The Collector of Names

by Miha Mazzini

  Raf put his hand on his heart and it gave him a fright. The madness was growing. His organs were working more and more irregularly, the visions and noises were becoming clearer and clearer.

  Oooooooooooooooohhh!

  He wrinkled his forehead. Was that possible? The creature was looking at the light above the trees and it seemed to Raf that it was standing there, listening. If it was seeing and hearing the same things as him, than it could not all be just his imagination.

  He looked towards the camp again eagerly but the boy was not there anymore. Raf turned his head around in panic, his eyes cutting the air. Finally, he noticed the boy near the campsite entrance, walking up the hill slowly. There was somebody at the reception door with his back towards him, but the completely confused Raf was not interested in him. Pull yourself together, he told himself, what did actually happen earlier?

  Aco fell and Raf looked on. In the meantime the boy turned towards Raf and asked for his name, he remembered that very clearly, but everything after that became blurred. He must have answered, because the boy went off and left him as if he had finished his assignment.

  "Too late, too late, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus!"

  That was all he had said, nothing else. He had repeated the name of the Saviour and NO!

  -NO!-

  it had saved him. He had directed all his attention to Aco's fall and that had helped him to lie. Not deliberately, that was not possible. He told the name collector a name he surely had already? So what happened with other people's names and duplicates? Was Jesus a self-sufficient name, which did not need a person behind it? Was that why many doubted it ever did have a person behind it?

  He's saved me, thought Raf. Saved me! Jesus has saved me.

  Suddenly, he found himself in the middle of the world again. He was not an inseparable part of it - that was impossible after his close experience of death - it was more a case of a temporary coexistence and responsibility.

  I have fucked everything up, well and truly. God saved me that time I didn't go to play on the trains and God lent me his name tonight and saved me again. There is a task I have to carry out. If there is a goal, than God does exist. This time I won't fuck up. I'll be cool and collected, just like Aco. I'll do everything right and try to atone for my sins.

  You'll hear them as soon as they start off and they'll come with a noise.

  That was what Aco had said. Raf repeated the sentence a few more times and suddenly he recognised the sound coming through the darkness.

  The tank. They were coming in the tank!

  The child was at the bottom of the hill.

  He had promised Aco to warn them and explain to them who their enemy was and what he looked like. He ran over to the spear and pulled it out of the ground. He wanted to run after the boy and attack him again. He changed his mind, remembering the boy's powers and his own clumsiness. There was one move which would do both at once: he must run along the slope across the wood and not on the windy road so that he overtook the boy, which should not be difficult as the boy seemed to be moon-walking. The rescuers on the tank were sure to have weapons with them and when the creature appeared in front of them, they could shoot him without coming within the reach of his powers. The solution had never seemed so simple and so near. A ripe promise of the end of the nightmare. He looked towards the campsite where there was nothing to do anymore. The boy had already completed his task there and the mad slaughter would begin any moment.

  Over the hill, then. Clutching the spear he ran like never before.

  *

  The reception door opened noisily and the biker jumped into the room, transformed into a wild and merciless monster. The receptionist jumped up, picked up the tourist by his collar, gave his head two good blows, one from the left and one from the right, kicked him over to the built-in cupboard, opened it and hurled his attacker in and then closed and locked the door.

  "There!"

  He brushed his hand on his trousers and sat back on his chair, which had not even begun to cool down. Good job he had been expecting an attack ever since he had started his shift that evening, when he had looked through the personal details of all the guests and seen that one of them was a writer. He had never met one in his life, but knew very well what sort of people they were. They came to the seaside, got pissed out of their heads and then caused havoc, having fights all night. His assumptions proved correct and the receptionist smiled smugly and shouted towards the cupboard, without feeling any need to open his eyes:

  "You just keep growling and scratching at the door (spitting on the floor) - fucking writer! We know your sort very well here!"

  *

  "We’re half way there now, boys, so let’s be a bit more careful from now on!" Luka said into the microphone. He was still half way out of the turret, leaning on the heavy Browning machine-gun on his left.

  Bruno asked: "Luka, may I lower the seat?"

  "You think it’ll be dangerous straight away?"

