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Sweet dreams and peaceful slumber evaded her, as a hand twisted around her braids, pulling her onto the hardwood floor of her bedroom.
"Mama?" she called, falling onto her knees as the woman, hardly her mother, threw her around like a ragdoll. It wasn't the first time she had been woken up in the middle of the night, but it may have been the harshest. "Please, I-" Martha didn't know what to say, didn't know what she had done to deserve this, and she gazed up at the woman with round doe eyes, begging for release and explanation.
"You're a rotten bitch, have I ever told you that?" Frau Bessell screamed, spit flying from her lips. At times, she could be more terrifying that her husband. When he went after Martha, it was for a specific purpose. She always knew what to expect. Only the spots that his dirty fingernails scraped and tore would change every night; but there was no way to predict what
she
could do, raw power caught in her throat as she shouted. "I just finished talking to Ina Bergmann. She comes over here, in the middle of the goddamn night, crying and babbling about how her little sister told her that we
abuse
you in this house. Your father and I give you everything you need, a roof, food, water, and you tell all your school friends that we're
abusive
?"
Martha didn't say anything that wasn't true, but with terror rolling down her cheeks in the form of tears, she wondered if she did. She must have been exaggerating, trying to get attention, making things up to lay the victim and earn a bit of pity when she knew, deep down, that she wouldn't be treated like this if she didn't
deserve
it, that she must have played a part in this relationship, that she should stop using the word 'abuse'.
"I have sacrificed everything for you, you little
shit
, and you don't care for any of it. You don't
love
your parents. What kind of pathetic excuse of a child doesn't love their parents? Get up."
Martha sprung to her feet, eyes fighting between staying wide and alert and blocking out anything that was happening to her. She knew it wasn't her place to talk, not yet. It might never be.
"You want to tell them how we make you sleep outside? Fine. Go sleep outside. There's an old potato sack on the front steps. Maybe it'll fit as a blanket. Get outside, child." She began to shove her daughter roughly out the door, even as Martha tried to run, she wasn't fast enough. Her mother pushed her onto the ground, and she crawled the final few feet out the door, which promptly slammed behind her.
Pain thundered behind her neck, where the braid was almost torn cleanly off. Her hands and knees, where she had fallen off the bed, were mildly scraped. She shivered- a late autumn's day that was only separated from the winter by the lack of a blanket of snow across the yard, though frost was threatening to come. Her nightgown was sheer, thin satin, and the burlap sack she burrowed herself in itched horribly. The only plants around her were dead rose bushes that had been neglected for years. She was almost jealous of them; wouldn't it be easier if her parents just pretended she didn't exist? No, that was a horrible thing to think. She told herself to love them.
Martha considered running to the neighbor's yard to steal some leaves- just to stop the bleeding. Her left knee was dripping against the burlap. She looked up as a whirlwind of motion came barreling down the street. A wave of auburn hair waved behind the bike, which tumbled over the pavement. The girl, who Martha couldn't quite identify from the distance, crashed into the grass when she saw Martha in the thin sack.
"What the hell are you doing out?" The older sister of Thea Rilow, someone who Martha hardly saw outside of Rilow dinners, asked as she took off her sweater and wrapped it around the shivering girl. Melitta was two years older and the last person Martha wanted to see her like this.
"Sleeping," Martha managed to get out, teeth chattering. The crimson sweater was warm and smelled of violets, like it had been sprayed with perfume. "Go home. If my mother sees you-"
"Did she do this?" she asked, prying the potato sack off of the other. "On purpose? Do your parents know you're out here?"
It would have been easier to say no, and have Melitta not worry, but Martha was afraid that she'd knock on the door loudly and the whole situation would be worse. "Yes, but please, leave, or it'll just be worse."
"Come sleep at my house," she offered. "You fit onto Thea's bed- she won't mind. You'll fit on my bike as well."
"I can't. I have to be here in a few hours. If they wake up in the morning and I'm not here-"
"Just a few hours, then. You'll die otherwise."
"Perhaps it's for the best," Martha mumbled, the only argument against it being how her parents would lose their precious plaything. She often thought they only kept her around because they took joy and pride in treating her like this.
In loving me,
she reminded herself dangerously.
Melitta didn't hear her, distracted by the skin flaking off of Martha's knees. "You have to come with me. You could get infected."
"But-"
"Martha. I'm not taking no as an answer."
