mike lee

The Summer Begins Tomorrow

The freighter Alaric, bound from Hamburg, traversed two fierce summer storms in the Atlantic before arriving at its destination.

The eyes of the crew and its passengers fixated on the lights of the city flickering in the pre-dawn gloom before the morning fog rolled in to shroud the ship in a veil of impenetrable shadows.

As the Alaric made its way to the city’s inner harbor, the passengers on deck stared toward the incoming fog, attempting to discern through the mist hints of how their lives will unfold.

All hoped for a happy end for their lives in this adopted homeland. They also hungered for connection, a desire for acceptance in a place better than the lands of birth and bitterness. Their stomachs hurt in this collective need. Soon, they hoped to be satiated.

They scrutinized the shoreline, shaping the skyline like clay to fit their expectations. Hopes, dreams to be fulfilled in the silhouettes of the rising architecture of the city, lit by the harbor floodlights positioned on the shore, beams of light dashing across the evening sky. The hints of details reflected in the light led to murmurs of excitement among the collective humanity huddled at the prow. Soon, they will find out.

With foghorns blaring, the tugboats pulled the freighter, navigating through the final set of shoals in the inner harbor. With each yard attained, the new crop of settlers to arrive at this distant shore waited for departure moved closer together, clutching luggage with sweating hands, while the poorer among them, shifted the weight of their duffels, burdened with the precious remnants of the lands they left behind.

Before arrival, the opposing shore held forth a dreamland. As the Alaric prepared to dock, the cadence of the foghorns accentuated with each blast a beckoning of welcome.

Making his way cautiously to the prow, grasping a cardboard suitcase with weary hands Ernst Sturm wanted to see closely the geography of his future.

He was hungry. Because of the early morning time of arrival, there was no breakfast served for passengers. Ernst hoped there would be coffee at the reception and processing center beyond the disembarkation point. The brochure received in Hamburg said there was a canteen.

He had slept fitfully in his third-class bunk, dreaming of stuffing kittens into a rucksack and carrying them to market. As he shaved and packed, Ernst mulled over its meaning.

The harbor lights were different and more numerous than in Hamburg; the city seamed so vast compared to what Sturm left behind.

Sturm placed the suitcase down between his feet, and from habit, he brushed the left side of his wool coat. His letters of recommendation, his visa, passport, were wrapped in a silk handkerchief, safely ensconced in the inner breast pocket. With them, neatly folded in an envelope was the letter that caused his sudden immigration to this new country.

Ernst was at the age of reckless youth, as was the reason for this cruel missive, and consequently his arrival in this faraway port. The sudden, sharp brilliance of change brought by desire strikes suddenly, yet its consequences are heralded by the following thunder. Thus his forced journey, a decision made to separate two deemed inappropriate and to resolve a threat to the plans made for one.

Tisi was named for Tisiphone, the guardian of Tartarus. Like the Greek fury, she had onyx eyes and hair, an exotic cast in their native land. The father was the newly appointed assistant headmaster of the gymnasium that Ernst attended.

His father knew him since they were young, having attended the same schools. While not close friends, the two men had a friendly familiarity that Ernst soon discovered masked a complicated relationship stemming from their childhood together.

Two years before, a separate school with the same curriculum was inaugurated for girls. They were placed in the former dormitory across the courtyard from the boys’ gymnasium.

Upon first notice, Tisi gave off the impression as one who did not want to be seen, as if she desired nothing more than to be merged with the tacky floral prints of the drawing room wallpaper.

She was petite, slight. This accentuated her bobbed black hair. Tisi habitually tilted her head in a seeming effort to mask the dark pools of her eyes that rested comfortably behind her steel-framed spectacles. This sedate, passive appearance turned out to be a pleasant deception that served as, she later told Ernst in their conversations in the forest, her sword and shield against those who treated her poorly, real and imagined.

The differences were there from the beginning of their meeting at the May dance, yet the desires of animal pleasures and the overwhelming desire of youth superseded reality. The indiscretions were discreet, furtive—only apparently real to the closely observant.

Several days after the dance, Ernst’s father requested to meet him at his office

His office was on the fifth floor of the Koncrete Building near the Central Station. The structure went up only the year before, and Father was the first tenant to sign. He prided himself with his modernity.

