A short story
Sometimes, I don’t have good words to write.
As I type this, I’m jittery—I had coffee this morning for the first time in a long time, and I haven’t eaten as much as I should’ve today. It’s hard to write. I am distracted.
So I’ve turned on Eschaton, an album I listened to on repeat last month while editing my first short story.
Which makes me think about that short story.
So I want to do something different for tonight’s newsletter.
Down below, you can read that story—Freedom Day.
And as much as I would like to write a preamble about how Freedom Day is a draft and it’s not perfect and it’s stripped down because my word limit was 2,600 words and it’s exactly 2,600 words and please like it because otherwise I will cry (really kidding), I won’t. I’ll just say listening to Eschaton while reading it will get you in the mood perfectly.
Enjoy!
Freedom Day
I can’t hide in this room. Selik stands by the door, arms crossed, eyes on my head.
The officer at the desk flips through the papers I’ve signed. His pen taps wood. “We’re set.” He looks up at me. “It’s a good day for you, Danek. Freedom day.”
I flatten my fingers against my leg.
“Just one last thing to do.” He nods at Selik.
Selik unlocks the door. A woman comes in. Rubber squeaks on floor. She pats my shoulder. Crouches. I keep my eyes on the papers.
Don’t move.
She injects something into my calf.
“Only a pinch,” she says.
Don’t move.
She leaves.
I swallow.
“We’ll know where you are,” the officer says. “As a precaution. Against leaving the country. Don’t want freedom to get to your head, so we get to your leg first.”
“Fine,” I say. But this changes freedom.
Selik waits with me outside Stammheim prison. Rain plasters hair to my forehead. I keep my hands fisted in the jacket pockets and watch the road my brother will drive up.
Four years.
“Not gonna miss our talks,” Selik says. His breath looks like smoke.
“We never talked,” I say.
A tiny sedan turns onto the road.
Selik nods at it. “Is that him?”
“I don’t know what he drives.” But I see Ulric inside.
The car pulls in front of us. Windshield wipers stop. Ulric steps out, squints as his face becomes soaked. Glances at me. Then he looks at Selik.
“I’m his brother,” Ulric says. He looks different.
Selik says, “Get him to the halfway house in Frankfurt by noon.”
Ulric nods.
I walk around the hood and get in the car. Leather’s cold.
Ulric slides back in, slams his door. He drives away from Selik; walking back inside Stammheim. Away from Stammheim; shrinking in the mirror. He drives onto the 81. The side of the road is thick with cars. Only ours moves.
“You got out,” he says.
I shut my eyes. His voice is the same–the one I’ve heard yelling in my head every night for four years. I still see it: the wrong end of his rifle. The pain he threatened if I moved. The police in our family’s home. He gave them some kind of proof I did “real-world research” on blackmail.
I don’t know why he kept his mouth shut about the treason.
I look at the road. “Sorry it wasn’t forever.”
“We don’t have to talk about what you did.”
I swallow. “Or what you did.”
But he doesn’t know what I did–he knows about the treason, but he doesn’t know details. Only one other person–a person whom I have never met–knows those. And they have their own secrets to keep.
“Should I call the police and tell them you’re not going to the halfway house?” he asks.
“Only if you’d like them to know I never blackmailed anyone.”
“Phone doesn’t work out here anyway.”
The jacket they gave me is too thin. I turn the heat up in the car. Rub my calf, the spot where they injected what I guess is a tracker. “I need a knife.”
“For what?”
“They put something in my leg.”
“You’re not taking it out if that’s what you’re saying.”
I open the console. It’s empty. Reach between the seats. Find a crumpled napkin, Ulric’s wallet. I drop the wallet onto the dash. “Dumb place to put that.”
He grabs it. Shoves it under his leg.
I reach behind my seat. Ulric’s seat. Fingers find smooth metal. A pocket knife. I get my seatbelt off, pull up my pant leg. Flip the knife open.
“Dan, stop.”
I feel for the right spot. Dig the tip of the knife into my skin.
“Danek.”
Blood trickles. End of the knife disappears. I taste blood. “I’m getting it out.”
I push deeper until the blade touches something inside my leg. Blink, try to clear the blurriness in my eyes.
Ulric grabs my wrist. The car swerves. Knife falls.
“I’m getting it!”
He brakes hard. Grabs for the knife. I suck in air, hold my hand over the cut. Blood drips from my fingers to my shoe. Ulric gets the knife, unrolls the window. Throws the knife out. Rolls the window back up.
“I told you not to try that,” he says.
I get the dirty napkin, use it to stop the blood. Swallow copper.
“Where are you going?”
I nod at the road. “Aren’t you going north?”
“I don’t know where I’m going.”
“You’re going north.”
“Getting a plane?”
“I don’t know. Do you have my thirteen million?”
