That was the moment when Roswitha turned as white as a sheet. She straightened up again, clasped her chair backs with both hands and pressed a "Single WARST???! What?!!! What have you done? And what in God's name are you doing??!!!". "You're not going to change your relationship with Julius, are you?
Adolé was really going for it. "Yes, Roswitha, that's what I want. I have to. Because everything has changed. I have no relationship to Julius! You know that better than anyone!! "With one look at Michelle, she dropped the bomb. "Michelle and I have fallen in love. We are together and very happy. But Michelle is beaten and blackmailed by her violent husband. He uses the press against her and keeps the children from her. This all only ends when there is nothing left to blackmail and Michelle gets custody of the two children. That's why we want to go public. We want to come out and stand by our love. That's our plan. Only then will you and I be free of the possibility that some copycat is trying to take advantage of us and blackmail us.
That's it. It was finally out! The passionate speech had cost Adolé strength. She felt the tears in the corners of her eyes and how a whole rock fell from her soul at the same time. At last she could breathe a sigh of relief again. Lovingly she looked at Michelle and once more gently squeezed her hand on her thigh to relieve her of the burden that now weighed on her. After all, Ella was completely unaware until just now that her protégé was about to take an uncomfortable path and make her secret weakness for women public. Although she knew about the quarrels with Matthieu, she had been divorced and mother of two children. Now, no doubt, a conversation in private was due. But was the most important thing said.
Slowly Ella regained her composure and addressed Michelle in French. "No, Ella, let's do it in German," Michelle finally spoke up.
"Good," Ella replied. "What's the matter with you. Is what Adolé just said true?" Adolé felt the excitement in Michelle. But she could not help her in this point - she had to go through it alone.
"Yes. Everything Adolé said is true. I didn't want to offer Matthieu any kind of target and no reason
to use the children against me again or to make him angry. "Michelle was shaking all over. "You know how it usually ends. I tried everything to sabotage the cooperation with Adolé and to escape the situation, because I actually knew quite early on that I was about to fall in love with Adolé. But I didn't want to give Matthieu any reason to beat him up or make myself susceptible to blackmail. You know him. But at some point I couldn't do it anymore. I just couldn't resist. And then it all came to another."
For Michelle, who was experiencing such a coming-out situation for the first time, the confusion and excitement was too much - she put her face into her hands and burst into tears. Worried, Adolé laid her arm and her and tried to comfort her. Michelle sobbed softly inside herself, and Adolé began to worry if her plan was premature. On the other hand, the alternative was Matthew's unscrupulousness, with which he would surely sooner or later, if he got wind of them, proceed and then knew no mercy in dealing with custody and visiting rights for the children. Basically their plan had no alternative.
Roswitha took the chance and interfered in the conversation. "It's absolutely out of the question for you to come out in public! Are you crazy?!" Roswitha was seriously upset. "You can see that the pressure is already too much for Michelle. And we're only here in a small circle. What's it going to be like when everyone knows about it and picks on her?!? " she argued angrily and only then started to really get into it.
"You know that not everyone will accept the fact that you suddenly want to live your life in a completely different way than you did before and that it is generally considered right?!!!? The hater in the social media will not take your feelings into consideration. And sooner or later this will have an impact on sales figures. After all you want to present your CD very soon.
She looked at Adolé piercingly. "I don't have to tell you how all this will affect your career. There is no one in German show business who has even remotely your calibre, who has come out of the closet so far. Not to mention that he or she would be successful afterwards. " Roswitha was actually angry and reacted more violently than Adolé had ever expected. "You're risking everything we've built up over the years. And as long as I'm responsible for you and your business, you won't jeopardize it!" Roswitha underlined the seriousness of her statement by repeatedly tapping the table with her index finger.
Adolé was surprised by the sharpness of the statement. She swallowed, but didn't let herself be bullied. "Yes, I know not everyone will like that. "But I don't care, I can handle it. I can do without those trolls, let them deal with it. They will not prevail and sooner or later lose interest. "To stand up to Roswitha took a lot of strength. "But only when everyone finally knows the truth, I will finally stop pretending and live someone else's life. It's worth it. That means freedom for me and honesty, not to speak of Michelle and her worries. “
Lovingly she looked at Michelle, who had slowly calmed down again. Facing Roswitha, she continued. "I don't necessarily like other people's concepts of life either. But I don't have to. I just have to deal with my lifestyle and be fully behind it. And I think I like my future lifestyle. It is true and honest and right and I can't change it. And I don't want to! " She made an elaborate pause and expected Roswitha to contradict her again. But nothing happened.
Into the general silence, Adolé was already determined after: "I have finally met the right woman with whom I want to share my life. And as sorry as I am and as grateful as I am to you for everything you have done for me so far: "You will not stop me from showing everyone who I really am and what makes me who I really am."
