Your Perfect Year(102)

And at that moment, she decided that was exactly how it would be: Today was her birthday. Her second birthday. The start of her post-Simon life. She wouldn’t allow it to be anything less.





55

Jonathan

Friday, March 16, 5:33 p.m.

“Well,” Leopold said two hours later. “Looks like we’ve reached the bridge. How are we going to get to the other side?”

He and Jonathan had asked everyone in the Lütt Café whether they happened to be celebrating a birthday. They had even pestered the staff, asking if anyone had reserved a table in honor of a birthday coffee. They had then taken up a position by the door, pouncing on each person who entered and asking their date of birth. Negative, negative, always negative.

Now they were sitting outside on a bench by the Isebek Canal, having been asked by the café’s owner—politely at first, then half an hour later somewhat more forcefully—to stop bothering the customers. He’d let them have their coffee and cakes on the house—anything to get them out of there. Jonathan had begun to protest and assert his citizen’s rights, but Leopold had grabbed his sleeve and dragged him out with a hissed “The owner’s rights are what count here, idiot!”

“At least we can be sure now that it’s probably the red-haired woman who has her birthday today, and she’s probably also the owner of the diary,” Jonathan said.

“Great! As I said, we’ve reached the bridge now. All you have to do is tell me how we’re going to cross it.”

“No idea,” Jonathan admitted. “But I just have to find her!”

“My God, you sound like Romeo.”

“That’s exactly how I feel.”

“Then you should know what kind of an ending to expect. In case you don’t know the play: it’s not a happy one. So forget the redhead and find someone else to fall in love with.”

“You don’t understand!”

Leopold raised his hands. “Oh, I’m terribly sorry, Herr Grief! Of course, someone like me would have no idea what love is. I’m just a stupid old hobo.”

“I didn’t mean it like that. But only a few weeks ago I was firmly convinced that fate and destiny and all that stuff were complete nonsense, and now—”

“And now you believe that a woman you’ve seen from a distance for all of five seconds is the one for you?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” He sighed. “I’m all over the place. My thoughts are playing ping-pong in my head. I’ve never felt like this before in my life.”

“You’re lucky. I feel like that most of the time.”

“Very funny.”

“True, though.”

“Hmm. When my mother disappeared, I felt something similar.” He sighed again. “It seems like all the women who are important to me simply vanish into thin air.”

“Come on, let’s not get carried away. Okay, so you’ve fallen head over heels in love. But you can’t start calling her ‘important’ to you just yet.”

“I guess you’re right.” Jonathan stared at his shoes to avoid looking at Leopold. He felt like a twelve-year-old schoolboy after a disastrous math test.

“Why did your mother clear off into the sunset?”

“She never felt right in Hamburg and wanted to go back home to Italy.”

“People don’t leave their children for a reason like that!”

“‘People’ might not—my mother did.”

“And you haven’t seen or heard from her since?”

“During the first few years. She came to visit, and I stayed with her in Italy a few times. But then . . .”

“What?”

“Oh, when I was thirteen I sent her an idiotic card that took her from me once and for all. You could call it teenage angst.”

“And there was nothing after that?”

“Total silence,” Jonathan said. “I never heard a thing more from her.”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t imagine a stupid postcard from an even more stupid teenager could have such a catastrophic effect.”

“Hmm.” Jonathan shrugged. “I’ve often wondered about it. But eventually I stopped really caring.”

“What did your father have to say?”

“My father?” Jonathan laughed derisively. “You don’t know him. He said absolutely nothing, never even mentioned her name until recently. Now that he’s suffering from dementia, he talks about her often. He even thinks his former assistant is my mother.” He looked up and gave Leopold a crooked grin.

“Sounds like a classic dysfunctional family to me.”

“You should know,” Jonathan fired back. “What about your kids? Are you in contact with them?”

“I’m afraid not. Though not because I don’t want to be.”

“But?”

“Because I’m not allowed to.”

“Oh.”

“An injunction. Another consequence of my career as a drunk. I lost it once too often.” He balled his fists. “But I swear to you, as soon as I have my feet back on firm ground, I’m going to fight for my rights, so I can be a proper papa to them again.”

“Um, excuse me, but aren’t they adults by now?”