Why so late E-Book

Helen Henckel

• Herausgeber: novum publishing
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 144

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

"Why so late?" In the sigh of a man in his fifties lies incredulous and delighted amazement at his chance encounter with a woman, only in her sixties according to the birth register, who sweeps him along like a wave and lets them both experience the highs and lows of late love. Neither of them are prepared for the rivalry of his teenage daughter, who vehemently defends her monopoly position in her single father's life. How capable are the three of them of maintaining a relationship in this exceptional situation, which develops turbulently over four years and is stretched to breaking point?

Leseprobe

Helen Henckel

Why so late

Wave action of late love

Contents

Isn’t it?

1 Short, yeah – and also sweet?

2 Beginning and end

3 Half a globe between us

4 Closeness and narrowness

5 In the neighborhood

6 One night – sustainably good

7 Turbulences

8 Blowing down to Marsala

9 Weakening, awakening, retreating

10 Taking a chance

11 So close, so tight

12 Attempted escapes

13 Islands in the sea, river and lake

14 A merchant’s cash ceck – and his lady’s

15 Stormy and silent

16 Holding the balance

17 Rippling waves

18 Storm without autopilot

19 Asia II

20 Ripcord or throwline?

21 Wave riders

Or is it?

Isn‘t it?

Fit and feminine, female and single for five years. For two years in a new context of life at the lake, far away from the exhausted living environment in West Germany, with a new job and a new social network. And new tasks.

Satisfied - aren't you? Yes, a high quality of life.

Happy - no.

Looking for a partner - no. Neither virtually nor in real life.

And then found him - yes!

A junior with ten years less on his lifetime account - is that possible?

Isn’t it?

Gender stereotypes are behind me. And him.

1 Short, yeah - and also sweet?

"It is as if we had moved towards each other, in our respective life tracks, until they intersected, touched and since then have been running parallel towards infinity."

A handwritten note from May of our first year re-emerges. And this is our story in short:

At last!

Our paths cross at a construction site on a grayish late winter day in early February. With purpose. Appointment for an apartment viewing. He, the real estate expert who is to market my almost completed condominium, and I, who wants to correct a bad decision with the purchase. I don't want to own anything anymore! I want to be flexible! Mobile - spatially and otherwise. As a local expert and Doctor of political science in a foreign city, he was referred to me as his client PhD by a mutual business friend. We know each other's birthdates, mine from the sales contract, his from Google. I'm 68 and he's 58. A difference in age, yes. Optically, energetically, no. It's all about business. Just that. Really? He invites me. To follow-up conversations. To cups of coffee, black for both of us, with chocolate, both our favorite snack - we realize. We never have lunch. Neither of us does. Topics of conversation expand. He comes from the West, disillusioned: "Wife gone, house gone, child lost and regained. Now a single parent." I'm similarly uprooted, coming from the West: "Husband lost, top job over, house sold, new start in the East." Conversations go deeper. Research, family and leisure, work, getting older and plans for the future. Conversations tempt us. To meet again, to connect, to get close, to stay. "Boy, he's courting you!" I can't believe it! Can't he read age data? Quick exchanges of words and intellectual leaps via email and WhatsApp, first names are followed by new baptismal names, from him: Bella and Bero. At the matinee with Beethoven and Brahms in the concert hall at the end of March, he opens up and gives me a deep insight into the beat and feelings of a man in free fall. That's when he wins me over. For himself.

"I'm the beginning!" he writes on the concert ticket at the end of a delightfully aimless stroll through the neighborhood under the first sunny rays of spring in March. "Get home safely, my Bella, the first move has been made!“ His short message on WhatsApp follows me on my way back home. Cinema replaces culture. The Tote Hosen rage across the screen. We share the 80s and the warmth of our arms on the plush armchairs in the semi-darkness of the top row of a neighborhood cinema. Teen lovers’ cuddle time déjà vu! Then we are the last midnight guests on high chairs by the window in a wine bar, gazing into the night and each other‘s eyes, wondering, exploring, letting ourselves fall. Street cinema. Falling in love - no German sentence has this depth. I drive him back.

# (He) "Right turn. That's where the child sleeps. Left turn is where you live. And then you'd have to take me with you!"

* (Me) "Alright, we're in the wild big city here, so I can turn left, crossing three lanes."

# "Yes, just like that: cheeky and wild."

I have a spare toothbrush and put him up in the guest room, a leapfrog act as among animals in heat, a headless retreat in the middle of theheated stage of sexual advances. He complies:

# "I'm a good boy."

But he probably wants to be enticed by me. However, I remain hesitant, block it, sneaking past his closed door until the wee hours, my hand resting on the door knob. Caressing. A substitute action. Reveling in his courtship. That won’t happen again. The lightness of his wooing for weeks - enjoying it a few more hours or daring to take the next step into his embrace? The bright early morning hours bring clarity. And give us "seconds of happiness", as sung by Grönemeyer's raspy voice: "the unique fraction of a millisecond ..."

