You (18 page)

“How did it go yesterday?” asks Uncle Runa without looking up.

“Same as always,” you reply, and think of the Vespa. If your uncle finds out that it has disappeared, you’ll just have to act the innocent and you’ll get away with it. Uncle Runa gets away with spending every other night at your place, after all. Your mother says he hasn’t got anybody else to have breakfast with. The loneliest people in the world are the lousiest liars.

You pour yourself a cup. The coffee tastes burnt. You add some condensed milk, the toast jumps from the toaster, you put it on your plate and spread it with butter. Uncle Runa snorts, clears his throat, and goes on reading. You look out of the window and suppress a yawn. That’s your life, and there’s nothing in it to suggest that you’ll soon be a martyr.

What a boring day. You keep an eye out for the girl at school, but there’s no sign of her. In the afternoon you meet your crowd. Darian doesn’t mention last night’s fiasco. His lower lip is much better, and the cut over his eye has scabbed over. He tells the guys one of the weights came off and nearly took off his head. The guys believe everything, but that isn’t much use to you, because Darian keeps you at a distance. You fucked up yesterday, and he’s making you pay for it. After school he asks why you didn’t call him back this morning, and it’s only then that you realize your phone is gone.

“Get yourself a new one,” says Darian. “Only tramps don’t have phones.”

He wants to play billiards, so you go and play billiards. The day slips away, Darian disappears at nine with Marco and Gerd, they want to trudge around the clubs; even though Wednesday’s a lame day, it’s better than just hanging around doing nothing. Their lives are parting company with your life here, like an Autobahn from a minor road. You head off to work at the pizza stand, agitated and nervous and, for the first time, curious about your night behind the counter.

“Well, on time for once,” Uncle Runa greets you.

You take off your jacket and put on the ridiculous apron with the grinning cook on it. Uncle Runa leans against the stack of beer
crates and shoos the mosquitoes away with his breath. Since summer began he’s been smoking cigarillos, and the stench always reminds you of used diapers that have been left too long in the sun. Your uncle hasn’t the faintest idea that the Vespa behind him isn’t a Vespa. The bike was parked outside the station, so rusty that the lock fell off the first time you kicked it. No one will miss it. You covered it with the tarpaulin. It looks like the Vespa, just a bit slimmer.

After an hour Uncle Runa leaves you alone at last. The waiting begins. She will come, you know that, she will come and give you the Vespa back and you will find out her name.

You believe that until three o’clock.

The next morning Uncle Runa is sitting at the breakfast table in your flat again, reading the same edition of
Ekipa
.

“How did it go yesterday?”

“Same as always.”

You pour yourself a cup. The coffee tastes burnt. You add some condensed milk and spread butter on your toast. It’s half past nine, you have two free periods first thing and you’re in no hurry. Uncle Runa holds his cup out to you, you top it up, he snorts and goes on reading. Every day is like every other day if you don’t catch sight of the girl of your dreams. You look out the window and wish you knew her name.

Ten minutes later you’re spitting foam into the basin and wondering why toothpaste has to foam quite so much, when your mother hammers against the wall.

“What is it this time?!” you yell.

She’s sitting in the living room, cigarette in her hand, feet on the footstool. Between her toes there are wads of pale blue cotton wool, the freshly applied nail polish gleams damply. The smell makes you feel nauseous, this mixture of chemistry and cigarette smoke in the morning is too much for you. There are already six cigarette butts in the ashtray, but you keep your mouth shut and say nothing about it. Your mother hands you the telephone as if it were a pair of dirty underpants that she found under your bed. She hates it when your
friends call on the landline. You should use your cell phone, the line has to stay free. Since your father ran off with another woman, your mother has been waiting for him to call every day. She doesn’t want to hear how he is or what he’s doing. She just wants to yell at him. Or as she once told you:
I want to tell the swine what I think of him, then I can die in peace
.

“Yes?” you say into the receiver.

