Axolotl Roadkill by Helene Hegemann

Author:Helene Hegemann
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781849018883
Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group

I got the elation, hesitation, dissipation, coagulatin’, relaxation, angxation, emancipation, propagation, moppin’, soppin’, talkin’ ‘bout your coppin’ blues

(The Charlatans)

Funnily enough, it’s pretty simple. The incredible paean to a well-planned lighting concept, which only a few seconds ago consisted of nothing more than two misplaced floor lamps. A kebab shop turning more and more into the desired techno palace with every blink. The question of whether a life spent sober can ever have any point.

Edmond, having stuffed a Turkish börek in his mouth while mumbling that he really ought to get more poetic, provides the answer to this all-important question: ‘And at last it’s all over, our hearts are really pretty fucked, but suddenly they’re not scared any more of turning into historical documents!’

Yeah, right. I’m wearing a dark blue parka, and the present day is still burning through the material into my back muscles. The world is melting. When I glance at my wrist, three stamps remind me that Berlin belongs to me. Varnished wooden furniture with unacceptably patterned upholstery, the walls decorated with enlarged passport photos of the children of the man currently standing behind a glass counter, with a daily habit of processing salmonella-infected meat using high-quality kebab slicing equipment.

I say, ‘You guys have got it so good, you’ve got siblings.’

Instead of diverting her attention to me, Annika leans over the back of her chair, her eyes closed. I’m vulnerable in this respect.

She says, ‘Don’t talk such a load of crap, you’ve got siblings too. You’ve got us – we’re incompetent and crap, but we’re your brother and sister.’

‘That’s not what I mean – you grew up together and everything.’

‘We shared bunk beds.’

‘Exactly.’

‘That was completely shit, it’s nothing to envy.’

‘But what you said the other day sounded so awesome, when you were staying in that holiday home with Dad in Zurich and you decided you wanted to eat fish, but then his girlfriend wanted to buy this cheap salmon at the supermarket and you said, “No, we’re getting proper fish!” And then the stupid cunt dragged Dad down to the basement and shrieked, “I can’t take it, this whole luxury crap and all the whole crap and they’re so spoilt and all that – they get it from their mother.”’

‘Jesus, I’d almost repressed that memory.’

‘And then you looked at Edmond and asked if you ought to call up the car-sharing agency and get a lift home, and Edmond like pursed his lips and nodded.’

Edmond, ‘Did you tell her that, Annika? That I pursed my lips and nodded?’

‘Anyway, I thought it was so great that you weren’t alone. Imagine if it’d been me sitting there, I couldn’t have looked at anyone to make sure it wasn’t me that was the problem, it was that stupid cunt’s inadequate reaction that was the problem.’

‘Please stop saying stupid cunt, I’ll pick it up and if those words come out of my mouth at the agency tomorrow morning, some intern in snakeskin boots will ask if I have Tourette’s syndrome.’

‘But don’t you understand

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