Chaperoned Read online

  Also by Dora Heldt:

  Life After Forty

  Inseparable

  Aunt Inge’s Secret Escape (forthcoming)

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Text copyright © 2008 Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag GmbH & Co. KG English translation copyright © 2012 by Jamie Lee Searle

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Chaperoned was first published in 2008 by Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag GmbH & Co. KG as Urlaub mit Papa (Vacation with Dad). Translated from German by Jamie Lee Searle. Published in English by AmazonCrossing in 2012.

  Published by AmazonCrossing

  P.O. Box 400818

  Las Vegas NV 89140

  ISBN-13:9781611090246

  ISBN-10: 1611090245

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2010919329

  For my father, who is a little like Heinz, and for my mother, who—thankfully—has perfect knees.

  Contents

  * * *

  A Little Favor

  Oh! My Pa-Pa

  A Bumpy Start

  The Island

  Shooting Stars

  Early Birds

  A Good Friend

  A Handsome Stranger

  A Dip in the Sea

  An Interrupted Flirtation

  Not a Moment’s Peace

  A Challenging Morning

  The Heartbreaker

  A New Love

  Something in the Air

  The Con Man

  The Egg King

  He’s Back

  The Penguins

  A Night to Remember

  The Search Heats Up

  Caught in the Act

  Bittersweet

  The Detectives

  Motherly Advice

  A Second Chance

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  About the Translator

  A Little Favor

  * * *

  “It’ll only be for two weeks.”

  My mother’s voice sounded cheerful but firm, always a bad sign. I’d had an ominous feeling from the moment I’d picked up the phone.

  “And he’s your father. Other children would be pleased.”

  “Mom, what do you mean other children? I’m forty-five!”

  I should never have answered her call. My mother ignored my comment. “I told him you could really use his help given that workmen are so expensive on the island. Plus, you know how contractors do whatever they want if you don’t watch over them. Your dad can keep an eye on things and lend a hand here and there. You know how much he loves to help out.”

  I knew the force of my mother’s determination all too well, and I needed to stop her before we were too far in. “Mom, wait a second. The whole reason I’m going to Nordeney is to help Marleen renovate the guesthouse and the restaurant. I can’t look after Dad as well…”

  “Oh, come on, you don’t need to look after him. He’ll be fine left to his own devices. And you’d have to make lunch for yourselves anyway, so just make a little extra. In the evenings he’ll be fine with a little snack, and he can just eat cake or something in the afternoons. It’s not like Marleen would have to bake for him.”

  I couldn’t help but wonder—since when had my father been fine left to his own devices? The last time I’d visited my parents was six weeks ago, and that certainly hadn’t been the case then. Not in the slightest. I tried to push the rising panic out of my voice.

  “Mom, I really don’t think this is a good idea. I—”

  “Christine, I’ve never asked you for anything before, have I? This is an emergency. I have to stay in the hospital for two weeks, and Heinz can’t just sit around at home alone for all that time.”

  “I thought you said he could manage everything by himself.”

  “Yes, but not cooking and washing and so on. Now listen, he’s your father. You can take him with you for once. It’s only two weeks, and you’ll be on vacation—you’ll have time. Don’t make such a fuss. Plus, your dad’s always wanted to go to Nordeney.”

  “But I won’t be able to look after him properly there. And how—”

  “Oh, it’ll be fine. Besides, Dad’s old friend Kalli lives on Nordeney. He can go visit him.”

  “Then why can’t he stay with him, too?”

  “Christine, please! Kalli’s going to be on his own, too—Hanna is on the mainland at the moment,” she said, referring to Kalli’s wife. “Their youngest, Katharina, is having a baby, so Hanna’s going to be staying with her for a while.” She proceeded to cross off a list of other possibilities. “Your brother’s going to be away on business. Your sister’s going to help me at the hospital the first few days, but then she’s already made sailing plans in Denmark, and it’s not like your father could join her there. Plus, it’s not like you and your sister have children to look after, so…”

  Only mothers have the ability to change the subject like that.