“Why didn’t you jump on the back?”

You know right away that it’s her. You turn away from your mother and go into your room. Your heart is racing and you wonder where she got the number. Your mother calls out that you’re going to be late for school.
Yeah, fuck you very much
, you think, shut the bedroom door behind you, and press the receiver harder against your ear.

“Can’t you talk, or what?”

“I … I can talk. But that Vespa you swiped isn’t mine. It belongs to my uncle.”

“Oh, poor uncle.”

“But—”

“Don’t shit your pants, you’ll get the thing back, okay?”

“Okay.”

“If you help me.”

“What?”

“We have a problem here. My girls and me. We need some medicine. I mean, I can’t really go into a pharmacy and just ask for prescription drugs, can I? And you, well, you know your way around.”

Her words echo in your ears.

You know your way around
.

She must know that you’re friends with Darian.

Damn
.

“Where did you get my number?”

“Guess.”

She’s confusing you, she’s making you nervous, you want to laugh out loud, you want to tell her that you spent minute after minute last night waiting for her at the pizza stand and that you forgive her everything. Just keep your mouth shut.

“The number’s stored on your phone under Mom. And you look like somebody who lives with his mom …”

She says nothing more, you can figure out the rest. Now she hasn’t just got your uncle’s Vespa, she’s got your cell phone as well. And she’s insulted you.

So what?

“And the Vespa isn’t stolen,” she adds, “it’s borrowed. You’ll get your phone back too.”

“When?” you say far too quickly.

You hear a honk and walk to the window. Another honk. You look down at the street. She’s sitting on the Vespa, grinning, her long hair in a ponytail, a pair of those sunglasses with outsized lenses on her nose, so that her face practically disappears behind them. She reminds you of a Mafia bride from one of those ’70s movies. She looks up at you, she talks into your cell phone.

“Surprised?” you hear her saying into your ear, and then she makes the engine rattle and you burst out laughing and can’t stop. Perhaps it’s hysteria. Perhaps you’re just happy. You’d like to shout down that she’s mad, that she’s really and totally mad, when you hear someone roaring.

“HEY, YOU CUNT, WHAT ARE YOU DOING ON MY VESPA?”

You look to the right. Uncle Runa is leaning out of the kitchen window. His face is bright red, he’s shaking a fist.

“GET OFF RIGHT NOW OR I’LL KILL YOU!”

The girl does what anyone would do, Mafia bride or not. She puts her foot down and rattles away comfortably. Her red ponytail is a banner waving behind her.

You can forget about school for now, and you should ignore your uncle’s outburst as well.

“Did you see that? Was that my Vespa, or what?”

“Bullshit.”

“Mirko, what do you mean by bullshit? I’d recognize my Dragica anywhere. How the hell did that bitch get her hands on my Vespa?”

“Uncle Runa, that wasn’t your Vespa,” you reassure him and murmur that you have to get to school now. You grab your backpack and run from the apartment before he can ask you any more questions. You expect to see the girl in the street. The street is
deserted. Two kids come toward you, kicking a cardboard cup back and forth.

“Have you seen a girl on a Vespa?”

“Hey, I’m still asleep,” says one of the boys and dodges you, while the other one dribbles around you as if you were a lamppost. You walk around the block. She needs your help, she called you, she won’t just disappear.

Please, not again
.

You spit. Since she mentioned Darian, there’s been an unpleasant taste in your mouth. Bitter as envy, salty as regret. Your friend’s not happy with you. Why did this have to happen right now? Why not two days ago? You were still thick as thieves then, and there was no coward who had crept under a car.

Two corners further on she’s sitting on the Vespa at the side of the street.

“I knew you’d come,” she says and hands you your cell phone. “And the Vespa?”

“Will you help me?”

“I’ll help you, but I need the Vespa back.”

She gets off, puts the Vespa on its kickstand, and hands you the key and a piece of paper.

“This is the list.”

You unfold the paper.

