Oranges for Christmas Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Other Books By Margarita

  Dedication

  Preface

  Chapter 1 - Sunday 13 August 1961

  Chapter 2 - Forbidden Territory

  Chapter 3 - Enemy of the State

  Chapter 4 - Stasi

  Chapter 5 - Mother Courage

  Chapter 6 - Oranges for Christmas

  Chapter 7 - Neues Jahr - New Year

  Chapter 8 - Prisoner

  Chapter 9 - The Tunnel

  Postscript

  Thank you for Reading

  Acknowledgements

  ORANGES FOR CHRISTMAS

  A Berlin Wall Escape Novel

  Margarita Morris

  ~~~~

  This novel is a work of fiction and, except in the case of historical fact, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Copyright Margarita Morris 2013

  All Rights Reserved

  Margarita Morris asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

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  By L1Graphics

  To find out more about Margarita’s books and join her readers’ list, go to:

  http://margaritamorris.com

  ~~~~

  OTHER BOOKS BY MARGARITA

  The Sleeping Angel

  Scarborough Fair

  Scarborough Ball

  For Steve

  ~~~~

  Preface

  After the end of World War II, Germany was divided into four Occupied Zones: British, American, French and Soviet. Berlin, which was geographically in the Soviet Zone, was divided into four Occupied Sectors: British, American, French and Soviet. But the Berliners continued to live and work there as if it was one city, which it was. Until the unthinkable happened…

  ~~~~

  Chapter 1 - Sunday 13 August 1961

  Sabine

  I open my eyes and see a head hanging upside down. Grinning at me.

  Brigitta springs down from the top bunk, lithe as a cat, and whips the blanket off me.

  “Komm, Sabine. Steh auf!” Come on, Sabine. Get up. She is excited. We both are.

  We haven’t seen our older brother Dieter in – how long has it been? – Six weeks? More like two months now I think about it. Yes – it was the middle of June, before school ended. Now that he lives and works in West Berlin we don’t get to see him so often. During the week we’re at school and most weekends he works long hours at the Hotel Zoo. But not today.

  Brigitta takes hold of my hands and pulls me out of bed.

  “Okay, okay. I’m getting up.”

  The linoleum is cool under my feet. It is still early. I glance at the alarm clock that sits on top of the old chest of drawers. Half past six. But already, through the gap in the curtains, I catch a bright glint of sunlight. Another hot day; perfect weather for sunbathing and picnicking.

  “What shall I wear?” I ask Brigitta, who has already put on her blue summer skirt and is pulling on her white blouse.

  I pull open the wardrobe door which creaks in protest and consider my options. They are not many. It has to be either the blue dress with the tiny white polka dots or the yellow one, bright as a sunflower.

  “Wear the yellow dress,” says Brigitta. “It’s a happy colour for a happy day.”

  I slide the dress off its hanger. “Back in a minute.” I tiptoe down the corridor to the bathroom so as not to wake Mother.

  The plan is for Brigitta and I to take the S-bahn train to the Hauptbahnhof in West Berlin, meet up with Dieter and then go on to the lake at Wannsee. Dieter said he would bring the picnic because you can buy better food in West Berlin – oranges and things like that. Besides, it’s best not to carry too much when travelling from the East to the West – it rouses the suspicions of the border guards. People with suitcases are hauled off trains and interrogated. They think anyone carrying more than a handbag is trying to leaving the East for good. A picnic hamper would be sure to raise eyebrows.

  I turn the tap and water sputters out. The plumbing in the apartment is temperamental. I don’t want to risk waking Mother with the banging that comes from the pipes if you wait for hot water to come through, so I quickly splash cold water over myself at the sink and pat myself dry. Then I put on the yellow dress and join Brigitta in the kitchen.

  She is standing on a chair so she can reach the half loaf of Schwarzbrot that is left in the cupboard. She passes it down to me and I cut two slices of the dense, dark brown bread. There’s no butter to put on it. I went to the shop yesterday but Frau Maier said they had run out of butter and, no, she didn’t know when the next delivery would be. We eat the bread as it is, gazing out of the window at the empty street five storeys below.

