Banality
He's angry. He's angry because he can see in your eyes that you've already won. You both know the thin barrier between anger and defeat. In his thoughts he strikes you down, utterly destroying you, but the vague imaginings of his mind mean nothing and penance forbids any real action. In the meetings they taught him the obsequious, tight-lipped smile, the shame-faced laugh, the "I'm sorry, I don't drink" with a polite decline of the head. They told him he was powerless against it, that he had to embrace his weaknesses. And he is weak, and he's powerless against you. And angry, but only for a little while.
"Why are you trying to forget?" you ask him. "Or are you lying? Are you lying to others or just to yourself?"
He says nothing, and that confirms everything you already knew. His psychiatrist, the tired, fat one, has asked him that many times before. It was an empty question, back then, and was always met with an empty response. "Why are you lying to yourself, Richard?" the psychiatrist would ask him. A shuddering breath, a whisper: "Because I'm afraid, Dr. Reichwein."
"Why are you afraid?" "Because I lie." "Why do you lie?" "Because I'm afraid." "What's the most frightening thing?" Silence. It's a tired catechism.
The wind is strong up here, with no trees or buildings to oppose it, and the sky with all its rushing clouds has descended from above in order to push against him, first one way, then the other. He tenses his shoulders and locks his knees against it. You lean back and watch.
"Did you confirm that boy's crime? Did you have the right to execute him? Do you think that by lying your crime will disappear?"
Your questions are not made for answers, and so when he opens his mouth he can only close it again, open and close, open and close, making wordless sounds like an animal struck dumb, a fish writhing on the spear that tears through its heart.
"What a heavy sin," you murmur, as if to yourself. "How can one who has committed such a sin meet his daughter and say he has turned his life around?"
He's not angry anymore. He's not anything anymore––not even weak, not even powerless. Only still, unmoving, even in this wind. An empty glass waiting to be filled. You can't help but smile, just a little.
"Well," you say. "Would you like a drink?"
He stares at your outstretched hand. "It's hopeless," he says, his words slurring slightly. "It always was."
You unscrew the lid to the whisky bottle and take a sip. He watches and swallows when you do.
"What was the point," he whispers, "Of trying so hard if I was just going to give up in the end?" His face is flushed, his breathing ragged. "In the end it meant nothing. It's almost as if I was drinking the whole time."
You wipe off the rim of the bottle with your thumb and offer the whisky to him once more. "Then what's wrong with having a drink right now?" you ask.
"Nothing, really," he says. "Nothing at all." He takes the bottle with both hands and holds it gently, like a newborn child. After his first drink he splutters a little, but he throws the next one back with practiced ease. "You know, this stuff is awful." Laughter quivers at the back of his throat. "Normally I'd drink scotch, but desperate times––" He laughs and drinks again.
You listen to yourself laugh along with him. To his murmurings about this or that distillery, about his opinion of bourbon. You listen to the wind and the creak of the railing as you lean against it.
The railing poses a problem. In order to be out of your way this man must first walk to the edge of the roof, climb over the railing, and then conveniently jump or somehow lose his footing. Of course, if things get too difficult you could just shoot him. But the sound of the shot would carry too easily from this location, and perhaps the wind would take it even further. Besides, murders aren't nearly as amusing as suicides.
Alternatively, you could lead the man to the second level of the roof, where there's no railing, just an eight-story fall to concrete and then nothing. Faintly you remember the time you led Karl up there.
"Where're you going?"
"To the second level. It has a better view."
He grunts and cranes his head to watch you go up the ladder. "You shouldn't be climbing around like that when you're drunk," he says. "Better stay close to the ground. Might fall."
"No I won't," you say. "I won't fall. I promise." When he looks up at your face he sees the same cheeky grin his daughter wears in the pictures that he keeps in his wallet.
"Well," he grumbles, "Just be careful, okay?"
You pause for a moment, then frown and lean back to look at him. "You should come, too. Like I said, the view is excellent."
"Nah, I'm fine," he says. "Don't need a pretty view to enjoy myself."
"But aren't you going to share that with me?" you ask.
The man starts and looks at the bottle at his lips, as if he forgot it was there. "What? Did you buy this? I guess you did, didn't you?"
"I did."
He grunts again and takes a moment to find the pocket of his jacket before stuffing the bottle inside and staggering onto the ladder, which groans and complains against his weight. You don't wait for him once you reach the top. Instead, you walk toward the ledge and stare out at the city below––the sharp edges of the buildings, the muted gray of the streets, the black of the alleyways. In all that darkness you can't see a single human soul.
As soon he reaches the top he sits on the ground and watches the clouds that lurch across the sky. "Do you think it'll rain?" he asks.
"Perhaps," you say, but it won't. This is the kind of wind that only makes threats of a coming storm.
"I hope so," he says. "I really hope it rains." The tone of his voice asks you to ask him why. As soon as you turn to face him––nod, make a vague noise of interest––he continues. "Because of my daughter," he flops on his back and spreads his arms wide. "Because my daughter loves the rain."
You turn back to the city. If a soft groan of irritation were to escape you now, the howling of the wind would cover it. But you make no sound.
"She used to play this game?" You hear him laugh––a sick, unpleasant hacking––and you hear the question in his voice. Now it is you who cannot answer, but only because he thinks being with you means being alone. Alone with all his forgettable memories. You kick the ledge, again, again, again, in a constant rhythm as slow and as sharp as your own heartbeat.
