Bad Luck in Berlin: An Exclusive Short Story

CHAPTER 1

‘I’m not going to die.’

The speaker was somewhere in her early fifties, a little overweight, and well dressed in a navy business suit. Her short hair was dyed a fiery red. She wore stylish glasses that had a designer’s logo embossed in gold leaf on the arms. She sat in a confessional pose, head angled down, eyes open but fixed on the closed hands in her lap. Her face was flushed with blood from a racing heart. She spoke the words quietly, barely more than a whisper, but just audible enough for Victor to register. They had a ritualistic monotone, almost trancelike, else the words themselves were designed to induce such a trance and block out the terror of impending death.

‘I’m not going to die.’

Victor wasn’t sure if he was supposed to hear or not, but he couldn’t help himself. He was intrigued by the woman. She broke the norm. When faced with what they believed to be their final moments people begged and pleaded and screamed defiance and threatened vengeance from beyond the grave. He had never encountered anyone who simply refused to accept it was about to happen.

The volume of the repeated words was a few decibels higher than they had been the first time and the woman’s hands tightened together as she willed those words to pass from mere sounds into the reality she craved. Victor watched her with perhaps more sympathy than a cat might show a mouse, but in his experience mere words made little difference when it came to that precarious balance between life and death.

‘I’m not going to die.’

This time the woman spoke at a regular volume and as the last rush of breath resonated through her larynx and was expelled through her lips she angled up her head and released her hands. Her eyes widened and her face visibly relaxed and the tension that had held her body rigid dissipated.

She looked across to Victor, who sat to her right, and smiled at him with a mixture of embarrassment and awkwardness. ‘Don’t laugh at me, please. I know it’s ridiculous, I truly do, but I still have to do it.’

‘I would never laugh.’

Some shyness left her smile. ‘That’s very kind. Thank you. Most people aren’t so understanding. I’ve got used to the stares, but the occasional mockery and muttered insult still sting. I wish I could stop but I really can’t. I’m not one of those people with that OCD or whatever they call it who believes the plane will crash if I don’t say my little tic. That’s utter deluded nonsense. I’m just scared of flying. That’s common enough, isn’t it?’ Victor’s mouth opened to respond, but she didn’t pause to let him speak. ‘And because I’m scared of flying I have to remind myself before take-off that the plane isn’t going to crash and I’m not going to be killed on this flight.’

‘I very much hope you’re right,’ Victor replied when a gap long enough to speak finally arrived, ‘otherwise things aren’t looking too good for me.’

Her smile became a grin and she nudged him lightly with her elbow to acknowledge the joke. A pair of stewardesses moved down the aisles checking safety belts were fastened. Victor took hold of the buckle and clasp and moved them together, but there was no click.

‘Of course the plane could crash and I could die. I’m not one of those people who think bad things only happen to other people. Talk about blissful ignorance. Oh, how happy I would be. But I can’t. I have a brain. I can reason. Intelligence is a curse, isn’t it? I’m not joking. Have you ever met anyone happier than a dog with a stick? Anyway, I’m well aware that I might get killed in a plane crash someday, but I’ve got about the same chance of it happening as I have of winning the lottery.’ She tapped the side of her skull. ‘I’ve got all the facts and figures about air travel locked up in here. And let me tell you something: I’ve never bought a lottery ticket in my entire life.’

‘And I’m sure you weren’t worried when you took a taxi or drove to the airport this morning.’

‘Exactly,’ the woman said with some big agreeing nods. ‘I know all the comparisons. I have to. I’m a sponge when it comes to knowledge. And talking, as you’ve probably noticed. Sue me. But not really. That happened once. Horrible. Not for talking, obviously. I won.’ She turned in her seat as much as the seatbelt would let her so that she could face him more easily. Her palms settled on the armrest between them. She leaned across it and further into his personal space than he found bearable, but regular people could handle it and he was so used to pretending he could that he showed no reaction. Her perfume was sickly sweet and full of lavender. ‘Did you know that about seven hundred people are killed a year in plane crashes, yet three thousand die every single day in car accidents? I don’t even know how many that is a year.’

‘About one hundred thousand,’ Victor said, deciding that giving the exact calculation of 109,500 would be excessive.

‘Wow,’ she breathed, eyes wide behind the designer glasses. ‘You see, I should be positively terrified of popping to the supermarket, but I’m not. Instead I’m scared of flying. I’m absolutely crazy.’

Victor nodded his agreement.

‘I’ve tried therapy and hypnosis. I went on a course. None of it helped. But because I know the statistics, because I know the odds, I can control my fear.’

‘It always pays to know the odds.’

