Man Into Woman - Chapter 16 by Lili Elbe Lyrics
The day of saying farewell to D. went more quietly than Grete had expected. When the Professor came to bid farewell to Lili she just humbly and simply said to him: "I thank you, Professor, not just for my life, but for the hope that you gave me. And all the confidence that I now feel. And I will now try to glide into life out there. But if I face any hardship, may I come back?"
The Professor just shook her hand: "Write me where you are, how you are doing, what keeps you busy. And rеgularly. Tell me evеrything. And if you need me, you will always find shelter here." That's how the Professor talked to her.
Then she bade farewell to the Matron and the other nurses. And when she walked through the portal, saw how her suitcases were lifted onto the car, she suddenly thought, how everything just worked now so easily, and how life seen by daylight is so undramatic and unpathetic. The day before and the whole night too everything within her had been tension and fear of this farewell and fear of the life out there, and before she knew it, she sat with Grete on the train ride to Berlin. And only much later, many months later, did she understand what a rough transition it was from the peace of the "Women's Clinic" into life, the days that would now be lived in Berlin again. Then only did she realize, why she had been sent away from her paradise on the Elbe into the noisiest of all cities she had ever seen. Because those Berlin days would be her proving time. They lived in a hotel in close vicinity to the clinic, in which a few months ago a man had lain ... There was no curiosity in her to visit it, this site of transition, as she called it afterwards. She also had no desire to visit the friends from back then. To move about unknown, anonymous, among the millions of this giant city, to live, to watch and to walk around, to become used to the working days of others, to take part in it herself on this working day, which was apparently the deeper reason for this stay in Berlin. Grete was not always with her during her wanderings through Tiergarten, through the museums and through the loudest, most lively streets. She often desired to find her own way, alone and relying only on herself, in the vortex of millions of Berlin. That was it: she had to find her way to prove to herself that she would be able to go her own way alone, with only herself to count on. Grete indulged her. Secretly she was happy for Lili's participation in the big and small things of the day, even if she certainly suspected that Lili was fighting many hard fights with herself especially during those Berlin days.
That was it. There were days through which Lili carried a very tormented, torn heart, in which she was depressed by many fears. It is so easy, she thought then, to endure an anonymous fate among complete strangers here. But how would everything go, once that anonymity stopped, once she would have to appear in the circle of those from which Andreas emerged, who Andreas had belonged to? She thought of her family in Denmark. Should she never return there? Would that not be easiest? Should she, the new person without a past and thus actually without a family as well, forgo everything that had to do with Andreas? Forgo the friends and siblings in Denmark. Forgo the friends in Paris, to begin completely anew? With a fanaticism she threw herself into those thoughts, with a headstrongness, that finally the question stirred in her, if she should not leave Grete forever, secretly, without saying a word? Or should she talk to Grete, tell her in simple, quiet words, that their ways had to part now? But just as she had posed this question to herself, she already recoiled. Would life, the world around her, not be too empty, too cold, did she want to forego everything that once surrounded Andreas? Would it not be cowardice, an admittance of a guilty conscience, if she renounce all bonds with the past – to Andreas' past? Would it not become too lonesome for Grete as well, if she were to leave her forever? These days of helpless searching were followed by nights in which Lili lay there sleepless, thinking of all that had happened with her,- with Grete, - with Andreas. And the deeper, the more longing, the more ardently she allowed her thoughts to wander back, the more shocked she became. Because she saw that her entire thinking now had actually been erased from the day on which she had been created down there in the city on the Elbe. A dread could come over her when she saw her unanswered questions standing there before a fog that was covering more and more thickly everything that had been before, and finally erased everything completely. Faces that Andreas had known were blurred. A bleakness surrounded her, an empty desert, in which not even shapes from her past surfaced. She felt close to madness in those nights, and she did not dare to confide what she now learned in any other being, not even in Grete. Only two names grew brighter and clearer in her fear, and with those names two faces, one belonged to the friend Claude, the other to Feruzzi, that young, Italian officer, who ages ago, or so she thought now, though it only had been a year, had been together with them in Rome. Feruzzi, that young, handsome Italian, who Grete, even though she had not mentioned his name in the last weeks, to whom, as if looking for help and protection from a man, who was devoted to her unto death, secretly and not clear to herself, she felt devoted. And the more ardently Lili conjured up the image of the Italian friend in her heart, the more she perceived ever more clearly how the facial features of Feruzzi and the image of Andreas shifted. And all of a sudden it stood clearly in front of her, which strange secret was entangled with the oath that Andreas had sworn to himself on that fine night in Rome when Andreas, Grete and Feruzzi sat together: Grete should be united with Feruzzi, because they belonged with each other, and Andreas should disappear.