"No, I can't––" he sucks his breath in through his teeth and takes another drink. Only two, maybe three, ounces are left. After another silent moment his shoulders slump. "I can't remember. A game, on rainy days. Something to do with puddles."
You find yourself on the ledge, now, swinging your right leg out in a dramatic arch that cuts through the empty air. One perilous step, then another, another. Tap, tap goes your heart, and you clasp your hands behind your back and look past the city into the night.
"What the hell are you doing?"
"Playing a game."
"Get down from there this instant! You'll get yourself killed!" He grabs at your collar, tries to pull you back, but you just laugh and dodge away.
"You've never played this before?" Standing about five feet away from him––a relatively safe distance––you dip one toe into the blank space beneath the ledge. "Not even after the incident with Stephan Joss? Don't tell me you never considered it."
"No!" Defiance flares in his eyes once more. "I've got my little girl to think of."
You raise your eyebrows. "Oh? And did you think of her when you killed that boy?"
He turns and stomps toward the ladder. "Fuck you, you little prick."
This is what will happen to the man if he climbs down that ladder: At the age of 84 he will fall asleep in front of a midnight infomercial on mute. A crossword puzzle will lie abandoned on his lap and old drool will crust on his chin. No one will see him sputter out in the middle of the night. They might not even notice the cold ashes left in the hearth the next morning. He is not a flame, but a flicker. In comparison to him, each man, woman, and child that you have killed has been such a blaze of momentary light. Those people would have charged at you, just now, for saying what you have said. And you would have brushed them past you, brushed them out over the ledge. Or maybe they would have jumped without your help. In any case, your words would smell and taste like gasoline to them. But some men are so dead they can't even die.
Like Karl. Whenever you're with him you want to light something on fire. Sometimes, during your Latin lessons together, you feel imaginary matches beneath your fingers. You long to strike them. But that never happens, because somehow Karl can convince you to do––or not to do––many things, one in particular. If Karl, dull, vapid Karl, can convince you of one thing, then he can convince a reasonable man of anything.
Karl turns toward the man and mutters, "Maybe I shouldn't have said…what I said."
"Yeah?" Mr. Braun pauses in front of the ladder but doesn't turn around.
"I––," Karl sits down on the ledge, tilts his head up to the sky, and takes a deep breath. "It's great up here, isn't it? It's even better earlier in the evening, around dusk, when families are coming home for dinner. You can smell it from here. Leberkäse from this house. Schweinshaxe and klöße from that." Karl grips the rough cement beneath his fingers. "It's like one big feast the whole city shares."
"Hey, kid––" Mr. Braun is staring at him. The whisky bottle dangles from his hand. "Are you okay?" he asks. Only now does Karl realize he's crying.
"I'm fine," says Karl. He tries to take a steadying breath, but that only makes it worse.
Mr. Braun shuffles over from the ladder. Before sitting down he hesitates, but soon he's on the ledge with Karl, their feet side-by-side, swinging through the air.
"Look, son––"
"This is––" Karl waves away the unsteady hand that hovers over his shoulder. "It's nothing, I'm sorry."
"Maybe you think that you're all alone. That there's no one out there who cares about you," says Mr. Braun. He looks at the sky with Karl, scanning the clouds for rain. "I've felt that before. I understand. But you know you're wrong about that, right?"
After Karl gives a reluctant nod and shrugs his shoulders, Mr. Braun ruffles his hair. Then he pulls his hand away and sits on it.
"I guess, when I think about it, I remember people that cared about me. People I shared meals with," says Karl. He turns to Mr. Braun. "Those meals weren't always happy, but they were family, you know?"
Mr. Braun nods and says, "Yes, I do." He looks relieved and a little pleased with himself, so Karl's not sure whether he should say what he planned to say next. His urge toward kindness and his urge toward the truth both tug at him, first one way, then the other. And then he remembers something that Johan once told him, that telling the truth is always a kindness. Karl clears his throat and speaks.
"Mr. Braun, I've been in and out of orphanages since I was a child. One of those orphanages was Kinderheim 511, where Stephan Joss was raised."
"Oh God––"
"Can you see now why your case is so important to me?"
"I'm sorry," says Mr. Braun. He drops the empty whisky bottle and it crashes with a tinkle 80 feet below. "Oh God, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."
Karl extends his hand and rests it tentatively on the man's trembling shoulder. It's an inelegant solution. And it's not something Karl would do, so there's also that inconsistency. Yet it's efficient. It saves time. Besides, you're already late for your next appointment.
Author's Note
Good God, Johan is hard to write. But I do love him so, and I figured I just had to try. I will say that I have never felt so conflicted watching anime as I did when I saw this scene. I wasn't sure whether I wanted to slap Johan or give him a round of applause. On the one hand, it was absolutely brilliant the way he took out Richard. On the other, it was just so…mean!
I apologize for how pretentious this story is. I would say that it's just Johan's arrogance coming through, but it's not. It's my arrogance.
Anyway, this is my second fanfic ever. Strangely, my first fic is also set in Munich and is also in the second person (and is also really pretentious). Shrugs.
Some of the dialogue is taken from various translations of both the manga and the anime, some fan translations, some official.
Finally, and needless to say, I do not own Monster, Johan, Richard, or Karl. I do, however, own an awful lot of whisky.