by Katja Bartholmess
June 1988
Sunlight reflects off a brass-colored panel of doorbells. My finger hovers over the rows of dirty-white buttons, one for each of this highrise building’s apartments. I’m about to ring up strangers. I will ask for their recycling and they won’t be surprised. No, they might even have things lying around for that purpose: To give to students at our after-school rally.
Before ringing any of the bells, however, I feel a pinch of rebellion. I let my hand drop.
Looking over my shoulder at my two classmates, I see Silke wrestling a few stacks of newspapers tied with string under her arm. Next to her, glass clinks as Katrin shifts a nylon bag full of empty bottles from one hand to the other. We’re all dressed in the white uniform shirts and red neckerchiefs that mark us as members of the Thälmann Pioneer organization.
“I have a better idea,” I say and turn to face them with my most winning smile.
Katrin looks up from the hand she’s started to clench and unclench. The handles of her bag must be cutting into her palm. Meanwhile, Silke has maneuvered the newspaper stacks onto her hip. Both stare at me blankly.
“What do you mean?” Silke asks.
I point at the expanse of blue sky that peeks out between the buildings around us.
“The day is too nice and it’s too hot to keep begging for trash,” I say.
Katrin’s eyebrows shoot up in protest.
“It’s not trash, Nina,” she says. “It's recycling.”
“Same thing,” I say. “It’s boring. And besides, it’s not as if it matters whether we get a bit more trash or not.”
“Recycling,” Katrin repeats, it sounds less urgent already.
“Let’s go to the quarry lake instead,” I suggest. “I heard the swans had babies.”
Silke tickles her nose with the tip of her ponytail. The promise of baby birds is working its magic on her and she doesn’t resist when I take the newspaper stacks from under her arm and pile them by the entrance door.
When I motion to relieve Katrin of her bag of bottles, she hesitates.
“What if we get caught?” she asks. “I don’t want to get into trouble.”
Like all the after-school stuff that our weeks are stacked with, these collections are mandatory.
“We won’t get caught,” I say.
“But what if we do?” Katrin insists.
“But we won’t,” I reassure her.
She rolls her eyes, but lets me take the bag from her. I set it down next to the paper. One of the other teams can take them.
Silke has started to trot down the stairs leading to the building entrance. I grab the railing for balance and slide down the metal brackets that parents with strollers use to navigate the stairs. I hit the sidewalk first. Katrin lingers at the top of the steps for another moment, then shakes her head and descends the stoop as well.
“You sometimes forget that we’re not all superstars,” Katrin grumbles as she steps toward us. “You get away with much more.”
“It’s true, Nina,” Silke chimes in. “And you don’t have a dad who tells you which way is up either. You’ve never even gotten grounded.”
That last part stings and I must have pulled a face because Silke immediately links her arm to mine and starts walking.
“Which way are we going?” she asks.
“Across the train tracks,” I say and smile at her.
Silke looks back at Katrin and pushes her other hand into her waist. Like the handle of a teapot. Katrin catches up and threads her arm through it.
As we amble down the sidewalk, the bright white of Silke and Katrin’s uniform shirts stands out against the muddy gray of the buildings around us. We live in a socialist model city. A perfect city of the future. Tall, wide, rectangular blocks of concrete as far as the eye can see. They are prefab apartment buildings called Plattenbau. All alike. Right angles, identical windows and pebble dash. The quarry lake is the one and only oasis that we have around here. And even that one is surrounded by high rises.
Intent on catching the summer rays, I lift my face toward the sun. The warmth feels as nice as the tingle from stealing a little time for ourselves from the never-ending barrage of obligations. I’m about to say something when Silke slows her step beside me.
“On no,” she says, worry in her voice.
I blink against the sun and then I see her. Yvonne. Our class council president and her team of after-school trash collectors. They are crossing the street ahead of us – all laden with collected recycling. My heartbeat fastens.
I steer us around a corner and into the shadows of an underpass. As we slip away, I glance over my shoulder.
“They didn’t see us,” I insist, trying to sound more confident than I feel.
My voice echoes off the walls around us. My normal heart beat returns. So does the thrill. As we huddle together for a while longer to make sure Yvonne is gone, Katrin and Silke’s remark takes root. What if they’re right? What if I really get away with more than others?
Shouldn’t I take a little more advantage of it?
***