Hair Everywhere

by Istros Books

  ‘You see how embarrassing and dangerous yawning can be!’ said Mum.

  Anaconda

  Sometimes, when I am wringing out a shirt I have washed, I think the veins on my hands will burst. Sometimes, when I am playing with the cat, I think she will sink her claws into my eye. Sometimes, while lying in the bath I think how the gas will enter into my nose, and I won’t notice.

  Sometimes imaginary male hands take my shoulders and shake me, vigorously.

  The snake in my stomach is THIS BIG!

  Cars

  Red, white, black and silver cars in the neighbourhood are sometimes parked in a way that blocks your entrance. One particular car is especially problematic. That’s why it is so scratched. Glowing from the sun, it stands opposite a red garage. Even its wing mirrors are not folded in our narrow street.

  All those red, white, black and silver cars leave no room for fire trucks or ambulances to pass. There is no music playing inside them. Their windows don’t squeal. Their doors don’t squeak. All those cars are silent. Silent and proud.

  The Island Conspiracy Aunt

  I have an aunt who rejected her role as my aunt when she accused my family of being part of an island conspiracy. Until the accusation, she used to buy me ice cream, and let me play with the little crabs in the shallow water. One time we were coming back home from the island by bus. My aunt was putting the bags in the luggage compartment while I looked for our seats. The passengers asked me:

  ‘Where are you going, little one?’

  ‘To the city,’ I said.

  ‘This isn’t the bus for the city.’

  I went out through the back door of the bus at the same moment my aunt entered through the front door. The asphalt melted my flip-flops while I watched the bus taking my aunt home. People in the café across the road asked me:

  ‘Whose little girl are you?’

  I told them my name and where I lived. A policeman bought me a sandwich and a fruit juice. Twenty minutes later my aunt slapped me. In the next bus, she sat in seat number one and I sat in number fifty.

  She never had any children of her own.

  Ice Cream

  Mum was angry:

  ‘You stole money from my purse!’

  ‘I didn’t.’

  ‘Do you know how hard it was to earn that money?’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘The hell you do! You’re seven years old. What did you spend the money on?’

  ‘Ice cream.’

  ‘Did you buy some for me too?’

  ‘No, I didn’t.’

  ‘Huh, serve you right when you get the runs!’

  Chestnut Cream

  First I put a small cup of chestnut cream on the radiator. Then a saucepan of water on the stove. When the water boils I put camomile in it. When the chestnut cream softens I transfer it into a blue plastic dish and pour milk on top. Then I stir it until it becomes frothy and liquid. I put this in a small plastic Coca-Cola bottle. When the water with the camomile becomes yellow, I pour it into a thermos. Sometimes I spill it on my hands and burn myself. I curse. I make white coffee too with lots of milk and pour it into a different plastic bottle. Three tablespoons of mountain cactus I pour into a small glass medicine bottle. I do all this every day.

  Mum later says that the camomile is too hot for her, and the chestnut cream too thick. Chestnut cream makes her go to the toilet more often.

  Fiji

  One morning I found Fiji at the bottom of the cage all bloody, and took her to the vet.

  The vet told me that she had violently pulled out her own feathers, and that she would get better. Fiji died just the same, but because of parasites. Her new boyfriend remained alone on the plastic rung. I called him Kyoto. I liked it like that.

  The Nipple

  I stay under the shower for a long time. I pee down my legs. I use up all the hot water and then wipe myself with a big towel. My nipple hurts. I notice on the bulging part a small cut, like when you cut yourself with paper. It hurts and stings. Then I look in the mirror at the colour and size of both nipples. All normal. Carefully I get dressed, go to the hospital and tell Mum my nipple hurts. And my bottom. She stays silent and drinks camomile.

  Patrick Swayze

  My brother is angry because the doctors say they cannot help Mum. I tell him Patrick Swayze had lots of money but he still died of cancer.

