you can wait here for her, you know where we’re going.
Rüdiger said quietly he’d keep me company. We sat down on the steps of the little temple, and he passed me a cigarette. The ugly ones are the hardest to pull, he said. Because they never get a man, they think they’re something special. I shook my head. Nonsense. Ivona reminded him of a girl he’d gone out with in the early years of high school, Rüdiger said. Subsequently, he’d not been able to tell himself why. In fact he’d already been in love with Sonia at the time, but she’d been too much for him, with her looks and everything. I must have gone for the other girl because of fear, said Rüdiger, or else I was trying to get a rise out of Sonia. Brigitte wasn’t a looker, and she was really hard work, and most of the time she was in a bad mood. I wasn’t allowed to do more than kiss her and grope a little bit. But somehow I wasn’t able to break up with her. She manipulated me, I never quite understood how. He went on talking, but I stopped listening. My own mood hadn’t improved. I was tired from the beer, and sweaty, and I felt unwell. I asked myself what I was doing waiting for Ivona if her company was so unpleasant to me. Perhaps some remnant of manners, perhaps curiosity, or perhaps just because heading off would have needed a decision on my part, and my lack of initiative was crippling me.
Ivona arrived twenty minutes late. She was wearing the same outfit as at lunchtime, plus a little beige cardigan, even though it was still warm. She didn’t apologize and didn’t say what had made her late. All right then, said Rüdiger, and he stood up.
We met the others at a place by the lake where we often went. The girls said hi to Ivona, but more or less ignored her after that. We had brought blankets, and Ferdy had a couple of lukewarm bottles of beer. We lay there torpidly, passing bottles around, and talking about all kinds of things. Ivona didn’t drink anything, and she didn’t contribute to the conversation. She just sometimes blew her nose and smiled a stupid-looking smile. Once or twice she made as if to speak, but one of the others got in first, and she gave up. I noticed that she was watching me. Each time I looked across to her, she looked away, as though I’d caught her in the act. Again I felt like hurting her, being rude to her. Her ugliness and pokiness were a provocation to me, her desire to belong exposed us and made us laughable. I wondered how I might shake her off. Shall we go cool down?, I finally asked. We grabbed our things. Ivona hadn’t said anything, but she trotted along behind us to the Eisbach. The greater part of the meadow was already in shadow, and the few people who were still there clustered in the last patches of sunshine. I had expected the presence of nudity to deter Ivona, but she showed no reaction, and silently sat down on one of the blankets, as though she was entitled to it. Ferdy said he was going for more beer, and took off.
The girls were wearing bikinis under their dresses, and Rüdiger and I stripped and ran naked down to the water and jumped in. When we returned a little later, the girls were lying side by side, talking together softly. The blonde had her top off, and turned onto her stomach as we approached. Ivona was sitting in the shade, she hadn’t even taken her cardigan off. She looked at me in surprise, and my nakedness embarrassed me, and I pulled on shorts and pants. Then I played Frisbee with Rüdiger. The girls seemed to have no interest in us, presumably they were talking about what they were going to do that night and we didn’t figure in their plans. And that’s what happened, Ferdy returned finally, and they said they had to go. Ferdy half-heartedly tried to keep them, but I think basically we were all relieved when they went. Only Ivona made no move to leave.
By now the whole meadow was in shadow. The last of the bathers had dressed and gone, and were probably drifting through the bars and beer gardens of the city. I was seized by a mixture of melancholy