Then came the hourly chime and the local news, and we sat back down on the cool leather of the sofa.
‘Humidity: seventy-four percent …’
I lit another cigarette. Poured a little more wine in Danijela’s plastic cup. She drank from hers and I drank from mine. The music programme continued. We stood up and danced again. Zlaja danced with both Mateja and Isabella. Fric with Isabella, Danijela and me.
Finally, we settled in on Raša’s corner sofa. Zlaja regretted not having his guitar with him. We talked about the film The Doors and the language of the Netherlands. Martin gave a few phrases at that point so we could hear how it sounded. He explained that in a way it was a mix of German and English. He called it Dutch.
‘I thought you spoke Hollandish,’ I said.
‘No, man, in English it’s Dutch. In Dutch we call it …’
He mumbled something that neither Isabella, Fric nor I could repeat.
‘Do you then speak both English and German?’ Fric asked.
‘Not very well. But many Dutch people do. Yes, yes.’
He took a sip of his beer, stifled a burp in its infancy and said:
‘Serbian and Croatian are almost the same language, aren’t they?’
‘Not any more,’ Zlaja said.
‘How come?’
‘Come?’ Zlaja wrinkled his forehead and looked at the door. ‘Who come? Where?’
‘I mean, how come? How can it be?’
‘Oh! That is quite complicated,’ Zlaja said. ‘In our country, things change.’
‘Yeah. I know,’ Martin nodded, oddly distressed.
Fric started a new sentence with ‘Imagine one day you ...’ and I bit Danijela’s earlobe:
‘Why don’t we look around a little?’
‘Later,’ she said and burped softly.
ELECTRIC SOCKET
Wow, was I ever wasted when I got up! Lovely, lovely drunk!
In the bathroom I splashed water on my burning face and pissed into Raša’s pink toilet bowl.
He must have sat here and had a proper dump, I thought. Or read those ‘adults only’ magazines far away from the shrieking brats and the exhausting TV recordings.
We looked around upstairs, switching lights on and off.
‘They should have placed the lamp a little higher,’ I said. ‘And look here! The two electric sockets there aren’t at the same height. Amateurs, man! Pure bungling.’
Danijela said nothing. She just smiled. The other’s laughter exploded down in the sitting room.
‘I would have placed a double switch here, so you could both turn the balcony light on both there and here.’
She nodded. Grabbed a woman's magazine that was on the bedside table. Quickly put it back.
‘It probably would have cost a little more. You would have to run a cable from here. Here!’
She looked up and smiled. A little ironically. Enigmatic.
‘Now it’s really stupid. You have to go to the other end of the room to switch on the light when you come in from the balcony. It would really be worth it to pay a little extra. I remember the time Boro – that’s my master, he’s Serbian but that doesn’t matter – once when he and I were …’
‘Switch off the light!’
‘What? Nobody can see us … There are heavy curtains and …’
‘Switch off the light and come here! Here!’
She tugged my lower arm. I just managed to switch the button which made us both disappear. Had it not been for a small gap between the two curtains at the window, we would not have been able to see anything at all.
Danijela wrapped me around her. I played along and voluntarily toppled over onto the velvet blanket on the bed. She threw herself on top of me like in a play fight. She gathered my hands above my head, held them there with one hand and played a harmonica solo on my ribs with the other one. I couldn’t help but snigger, dammit, that tickled:
‘No, stop!’
She laughed:
‘Shhhh!’
And pulled up my T-shirt.
Her kisses jumped around on my stomach like small, moist frogs. It tickled like hell. I held my breath and bit my tongue, until she enveloped my left thumb with her soft lips. Instinctively I moved it and cut the base of my finger on her front teeth. My entire left side was tingling, even my bones.
I discreetly wiped off the finger with the other four, while practically in one tug she pulled off my trousers and underwear. I helped her the last bit of the way.
Danijela straightened up and pulled her T-shirt over her head.