It was already late at night, when Lili suddenly got up, sat very quietly down with Grete and took her hand. Grete was asleep. But suddenly she woke up, and startled saw Lili sitting next to her.
"Did I wake you?" asked Lili.
"Oh I was dreaming so nicely," said Grete.
"And where were you in your dream?" asked Lili.
And then Grete replied: "I believe we were in Rome."
"And Feruzzi was with you, right?" said Lili. And then Grete put her arm around Lili and Lili her arm around Grete and they did not speak another word.
The next morning Lili wrote a very simple, calm letter to Feruzzi:
"Dear friend! I just want to tell you that Andreas kept his word. He is dead. I know that Grete has not yet told you about this. Write to her, and never leave her."
And underneath that she put her name.
And eight days later both of them went from Berlin back to the city on the Elbe. And they were in Lili's hometown again for a few days. And they walked again through the garden of the "Women's Clinic" like two sisters, and the Professor was glad they were there. And they bade farewell again and on his suggestion drove to a small town in the woods of the Erzgebirge, lived in a small spa hotel, lived together with other people, unknown persons, who, just like them, sought and found weeks of relaxation. And one day a letter came from Italy, for Grete. And Grete gave the letter to Lili. And in the letter was written only, that a man was waiting for them both, wherever they were and wherever he was, and that they had only to call. And that his heart was theirs both. And beneath that was Feruzzi's name. On this day Lili felt for the first time in her woman's life that she had worked off some of her debt to Grete and that she had given some happiness to two other people Grete and Feruzzi.
And Grete only got to know now what Andreas had sworn to himself and to her and Feruzzi back then in Rome.
"Grete," Lili said to her the next day, "I am ready for the both of us to go back home."
"Back home?" Grete asked.
"By back home I mean Denmark, so you can become free from a person who has been dead for a long, long time, from Andreas, and so the both of us, you and me, can begin a new life."
A week later they drove northward to Denmark.
The Professor just shook her hand: "Write me where you are, how you are doing, what keeps you busy. And rеgularly. Tell me evеrything. And if you need me, you will always find shelter here." That's how the Professor talked to her.
Then she bade farewell to the Matron and the other nurses. And when she walked through the portal, saw how her suitcases were lifted onto the car, she suddenly thought, how everything just worked now so easily, and how life seen by daylight is so undramatic and unpathetic. The day before and the whole night too everything within her had been tension and fear of this farewell and fear of the life out there, and before she knew it, she sat with Grete on the train ride to Berlin. And only much later, many months later, did she understand what a rough transition it was from the peace of the "Women's Clinic" into life, the days that would now be lived in Berlin again. Then only did she realize, why she had been sent away from her paradise on the Elbe into the noisiest of all cities she had ever seen. Because those Berlin days would be her proving time. They lived in a hotel in close vicinity to the clinic, in which a few months ago a man had lain ... There was no curiosity in her to visit it, this site of transition, as she called it afterwards. She also had no desire to visit the friends from back then. To move about unknown, anonymous, among the millions of this giant city, to live, to watch and to walk around, to become used to the working days of others, to take part in it herself on this working day, which was apparently the deeper reason for this stay in Berlin. Grete was not always with her during her wanderings through Tiergarten, through the museums and through the loudest, most lively streets. She often desired to find her own way, alone and relying only on herself, in the vortex of millions of Berlin. That was it: she had to find her way to prove to herself that she would be able to go her own way alone, with only herself to count on. Grete indulged her. Secretly she was happy for Lili's participation in the big and small things of the day, even if she certainly suspected that Lili was fighting many hard fights with herself especially during those Berlin days.
