1. Holly, Berlin

Itilted my head as though it would give me a different perspective.

‘Does looking at it from that angle help?'

Startled, I turned in the direction of the British accent. The person sitting on the opposite end of the bench looked around my age, with cropped black hair, flawless brown skin, a playful half-smile and dark, soulful eyes. My face warmed. ‘Erm, maybe?' I glanced back to the large canvas on the gallery wall. ‘I was trying to work out their relationship.'

‘Ah,' the stranger said, her tall, thin body scooting across the bench. ‘It's called Italia und Germania by Johann Friedrich Overbeck.' She gestured to the artwork. ‘The woman on the left represents Italy, with the Italian landscape behind her, and the other represents Germany, with a medieval German city behind her. It's a symbol of the connection between Northern and Southern Europe in the early 1800s.'

I raised my eyebrows, which the stranger – or gallery guide, I wasn't sure which – took as an invitation to continue.

‘It's from the romantic-religious movement founded by German artists. Nazarene art, it's called.'

‘Wow,' I said. ‘Impressive.' I pointed to the plaque below the painting. ‘You can read, too.'

Her face split into a grin and her dark eyes danced. ‘I can, yeah.'

That look made me want to melt right there in the Alte Nationalgalerie – a soft mess of liquified bones slowly oozing across the parquet floor. I'd be mistaken for a piece of contemporary art called Liquified by Lust or something equally wanky.

‘But I'm also studying art history at university,' she continued, snapping me back to the conversation. ‘We're doing nineteenth-century art this term.' She leant closer. ‘I wouldn't know any of that otherwise. I'm not a total smart-arse.'

My eyes drifted to her full, silky lips and I pictured them gliding across my collarbone. ‘I reckon you might be a bit of a smart-arse.'

She laughed – a rich, comforting sound that zapped the chill from the room. ‘My name's Casey, by the way.'

I unstuck my tongue from the roof of my mouth. ‘I'm Holly.'

‘Holly,' she said slowly, as though trying it out for future use. ‘That's pretty. It suits you.'

The flush in my cheeks intensified, and I was grateful when Casey turned back to the painting.

‘Go on, then,' she said. ‘What were you trying to work out?'

I shifted my gaze to the artwork. ‘The intimacy between them; it's tangible, like the connection isn't about the countries. It's so much more than that.'

‘Mmm. They're definitely more than friends.'

‘Yeah. Like they want to kiss.' I turned my attention to Casey. ‘Like they need to kiss.'

Her eyes met mine. ‘Or like they were lovers in the past and have met again after being apart for so long. It's the pain of separation in their expressions.'

‘Oh,' I breathed. ‘Yes. That.'

Casey gave a satisfied smile and gestured to the doorway. ‘Want me to take you around the gallery and show off more of my art knowledge? There's an Aesthetics of Resistance exhibition on.'

I picked up my bag. ‘I have no idea what that means, but defo up for a tour guide.'

Casey hooked a small backpack over her shoulder and started walking. ‘You're Australian, yeah?'

I fell into step beside her. ‘Yep. From Melbourne. And you're a Londoner?'

Casey raised a surprised brow. ‘Very good. How'd you tell? Please don't say EastEnders, otherwise I'm going to have to compare you to someone from Ramsay Street.'

I chuckled and shook my head. ‘No. British parents. My dad's Welsh and my mum's from London. She grew up in Wanstead.'

Casey stopped and faced me. ‘No way! That's near me.'

A little thrill shot through me that this beautiful stranger and I had some kind of link, albeit a tenuous one. But I didn't want to come across as too keen. ‘Cool,' I said and continued walking.

A beat of awkward silence followed, then Casey asked, ‘Why are you in Berlin? It's a long way from home.'

‘Student exchange with Berlin Tech for a semester.'

‘Same, but at Berlin Arts. What degree?'

‘Creative Arts.' I held up my small camera bag. ‘Photography's my favourite, though.' We entered the next gallery, and I took a step closer to her. ‘But I'm taking German art this semester, so here I am.'

Casey's arm brushed mine and my skin prickled. ‘I can help with that, if you like.'

Two weeks later, we found a patch of grass under a tree in Monbijoupark. It was early evening, but the late summer sun hadn't yet started its descent.

Casey laid her jacket on the grass and patted it. ‘I've made you a bed.'

I held my camera at eye level and twisted the focus ring to sharpen the image, keen to capture the dappled light that shone through the leaves and fell across her face. ‘You're sweet,' I said, shifting a few steps to the left so that she was off-centre.

She stretched out and propped up her head with her palm, warm brown eyes gazing into the lens. ‘Romantic is the word you're after.'