  "No, it’s just that there’s quite a cool breeze and my rheumatism"

  "OK, lower it and drive more slowly!"

  From where he was, Luka could not see the driver looking out of the tank just beneath the turret, right next to the barrel. His seat was lowered and the lid was closed.

  "Miro, are you ready?"

  "Yes."

  Miro was really an artillery-man, but had now taken Luka’s place at the second machine gun.

  "Give Adriano down there a kick, just to make sure he’s not asleep."

  "What if he starts going on again?"

  "Kick him!"

  "EH? WHAT? WHAT SORT OF BEHAVIOUR IS THIS, YOU’RE NOT ON A BUS OVER ON THE MAINLAND!"

  "Alright, it’s alright. Just like I said, be careful now, boys!"

  The tank struggled on up the road and it was another five-minute drive up to the junction at the top of the hill.

  *

  Raf stood in the middle of the road and the lights were already penetrating through the trees. The child was nowhere to be seen.

  "Victory!" he said, while catching his breath and then he waited for the arrival of the rescuers.

  "FATHER! FATHER!" Raf heard behind him, at first quietly from a fair distance, but then it got louder and he knew it was coming nearer.

  "Oh, no! Max!"

  He looked around quickly and hid behind some pine-trees at the side of the road. He could not afford to be seen by Max, it was not the right time to be kissed by him, he needed his mouth empty so that he could speak to the pensioners.

  Lights appeared in the middle of the road: the one a few metres above the ground was so strong that it blinded Raf whereas the two lower down, in a triangular shape, were much weaker. He could only hear the mass of iron behind them but not actually see it.

  Max sped down the road, shouting and running towards the tank.

  *

  That was Father’s look! So full of light that it blinded everybody, especially his nameless son. Max could feel his Father’s strength, he could hear his rumble and he knew that they were getting closer and closer, another moment and they would be united in an inseparable embrace. The earth trembled when his Father walked, so he could not be mistaken.

  Max waved the strips of jeans he had been tied with in the air. Let his Father see how his worthless son had freed himself from them and was now bringing them to show.

  FATHER!

  *

  Max ran towards the centre of the light, waving his arms in the air and shouting. His words lost their meaning and became one long howl, an orgasm of euphoric vocal cords.

  Raf was hiding behind a tree and could not take his eyes off the scene in front of him.

  Luka suddenly noticed the screaming boy, waving something long and flexible above his head and grabbed for the Browning. He was not as quick as he used to be and for a moment he thought that he was finished, the terrorist would throw his explosives before they managed to stop him.

  What was Adriano doing? Why wasn’t he firing, he was the hea
d machine-gunner! Was he now blind as well as deaf? Adriano!

  The machine gun at the front went off, a moment later Miro joined in and Luka finally managed to aim his barel in the right direction and press the trigger. That was more like it! Fire at the end of the barrel and after every ten loads the fire extended into a long ray of light, which helped him aim. A spider’s web in the darkness.

  Max did not seem to be harmed at first and then his right arm came off at the elbow and flew in a long arch into the darkness. The end and devastation happened in a moment: an explosion of stones, soil, pine-trees, blood, flesh and bones fused into a cloud which first flew up into the air, then smashed onto the ground, rolling here and there under the shower of bullets which just would not stop.

  Luka let go of the trigger, but the machine-gun would not stop firing. He started hitting the mechanism until it finally stopped.

  "STOP!" he shouted.

  Miro stopped immediately, whilst Adriano needed another kick, but this time Luka did not have to order it.

  "FUCKING HELL!" Adriano’s shouting came through the earphones. "LUKA, FUCK YOU. YOU STICK THAT FUCKING LABEL OF YOURS ON MY MACHINE-GUN AND YOU WRITE ON IT: MACHINE-GUN M 19119A4 AND I CAN TAKE THAT. BUT THEN YOU PUT ANOTHER FUCKING LABEL ON THE FUCKING TRIGGER, SAYING MACHINE-GUN’S M19119A4 TRIGGER! HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO FUCKING FIRE WHEN I HAVE TO SCRATCH THE FUCKING PAPER OFF THE TRIGGER, EH?"

