunday, then, after mass, we could talk when you’re less busy,’ Albert said and smiled one last time.
Then he disappeared up the path to his house.
Dagmar felt all eyes on her, eyes that wouldn’t forgive her if she swooned too obviously or swooned at all; eyes, she suddenly realised, she didn’t