by Sarah Kassem
All at once the people from Bresolino views arrived in a flurry. Gerald van den Berg had picked up both Marco and the cleaning lady and, on the express road to D4, they had met Emilia and Viktor’s father. As that little motorcade had driven into Aquifolium Street, Viktor had gotten quite beside himself, especially when they had come pouring into the studio with so many presents. In fact, his excitement had peaked somewhat with his jumping up and down and the putting on of his birthday cassette. When at last the studio people arrived, Grandpa Gideon showed up and the living room was full with all the gifts on the living room table and everyone talking at once, Viktor had danced in his Darth Maul costume to the birthday song, and everyone had clapped him and laughed and to Viktor the world had never been so beautiful.
Even with everyone having arrived, however, Viktor was not yet allowed to open his presents. Instead he had to watch as the usual small groups formed. The dressmakers and Emilia sat at the table drinking coffee and talking all at once. His father, grandfather, Gerald van den Berg, along with Hamid and Malek, the two tailors from Bahrain, all stood with a glass in hand by the window which looked at the square in front of the house and talked about cars (or at least Viktor suspected that they did, as in front of the house were a multitude of cars being pointed at, gestured to, and otherwise motioned toward). Marco and Oded sat on the floor and talked animatedly about something while Rocco, Rocco’s mother and the maid were quite lost on the couch. This slight problem was solved quite quickly however when Rocco was called to the window to answer a technical question on his car and Rocco’s mother and the cleaning lady found that they both knew Russian, a discovery that ended with the two of them delving into a conversation masked in an outlandishly secret language. Viktor was creeped out by their jabbering. Helena buzzed from one group to another, pouring coffee, talking to everyone, and spreading her perfumed fragrance.
After a while of all this small talk, Helena came in with the cake, lit the candles and everyone sang for Viktor, who clung to the leg of his father and nearly fainted with happiness. They all kissed and hugged him and he thought his heart would burst. Then came the gifts. Viktor took a deep breath and told himself, as he had earlier when getting dressed, that, with such an advanced age, one must of course preserve countenance (the word ‘countenance’ he had learned from Emilia and she had explained it in such a way that he actually understood what it meant).
Viktor stood in front of the pile of boxed gifts and slowly and cautiously opened the wrapping paper so as not to tear it. He liked wrapping paper, it was always so colorful and so pretty and reminded him of birthdays and as such he thought it a pity that it was easy to tear, to crumple and then to toss in the trash.
He looked first at Rocco, the hulking, sullen Rocco, who stood looking completely out of place in his wayward suit, occasionally grumbling to himself, and then at the awkwardly packed, crumpled gift, already with dented corners and little tears. The wrapping paper was not really wrapping paper, but aluminum foil, and around it all a piece of packing cord was bound as a loop. Viktor imagined Rocco in his dimly lit, smoky bar at the counter, trying to pack the gift with a cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth and his brow impatiently furrowed. This scene so emotionally overwhelmed him that he ran to Rocco and hugged his leg. Rocco knelt down and hugged him back. Viktor got lightheaded from Rocco’s embrace, which seemed to squeeze the air out of his lungs and threaten to crush his ribs, but he put his head on Rocco’s shoulder, breathing in the Rocco smell of nicotine, beer and aftershave and whispered, “Thank you Rocco” to which Rocco grumbled something unintelligible in reply.
Viktor then moved around and hugged everyone. His father picked him up and held him for a while and kissed him on the neck. His mother raised him also and covered his face with lots of kisses. Gem looked scared and backed away, but Viktor hugged him anyway. He hugged the small, thin Hala gently, and she hugged him and gave him a little touch of peck on the cheek. In turn, he embraced each of the studio staff, then Oded, who spun him through the air. He then embraced the wonderfully fragrant and pretty Emilia before Gerald van den Berg picked him up and left him dangling from the feet down. Marco gave him move a cautious embrace then the cleaning lady laughed and said something garbled with a hug. Finally, Rocco’s mother enveloped him with her apple pie scent.
Once all this was done he was finally allowed to unwrap his presents. He chose the biggest first. The studio employees had all pitched in and had bought him a bicycle. Helena was so touched that she got tears in her eyes and, in a mirror of her son, hugged and kissed each of her employees in turn. Viktor was so excited that he got on the bike and peddled a few laps in the living room until his mother told him that he could only use the bike outside. From his father he got a huge chemistry set. Viktor did not know exactly what to do with it, and everything looked very complicated, but he nonetheless emphasized his joy several times so as not to offend his father. Helena gave him a model airplane to assemble, making him extremely pleased. From Gerald van den Berg he got a football autographed by Ruud van Nistelrooy which made him dizzy. From Galina, the cleaning lady, he was given a pirate ship together with some small pirates and Viktor was instantly looking forward to taking the whole lot in the bath with him. Emilia gave him a huge, thick children’s encyclopedia, which he did not find so exciting, but to which he hid his disappointment and instead tried to look awfully grateful. Rocco’s battered gift contained a rusty cigar box with some pyramids and men with turbans on it, in the box was a season ticket for the circus, which was to begin in two weeks – Viktor loved the circus and, as he felt he could never get enough of it, he was as such beside himself with joy. When he was told what a season ticket meant he could not believe his ears and everyone had to repeatedly tell him that it actually means that he can so often go as he wants and pay nothing, no matter how many times he goes. Finally, he got from Marco a remote controlled car.
