Chapter 10: Berlin

The flight from Rome to Berlin is two hours.

Sush is running out of money.

She checks her bank account on the plane. ₹23,000 left.

She has five more days.

She needs to be more careful.

But she's not.

Berlin is cold and gray and beautiful in a way she doesn't expect.

The hostel is in Kreuzberg, in a converted factory. It's the cheapest one she's booked (€12/night).

The dorm has twelve beds. It smells like feet and weed.

Sush doesn't care.

She's too tired to care.

She spends the first day walking. The Berlin Wall. The Brandenburg Gate. The Holocaust Memorial.

Everything here is about history. About trauma. About rebuilding.

She thinks about her own rebuilding.

About the fact that she's going back to Pune in five days.

Back to her job. Her mother. Her life.

The thought makes her chest tighten.

That night, she goes to a club.

It's in an abandoned warehouse, the kind of place that doesn't have a sign, just a door and a bouncer and a line of people waiting to get in.

The music is loud. Techno. The bass vibrates in her chest.

She dances. Alone at first, then with strangers.

A girl kisses her.

Sush has never kissed a girl before.

It's softer than kissing a guy. Gentler.

She likes it.

They dance together. The girl's hands on her waist, her hips, her ass.

Sush is drunk. Or high. Or both. She's not sure.

The girl pulls her into a corner. Kisses her harder.

Her hand slides under Sush's shirt. Cups her breast.

Sush gasps.

"You want to get out of here?" the girl asks.

Sush nods.

---

The girl's name is Lena.

She's German, twenty-five, a student.

Her apartment is small, messy, full of plants and books.

They don't talk much.

Lena undresses her. Kisses her. Touches her in ways that are different from the guys.

Softer. More patient.

She goes down on Sush, and it's better than Marc, better than anyone.

Sush comes so hard she cries.

Lena holds her afterward. Strokes her hair.

"You okay?" she asks.

"I don't know," Sush says.

And it's the truth.

She doesn't know if she's okay.

She doesn't know who she is anymore.

She doesn't know what she wants.

But she knows she doesn't want to go back.

---

She spends two more days in Berlin.

She doesn't see Lena again.

She meets other people. Other guys. One more girl.

She's collecting experiences like they're currency.

Like they'll mean something when she gets home.

But she knows they won't.

---