Such a response would usually be the worst thing that Martha could hear, the kind of thing that would prompt bile to rise in her throat, but it allowed her the luxury of surrender, as she wrapped her arms around Melitta's neck, grateful for her arrival. As far as she knew, Melitta knew nothing of her home situation, thank God.
Carrying her to the bike and setting her behind her, Melitta pedaled back to her house as fast as she could. She never mentioned why she was out so late, and she hoped Martha wouldn't ask. All of her own thoughts and worries melted away. The girl wrapped around her for life was the only person in the world that mattered.
The wind nipped at both of their noses, Melitta in only a thin blouse under overalls. Martha needed the sweater more. Her eyelids drooped- she was, after all, interrupted in the middle of a deep sleep.
At the Rilow house, Martha followed Melitta upstairs, watching her as she gestured to which floorboards would creak and which were silent. After bandaging her friend's wounds without saying a word, Melitta knocked on the door to Thea and Hanschen's room. Typically, when Martha would spend the night, Hanschen would be out and Martha would take his bed. It wasn't unusual, however, for him to be home and for Martha to sleep nestled against Thea.
"Thea," Melitta whispered, waking up her little sister. Hanschen was sound asleep, limbs sprawled across the twin size bed that he took over. He wasn't too tall for it though- not even close. "Martha's crashing here tonight."
"Why?" Thea asked, sitting up and making room on her own twin-sized bed, pale green sheets tangled around her legs. Martha watched as she pushed pillows off, not hesitating to allow an impromptu sleepover to happen. Thea was the most loyal friend that someone could ask for, and Martha never had to ask. She often felt like she didn't deserve someone with so much love to give.
"Ask me again tomorrow." Martha said in defeat crawling under the covers. "I have to be back- back home- in a few-" She was at a loss for words, the world spinning around her as she realized how lucky she was to sleep in a warm bed- if she could get to sleep.
"I'll wake you by four," Melitta promised, hanging in the doorway. "Sweet dreams."
"I hope you've learned your lesson," Frau Bessell stood above her shaking child, who had returned from the Rilows' house an hour prior, just enough to shiver again. The morning was kinder than the night. "But knowing you, you haven't. Get inside before I change my mind."
Thankful for this shred of an excuse of kindness, Martha hurried inside, where a fire blazed in her living room. She had discarded her bandages before she left the Rilows' house- healed wounds were a sure-fire way to get caught. As disgusting as it was, she even reopened and picked at her scabs to make them appear fresher. Clotted blood fell onto the carpet, illuminated by the fire.
That night, Frau Bessell returned to Martha's room. Her eyes, somehow, were gentle and soft. Martha was weary as her mother approached her, kneeling on the floor next to her bed.
"Aren't you going to join me?"
Martha hadn't prayed with her mother in years, not since she was learning out to pray. It's strange that something so primal (that even atheists do in their hours of need) still had to be taught. Knowing it would be a crime to hesitate, Martha kneeled beside her mother, sharply sucking in air as her tender knee pressed against the oaky floors.
"Our heavenly father," Frau Bessell began to say aloud, eyes closed. Martha didn't dare close hers. It was far too risky. "I ask you to bring my daughter the holiness that she needs to be loved by you. She is a wicked child and you must help her grow into your light."
Martha understood why her mother was there. She was such a hopeless case of evil that it was time to call a deity to fix her. The child began to cry, silently, knowing that if she made noise, that her mother would scold her for interrupting. She silently begged God to fix her- if she was truly such a burden, she prayed for it to stop- so that the punishments would stop.
"She's turning to the Devil, Lord. He works in his sly ways, making it hard to love my daughter. Please, help her become the God-fearing woman I know she can be. Give me my daughter back."
A tear ran down both of their faces, emotion too raw for either of them to control.
Frau Bessell's daughter would never return. She was too shattered. Her broken pieces would form something entirely new, the way an old teapot can be crushed and reglued in a collage or a ripped dress could be a child's blouse. That was the only way for Martha to be whole again; to begin as something else. To begin as a someone rather than a something.
To begin as far away from her mother as she could.
"Amen."
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
He was not being punished for being dumb. He wasn't dumb by any standard- this was the boy who first suggested that shame was the product of education, who only struggled in school because he fell asleep so often, plagued by the details of his own masterful brain. It was never about being dumb, or else, it wouldn't have been about Moritz.
He was being punished for love.
Not in a romantic sense, and certainly not a sexual sense (by any means), but if he didn't care so deeply, have such a strong bond with Melchior, he knew that he wouldn't be failing. Ernst would be- after all, Ernst hadn't passed the midterm. They were to allow both boys to the upper grade, and whoever failed first would be kicked out.