  “Mom, I’m—”

  “Perfect, it’s settled then. Dad will come to Hamburg next Saturday; you’ll pick him up from the train station and head off to Nordeney together. He doesn’t really know his way around with the ferry and so on, so it’s best if you go together. And then I can go into the hospital for my knee operation with my mind at rest.”

  This was my last chance. “I think we should talk about this calmly some other time. It’s not the best plan, I—”

  “Don’t worry, darling. I’ll make a note of all the important things and send it to you. Okay then, have a lovely evening. Dad sends his love and can’t wait. Tschüss.”

  I stared at the display on the telephone. She’d hung up. It seemed it was a done deal. For the first time in thirty years, I was going on vacation with my dad. Our last family vacation had ended with him leaving me behind at a gas station in Kassel as a “learning experience.” I was a difficult teenager, I admit, but it was a little harsh, nonetheless. He picked me up again half an hour later and felt guilty for the next three weeks, but still. And now, thirty years on, here we were again.

  Well, at least we wouldn’t be passing through Kassel this time.

  Oh! My Pa-Pa

  * * *

  My brother once described our father as having “eyes like Paul Newman and the neediness of Scooby-Doo.” Scooby was renowned for being so afraid of his own shadow that he jumped into his master’s arms at every strange noise. My dad doesn’t jump into anyone’s lap, of course—he’s far too well-mannered for that, nor is he anywhere near as dumb as that animal—but he can be helpless, and he does have very blue eyes. So I’d say my brother’s description is pretty accurate.

  Walking up the steps to Dorothea’s apartment, I wondered how to gently break the news about our adjusted vacation plans. Dorothea and I had been friends for fifteen years, and she knew my whole family, so the simple words “Heinz is coming with us to Nordeney” would say it all. I had to find a way of taking the horror out of the sentence. We’d been looking forward to these two weeks away, and I didn’t want her to think that my dad was hard work. Unfortunately, he was. I tried different approaches in my head. “Dorothea, guess what? Heinz is coming with us! Isn’t that great?” Nope, that was going too far. “Dorothea, my mother finally got an appointment for her knee operation, so would you mind if Heinz came with us to Nordeney? He wouldn’t be able to make so much as a bowl of cereal if he was left by himself.” That wouldn’t work, either—I didn’t want to scare her. “Dorothea, you really like my d
ad, don’t you? Well, what would you say to us taking him along to Nordeney so my mom doesn’t have to worry about him when she’s in the hospital?” Great. “Dorothea, I’ve been thinking. Heinz could really help us out with renovating Marleen’s guesthouse, and I’d like to bring him along with us.” She’d never believe that. “Dorothea, it’s like this…”

  The apartment door opened before I had a chance to knock. Dorothea stood in front of me with a shopping basket in her hand. “Hi, Christine, I was just about to go—”

  “Heinz is coming with us.”

  That wasn’t what I’d planned. Dorothea wrinkled her forehead.

  “Shopping?”

  “To Nordeney.”

  “Which Heinz? Your…?”

  “Yes, that one.”

  “With us? To Marleen’s? On Saturday?”

  “Yes.”

  Nervously, I waited for a breakdown, a look of complete incomprehension, or a screaming fit, but none came. Without a word, Dorothea put down her shopping basket and went back into the apartment. I followed her to the kitchen and watched as she boiled some water for tea. She whistled Eddie Fisher’s “Oh! My Pa-Pa” as she worked, and I tried to win her over.

  “My mother called earlier. She’s having a new artificial knee joint fitted, and an appointment for the operation came up suddenly. My sister’s sailing in and my brother’s away on business, so I’m the only one she could ask. You know what my dad’s like. He can’t stay at home by himself for two weeks. He doesn’t even know how to make coffee, let alone a baked potato. Or a boiled egg. And on top of all that he’s color-blind. You wouldn’t believe the clothes he puts on when no one’s there to keep an eye on him.”

