Stephanie de Velasco - Tiger Milk

I look over at the other bed. Jameelah is sitting on the edge of the bed in her tank-top smoking. She doesn’t look at me, she’s looking toward the window. Baby-seat-guy throws his legs out of bed and stands up. I gather my clothes as quickly as I can. Jameelah stubs out her cigarette and just as she reaches for her rucksack baby-seat-guy puts his foot on her passport, which must have fallen out when I was rummaging in her bag for a condom.

What’s this, he says picking up the passport with his toes. His nails are yellow like Frau Struck’s but even worse because he’s a guy.

Give it back, says Jameelah grabbing for the passport. As she wrestles for it her residency permit falls out. The guy looks at it calmly.

Your residency permit is about to expire, he says.

I’m aware, says Jameelah, grabbing the permit and stuffing it together with her passport into her rucksack.

Did you know Jameelah means beauty in Arabic, says baby-seat-guy. When she doesn’t answer he laughs loudly and says, why didn’t you say anything, we could have done it in the ass and you’d still be a virgin when you get married.

I look him up and down.

What the hell are you looking at, he says.

His cock is dangling between his hairy thighs, long and thin and red like a sick worm, so ugly I have to look away. Still laughing he disappears into the bathroom.

Jameelah quickly puts on the rest of her clothes and crouches down on the carpet in front of the black bag. Inside, baby-seat-guy’s wallet has at least five hundred euros in it. I turn and look over at wheelchair guy. He’s still asleep.

It’s cheap, I whisper.

From the bathroom comes that noise that only men make, hacking up yellow mucus and spitting it in the sink, hacking up from deep inside, again and again like an Olympic sport. As I get dressed Jameelah shoves the money into her Chucks. Then we rummage around in the bag some more.

Look, I whisper grabbing a bottle of Tabac cologne, Amir loves this stuff.

The nearly full bottle finds its way into my rucksack.

Jameelah smiles and shoves a pack of gum, an expensive organic lip balm and a nail grooming kit into her rucksack.

What a little girl, she says, come on let’s get out of here.

Did it make you bleed asks Jameelah when we’re back out on Nollendorfplatz.

No, I say, you?

No, me neither, there was just a weird feeling between my legs.

Me too. Like a muscle ache.

Now what?

No idea, just not home.

Planet?

Planet.

We get a currywurst on the corner and then we get the train to Wilmersdorfer Strasse. Apollo and Aslagon are sitting at the planet and Aslagon is cleaning his fingernails with a toothpick.

Here, says Jameelah pulling out the nail grooming kit, it’s a gift from me.

Is it made out of silver, asks Aslagon suspiciously.

No, I don’t think so.

Then no thanks.

Why not?

I’m only allowed to accept gifts of silver. All other metals let evil in.

Bullshit, says Jameelah, there’s no way that nail clipper you had the other day was made of silver.

Do you see a nail clipper anywhere around here, asks Aslagon holding up his toothpick.

We sit down at the planet and stare at the dry cement basin. I’m itchy all over, I hope the guy in the wheelchair didn’t have some kind of disease, I think. Apollo and Aslagon start whispering to each other.

Lies are told in whispers, I say.

We’re not lying, says Apollo.

No, says Aslagon, we’re not telling lies, we’re talking about you guys, about your wings.

What about them, says Jameelah.

They’re gone, says Apollo, where did your wings go?

We sold them at the flea market.

Then you’re no longer wing-children, just so you know.

I think we can live with that.

Somebody came by looking for you by the way, says Aslagon looking at me.

Who?

The big guy who always has pot in his bag, says Apollo with his gravedigger’s grin, he wrote something on the phone booth.

I hop up and go have a look.

Nini call me right away, Nico it says and next to it is today’s date.

Come on I have to buy minutes for my phone.

Wait a second, says Jameelah, we have to take care of something first.

What?

The jewellery she whispers.

Oh yeah, I say, that’s right.

We walk over toward the S-bahn together. Right where the road goes under the tracks is a bin.

Anybody looking, asks Jameelah.

No, I say, take it easy.

We rummage around for Jasna’s jewellery among the lip balm, condoms, tampons, and pens.

One piece after the next goes into the bin. Then Jameelah’s eyes light on my hand and she stares angrily at the ring.

Are you completely fucking crazy, she says grabbing at my finger.

What, I say, I’ve had it on the whole time.

Are you planning to keep it?

Of course, it’s mine after all, or my mother’s I mean.

You have completely lost your chador.

What do you mean, I say but Jameelah starts trying to rip it off my finger.

Leave it alone, I say, I want to keep it.

Bullshit, give it to me.

It won’t come off anyway, it’s too tight. You can only get it off with soap and water.

Jameelah raises her eyebrows and looks at me for a while then she grabs my wrist faster than a crocodile and shoves my finger in her mouth.

I scream.

Jameelah starts sucking like mad on my finger.

Let go, I say but Jameelah just keeps sucking.

I feel her tongue swirling around my finger and her sucking and sucking and then I feel the ring working its way off my finger. Like a piece of bone she’s just choked on she spits the ring onto the street.

You can’t do that, I shout.

Yes I can, you saw for yourself, she says picking up the ring and tossing it into the bin.

I stare at her stunned.

That’s my mother’s ring!

No it isn’t and even if it is, says Jameelah, it was on Jasna’s finger and if somebody sees you with it you’ll either be dead or under arrest for murder. I’m protecting you, try looking at it that way.

I lean over the bin and stick my arm in as deep as I can just as Nico comes speeding up on his BMX bike.

Why aren’t you answering your phone, he says screeching to a halt, I tried calling you a thousand times. What are you doing anyway? Have you joined the ranks of the deposit bottle collectors?

Haha, I say straightening myself, what’s up?

What’s up? Jasna is dead.

We know, says Jameelah.

Nico stares at us, first at Jameelah and then at me. He looks really angry and Nico hardly ever gets angry.

Aha, he says, and did you know that the cops have arrested Amir?

What?

Nico looks at me chidingly.

Are you drunk, he asks me but Jameelah grabs him by the arm and shakes him.

Tell us everything, start from the beginning!

Like I said I tried to call you and then I went over to your place and rang the bell but nobody answered, says Nico. So then I went to Amir’s and there were cops and television crews everywhere and the old lady on the ground floor told me everything, that Jasna was dead and that they took Amir in.

Frau Stanitzek is always running her mouth, says Jameelah.

No, says Nico, everyone said the same thing, and also that Amir had confessed.

What do you mean confessed?

What do you think, he said he did it.

All of a sudden I feel like I’m going to be sick. Amir. I see his face before my eyes. Jameelah wasn’t even there yet when he stood on the playground and looked over at me and we touched hands inside the tunnel we’d dug in the sandbox, I see his fingers, the ones he played marbles with, and how when Santa Claus came to our school Amir told him Allah is great, much greater than Jesus, his nimble legs and the way he scurried up the linden tree, the way he sat up in the tree shouting Allah is great but I’m Leonardo DiCaprio and I’m the king of the world.