Ernst didn't hold anyone back, didn't keep his friends from their true potential.
And Moritz, well, he didn't
mean
to, never wanted Melchior to fail so they could stay together. Even in death, Moritz would never want Melchior to stoop to his level for the sake of them remaining friends.
Death.
It was such a heavy word, especially for a
child
to say and to take so seriously, but it wasn't't as if Moritz would be the first one to go. Max Von Trenk-- and look how
he
turned out, nothing but a body underground. Was it wrong for Moritz to envy him? Von Trenk never once was punished for holding back Hanschen Rilow, who had neglected his homework in order to spend more time at his bedside. So why was
Moritz
the subject of such harsh accusations when it came to Melchior?
Once, Moritz wondered if the headmaster saw more of a friendship between Melchior and him, something to squash fearfully, but he shook that thought at once; if anything, there was that forbidden love between Rilow and Von Trenk, and again,
they weren't punished
. Was it Moritz' father's involvement in the church? Rilow hardly attended, although he was now a part of the choir for some odd reason, despite agreeing with Melchior on the topic of religion (he did, for the most part, believe in some higher power, but not one that hated him and Ernst-- Moritz loved these sort of intellectual discussions, as contrary to popular belief, he wasn't
stupid
, but he hated the idea of debating on whether or not his friends should be
alive
).
Regardless, this story or chapter or perhaps, so far, just a stream of unconsciousness, it's not about Hanschen and Ernst-- oh, just you wait -- and it's about Moritz, rather, Moritz and Melchior's doomed relationship (read as: more than friendship but less than love-- does such a thing exist?).
After school, the pair sat in Melchior's study; his family came from money, affording a home with four bedrooms, two of which had been transformed into offices for the patriarchs of the Gabor family. Melchior's uncle was a wealthy tycoon and as a fulfillment of a childhood promise, he purchased a house for his brother and paid off all of his debts. Funnily enough, the brothers hadn't spoken since.
Moritz didn't find that funny at all. "What if perchance, someday, you and I no longer speak? Once we call our
stupid
whimsical promises even, what is to say that we continue to be present in each other's lives?"
"We don't have any promises, Moritz, not like my father did, and if we did, they'd hardly be
stupid
." Melchior rolled a smoke, removing the papers and matchbox from a small chest he kept under a false bottom in his desk. "And if we no longer speaker, that's not by chance."
"Fate, then?" Moritz raised an eyebrow. "You, the most radicalized non-believer I've ever known, cannot tell me that you believe in something such as fate, when you don't-"
"I never said I did," Melchior cut him off sharply. "And I don't, of course not, you know me better than you know yourself. But you do not cut off ties with someone by chance. You either drift apart, as most childhood friends do, or an event causes an unrepairable rift. Take me and Wendla, for example."
"Wendla Bergmann?" Moritz repeated the name, unfamiliar in his mouth in the last few years, since they had parted schools. He saw no relation between the topic at hand and the girl they once played pirates with. "With the brown curls and different ribbons in her hair every day?"
"Yes, exactly." Melchior nodded as he took a drag. "We drifted apart naturally, as the schools kept us apart in the more unnatural of ways, dividing us by genitalia. But then, Ilse Neumann; there's an event that snatched her away from us. We don't know what, of course. Something about her parents. Wendla won't tell me."
"You speak to Wendla?"
"Just the other day, yes. She found me."
"By chance." "Dare I say, fate."
"Melchior Gabor! I cannot believe such a thing has escaped your lips!"
"Neither can I, I assure you." he laughed a little at the absurdity of his intentions. "My point is that you and I, we'll be friends until the end, Moritz. We won't drift apart, and no parentocracy will force us to. And we're always honest with each other, so I see no possibility of some unspeakable event driving us away from each other."
"Do you mean that?" Moritz asked, sitting at the edge of his chair, across from Melchior's desk.
He cocked his head. "Of course I do. Do you think otherwise?"
"I just- if I were to fail, Melchi--"
"You're not going to fail, you're one of the brightest! You always hold our conversations with the utmost intellect and capacity of understanding as someone can expect from us." Melchior argued. "Besides, Robel is points behind you, isn't he?"
"Yes, but Robel isn't holding anyone back."
"What do you mean?"
