Chapter 7 In which I stop falling and see the inside of a nut 95 Chapter 8 In which Ines and I go shopping and I come to an astounding conclusion 109 Chapter 9 In which I sit in a cage without a key 129 Chapter 10 In which I go for a walk in a tree at night and make a bouquet of flowers 141 Chapter 11 In which I soak a sofa and open lots of cages 159 Chapter 12 In which a fight takes place in a storm and the tower collapses 177 Chapter 13 In which a kitchen utensil plays a key role 187 Afterword 193 x
The Secret Room
CHAPTER 1 In which a collision takes place and a door is discovered I should have known My name is Achim I’m eleven years old and on that summer day when Karl was chasing me around with a piece of soggy bread I should have known that my life would never be the same But I didn’t know I woke up and didn’t know I looked out the window onto the yard where fog was rising from the field and I didn’t know I still didn’t know when I pulled the blankets off Karl so that he wouldn’t stay in bed till next Christmas If this was a story that I had made up I would tell it differently I would say that the night before I had had a strange dream But I hadn’t I wasn’t expecting anything I didn’t feel any differently than usual not even for a split second Instead I rushed down the stairs just as quickly as ever so that I’d beat Karl 1