‘Mmaaghr!’ I said a little later, if not even a little less articulated.
I had no idea where I was when she lowered herself onto me. I just noticed that the bed moved in time with her movements. It was a double bed with a velvet blanket stretched over the mattress. Still no sheets.
REVENGE
I woke up with one of Danijela’s knees pressed against my ribs. It was all not a dream.
From downstairs Zlaja and Isabella’s voices could be heard, they called each other and rustled things, but I had no desire to go downstairs yet. I closed my eyes and remained lying.
Danijela breathed heavily. She was more than two years older than me. She could have chosen anyone at all, but she chose me. And it was not a dream, I kept thinking.
When I finally got up, dizzy from the hangover, and stumbled onto the balcony, everything seemed a little different. A little kinder and closer. An aeroplane with a banner fluttering behind it crossed the bay. A red transport ship out on the horizon behind the island. It was the world and not the bed that had moved. And it had done it – in my direction.
I ignored Zlaja’s instruction and remained standing on the balcony. The warm marble felt pleasant under my bare feet. I wished for nothing at all. I felt light and free, was completely present and relaxed.
‘Dear Mister No, I wish you were here. You still think I am just a little boy. But I am much older than you think. I can do lots of things by myself. Now I can manage without your help.’
Danijela slept with her mouth half-open. I woke her up with a gentle stroke behind the ear and a kiss on the dry, full lips.
She had killer breath.
Down in the sitting room, the hangovers ruled to an equally great extent. Mateja and Isabella had collected the rubbish in two large bags. Now they sat drinking water from Zlaja’s plastic cups. He stood by the kitchen tap and gave out rounds of water. Martin and Fric were gone.
‘And?’ Zlaja shoved me when we went outside to throw out the rubbish. ‘Did you?’
I tried to conceal the smug smile.
‘Boom!’ he shouted and raised his arm. ‘I need all the details! Tell, tell! What have I taught you? What have I taught you?’
‘No, let’s meet by the pier later. Then we can talk about it. What about you and Mateja?’
He made a face and shrugged.
‘What? Didn’t she want to, or what?’
It was a rhetorical question. Is there anyone that would not want Zlaja, the number one scoring king of the bay? No way. That could never be the case.
‘No, no,’ he shrugged again. ‘It was me, I couldn’t be bothered.’
‘Why?’
‘I don’t know.’
He jumped over the fence and put the rubbish down in the round bin of the neighbouring villa:
‘She looks like an iron.’
‘What?’
‘She looks like an iron.’
‘What the hell do you mean by that?’
‘I don’t know. That nose … And then that guy Martin was there too. He was staring like crazy!’
‘Ohhh! Now I’m with you.’
Zlaja jumped over the fence. He stood in Raša’s garden again:
‘Wait till you see Miraja, man! She is … She is completely wild! I’m telling you. Just wait till you’ve seen her.’
The abandoned bungalows were where they always were, but looked a little cosier than they ever had before. The three girls and I
were on our way home, when the fascist Pero came walking towards us. Danijela and I were holding hands, Isabella and Mateja were walking further back.
I had loose, uncombed hair and was wearing a pair of Lennon sunglasses. Our gazes could not meet.
He was wearing his new orange shirt. He was probably headed to Vešnja or something. The colour of the shirt really stood out from the surroundings and the rest of his clothes. He risked having someone pouring a bucket of water over him. Wrap him up in a blanket. Ring the fire service.
‘Hi,’ he managed to mumble when we passed each other.
It must be Danijela who had nodded to him. I completely ignored him.
When he was behind us, Mateja broke out sniggering:
‘A new fashion!’
All four of us laughed wholeheartedly. My own was dancing a jig.
The moron turned around and mumbled something. But I didn’t care. Revenge was so sweet.
That’s what it takes, I thought. Three girls and a clear indication that you have not slept at home. From now on I was going to score like a madman, stand here and wait for Pero and the other fascists to come past. Those snotty brats, man! They don’t score shit!
