100 Pages a Day: Adam + Evelyn Part Three

Part One Part Two

Pages 199 – 284
Adam & Evelyn keep arguing, about nothing. It’s practically boring now. They’ve made it to the West, just as their car dies for good.

In their hotel room, Adam finds a copy of the bible and begins to read the creation story of Adam & Eve in Genesis.

The next morning, at breakfast, the mechanic returns to tell them he’ll buy the car from them.  There’s just no fixing it.

Taking the money, they phone Adam’s aunt and uncle asking for a place to stay while he and Evelyn get settled in West Germany and begin again.

There’s an interrogation of sorts in an embassy so they can get their papers sorted and their continued living in the West will be approved.  Adam continues to carry the bible he took from the hotel in Bavaria.

More bickering.  Adam thinks getting to the West is going to be disastrous.  Evelyn looks at it as a positive thing, at least she’ll get to go to university now.  There’s a reunion with Katja, who introduces them to her boyfriend, Markel.

Evelyn learns she is pregnant.  Adam wants to know who the father is, him or Michael.  While staying with Adam’s family, he starts to look for clients but discovers that women buy ready-made off the rack and don’t want a custom tailor.  He grouses.  Evelyn keeps trying to cheer him up, to no avail.

The wall between East and West Germany comes down.  Those from the East are skeptical that this will change anything.  Adam returns to his home in the East and finds it trashed.  Appliances have been stolen, the photos of Adam’s models in his creations have been torn apart.  Even his bicycle has been stolen.  He returns with the box of photographs.  Evelyn, thinking he can use them as a portfolio, tapes them back together and, with Katja, puts them in albums.

Soon, Adam has a part-time job with a shop doing alterations.  Evelyn has been accepted to university.  Katja and Marek help them get into a room in the same house Katja and Marek live in.

The book ends with Adam standing in the backyard of his new home standing over a fire and burning his photographs, giving a short laugh over each photo.  Evelyn watches from the kitchen, while the neighbors watch in alarm.  Evelyn, at last, feels content.

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