Grace (English Version)

Chapter 12

It's been a week since Grace is back. It's the weekend now and I don't know whether it is on or off. My feelings are total chaos and change every few minutes. I can't concentrate, let alone sit still. No matter where I am, I have the urge to go somewhere else. I can't take it anymore on Sunday and get up early to attend the Sunday morning service. I've never done anything like this because I tend to sleep a lot. That night I barely closed my eyes and the urgent need to speak to someone. I hope the service calms me down a little and maybe I can talk to our pastor afterwards.

"What is there?" Pastor Mendes asked me after the service when I came to him.

"I have a problem that I cannot solve."

"Come along." He leads me to the sacristy and offers me a chair. I'm starting to tell.

"At the beginning of this school year I met a girl. At first she was very closed and suspicious of us. She was new to our school and is actually from the USA, so I considered it normal. I later invited her to the cinema and after that we talked for a while. On that occasion, I had the first suspicion that she had a secret she didn't want to talk about at any price. She seemed very uncomfortable. We got together around Christmas. We celebrated Christmas and New Year's Eve together. A few weeks later, she disappears completely unexpectedly. There is no sign of life. I have written countless messages and called her dozens of times. Since I couldn't reach her parents either, I went to the police to file a missing person report. Just as I am sitting there she suddenly calls and tells me that everything is fine with her. She completely ignores my questions about where she is and how she is. It is typical of her. When she doesn't want, she just doesn't answer. For the next few days, however, she will still be gone and I won't hear anything from the police. At some point I didn't care. After all, she just let me sit and that's why I'm mad at her. Then one day she reappears in the city and at school as if nothing had ever happened. Not a word of her disappearing or anything like that. As if she had never been away. And this is exactly the point. She is back and she is fine. So I should be happy about it. Instead, I don't feel anything. I didn't care that she was back and that scared me. I don't know how to behave. I can't just upset her like I do. But I also can't just go on like nothing has happened. What should I do?"

Pastor Mendes thinks for a while.

"You are asking me a difficult question here. Your story is very strange. Tell me more about your friend."

"Her name is Grace and she comes from the USA, but she was born in Australia. She looks like she doesn't shy away from hard work and is quite strong. She wears her own style of clothing and has a prosthesis below the right knee. At the beginning she looked very closed She didn't seem to be comfortable at school and was always sitting there as if expecting to escape the next moment. She is often very taciturn, especially at the beginning. Everyone knew her and knew nothing about her. I don't that do really today. She seems to have something to fight against internally. As far as her time in the US is concerned, especially the last few months, she's completely blocked. Something has happened that is very stressful. I have the feeling that it hangs with her prosthesis. "

"An interesting person."

"It really is. In its very own way." I show the pastor a photo of her, it is the New Years photo. He nods after a while.

"She has a special charisma, you can see that. However, she seems to feel comfortable in your presence."

"That's right. When we were alone she was always in a good mood. Only in this special case she was very silent. She always said very little. A very quiet person, at least in company."

I tell the pastor quite a bit. From her, from me, from our friendship.

"You are both unusual people. You too," summarizes Mendes.

"In what way?"

"You can respond very well to other people and understand their nature. You can quickly guess how they behave and what their problems are. You are extremely social. Therefore you are different from the crowd and therefore become an outsider because you are different. You can read in other people, but it is difficult for you to talk to them, also because you are afraid they could make fun of your dialect. "

"How did you find out all of this?"

"I speak to people every day. I can read in them too."

"And what do you advise me to do?"

"You can't lie. You have to go to Grace and tell her what bothers you, how you feel and what needs to be changed. You have to make it clear to her that her behavior has hurt you a lot."

"Am I not risking our friendship with it? She could get pretty pissed off."

"It is possible, but I don't think so. Of course she will be angry, but she will understand what mistakes she made and will forgive you."

"For sure?"

"I'm sure."

"Thank you Pastor Mendes."

"No problem my son. God help you in your actions and give you strength. Let me know if there is anything new."

"Of course. Thank you."

"Goodbye."

Now I see things differently. Pastor Mendes has disclosed some things to me. I will talk to Grace. Today. I'm calling.

"Yes?"

"Grace? It's Fiete. We have to talk."

Silence on the line. What else.

"At 2 in the park," I say and hang up. A very cruel deed, but if I don't present Grace to a fait accompli, her stubbornness wins. So I drive to the park and wait. Wait for the encounter that means the decision between reconciliation and disaster.

I get nervous in the park. I'm still pissed off, but of course the first doubts come in the light of the upcoming conversation, which will be anything but easy.

Grace comes running and I brace myself for the conversation. A frontal attack seems to make the most sense to me.

"Here I am," she greets me.

"Where have you been the last few weeks?"

"Glad to see you too."

"Grace, where have you been?"

"Out of town?!"

"I know that much too. Where have you been?"

"In an apartment near Hamburg."

"In the middle of school? Why?"

"For personal reasons."

"Aha. For personal reasons. And you don't think it's possible to get in touch?"

"Bad network."

"Don't tell crap! Why didn't you report back?"

"As I said bad ..."

"Damn Grace! You don't tell me where you went or why you went there; you don't even tell me that you EVER went anywhere. Do you realize how shit it is? To go somewhere without those close to you to say one is gone! This is really the very last! You don't believe how pissed of I felt! "

"I can understand..."

"No, you can't! It's typical again. You just do something without telling anyone. The others will adjust to it, or what? That really annoys!"

"Then just leave it!"

"Good idea Grace. I'll just let it go. Have a nice afternoon." I turn around and march to the train. It really didn't go the way I wanted it to. Grace really knows how to piss other people off. From now on, I'll just let it be, just like she said it. No calls, visits, messages or anything. I leave it. Let's see what happens. Is that what she imagined or does she regret her words? I will definitely not make it easy for her. I've fought for her for so long, now it's her turn. Should she fight for me? We'll see how much I mean to her. I would fight in their place. I still love her deep inside me, even though I'm not very good at talking to her on the outside.

In the evening, despite my anger, I have doubts. I wasn't exactly sensitive. This was more like the brute force method. With the mallet on top. I should be a little more diplomatic next time, but I'm too defiant at the moment to admit this mistake to Grace.