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“Heinrich, wake up, heavens!” Alexander reprobated, pulling at the sheets. “It’s ten-thirty!”
“Going to your death, old man? What’s the hurry?”
“I like to keep good habits in my house, that's all.”
“Good for you, dear. Fine, fine, quit nagging me about it. I’m up.”
“I’ll make breakfast.”
“But you will lie down with me later, won’t you?”
“I’ll consider it.”
Half an hour later, the two were sitting at the dining table. Porridge, egg and bread.
“Do you have anything more exciting?”
“Sorry, you can’t handle anything more exciting.”
“Ham? Sausage?”
“Processed food!”
“Nazis didn’t kill me, processed food isn’t going to.”
“Tea?” Belov asked, ignoring Heinrich’s complaints.
“Do we still have coffee?”
“No coffee either.”
“I miss my youth.”
“Erectile dysfunction from alcoholism?”
“Stop talking about that!”
“I’m sorry, ha-ha!” Alexander laughed, looking at Heinrich’s face of bright scarlet, though he tried toning it down—a man’s ego concerning his abilities is fragile.
Sixty years flew by, and Schwarzkopf’s countenance still bore the boyish qualities of his older days with a couple marks of time, like a cellaring wine. How aristocrats age! Alexander did not have such luck. Stress and constant examination had effects not only on his soul but his body as well. His hair was already beginning to grey during the war, let alone after decades.
It was the ‘90s, and a brand-new chapter for the Russian people.
They tore down Dzerzhinsky’s statue a few months ago. Belov was there. It came as more of a shock to see people surrounding the Berlin Wall on the television screen than the lowering of the red flag with hammer and sickle from the Kremlin; then, he just accepted it.
It had been decades since Alexander set foot back into the motherland again; his Russian was rusty, and that was a generous phrasing. All the years of restriction on his speaking of the Russian language dulled his skills, like there wasn’t a time before where he could breeze through classics at the age of thirteen and discuss complex political issues at fifteen. People used to say he could become a famous author when he was younger. Now writing a single paragraph in his mother tongue proved difficult at best, and impossible at worst. He could speak, for sure, but stuttering and stumbling over words were commonplace whenever he tried expressing concepts more complicated than daily life.
And how many things did he miss out? He wasn’t there when his parents were sick and declining; not there when his relatives were wed; not there when his comrades died.
He had been gone so long, he couldn’t understand the political atmosphere of his own country, and not without good reason. When he left, they had just won a war against the fascists—a war which he aided. When he returned, the Union, the other Eastern Bloc, and the ideology of communism was on the brink of complete collapsation. This country used to be one that could reckon with world powers all by itself. Now it’s nothing but a shadow of its past. The ideals of communism demolished along with the statues.
And he would become nothing more than a ridiculous, old man mulling over the days when he was younger.
What will be his nationality from here on? He was issued a Russian passport with an unfamiliar flag he hasn’t seen since learning about history in school. But was he truly ‘Russian’ in such a sense? Could he call himself such? When he could speak the language no better than a schoolboy; when he had always considered himself a Soviet before Russian; when he felt so out of place standing on the soil of somewhere he grew up? He was a son and a stranger to Russia.
His motherland was long gone to history, and the glory he once saw and attained was none. He wondered if it would ever be the same.
And Heinrich? Day after day, upon finishing work at the enterprise, he would immediately rush to the mailbox, hoping for a letter from Moscow and be disappointed. He had been warned earlier about Alexander’s line of work; thus, it did not come particularly as a surprise, yet it still saddened him greatly. The files relating to Belov’s missions are highly confidential, which had no hopes of being declassified any time soon, so for the longest time, Schwarzkopf thought he may never know the truth.
He was initially upset when Alexander returned, having felt like he was betrayed, but eventually found forgiveness for the man he loved so ardently.
Nowadays, Alexander, in his eighties, finally had the time and chance to relearn his mother tongue and returned to his previous prime understanding of the language—he was known to be a fast-learner. Moving on from the fact that Communist Russia was never returning as well. In his mind, he thought of it as living in a foreign country that just so happened to speak the same language and have the same kind of people from where you are from.
He had been invited as one of the dozen spies with significant contributions to the intelligence field of Russia, but it brought him no joy being praised as a Russian spy; his true homeland ceased to exist the moment the flag which represented so much tears, happiness and dreams was lost forever.
His life was much simpler now. He preferred to read old children’s books, draw and smoke cigarettes, just as he did when he was young, with Schwarzkopf by his side. He still found it strange that Heinrich still loved him even when he disregarded everyone in his life to serve overseas with no alert.
Unlike Alexander, Heinrich wasn’t too bitter about the collapse of East Germany, but always reminded the former what he always used to tell him, to ‘believe that the ideology of the people will eventually prevail’.
Heinrich hasn’t changed much over the years, he was equally persistent, passionate, and sincere as Alexander remembered he was from their Riga days. Some things never change, he supposed.
Outside, it was quiet, another silent night. Alexander held Heinrich in his arms; the latter placed his hand softly on Belov’s face and stared at him for several minutes, not saying a word.
“What’s wrong with you?” Alexander finally inquired.
“Just think you’re beautiful.”
“Heavens, we’re not twenty anymore.”
“… Johann.”
“Yes?”
“Are you… Do you want to…”
“It’s too late.”
“One last time.”
“…”
Sex has never been about pleasure, but intimacy and vulnerability to them, a union of affection. Afterwards, Alexander held Heinrich in his arms, chest to chest, feeling his heartbeat on his, breathing in time. How fortunate it was to still be alive at this moment and to share it with each other! After all that they’ve been through. Every daring and risky operation that could’ve easily sent both of them to their death they’ve survived. Time after time fate had tied them together.
Alexander kissed Heinrich tenderly.
***
When the next morning came, Alexander tried to wake Heinrich who he assumed was sleeping in late again. “Heinrich?” He said softly.
There was no doubt.
In his room in the Warsaw hotel, Schwarzkopf once told Belov that he seemed to be cursing everyone around him, seeing that those who loved him had all died one way or another. Since his parents and Professor Goldblatt, he figured he bore some sort of bad luck, and often wondered why he was the one deserving to live.
How Alexander wanted to wake him now and tell him that it was not true.
When they did it for the first time, Heinrich, laying in his embrace, remarked that if he were to die, he’d want to be in his arms—a statement which was instantly reproached by Alexander for being disagreeable.
There was no need to cry. Death blew his breath so many times over their shoulder, barely passing them by, it was only right for him to succeed eventually.
Alexander pressed his lips to Heinrich’s cheek.
One last time.