  Out of habit I reach for the dial on the radio. I like to listen to RIAS, Radio in the American Sector, even though, strictly speaking, it’s illegal to do so in East Berlin. But then I think of Mother, of how tired she looked when she came home from the factory last night, and I leave the radio switched off. Mother needs her rest. Last night she told us to enjoy ourselves and that she sends her love to Dieter. She hopes he’ll have time to visit us soon.

  Brigitta clears away the breakfast things while I fetch our Personalausweise, the personal identity cards that every citizen is required to carry with them at all times.

  “Fertig?” asks Brigitta when I reappear. Ready?

  I nod. “Let’s go.” She opens the door to the apartment and we slip outside onto the dark landing.

  Dieter

  Spread out on the kitchen table it looks like a feast. I go over everything one last time to make sure I haven’t forgotten anything.

  Six bread rolls, still warm from the baker’s. Emmental cheese. Eight slices of smoked ham. Apfelstrudel. Bananas and oranges – a rare treat for Brigitta and Sabine. Lemonade. And Schokoladenkuchen – chocolate cake which I baked myself. Sabine will be impressed at my new found culinary skills. You can’t even buy proper chocolate in East Berlin. And as for bananas and oranges, well, most people have probably forgotten what they look like.

  I start packing the food into the picnic hamper, wrapping the bread rolls in a clean tea-towel to keep them fresh. I wonder what Sabine and Brigitta are doing right now. I bet they’re already on their way. Brigitta always did wake up at the crack of dawn and she won’t want to miss a minute of today. I lay the rolls at the bottom of the hamper and place the ham and Emmental on top. Just wait until they see this food. They’ll have to take some back for Mother – she loves fresh oranges. And a slice of chocolate cake.

  Thinking of Mother, I feel a little guilty. It’s my first Sunday off in ages and I should really be visiting my family in East Berlin. But Sabine and Brigitta so wanted to go to the lake at Wannsee and we should do it whilst the good weather holds. Of course, Mother could come too, but Sabine said she would want to rest after a hard week at the factory. I reach across the table for the bananas, slotting them into a corner of the hamper. I tell myself I’ll visit Mother in East Berlin in September. And, of course, at Christmas.

  I place the chocolate cake carefully into the hamper and arrange the oranges around the edge. My resolution to visit Mother in September has assuaged my feelings of guilt and once more I feel excited that Sabine and Brigitta are visiting me today and not the other way around. The truth is, when I think of my old home in East Berlin, it’s like a different country, a different world, even though it’s only the other half of the city in which I still live. But there’s no way I’d go back there. The Communists in the East talk of building a better future for everyone – housing, education and all that, but really they just want to control people’s lives. No one is allowed
to criticise the Party. If you do, you’ll be locked up. They spy on their own citizens all the time. Who can live in a place like that? They call themselves democratic, but that’s a joke. I mean, how can it be a democratic country when there’s only one Party? The other parties are just there for show – puppets of the Communists. Over here in the West, we don’t just have real democracy and the freedom to say what we think, we have shops, restaurants, bars and nightclubs on the Ku’damm that most East Berliners couldn’t imagine in their wildest dreams.

  I go over all these arguments in my head every time I think about my decision to move west, justifying my actions to myself. But, I do have one regret and that’s that I didn’t try harder to persuade Mother, Sabine and Brigitta to come with me. But I was impatient to get going and Mother…well let’s just say Mother doesn’t like change. Sabine, I know, is torn, but she tends to take Mother’s side saying Mother doesn’t want to leave her home and her work, that she still likes to visit Father’s grave, all the old arguments. But I can see which way the wind is blowing. There’s no future for them over there in the East.

