From Offene Blende (Open Shutter)

Abstract

Christine has been living in New York ever since she came to the U.S. illegally from East Germany in the mid- 1980s and is working in a small theater. In the mid-1990s, when she runs into Leah, a West German photographer, she pretends to be an American by birth. But Leah finds out who she really is, and after tracking her down manages to break into the theater. -AS In the morning, shortly before seven, when it's still quiet and the cleaning woman is the only one she meets in the hall, Christine goes up to her office to plan her day. The cleaning woman nods with every step she takes, flapping her hands back and forth to dry them off. Every morning the soles of her blue sneakers squeak along the polished floor. Then, firmly holding on to her pail and scrubbing brush, she disappears, and Christine takes the key off the board. In the beginning, she used to sleep in the theater, in a dress that felt rough and heavy on her skin. During the day it hung in the huge closet on the other side of the room, where now only files are kept, files and a few pencil stubs. Jeff sharpens them till they're down to a fraction of a centimeter so he won't have to buy new ones. Jeff, the smell of wood, and the squeaking rubber soles on the linoleum floor: these are more familiar to her than anything else in the world. She feels like an old woman and suddenly realizes why there are never any young people involved in the theater. Stage characters are either children or old people, never young people. One can't afford to wait around. Only children know that, and old people. They live one day at a time. Christine closes the closet door, which had come open during the night. The room is already filled with glaring light that promises a hot day. There was a time when this would have bothered her. The blind is lowered halfway, and she stands there a while, gazing out at the empty street. Somewhere in the house she hears footsteps; the sound is muffled and far away, as though coming through glass. These are not the footsteps of the cleaning woman. They're determined, marked by brief pauses, sometimes barely audible, and then suddenly very loud as though they were right outside her door. It could be one of the actors. But it's too early; rehearsals don't start till eight. Nobody walks around in the house this early. As she always does, Christine had closed the front door behind her and checked to make sure it was locked before taking the key out of the lock. No one could have followed her in. Maybe there's a faucet dripping somewhere. The file binders on her desk are a mess; one is tipped over. Christine picks it up, leafs through some pages, and puts it back, in line with the others. Jeff has not touched them for years. It's the deficits that make him do it now. The increasingly bad runs of the productions. He isn't one to rummage through the files and, as back then, she won't mention it to him, even though this time it's disquieting. She can still hear the footsteps, irregular but persistent. A dull pounding. She listens for a while, can't figure out where they're coming from. They seem to be everywhere; on the stairs, in the hall, and inside her, in the rhythm of her heart, but that sounds the way it always does, even though without coffee it seems to be beating more slowly. The footsteps are outside on the stairs in her head; they run from one side of her head to the other, tapping, clacking against her forehead from within. Steps made by the broad square heels on a woman's shoes. Shoes that don't go with elegant stockings. Christine stands there, motionless. Down on the street someone is fussing around with the garbage cans in front of O'Heave's store. Maybe the footsteps are those of the person on the street, even though the window is closed and only very loud and high-pitched noises can penetrate it. Outside it's midsummer; the heat has shriveled the leaves on the trees; the office hardly cools off overnight. …