City, Sister, Silver, page 62
The capitalists advanced. What they sewed went to the kiosks, where the other tribe members took over … they even set up a nursery and something like a school, I noticed Vojtěch was in charge there, and I glowed pretty bright … no no no, he stomped the sand, not baroon! he told a slant-eyed boy, balloon, but have i’ you’ way … the lessons bore fruit, we’d go for walks on the lawn, once we’d cleaned it up … the rest of the street was nearly deserted, a fire or two in the ruins at night, but Lao had taught me … safety first … I noticed two or three husbands or cousins were in the sewing room at all times, and they may’ve looked condescending and lordly … but they were looking out.
I lugged some books over from Černá’s place and settled into a flat on the second floor … me and Lao were together only occasionally, but more and more often. And if anyone honorable feverishly opposed it … I could only gently point out how extremely fortunate it is when all the cruelty that’s been, is, an always will be isn’t so visible cause you’re with someone you hold, an your palm’s just right to cover their heart, worn paper-thin with anxieties … to shield it from the barb of solitude that drives you mad, pounding, an you hold that someone so tight that you also cover yourself. Lao. Peeking across the bed at each other in our unwritten agreement. We got close.
And then one day the little boy said: I’m tired! I’m … so tired! He was startled to see my eyes bug, I interrupted our ball game, it reminded me … he watched me run off … I flew through the buildings in horror … but Granny Macešková wasn’t there. Not a trace. Not a trace of anything … that might remain of her. Even walked across the concrete in the cellar, examined the surface … maybe here. Maybe she’s here somewhere.
I combed through the buildings, checked around the flats, the remains, there weren’t any tenants left and Lao had hinted one of her friends would like to move in with her family … it was strange, sometimes she treated me as though it were still the old times and I was one of the owners, I guess it suited her, she was settling into our contract on her own terms.
And mornings, every morning on the days commonly considered working, I flew out the door to the tram to see Kasel, who’d tell me how he’d sent out grant applications, better look aroun for someone, I’ll be packin it in soon … he’d say confidently … headin out to an Art Colony, hey … an when I get there I’m gonna write about how we worked our balls off here, you’ll see … yeah, definitely, it’ll be a bestseller, I can’t wait, Kasim … and we’d flip the lardlings and chop up the rest, and the third possibility we’d fling into the sizzling fat, by now we were a pretty fine-tuned duo.
And now and then … I’d poke around the studios, since that was where the trail left off. And also go to the Press Center, putting together that short Bohler story …
Out at the Rock, you see … in the surrounding woods and villages, back in our times, there still lived Gobs.
Bohler had always maintained friendly contact with the creatures, and he didn’t have to twist our arms either … some of the Gobs were a lot of fun … it doesn’t make one bit a difference if folks out here say Gobs aren’t people, it’s no one’s business anyway … they’re here! Bohler thundered.
He would go on religious and reconnaissance missions among the Gobs, they let him instruct their young ones, after a brief moment of hesitation and self-searching he even baptized them, to be on the safe side, as he put it … it’s the one thing that can’t be neglected, he claimed … and the Gobs, when Bohler preached to them, may’ve wagged their furry heads, but they admitted: Yeah, could be somethin to it, leave the seedling in our hearts a while, we’ll play around with it, see what it does, we got the Black Daliah, you know …
Shy creatures, those Gobs … right at the onset of the Sewer period, the Communists smashed their wagons, adopting Gestapo-style edicts against “vagrant lifestyles” and “the Gob public nuisance,” by the end of the Third Reich there weren’t a lotta Gobs left either, whole tribes had disappeared, it was just like with the Gypsies … what was left of them the authorities ordered into the factories … well, the Gobs didn’t sweat it out there long, that sort of movement was foreign to them, they lived in a different time than mere machines … so to keep the Gobs from pickpocketing, the state instead gave them cash, stolen from somewhere else, and that’s what did them in, they spent most of it on the Fiery … and then, when time exploded, the Gobs no longer knew the old way of doing things and didn’t get the new one at all … some lived pretty miserably, stealing … picking pockets … the losses weren’t that heavy, but for the Karlovice town councillors it was enough … infertility, retardation, forty years of the Sewer, black comets, escaped convicts, floods, every scar the township ever suffered they threw at the Gobs, trashed a few of their hideouts … Bohler spoke out against it … and in the Karlovice Courier I found: “This decadent, un-Czech figure canvases his neighbors dressed in a faded cassock. Point your finger at him! He is a heretic, a Pragocentrist, and is urging Gobs to commit attacks. Again yesterday, two people were assaulted by individuals of Gob origin …” etc.