The shutter whirred as I held my finger down for a few seconds. I checked the images on the monitor, tucked the camera into my bag and flopped on the grass beside her. ‘You are romantic.'

She pressed her mouth to mine, forcing me to sigh, the way I always did when she kissed me. When we broke apart, Casey said, ‘You know, people always think Paris is the most romantic European city, but I think it's Berlin. It has this understated romantic coolness, yeah?'

‘Uh-huh.' I brushed my nose against her neck and inhaled her scent – fresh and earthy from the cedarwood shower gel she used. ‘You believe in love and romance, then?'

‘Totally.'

My heart swelled with affection for her. We hadn't talked about the intensity of what had passed between us since we met, but the way Casey pressed her ear to my chest and told me that our hearts beat to the same rhythm had to mean she felt the same. Still, I wanted to hear her voice it. ‘What happens next?' I asked.

She slid her hand across my waist, her fingertips grazing the bare skin between my T-shirt and jeans. ‘We go to your room.'

‘I don't mean now. I mean after semester finishes. You go back to London. I go back to Melbourne…'

‘Fuck, Holly,' Casey said with a laugh. ‘We only met a couple of weeks ago.'

The sting in my chest was hard to ignore. ‘And it's been the most incredible two weeks I've ever experienced.' Not that I'd experienced many relationships in my twenty years – sex a few times with a male classmate in year eleven, a brief relationship with a woman in my first year at university, and a healthy amount of pashing and fumbling here and there over the years. ‘I can't be imagining this between us,' I said, slipping my hand up the back of her shirt and running my palm over her soft skin. ‘It's too real, like the women in the painting.'

Casey considered me for a long moment, then said, ‘You're not imagining it.'

Relief coursed through me. ‘Maybe I could go to London after the semester finishes? I have a British passport and family in London. They're in Wanstead, too. You said that's near you.'

She sat up, a flash of irritation sparking in her eyes. ‘Whoa, Holly. And drop out of university?'

‘I can apply to a London uni – get credit for what I've already done.'

‘And pay stupidly high international fees?'

‘I'll pay domestic fees with my citizenship. I don't care about that – I'll get a student loan or something.'

‘You can't leave Australia and get yourself into debt for me. That's huge. And what about your family? Your friends?'

I shrugged. ‘I'll miss them. But we'll have each other.'

Casey shook her head. ‘I can't make promises about the future like that.'

I fell silent, blinking to hold back tears.

She gave a remorseful groan and grabbed my hand. ‘I didn't mean for that to sound so blunt. Please don't get upset.'

‘I'm not asking you to make promises,' I said quietly.

The light breeze blew a strand of hair across my face and she gently brushed it away, letting her fingertips linger on my cheek. ‘I think we should just enjoy the moment, yeah?'

‘But what if we lost one another right now? In this huge city?'

She lay back and pulled me down with her. ‘I know where you live.'

I sat up. ‘I don't know where you live.'

‘I told you. I'm staying with my aunty.' Her face softened. ‘We do have each other's phone numbers.'

‘Okay, but what about other ways to contact you? You're not even on social media.'

‘Because I've got a shitty temporary phone and a shitty laptop – it's a hassle. Can't we just call each other?'

I stretched out beside her and fiddled with the sleeve of her T-shirt. ‘But what if one of us loses our phone or something?'

‘Then I'll sit by your door until you turn up.'

I searched her face, looking for signs that she meant what she said. It was unreadable, so I dug for more. ‘What's your last name?'

Casey nuzzled my neck. ‘If I tell you, it takes away from the mystery and romance of this amazing time we're having.'

I pulled away, narrowing my eyes at her. ‘Seriously? You won't even tell me your last name? I told you mine the first day we met.'

Her brow creased, as though she was trying to recall that conversation. ‘Right. Mine is … Vassell.'

‘Vassell,' I repeated.

‘Mmhmm.'

‘Spell it.'

She gave an exasperated huff. ‘V-A-double-S-E-double-L. Okay? Can I snog you now?'

‘See, that wasn't so hard.' I shuffled closer. ‘And yes, you can snog me now.' Her lips pressed against mine, sweet and warm, making all my worries melt away.

When we stopped for air, I laid my head on her chest. ‘Sorry. That was too much. I just … I haven't felt like this before.'

There was a long silence, and I was about to ask if she was okay when she said, ‘I tell you what. If we lose each other, then we'll come back to this spot, on this day, at this time, every year until we find each other.'

‘Right here, under this tree?'

Casey nodded, peeked at her watch, then closed her eyes, a band of sunlight falling across her face. ‘Yeah, 6 pm under this tree.'

‘But this park is huge; you won't remember what tree.'