  I close the lid on the hamper and pull the leather straps through the metal buckles. As I pull the straps tight I decide once and for all that they must leave East Berlin and come and live in the West. I will not take “no” for an answer.

  I check my watch. It’s still early, only seven o’clock. I’ve got plenty of time before I need to catch the train from Anhalter Bahnhof. I make myself a black coffee and switch on the radio, tuning in to RIAS. As I’m carrying the coffee over to the table, the announcer says something so shocking and unexpected that I come to a sudden standstill, jolting the mug. I yelp in pain as hot coffee scalds my right hand.

  Sabine

  The stairwell is gloomy, even in the middle of the day.

  I don’t believe in ghosts but the smell of frying cabbage and stale tobacco which rises up to our landing from Herr Schiller’s apartment on the floor below evokes a memory so strong, I feel as if Father is here right now.

  The pungent smell catches my nostrils and I am taken back eight years to the age of nine, one year older than Brigitta is now. Brigitta is a baby in our mother’s arms. We are standing at the door to the apartment. Dieter is on Mother’s right and I am on her left. Father is on the landing. Mother is asking him not to do something, almost pleading with him. I don’t understand what they’re talking about. Something about construction workers and a general strike. Mother says it will be too dangerous. I can hear the fear in her voice and I move closer to her. Father says not to worry. Everything will be different now Stalin is dead. Father says we must stand up for what we believe in and he looks down at Dieter and me and smiles. I catch the sense of his words and feel proud of him. I want him to be proud of me too. He kisses Mother on the cheek, pecks Brigitta on the forehead, then bends down to Dieter and me. He ruffles Dieter’s hair and strokes the side of my face, planting a kiss on the tip of my nose. Dieter asks if he can go with Father, but Father says, no, not this time. He promises he’ll be back in time for dinner. We never see him again.

  I know now that Father was going to a demonstration at Alexanderplatz. People were demanding political change and workers’ rights. They didn’t get either. Instead what they got were Soviet tanks that rolled in and quashed the demonstration. Hundreds were arrested or injured. Dozens killed. One of them was Father.

  I try to dispel the memory by pressing the light switch. The fluorescent lights flicker reluctantly into life and the timer starts to tick, like a bomb about to explode.

  “Race you to the bottom,” I say.

  “You’re on,” laughs Brigitta. We have this thing about making it to the ground floor before the light times out. Before we are plunged into darkness.

  It’s a long way down. We live in a two-bedroom apartment on the top floor, the fourth to be precise, of an old nineteenth-century apartment block in the Prenzlauer Berg district. As we run down the stairs, I can’t help noticing how shabby the building has become. The olive green paint is peeling off the walls and the linoleum on the stairs is wearing thin. My hand brushes lightly over the wooden banister which has long since lost its sheen.

  Brigitta is already ahead of me. She always wins this game.

  We pass Herr Schiller’s door on the third floor where the smell of tobacco is at its strongest. It mingles with the aroma of frying potato and cabbage. I smile to myself. Herr Schiller likes his food, and it shows in his substantial girth. His size matches his larger than life personality and generous spirit. He’s a good neighbour to have. I can hear the crackle of his radio but I can’t make out the words.

  Brigitta speeds up past Frau Lange’s door on the second floor, so I do too. Brigitta insists that Frau Lange is really a witch waiting to toss little children into her Kachelofen, the large, round coal burning oven that takes centre stage in traditional German living rooms. I fear Brigitta may have read Hänsel und Gretel a few too many times. I don’t know what Frau Lange does exactly, but I think she has some senior role working for the authorities. Anyway, there’s something unnerving about her. She is Herr Schiller’s opposite in every way imaginable. Whilst he is round and fat, she is thin and angular, where he is jovial and generous, she is dour and mean, where he is kind and friendly, she exudes an aura of hostility. So it makes sense to try and avoid unnecessary encounters with her.