Moritz shifted in his seat, eyes glancing around at the antique decorations of Melchior's study, a variety of strange metal things selected by Fanny. A clock ticked on a shelf next to a small metallic mouse made of cheap bronze. Dust was a distant memory to the mouse figurine. "The headmaster- he believes that I am stopping you from reaching your potential. That we spend too much time discussing pointless endeavors like-- like
Wendla Bergmann
and not enough time conjugating Greek. Ernst's -- er -- friendship, to say, with Hanschen doesn't stop the latter from high marks."
"And our
friendship
doesn't stop me either!" Melchior argued.
Moritz sniffed. "They believe you could do more."
It wasn't as if Melchior wasn't willing to put in extra time and hours in order to prove that Moritz
didn't
hold him back, but he found the suggestion that he would
have
to do such a thing an insult to him and to his cherished friend. "If you fail, I shall never forget you. You are welcome to visit whenever and nothing shall change."
"I disagree, Melchi. I would consider the fact that I would, in such a future, not have a head, a most amicable change."
"What a most odd thing to say, and disturbing," Melchior mused. "What inspired such a deeply perverse thought?"
"My father! If I were to fail the finals, he would have my head, and we both know it. Ernst would be fine, but no, if I am to drop, I am to
fall
. I cannot wrap my head -- excuse the metaphor -- around the idea that it would be a crime to be friends with you."
Melchior smirked. "It already is. And you're not the only jailbird. There's no future I can see where everything would change and where you would be -- nothing more than a figment of a memory. Nothing will change. We will not accept punishment on the grounds of an unagreeable friendship. Nothing will change. I will not let your head roll along the river. Nothing will change."
"To be naive, Melchi, is not a trait I would have assigned to you."
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
She wore far too many skirts, in Hanschen's humble opinion, and had a youthful and
believable
face, which is what made the whole situation so painful. He was eleven years old when his father made partner in the city at his firm, keeping him working later and later and coming home at ridiculous hours, if ever. And his mother, she was a working woman as well, at a factory down the road. She came home late as well, but even at eleven he could suspect there was a reason.
He wasn't sure what.
But she -- the woman in too many skirts -- with the kind eyes and rosy cheeks, the kind that the girls in newspaper advertisements would have, she was his governess. Watched over him while his parents were gone. His little sister, who was ten years old, was out playing dolls with Marianna, the girl who lived next door, and his elder sister, who was at the unfortunate age of thirteen, had been riding her bike around the neighborhood for ages.
He was left with the governess, of course, who enjoyed her job the most when she wasn't chasing after and responsible for the well being of three separate children. And Hanschen was her favorite.
Hanschen, even as a child, was respectable and quiet. He asked questions, and many of them, but always because he cared about the answers. He found no pleasure in annoying others, like Thea often did, and wanted to learn how the world worked. Later, he would come to discover that was because he wanted to learn how to manipulate it.
"Gouverante," he said, sitting beside her in the drawing room. His family, undeniably, had more money than most-- but the Gabors were a close second. "Why does Mama come home so late? Max Von Trenk says that his mother comes home at six, and she works the same job as Mama."
The governess, around twenty years old, hesitated to answer such a question. It was easy for her to know why, at her age. When Frau Rilow would come home with alcohol on her breath and her blouse sticking out in strange spots, with lipstick smudged to her chin. She hardly tried to hide it. Thank God that the children were in bed by then- Melitta could have figured it out, almost. Of course, a thirteen year old girl of this time knew nothing of
sex
, as it was reserved for adults to have and to discuss, but she could tell that it was a drunken secret.
Despite being two years younger than Melitta, Hanschen was allowed to grow up first.
"If I tell you, Little Hans, you must swear to me not to repeat it to anyone," his governess said. "Even your sisters, and especially not your parents."
The young boy paused for a moment, mulling over the conditions. He must have proven himself trustworthy thus far, and would have to continue the facade. "Yes, I swear to it." He was far cleverer than a boy at his age should be, already learning how to manipulate the world-- a world that, at this point, he believed to be full of light and hope.
"Your mother, I believe, is having an affair," she sighed, pulling her hair loose from its tight bun. "That's an adult word for a secret of a specific kind, a secret where she is doing wifely thing for another man."
"She's cleaning?" Hanschen asked, raised a very specific way.
His governess shook her head. "No, she's-- she's kissing him, this other man."
"Is that all?"
His eyes were large and round, a feature that he would one day grow into, but he hadn't begun the process of growing up yet. Melitta as at the crux of such a stage, but I must drive the point in that Hanschen is a child.