"Yes, Adolé, I will. You are contractually obligated to clarify and discuss such important strategic decisions with me and to obtain my consent in advance. But I can't give you that. And so it remains. And that's that.
With these words Roswitha stood up, grabbed her coat and left the restaurant without a word.
31.
She woke up alone in her hotel room in Hamburg and felt deeply miserable. While she tossed and turned restlessly back and forth half the night, she had to fight her way through a restless sleep the other half. Once again. The rest that sleep had given her in earlier days had become less and less to her in recent weeks. The unpleasant taste of last night's red wine spread on her tongue - a taste that had become all too familiar to her recently.
She turned to get up, but broke off again exhausted and let herself fall powerlessly back into the white fabric of the hotel bed-set. A narrow gap of bright sunlight broke through the drawn curtains, so that she had to squint her eyes. She breathed out with resignation and stayed crouched for a few minutes before finally dragging herself into the shower, completely exhausted.
Because of the lukewarm water that was splashing on her stressed body, she felt at least some spirits awakening again and that was good. She would need her strength. Today would be a long and exhausting day, like the awarding of the German music prize "Echo" every year. But this year's event would be very different for her from all the others - for one thing, she would go to this event alone for the first time. This time there would be no Julius at whose side she could present herself confidently to the fans and the press on the red carpet.
Although Roswitha, for strategic and contractual reasons, had rigorously refused to make Adolé's relationship with Michelle public and Adolé had finally reluctantly submitted to this, she had at least cleared the air and confided in Julius, with whom she was on friendly terms. At the same time, she had cancelled the agreement between them and asked him not to comment on her and their relationship until they had informed the press of their friendly decision to go their separate ways in the future, and Julius had thankfully kept to this decision.
On the other hand, Adolé would meet Roswitha today for the first time since their argument on Sylt. After the conversation in the restaurant in Westerland had ended so abruptly, they had only had purely business contact. Although Adolé often wanted to call Roswitha and talk to her, she had decided against it. She knew from experience - once again - that it was no use. Roswitha knew her contractual obligations and rights. And once she had made her decision, it was naive to assume that she could change anything by arguing on the phone. After all this time, she knew Roswitha all too well for that, and Roswitha was too much of a businesswoman for that, to throw overboard all the efforts she had made to build Adolé into a superstar.
Although she was also humanly disappointed in Roswitha because of this fact, she was angry with herself in addition to everything else in her heart, as she had ever assumed and expected that Roswitha could put her - Adolé's - personal needs above her business interests.
But what brought the barrel of her personal defeats to a head was a telephone conversation that took place a few days after the argument with Roswitha. She had called Michelle and explained to her that they had to put their relationship on hold for the time being - quasi for their own protection - again because of Matthieu and the fear that he might take the children away from Michelle. Of course Michelle had not understood this strategy. She had contradicted the whole plan and talked Adolé into believing that there must be another way. But Adolé had not been impressed and preferred to play it safe. Now that her plan to make everything public and Matthieu's secret knowledge worthless had failed, she did not want to be a risk for Michelle. She had already endured enough. So she had continued her plan to keep Michelle away out of love and since then she had ignored her calls, SMS and all messages by any other means, even though it almost broke her heart. But it had to be done. Otherwise she would blame herself one day, and Adolé was determined to prevent this.
And as if all this wasn't enough to make her lose her mind in desperation, this damned Echo event unfortunately took place in Hamburg, the city where she had spent so much time with Michelle during her recordings and where she had first met her. This awakened many common memories - beautiful memories, which now more than hurt her.
Again and again this senselessness almost made her despair - why had she finally found her soul mate after all this time, only to lose her again directly after such a short time? Fate obviously took pleasure in such twisted turns, leaving her at a loss. No matter how hard Adolé tried, she could think of no other way. It was simply too risky to continue her relationship with Michelle as if nothing had happened. Even if their meetings were secret, she would only expose them to the risk of incurring the wrath of her ex-husband. It just wouldn't work.
But even if they had only agreed to "put their relationship on hold" until then - it was only a matter of time for Adolé before they had to end it completely. What other way out would there be? It was just pointless...
But all this had taken a lot out of her, more than she wanted to admit to herself. The many sleepless nights since then had left their mark, not to mention the countless red-wine pregnant evenings with which she had had to comfort herself to sleep. But in the end she had to realize that there was no consolation - it was all very difficult to digest. It cost her infinite strength not to react to Michelle's many attempts
to make contact. But all the nagging didn't help, she had to get through it.
At least the new CD was released successfully and stayed in the Top 10 album charts for about three weeks without any promotion. This was already a tremendous success for the collaboration between a pop hit singer and a classical pianist.