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the world for a while. I was going to live like a belated flower child. Petra, however, was progressing rapidly in her career. I hadn’t even left Berlin when Petra Vogel’s name started to be heard in the world of cinema and television. It wasn’t exactly fame at this stage, even in Germany, although we all realized she had the potential for fame. It was around then that we lost contact. Even though we didn’t meet up, we continued to get news of each other through mutual friends. The last I heard from these friends was that she was living with Wolfram von Haagen, one of the leaders of the socialist student movement. Wolfram was a brilliant medical student, an effective orator and a very handsome man. Half the girls I knew were in love with him. When I heard that Petra was with him, I couldn’t believe it. Petra was my friend, yes, but I couldn’t really understand what someone like Wolfram saw in Petra. It wasn’t because I was jealous, that’s just how it was.
    Petra and Wolfram were complete opposites. Deep down, Petra wanted to be a housewife. She had an appetite for life, but only seemed to be working at her career until she found a man to rescue her and take her
away from ordinary life. She didn’t have a real passion for her work. I still think of Petra in that way. She is very competent, but in my view the reason she remained a B-grade actor was this lack of passion.
    As for Wolfram, I listened to a few of his open-house forums at university. Unlike Petra, he could become passionate about anything. He spoke about revolution and socialism in a way that could persuade the most ardent rightist and excite the most soulless person.
    I heard that they were living together shortly before I set off from Berlin with my rucksack for new horizons. At that time, according to Petra, her relationship with Wolfram was already deteriorating day by day. Wolfram had fallen out with his rich aristocratic family, who in turn had cut off their rebellious left-wing son. The task of making ends meet fell to Petra. Wolfram couldn’t decide what to do with his medical degree and spent all his time running around between protest meetings and political gatherings.
    Petra began to yearn for a child. Marriage was unfashionable in the mid-eighties, and the only way of making a relationship official was to have a child. In those days, a child really did make a relationship permanent. However, Wolfram always insisted that he didn’t want a child and that there were numerous other things he wanted to do in life. He clearly began to fear Petra’s determination and, as a way out, started looking for work outside Germany…
    Petra was two months pregnant when Wolfram joined a group of doctors researching malaria in various parts of Africa. Wolfram insisted on Petra having a termination, but she was stubborn and said she would raise the child on her own and wanted nothing from Wolfram. That
was their last conversation. Three months later, Petra heard that Wolfram had left for Africa.
    Petra was now five months pregnant and in a desperate dilemma. She had never really wanted the child for herself, only to save her relationship. But since Wolfram had no interest in children… Anyway, their relationship was now over, despite their unborn child… She had failed at that game… Petra had to think what she would do if she had this child. She went to several quacks asking for a termination, but no one would abort a five-month-old foetus. Petra finally accepted her fate: she would have the child and accept that Wolfram had left her.
    Petra had no chance of finding work as an actor with her expanding belly. After giving careful thought as to how she was going to manage, she gathered her few belongings together and packed them off to her mother’s house. Her mother lived alone in a remote house near a tiny village on the bank of the Rhine. Petra stayed with her there until she had recovered from the