The Story of a Friendship. Since childhood, they have been close friends: Willi, the somewhat eccentric pharmacist who always wants to please everyone, and Irene Gartmann, the writer. Their fateful last encounter takes place during a poetry reading in a northern German city in the early nineties—an occasion for the narrator to reflect on the person Willi Wings. Seeing him among relatives and friends, recounting episodes of everyday life, and referencing conversations: about the struggles of bourgeois existence, politics, current events, and also about writing. It soon becomes clear that he is not quite the person everyone perceives him to be.