It was Mercedes Benz fashion week in New York City, and Hans was running late. His sister Greta was already backstage checking the models, adjusting accessories, and giving encouragement.
As he entered the venue, Hans spotted the sweets table and decided to make it his first stop. He loaded a plate with chocolate éclairs, lemon tarts, and fudge brownies. Energy for the show. He checked the drape of his suit coat. He’d just picked it up from his tailor. All Hans’ clothes were custom made to his design. He was a huge man—6 feet 5 and 350 pounds. He spied Greta across the room fussing with three models, added an oatmeal cookie to his plate for fiber, and made his way over to her.
Greta looked terrible. Her skin was pale, she had dark circles under her eyes, and her mouth seemed drawn. Hans put his arm around her shoulder and kissed her on the cheek, leaving a smudge of chocolate.
“Are you okay?” he whispered, using a napkin to wipe off the chocolate.
“I’ll be fine.”
“Are you having that nightmare again?”
She waved him off and said, “Not now.”
Greta and Hans had grown up in an orphanage in Bavaria. They had no memory of their parents or their birthplace. But the caretakers knew some of their story.
The children’s father and stepmother, too poor to buy enough food for four people, took Greta and Hans deep into the forest on the pretense of having a picnic. They abandoned them, leaving the children to the mercy of wild animals and the elements. No one knew how they survived, but months after being lost, the children emerged from the forest, plump and healthy. The authorities removed them from their parents’ care and placed them in the Münchner Waisenhaus. And every year, on the anniversary of their arrival at the orphanage, the staff repeated the story to Hans and Greta. And every year, even long after they had left the institution, Greta had a recurring nightmare. But now it was happening more often.
Reporters crowded around the brother and sister seeking a preview of the fashion show. No other designer had created couture clothing for the larger woman until the Schneider siblings and their company, Substantial Designs, came along.
“What was your inspiration for this season?” they asked Hans. His guiding light was the same for every collection. Hans loved curvy women. He enjoyed showing off luscious rounded bodies in graceful, glittering ways. He had a gift for finding fabrics with the right weight, sheen, and texture. His innovative draping created silhouettes that seemed to float over a full body without hugging or straining and his designs defied imitation. Greta had counseled Hans on methods to deal with the press. “Give them something to print,” she said, “something new they can use.” Hans complied. “It was tulips,” he told the reporters, “Lush, full tulips, swaying in a gentle breeze in the park near my apartment in Munich. The rich colors and contours of the flowers inspired me.”
Hans was the creative partner. Greta handled the business end. A beautiful full-figured woman with blonde hair and sapphire eyes, she was often photographed and recognized as an icon for this market segment. Annie Leibovitz had begged to shoot her. Anna Wintour, editor of Vogue, was one of the first fashion mavens to embrace their collections, and each season the magazine featured their designs.
But Greta was losing weight. Hans thought she must be down sixty, seventy pounds. It wouldn’t do. Bad for business. When the show was over, he’d have a talk with his sister.
Two weeks later Hans and Greta flew to Germany and drove to their lodge outside Munich. It hadn’t been easy to persuade Greta to take time off but Hans prevailed.
The first night in the country Hans awoke to Greta’s screams. He rushed to her bedroom, gathered her in his arms, and gently woke her. She looked up at him, her blue eyes wide and terrified. “The dream,” she said. “It seems so real. There’s a huge wood-burning oven, glowing with fire. An old woman, a crone with red eyes hovers over me, telling me to crawl in to make sure it’s hot. I tell her I don’t understand, so she draws nearer to show me, and when she’s close enough, I pretend to see something in the flames. She looks inside, and I push her right into the stove and slam the door shut. Her screams are terrible.
“I run to the stable where you are tied to a stall. She’s fattening you up. She’s going to eat us!
“Why do I keep having this awful dream? Could it be true? Do you remember?”
Hans sat back on his haunches, his hand to his mouth, his complexion drained of color.
“You do remember!”
# # #
Susan Knox is an essayist, short story writer, and author of Financial Basics, A Money Management Guide for Students published by The Ohio State University Press, 2004, 2nd edition 2016. Her stories and essays have appeared in CALYX, Forge, The MacGuffin, Zone 3, and elsewhere. In 2014, her essay, “Autumn Life” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She and her husband live in Seattle, near the Pike Place Market where she shops most days for the evening meal.
