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And then they were gone, and A
To the commons. We’re on a trip to the student dining hall.
The university dining hall was in the city, near the entrance to the pedestrian area. A
A
The entrance to the dining hall was a chaos of people and bicycles, conversations and phone calls, weekend plans and dates. For a moment A
Abel and Micha had already reached the checkout. A
She saw Abel tuck a plastic card in his backpack, a white rectangle with light blue print on it. All the students seemed to have them. “Excuse me,” she said to the girl behind her, “do I need one of those cards, too?”
“If you pay cash, they’ll charge you more,” the girl replied. “Are you new? They sell those cards downstairs. You’ve gotta show them your student ID. It’s a five-euro deposit for the card, and you can load it with money in the machine near the stairs and …”
“Wait,” A
The girl shrugged. “Then you’ll have to pay full price. You’d better find your ID.”
A
Even at full price, the cost of run-over dog wasn’t especially high. And so soon A
She wasn’t the only one craning her neck in search of someone; a lot of people seemed to be similarly occupied. The pink jacket had disappeared, and there wasn’t a child with thin blond braids anywhere. A
“There are some free tables in the other room,” someone next to her said to someone else as two trays moved past her, out the door. A
The floor was wet with the traces of winter boots. A
“What is that?” a student next to her asked as he contemplated her plate with suspicion.
“Dead dog,” A
“But you said you’d tell me a story today,” said a child’s voice behind her. “You promised. You haven’t told me any stories for … for a hundred years. Since Mama went away.”
“I had to think,” Abel said.
“Hey, are you dreaming? I just asked you something,” the student said. A
He was only too happy to oblige. “I haven’t been here for long. I was hoping you could tell me something about this town. I’m from Munich; my parents sent me here because I wasn’t accepted anywhere else. As soon as I am, I’ll transfer …”
A
And this was the moment when everything turned inside out. When the story that A
A
The fairy tale into which A
Only later, much later, and too late, would A
They hadn’t seen him. None of them. He had disappeared, dissolved in the crowd of students; he had turned invisible behind his orange tray with the white plate and unidentifiable contents.
He smiled at his own invisibility. He smiled at the two of them sitting over there, so close and yet at different tables, back-to-back. They were here together and didn’t know it. How young they were! He’d been young once, too. Maybe that was the reason he still went to the dining hall from time to time. It wasn’t like back then of course; it was a different dining hall in a different town, and yet here he could visit his own memories.