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“…occupied by the Romans,” I interrupt him. “Seriously? Like at the beginning of every Asterix book?”
“No.” He snorts the syllable more than he speaks it. “All of Gaul is divided into three areas, one inhabited by the Belgians, one by the Aquitans, and the third by those who call themselves Celts in their own language. Then Caesar adds, probably for the understanding of his readers, that those are called Gauls in his language. And that the three parts differ in language, customs, and so on. Finally, he elaborates on which rivers separate the different territories.”
“Well, that’s interesting. And what are they called?”
“The rivers?” he asks back, and I nod. He shrugs. “Garumna, Matrona, and Sequana.”
Gosh!“And what are their names today?”
He snorts. “I haven’t the faintest idea! I wasn’t particularly bright in geography…”
Neither was I…But I don’t say that. Instead, I listen to Philipp as he continues to talk about his school days.
In the meantime, his mother had taken over the position of head of the District Attorney’s Office and had not exactly made friends with her commitment to fighting criminal clans, so for security reasons—there had been serious threats against the family—he was no longer allowed to take the bus to school. Instead, in the morning, his mother took him along with her on her way to the DA’s office, and either his father—or, if he couldn’t, a security guard—would then pick him up and take him to private piano lessons and later home.
It’s easy to understand how this special treatment quickly turned him into a vulnerable outsider in the classroom.
“Kids can be so cruel,” I agree with him. “I was also bullied for a while because Aunt Mareike and Uncle Bert were so old and not my real parents. But luckily Pauline stood up in front of the assembled class and threatened to kick anyone in the shins who teased me.”
“Pauline?” Philipp raises his eyebrows. “That fashionista? I can’t imagine that at all.”
“You should never drive Pauline to white heat,” I explain, my mind dwelling on memories from junior high school. “Then she mutates into a Hulk.”All that’s missing is that she turns green in the process…I laugh, but Philipp doesn’t agree.
Instead, he becomes more insistently occupied with the steering wheel. “…mutates into a Hulk…” he picks up on my joke a bit incoherently. “That could also fit my… mother.”
I learn the smallest trivialities made her escalate more and more.
In the meantime, after the death of GGG’s parents, the little family moved into their stately villa. The fact that Philip’s father—who had long since given up his studies without success—developed an unhealthy friendship with the well-filled wine cellar did not exactly ease the situation.
At first, GGG only dropped hurtful words towards her husband but later directed them at Philipp too.
But one evening she had to prepare dinner after a long day at work because Philipp’s father was tootired. Which meant he was sleeping drunk on the couch. When Philipp presented his straight grade F in Ancient Greek classwork for her to sign, she completely freaked out.
“I think…” Philipp says slowly, and I can hear that this thought has just occurred to him for the very first time. “…that at first, she really just couldn’t stop herself from hitting me. And that if she had slapped me, she probably would have come to her senses from her palm’s biting.”
But?The question lies on the tip of my tongue, but I don’t dare ask it.
“It was a stupid coincidence that she was holding the frying scoop, dripping with grease, with which she was trying to turn the fish sticks in the pan that had thawed to a mushy slush. My father had forgotten to put the groceries in the freezer.” Philipp turns his head toward me, perplexed, though I register that he’s smirking. “She hit me with the stainless-steel scoop until it was completely bent. After that, she smashed three more wooden cooking spoons on me until her rage finally fizzled out.”
Oh my God! No, don’t speak it out loudly, Celine!I bite the insides of my cheeks and listen petrified as he continues almost cheerfully.
“At least, one thing you had to concede to her: even in the greatest rage, she always had herself under control well enough that she never hit me in the face.”
Piece by piece—it takes half the morning—I get insights into the existence of an abused child that I would not have thought possible.
I learn of thenormalcyof being dragged by her, her fingers clawed into his chin-length curls, halfway across the house and down the basement stairs.
How it feels to crouch under the top of the antique desk while kicks hail onto you.
To stand stark naked in the corner of the shower and be chastised with the metal shower hose.
When Philipp tells of the thirteen-year-old who wishes she would finally beat him to death, my heart almost breaks. He’d prefer that to be locked overnight in the damp and cold sandstone cellar one more time.
I can’t believe anyone witnessed all of this. I feel anger towards his parents, and I can’t decide which I’m more upset with: the mother, as the active part of the mistreatment, or the father, who turned a blind eye to everything?
After countless fruitless attempts to turn to teachers or social workers for help, a trainee teacher took over Philipp’s class in the sixth grade.
In the meantime, he had already repeated two school years, of course with the corresponding physical punishments.