The citizens of Karlovice formed the Society of the White Hood for the Defense of the Purity of the Noble Czech Nation, and it began … some Gobs fought back, but it was the old ethnographic imbalance … the townspeople went out on raiding sprees, strong men with sticks and knives … and the stupid Gobs sat in their hovels scared out of their wits, old folks, children, all together … and then some Gobs said, not anymore, and also took things into their hands … at this point the accounts in the Karlovice Courier get pretty confused … Bohler and several others had begun digging tunnels so the Gobs could flee the township, but demonstrations against them began outside it too … and the Gobs had no country of their own they could flee to, they’d been born here after all … Lao couldn’t understand … the people encircled the Rock just as Bohler and the Gobs and the rest were crawling into the barn, and when the people sicced the dogs on the Gobs, they fought back, as did the others, the theologian skewered an attacker on a pitchfork … I remembered his perverted old smile and that olovrant of his … Evil must be countered with violence, immediate an brutal, remember, colleagues … the priest of the tribe had preached to us … they drowned the Gobs outside of town, cause Gobs donno how to swim, and Bohler went down with em …
Lao?
Mm-hm.
So … someone’ll hafta go out there, I said, jotting notes in my notebook … it’s too late, she told me, and she was right.
Meanwhile … we’d been torn apart … David, now Bohler … Sharky’s off fighting a war, and Micka’s around here somewhere, I felt a pang of nostalgia and said so … and Lao got up and brought me a byznys card, said she’d found it a while back but didn’t know how to read and forgot … I leapt up: Mr. Micka Co. Crystal s.r.o., of course it was a riddle, there hadda be some catch, but at least it gave an address: Golden Cross, Skyscraper 33 … Lao tossed me my clothes and I dressed on the fly, it was late, but knowin him he’d be grindin away … you wan’ snack, she asked with concern … all those memories and she was worried about this old schemer …
Many remarkable buildings had sprung up at Golden Cross, actually not that many, but their shiny glass walls gave the pedestrian, squeezed suddenly beneath a lower horizon, an impression of abundance that greatly amplified any feelings of inferiority … just to be safe, all over the place were submachine gunners and doormen decked out as rear admirals … and I ran aground. It was unbelievable, I mean I was practiced in hallways, walls, holes, trapdoors, me and Micka had learned together, jump, scramble, crawl, fly, smash, go! But here it was a no-go. Not a single garage or barred window or service entrance, and the skyscraper’s walls were smooth … then again it was only logical. This eminent figure had the same schooling as me, he knew how to build a barricade … I didn’t even get to the secretaries.
I made a sport out of it, going over every day in a different getup, mustaches, beards. Lao and Vojtěch kept their fingers crossed, sometimes I took them along … me and the rear admirals and submachine gunners were soon on a first-name basis, swapping remarks about our mothers, amatory abilities, appearance, attire, etc., it was quite entertaining.
I spent plenty of time with Kasim though … he was brooding and distraught, the Art Shacks were all he talked about … old Burda started roaming around again, wearing an odd smile … the literati didn’t come anymore, now they knew about Kasim, and they’d socked it to him in the press pretty good, he’d turned rather bitter, mumbling: Get outta here, dude, here everyone knows ya right away, place is a fishpond, I filled out the application, enclosed translations, bibliography, photo, c’mon, let’s go to a pub, but someplace we won’t run into any writing fucks … that’ll be pretty tough, I replied … he got furious.
I’d disappear straight from the stand to the studios and run around there and … I had a plan now, I’d found a few people I knew that still remembered me from the old times, when I used to recite other people’s monologues, till I got the bug and started in with this thing … remembered me as an actor … earnestly I sought a role, I wanted to leave a trail for Černá, not in a field or the sand anymore, and not on a lake either, uh-uh, not some bent blade of grass, or a notch, or stones, no … now I knew where I had to leave a trail so she’d know that I still was. In this world.
About sixty of us stood there, naked, in a damp cellar, nothin to eat or drink for hours, till the director had time … then he walked in with his entourage, we all fell silent, he pointed his switch … Beda, you know what I need an what for, move it, Jesus, look at those figures … move it, Beda, take him into synch, profiles an straights, let’s get this outta the way an we can all go get laid … Beda pointed to me, I was thrilled. All around me I could sense the daggered looks.