  I wondered what else I could say without taking away his dignity. It was tricky—I didn’t want Dorothea to think badly of him, but he did have certain habits that, to put it delicately, were rather unusual.

  “Your dad’s good fun.”

  I gulped. That wasn’t the expression I would have chosen. Dorothea poured boiling water into the teapot and turned around to me.

  “I mean, he’s still in pretty good shape. And if he feels like giving us a hand, that’d be really nice. As long as it’s not too tiring for him.”

  Not too tiring for him?

  Dorothea put the teapot on the table and took cups from the cupboard.

  “Don’t look so worried, Christine. We can keep an eye on him, you know, make sure he doesn’t take on too much.”

  “Dorothea, you don’t understand. I’m more worried that he’ll be too much for me. He can be quite demanding. He really can’t do anything by himself, he has to be kept busy, he’s always sticking his nose in, he always knows better, he doesn’t like change, he…”

  I bit my tongue. I hadn’t meant to say any of that. I really like my dad. But preferably when there’s a three-hour drive between us. Or if my mother’s there too. Or when I meet him for the occasional cup of coffee. But two weeks in an apartment with him, a long drive away from my mother, who’d be tending to her new knee in a Hamburg hospital, well, that could lead to more than a little friction. But Dorothea wouldn’t understand that. She’d just have to see for herself. I stirred some sugar into my tea and looked up at her.

  “Oh well, maybe it really will be fine. Marleen might be happy to have the help.”

  I didn’t believe a word of it. Dorothea nodded.

  “I’m looking forward to it anyway,” she said. “Even with Heinz. It’ll be an experience, right?”

  I nodded hesitantly. We could count on that, for sure.

  My friend Marleen had recently taken over an old guesthouse with a restaurant attached on the island of Nordeney, off the north coast of Germany. Her aunt had run it for decades, but at nearly seventy, she had decided to enjoy life a bit more. One of the deciding factors was Hubert, a seventy-four-year-old widower from Essen who had been one of the regulars for over twenty years, eighteen years of those with his wife, and then without. Aunt Theda told her niece that Hubert had become a completely new man, “so adventurous, you wouldn’t believe it,” and that he’d made a passionate declaration of love to her. He didn’t want to get married again—he thought that was all nonsense—but he did want to travel around the world with Theda—first to Sylt, then Mallorca, and then maybe even America. Theda was flattered but cautious. As Theda filled Marleen in on her travel plans, Marleen gave her aunt news of her own. She’d separated from her boyfriend, the one she managed a restaurant with. Theda’s reaction was less sympathetic than enthusiastic. “Well that’s wonderful!” she’d said. “It means you can come to Nordeney for a few months and run the place. I can give things a go with Hubert, and you won’t have to see that idiot of a man back home anymore. And a restaurant’s a restaurant, so you already know you can handle the work.”

  After the trial period passed, both women knew they’d made the right decision. Theda and Hubert were in love, Marleen was in love with Nordeney, and the locals were equally smitten with her. Hubert suggested to Theda that she set herself up in a little vacation apartment and sign over the guesthouse and restaurant to her niece. Marleen got her ex to buy her out of her old place and then put the money into renovating the new one. She was almost finished, and the new place was set to open just a week after our arrival.

  Marleen had asked a few months prior, back in the spring, whether I could help her with the renovations. I’m not that handy with tools, but I did help out in my grandmother’s guesthouse for years. I could clean a room in fifteen minutes, and manage and clear a breakfast buffet with my eyes shut. It would give Marleen time to oversee the workmen.

  Marleen wanted to make the restaurant reopening into something really special, with beautiful colors and artful use of light. She remembered Dorothea was a costume and set designer. On one of her visits to Hamburg, Marleen had shown Dorothea the plans, and Dorothea was so taken by them that she offered to come to the island with me to help. I’d scheduled two weeks off of my job at a publishing house, and Dorothea had gotten the time off as well. Marleen rented us an apartment. Our plan was to help in the mornings, lie on the beach in the afternoons, and drink chilled white wine in the evenings in Nordeney’s most charming bars. In the three years since my divorce, it was trips like these with my girlfriends that gave me the rest and reboot that I needed, and I couldn’t wait. Now, with Heinz along, I wasn’t sure what to expect from the trip.