That was it. There were days through which Lili carried a very tormented, torn heart, in which she was depressed by many fears. It is so easy, she thought then, to endure an anonymous fate among complete strangers here. But how would everything go, once that anonymity stopped, once she would have to appear in the circle of those from which Andreas emerged, who Andreas had belonged to? She thought of her family in Denmark. Should she never return there? Would that not be easiest? Should she, the new person without a past and thus actually without a family as well, forgo everything that had to do with Andreas? Forgo the friends and siblings in Denmark. Forgo the friends in Paris, to begin completely anew? With a fanaticism she threw herself into those thoughts, with a headstrongness, that finally the question stirred in her, if she should not leave Grete forever, secretly, without saying a word? Or should she talk to Grete, tell her in simple, quiet words, that their ways had to part now? But just as she had posed this question to herself, she already recoiled. Would life, the world around her, not be too empty, too cold, did she want to forego everything that once surrounded Andreas? Would it not be cowardice, an admittance of a guilty conscience, if she renounce all bonds with the past – to Andreas' past? Would it not become too lonesome for Grete as well, if she were to leave her forever? These days of helpless searching were followed by nights in which Lili lay there sleepless, thinking of all that had happened with her,- with Grete, - with Andreas. And the deeper, the more longing, the more ardently she allowed her thoughts to wander back, the more shocked she became. Because she saw that her entire thinking now had actually been erased from the day on which she had been created down there in the city on the Elbe. A dread could come over her when she saw her unanswered questions standing there before a fog that was covering more and more thickly everything that had been before, and finally erased everything completely. Faces that Andreas had known were blurred. A bleakness surrounded her, an empty desert, in which not even shapes from her past surfaced. She felt close to madness in those nights, and she did not dare to confide what she now learned in any other being, not even in Grete. Only two names grew brighter and clearer in her fear, and with those names two faces, one belonged to the friend Claude, the other to Feruzzi, that young, Italian officer, who ages ago, or so she thought now, though it only had been a year, had been together with them in Rome. Feruzzi, that young, handsome Italian, who Grete, even though she had not mentioned his name in the last weeks, to whom, as if looking for help and protection from a man, who was devoted to her unto death, secretly and not clear to herself, she felt devoted. And the more ardently Lili conjured up the image of the Italian friend in her heart, the more she perceived ever more clearly how the facial features of Feruzzi and the image of Andreas shifted. And all of a sudden it stood clearly in front of her, which strange secret was entangled with the oath that Andreas had sworn to himself on that fine night in Rome when Andreas, Grete and Feruzzi sat together: Grete should be united with Feruzzi, because they belonged with each other, and Andreas should disappear.
It was already late at night, when Lili suddenly got up, sat very quietly down with Grete and took her hand. Grete was asleep. But suddenly she woke up, and startled saw Lili sitting next to her.
"Did I wake you?" asked Lili.
"Oh I was dreaming so nicely," said Grete.
"And where were you in your dream?" asked Lili.
And then Grete replied: "I believe we were in Rome."
"And Feruzzi was with you, right?" said Lili. And then Grete put her arm around Lili and Lili her arm around Grete and they did not speak another word.
The next morning Lili wrote a very simple, calm letter to Feruzzi:
"Dear friend! I just want to tell you that Andreas kept his word. He is dead. I know that Grete has not yet told you about this. Write to her, and never leave her."
And underneath that she put her name.
And eight days later both of them went from Berlin back to the city on the Elbe. And they were in Lili's hometown again for a few days. And they walked again through the garden of the "Women's Clinic" like two sisters, and the Professor was glad they were there. And they bade farewell again and on his suggestion drove to a small town in the woods of the Erzgebirge, lived in a small spa hotel, lived together with other people, unknown persons, who, just like them, sought and found weeks of relaxation. And one day a letter came from Italy, for Grete. And Grete gave the letter to Lili. And in the letter was written only, that a man was waiting for them both, wherever they were and wherever he was, and that they had only to call. And that his heart was theirs both. And beneath that was Feruzzi's name. On this day Lili felt for the first time in her woman's life that she had worked off some of her debt to Grete and that she had given some happiness to two other people Grete and Feruzzi.
And Grete only got to know now what Andreas had sworn to himself and to her and Feruzzi back then in Rome.
"Grete," Lili said to her the next day, "I am ready for the both of us to go back home."
"Back home?" Grete asked.
"By back home I mean Denmark, so you can become free from a person who has been dead for a long, long time, from Andreas, and so the both of us, you and me, can begin a new life."
A week later they drove northward to Denmark.