Yes, only I could play Fly Man, it was an ad for Bohemia Halucia Milk of Milks … disguised in fly garb and a fly mask, I flapped my wings around in a huge cup of bad old milk while next to it a gorgeous young lady sipped the one and only proper milk, the totally new Bohemia Halucia Milk of Milks … it gave off these vapors that killed flies in flight, and they plummeted to all sides of the glass at a safe distance from human lips … a prominent Czech composer wrote the music, it was a zinger … I flapped around in there, and in an unguarded moment I made a typical move, a rap of the knuckles, you know it well, my dear … raised a shoulder, you’ve leaned on it, little sister, surely that you’ll recognize too … I hit the jackpot. After that they wanted me everywhere. I also played a fuzzball in the Dust Sucker ad, but you couldn’t really see me.
And then I went back to Crystal and tried to get inside again.
But carpenters didn’t work on this place, there wasn’t a single opening … it was an enormous structure, reaching toward the clouds … maybe touching them … astronauts musta built this tower, Gaudí’d be floored … I thought up some new tricks. Wait’ll the rear admirals see me on TV, that’ll make em button their lips. Cut em down to size.
And then one day old Burda walked up to the stand: Say, boys, you eat that stuff you sell? We laughed wholeheartedly. Good, cause as of next week City Hall’s declarin that shit illegal … Finally! said Kasel … I’m glad, boys, that you’re takin it like that, see I’m gonna build … Křepek an me been savin up to buy us a little Mack Donald’s, already signed an everything … an I got some great outfits for ya, fit cha like a glove … laughing our heads off, me and Kasim began dousing each other with beer, we stank like hell anyway and at least the beer attracted wasps so you had to be alert, didn’t get too sluggish … Burda stared … this is no joke, they’ll give ya an allowance for clothes an shaves, plus a uniform, red on top, green below, copacetic slippers to boot, an you can work your way up … so ya really don’t want it, huh? spoiled brats … in the end Burda got drunk with us, we closed up shop, leaving the dead meat to its natural course … let’s torch the place, Kasim suggested, but Burda wouldn’t allow it … his good mood didn’t last long, old fogies, sometimes when they get a drink in em: Go ahead an leave, boys, see if I care, pissed me off anyways … but me an this park, we remember the Kaiser, an there’s always been squirrels here, an what’ll happen to them now … this is all gonna be an amusement park … ah, they’ll survive somehow, an if they don’t, no big deal, I wrote a poem about em, Kasim consoled him, we turned gloomy anyway though …
Then we told Burda goodbye, he’d seemed somewhat suspect to me anyway since that incident with the spider, we stole what cash there was and staggered off … we hit every place we could think of, and then, at Galactic … I was entertaining Kasim with stories from my shoots … and suddenly on TV … a perfect ad, kick-ass … Soapy Happysoap, hey, that’s me too … in the washing machine, donno if Sister’11 be able to tell … listen, said Kasim seriously, this is unadulterated commercialism, what’ll the city underground say … it doesn’t matter, Kasim … you gotta spread yourself around if you ever want her to find you … and the Grainy glows even in the circular corrals of the O jib ways, in icy igloos, even if Sister’s plodding through the desert it’ll catch up to her at the first oasis, she’ll know it’s me, even if she’s hiding her beautiful face beneath a black veil among Muslims, the Grainy’ll chase her down even in an old log cabin in Sázava, get it, even among the bronzed, happy youth on Mykonos, Ios, Sumatra, I’ll come on screen, and my sister, out there in the islands, will see that I’m waiting faithfully for her … an not washin much, to discourage the others … just then a girl with braids the color of fire pulled up a seat at our table … we’d been eyeing each other a while now, that was one of the reasons I’d been braggin about my film work … Titiana swept her hair back from her forehead and laid her hand on my shoulder in an unmistakable way … why’re you shoutin, what’s all the shoutin for, c’mon, the News is on, an you there watch, watch closely, she told me … Kasim was asleep … and Titiana added: So, my place, or yours, or nothin?