"No," she stammered, feeling as though he might as well know. He promised not to tell his family anyway. "There's a step after kissing, something far more-- special."
"What is it?" His sentences were short and chopped, letting her decide how much he should know.
She pressed her lips into a line. "By now, I'm sure you're at the age where you might as well know the mechanics of it-- and I suppose it's my job to teach you. It's just you and me, talking. You see, when a woman and a man both want to feel good -- or in some cases, show love -- they can engage in a thing called 'sex'. It brings pleasure, usually, to both parties involved, and can even create children. In fact, it's the only way, actually to create children."
He nodded in understanding. His parents must have engaged in this act at least three times, then. "What happens during sex?"
She flushed as she struggled to find the proper words to describe the
devices
involved. But she did. And she told him so, to the best of her ability, the truth behind the act. She elaborated that it's something special, and that many people wait until marriage.
"Are you?" He asked. Hanschen -- at this point in his life, anyway -- had a way of making things pointed and personal. He liked to know people.
"Waiting until-- no, my child, I am not." She said candidly. "I've known one man in this way, and it was fulfilling."
She left it at that and went to prepare dinner.
That night, when he went to sleep, she tucked him in as she always did. Melitta had her own room, and Thea was spending the night with Marianna, who had invited her over for supper and now for the night. Spontaneous nights of childhood are quite the same as adulthood, in a way-- the best days or nights ended with you spending the night at the house of someone you didn't expect to.
Hanschen wonders, now fifteen years old, if the same events would have transpired had Thea been on the bed across from him. Panic overtakes him now, as he sits across from Ernst Robel, who was focused on a particular passage of some kind of literature. Ernst is oblivious to the thumping of Hanschen's heart, to the way his knuckles turn white as they clench around the armrest of his chair, the way that he must sharply inhale if he wants to breathe. The flashbacks come quickly, when he least expects it. Sometimes there's a trigger, sometimes there's not, and neither of them make sense. He doesn't remember the original event, when his governess tucked him in that night, he doesn't remember how many skirts she wore or in that moment -- how few, how bare, how--
"Hanschen?" Ernst looked up at him, not even noticing his foot brushing against the ankle of his beloved
friend
, that must have been it, Hanschen realized as he looked down and noticed the contact that set off his heart like a bomb. "Are you alright? You look like as white as a ghost or a phantom."
"Fine," he said, tapping against the cover of his leather-bound journal. He no longer knew his governess' face, or why she did what she did- but he knew she did something. The week following, Melchior had made some passing comment about the act-- not the version that Hanschen had experienced, but the word.
"Rilow, do you know about it?" Melchior had asked, clutching his book against his chest like a lifeline. "Sex, that is?"
"Yes," he choked out. "My governess-- taught me."
But that was years ago, that's all he spoke on the subject, and it wasn't explored again. Ernst made him want to explore it, five years later, but he was all trembling hands and rough fantasies when he thought about it. Desdemona with muffled scream against her pillow, the same cotton fabric of his childhood bed set-- of course, Hanschen had yet to make the correlation between what he saw and what he felt that night.
"What's that you're reading?" Hanschen asked, desperate to change the topic.
Ernst valued his friend's desire for space and privacy, not wishing to press the topic. "
Othello
. I've just gotten to the--"
Hanschen grunted, leaning forward in his seat. He knew how far Ernst must be, judging by the few number of pages left. The picture of his own firm hands slapping her- Desdemona-- his governess-- a woman flickered in his mind. He almost never had these thoughts around Ernst; and certainly never about him. "You need to leave," he told Ernst, squeaking the words out. "Right now." "Hansi, I don't understand--"
"Neither do I!" he found himself saying, more vulnerable in front of Ernst in that moment than he had ever been in front of anyone -- even Max -- in his entire life. "I don't understand why this happens to me-- why
that
happened to me, and I need you to leave."
Ernst hated to push the subject, hated, but something told him that he had to, even if it wasn't the right thing to do, even if it was dangerous. "What happened to you?" "I don't know-- I don't remember!" He panted, leaning against the side of his armchair for support. "I need you to leave. Trust me-- on this."
But he didn't-- leave, that is, but who's to say that he
did
trust? Ernst rested a hand on Hanschen's shoulder in comfort, but a firm slap against his cheek told him that he
wasn't doing the right thing
. "Leave, Ernst." Hanschen scowled, a glint in his eyes that Ernst had never seen before as he ran his fingers across the red of his face. "Now."