The next morning Danijela, Mateja and Isabella set course for Italy. Zlaja and I wandered down to the beach, played shaggy beasts and came into contact with two Czech grungers named Barbora and Tereza. Barbora had bigger breasts than Tereza, but the unpredictable Zlaja graciously left her to me.
‘There’s more to life than a pair of good breasts,’ he rambled on profoundly on the terrace at Adria, where the band still played the same songs, now mostly that one, ‘Oh Carol, I am but a fool. Darling, I love you though you treat me cruel.’
Afterwards he took Tereza with him down to the beach, where she surrendered without much fumbling, while I was not given permission by Barbora to unbutton her torn Levis. She grabbed my wrist discreetly and said, ‘No!’ somewhere between a vague plea and a firm order.
Later she wrote letters in terribly bad English about how it was also baking in Karlovy Vary. About how we should be happy that we live by the sea and could just jump in.
I did not reply to her. Zlaja’s Dutch girls had arrived at Adria, and again he had luck on his side. He repeated his success with Miraja – who incidentally was called Mariah – while Fric, Goi and I drew the short straws.
One of the girlfriends had a guy back home, the second had hers with her on the trip, and the third – according to Gogi – ‘was not capable of winning his heart.’
Cassette 8
HARD TURD MACHINE
WHAT ELSE HAPPENED?
July turned to August. Zlaja and I ruled the beach, Fabio and I ruled Ukulele. The summer had already lived up to expectations, and it continued to surprise me with its generosity. It was not merely an unforgettable summer, it was the summer. I did not think it would come to an end. Everything that ’92 and ’93 had cheated me of, ’94 gave back. Just in another shape and surrounded by other people.
The thieves who stole the tourists’ passports in Adria were never caught. The police did not even sniff around any more.
The war in Bosnia continued tirelessly. The Bosnian muslims, now called Bosniaks, no longer fought against only Serbs and Croats, but also against each other. The businessman Fikret Abdić and his supporters in the Bosanka Krajina region had declared independence and had jumped over to the Serbian side. Agreements were made and rejected on the same day. Radio and TV fed people with fear and indigestible amounts of bad music. I was part of an entirely different film. I idolised Bruce Dickinson’s solo album, which he made after the break with Iron Maiden. Balls to Picasso, it was called. It kicked arse! Pantera: Cowboys from Hell, Vulgar Display of Power. Suicidal Tendencies: The Art of Rebellion. My red cassette player glowed with thrash when Mum and Dad were out.
When I woke up, I immediately thought of Neno. With the same fear as before. Then it struck me: Oh, no, he is in Sweden, all’s well, nothing to be scared of. I hopped out of bed and cast myself into the new day, relieved and grateful that he was in safety.
Then a letter suddenly arrived from Adi.
‘What’s up, Nose-prince? … Are there Chetniks over with you? Punish those you can, man, and those you can’t – Allah will take care of! … One day we will return and make minced meat out of them! … You and I, the great heroes … Do you remember the good old days? … We played Germans and partisans …’
And all in a kind of suspicious tone with a mixture of gravity and irony, nostalgia and hate.
He included his address and telephone number. I considered calling him straight away. Ask him if he was drunk when he wrote that, or had eaten mushrooms over there in Slovenia?
But for some reason or other I did not. I also hesitated in replying to his letter. My mind was swimming for the rest of the day.
Not until that night in Wicky, where Fric came up with a fantastic gem, did I manage to shake Adi’s strange letter off me.
‘What’s up, Fric? How are you doing?’ I asked him when he came in.
‘Like an arse without buttocks,’ he replied.
‘What the hell does that mean?’
‘Exactly! You caught on right away.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Precisely! That’s precisely what I mean. Do you understand?’
Another unforgettable gem, Slavko, the camp’s self-appointed mayor, was responsible for. It was the middle of August, two to three weeks before the last weekend of the holidays. Everything was shit over those days. Literally. The soil pipes trickled and jingled and you could hear grandiose tunes between the thin walls of the toilets.