  "ADRIANO, SHUT UP!"

  "I FUCKING WILL NOT! SOON YOU’LL BE STICKING A FUCKING LABEL ON EVERY FUCKING BULLET. MACHINE-GUN’S M19119A4 BULLET. AND THEN I’LL HAVE TO SCRATCH OFF EACH FUCKING ONE BEFORE I FIRE IT!"

  Luka blushed. Was it possible that the deaf old man could read the innermost thoughts that he had fought against so hard? He decided that attack was his best defense.

  "BE QUIET, ADRIANO! WOULD YOU LIKE ME TO FORGET EVERYTHING? YOU SPEND ALL YOUR LIFE LEARNING NAMES OF THINGS. ALL YOUR LIFE! AND THEN YOU FORGET THEM ALL AND YOU’RE NO LONGER HUMAN! GO AND HAVE A LOOK AT MY PARENTS! IS THAT CLEAR? NOW LEAVE ME ALONE!"

  "FUCK YOU, LUKA!"

  "HEY, YOU TWO!" Miro interfered, laughingly. "What if we paid some attention to that guy on the road?"

  "Yes, you’re right!" said Luka. "ADRIANO, THE DEAD BODY INSPECTION!"

  "ARE YOU MAD? WE’VE SCATTERED HIM AROUND A RADIUS OF HALF A KILOMETRE, YOU CAN’T EXPECT ME TO WALK THAT FAR, I’M AN OLD MAN!"

  So that was it, he was now starting to disobey orders! Luka knew that Adriano would spend at least ten minutes sulking and that he could not count on him.

  "ADRIANO, COVER US! Miro, come with me and take the gun!"

  *

  Jesus, said Raf. If I show myself they’ll shoot me.

  The dust was beginning to settle and he was worried that he would soon be able to see what was left of Max.

  Two old men came carefully from behind the lights both wearing uniforms, one carrying a machine-gun, the other one a pistol, and slowly approached the mess on the road. They looked around cautiously and Raf ducked down instinctively.

  "Hey," said the one with the machine gun, "there are no weapons. Just some strips of material"

  "Well, I thought"

  "Me too!"

  "Why the hell was he running like that then! Serves him right! Did you understand what he was shouting?"

  "Not quite, but it sounded to me as he was saying ‘father’."

  "Yeah, I had that feeling too. There are some weird people around, don’t you think? He sees a tank, runs towards it, shouting ‘father’!"

  "If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes I wouldn’t have believed it!"

  The one with the pistol added:

  "Don’t say anything about this to Adriano!"

  "I won’t."

  "Still, we’d better be a bit more careful from now on! We should soon be catching up with that niece of Aco’s and I wouldn’t want to have her on my conscience."

  "Yes, she’s a fast walker for somebody from the mainland!"

  "She’s young."

  "Yeah."

  Raf bit his bottom lip. The girl from the ferry was not safely in the village but somewhere in the woods, on the way to the villa. He had to pluck up the courage to reveal himself to the pensioners, hoping they would not shoot him. Their eye-sight probably was not very good and they would probably think he was another terrorist. Maybe he should find a white flag somewhere?

  "Hey," said the old man with the machine gun, "there’s somebody by the tank! Why doesn’t Adriano shoot?"

  Raf saw the outline of a small figure between the bottom two lights.

  *

  Ana kept looking at the beast in front of her and could not stop trembling.

  "Yes," she said, "I’m cold"

  "Unfortunately," said Alfonz, "I haven’t got anything to put around you."

  "I know, I know."

  She nodded eagerly. The light did not reach below his naked shoulder and she had no desire to see the rest of him.

  "I can put a hand on your shoulder, the good hand, the one that gave me crisps, if you want?"

  The only thing Ana understood was that the monster wanted to touch her and she found it very hard to suppress a scream.

  "No, thank you, I’m getting warmer. I’m not shivering any more."

  "Yes, you really are shivering less. I’m glad."

  They stopped talking. Ana knew she had to look at him, look into those crazy eyes in front of her, but at the same time she was trying to blur out what she saw as much as she could.

