Carl and Gerlinde (VI)
When Carl fell in love with Gerlinde, he had almost eaten up all of the “Red Inge”!
And even as he chewed the last few bits, he felt the crunchy sound of his crowned teeth causing that welcome palatal sensation on the bony resistance in its alabaster mass until all resistance between the teeth had volatilized.
„What a delicacy – exquisite!” – Carl mumbled while noisily smacking his lips. Yet he felt ashamed in a way that was hard to define about the abominable pile of blood-red napkins with which he was wiping his mouth all the time…
Fortunately, the guests had already left when, after another bottle of “Spätburgunder”, he had attacked the “Red Inge” like in a frenzy of love: again, it had been the titian-red hair and those shameless, inviting lips which had catapulted him out of his comfortable thoughtfulness and caused a sort of naive raving like the other time!
Even at school, Carl had suffered under the fateful effect red hair had on him. With each turn of her beguiling head, he had ended up getting caught on her fleshy lips. Yet the provocative sensuality of those lips had never delivered what they had promised to a set of boyish brains in the middle of puberty. Because between himself and Inge, it had never gone as far as everybody had assumed as they were seen sneaking out of the school building in close embrace: Inge always shrank back at the crucial moment, because those were the shameless moments when, for her, Carl in the blink of an eye became her uncle who had fumbled all over her one night. With disappointment, she always pushed him away, turned around and began sobbing!
Carl knew this small, poorly shaved, well-rounded uncle who was always friendly, pretending nothing had ever happened. Perhaps he really believed Inge had not noticed anything, because in her misery she had pretended to be asleep and had remained in the ever colder bed, lying as motionless as a stone until the morning had dawned.
It had probably been a mixture of pity, stubbornness and vanity when Carl and Inge married regardless.
In a suburb of R., it had not taken them long to rent a small house with a garden and to get very active in the local clubs and church groups. Within two years, they – more by accident than anything else – produced a diligent daughter and a recalcitrant son.
What a happy, successful couple! Just like in those days at school. And since Carl was mostly away on business, they believed it themselves, as well.
For the “Triga” company at W., Carl toured half of Europe. The high-quality underwear collections were still on demand, even if the margins got smaller by the year and the competition from Asian countries got more and more powerful. And since Carl appreciated red-heads besides his Inge, it was hardly avoidable that he discovered some delightfully uncovered surprises among and along with the products he was selling. With no sense of shame at all, he labelled them all as: coincidences of life.
Consequently, it did not really come as a surprise when Inge, on a Friday evening in November, sitting at the carefully laid dinner table decorated with white asters and blue candles, immediately after they had eaten some soft loin roast with beams in bacon, informed him that she had met someone else.
She had sent the children to their beds before her announcement.
„Carl, please do not be angry with me, but I want a divorce”, she said it with so much charm that Carl almost felt like kissing her hand.
And it certainly did not lack style, either: even while talking, she handed him a huge bowl with his favourite dessert and diligently refilled his glass of red wine.
At the time, Carl had also eaten the “Red Inge” – which nobody was able to cook quite as deliciously as his now one-time Inge – sitting by himself without another word. He also stoically had let the proceeding divorce formalities roll over him and consented to everything Inge thought necessary for herself and the children.
He had moved out of the shared house at R. on the same night.
Today, twelve years later, on his fifty-sixth birthday, was the first time since then that he again sat in front of the “Red Inge” – or rather, he now sat in front of the empty bowl!
Mind you, he did so regardless of the fact that the broken meringue over the frozen raspberries in yoghurt cream had haunted him in his dreams for years: he was always bitterly cold, because he always got stuck in the ice-cold mass and, no matter how hard he tried, he never managed to get his head far enough in front of him to at least be able to touch the delicacy with the tip of his tongue a single time.
And on this of all birthdays, a Gerlinde with hair dyed titian-red and deliciously inviting lips had brought the “Red Inge”, because all guests had to bring something for dessert. Kurt und Hannelore, his two best friends in the world, had brought Gerlinde: as a birthday surprise!
These sneaky pimps, thought Carl, while humming to himself contentedly.
He immediately knew why Gerlinde of all people, whom he had never seen before, had brought the “Red Inge” when he saw the funny wrinkles around her eyes and heard her laugh. It was a laugh that vibrated from the pit of her stomach right to the pubic bone like a ricochet. And those flawless teeth: they had definitely cost some money!
Carl assumed he had turned purple – which kept happening to him – when Gerlinde, holding the “Red Inge” in her bowl had been presented to him. Because Hannelore had tauntingly asked if he had mutated to chameleon, since the colour of his face had adapted itself to the colour of his dessert. But then, why not? She was sure this increased the chances of survival, as she had maliciously remarked.
Since Carl had lost all countenance, he kept quiet as usual, instead clumsily embracing the titian-red Gerlinde who stood in front of him. She let it happen, even giving him the sensation that the bowl full of “Red Inge” was not creating a sense of distance but – with surprising intensity – closeness for a short time.
When, three visits to the theatre, two concerts and four dinners later, the decisive moment came and he was at long last allowed to drown in the deliciously aromatic meat cooked by Gerlinde, he felt that, all of a sudden, everything inside him called for that well-rounded, poorly shaved uncle who should have made Gerlinde turn around sobbing…
But this Gerlinde only loomed over him smiling and said there was no need for him to be ashamed. The same had happened to others before him.
Courageously and in the nude, she ran to the refrigerator and surprised him with two glasses of champagne full to the brim!
KH
(Translated by EG)
PS:
Read the next sequel of Carl and Gerlinde on April, 7th, 2011
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