  I dialed Marleen’s number.

  “Haus Theda, Marleen speaking.”

  “Hi, Marleen, it’s Christine here.”

  “Oh, please don’t tell me you’re not coming? The guesthouse is booked full, the workmen are moving at a snail’s pace, and one of my assistants pulled a muscle in her foot. So now I only have Gesa helping me. I’m panicking here. Theda and Hubert have said they’re coming for the weekend, but they said they only want to see how it’s going, not pitch in—they’re retirees, after all. So, say what you were going to say, but bear in mind that I’m on the edge of a nervous breakdown.”

  If she hadn’t been laughing as she said it, I would have believed her. But it laid the groundwork wonderfully for me to break the news. I tried to keep my voice neutral.

  “Well, then I have the perfect solution. I’m bringing Heinz along too. He’ll only need a bed, some company, a hot meal once a day, and a job to keep him occupied. And maybe a wheat beer now and then. What do you think?”

  “You’re bringing your father along? Seriously? How on earth did you come up with that idea?”

  “How did I come up with it?! It was my mother’s grand plan. She’s having her knee operated on next week in Hamburg. Everyone else who could help is away, so it’s down to me to look after him. The only alternative is for me to go to Sylt, but then I’d have to cancel on you, which I don’t want to do. So my mother told him we’d be happy to have his help, and, as it happens, an old friend of his lives on Nordeney too. Apparently Heinz was a little hesitant at first, but now he feels like the knight in shining armor. Anyway, that’s the sh
ort version of the story.”

  “You know, this isn’t so bad. I mean, I don’t know your father that well, but he always seems happy to help and gives the impression that he’s in pretty good shape.”

  A nervous cough escaped me. Oh yes, he gave that impression all right.

  “Have you got a cough?” Marleen asked, but plowed right along before I responded. “I’ve certainly got enough things for him to help with, so he really will be a knight in shining armor. Even if he only keeps Hubert from getting under my feet. He’s a great guy, but he always knows better and always sticks his nose in.”

  “Then I’m sure the two of them will get on like a house on fire.”

  “I’m sure Heinz isn’t anywhere near as bad as Hubert. Okay, great, I’ll let the owner of the apartment know that three of you are coming. We’ll have to put an extra bed in the living room; you only have the two bedrooms. But that’ll be fine. I’m so pleased you’re coming, Christine. You can help me in the guesthouse in the mornings while Dorothea sweet-talks the workmen.”

  We said good-bye. I pictured myself lying on a rollaway bed in the living room while my father looked for sports results on TV.

  Wonderful, I thought. I hoped Hubert would be able to handle it.

  List/Sylt, June 10

  Dear Christine,

  I’ve just packed my suitcase for the hospital. It’s amazing how much you need for two weeks. I bought myself six new nighties, really chic ones, one striped one and one with hearts, they’re really lovely. But Agnes—you know, from Süderhorn? Third house from the left?—she had the same operation last year, and she said all you need is a sweat suit from the third day onward. But it doesn’t matter, I think they’ll fit you too, and I don’t wear nighties anyway. You can pick them up the next time you come to Sylt.

  Anyway, I’ll get to the point. I’ve told Dad that he should help Marleen a bit, not the whole day, but one or two hours perhaps. You know what he’s like when he doesn’t have anything to do. You’ll find something for him, I’m sure. Just remember that he can’t do any heavy lifting because of his hip, and he can’t go up ladders because he’ll get dizzy. If you get him to help out with the painting, make sure you check the paint bucket—you know he’s color-blind. By the way, he painted the guest bathroom turquoise last week thinking it was gray-blue, but we’ll get used to it. I hope so, anyway. Don’t get impatient if he makes a mistake now and then. He means well, and you know how sensitive he is.