New Lives

Last Practice

It was long past midnight, but Corporal Türmer couldn’t sleep. Bracing himself against the steering wheel, he stared at the thermostat of his APC. The pointer was almost at the red zone. Corporal Türmer asked himself if he would ever have the courage to be a partisan in resistance, an agent, a man rigorously opposed to all wars, who would let the motor of his APC run so hot that its cylinders locked. But each time the pointer crossed into the red, Corporal Türmer would crank open the louvers above the motor. And each time the temperature fell immediately and the pointer went back to vertical.

In the first weeks after induction Corporal Türmer — just Private Türmer back then — had upbraided himself for not finding the soldier’s life all that awful. He hadn’t had to put up with anything horrible. And as soon as he slid behind the steering wheel of an APC, he was actually happy. He liked driving it. He loved his vehicle, his hippopotamus, for which no road was too steep or sandy and in which he could even swim across the Elbe.

Corporal Türmer couldn’t get to sleep. His hands lay folded in his lap, his right foot resting on its heel at the gas pedal, his left leg pulled up — just like always when he was waiting. Most of his year-and-a-half hitch had been spent waiting. But this was his last night of camping out on maneuvers. Tomorrow they would drive back to their regiment — back home, so to speak — and then it was less than two weeks until his discharge. He wasn’t surprised that the thought made him feel melancholy. He would have liked to talk with somebody. He loved standing around with the other drivers, smoking and shooting the bull, while the company had to spread out across the fields.

Corporal Türmer stretched. The back of his seat had an indentation on the left side. Other drivers called it the “cripple seat.” Corporal Türmer had grown comfortably used to the driver’s seat and over time had helped hollow out the indentation. The backrest had become his backrest, just like the hood of his vehicle was his hood. When all was said and done, he felt cozy in his APC.

Corporal Türmer could hear the breathing of his squad as they lay like one big family on the metal flooring or sat angled on the front bench or wedged on the floor under the first gunner’s seat. Fast asleep in the seat beside Corporal Türmer sat noncom Thomas, his squad leader, his helmeted head resting against the wall. If the motor was ruined, it would be his responsibility and he’d be thrown into military prison at Schwedt. Because as a noncom officer, Thomas should have forbidden Corporal Türmer to let the motor run, no matter how the squad might freeze — and in mid-April the nights were still chilly, at least out in the forest. Of a morning the puddles in the ruts were covered with a thin layer of ice. And no driver let his men freeze.

The pointer was in the middle of the red zone. Corporal Türmer’s ran his hands down over the steering wheel until they touched just above his lap. He rested his right hand against the center of the steering wheel and almost honked the horn. How often had he had to warn the driver ahead when he drifted off the road. He himself relied on the driver behind him to make sure he didn’t drop off to sleep. Because you got hypnotized by gazing for hours at red taillights as your only point of orientation. He had hallucinated railroad crossings or dump heaps big as houses — and then let the hatch above him fly open, so that the cold could shake him awake, had cursed himself and slapped his face. All the same, all he wanted was to be a driver. Only drivers watched through endless nights while the others slept, lulled by the rattle and warmth of the engine. Corporal Türmer was amazed, yes, truly touched by how the others had trusted him from the start, as if it were perfectly self-evident that he would steer this dancing, rocking ship safely through the night. That was the origin of every driver’s pride. They were like fathers to their families. They, the drivers, were the ones who gave the company its sense of security.

Corporal Türmer didn’t have to turn around to look at them. The gentle snore was Private Sommer, the whimper was Corporal Kapaun, a whimper that absolutely refused to match his bearish body and laugh. Private Petka, who had a rumpled face that made him look like a mushroom in his helmet, sometimes laughed in his sleep. No, he would

[Letter of July 11, 1990]

never be able to bring himself to betray them by harming the army. Not because he had sworn it, that would be ridiculous. No, Corporal Türmer was grateful because — whether you wanted to believe it or not — everything had its place in the army. Corporal Türmer had to take a piss. He cranked open the louvers above the motor. Gave the switch a slap, silencing the engine. He pulled on the new boots the staff sergeant had finagled for him. They were a little too big, but only one or two sizes. So it didn’t matter.

Corporal Türmer cranked the hatch open above his head and, tucking his boots up on his seat, pushed himself up. With his butt against the edge of the hatch, he pulled his legs up and wriggled out, pressed down on the hatch with his fingertips, and closed it cautiously, slipping the precious square-cut key into his right pants-leg pocket. He groped for the running board and crouched down. He had expected a few lights, at least in the guard tent. He really wanted somebody to smoke with and talk with. And maybe even drink with.

The forest floor silently greeted Corporal Türmer, as if he had jumped down barefoot. The only sounds were the rustle of his uniform and with each step the slupp slupp, slupp slupp of the tops of his boots.

The cold forest air was invigorating. Odors drifted toward Corporal Türmer from all sides, rising from the soil, dropping from the branches overhead — he only had to stretch out his hand to grasp the air in all its palpable moistness.

He undid the top buttons of his padded jacket, tugged at the opening of sweater and undershirt with both hands, and let the draft of fresh air rush over his skin. Suddenly he could smell all the stuff his body had stored up inside his winter uniform — mostly cigarette smoke cured in the cold iron atmosphere of the APC, but also the odor of mess kits sticky with splotches of brown gravy and bits of potato.