‘Doesn’t it just? And we’re all scared of something, aren’t we? Unless you have that disorder which stops you experiencing fear. Must be the only disease that’s actually a benefit.’

‘I certainly think so.’

She tapped him on the arm. ‘So, what’s waiting for you in Berlin?’

‘Work,’ Victor answered.

‘Always business, never pleasure, right?’

‘Right.’

‘Story of my life. I’ve been to half the world’s major cities, yet I’ve only seen them through a taxi window on the way between my hotel and the office. This time it’s Operation Kiss Arse. My firm is owned by some gigantic German conglomerate. I’m the board’s designated diplomat sent over to “strengthen relations”.’ She pulled a face and used air quotations. ‘In other words I’m the only one who speaks German. It’s not that bad though. I do get three nights in a four star hotel, all expenses paid. It’s got a spa and there’s no big oaf snoring in the bed next to me. What about you? Sprechen sie Deutsch?’

He looked confused. ‘Excuse me… Dutch?’

She shook her head to say it wasn’t important and asked, ‘What business are you in?’

‘I used to freelance. But that didn’t work out in the end.’

‘And now you’re slaving for the Man?’

He nodded.

She nudged him in the arm again. ‘I know how you feel. I used to consult on a contractual basis. It was so good. Fantastic money. I could pick and choose the jobs I actually wanted. Lots of free time to spoil my two boys. Except they’re young men now. Correction, they think they’re men. But times change. It’s a tough climate. You take the pay that’s available and you wave your freedom goodbye. It’s awful not being your own boss any more, isn’t it? But what’s the alternative? How else do you survive?’

‘That’s precisely what I’m trying to figure out.’

‘Want my advice? Don’t worry about it. Take the regular money and pucker up to all the posterior you need to keep your job. When the economy gets better, tell them where to go. I’m Victoria, by the way.’

She held out her hand. He took it in his. It was soft and cool.

‘That’s a beautiful name.’

She beamed. ‘Do you really think so? I’m not sure. It sounds very old-fashioned to me. Can’t help but think about that fat, sour-faced queen holding the hand grenade. Why don’t we get to choose our names, instead of being saddled with the one our parents chose for us? It’s bizarre, if you ask me. Years before we can even speak, let alone have the kind of self-awareness to decide what kind of names we like or don’t like, someone else from another generation and born in another era with different values and fashions decides how we will be known for the rest of our lives. It defies belief, if you ask me. I wish we were free to go by whatever name we chose. Tatiana today, Scarlett tomorrow. Maybe something else the next day. I think it would be fun, don’t you?’

‘I expect living like that could prove to be quite a challenge.’

Her eyebrows arched. She seemed shocked that he didn’t automatically agree. ‘How so? I wouldn’t care if people got confused.’

‘That’s not what I meant. If you had so many different names how would you think of yourself? Isn’t a name intrinsic to self-identity?’

She thought for a minute. Her eyebrows stayed arched the whole time. ‘Well, I suppose I’d pick the name I liked best and that would be how I thought of myself. That would be me. It wouldn’t matter what name I gave out to other people. I’d always have that name for myself. Like a secret.’ She paused to think again. Her eyebrows fell back down. ‘Yes, that makes it more fun if only I knew it.’

‘But if no one knew your name no one would ever know the real you.’

She smiled. ‘You are a funny one. I turned fifty-two last month, so I’ve been alive half a century, and the only one who knows the real me is my reflection. Does anyone out there know the real you?’

Victor shook his head.

‘Then what does it matter if only I know the name I chose for myself?’

‘You make a compelling argument.’

‘You’d better believe it. I may be silly enough to have to tell myself three times before every flight that I’m not going to die so that I don’t turn into a screaming, crying wreck, but that doesn’t mean I don’t know what I’m talking about.’ She winked. ‘At least occasionally.’

The plane finished taxiing to the runway and prepared for take-off.

The woman said, ‘You see, take-offs and landings are the most dangerous part of any flight. I’m scared, but I’m not going to freak out. Just in the same way I don’t panic about getting struck by lightning if I’m out in a storm, or I don’t think if only I’d bought a ticket when I hear someone’s won a hundred million.’

‘Live by the odds, die by the odds.’

‘I think that’s going to be my motto from now on.’

‘It’s served me well thus far.’

‘Long may that continue.’

Victor glanced around as the plane accelerated and lifted off. Lots of people were nervous. Lots of people weren’t. Within a few minutes it had reached cruising altitude and levelled off. Two hundred tons of metal carrying forty tons of flesh, blood and bone, resting on nothing but air.

She winked and said, ‘Live by the odds…’

He smiled in response.

She smiled back and rested her hand on his arm. ‘So, handsome, what do they call you?’