Century - long Love in Prague

Exchange student

"Respected Miss, it is I who longs for your love, blocking all your paths of retreat. Forcing you to write to me every day, forcing you to miss me, tormenting you with the feeble struggles of a weak and powerless man..."

"You need not write to me anymore, nor will I write to you again. But please, do not return my letters. Let them remain humbly where they are, locked away in a drawer, as proof that you once knew such a coward, a man both detestable and loathsome, who once hurt you. Let his pitiful memory linger in some forgotten corner of your mind."

On this end of 2018, Lin Xuennie read aloud this "final letter" from Kafka to her friend Helena.

When she finished reading the letter carefully, she knew that this middle-class writer—handsome, highly educated, gifted yet deeply unhappy—had unilaterally declared their separation.

Yet, having read the letter to its last line, Lin Xuennie found herself surprisingly calm, with no desire to fight the decision. Many reasons contributed to this natural acceptance.

For one, she was utterly exhausted from running back and forth across the Charles Bridge every day, covering nearly five or six kilometers each time.

For another, the relentless barrage of letters from the "Raven Gentleman," urging her to reply immediately, had filled her with such anxiety that her hair was falling out in clumps—so much so that she had even jumped off the Charles Bridge into the river.

And then there was the fact that having letters from her literary idol was wonderful—but if it meant he wrote her hundreds of thousands of words while neglecting his own work, that was far from ideal.

But the most important reason was that Lin Xuennie felt her presence had hindered Kafka’s writing and caused him distress.

Moreover, when she thought of him again, she realized she no longer adored the Jewish-German writer as fervently as she had when she first arrived in Prague.

How strange! The "illness" even her mother couldn’t cure had somehow healed on its own.

With this realization, she no longer wished to return to the Prague of 1918. And once that thought took hold, she found that the distorted time and space—the gateway to 1918—no longer appeared every time she crossed the Charles Bridge.

After that, she even felt a little lost.

"It sounds like you’ve cured your own delusions with more delusions? How fascinating. Go see my advisor again—he might even pay you to hear this story. He’d probably want to include you in his psychology thesis."

Helena, a psychology student whose focus always seemed to differ from Lin Xuennie’s, offered this assessment after hearing her friend’s report and subsequent analysis.

Unhappy with this response, Lin Xuennie responded with a silent glare.

Helena swiftly switched to a more sympathetic expression. "So, you’ve been dumped? Need comforting? Want me to recommend a good bar? Or would you prefer Prague Castle? I still highly recommend the patrolling guards there."

"No, no, no! I’m not interested in your bars or guards," Lin Xuennie waved her hands dismissively. "Besides, I’ve already been comforted by a little blond angel! He’s only ten, but he’s so, so sweet! Spending an afternoon with him is way more healing than an hour with your advisor."

Lin Xuennie spoke earnestly, but Helena’s eyes narrowed suspiciously at the mention of a "ten-year-old blond angel."

Helena: "He’s only ten? I had no idea you were that kind of person."

Lin Xuennie: "..."

(What just happened? Something feels off...)

Lin Xuennie: "The little angel’s name is Eiberholt! Eiberholt Groitzsch—same as that German hottie I met on the train to Prague! I think the little angel is just his manifestation in my delusions!"

Helena: "So the German hottie does exist? And in your delusions, he manifests as a ten-year-old boy? And you like him more that way? Xuennie, I never knew you were that kind of person. This is serious. You must restrain yourself. Don’t do anything illegal."

Lin Xuennie: (This feels even more off...)

This was Lin Xuennie’s first year in the German Studies department at Charles University in Prague. For her classmates, it was a year of transition from high school to university, diving into their dream fields of study.

But for Lin Xuennie, this year was far more significant.

This was the year she met her literary idol—Franz Kafka, the master of expressionism who had inspired her to pause her studies at the Berlin Conservatory and come to Prague.

This was the year she experienced a blissful delusion, glimpsing Prague a century ago, encountering famous figures of the time, and even sitting in the front row for a baffling lecture by Einstein.

And this was also the year she met little Eiberholt—a boy who, in reality, she had only crossed paths with once.

Though ever since reading Kafka’s "final letter," her connection to the world of 1918 had grown increasingly faint, she couldn’t shake the feeling that the promise she made with little Eiberholt would still come true.

Perhaps in her delusions, perhaps in reality—driven by this thought, Lin Xuennie began considering whether she should take the train from Berlin back to Prague a few more times after winter break began.

But when she shared this idea with her friend Helena, she was met with yet another bucket of cold water.

"Do you even realize that a man asking for your contact information doesn’t actually mean much? Fine, even if he was somewhat interested, so what? Does that automatically mean he’ll pursue you and start a relationship?

"That’s just an initial point of contact—a faint flicker of interest that could vanish over the smallest thing. If he senses this abnormal level of enthusiasm from you—and if he’s half as handsome as you claim—he’ll definitely be scared off. That’s practically a foregone conclusion. Honestly, it’s the most obvious outcome."

Splash! Splash!

What a wake-up call for the delusional!