He taps the steering wheel. Glances in the rearview mirror. “There aren’t many flights out. It’d be easier to go by car.”
They’ll stop me at the border. And apparently he’s used what he discovered. “Are you offering?”
“Depends. Do you have more euro hidden somewhere?”
“I’m not leaving the country.” Not with this tracker. “And no, Dan,” I mock, “we don’t have to talk about what you did.”
“Then where are you gonna go to get away from things you need to get away from?”
The napkin’s soaked. I pull it from my leg, bite my tongue and pull harder when some of it sticks. I pull my pant leg down. Drop the napkin. Fingers are sticky.
“Where am I driving?” Ulric asks.
Heat from the vents is making my eyes droop. I cross my arms, keep my hands fisted. Shut my eyes. “Berlin.”
The police should be hungry enough to follow the tracker. I’ll make sure it heads to Frankfurt. Then I can get away from them, from my brother. From everything else I’ve done.
Ulric brakes the car hard. I jerk awake.
“Good morning,” he says.
I sit up straighter, look out the windshield. I see Berlin. Its buildings disappear into the sky. Dark smoke rises in sections.
I swallow. Look at my hands–blood is dry. Clock says 3:14. I check the rearview mirror. Can’t see any police.
Ulric drives into the city. I see other people, other cars. Bare trees and pedestrians without coats. Windows are boarded. People sit on curbs, walk on the streets. The stoplights are off.
I hear a siren. Check behind us. Still don’t see any police.
“We’re going to park,” Ulric says. He pulls a phone from his pocket, unlocks it, drops it in my lap. “Figure out where you’re going. Just use the map, nothing else.”
I pick up the phone. Find the maps. Pinch around–fingers are shaking–until I see something that makes the most sense.
“Berlin Hauptbahnhof.” I can get the tracker on a train. “I’ll go from there.”
“Fine. Tell me where to drive.”
I swipe on the map. Look up to figure out what street we’re on.
A girl crouches on the curb. Holds a pale hand out. Pale hair sticks to skin.
I look at the phone. Pulse is loud in my ears.
“Where, Dan?”
I stare at the map. “I’m looking. It’s nearby.”
“Then I’m parking. I don’t want to drive here.”
“Yeah.”
Ulric turns into an underground garage, parks. I get out, slam the door. Icy air creeps through my jacket.
Ulric walks around the hood. “Which direction?”
I twist, turn the phone. “I don’t know.”
He holds out his hand. “Phone.”
I give it to him. He swipes, pauses, types something. “Up and to the left. Three blocks.”
We go up stairs to the street. My calf aches. The tracker taunts me, tells me I am not doing what I should be doing.
Hundreds of people fade into fog.
Ulric bumps into me. “We don’t walk slow here.”
I shove my hands deep into my jacket pockets and move.
Someone yells. I pass a man wearing a blanket. Some people wear plastic gloves and carry bags, and they walk and crouch around the people sitting on curbs.
If they found the person who helped put their country in debt for a payment of thirteen million euro . . .
A gunshot cracks air.
Someone screams.
Another shot.
My legs stop moving.
Someone pushes past me. She wears a badge. Jogs a few paces, stops. Looks both ways. She rubs her arm and goes into a shop. People keep moving–or don’t move–like they never heard that scream.
Ulric pulls me down a different street. “I said we don’t walk slow here.”
“Someone’s shooting,” I say.
“Someone’s always shooting.”
I push Ulric’s hand away. Walk ahead of him to the end of the block. I stop at the intersection. To my left, a row of posters covers the side of a building. One’s repeated–a graphic of a crying woman’s eyes with Morgen wird kommen written beneath. Those eyes steal mine.
“What’re you waiting for?” Ulric asks.
“The light.”
“The lights are off, Dan.”
I see it then–the crosswalk box is black.
“Station’s up ahead,” he says.
We cross the street. An arched building looms ahead–Berlin’s Central Station. Gray glass stands against gray sky.
We go inside. I get on an escalator to a lower level. Ulric follows.
“This is unreal,” I say quietly.
A man stands at the bottom, yelling for spare change. His jacket is bright yellow. I can’t move my eyes.
“This is someone’s fault,” Ulric says loudly.
I step off the escalator. Stop, try to figure out where the ticket machines are.
The man grabs me. His eyes are as yellow as his jacket. He says, “If I ever find the person who stole Germany’s money, I’ll make sure he never goes blind. He would miss our performance of pain.”
I twist his fingers off my forearm. Say, “If I were you, I would make sure I do it.”
He stares at me.
I open my mouth.
“Danek, keep walking,” Ulric says.
I force myself to leave. “I need to get a ticket.” Or two.
“Then get one.”
I hold out my hand. “Wallet.”
“That’d be an accessory to a crime.”
“What do you call driving me here?”
“Blackmail.”