Viktor sat amidst his gifts, looked at everything then looked at everyone and he almost wanted to cry with happiness. He managed to keep his composure however and instead dealt with the remote control of the car to distract himself.
Everyone soon slinked back into their small groups. Viktor sat on the floor and played with Oded, Marco, Gem and Hala. Oded was fascinated by the model airplane and as such examined the blueprint. Marco was impressed with the chemistry set and, after reading through the instructions, he revealed to both Viktor and Gem the secrets behind the many powders and vials. Viktor did not understand everything, but words like “explosion” and “color change” sounded quite promising. Hala leafed through the children’s encyclopedia and looked at the pictures and Oded read to her the entry for ‘butterflies’.
Rocco’s mother and the cleaning lady, Galina, stayed on the couch with their plates of cake and whispered in their strange, creepy language. Oded and Marco managed to eat between them, two complete baguettes, 12 cheese skewers, a whole cup of olives and each a piece of cake along with two slices of apple pie and eighteen rum balls.
Sometime later, while Oded and Marco were assembling the pirate ship, there was a sudden loud cry from the table where the grownups were sitting. A ripple of varied reactions spread around the room as Viktor winced and thought everyone would die immediately thus ending his birthday, Rocco’s mother sent a hand to her chest in fright and Galina yelled something Russian as her face went as white as a sheet.
At the table however the reaction was a different story as Viktor’s father laughed and slapped Malek, the tailor from Bahrain, on the back. Emilia cheered as Maricel and Donna clapped and Helena wiped a tear from her eye. To all this Gerald shouted, “you think we didn’t know?” and even Rocco had a hint of a smile on his face. Only Andala, the youngest seamstress, sat crimson and embarrassed in her chair, while Hamid hugged Malek and shook his hand.
Viktor ran to the table and demanded, “What is it? What is it?”
It had been confirmed what had been speculated for a long time: Andala and Malek were a couple. Geral
d and Maricel had not only managed to wring from both a confession, but on top Malek had announced that they were secretly engaged and wanted to marry soon.
Viktor listened very carefully, because he liked Andala and Malek. He had never been to a wedding and only knew about them from the movies. Andala was a niece of Maricel and the two of them had come together to Hedera Helix from the Philippines. She was small and very thin and Viktor found her very pretty. She had beautiful eyes and very long, shiny hair and she always stood in the workshop kitchen and cooked lunch for everyone, putting aside some extra for Viktor knowing that he would have it when he came home from school. Furthermore, it had been Andala who had embroidered the ‘S’ on Viktor’s Superman costume.
Malek, however, was Helena’s favorite in the workshop. He was the only one Helena really trusted when it came to customizing complicated patterns or dealing with very expensive materials. As far as Viktor could tell, Malek was also very good looking. He had brown skin, not as brown as Gerald van den Berg, but darker than Viktor’s.
What Andala and Malek had in common in Viktor’s opinion, was that both shared a small speech impediment. Andala could utter no F, instead always making it sound like a P. And Malek could not say P, which always sounded like a B. Despite these inadequacies however, they could both pronounce letters which Viktor did not even know existed at all. A letter similar to ‘N’, which seemed to come from the nose, and guttural sounds which always made Viktor choke when he tried to say them.
Rocco soon took out his guitar and sang ‘Drive’, making it a cheery and summery version that got everyone both laughing and singing along. After he sang ‘Closing Time’, and, as everyone knew the song by heart, the women took over the background vocals and the men sang along with Rocco. Though the lyrics had little to do with birthdays, the melody was happy enough and everyone started to dance, meaning that Rocco had to play it four times in succession due to popular demand.
When the clock finally struck 11, everyone took their leave. Hugs were offered around and Malek was beaten on the back as Andala got kisses and Viktor’s hair was boisterously ruffled.
Though Viktor was still feeling wide awake, his efforts to help his mother clean up meant that he was soon falling asleep standing up with a trash bag in his hand. Later, when laid asleep in his bed, he did not hear Cristobal knock on the window pane. Cristobal then turned to a couple of tricks that he had learned in his training and managed to open the window.
He put a small gift that was wrapped in white paper and a red bow on Viktor’s bedside table and put a small orchid flower beside it. He stayed a while and watched the sleeping Viktor before moving a single strand of hair from Viktor’s face and finally leaving him to his slumber.
Monoecy
Cristobal came the next evening, fluttering outside the window to attract Viktor’s attention. Viktor was so pleased that he stumbled over his new children’s dictionary in an effort to rush to the window. Having hurt his knee and thus riddled with pain, he was forced to hobble the rest of the way to the window.