The concrete structure was streamlined and curved, in stark contrast to the Jugendstil art nouveau style of the surrounding buildings. The Koncrete was a daring design, and one of only a few modern office buildings in Germany, and the first in the city.

His father’s office was simple. Herr Sturm was utilitarian in his approach to modernism, believing that bare walls, and limited furniture reduce distraction. He also loved to intimidate as a technique with clients and business rivals: his desk was huge, and sat diagonally straddling the farthest corner from the office door.

Ernst sat in the stiff oak armchair set close to the desk.

Herr Sturm wasted no time. “I heard that you and Tisi Altman made quite the pair at the dance the other day.”

“Yes.”

“Keep your hands to yourself. That’s an order,” said Herr Sturm, his voice clipped, direct. “Her father has plans for her.” He paused. “And I have plans for you. Don’t mess them up.”

“Yes. Sir.”

Ernst left, and made plans to ring Tisi to meet at the Johannapark.

***

In the late spring and into the summer Ernst and Tisi engaged in the rituals of the forbidden: Chasing the moonlight with embraces within the depths of the wood, furious trysts in the attic above his bedroom. They did not dare to be caught in bed.

The walks in city parks and in secret places in the working class neighborhoods were passionate discussions questioning facile certitudes. Words twisted around them as ropes and ribbons. Tisi worked magic on him with her oratory; fierce and passionate, sparkling bright as a Yuletide rocket.

Their desires were expressed in hushed tones, with mouths planted on bodies to divert suspecting ears in the spaces just beyond. Despite best efforts, their actions was eventually noticed; the behavior pregnant with conjecture.

Consequently, when it ends, Ernst was told—it ends. There is a fine and precise science to resolving problems to nip a budding scandal, and the parents came up with one that settled the trouble Ernst and Tisi would create before the affair became widely known.

The respective fathers agreed on a solution that pleased neither, but succeeded in assuaging damages to reputations. Tisi was protected, and of a sort, Ernst as well.

The evening before taking the train to Hamburg there was only time for an embrace. She wore a blue sailor dress, with a white and red tipped collar—his favorite.

When Ernst revealed the envelope holding his papers signifying exile, she pressed her lips to the envelope, and hastily scrawled an address on the cover.

After handing it back, she nervously fingered the red silk scarf tied tightly around her neck. Ernst grasped her hand and held it for the brief moments before the door to her house opened.

“Come, and I will follow,” Tisi said.

Then, gone. Like a dream—dissipated.

 Perhaps that was what this waking dream was about. A love burdened with a rhythm of cruelty as carrying kittens in a rucksack.

The Alaric lurched at the dock. Ernst grabbed the railing, nearly falling.

Ernst Sturm breathed in, instinctively patted his jacket. The bulge remained.

***

In processing Ernst produced his papers. The medical inspection was waived, and the interview perfunctory. After his paperwork were notarized and stamped Ernst fled to the canteen for papery scrambled eggs and overcooked sausage. He vowed never to eat either again. There was a new life at hand, new cuisines.

Outside, Ernst warmed himself at the fire in the oil barrel. He opened the envelope and unfolded a letter from his father. While he had included money and the ticket for the Alaric, the accompanying note was unsigned; its message brief and blunt.

I realized that by doing this I have lost you. But this is for the good of everyone involved. Nothing matters more than that. This is the way it is, you see.

“Therefore, I respond with indifference,” said Sturm, before tossing the letter into the flames. He thought wisely to keep the formal letter of introduction to Herr Sturm’s South American agent.

He held the envelope and kissed where Tisi’s lips had been. Holding it before him, he looked at it again. Scrawled quickly in an honest hand writ a name and an address. Inside was a photo he had added before departing home, her school portrait. This was as valuable as a diamond, though the address of Tisi’s cousin, who was expecting him, was vital.

Folding the envelope in neatly creased thirds to protect the photo, Ernst Sturm placed it in his jacket pocket. As he walked, the suitcase felt less burdensome.

For here, in the Southern Hemisphere—El Sud—the summer begins tomorrow. Letters to write. Plans to make.

He recalled Tisi’s words the night they met.

As one travels outside of this path the soul will hurt. Shortcuts taken against instinct invariably end in failure.

Often the journey is delayed in the effort of retracing ones steps.

Thus, instead forge ahead.

Come, and I will follow.

Beams of sunlight broke through the dissipating fog, striking the cobblestones with gold.