  Rooms for Crabs

  Summers on the island were perfumed, resonant and salty. I would wake up in the morning, put on my flip-flops and hurry down the long street. I would throw my towel on the shore and jump butt-first into the shallow sea. That’s how it was when I was alone with my aunt. When Mum came, I spent my time with her at the beach. She would tan her small breasts in the sun, and, in the shallows, I would build a home out of sand and pebbles for the dozens of hermit crabs I caught. Unlike the crabs in hospital, each of them had their own room. But neither kind of crab ever left their little houses, once they were in them.

  Mum (at Home)

  Today I brought her home. We took the orchid with us too. I hemmed in three cars, left a note with my mobile number on the windshield; hurried through five corridors, scrambled eggs and the Mother of God to number 135 and there I saw her back, onto which hair now seldom falls. And her thin ankles. In the hospital they say she doesn’t weigh enough to have chemotherapy.

  Today I brought her home, and she could hardly even smile when she saw the cat. She wrote on a piece of paper:

  young spinach

  juice

  ripe pears

  I beg the cat not to jump on her orchid.

  I leave her alone, and go to the market. The sun tickles my eyelashes. Adults sit outside on the terraces of cafes. Children behind large flower pots put their fingers in their noses and then in their mouths. Little dogs tremble in their owners’ big bags.

  It is hard for me to go back.

  Tiny Aunty

  Tiny Aunty, Mum’s sister, gave me for my birthday a collection of other people’s poems. Once she gave me a gold pendant of a bow and arrow. The doctors told her she must not give birth because she is diabetic. She didn’t listen to them. She also made cakes she was not allowed to eat. Then one day she collapsed in front of the big department store. They put her in a bed on wheels. She lay for fourteen days with her eyes tight shut. Right up until they told us she had died. Grandma said then:

  ‘I’ve been left all alone.’

  A Short Conversation About Their God

  ‘Couldn’t I call Shiva by some other name?’

  ‘No, Shiva’s name does not change.’

  ‘Then that God of yours is very sensitive.’

  Blessed Humiliation

  The Church of the Blessed Assumption’s interior is now decorated with large metal rods and wooden planks that hold up the ceiling. The alms-box for the poor is empty. The dish of Holy Water is slimy. The pictures of bearded men, and women with tablecloths on their heads stare emptily. The altar is new. Incense can be discerned just the same. The same old woman is selling little books of messages from “She who Ascended”. The big brown door squeaks.

  Quietly I pray inside myself; halfway and then I stop. I don’t know any more. I run out from the pew, trip on the red carpet and fall. The lady turns the pages of the book and does not look up.

  The Great Healer

  The “Great Healer” from the Middle East has arrived in the capital city. He is quite well built. His face is full of little black spots. He has a wide-angle smile. He has bodyguards. Politicians, athletes, and artists, all visit him. They say he heals everything, including souls. During his healing visits, he heals hundreds of thousands of people. Although newspapers exaggerate.

  Everyone from small towns round about goes to him. Everyone except beggars on crutches.

  And us.

  Sister

  A doughnut. So small she was when Mum squeezed her out. That’s why they laid her in the container for little doughnuts. To rise like bread in the warmth until she was ready for us
to taste. For our kisses and caresses. So small then, and now so ready to say:

  ‘Boys are yuck!’

  I was fifteen and had five coins in my pocket for mid-morning snack when they let me see her from a distance, through the hospital glass. I’m too old to have a bath with her, I thought. And she, quietly and without crying, poked her finger into her ear.

  Mum

  While I watch her lying in bed, I can feel the umbilical cord between us. Something I have tried to cut a thousand times already. And now I hold onto that invisible cord as though I were hanging from a bridge.

  ‘You have to be here. Who else should I call upon when I give birth myself, if not you? Because I know I will be cursing the father of my child for doing that to me,’ I speak softly to her.

  She looks at me. Looks. Looks. Looks. Looks. Then closes her eyes as the pain relents.

