"Look at that desert down there. You're like a bald old man," Katrin heard Sabine Fromberg comment, causing her to turn away. "Ha ha, there's no need to be embarrassed. You might have a bald bush, but your body's nice. Look at those tight buttocks, and your tits are bigger than mine,"
"You are more beautiful," Katrin replied quietly, continuing to stand side-on to her friends, while she soaped herself.
It was true. Of the three girls in the showers, Sabine was the best looking and she knew it.
"More beautiful and with a nice thick thatch," Sabine said running her fingers through her dark pubic hair, while she and the third girl Monika laughed.
Katrin laughed along with them, while rinsing the soap off, aware Sabine was being mean to her again. Katrin didn't like the girl much. Monika was her longtime friend, with Sabine only recently coming into their lives.
The three girls all squealed in unison, as the showers ran cold.
"You girls alright in there?" a male voice called, Katrin recognizing it as Monika's brother, Andreas..
"Yes; the shower went cold; that's all," Monika called back.
"He'd love to come in and check, I'll bet," Sabine said with a broad smile, as she began to dry herself.
"Oh Sabine, you're so naughty, some of the things you say. He's my brother," Monika berated her friend.
"Well he wouldn't be looking at you, would he? He'd be looking at Katrin. He'd like to see her right now, with her bald tushy."
Katrin self-consciously covered the area her friend was referring to, pretending to dry it.
"Look she's rubbing herself just thinking of him. Look at those pink nipples grow," Sabine continued, as she and Monika dissolved into raucous laughter.
Katrin giggled, but was not at all comfortable with Sabine's crudeness. She was fully aware Andreas liked her, but she did not like it being verbalized so crudely. The young women wrapped towels around their bodies.
"Don't look you perverts," Monika yelled through the door, before they all ran through the common room to the bedroom, which the three of them shared with a fourth girl, Marion.
Katrin saw the four men avert their eyes, but knew Andreas would turn to look. He liked her alright, she could tell, her radar now far more honed than it had been a year ago. However, she'd never returned his interest, especially in the past year when she'd gotten a boyfriend.
In the room they found Marion, sitting on her bed. She didn't acknowledge them when they came in. A tall, average looking girl, with long hair, Marion never showered with the other girls. She would take a cold shower later. Katrin put this down to her being shy and self-conscious. She wondered how Marion would get on in the West, where Katrin had read all women were beautiful and vibrant, but needed to have their wits about them, for fear of being exploited.
The three young women ignored Marion while they quickly dressed; clothing themselves against the cold. The drafty prefabricated building offered little warmth. Katrin donned warm tights under her knee-length dress.
"Bulgaria! What a cold shit hole," Sabine grumbled. "I can't see why people come here to holiday."
"They come in summer for the most part," Katrin replied "In summer it's warm... hot even."
"Well maybe so, but it's still a shit hole. Turkey had better be warmer than this."
"Quiet Sabine. Don't speak of that; even here," Monika warned her friend.
"No one can hear," Sabine snapped, starting to comb out her dark hair.
"Even so, we're here on holiday. That is what we say."
"No one would believe that," Sabine continued. "There are hardly any other German tourists here at this time of the year. We stand out like... like Katrin's nipples."
"Can you stop being so crude," Katrin complained.
"Oh, look who's got her nose out of joint."
"You're always picking on me."
"Well that's because you're an easy target. You lack sophistication."
"Monika!" Katrin said, turning to her friend for support.
"Don't be so mean to her Sabine."
"Oh well, I'll try. Sorry Katrin, it's just this place, the cold... surely it will be warmer in, TURKEY," the attractive woman yelled the countries name, before breaking into fits of giggles.
"You put all our lives at risk," Katrin said quietly.
"Oh do I, you little virgin bitch," Sabine sneered, before beginning to loudly sing. "We're all going to Turkey, we're all going to Turkey, hooray, hooray, we are going to..."
Monika joined in, just before the door flew open.
"Be quiet you girls! What do you think you're doing?" Herr Lehmann roared angrily.
"Oh Papa..." Monika began.