  "I know you," he said. "You’re the girl from the ferry. The decent girl, the one I could introduce to my mum and dad and we could have a cup of tea together. Fresh tea, not the one brewed in advance for the guests."

  "From the ferry?"

  "Yes, we saw each other there, you probably didn’t notice me, because I was very different then. I was sadder, I wasn’t smiling yet."

  He was one of the boys from the ferry? My God, not the bony one? His shoulder answered that question. It was either the muscular one or the one next to him, whose face she could not remember, but who was dressed like some boys she knew from Sunday school. And the one who was earlier shouting for his father on the road was probably one of them too? What was happening? Where was her uncle? And that boy?

  "I remember," she said.

  "And I remember you. You know, I divide feelings into three levels of love: to like somebody, to be fond of them and to love them. I liked you then on the ferry. Quietly – I didn’t dare say it out loud – I said: I like you."

  "Thank you."

  She tried to be friendly hoping that kind words might soften what she saw in front of her.

  "But since a few minutes ago, when you looked in my eyes and smiled at me so nicely – the most beautiful smile I’ve ever seen in my whole life – I’ve been fond of you. Ever since you’ve joined me in here, I’ve been looking at you, not daring to speak to you. But your smile gave me the courage. Listen, I’m telling you, I’m very fond of you."

  Ana did not quite comprehend what the creature was talking about:

  "A smile?"

  "I think soon I’ll love you," he said. "But don’t worry, I’ll warn you before it happens!"

  Ana understood. She fell into the hollow, started thinking and smiled to herself, but the creature in front of her saw that smile and thought it was directed at him. She had to be careful and friendly. She had to lead the conversation away from rape. She remembered how all her schoolfriends lost their virginity by the sea, after long romantic talks in the dark. But she did not want to follow their example, at least not there and then, and not with him.

  "What’s your name?" she asked him.

  He moved and she nearly fainted with fear when he growled and gritted his teeth.

  "It doesn’t matter!" he hissed. "What does a name mean to somebody who’s in love! Nothing! Real love pays no attention to names! Names are only important when it comes to inheritance, not to matters of the heart! This is love, not the law! We, the nameless, ha
ve a right to love too!"

  He went on and on. Ana did not understand anything anymore. Maybe he was not all that dangerous and would let her leave?

  He stopped suddenly and remained still.

  "I’ll give you my heart, that’ll make you believe me!"

  "I believe you!"

  "You’re just trying to calm me down. How can you believe me when we’ve only just met? And to top it all I’m very sad. I lost a friend."

  "You lost a friend? One of your friends from the ferry?"

  "Yes, I wanted to separate the good parts of my friend from the bad ones, so that I could keep just the good ones. And then I went for a walk and I realised that friendship is not just about looking at all the good things. You look at a good thing, get hurt by a bad thing and then take comfort in another good thing. Have you ever lost a friend?"

  "No."

  "Well, there you go. That’s why I have to explain it better to you. A friendship is like a yo-yo, it goes up and down, up and down. Yes, I can see you do understand me, that’s why I’ll give you my heart."

  He moved so that she could see him down to his waist, pulled an axe out of the darkness and put the blade to his chest. He pressed on it and Ana could see blood trickling from the wound.

  "NO! Don’t give me your heart!"

  He sounded terribly disappointed:

  "You don’t want my heart?"

  The axe was lifted and directed towards her.

  "I do! I do! But you still need it!"

  He started thinking hard. Ana felt sweat running down her back and into her pants, she felt an itch in the middle of her back but she did not dare to scratch it. A stench of rotting flesh was coming from the boy and his breath smelt sour.

  "You reject it just because of me?"

  "Yes! Yes!"

  "Then I’ll give you the only other heart I’ve got."

  He reached towards her with his hand and there really was something dark on it.

  "Take it, it’s a friendly heart, it comes from a friend."

  "I don’t know"

  That look again.

  "Oh, I’ll gladly take it."

  She touched the thing on his hand, trying very hard not to come anywhere near to the hand offering her the gift. She prepared herself for something slimy but it was not too bad. Warmish and dry, a bit sticky in places. A lump of meat, obviously.