“Congratulations on your birthday!” Cried Cristobal, turning pirouettes in the air. Viktor bounced up and down in spite of his painful knee, and cried, “Thank you for the gift!”
In the small package that Viktor had found next to his bed that morning was a small round structure, woven of many bird feathers in every color imaginable. Viktor had no idea what it was, but he didn’t care. It was very nice and it was from Cristobal and it looked awfully delicate and fragile. Cristobal said it was a fringe of hair, that Viktor could wear on his head like a crown. Furthermore he said, with proudly puffed out feathers, that it had been made purely by hand.
Viktor showed Cristobal everything that he had been given for his birthday. Cristobal inspected each gift carefully and repeatedly announced, “I want one as well!” Then the two of them played with the remote control car before looking up the word ‘Hummingbrid’ in the encyclopedia. Cristobal unfortunately then declared that he had to leave.
“I have to urgently visit a few people,” he said.
“Who?” asked Viktor.
“First of all Maradona. And then I have to visit someone called Desmond Tutu.”
“Who’s that?” Asked Viktor.
Cristobal shrugged, he had no idea.
“Is he famous?” Asked Viktor.
“I think so,”Cristobal said. “He’s won a few prizes a couple of times.”
They looked in the children’s encyclopedia to see if it would offer any further clues but found no Desmond Tutu.
“Is he a boxer?” Asked Viktor.
“I don’t know. I hope not!”
“Then maybe he’s a racing driver.”
“Cooool!” cried Cristobal.
When Cristobal was gone, Viktor left his room in order to brush his teeth and, feeling a bit tired still from the day before, he wanted to lie down but froze when he heard a strange noise, a kind of creaking, coming from under his bed.
Viktor went through all sorts of possible options as to what it could be and, though he wanted to cry for his mother, he remembered that he was eight and, having learned all about self-defense from Cristobal, he decided that the existence of a possible monster under his bed was nothing in fact to fear.
He lay flat on the bed, letting his head hang down. This pose, meant to offer him more protection, in fact backfired when he leant too far forward and ended up sprawled on the floor, his head now fully under the bed.
Thankfully though there were no monsters, but instead a lizard sitting in Viktor’s old sneaker.
The lizard was mostly inside the sneaker, sitting there as if it were sitting in a big comfy chair, one arm on the top of the shoe as if it were an armrest. It looked out of bored, half-opened eyes at Viktor and said softly “Good evening, Mr. Abies.”
Viktor was quite surprised. Never had anyone ever greeted him with a “Good evening,” before, nor for that matter had anyone ever addressed him as “Mr. Abies”. He, of course, knew his own last name, but so far he had been known his entire life as either “Viktor”, “Viktor Abies”, “son of Helena Abies” or “son of Mr. Abies” but never himself as “Mr. Abies”.
In fact he was quite confused at first, thinking that perhaps the lizard was only looking at him by accident and instead meant to address Viktor’s father who would suddenly appear. Only when the lizard looked at him impatiently and repeated in a very articulate way: “Good evening, Mr. Abies,” did Viktor know that it was him who was being addressed. This realisation brought about a rather polite reply from the boy who said: “Good evening.”
Viktor knew that he shouldn’t really be so surprised, after all he was 8 years old now and as such the world had changed, meaning therefore that it was perfectly reasonable for him to be addressed with such adult language.
The lizard sighed with annoyance and slowly climbed out of the shoe and out from under the bed, Viktor in turn sliding out before him.
“How are you?” the lizard asked casually.
“Good,” Viktor replied, before adding a dutiful “And you?”
The lizard offered him a brief bored look, slowly walked around the room and looked at everything. “I wanted to have a short look around here myself tonight” he said.
Viktor did not quite understand what was meant, but said: “Welcome”, just as Helena and Oded did whenever new people entered the store.
“You’re a clever one,” the lizard said disapprovingly and walked across the room. It was a beautiful lizard, metallic green with a broad orange stripe on its back. It walked past the pirate ship and circled the model airplane.
“Since when has this bird been yours?” It asked.
“Who? Cristobal?”
“Whoever. The hummingbird.”
Viktor thought but did not know quite what to answer and so said: “He often comes to visit me.”
“That is clear to me. But since when?”
Viktor thought once more then said hesitantly: “Since about three weeks
ago.”
“Oh. You don’t say.” The lizard sat down on the children’s encyclopedia. “Stand up, I want to see you.”
Viktor stood up and the lizard examined him from top to bottom.
“Mr. Abies, what has this bird discussed with you?”
Viktor did not know what to say, so he said, “We always play.”
The lizard sighed and looked with a bored air at its fingernails.
Viktor was silent. The lizard was so mature and authoritative that Viktor thought it a good moment to apply the rule often preached by his mother: “Speak only when spoken to”.
“I’ll take my leave now. Thank you,” said the lizard, and then added: “Have a good evening, Mr. Abies. We will be seeing each other again someday,” before it climbed out the window and disappeared.
As soon as the lizard had left Viktor thought about this and ran into the hallway to look at himself in the mirror, he wanted to see what the lizard had been examining, and yet he saw nothing of any interest.