Her eyelids slowly opened. ‘Big tree right in the middle of this grassy area.' She sat up and pointed towards the river. ‘The Bode Museum is there.' She shifted her arm to the left. ‘The Berliner Fernsehturm is there.' She twisted behind her. ‘The fountain is there.' Then she waved her hand in the distance. ‘And the Alte Nationalgalerie, where I met the prettiest girl I've ever seen, is over there. I'll remember. This spot. On this day. At this time.'

The idea that either of us could travel to Berlin every year was unrealistic, I knew, but the fact that Casey had even suggested it made me weak. ‘That is the most romantic thing anyone has ever said to me.'

She shrugged and lay back down. ‘It's the Berlin air. Has that effect on me.'

I ran my finger down her torso, stopping at the waistband of her jeans. ‘I thought it was the effect I had on you.'

‘It's defo you. See – I even sound Australian now.' She smiled, but her eyes didn't glisten like they normally did.

I jumped up and pulled her to her feet, eager for us to be alone and carefree again. ‘Let's go.'

We left the park and took the S-Bahn four stops to my dorm room. Although Casey stayed close to me on the journey, she was quiet, and the regret for coming on so strong sat heavy in my gut.

Inside my room, I dumped the pizza we'd picked up on my tiny desk and tugged her down onto the bed, holding her close. ‘Are we okay?' I asked, running my hand through her short curls.

She nodded.

‘I didn't mean to say all that stuff. I don't know why I did.'

Casey reached for the small silver H that hung around my neck and pressed it between her fingers. ‘I do care about you, Holly.'

The ‘but' that hung in the air was deafening, and I scrambled for something, anything, to say to shift the focus from the pressure I put on her. ‘You seem worried. Is it that exam next week?'

Her brows furrowed. ‘Exam?'

‘That renaissance art exam. You said you haven't studied for it.'

‘Oh, that. I'm a bit stressed about it, yeah.'

‘Okay, well, you should study then. I can leave you alone,' I said, rolling away.

She pulled me back to her. ‘Not now. Can we just be together tonight?'

I kissed her in response, long and deep, delighting in her soft sighs and warm hands on my skin. We took our time removing each other's clothes until our naked bodies were fused together, silky skin, gentle fingers, hot tongues, and just when I thought my heart couldn't hold any more affection for her, her tenderness made my chest ache in a way it never had before.

After our heart rates had slowed and we'd untangled, we ate, shared a beer and smoked a joint on the balcony. Then I set up my tripod.

‘We having a photo shoot?' Casey asked, draped against the pillow dressed in underwear and one of my singlets.

‘I need to practise low-light shots.'

I turned off the overhead light and angled the lamp on my desk so that a gentle buttery glow shone over my bed, then set a low ISO and a wide aperture. I adjusted the lens using Casey as the focal point, set the timer and jumped back in bed. We lay on our sides gazing at each other as the camera snapped a series of shots. Her face carried an intensity I hadn't witnessed before, and in the dim light I could see the tiny cinnamon flecks that marked her dark brown eyes. I set the timer again, and this time Casey kissed me softly and held my face close to hers.

I scrambled off the bed to check the photos and gasped. What I wanted to see was there – our connection, solid and electric, evidence it was real and captured forever. ‘What do you think?' I asked, passing Casey the camera. ‘I'll edit and fix the exposure, but they're good.'

Casey stared at the digital image for a long moment before thrusting the camera back to me. ‘They're … um … they're nice. I-I like what you did with the lighting.'

I took the camera from her and tried to meet her eyes but she turned away. ‘We look good, too. Together, I mean.'

She nodded.

‘Casey, please look at me.'

She slowly turned, her eyes misty.

‘Are you crying?'

She kissed my forehead. ‘They're beautiful photos. I just get emotional over art sometimes.'

I tossed my camera to the side and clung to her, desperate to wind back the clock so that our conversation in the park never existed. ‘The London thing was too much. I won't make any plans. I can't imagine saying goodbye to you, that's all.'

She didn't respond, just buried her face in my neck and held me tight.

The next morning, the quiet click of a door woke me. I stretched and reached for Casey, but my eyes shot open when I felt an empty space. ‘Casey?' I hopped out of bed and checked the bathroom. Empty. I grabbed my phone from the desk. No calls or messages. I opened the door to the small balcony. Nothing. I leant over the iron balustrade and spotted a thin figure with short, black hair rushing along the concrete path below. ‘Casey?'

She stopped and peered up.

‘Where are you going?'

She pulled her phone from her hoodie pocket, tapped the screen and looked back up, a pained expression on her face.

My phone buzzed and I quickly opened the message.

Sorry xx

My blood ran cold. ‘Wait!'

But Casey turned and ran.