The white-haired Slavko made a speech on the terrace between D1 and D2, while I sat on the balcony. It was not as long as some of the president’s, but I had neither the strength nor time to hear the end.
He started by reeling off all the sufferings that we – which later became I – had experienced since arriving at the camp, ‘back when pictures of the Serbian generals still hung on the walls.’ He reminded the audience about back when we still had Serbian cooks at the restaurant, and who knows how that could have ended up, had he, Slavko, and some others, not reacted in time.
‘And now this!’ he ended. ‘This! Yes!’
A tin of liver paté hung from the small flap that you pull when you open the lid. He held it between his thumb and index finger, like the flap was the tail of a dead mouse.
Then it came. The theory that, ‘French liver paté like this’ could be to blame for the food poisoning and the collective intestinal draining taking place in the camp. The French were known to be Serbian allies. Mitterrand supported Milošević!
I don’t know if the liver paté really was French, or if it just had something written in French on the tin: Mum had binned the one we had. But it was not the guilty party. Shortly after Slavko’s interminable speech a couple of inspectors from the food hygiene department came by. They conducted an investigation and wrote a report. The liver paté was completely exonerated. Disinfectant had been sprayed in the kitchen the day before the first – and the worst – diarrhoea day. The inspectors took tests and came to the conclusion that the spray, which was for the purpose of exterminating some of the kitchen’s many moths, which had happened to land on an open bag of macaroni.
It was a regrettable mistake. Nobody was fired. The war on moths could continue. Tirelessly and without fear of further victims.
BLOOD AND SOUP
The most sensational event of the summer was Mirko’s dramatic departure from the camp. For a long time afterwards, people shook their head when they talked about Mirko Parasite – the man who briskly strolled around and doggedly claimed that he was disabled, who idolised the president and the pope and always wore a rosary around his thick neck. But then it was too late. The damage was done and blood had been spilled.
Every day after lunch Mirko had the habit of opening the French windows on his balcony on the ground floor of D1. Here he placed various fruits –
apples, pears, oranges and bananas – and tucked into them with undivided delight. The passers-by who presumed to ignore him, were verbally challenged to just try to see Mirko ‘vitaminizing himself.’
Next to his colourful fruit he usually placed a framed photo, which everyone in the camp knew all about. It was a photo taken by a professional photographer from Vešnja, who Mirko had hired and paid for a single, yet unforgettable shot.
In the spring of 1994 the first rumours had been heard that President Doctor Franjo Tudjman was going to pay a brief visit to the city of Vešnja. Tudjman wanted to pass through the city, it was proudly whispered, and on foot even! It gave Mirko the brilliant idea to fore his way through the passionate crowd of people, step in front of ‘the president of all Croats’ and hold out his hands towards him like some kind of supernatural figure. At the same time it had to be done spontaneously and sincerely, as though it was towards his equal, or a member of the family you had not seen in a long time.
At least that was how it looked in the photo: Tudjman also smiling. His right hand was open and outstretched. It was as though he stood and emphasised: this is a hand. In the background stood one of the president’s corpulent body guards, suspiciously dissecting Mirko with his piercing and cool gaze. As Kaća said: the gorilla nearly managed to ruin everything. His presence alone within the frame dragged the photo down a little, from the supernatural to the earthly.
Mirko tormented us for a long time with his unique photo. He walked around with it in his inside pocket and showed it to everyone regardless of sex, age or nationality. When he was no longer both annoying and ridiculous, but just annoying, and when people began to avoid him and his photo, he had it enlarged, framed, and at regular intervals exhibited on his balcony next to his ‘vitamins.’ In that way he raised himself up above the rest of us, who for one thing had never been photographed in the company of the president, and for another, could not afford to improve our vitamin deficient diet.
Ukulele Jam Page 25