Wilhelm Heinrich von Dohren (Third Generation)

Wilhelm Heinrich von Dohren (Third Generation), usually called WH 3, is a seventeen-year-old heir to a family business whose adolescent life is marked by bodily difference, sexual frustration, and a powerful but largely private longing for intimacy. His encounter with Petra Schulz begins when he acts compassionately toward the suffering dog Flamingo. The brief companionship that follows becomes the focus of a hope he cannot easily contain, even as his own appearance and other people’s reactions repeatedly reinforce his sense of being shut out.

Identity and bodily experience

At seventeen, WH 3 has little interest in public affairs, government agencies, or his parents’ firm. Animals attract his attention chiefly as targets for cruelty rather than objects of protection, and the coming football World Cup is one of the few subjects that engages him at all. Girls, however, occupy his imagination intensely. He has never flirted with anyone or experienced a kiss, tenderness, or affection, and he is convinced that this inexperience will continue.

WH 3 has Noonan syndrome, associated in his case with a changed gene on chromosome 12. The condition is only partly expressed, but its visible effects matter greatly to how he experiences himself: his eyes are set wide apart, his eyelids droop, his nostrils are broad, and his low-set ears angle backward. His face appears misshapen to him and to the narrative’s unsparing descriptions. The account makes clear that his intelligence is not impaired; it places him somewhat above average. His difficulty is not intellectual but social and intimate: he lives with a body that attracts attention while his sexual desire remains intense and unrelieved.

That mismatch makes his adolescence especially painful. His own account of his condition is shaped by the belief that he is ugly and that desire has become a torment rather than a source of possibility. On the last day of school, under the hottest sun of the year, his acne is severely inflamed and his skin seems to burn. A girl he has stared at tells him he is not right in the head. The rebuke confirms his bleak sense of himself, and the approaching summer appears less like freedom than a stretch of time to endure in the shadowed rooms of his parents’ villa.

Flamingo and the meeting with Petra

On that same last day, WH 3 encounters Flamingo, the caretaker’s profoundly neglected dog. The animal is exhausted and trembling outside its kennel, covered with dense clusters of flies attracted by its powerful odor. When the dog gives him a crooked, desperate smile, WH 3 picks it up. The flies turn toward him as he carries Flamingo repeatedly around the schoolyard in the blazing heat, shaking them off the animal. When the dog is nearly free of them, WH 3 takes it back to its kennel and pours the remaining water from his bottle over it. He can do no more, but he has refused to leave it alone with its suffering.

Petra Schulz sees this act. She has been held back after poor schoolwork and is crossing the yard late when she witnesses WH 3 helping Flamingo. She catches up with him near the kiosk, speaks to him, buys two bottles of cola, and shares one. For WH 3, being addressed by a girl is unprecedented; being addressed by Petra leaves him so startled that he can scarcely respond. He imagines a future winter encounter in which he might warm her cold hand, but even this small fantasy remains modest: he pictures himself holding her hand, not demanding more.

Their contact continues in the new school year. They stand together during breaks, go to the kiosk, and sometimes walk to the bus stop. Petra once brushes her hand briefly against his. WH 3 spends the summer learning to smoke and buying his first pair of blue jeans, treating these changes as preparation for becoming someone who might eventually be ready for her. He knows that he has far to go, yet begins to hope that she may wait. Other people gossip about why a girl like Petra spends time with someone like him; the narrative indicates that their conclusions are correct, but WH 3 reaches a different one. He believes he may still win a place in her heart.

Hope, longing, and fear

WH 3’s attachment to Petra is both sustaining and frightening. He imagines rescuing her from a burning house, a dramatic way of picturing himself as useful and worthy of her affection. He does not know why she spends time with him, and he will never learn the reason. The uncertainty does not stop his hope from growing; instead, he reads their ordinary shared routines and occasional touch as signs that a future with her might become possible.

Yet he cannot simply enjoy this feeling. At times he allows his love to overwhelm him until it seems his heart might break; at other times he prays to be freed from it and struggles through long, painful days trying not to think about her or love her. He fears that something may happen from which he will never recover. His desire therefore produces a cycle of imagined closeness and attempted withdrawal: Petra’s companionship gives his life a focus, while the same attachment exposes him to the possibility of rejection and loss.

Encounters at the bar

The bar scenes place WH 3 among people whose appearances, nicknames, and vulnerabilities are sharply noticed. When Soldaten-Norbert turns his attention toward him, WH 3 experiences the encounter not as casual conversation but as a threat. Norbert sits beside him and stares; his hard, feverish eyes, together with the overpowering smells surrounding him, make WH 3 nauseated and frightened. WH 3 soils his trousers slightly from fear and thinks Norbert looks like the Devil. Asked what he is doing there, he gives the minimal answer that he is drinking a cola.

The moment contrasts with the tentative warmth of Petra’s approach. With her, a shared drink and a walk allow WH 3 to imagine tenderness; with Soldaten-Norbert, even a stare is enough to overwhelm him. The contrast shows how fragile his attempts at connection remain. His compassion toward Flamingo demonstrates that he can act decisively for another living creature, but in a threatening social encounter he is reduced to fear and a brief answer. The available episodes leave his hopes unresolved: Petra’s companionship continues, but WH 3 remains caught between the life he imagines and the isolation he expects.