Text for You (SMS für Dich)

TWO YEARS LATER

RIEKE THE STUBBORN CATERPILLAR WHO REFUSED TO BECOME A BUTTERFLY

RIEKE THE STUBBORN CATERPILLAR FLIES TO THE MOON

RIEKE THE STUBBORN CATERPILLAR AND MR FRUITFLY

LOBECK BOOK PRIZE FOR CLARA SOMMERFELD, AUTHOR OF RIEKE...

CATER-BURGLED

STOP GRUMBLING, GRUB!

...RIEKE THE CATERPILLAR WHO COULDN'T STOP CRYING

Katja?

I think I'm coming back.

Bye, Mama.

SMS FOR YOU

YOU'RE A GRANDPA, CONGRATS.

NEVER CALL ME AGAIN!! - HEY, SEXY! MEET ME FOR LUNCH?

YOU LEFT SOMETHING BEHIND...

...MY HEART

WHERE ARE YOU???!!

Still trying to grow into Ben's car?

What do you mean? - What I mean? Nothing.

Come here!

I'm up top. - I am.

It's not worth my paying rent anymore.

Want to spend more time there? - It's not that...

My place is too small for the two of us. - So let's find a bigger one.

I saw one on Saalman Street. With a crèche round the corner.

Crèche? Are you pregnant? - Of course I'm not pregnant.

One doesn't get pregnant by mistake.

That sigh was a bit too relieved.

It'd be a bit much all at once. - I thought in two, two-and-a-half years.

But I can go over it with you tonight. - Listen, Poem of the Day:

Great! A poem instead of our future! - "I love her not, or love her still,

So brief is love, so long its oblivion."

Are you trying to tell me something?

Huh? - "So brief is love?"

I thought our love was for the medium-to-long term.

It is. Stay cool. I mean, who reads poems nowadays?

I'll do the upbringing, then. - Lf I wanted poems, I'd buy a book,

not a paper. - Good you're a sportswriter, then.

Fuck!

That one lasted almost two months.

It's already five to. - So?

Oh shit!

Where were you? You missed the in-house debate.

We sat and waited! Gee, Mark! - Mark!

Wortmann wants to see you. And he's pissed.

Easy listening?! Is this my punishment?

Are you down on love? Die Zeit says, Henriette Boot is bringing love back.

Hah! There's no love in that funfair music.

It's kitsch. I'm a journalist!

Right. And your readers want to be moved.

I thought they wanted insight:

Like: "So brief is love, so long its oblivion."

Right, "When you're gone, my heart is out of gas".

What's the difference? That's Ms Boot's latest hit.

You can discuss it all with her. Listen:

For weeks you've been saying you want to do a profile of Messi.

You'd be the first German to do so. You know that?

For a profile you have to move in close, get to the heart.

Goal statistics alone don't cut it!

Sure you know everything about football, but for Messi I want more!

You're a good apple, but are you ready to pluck?

Get to the core of Ms Boot and you can get to Messi's.

I'll get you heart and core, but then you'll let me do Messi?

I'll put it this way: If you want to move people,

you have to let yourself be moved.

And no one's cracked Ms Boot yet!

That's the lot? - Almost.

Ben's box is the way I packed it. Didn't you even open it?

No, not yet. - Gee, Clara!

I thought I'd wait till I have more time. - Yes, right!

You'll cure your writer's block here. - Hope so. My publisher's going mad.

Am I hungry! Programming zombies eats blood-sugar.

What's that pullover? - Bernd gave it to me. - Nice.

We could have raspberry delight. - Spoiler alert:

I'm for the Gockel. - I can't handle it. - You can.

Ben is in all Berlin.

Try to avoid him here and you'll end up spooning ice like in a kitschy film,

watching kitschy films, like in a kitschy film,

till you go nuts as it all reminds you of him.

The vaccine is a sausage at the Gockel.

So?

Bernd wrote. - What's up, is he getting divorced again?

"See you soon, dot-dot-dot, winky-smiley."

Real Shakespearian. And you wrote?

I wrote,

"It's cool, I like being your stop-over.

Let's not talk it to death, let's enjoy it, don't worry about me.

But we need to talk about that thing at Bukowski's.

P.S.

I sent you the program, office organisation should be fine now.

Did you get it, question mark."

