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Back The Woman on the Stairs Save as PDF
Chapters (83)
  1. Cover
  2. Also by Bernhard Schlink
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright
  5. Part One
  6. 1
  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. 24
  30. 25
  31. 26
  32. Part Two
  33. 1
  34. 2
  35. 3
  36. 4
  37. 5
  38. 6
  39. 7
  40. 8
  41. 9
  42. 10
  43. 11
  44. 12
  45. 13
  46. 14
  47. 15
  48. 16
  49. 17
  50. 18
  51. 19
  52. 20
  53. 21
  54. 22
  55. 23
  56. 24
  57. 25
  58. Part Three
  59. 1
  60. 2
  61. 3
  62. 4
  63. 5
  64. 6
  65. 7
  66. 8
  67. 9
  68. 10
  69. 11
  70. 12
  71. 13
  72. 14
  73. 15
  74. 16
  75. 17
  76. 18
  77. 19
  78. 20
  79. 21
  80. 22
  81. Author’s Note
  82. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  83. What’s next onyour reading list?

Again, I had no idea what she meant. I started crying, not knowing why, and not why now. I was ashamed, I felt ridiculous, but I couldn’t stop myself. I missed my children, not the children who now lived in England, but the teenagers they once were, and all I had missed: their adolescence, their school conflicts, the hobbies and friendships and first loves, the questions about what to study. When, back then, I picked up my children at the airport, they weren’t returning home, but were only visiting on holiday, and often they immediately left for a language course or tennis camp. Back then, my children never complained, but still, now, I felt sorry for them. I felt sorry for myself as well, and I was crying for myself as much as I was crying for them, and for my wife, who had always been opposed to England. Had I really thought that was what was best for them? Or had I just given myself an easy and comfortable child-free life?

“Go on, cry,” Irene kept stroking my back. “Everything will be all right.”

But how? Anyway, I took in her comforting attention, and it wove together with my self-reproach and self-pity into a blanket, under which I cried myself to sleep.

15

“I think this is the last time,” Irene said the next morning. “I want to go down the stairs to the beach once more.”

As we went down, she with one hand on the rail and the other on my shoulder, I too knew this was the last time. She stopped on each step and gathered her strength for the next, then put down the right, always first the right foot, and then the left. Then she rested until she had again gathered her strength. She breathed heavily, and couldn’t speak, and every now and then she gave me an exhausted or apologetic or ironic smile.

I could have cried again. What was wrong with me, last night and today? When Irene and I found each other, it was clear that we would have each other only briefly. But that was a truth somewhere out there, not between us, where so much happened, where there was so much life, so much promise. Now, on the long way down the stairs, the shortness of our time became a truth between us, and I could not bear it. I don’t need anyone, I had always thought – perhaps to be happy, but not to survive, and I had survived on my own. Now, I didn’t know how I could survive without Irene, how I would approach my children differently without her, or do my work differently, or make my life different. How I would fall asleep, or wake up without her.