Berlin Picks Up
The call came on a Friday morning, a week after I’d been to Berlin, when I was trying to steal a few more hours of sleep before Silvi’s party that night. The phone rang. My grandmother: how was I, did I need her to come over for the dishes, had I tidied up. Fine, no thanks, no. I hung up and drifted back toward sleep.
A few minutes later, another call. Not my grandmother. Berlin itself, it felt like. I was awake immediately.
To skip the suspense: I got the job. Moving to Berlin. Starting my apprenticeship at Aperto in September, and I want to say—even though it sounds impossibly sentimental—that I’m grateful to Ella and Tim for making it happen. They gave me a shot at something I’d actually wanted.
That’s it for me and Buchloe, then. I’m leaving without regret; nothing’s holding me here. Several things are shifting at once: Becks is newly in a relationship and heading to Augsburg for psychology instead of Freiburg. Ana and the others face the hardest year before their Abitur—they’ll get through it, even if Nastja was already tearing up about it. Hannah has her own September waiting; she says one day she’ll come to Berlin and stage the best fashion show of the century. I’m holding her to that.
I don’t worry about the people I’m leaving behind. My mother has her life here, her circle, her job—and I’ll come back to visit. Mille is working his martial arts circuit and traveling through Eastern Europe with Annette. Eniz will make his first million before I make mine, probably on sports betting; he has a system that apparently spans generations. And Ali is the last person who needs anyone’s concern. He’s sharp enough and charming enough to walk out of any disaster looking like he planned it. Or else he learns. Either way.
I haven’t quite taken it in yet. I can still resent this town because I still live here, and that won’t be true much longer. I’ll probably miss it eventually. I’ll probably figure out that I’m actually leaving when I’m drunk on someone’s couch somewhere—crying, or laughing, or both at once. We’ll see.