Corporal Türmer looked for a guard, but found no one. All the same he didn’t want to piss right here, where somebody might surprise him. Besides, it was pleasant to walk. The pines weren’t too close together. Branches and twigs crackled only rarely under his feet, for the most part his boots just pressed them down into the needle-covered moss. He could see the pale spots where tree trunks had been scraped by the APC’s until each vehicle had found its spot — those dozing reptiles, some of which, as if caught up in lively dreams, had left their motors running.

The restricted area was good for the forest. No foresters, no loggers here, and certainly no mushroom hunters. There was nothing here but slow growth and slow dying. Here trees sprouted, grew, lived their decades or maybe an entire century, and then perished again, striking the forest floor with a boom. They were followed by sunlight that awakened the underbrush, caused ferns and shrubs to flourish, weeds by the thousands, until the snow buried it all and a few patches of lichen and moss clinging to fallen tree trunks were the only bits of color. Everything contributed to the rot, everything worked to advance the process of life in the mold at the earth’s surface, the humus of all existence. Even the silence here seemed ancient and impenetrable, and the air sated with odors that enervated every waft of wind that struck their heavy curtain.

Corporal Türmer had walked a good distance when he began to feel dizzy. Bracing a hand against a tree trunk he rested as if he had overexerted himself. He was hungry. And above all he was thirsty. Corporal Türmer breathed through his mouth. But some hidden, nameless herb refreshed him and set him back on his path, which had been cleared not by man but by the forest itself. The animals, the moods of the vegetation, would guide him, if only he understood the hints they gave him. He liked the idea of finding his way through the trees, through the night. Only in the dark did the body awaken, only then did it trust the knowledge embedded in its limbs.

Corporal Türmer drifted into an easy jog, moving his arms and shoulders like a skier in a slalom. The joy it gave him was obvious.

As the first light of dawn crept closer, dead branches in the pines stood out like snakes, some of them still coming to a point, but some split, so that their tips looked like bats or the fierce faces of gargoyles. He ran faster and faster, dodging with his head, ducking, avoiding branches like a boxer in training — some of them struck him, however, lashing him awake, driving him forward. Several times he thought he had reached a clearing, but it turned out only to be a bit of fresh growth, or a small pond. The shafts of his boots bumped rhythmically against his shins and calves, slupp slupp, slupp slupp. He heard birds. Just now it had been silent and dark, and he the only unsleeping creature. And now the whole forest had evidently awakened.

Corporal Türmer felt needles pricking his bowels. A few more strides and he reached a wide, seemingly endless field. He stepped out of the forest, tossed his padded jacket aside, slipped his suspenders from his shoulders, tugged his pants down, and squatted. He moaned once with pain, then came the release. He tried to recall the last time he had taken a dump. It had been a long time. Corporal Türmer enjoyed feeling himself empty out.

A few moments later, however, the process began to unsettle him. It wouldn’t end, and the stench was bestial. Corporal Türmer waddled forward because the pile he created had nudged him like an animal. He looked around as if afraid his shit was following him. Wet grass brushed against his butt.

Corporal Türmer no longer understood how he could have lived such a caged, meager life, penned up with all those others. He shuddered at the idea of returning to the APC.

Even with eyes closed and trusting only his nose, he could have said what all was in that pile. The worst stench came from what he had last eaten, that once-a-month meal when old canned supplies were used up. But the goulash from two days before and the cabbage that had been combined with something that made it taste like car exhaust — it all befouled the silver gray morning. His thighs and knees hurt.

“Dammit! Dammit!” Corporal Türmer shouted. “Dammit!” He had pissed on his pants, and hadn’t noticed. He stood up. He didn’t even pull his pants up, but tramped on them, until he finally had them off, along with his boots and socks.

He unbuttoned his holster, took the pistol out, flung it in a wide arc, and watched as it vanished soundlessly in the high, wet grass. He didn’t want to have anything more to do with the army.

He quickly stripped off all the rest. He was a little chilled, but he likewise enjoyed the way his sphincter had relaxed. Every step was now a blessing that made his gait more supple. The contrails of the jet fighters were already turning reddish, the fresher ones looked like veins in the white of your eye, others were broad and translucent, as if someone had made strokes with a brush.

All he asked for was a little something to drink and a bit of food, but even that wish wasn’t of any real significance. Would he even have any wishes in the future? And what would be left as memories? A song maybe, a melody, or not even that? He accepted this — no, it didn’t bother him anymore, he didn’t give it so much as a thought.

Corporal Türmer scratched his belly. He looked down at himself and glumly, yes, almost disgustedly, examined his cheesy white body strewn with pimples and moles. What a strange odor human beings give off. The cows had stood up and were staring at him. It comforted him that there were living creatures nearby.

He felt an urge to stretch out in the wet grass, to cleanse and refresh his body. Corporal Türmer sank to his knees, let himself fall to one side, and in the next moment felt morning dew along his back. Directly overhead he spotted the pallid moon. Moaning with pleasure, Corporal Türmer rolled onto his belly, and then onto his back again, he scrubbed his shoulders, butt, belly, chest, and pressed his forehead against the ground.

On his back again, he stretched his left arm heavenward and loosened the band of his wristwatch — and the first ray of sunlight struck his fingertips. Corporal Türmer could sense that he was sobbing, and felt his watch fall off.

In the next instant he was on all fours, he shook himself and howled up at the pinkish disk of the moon. He bared his teeth. The cows began to low, turned around, and tried to flee. He wanted to yell something, say something, but all he could manage were growls and whimpers.

Then he froze in place. The only sound came from the cows and the very distant tolling of a village church bell. The wolf sniffed at the wristwatch, skirted the boots and pieces of uniform lying in the grass, and trotted off soundlessly, thirsty, hungry, voracious.