  From the apartment on the first floor the sounds of small children are clearly audible; running, laughing and shrieking. The Mann family have a four year old boy called Olaf and a six year old girl called Michaela. They often play in the Hinterhof, or courtyard, out the back of the building, but today they are cooped up inside. I think I hear a woman crying, but it’s difficult to be sure over the noise of the children.

  “I win,” shouts Brigitta who makes it to the bottom just as the lights click off.

  “Well done,” I say, pausing a moment to catch my breath.

  We walk past the post boxes lined up on the wall like a row of metal bird houses and push open the heavy wooden doors that lead out onto our street, Stargarder Strasse.

  “Which way?” asks Brigitta.

  I think for a moment. “Let’s walk to Alexanderplatz,” I say, “then we can take the S-bahn train to the Hauptbahnhof via Friedrichstrasse without having to change.” Friedrichstrasse is the last stop in East Berlin before the line crosses the sector border into the West.

  We set off at a brisk pace. Stargarder Strasse is empty at this time on a Sunday morning. The shutters at Frau Maier’s food shop are pulled down and the Kneipe on the street corner where the locals like to go for a drink is in darkness. We turn into Prenzlauer Allee, the main road that leads to Alexanderplatz. A tram trundles past, otherwise the road is quiet.

  We walk past bombed out plots and bullet damaged buildings. This part of Berlin still bears the scars of the Second World War. The Americans and British are helping to rebuild West Berlin, but here the Soviets are letting everything fall apart. I know Dieter will try again to persuade us to leave East Berlin and join him in the West. The last time I saw him, in June, we talked about the large numbers of East Germans who are fleeing Communism simply by crossing the border into West Berlin. They go to the refugee centre at Marienfelde where they are given food and identification papers. “You should do it,” Dieter said. “Before it’s too late.” I know he’s right. We should have done it months ago. This time I’ll make Mother see sense. I’ll insist that she…

  “Watch out!” Brigitta grabs my arm.

  I was so lost in my thoughts that I hadn’t seen the car chugging along the road. It’s a Trabant, a square box on wheels that everyone calls a Trabi. The two-stroke engine is causing the exhaust to spew out a haze of noxious fumes. We both cover our mouths as the car limps past. What a joke. I’ve seen cars in West Berlin and they’re so much better than what we have here. Besides, you can’t just buy a car in East Berlin, you have to apply for one and then it takes about ten years to acquire it. That vehicle is probably the
driver’s most prized possession and it looks as if it was made out of cardboard and sticky tape.

  We arrive at the concrete expanse of Alexanderplatz without further mishap. The huge square is empty save for a handful of people milling about outside the Rotes Rathaus, the nineteenth-century red-brick Town Hall. I never want to linger at Alexanderplatz, knowing it was here that Father was mown down by a Soviet tank, so we head straight to the S-bahn, buy our tickets and make our way to the platform.

  We’re in luck. A train arrives within seconds and we jump on. As it clanks its way westwards we talk about how much we’re looking forward to seeing Dieter again.

  “Will he remember to bring oranges?” asks Brigitta.

  “I hope so.”

  “And chocolate cake?”

  “He better do.”

  “If not I’ll push him into the lake with all his clothes on.” We both laugh.

  The train stops at Friedrichstrasse before crossing the border into West Berlin. I peer out of the window at the empty platform, impatient for the train to start moving again, but nothing happens.

  “Why aren’t we moving?” asks Brigitta after a moment.

  “I don’t know.”

  We look up and down the carriage. Other people are also clearly confused. Then there’s an announcement over the loudspeaker on the platform.

  “The train at platform B is terminating,” says a crackly voice.

  I look out of the window and see that we’re on platform B.

  “All passengers must leave the train on platform B,” says the crackly voice. That’s odd. I don’t know what’s happening, but this train clearly isn’t going anywhere.

  “Look,” says Brigitta, pointing through the train window. Two soldiers armed with machine guns are marching, side-by-side along the platform. The sight of them gives me a queer feeling in the pit of my stomach. Brigitta looks at me with wide eyes, her eyebrows raised.