"Quiet I said! You're grown women, but you think this is a game, where you can carry on like little girls. Stassi informants could be anywhere. We will never get to the West if you keep carrying on like that. We'll all get to a prison cell or worse. Now shut your mouths."
The four girls all bowed their heads. Katrin had never heard Herr Lehmann yell like that. It crossed Katrin's mind to state it wasn't her or Marion, but she knew that would bring further bullying from the other two. This saddened Katrin. Sabine she could understand, because she was a bitch, but Monika disappointed her. She'd been Katrin's best friend for many years. Now she'd fallen under the spell of the attractive Jewish girl. Katrin refused to back down to her. She knew it best to say nothing, but couldn't help herself.
"Anyway, I'm not a virgin, although I doubt I've been with as many men as you."
"Oh ho, the little mouse roars. So, you're no virgin. Then tell us who has pierced your bald petal," Sabine continued, thrusting her pelvis forward to emphasize the body part she was speaking of.
"Stop it you two," Monika said, clearly tiring of her friends fighting. "Katrin had a boyfriend. Jurgen... from the factory..."
"Monika!" Katrin interrupted, scared her friend was about to divulge things she'd told her in confidence.
"Well it's true. He is your only boyfriend, so, if you are no virgin, he must be the one," Monika said, deliberately playing down how much she knew about Katrin and Jurgen's intimacy.
"So; it's Jurgen who took his wurst and speared you with it. Dumb Jurgen the factory worker. What a catch he must be," Katrin heard Sabine taunting, as she snatched her coat and fled the room.
"Are you girls arguing again?" Herr Lehmann asked.
"No! Just talking," Katrin lied. "When will we leave here Herr Lehmann? "
"Soon! Maybe tomorrow night. It will be cold, but the weather forecast says no wind, so maybe we go. By the morning we will be in Turkey," Herr Lehmann whispered. "You are ready Katrin?"
"Yes... I think so."
"Of course you are Katrin," he said, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "You are stronger than the other girls... and brighter. You will flourish in the West."
Katrin nodded her head, glanced at Andreas, before wrapping her coat tightly around her. She walked through the kitchen, where the older two women were preparing the dinner and outside to stand by the kitchen door. It was the only place to be alone with her thoughts. Talk of Jurgen saw 20-year-old Katrin begin to recall how she'd come to be in the south of Bulgaria, mere kilometers from the Turkish border.
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Katrin had been born in East Germany in 1957. Her mother, still traumatized by experiences in World War Two, had taken her own life when Katrin was 8 years old and her younger brother Thomas only three. She'd placed her head in their gas oven and turned it on. Katrin had found her, breathing in the gas and spent some days in hospital herself. Their father had raised both children on his own. He was an unemotional man, who drank to excess and gave his children little affection. In addition, Katrin had never been comfortable with how he acted around her when drunk. Some of his advances had required a serious rebuff, on her part.
Despite all this, Katrin was intelligent and excelled at school. However, at age 15 she'd had to leave and go to work, undertaking menial work in a local factory. She'd little in common with the other workers and found it difficult to adapt or find friends there. She did maintain a friendship with Monika, who she'd known at school. Monika's father, Herr Lehmann, had been Katrin's teacher for a year.
The factory work was mind numbingly mundane, but Katrin continued to read everything she could get her hands on, much of it about life in the West. Much was censored in East Germany, but some information could be found, and Herr Lehmann gave her books and pamphlets. By the time she reached her late teens, Katrin became increasingly interested in the freedoms she read about.
Monika shared everything with Katrin and one day confided that her father intended for their family to flee to the West. Katrin begged Monika to ask if she could go with them and Herr Lehmann had agreed to this. There would be Monika; her parents; older brother Andreas; Herr Fluger; Herr and Frau Kruger and their daughter Marion. Herr Lehmann's plan was that they would flee through a southern country and that they'd go in winter, when no one would be expecting them to try. Subsequently, a number of things occurred to raise the numbers in the party.
First, Monika announced to Katrin that she'd told a new friend Sabine. She said her father had been furious, but had to agree to her coming, for fear Sabine might inform someone. Second, Katrin, who had virtually mothered her brother Thomas, knew she could not leave him behind with an uncaring father. She went directly to Monika's father.