I set my jaw. Spin on my heels. I scan people’s hands. Their bags.
There.
A woman holding her credit card.
I start toward her.
You stole from all of them.
I try to force the thought out.
You’re going to steal again.
I accidentally bump the woman’s shoulder. “I’m so sorry,” I say.
She ignores me. Keeps walking.
Her credit card’s in my hand.
I look for a ticket machine. There’s one near more people–someone sleeps against it. I look for something else, but an overhead voice says, “Bitte melden Sie verdächtiges Verhalten,” and my heart’s in my ears.
I go up to the machine.
I don’t know who I did this with. But I could find them. I could reverse all my work, give Germany back what I helped steal. I hid most in Lübeck. Maybe it’s still there.
I stare at the screen asking for my destination.
I use the woman’s card to buy a ticket to Frankfurt.
Obviously, I do not change.
The machine spits out a ticket.
Obviously, as my brother yelled that morning he called the police, I do not care.
“I did this,” I whisper. I did all of this.
I buy a ticket to Lübeck.
Breath heats my ear. “I’ll tell them.”
My heart jumps. I see Ulric’s shoes. “Tell what?”
“That you’re the reason they live like this. That you stole until they had nothing.”
The machine spits out another ticket. Ulric grabs it, reads it.
“What’s in Lübeck?”
I take the ticket from him, get the other; still in the machine.
“They never caught you because of what you did.”
I blink. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Treason, Danek. It’s treason to hide emails and bank accounts and make sure the government never traces you.”
I squint at him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You do.” He grabs the tickets. Tears both in half. Holds the pieces up to my face. “You don’t care about what you did!”
“I do!”
The person who was sleeping against the machine stands. “Everything all right?”
“Fine,” I say.
“I have proof,” Ulric says.
I push my voice to a whisper. “Yeah, like the proof you had so I went to prison.”
“No.”
I back up a step. “I didn’t plan this.”
“But you did it. I have bank records to prove it.”
“You know nothing.” The records show nothing.
The person by the machine is still watching. More people have stood, stopped walking.
“How come no one can figure out who did it, Dan?”
“Did what?” I shout. But my hands turn to fists.
Only one other person knows the details of what I did–that I hid their treason and helped steal and got paid thirteen million to do it. My brother shouldn’t know.
His eyes grow dark. “This is Freedom Day, Danek. And we will get our freedom.”
My chest thuds. “Ulric, stop. I got paid to do this.”
He pulls out his phone. “I have proof you didn’t.”
“Stop.”
He looks at the people around us. “This is the person who did it!” he yells. Points the phone, shaking, at me. “This is him. He stole from you–hundreds of billions. He did all of this.”
I take another step back. My shoulder hits someone.
Pain–all the pain I’ve caused–crawls up my throat. Pulls on my tongue, tries to tell me keep your mouth shut, Dan, keep it shut or they will know. But it also tells me I should speak–I should speak and tell these people who I’m staring at, that he’s lying to save himself.
How did he hide from me?
He shouldn’t know. But he does.
It was him.
A whistle blows–police.
“They’re coming,” Ulric says.
I turn. I can make it to the train. People won’t care.
But people are watching. They want to see.
My calf burns.
He’s sending me back to prison.
People are watching.
I look at Ulric.
It is not only my secret. But it shouldn’t be hidden.
“I stole nine hundred billion from Germany,” I say. The secret pushes on me until it escapes my mouth. I force it out louder. “It was me. I did it. It was me.”
Ulric blinks. “Where is it?”
My eyes burn into his. He knows where half is.
“Where?” he yells.
I swallow.
People are listening.
They shouldn’t live like this.
I turn, face them. Shout, “It’s in Oslo! Germany’s money! All of it! And in Lübeck–it’s split!”
The police whistle penetrates my ears.
I can’t hide.
I yell, “This is your freedom day! Take it back–get it back!”
Ulric stares at me. He should be afraid of what I can say now I know what we’ve both done. Of what these people will do now they know where Germany’s money is.
Police break the crowd.
My mind screams—go, Dan!
Every day for the last four years, I imagined people breaking into my cell, yelling that they know my secret, dragging me into the open, forcing me to say it all. I’ve lived that now.
Every day, for the rest of my life, maybe I will only imagine my freedom.
“On the ground!” Officers.
I push on arms, step on feet–I can make it out of the station.
People yell, “Traitor!”
Maybe freedom is not something I deserve.
Hands grab me. Push me onto my knees. They handcuff me. They don’t let me go.
When they force me back up, I look for my brother. He’s watching me.
“Do something,” I mouth.
He shakes his head.
“Fix this!” I yell.
In his eyes, I wish there were tears.
Thanks for reading my short story! If you liked it, hit reply and let me know. If you didn’t like it, hit reply and let me know why. Feedback’s needed—and it’s how my writing gets better.