Free Living with Strangers by Elizabeth Ellis Page B

started to rain.
    The legacy of recent history is leaving new markers too, complexities that I’m hard pressed to follow. Europe has new boundaries, its countries parcelled up and changed. I’ve heard about the division of Germany, not only from Adam’s dismissive comments, but from snippets picked up at meetings in the schoolroom or round the supper table. I know that Berlin is cut in half by a giant barrier; now I learn that Lübeck’s eastern side descends into wasteland, buildings remain in ruins, restoration has been limited. From here, the Intra-German Border runs north to the Baltic, then south and east to Czechoslovakia.
    A few days later, Jakob takes us to the coast for a day out, where the mouth of the River Trave meets the sea at the northernmost point of the frontier. It’s wet and windy that day; the little seaside town struggling with its damp cafés, its dispirited tourists. We stand by the lighthouse looking east to Priwall, to the guard tower and the border control and the flat, empty heathland beyond. Saul wipes the rain from his face, but I think now they were tears – because of what happened, because the country he left simply replaced one deplorable regime with another and now he can never go home.
    ***
    Under the eaves, the wind howled. There was a gentle creak as Chloé turned in her cot; water dripped in the airing cupboard next door. I thought of how I had settled in an adopted land, of how, as a family we had all chosen to become strangers: Oma, Saul, Jakob, Josef and I gave up the familiar for the foreign. Displacement, through necessity or choice, became the norm as we dealt with a new, obscure landscape rolling out before us. Even at home, in the bleak years after Josef left, we circled each other warily, shocked by the loss, floundering in the new place, none of us knowing where to tread.
    I returned from Germany that summer full of insight, to the home I still recognised, a jigsaw piece of my heritage slotting neatly into place. I was touched by Saul’s decision to take us with him and his faith in our concern for the past. And I loved every waking minute with Josef. But six months later he had gone.

Twelve
    May 20
th
1965
    Dear Joe
    It’s nearly summer. Or trying to be. I’m sitting in Paul’s tree house – Gil made it for him last year out of bits of wood from the old tall boy, the one from Adam’s room. Adam doesn’t need it any more now he’s found a flat up north. It looks as if he’ll stay there after his degree – he says it’s cheaper and there’s more opportunity. His new girlfriend lives up there too so that’s probably the real reason. He wants to do industrial law or something – doesn’t sound much fun to me.
    I can’t remember what I wrote in my last letter, the last one I sent you anyway. Sometimes I write and then throw it away. Did I tell you about the Easter March? Did I tell you about Gil? He’s been around quite a bit – at least he was until recently. We’d sort of been going out for a few months. Well, I thought we were going out, but he had other ideas. He and I did the March this year, all three days, the first one since you left. To start with it was really good. There were thousands of marchers – we were up at the front with the flags and all the important people, even famous ones – I’ve seen some of them on telly. But it didn’t end up as I expected. Not at all. I’d love to tell you it was great, all of us united for the common cause, that we came back resolute and committed – but that’s the fantasy version. I won’t bore you with details, suffice to say I had blisters the size of half crowns and things got really messy in London in more ways than one. Gil’s idea of a relationship didn’t quite coincide with mine and the sad thing is I’ve ended up without the only real friend I’ve had since you left.
    Life’s not so sweet at the moment, just when I thought it was getting better.
    Write soon. M x

    Gil. That wasn’t his