Flights of Love by Bernhard Schlink

Author:Bernhard Schlink
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
ISBN: 9780307425935
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2007-12-18T00:00:00+00:00

4

WITHOUT HELGA he wouldn’t have made it through the winter. She didn’t ask many questions, didn’t say much of anything, but was beautiful, soft, took pleasure in him in bed, enjoyed their drives and dinners together, his presents. He was so happy in the relationship that he spoiled her. She was there for him when he could no longer cope.

Until time came for exams. She needed a patient, asked him, and he didn’t want to refuse her request. He assumed he was letting himself in for especially painful shots, especially agonizing drilling, bad fillings, and lop-sided crowns, but was willing to accept it all for her sake. In fact he let himself in for something else. Nothing went wrong, there was no pain or agony. On the contrary, every move Helga made was first checked by a dental assistant and then, if he had any doubts or the procedure was especially important or difficult, by the head dentist. It all went smoothly. Waiting for the assistant or the dentist wasn’t unpleasant, either. Helga and another student, who would lend her a hand and vice versa, talked and joked with him, and when Helga bent down over him she let her breasts brush against his face. But it took an eternity. He spent hour after hour, half a day after half a day at the clinic. If his appointment was for nine o’clock, the rest of his morning schedule was shot, and if he came at two, he would still be sitting there at five—no meetings held, no construction sites visited, no red tape unraveled. He had to reschedule meetings for the evening and take more work home on the weekends, and his elaborate structure of hours and days in Berlin and Hamburg began to totter.

He realized what a mess he, or Helga, had got him into and wanted to take his half-filled root canals, his half-finished fillings and crowns to his own dentist and be done with it all in two hours. When he told Helga, she reacted with cold rage. He needn’t show his face to her again if he deserted her now. She didn’t know how she would pay him back for the damage he’d done to her prospects for her exam, but she’d come up with something he’d never forget. He certainly didn’t want to jeopardize her exams, he simply hadn’t realized that cutting the procedure short would put her in jeopardy, and immediately agreed to let her go on treating him. The heavy artillery she had pulled into position wouldn’t have been necessary. But it taught him that there were both determination and an inflexible will beneath her inviting femininity.

Once she had passed her exams with flying colors, she laid out her project of a private dental clinic. She would start the preparatory phase while serving her assistant-ship. Would he like to be a part of it? Plan and build it with her as the architect? Help shape and enjoy the financial success as a silent

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