What makes that a good answer?

"See you soon" means he wants to see me,

"Dot-dot-dot" means he has plans for me.

Or he's keeping his options open. - Nope.

I don't think so. And anyway: Winky-smiley.

Come on, winky-smiley is total commitment!

He could have just used the "I'm happy" smiley.

How are you doing...

on the inside? - I don't know.

He can't just simply be gone.

Life must be missing something, too.

Lalle, how do you do it? - Cut them in bits

and add special sauce.

No, I mean, how is it you deal with it all?

You mean because of my Marie?

It can take a while. I know that.

I don't know if my while has passed yet.

As long as I keep talking to her, she's not dead.

Or, okay, she's dead, but that doesn't stop me living with her.

The ice keeps getting thicker. One day it will bear your weight.

Maybe you should do that too:

Bring Ben back into your life, talk to him.

Right. I'll get 20 cats, too. - It's time we unpack Ben's box.

Your heart is always right if you...

Nothing happens in your life without meaning

Every experience you have is enriching

Heart! What shit! - I got you a new phone since I'm sweet.

But you have a new number. - What for, Niki?

It's my third in six months. Do you always get a new number?

No. - Hey...

You got another new number? - Leep busting them...

and you'll keep getting them.

If you start taking care of things,

you'll be able to keep your old one. - Mark has a new number!

All my contacts... - Quit whining. - 0152...

24074307!

Thanks. Got a story on home-field advantage?

In 2013, almost all Nigerian wins were at home.

You're faster than Google.

"The Brain." Pity you turned into a girl. Got interested in the soul and all that.

I can write objectively on easy listening.

You need to think about why you threw a ball at your girlfriend's head.

That was a joke among friends. - Friends?

Let me just say: Subconscious! It's a gaping abyss.

You read too many self-help blogs. - You take care of her?

Course I do. - Maybe you're too nice.

Either I'm too nice or I don't take care, which?

It's not so simple: Too much and they drown, too little and they wither.

Maybe Fiona's a cactus.

Thanks for the parable but there is no abyss.

It smells of box.

Oh God!

Our engagement ring.

I bet he meant to ask me at the Gockel.

Of course he had no idea what size the ring had to be.

So one day he came up to me with a measuring tape

and told me this endless story

about how finger size indicates sexual drive and fidelity.

I knew all along what he was up to.

He simply couldn't lie.

Hmm. Fits perfectly.

Should we maybe go to the cemetery?

I've never been. I need to go, don't I?

I don't think I can till I'm back to normal.

Meaning never.

Oh God, my old cell phone.

All his old SMSes will be on it.

Even with amortisation and instalments, we'd not be over 1377.31 euros a month.

You see? It's worth it.

Yes, that's definitely... a convincing table.

If you don't want to... - I do!

Why must I drag you along? - Drag me? I'm going along.

It's a sign to the world that I'm your wife.

You're not big on public declarations of love.

HOW WAS IT? - WHAT?

WITH MIA? - BIT BORING...

Hello?

Ben?

Oh God, I can't do this. I sound like a granny talking to herself on the tube.

HELLO BEN. I MISS...

POEM OF THE DAY

SO BRIEF IS LOVE, SO LONG ITS OBLIVION.

Would you turn the light back on. - I didn't turn it off.

Nor me.

SO BRIEF IS LOVE, SO LONG ITS OBLIVION. - Very funny.

What?

It's not from you? I got an SMS of the poem I read to you this morning.

It must be spam. - Isn't it an odd coincidence?

Mmm... funny.

You're not big into that, huh? - What, spam?

No, odd coincidences. - I'm into life planning,

job satisfaction, a nice home, a family.

But you're not into that, it seems. - One can't plan everything.

That's a hassle. - One must plan everything.

You'll see.

Hello?

Hello?

Anyway, the power failure came at a stupid time. I was in the lift.

Would Ben turn out the lights when he knows I get claustrophobic?

What if he can't communicate otherwise? - That's unlikely.

How do I tell my publisher I've got nothing?

She'll understand.

A few months, yes, but two years?

No, Ms Volkowicz will have my hide.

I'll have to go lecture in Darmstadt, after all.

And it's goodbye to Caterpillar Rieke.

Darmstadt!

Who would name a place Intestines City?

Could you start running? This is a drag. - I don't run.