Hands roaming, lips exploring, caressing eyes looking for the spark that will finally ignite.

* "You’ve got a lot of plans for today. How much time is left for us?"

# "Enough."

* "Then come. With. Me."

Textiles fall. Bodies fall. For each other. Under each other. Into each other. Merge. Desiring. Seducing. Slowing down. Failing (she). Prematurely climaxing (he). Forgiving.

# Leave a Ferrari in the garage, unused for years. It also needs fine tuning. We’ve got a world of time."

* Yes, digging deep. Into our hearts and bodies. It's a process, couple motion, not instant success."

For the fifth year now, we are both on a parallel course, exploring each other, in pulsating proximity and smoothing distance, in two homes and two domains in two nearby cities.

# "Why so late?!"

This is Bero's early cryptic version of "Love has no age".

So where do we go from here – running parallel towards infinity? Parallel, yes. Still. In the fifth year. That's all that counts. The here and now. Distance and closeness. Meeting and parting. More together than apart? Who knows for sure. At least in the rhythm of the heartbeat. In wave action. That‘s life. My life. His too?

This is the patchwork of our story. I want to fill in the blanks. Not all of them, just the pivotal points. The ones that point the way. Not everything is worth telling.

And this is the motto of my life with BellaBero - and of my WhatsApp account, very soon after our beginnings, sweat and as light as a feather:

How many stones

must be swallowed

as a punishment

for happiness

and how deep

you have to dig

until the field

yields milk and honey

Erich Fried, "Necessary questions"

2 Beginning and end

Two or three months into our new relationship. I want to seduce him to develop feelings. To be able to love. He probably does. In his own way. But to be able to say it. Not just to confess it silently in our chats. How? With his child. His daughter of fifteen and a half years. Not as a means for Machiavelli's purposes. No, for her own sake. Out of loving kindness. Because she has gone through so many upheavals in her young life – in her family and in school, at home and in peer groups, and in health. Because she deserves it. And is worth it. I will tell him that and her, some other day.

To entice Kaya to develop an interest in going out into the wider world, in socializing with others. Building relationships. Beyond the symbioticDaddy-Kiddie axis. Step by step. She came back into her father's life at the same time as I in February - brought back from the other end of the republic after a five-year odyssey with host families and in boarding schools. Since her parents divorced. Now isolated in the big city, at a new school without friends, commuting to school for one and a half hour, stuck in the cramped apartment of a bachelor father with a time-consuming job.

Hopefully, I'll succeed with her, step by step. I don't want to scare Kaya, and I certainly don't want to lecture her. I want her to enjoy interacting with other people, preferably with people her own age, in new living spaces, at my place at the lake, pursuing leisure activities: cycling, running, swimming, boating, partying, shopping, cooking, dining. I want her to like classes and their offer to acquire knowledge and skills she might use for her growing understanding of people, society and the world.

Give them time. Let it grow. Let him grow. And her. Let him see his daughter blossom. No couch potato anymore, no more boredom, no more disinterest in outdoor living, no more endless browsing in social media channels.

Three and a half years after our first meeting. Kaya has been co-living with me in our commune at the lake for two and a half years and has found a new school in my small town, a comfortable 25-minute commute by bike and bus.

Kaya just turned 18 and has blossomed. Put on weight, more than I have, enjoying the vital range of her young adult powers. Eats with the appetite of a calorie-burning teenager. Buys food for herself on our motorized shopping trips, prepares small meals for school and home. Rides her bike to the bus stop in all weathers. Swims and paddles in the lake. No longer weakens in challenging situations or menstrual turbulences. Does sports, voluntarily and with pleasure, working out to the point of self-imposed exhaustion. No longer shies away from neighbors, chatting with them in a relaxed and familiar tone. Adopts her neighbor's cat, a pet that she was never allowed to have as an alleged bacteria blaster in her biological mother's regiment, showing her caring side. Goes out, beautified, styled, and reliably returns home at night, sober, no drugs, sometimes using my cab service. On her way through adolescence, she dares to be cheeky towards the only person with whom she can do this without having to worry about consequences: me. Achieves good grades at high school graduation, raised by one grade level thanks to the coaching of her hostess in the commune. Which she wouldn't want to admit. Invites her hostess to the graduation ceremony under massive pressure from her father. Refuses, however, to invite her to the high school prom, continues to exclude the woman at Daddy's side, unwilling to grant family status to third parties.

