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Back The Hiding Game
Chapters (64)
  1. Cover
  2. Naomi Wood
  3. Dedication page
  4. Epigraph page
  5. 1
  6. WEIMAR, 1922
  7. 2
  8. 3
  9. 4
  10. 5
  11. 6
  12. 7
  13. 8
  14. 9
  15. 10
  16. 11
  17. 12
  18. 13
  19. 14
  20. 15
  21. 16
  22. 17
  23. 18
  24. 19
  25. 20
  26. 21
  27. 22
  28. 23
  29. DESSAU, 1929
  30. 24
  31. 25
  32. 26
  33. 27
  34. 28
  35. 29
  36. 30
  37. 31
  38. 32
  39. 33
  40. 34
  41. 35
  42. 36
  43. 37
  44. BERLIN, 1932
  45. 38
  46. 39
  47. 40
  48. 41
  49. 42
  50. 43
  51. 44
  52. 45
  53. 46
  54. 47
  55. 48
  56. 49
  57. 50
  58. 51
  59. 52
  60. 53
  61. Thank you
  62. Praise
  63. The Hiding Game
  64. Also by Naomi Wood

Suddenly I felt revolted: that I had thought Jenö would kiss me with those lips that had kissed Walter and Charlotte; that we were such a foul merry-go-round of desires and bodies. I wondered whether Walter and Charlotte would be enjoying the same kind of heart-to-heart. Outside, the world would be rolling: the unknown trees soughing; the placid swans; perfect roads of smashed-up stones; the city waiting for its summer floods in the wind-blasted plains, Brownshirts crawling the city like lice; and Walter and Charlotte looking at the sky, his hatred of her like an arrow prone; not far away, the Bauhaus signifying something of worship to all of us and yet sometimes not so much a school as a cage wherein our madnesses multiplied. To think that a friend might take a club and wing it to my head! Being pent up like this: no wonder we thought such fevered things.

Irmi was right – as always. I should get out of here.

There was a crashing sound in the atrium. ‘Time to go?’

Upstairs Jenö gestured for me to go ahead of him through the narrow gap. But before I did he evidently changed his mind, and, without warning, embraced me where I stood. The moment’s intimacy – inexplicable – flushed my heart; then, just as soon, it left.

Outside, the world was bright, and Jenö and I both stood blinking off the darkness, waiting for Walter and Charlotte to materialise, but they did not. They had left without saying goodbye.

29

Dessau

Last summer, when the mark was high, we’d been able to have something of a reunion in Rügen. Our four met Kaspar and Irmi at Berlin’s Friedrichstrasse Station, then we trained to the Baltic Coast and ferried to the island. Visiting Pomerania had been Walter’s idea; he wanted to see the cliffs as Caspar David Friedrich had done. Though Charlotte sniffed at the Romantic idea, we were all happy enough to spend a week on the beaches of Rügen.

At night the dead drop of the white cliffs gave an eerie feel to the place, but in the days the place took your breath away: the Baltic as clear as anything you’d find at Obersee. It was a hot summer and we all turned dark. We drank a lot and ate a lot that holiday: Riesling, bread and salty butter; baked fish and greens. In the days Charlotte and Jenö would bob about in the chalky sea, her blonde hair scraped and shaved on either side, so that she resembled a Fitzgerald hero, and the cast of the cliffs made her paler than she was. In Dessau, they were circumspect, but in Rügen they couldn’t stop touching each other.