The Wall Crossers

Like a River Going

Olivia's perspective

During the next few weeks, Anja and I become very close. She avoids mentioning that first day we met and the passion we had felt toward each other. Instead, she retreats into telling me all about Horst. If we start getting too close, she begins talking incessantly about him, and her. Their past. Their present. How he waits patiently in the East—for her, his waiting bride-to-be in the West. The some-day perfect love story when: He will, and soon, escape through the Wall so they can be together forever. She does not do this to hurt me—not to make me jealous. I believe she does it out of a fear of falling in love with me, which would place in doubt all these years anxiously waiting for Horst. And it is a truth that whatever we already possess, we do not value that as highly as what we seek.

She tells me again and again how Horst will signal her. Will write to her, telling her where and when.

Until then, it is all letters—only letters. I listen raptly to Anja—my heart beating fiercely in my chest, my heart feeling all its blood. She interprets that as total support—to her... and him. But I know I am deceiving her. I just love hearing her excited voice, seeing her glowing face, and feeling her utter joy, even if it is not centered on me.

When I give her total support, she responds with abundant and overflowing affection for me—accepting me as part of her world—part of her! I am inside her—inside her heart. She is inside of me. And there is nowhere else I would rather us be.

But there is no kissing—that is verboten (forbidden). Some nights I lie in my bunk in the barracks, and I ache to have Anja with me in my small space—kissing me passionately. I want that so much it hurts and sometimes I can't sleep because of the hurt!

Anja seems oblivious to my pain, as I always put on a strong show of happiness and support for her. Is it a one-way street? One-way-street relationships are doomed to fail, I think. But then, what do I know about love? I still have never even kissed anyone!

When we actually do catch Horst, as he comes over the Wall, I will be crushed beyond belief to see Anja kiss him. Even though we are, as she says girls friends, she never ever points to any man she may see, or woman, to say anything like how she desires them or would love to... well, whatever, with them! I perhaps fool myself into interpreting this as loyalty to me.

And yet at night I ache for her—that she would truly give herself to me and want me like she wants Horst.

In spite of Horst always being this ghostly presence in our relationship—an influence on our friendship from some murky distance of time and space and future actions, Anja and I love being together and just talking, about work, our feelings, the world, and of course Horst. When she smiles at me or speaks to me, her radiance makes my heart soar, suspends the moon in the sky, eclipses the sun.

Without warning, one day I realize—I have truly fallen in love with Anja. I am her Keterlyn, only I never left on that raft, but stayed with her. I am certain: our hearts are joined, and, inexorably, we are going like an unstoppable river into some future together.

Anja's perspective

I sometimes get unsettling urges for Livie. They come on me strongly at strange times—like if she smiles at me sweetly and says she is so happy for me. Or if we go somewhere and she makes me laugh when I am tired or scared about the future. Or if she touches my hand to point out something she knows I will love to see, or know. In those times I want to give up my quest, my suche, awaiting Horst. In those times I want to fulfill our every demanding need and passion—now! I think she would grant me this. I think she would gladly roll over onto my pillow, looking up at me, approving, as I climb on her and stare into her eyes from just one inch away. As I mold every inch of my hot craving flesh into her receptive sweet body.

But in those times, Ich denke an hohe Dinge (I sublimate).  I fall back on my principled loyalty and enter my planner's mind—which makes me see the consequences of cast-aside self-control.

Livie will leave one day—in less than a year. Soldiers always leave, and they never return. That is what my friends say—Jelena, Margot. They know best. They have experience, much, in love.

And yet, some nights I lie in bed and in a half-dream I am imagining Horst has come to me—steps closer, is pulling back my covers, climbing slowly on me as I shiver with excitement, my eyes closed. Only it is not that man with body yet unknown, unfelt, that I feel, but that girl who is my best friend. I smell her familiar smell and feel her familiar heart. I open my eyes to Livie and open my all to her, pulling her to me with all my strength in my unabated hunger for her body and her love.

And then the guilt comes—guilt like a surging current, a rogue wave, like a river, going out to sea, and with it washing away my dreams, my for-life-held yearnings, all my plans.

And then, I close that hole that links my heart to hers. I close that hole that threatens everything. I turn my growing love away from Livie once again.