Now, as I begin to write our story, Kaya has just turned 19, a young adult and, after graduating from high school by the lake, she is back in her dad's apartment in the big city and from there goes on her graduation trip to the Mediterranean. Self-organized. Self-confident. In love with herself. Elated at her recent graduation, the gateway to life. Ready to go her own way. And six months later, she will be taking off again: on a course of self-discovery in Scandinavia.

The life span with the set goal of "high school graduation" has been completed. Child satisfied. Dad proud. And relieved.

# "An Atlas weight has fallen off me!"

So he confesses to me. While his child keeps at a distance. From Bella.

All's well that ends well? No, it’s not the end - fortunately. But not all is well, either. Have I seduced him to love? The course of our relationship defies any predictable expectation - like a wave in motion.

3 Half a globe between us

A few days after the prom. Kaya at home alone in the big city in June. A weekend at the lake for Bella and Bero. Precious. Sensual. As it hasn’t been for a long time. Rediscovering ourselves? Without wanting to rewind to the beginning, the magic won't happen again. And we wouldn‘t want to live in asynchronous retrospection. It would blur our view of the present. After three and a half years, we have got the chance of riding a new wave: What will it be like without Kaya among or between us?

On the third and final day of their long pleasure weekend, they talk about their travel plans on a fresh but still unstable foundation.

* "I take a vacation from language school from July 2 to 20. Can we talk about traveling?"

# "I applied at university for three weeks of vacation in July."

* Super. Suits me. And what are we going to do?"

# "I'm going to Asia."

* "You? On business? Like New York, Stockholm and Vienna this year?"

# "No, as a tourist."

* "Alone?"

# "Yes."

* "You don't want me to join you?"

# "No."

* “How long will you be staying over there?”

# "From July 3 to July 24."

* "You're fixing the date for your solo trip in my vacation time?"

# "Yes."

* "Why?"

He has no answer. Just silent stares from empty eyes. Then a cautious attempt:

# "I gotta get out of here. Recharge my batteries. My mother's death in spring. Our quarrels. The crazy jobs at university and in the real estate business ... the kid ..."

Her self-restraint diminishes. Her reaction is more impulsive. Her summaryreview:

* "After two and a half years of marathon efforts for your child, close to me, in my home, giving up my spatial and temporal freedoms, my paid job, with extra efforts since last November encouraging her to graduate from high school, which resulted in valuable grade points on her diploma, not by her own work, while you spent the week at a distance of 40 km in the neighboring town with total freedom for your professional flights of fancy and your social contacts, with relaxation here at the lake on the long weekend, she brings in an aggressive virus from her party trips after graduation, which first you and then I had to fight fiercely, I still do today ... And the first thing you can imagine at the end of this long race together is: It’s ME who needs a break!"

He remains silent.

* "Then go your own way - alone, bello Bero! Let's split up."

She loses her self-control. She wants to get out of the room, further away from him, out of the relationship. He follows her. Holds her tight.

* "You're out that fast, less than a week after she graduated?! And the goal you achieved?!"

# "I wasn't thinking of splitting up. I can reconcile this."

* "How? Solo and still a partner? And you don't ask me? You exclude me from your plans? I'm not involved in your decision-making process? Only at the final stage? Like so many times before."

# "Yes, that was wrong."

* "Is it that easy? Making plans secretly, pursuing your own way and then saying it was wrong?"

Tentatively, awkwardly, he tries one of his rare hugs. It doesn't warm her.

# "Maybe just letting go in order to find each other again?"

* "These are ready-made slogans!"

# "Why not enjoy what we have in each other? Even if it's not 100 percent?"

Yes, she remembers. A conversation they had last September, in their third year. At the time, it seemed meaningful to her. A business guy’s declaration of love.

* "If we don't share new experiences, discover new things together, explore the world our way - 'wild, cheeky and wonderful', that used to be our motto. Then we’ll become impoverished. Dry up. Wither away."

Arguing gets them nowhere. The turmoil dies down inside her. The situation calms, unexpectedly. There is now a clarity, if not certainty, that replaces long weeks and months of doubt and hope. Is there still a feeling in him, a loving kindness,such as Hindus show to everyone, an appreciation that supports their relationship?

* "Who am I for you?"

My question, not asked at the beginning, but after just one year: I pleaded, insisted, shouted when we both had consumed too much alcohol, falling silent finally. Never answered. But now serenity: No, what I wished for didn't happen. To seduce him to love. Which would outlive the early stages of our intense discovery. I have to live with this loss in my lifetime account. But there is no more anxiety. He is certainly a great professional, a loveable man, but not a partner. Asia is a landmark on our path. A buoy in the strong wave action. I can now find a new orientation.

He makes another feeble attempt to explain himself.

# "I’ve got simply two souls in my breast."

* "Soul no. 1?"

# "You."

* "And what about me?"

# "Your intellect. Your body. Your caring for others."