Falling Walls (III)

Chapter 22

I woke up at two in the morning. No matter how hard I tried,  I just couldn't go back to sleep.  The kids hadn't responded, they hadn't called and as hard as I tried to convince myself to take a distance to Tom's past, my thoughts kept on going back to the bracelet, to Eva and her talk in the evening. I was aware that my idea of Eva being Tom's mother couldn't be possible.  Her story,  however, had affected me deeply.  And so I found myself sitting yet again on the lounge in pajamas, over-viewing the night lights beyond the Alster Lake, with Eva's book in my lap. 

In the silence of the night I read about Eva describing her pregnancy, how Johan had been happy when she finally had the chance to tell him. But he also was concerned for her and their unborn child. They both were still studying, without employment. Johan obtained aid money for his sports but that was about it. To make the most of the time they had until their child was born, Eva used every minute to study and Johan was determined to win a medal, hoping the extra income would take some of the pressure off Eva. To be exact, he was adamant to use the championships in the UK to finally make it into the top sports league, which would have likely guaranteed a comfortable life for them. 

Their son Max was born while Johan was competing in the UK. He won a silver medal and a bronze in a team event. Happily, he returned to this small family, Eva and Johan got married and they both continued their studies, financially aided through the GDR sports aid.

Everything changed a year later. Johan was competing at the Olympics in Canada when two of his teammates disappeared. Like so many athletes at the time, they had fled. Johan, who had been a close friend to one of them, was immediately after his races brought back to the GDR where he was interrogated for several days. Eva also received a visit from the State Police, questioning her about a possible involvement of Johan. While nothing had been said directly,  she felt threatened and feared for her child, growing up in a surveillance state, who didn't blink twice to remove children from traitor parents. Eva's uncle, who was a member of the political party,  eventually got involved and Johan returned home. In the safety of a Sunday walk through the forest,  Johan one day admitted that he had known about the escape plans of his friend, who had offered him to join them. With the privilege of being allowed to leave the GDR, it was relatively easy for athletes to disappear and seek asylum in a non-communist country,  in particular in West-Germany. But of course,  Johan would have never left his beloved wife and son. This was the first time the two spoke about leaving East-Germany.
Eva was convinced they were under strict surveillance.  When making phone calls,  she often noticed the crackling in the line and the feeling of being watched accompanied her constantly. Two of Johan's planned overseas competitions had been cancelled without further explanation.

I was so absorbed in the story that only the urge to go to the toilet made  me realise that three hours had passed. Back on the lounge, I immediately picked up the book again.  I was determined to finish it before the Eva's talk in the evening.

Eva continued telling how she managed her last year of studies while raising a toddler. Johan considered an end to his sporting career after competing at the World Championships in the Netherlands. He wanted to spend more time with his family. He mentioned this to Eva during dinner one day, when the following day the State Police visited them. Again, no direct threats were made, just a friendly talk, but Eva felt terrified when one officer looked at Max with an evil grin and incidentally mentioned how sporty toddler Max looked and that one day he may benefit from one of the specialised sporting schools for talented children. Of course Max might have one day -  Johan did. But the comment felt more relevant to the now and made Eva feel helpless and desperate, as if he was indicating that Max might be taken away from them. She had heard often enough about forced adoptions of children whose parents were pronounced unfit to raise them for the purpose of socialism. 

Not even two weeks later, exactly that happened to Mandy, whose husband had been a good friend of Johan, competing for the state in gymnastics. They had gone to school together and remained a close friendship. Mandy's husband had refused to take the new pills his trainer handed out, which, as it turned out many years later, were most likely the state-sponsored drugs unknowingly given to athletes. Years later, Mandy, who also hadn't been able to find her son after the German reunification, told Eva that she had discussed a possible desertion from the Republic with her husband. This was being held against them in the court hearing which didn't even last five minutes. And there had been nothing she could have done. Following the incident, the two friends lost contact and only years later found each other again, working together as advocated for victims of the forced adoption scheme in the GDR.

I lowered the book and had to take a deep breath. Rubbing my eyes, I just couldn't believe the coincidence of two close friends losing a child to the socialist state. Stretching over the coffee table, I took my mobile phone and curiously searched for numbers. An estimated ten thousand forced adoptions took place in the GDR. Ten thousand, I repeated in my head. Many of these children never knew, might still not know, that they were forcefully removed from loving parents, often given a new identity. I felt a headache coming, but took the book back up.

Eva tried to bury all of her worries, concentrating on her family, supporting Johan in his preparations for the World Championship and finding out that she was expecting another child. At that time, Johan's cousin, who had just turned eighteen, gave birth to premature twins. She was convinced she heard two babies cry, but one of them didn't survive the birth. The nurse in charge explained to her that the drugs from her cesarean must have affected her senses,  causing her to hear two babies. Eva had heard rumors, which had years later been confirmed, that young mothers, especially when having twins, sometimes were told their babies didn't survive, only to be given to a devoted comrade as a present. 

Hearing these stories in combination with increasing visits of the secret police, probably in preparation of Johan's overseas trip to the Netherlands, Eva began to panic. Johan noticed her deteriorating mental stability and one day surprised her during a picnic on a large cornfield with no one around, that he had spoken to someone who could help them to escape. The sooner the better. 

Four days later - Johan had just left for the Netherlands earlier in the day - Eva found herself with a frightened toddler on her hand standing in the cellar of a restaurant. Her own hands were moist from sweat, trembling around Max's little fist. In his navy blue corduroy pants and red anorak he looked up at her with wide eyes. It was hot in the cellar, but what they wore was all they would take. The man with large round glasses slowly moved a table aside, then opened a heavy lid in the floor, revealing the steep entrance into the tunnel. Silently, he nodded at her once. 

When Eva took the first step towards her helper into freedom. Loud noises suddenly echoed through the room. Panic spread out within her. She stopped, looking around frantically. When she noticed that both her escape helpers had equally panicked expressions, Eva froze. The helper who was meant to cross the border with them rushed her to move but Eva's body was no longer under her control. In a blur, she felt Max's hand loosen from her own, then she watched him lowering down with their escape helper. The other helper continued to urge her to move, but Eva was frozen. Max's eyes, wider than they had been before, stared at her as he slowly disappeared into the depths of the tunnel. 

"We cannot make a sound. Not a single one. No matter what happens. Do you understand, my darling," she had told Max again and again.  And he didn't scream, he didn't cry. Her beautiful, little boy disappeared from her view with a thick, silent tear running down his cheek. Eva's helper pushed her forward, but the door to the cellar opened before they could reach it.

Eva was detained. She didn't care about her sentence, all she could think of was Max. No one gave her any information. One of the prison wards eventually told her that they got to him before he crossed the border and that Max had already been adopted. The same fate would meet her unborn child. 

Several weeks later Eva's uncle managed to get her out of prison. Johan, however, had also been stopped from escaping while in the Netherlands. He took all the blame, stating that he didn't give Eva much of a chance, taking advantage of her mentally weakened state due to her pregnancy. A medical exam was organised with the help of Eva's uncle and she walked free, being allowed to raise her daughter, with her uncle being her guardian. She became very involved in the socialist party - more on the surface really - which eventually helped to get Johan out of prison early. He served two of the three years he had been sentenced to. When he finally walked free, he became a sports trainer. Eva and Johan had another daughter, not even ten months later. Johan joined the socialist party as well, both of them hoping that this would eventually help them to find Max.