Oxazepam. Tilidine. Naloxone. Nemexin. Clomethiazole.

“Wow, what’s the plan, are you opening a pharmacy or something?”

She doesn’t smile. She puts her sunglasses up on her forehead, the skin under her left eye is swollen.

“Who did that?”

“Not the issue.”

“Did someone hit you?”

“Calm down, it was an accident.”

She flicks the paper in your hand.

“Can you get me some of this stuff?”

You look at the list again. You don’t know what kind of drugs they are and how you would get hold of them, but you keep that
to yourself. She could ask you for uranium and you’d find some for her.

“I’m sure I can get some of it,” you assure her, and look at her almost pleadingly. “Is that all?”

She smiles suddenly, it’s a sad smile. She says that’s all, and to your ears it sounds almost as if she’s sorry not to want anything more from you. Wishful thinking, Mirko, just wishful thinking.

“When can I collect the stuff?”

“Tonight?”

“Is that a question?”

“A suggestion.”

“Tonight, then.”

“Seven?”

“Seven’s fine. You can take me out for ice cream.”

“Ice cream?”

She points at your phone.

“My number’s stored in it, call me if you know where there’s good ice cream.”

With those words she puts her sunglasses back on her nose, straightens the bag over her shoulder, and walks past you.
Tonight at seven
, you think and watch after her until she’s disappeared around the corner, and only then do you think about what she said last. You nervously look through the contacts on your phone. The name leaps out at you: Stink.

What? What the hell sort of name is Stink?

She answers after the second ring.

“Did you forget something?”

She doesn’t ask who’s calling, she knows it must be you.

“The ice cream parlor on Krumme Strasse,” you say.

“Fine, I’ll be there.”

“Are you really called Stink?”

“Are you really called Mirko?”

“But why Stink?”

“Because I smell so good.”

You don’t know what she smells like. You wish she were standing in front of you so you could bury your nose in the crook of her neck.

“Anything else?”

“Who are the drugs for?”

She is silent, you hear her breathing, the silence stretches out.

“For my friend, she’s not in great shape and we’re worried she’s going to die,” she says at last and cuts you off.

You stand at the side of the street and are incredibly pleased with yourself.
Stink
. You kiss your phone, you really kiss your phone. That girl has such a hold over you that you nearly disappear. You don’t mind disappearing. You’d do anything for her, you wouldn’t even mind becoming nothing at all. See, that’s how it goes. A martyr is born.

As if from nowhere a hand rests on your forehead and cools you down. As if from nowhere you hear words, and the words are meant only for you.

“Taja, hey, Taja, can you hear me?”

As if out of nowhere you float up and are set down gently as if you were a breathing, quivering soap bubble that would burst immediately if touched too hard. You feel a glass being put to your lips, you drink and cough. There’s the hand again, reassuring. There’s breathing by your ear.

“Taja, wake up.”

I am awake
, you want to answer, but you know it’s a lie. Being awake means being there, it means being in reality. Reality is a whore who hates you because you’ve pissed her off.
I don’t exist anymore
, you want to say, but your mouth’s on strike, your whole head is …

“Hey, not so hard.”

“That’s not hard.”

“If I slapped your face as hard as that you’d burst into tears.”

“Schnappi, shut up.”

“Just saying.”

You open your eyes, your friends give a start.

They’re real
, you think,
they’re really there, they—

“Hi, sweetie,” says Nessi.

“What’s up with her eyes?” Ruth asks, as if you couldn’t hear her. You want to raise your hand and rub your eyes.
What about my eyes?
You can’t move.

“Stay calm, now.”

Stink puts a hand on your chest as if she has to keep you calm. You want to tell her you are calm, but your teeth click together, your body is all quiver and shake. You tip over sideways and Schnappi already has a bucket ready. You throw up and throw up, and when it’s over, when you feel at last that it’s finally over, there’s a rumble in your gut and you shit yourself helplessly.