  Love

  Mum always said that Grandma loved her two sisters more than her. Grandma would say:

  ‘Fibber! I gave you everything.’

  Mum always said that I loved Dad more than her. Then I would say:

  ‘It’s not true, it’s just that I get along better with him!’

  Then Mum would go to the neighbour’s flat, Grandma to bed, and I, out into the street. Dad would remain silent.

  My brother also.

  Grandma (Settles the Accounts)

  Grandma is sitting in the armchair. I am at the table. I am filling in slips for the monthly bills. I measure the time with these slips. Grandma is angry because everyone is always taking advantage of Mum. That woman stole her coat; she lent the other one her whole week’s pay and the woman never paid her back; that man deceived her about a job, she even gave food to the refugees: Grandma gets angry! But she must not become too angry. Her heart will catch up with her. She hasn’t even cleaned the house.

  ‘I just need to help your mother get through this, and then I can die,’ she says, and stays awake sitting in the armchair. Outside, the day is still bright; with more days to come.

  Conversation

  Mum is home. They sent her from the hospital to rest. Grandma is cooking fish for her. Leaning on her stick, she tries the soup with a spoon. Mum is lying on the couch. Looking at me.

  ‘It’s no good!’ I get cross.

  ‘What will I do if she leaves me?’ Grandma wails.

  ‘Why don’t you hug her? Talk to her!’

  ‘How, when I don’t understand her?’

  ‘Find a way, for fuck’s sake!’

  I go out and slam the door. She cannot eat the fish. She can’t even eat chocolate pudding any more! Her tablets are an endless list of side effects. She doesn’t write messages. She just looks. Where shall I put all that? All my organs are already full up.

  I’ll buy a nice dress for myself.

  Car Accident

  That gentleman, the one I hit with the car, fell slowly onto the road. They said I shouldn’t have pressed the brakes so hard. That the road was too greasy and wet. The policeman told the nurses that the man could walk, but that I needed something to calm me. They took the man away to assess him, while I sat in the car and ate a slice of pizza instead of tablets to calm me down. An unusually cute dog passed by. I said:

  ‘Oh, what a cute mutt!’

  In court they inform me and the gentleman just how much our dance with death will cost us.

  It was as much as a really big television set costs. You can do nothing else but sit in front of such a big TV set. You don’t go outside. You don’t do stupid things. You have already spent all your money.

  The Wooden Bridge

  I nearly died once. Fell from a wooden bridge. Ended my life in a beautiful canyon. Better that I didn’t. That young man, because of whom I was turning around when I slid down the hole in the bridge, was much too shy. I didn’t want someone like that to make a speech at my funeral when I finally died.

  The Wig

  In the wig shop, the woman behind the counter says:

  ‘Your mother has to try this wig on. If I sell it to you now, you won’t be able to return it. Can’t your mother come here to the shop to try it on before buying it? You know, all the wigs look good on the dolls’ heads.’

  It’s the short-haired blond wig in the window. Mum likes it. She saw it from the car.

  I tell the lady that Mum is totally exhausted and that I’ll talk it over with her. I go out into the rain. The drops on my glasses don’t worry me. My ribs hurt. My doctor says it’s because I am too thin. I have to drink protein and spirulina. I have to go home and cry. Tomorrow I won’t.

  The short-haired blond wig costs a lot.

  The Park

  On the black and white photo taken in the big green park, where many years later I buried six fresh-water turtles, there is a couple in love. She has curly blond hair, a long leather jacket and a smile on her face. He has long black hair, a leather jacket with frayed wool on his sleeves, and all his teeth. They are hugging on the bench beneath the chestnut tree, next to the stone sphinx and the laurel bushes. They hide their kisses with their hair. Storing them in the leaves of the trees.

  Those leather jackets now hang in the wardrobe.

