Wolfgang throws away the burner phone he just used to check in on Felix's condition and continues walking down the boulevard. The doctor was away on an emergency and not expected back until that evening, so he must call later, as there is news regarding Herr Conan's condition. Wolfgang is annoyed and agitated and wishes he's still in Berlin. Instead, he is in Austria, specifically Graz, with a half-baked idea of driving through to Croatia and the coast, maybe disappearing among the tourists for awhile as Felix recovers, even though he doesn't need to anymore: Switching IDs with a dead bodyguard that matched his general description made it easy to kill Wolfgang Bogdanow, whom the authorities pronounce dead.
He thinks that in all the things that matter, it's the truth.
He spots a cafe not too far from the Mur and he doesn't think twice about the fact that it's Indian when he goes in to eat. He's hungry, and because it's only four in the afternoon, he is seated almost immediately in a quaint and intimate booth. He looks through the menu and orders a curry dish and naan and adds the thali just in case it's not enough. He declines the chai and asks for beer instead.
He can feel her pull at the back of his mind. Here, surrounded by pale imitations of India and aromas that are mere shadows of what exist in a restaurant in Mumbai, Kala's voice calls the loudest. The others stopped trying to reach him after Iceland. Kala has not given up.
He ignores her. Even though he really can't.
Wolfgang takes a drink of the local beer that is brought to his table and taps his finger absently against the glass. He blocks his mind from the wave of pain and regret that always comes whenever he permits himself to think of her, even just a little. For once in his life, he will do the right thing. He knows she deserves better than him.
Wolfgang looks down at the plates of food that are brought to his table, and his appetite wanes. He yearns to see her. There was a time when merely recalling her face brought them together, but he has learned how to control that, even when he indulges himself in heated, sordid fantasies of her (of them), with limbs tangled, in the dead of night. She would be appalled if she knew all the things he wanted to do to her.
Maybe not.
He forces himself to eat, and after a moment or two, it is no longer a chore. He eats his meal and pays for his food and heads back to his hotel.
...
It is after eight when Wolfgang finally reaches the doctor on a new burner phone. He has been feeling alternately high and low, thinking one minute that Felix is getting better and the next concluding his luck is too shitty for Felix to survive. But it's all good news: Felix woke up early that morning, very weak, and not fully coherent, but he was at least conscious for several-minute stretches. He asked for his brother.
Wolfgang feels relief for the first time in ages. He grins into the phone, tells the doctor that when Conan wakes again, let him know his brother is coming. He hangs up and shakes his head in wonderment. He considers driving back right away; it's only eight hours, maybe less, to Berlin, but he realizes it's foolish to do so at this hour. He sits for several minutes before he decides the news of Felix's health warrants a celebratory drink, even if he can't share it with the one person in his world who would give a fuck. Wolfgang grabs his jacket and leaves his room.
He goes no further than the next block, where he hears revelry coming from a touristy restaurant, so he lets himself in and sidles up to the dim bar, looking back at a group of office workers raucously celebrating something. He orders a beer and is content to listen to them enjoying themselves; their good cheer is amusing and keeps him company.
"Are you waiting for someone?" The bartender moves to stand by him as she hands him a beer. She's young and very pretty; her green eyes stand out against her short, dark brown hair. He shakes his head. "No," he says. She turns back to the office group when a loud cheer erupts but brings her attention back to Wolfgang as soon as the disruption proves harmless; there are two other bartenders and several wait staff in attendance anyway. She tilts her head slightly to the side and he notices a small tattoo behind her ear.
"Bad day?" She asks him.
The question makes him smile: He has just heard the best news in forever and instead he comes across as morose. He shakes his head again and says "no". "It's been a very good day, " he volunteers, and he raises his glass in salute. "I'm actually celebrating. "
He finishes the beer and gestures for another. She raises her eyebrows and goes to bring it to him. When she returns she asks him what it is that he celebrates, and he responds that his brother is finally recovering from a serious illness. She gives a cry of approval and tells him the next beer is on her. He smiles.
He spends the next hour or so drinking alone but chatting with the bartender who flirts with him. He flirts back. She throws casual touches at him: a hand on his arm to emphasize a point; a finger playfully swiping foam from the side of his mouth. He asks her about the tattoo and she leans across the bar to give him a better view of a stylized heart. The gesture also affords him a better view of her generous cleavage, which almost rest over his arms in her attempt to lean across the bar. She turns her face and murmurs in his ear that her shift is almost over. "Let's celebrate your brother's health together, " she says easily.
Wolfgang gives her a deliberately considering look that should have made her blush or slap him or both. Instead she laughs and tells him she'll be back with his tab.
Wolfgang looks down at his empty glass. He wonders briefly if he can drown his sorrows by simply fucking someone else. He smiles mirthlessly to himself because he knows he can't: He's more likely to simply fantasize he's with Kala and inadvertently drag her into a threesome. He almost chokes at the image, finding it unbearably funny and heartbreakingly tragic.
But he really ought to be celebrating. He ought to be "fucking celebrating." The memory makes him genuinely smile until he thinks about that in its literal sense.