And he did, running, barrelling out of the house, not bothering to say goodbye to Frau Rilow, who sat in the salon, knitting. She hadn't worked at the factory in two years, staying at home to juggle three children, especially as they all entered adolescence.
"Ernst?" she called after him, but he was gone.
Upstairs, alone in his room, Hanschen threw a fist against his pillow, crying-- hot salt seemed to burn his face as he pulled out the box he kept hidden under his bed, a variety of photographs -- of
women
, and began to rifle through them. It was not Desdemona's night, but Io's, and he began work.
Work
-- to think, the act that brought joy to Georg and atheism to Melchior Gabor was considered
work
to him, something he had to earn, something that required focus and pain for just a moment of relief and then-- a lifetime of guilt. Bruises and scrapes layered over women's skin-- it wasn't as if Hanschen chose to
like
such images, but he -- and his member -- were drawn to them, and he gave in to the impurity of it all, wiping the slate clean with old socks he would have to throw away.
He never thought of Ernst in such a way- with hands around the tall, scrawny boy's neck-- no, never to Ernst. That wasn't to say he didn't
desire
Ernst in a way that he was told was
wrong
, but not
that wrong
. The faceless governess had ruined him, ruined the way he experienced this
desire
, and now-- ruined his relationship with Ernst. Once he had finished the -- the painful task, he whisked away downstairs. "I'm going out," he told his mother, snatching his winter coat off of the rack and flying out the door before she could ask
where
.
Ernst wouldn't be at home, he was too -- too
good
. He would have immediately told his parents the truth if they had asked. He was excellent at keeping secrets until he had to lie. He'd be at a place where he would not only be alone, but safe.
"Ernst, I can explain, please-- please let me explain," Hanschen stammered once he arrived at the vineyard, seeing Ernst's back hunched over beside a willow tree. He was tying the grass into knots. He wasn't crying. He nodded.
"Please. Tell me that I didn't do something wrong, that I --"
"God, no-- of course not." Hanschen shook his head, crouching in front of Ernst and taking his hands. "I- There was something that happened to me-- five years ago, and the-- sometimes I -- I think about it again. And when the thoughts strike, I get vicious, vengeful-- violent, Ernst."
"What happened?" Ernst asked, not looking up to meet his eyes, afraid of what he would see in them. He stared down as his hands enveloping in Hanschen's.
"Did Melchior-- did he ever tell you about-- about how I learned about sex?"
Ernst swallowed. Yes, he had-- he told everyone. "Yes-- he said your governess taught you."
"She did, and after-- after she told me what she knew," Hanschen cleared his throat, choking back tears. "She put me to bed and she-"
"You don't have to finish the story," Ernst said, cutting him off. He didn't want to hear more. "I can see where it ends. I'm deeply sorry this has happened to do-- something that should not happen to anyone."
"I just-- I get these images of my hands around her neck, or of my fingernails along her forearms-- or much more furious acts against her. Acts I would never-- ever -- want to perform, but they overcome me in my grief. And then-- I feel as if there's only one way to experience sweet release from them, and I -- I couldn't do it while you were there."
"I see," Ernst said, understanding. "Why-- why did you hit me?"
"I don't--" He began to lie, out of a habit almost, but he knew that wasn't the truth-- he did know exactly why he did it. "I saw her eyes in yours. For just a fleeting second. The-- the not leaving when I asked-- when I begged her to-- to leave. I'm so sorry, Ernst. I'm so deeply sorry."
It wasn't as if Ernst didn't have a spine or understand that sometimes people say they're sorry and they aren't-- he was much more aware of the world around him than the others would have you think. But he knew Hanschen-- and now he knew more of Hanschen. "I am not her," he said simply. "and I forgive you."
"I wasn't--" Hanschen stammered again, not asking for forgiveness. He didn't expect it, almost didn't
want
it. He simply wanted Ernst to know he was apologetic-- there was no second step. "You don't-- you shouldn't--"
"There's a lot of things I
shouldn't
do," Ernst threw his head back, laughing. "but I know you. Sincerely. I know the way you think about-- treat women. You are not violent."
"When I'm alone, I am. You don't know what happens in my head."
"But you're willing -- now -- to share with me, yes? And I will help you through it. I don't expect to solve your problems, but I can ease the tension, stop your episodes in their tracks, calm you in some way."
"You shouldn't have to. You don't stay in a bad relationship because you think you can fix the other person."
"This isn't a bad relationship."
"It could be."
"Hanschen. It isn't."
"Not yet."
"Not ever."