Coalition Partner

Cold sunlight tracked me down the moving sidewalk, the city busy with its market routine. It must have been a Saturday in March, the faraway towers gleaming. I was crossing the street of a refugee dream when someone spotted Angela Merkel. Hey look, they said. And a crowd formed around her. She was sweetly obliging. I reached out first to pat her on the back. Nice job, I said. Keep up the good work. Then I couldn’t get the camera on my phone to open. The screen was frozen, the filter slow to load. Around me people took their selfies and dispersed. Angela began to walk away, so I followed at a polite distance, trying to think of a question to ask her, something about her step-grandchildren or the future of democracy, all the while fiddling with my phone. A couple of blocks and she reached her doorstep, was about to slip inside a flower-trimmed townhouse when finally I managed to open the lens. I held out my arm and stood on the brick stairs below her, the tall stout figure of Angela Merkel. She leaned down to get inside the frame. She smiled sweetly. An informal clique gathered to watch Angela Merkel put her arm around my shoulder when someone in this sudden faction shot me with a water pistol. I laughed, but that laugh masked outrage that Chancellor Merkel might get splashed in the doorway of her very own house. And then without a word she slipped inside. The door clicked shut, and I started down the stairs, exceedingly pleased that I had met Angela Merkel. Someone else looming and vigilant patted me on the back. Let’s see, they said. I thumbed through the photos but there were only a few blurry shots of crossbars on windows and crows on streetlights. There was one of me on the brick stoop, gritting my teeth, biting back a laugh, my face wet with tears. But no Angela Merkel. She was nowhere to be seen. The crowd turned away, a slow murmur trailing down the street dissolving into ordinary traffic. Alone, I shuffled glumly toward my hotel. Oh Angela, where have you gone? On whose doorstep will we build our welcome now?