The bartender returns with his bill. It's ridiculously small and he smirks up at her when she shrugs. "On me," she says, "and no tip necessary!" She flashes him a smile, accepting his cash and walking back to the register where she waits her turn behind a server who is having trouble with the computer. She looks back at him and rolls her eyes before turning her attention back to the server, who asks her a question.
Wolfgang gets up and drops more euros on the counter before she returns. She's beautiful, and he's drunk, and admittedly horny, but he's not all that interested. He heads back to his hotel, his moodiness returning.
He really should be ecstatic. With Felix awake and a new identity he can do anything he pleases. He shrugs off the problem of The Cluster; they know he'll help when he's needed, but he's been ignoring them for days, too, because he knows they are concerned about Kala. About what he's doing to Kala by refusing to see her.
As if he can't feel what he's doing to Kala himself.
As if he wasn't feeling the same way, a thousand times over.
He lets himself into his hotel room and decides he needs a shower. He leaves a trail of clothing to the bathroom and doesn't bother setting the temperature when he turns the shower on; the water is always a little cold. He gets in and merely stands under the showerhead for several minutes.
He thinks of what he offers to Kala: A grim, violent past; a career criminal in the family business; an unrepentant murderer. In the beginning, before he knew her, none of that mattered. He wasn't looking for a relationship. He only knew she was a beautiful, desirable woman he wanted in his bed. He'd tried hard enough to charm her into it when he'd woken up in her bedroom. But something happened. He found that he liked her. She was full of knowledge and opinions about science and faith and the "miracle" of their connection. He discovered she was not only beautiful, but intelligent and thoughtful and born to a loving family that doted on her. She was everything kind and truly good, and he had fallen so hard so fast that he didn't realize it until he thought he was going to die and his only regret was that he would never meet her for real. The true miracle was that she loved him back. Him.
And then it mattered. His fucked up life with its fucked up choices versus The Perfect Man. What kind of selfish bastard would let her fuck up her life by letting her choose him?
Kala.
Wolfgang whispers her name and it's all he can do not to give in to one of his fantasies. He showers and heads straight to bed.
...
The next morning, he leaves Graz and arrives at the hospital a little before two in the afternoon. Felix opens his eyes when he enters the room. A nurse has just replaced one of the drips with a fresh bag and is making an entry on a computer tablet when Wolfgang sits down beside Felix's bed.
"'What is best in life? '" he asks, smiling gently at his brother by choice. Felix moves his mouth but no words come. Wolfgang finishes the quote about crushing their enemies, and he stays by Felix for a few hours, even when Felix falls in and out of sleep, until the doctor tells Wolfgang he should leave so Felix can rest. The doctor is optimistic that Felix is on his way to a full recovery.
It's still early, but Wolfgang doesn't feel like checking in on old haunts or doing anything in particular. He's tired after the long drive and the short vigil by Felix's bedside, so he returns to the cheap motel nearby where he is staying. He watches something on TV but his mind wanders back to Felix and his visit.
He is content now that Felix is awake, that he will recover, Wolfgang tells himself. He has enough money left over from the diamonds to take care of the both of them until Felix is 100% and they can plan new lives. Maybe go to America or Mexico.
He asks for nothing more.
"'What is best in life? '" he mutters.
And unbidden, he recalls sitting on a sunny rooftop in Mumbai and simultaneously being rained on in Berlin. A drunken singing performance in a nightclub with his mysterious stranger and playfully teasing her about nudity as he lays in the sanctity of her virginal bed. He thinks back to the first time he ever saw her. ..at the restaurant in Berlin, on a balcony in Mumbai.
He was fucked from the moment he first saw her.
He laughs a little to himself. He should be content but instead he is reminded of how much he gave up for revenge. As if he was worthy of her to begin with. And just like that, he is flooded with a wrenching ache that steals his breath and breaks down his defenses.
Kala. Kala.
He is no longer sitting in his motel room. He looks around and knows he is at her father's restaurant in Mumbai, facing outward, standing on a threshold that overlooks a private back garden. It's awash in colorful foliage, made more brilliant by the amber glow of a setting sun. But nothing is as stunning as the woman he sees surrounded by flowers that pale in comparison.
Kala sits quietly, head bowed close to Rajan's, her hand resting on his. Her wild, dark hair is smoothed away from her elegant face, her focus wholly on whatever it is she is saying to the man sitting across from her.
It feels like a punch in the gut, and Wolfgang leans against the doorway, folding his arms across his chest as if to lessen the blow. He reminds himself that this is what he wants for her: A good life with a good man.
Not me, he thinks. She isn't meant for me. And he wants to laugh because doing the right thing is surely, literally, killing him.
Kala looks up and sees him, and he curses himself for not having the will to be gone from there already.
His heart races. It has been so long, he thinks, and he can feel her heart race, too.
And then he hears her whisper only to him: Beloved.
It feels like absolution and benediction. He can barely breathe.
Beloved, she says again, removing her hand from Rajan's.
And he permits himself the smallest hope, because she is his beloved, too. More than that. His heart.
So he gives a tentative, wry smile, and tells her so: "Beloved," he whispers back. "Mein Herz."