Anyway, for the first couple of months of his new posting, we’ve continued to meet for coffees about once a week. Well, we had a bit of a break from the coffee last month when the Elbe flooded. Apparently, Arnie said it was well over the Terrassenufer, right in front of the historic Brühl’s Terrace, and up to the top of some of the bridges. So I decided then it was safer to stay in Pirna, even though Arnie was trying to get me to come and have a look.

But now he’s invited me out for a meal again, at the Fresswürfel – the eating cube – in the centre. I try to doll myself up as nicely as possible. All right, I know it’s a bit like old wine in a new bottle, but you’ve got to at least make the effort. My new haircut helps – permed but worn long, behind the ear on the good side of my face but flopping over the burnt side to hide it a bit. In the bathroom mirror, I tell myself I haven’t scrubbed up too badly.

*

Oh clever him! It’s a lovely warm summer’s evening, and he’s only managed to bag us one of the tables on the terrace overlooking the Zwinger itself. I wonder which waitress he bribed to arrange that. I hope it’s not the pretty young thing coming towards us with the menu cards, smiling sweetly at him and getting a shy grin back. I almost want to kick him under the table.

But his attention is soon back on me once we’ve ordered our food and drink and are waiting for it to arrive.

‘You’re looking well, Lotti. If you hadn’t told me, well, I wouldn’t have known.’

We both know what he’s referring to. Is it safe to talk about it here? Perhaps it’s safer than at either of our flats. He’s a foreigner, so he might be a target. I know at work I’m increasingly being seen as a troublemaker, so I might be too. But here, it just seems to be families or lovers meeting in a beautiful spot. Of course, we’re not the former, or the latter . . . yet.

‘I feel well. It’s been lovely to meet up with an old friend.’ He keeps on insisting we’re just friends, so I humour him.

‘Have you thought any more about what you’re going to do about it?’

Last time we met, he was urging me to leave my job. That’s all very well, but what would I do? Everyone knows that everyone has to work in the Republic. You can’t just choose to be a layabout. ‘I can’t leave. I need to earn money.’