I was about to choose from the options when I heard vzhhhh Headline News vzhhhh, and on the Grainy I saw: a fella with a mike … standin in the Dump, on a purple heap, couple people behind him, dazzling jackets, but Dump faces, drifters … and the guy said into the camera … garbage monster … killing … bloodshed … tellin how they’d finally made it in and how a couple TV crews had gone down fake trails and were never heard from again … briefly they showed what was left of Vulture’s pack … Titiana dug her nails into my shoulder … the man on TV said the police were in pursuit of the deviant killer, they showed the food pits veiled with flies, even found a skeleton in there … I should hope so, I said … a woman’s skeleton, the reporter announced, pointing to it … he said Bohemian supermarkets were in the process of building an oven system to burn expired food products and leftovers, and that technology subsidies were needed, on that the newsman agreed with the chairman of the Food Product Trust … once this food ceases to exist, so will these people, the chairman said, and they flashed a picture of a kid that looked like Stick … the doozy and reassuring thing was that the police were hot on the killer’s trail … that made me burst out laughing … you’re jolly, said Titiana, but still, you’re all pale … an didn’t you used to wear your hair long, she inquired mournfully … yeah … well, next to them, darlin, you’d look pale as an angel … know that one?
That gave me a little chill, yeah, I know it, I said … an who’re you?
Guesser guesser guess away, said Titiana, parting her ruby-red lips to reveal her dainty teeth … so which option will it be? she asked … here you are, fella, sittin here with everyone else like it’s nothin, like nothin’s goin on at all … scuse me, I said, and I entered the restroom, opened the window, yanked out the screen, and crawled out, hauling myself up on the wall … she stood in the street looking me in the eye … I locked myself in a stall … chattering my teeth. I saw white.
And then … I think I didn’t have a body, I was inside a barracks, wood, fences and stakes, bunks, and on them people. Some in rags. Through the windows, which were bare, I saw the sky, medieval clouds, driven by the wind, apart from that no other movement.
Halflight. Opposite me a figure cloaked in black. I saw a field, I was looking through barbwire. Aright, I mumbled to myself with the tongue that remained to me, aright, me too. I was starting to see … I saw faces around me, if I’d had a body I would’ve frozen, opposite me was Viška … my enemy, I thought, and I heard: She wanted it, it’s obvious … that look, hey, I don’t make mistakes, I’m a man … I heard coming from Viška, sitting there, gaze fixed … somewhere else, maybe inward, I’m hearin his thoughts, it hit me … the little slut, I mean the way she looked at me, there’s no way … yeah, yeah, she was grateful to me for gettin her outta there, maybe I should Ve held off … but that time in the cellar, she offered herself, I could tell … she seduced me, I can’t be wrong … and I loved her, I did … pulled her panties down herself, wouldn’t’ve done that if she was afraid … but maybe I shoulda been firm … and then, then I couldn’t hold back anymore. But I shouldn’t’ve beat her. She told on me. And later … she was all grown up, but she still belonged to me … she couldna been serious about that chump, that hooligan … I gave her a choice, I loved her. And what I turned into, she did that. It was like I was obsessed. But I don’t regret a thing.
This came out of Viška at me, a constantly altering stream … but I don’t believe a word, the goon … he’s deceived himself, the truth’s gotta be different … hers.
And then I heard: Back then, when we crossed the water. Yeah, Morales told me how it goes. That time by the fire … and I saw Vohřecký, and it came from him too, a stream of speech … I felt good there, standin guard by the fire at night, how many times did I wish it could last forever … everyone else asleep an me keepin watch with my weapon, the only one awake … that’s life, that means somethin … came out of Vohřecký … that was where I realized what I wanted to do an who I wanted to be, an one day Morales came, an that was an honor … he was somebody, an he says to me: Hey, amigo, you know how it goes on the Congo? Took a cigarette from me and lit it off a twig, cupped it in his hand, we kept to the side, off in the shadows, cause a the freedom fighters … but he was there with me, an he says: Scorpion’s sittin on the bank of the Congo, river’s flooded, bridges’re all swept away, an he says to the hippopotamus, hey, pal, I gotta get to the other side, there’s this chick I got over there … how bout a lift? But the hippopotamus knew him … not you, lovebug … you’re poisonous, you’ll sting me, you’re wicked … c’mon, that’s nuts, the scorpion says, if I sting you I drown too, right? It’s only logical … so the hippo thinks it over a minute, gives the nod, the scorpion climbs on his back, an the hippo goes swimmin off into the muddy waters … he’s swimmin along, the scorpion starts laughin … an when they get to the middle … the scorpion stings him with all his might, fucks him fulla poison … are you insane, says the hippo, I mean you promised … sorry, pal, the scorpion says … but that’s how it goes on the Congo.
