Erich - Eight

Erich

 

            I’m running. That’s all I know. I’m ten times more sober than I was three seconds ago, but not sober enough to realize how stupid it is to be doing what I’m doing. I see the planes in the sky, hear the siren’s wail. The bombs fall, not close enough to stop me, but close enough to make the ground shake. I can’t comprehend what’s happening. All I can hear is the sound of my own feet hitting the pavement.

            The siren drags me back, back home. I’m not running from the bar anymore. I’m running from Führer, from his fists, from his shadow falling over me. His voice, the viscous German cuts me like a knife. “Scheiß Tunte! Du denkst du bist ein Mann? Du bist kein verdammter Mensch!” You f*****g fairy. You think you’re a man? You’re no f*****g man. It was always some variation of the same idea. I was a disgrace. I wasn’t a man. I would never be a man. I should be more like Chris. I should go f**k a guy.

            I’m running from Christian. He and his friends chase me down the stinking alleys, throw me into the wall, knock me over. He gives me one more kick and tells me to start acting like a man and go get a girl to f**k, a phrase he learned from Führer. They leave me there, a ten year old with a bleeding lip that I have to keep from quivering because I know he’s right.

            I’m running from Mama. Mama on a day when she didn’t have a black eye. Mama when she was pretty. Mama before she had the scar on her face that dragged down the right side of her mouth, the scar from the beer bottle Führer had in his hands the night he came home late. She huddles next to the bookcase, where Führer has thrown both of us after a bad day at work. She whispers for me to come to her once he’s stormed into the other room. She kisses the swelling spot on my cheek where he hit me, seven years old. She repeats those words, the first words I ever learned in English, the words I could say for memory, before I even knew what they meant. “We’ll get away. Someday we’ll get away.”

            I’m running from Brigitte. From the way she looked in that black dress the day I met her. From the first time I lit both our cigarettes together, the way that always made her smile. From the way she loved sex the most when I was drunk and sloppy. She asks why I don’t just marry her already. She tells me how handsome I look in my uniform. She tells me how proud she is of me. She tells me to put my dick in her, pull her hair, f**k her harder. She tells me to meet her after midnight. She tells me I ruined her life.

Then it’s the day it happened. Führer asks me where I’ve been. I can’t tell the truth. By the time I get out of the house it’s too late, and they’re after me and the bombs falling and I’m running again.

            It didn’t seem like I had been running long, but when I returned to reality I was far away from the seedy bar where I had started out; far enough that I could barely hear the bombs anymore. Or maybe they had just stopped.

Either way, I didn’t stop because I wanted to. My legs gave out under me. I wasn’t on the road anymore. I was in a ditch, in a part of town where the buildings were smaller and the air was thicker. I landed hard on my hands and knees. My legs were wobbly and, as much as I wanted to, I couldn’t get back up.

This was something I wasn’t supposed to feel. My stomach was cramped, heart pounding, mind racing, eyes stinging. It was something I couldn’t be, not here, not now. Afraid.

I let out a coughing, shuddering, dry sob and pounded on the ground. I hated myself for feeling like this, for running away from danger, for letting Berlin get to me when I was so far away.

Footsteps came up from behind me and I whirled around, ready to kill anyone who saw me like this. The person behind me froze and I had to squint to make out the face of the b*****d.

It was Gabe. He had followed me all the way out here, and now he was watching me, with what looked like concern (but might have been panic) in his eyes.

It was too much to handle. I was too drunk, too humiliated, too goddamn scared. The sudden movement made my stomach lurch. I turned back around, felt every muscle in my body lock, and hurled the contents of my stomach into London’s ditch.

Reviews

[Coyote Poetry]

Some memories can be rebirth by noise or similar situation. I like the history given and the memories reborn in this chapter. Thank you the excellent chapter.
Coyote