  Kyoto

  When birds have mated, and one dies, the other can die of grief. So Mum says. This happened to Grandma and Grandad too, when they were living in the South, far away from us. That’s why Kyoto quickly got a new partner. Yellow. Yellow would screech shrilly and I called her Suzi. When she died, I said:

  ‘Enough! I’m not going to keep on buying new parrots.’

  So Kyoto remained alone. And here he is, just fine. Nothing wrong with him. He is only unhappy when I talk to someone on the telephone.

  Healing Plants

  Mum holds her discharge letter in her hand and says:

  ‘It’s everywhere.’

  I peek into the fridge. I check the medications. Neither one of those plants grows just anywhere. The passion flower seeks the South, and the mountain cactus for the North. The North is ancient night, and the South is a young day. Both cure dense clusters of feelings. Neither one of those plants is kept in clay pots, but in the fridge. In dark bottles.

  Mum can no longer drink the mountain cactus. We take her back to the hospital.

  Ghosts

  The three-dimensional ghost with a hat didn’t come at three in the morning when I usually wake up, but at six. The alarm clock opened my eyes, and there he was, standing in the left corner of the door. I covered my head with the blanket and said:

  ‘Please go away, you’re frightening me.’

  Maybe he stayed in the corner, silent. A warning or a question? It’s not important – one must sleep. The next night I left the light and the television on. Grandma said:

  ‘See! They’re everywhere.’

  A Friend

  Silly dog! Again he is in someone else’s garden. I call him. My hands are on my hips. I call him more loudly. Nothing else can be heard, only my voice. The old man comes out of his red garage.

  ‘Did he run away from you again?’ He smiles and directs his light-blue gaze towards the heavens. I do the same.

  ‘Better you hurry home, it looks like rain.’

  ‘It’s going to. I’m off home. See you!’

  ‘See you, my little lamb.’

  People I Knew

  One young guy had a band. When our country beat another country in an important football championship, he jumped high up into the air in his happiness, and hit his head on the awning of the café. He hit the metal part. In the emergency department they sewed up his cut. That same evening he performed with his band in the town square. He jumped high into the air on the stage, where there was no roof.

  Some years later, he put awning in front of his own café, which had a view of the stadium. Sometimes he played chess, and went dancing on the islands.

  Again, some years later, he opened a disco so that he could dance on his own podium. They found him there one day, hanging from the ceiling. It was said he had been hanging t
here for at least a week. There were no curiosity seekers at the funeral; only a lot of sad friends. One of them even lost consciousness. He fell onto me, and then down onto the ground. People pressed on his lungs, breathed into his mouth. Nothing helped. His head was purple at first, then transparent and then ready for ice. The white coats took him away, and the funeral continued.

  After all that, I sat underneath the big yellow awning of a restaurant and ate pizza. It was late at night when I began to cry loudly.

  At the Emergency Department

  ‘We can’t do anything more for your mother. She’ll be here with us a bit longer, and then you will have to move her somewhere. Have you thought about that?’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘In an institution for palliative care.’

  ‘You mean, like a nursing home for old people?’

  ‘Like a nursing home. But where she can have all-day hospital care.’

  ‘But there is no such place here.’

  ‘Well, no, there isn’t.’

  The Market Place

  I don’t know how to push myself through people at the market place. I am afraid rotten tomatoes will fall onto my new shoes, which are satin and seemingly Japanese. Old people here look at everything a lot, but buy little. There are five of them grouped around one stand. The seller declares:

  ‘These are peppers from Palagruža. That’s why they cost so much!’

  From another can be heard:

  ‘I was trained as a florist, these are real hydrangeas!’

  I walk along and glance furtively at lemons, strawberries, carrots. If they catch me, I’ll have to buy a kilo more than I want to. Twice as expensive as what I want to spend. I follow my shoes. There is a squashed leek on the ground. And slimy mud. I don’t want lady’s perfume; I don’t want a shirt or pear brandy! I want you to wash yourselves before you come into town!