Jáchym Topol - City, Sister, Silver

Hey, boss, said the blond, sorry, we were just in the middle of a gig … an she knows, we got a contract with her. So you have a contract … with my sister, I raised my voice. Yeah, I swear, the blond one yelped in falsetto. I just came by to check it out, I said … I’m goin now. And I went. Didn’t bother with any goodbyes.

My mind raced, what could Černá have … with juvies, maybe from the bar … drugs or whatever, gambling … gladiators, no way. I walked past the odd tile, now the rays clung more weakly to it, the sun had shifted … and I pulled up suddenly, hearing … Černá! … and she was saying: Hurry, go on. He’ll be back any second, dammit, scram.

She was … whispering, I broke into a run … the guy went down the stairs, disappeared, Černá caught hold of me, and when I saw her smile I hit her, her eyes bulged in disbelief, she sank to the ground but still held on, hugging my knees, I tried to shake her off, but she held tight … No! No, you can’t … not yet! You bitch, but I couldn’t slug her again, I’d just lost my head, I picked her up, heard that sound … Černá, I’m sorry, that wasn’t me … with all my might I gripped her shoulders, spun her round, but she wasn’t sobbin, she was laughin … in my face.

I walked into the flat and started packin … tossin around my things … she planted herself in the doorway and said … Don’t do it, it’s not worth it. Who was that? Hey … my business. Yeah, I don’t even care … but how come you wouldn’t let me … It’s old stuff, real old stuff. We’ve got time. Černá, I don’t trust you. And I love you.

She knew what that would do to me. Actually I didn’t get why she wanted me. Bed … I wasn’t that conceited … the only possibility was that she wasn’t lying, that she … really likes me, maybe. Or she doesn’t know if she does, but she wants to. Or else there’s somethin here I don’t know about … okay, I’ll wait. I stayed. Gladly. And didn’t ask questions.

Again that night we sat over the chessboard examining possibilities, moving pieces. The mirrors were set up on opposite walls, you could look and see from one into the other, and there was another infinity, casual and matter-of-fact, like stringy meat on a cutting board.

Sometimes I’d like hunch myself down over the board and the drinks and succeed in getting the solemn, often passionate face of my love in the picture, sinking and reemerging in the shiny surfaces, farther and farther away, and then here.

Sometimes I had to touch her, sometimes she purred and liked it. Now I gotta hold you, she said, and she did, and now I gotta kiss you, she quick slid under the table and touched it, sometimes she got me so excited, touching her lips to it through the fabric, dancing over it with her tongue, I had to grab her neck … unbuckle myself … a couple times we had to go down the hallway to the restrooms, the walls there were strewn with classics … I’d study the obscenities, or better yet close my eyes, standing up, holding her on top of me, behind the curtain, her hitched around my hips, my arms underneath like bars, like branches … the penguins suspected but left us alone … Černá drank more in a night than all the random walk-ins … see, this coffeehouse didn’t have any TV or video shit or pseudogames, it didn’t even get the daily papers … there was nothing there but mirrors … and a permanently shut Stein piano … ladies with cakes around us, some we started exchanging nods with … some of the old ladies used to be actresses and talked about it … constantly … their only audience here was the cakes and the eggnog, the mirrors, it was a relatively high-society slice of old Prague … I was wary … I didn’t want any more contact … and many no doubt were well aware what Černá was doing under the table, that she wasn’t tying her shoelace, we got accustomed to one another … all guests at the same place, and one time I got up the nerve, we ordered a bottle of cognac for them and JD for us, they twittered, but then we got drunk … I didn’t recognize Černá, she was attentive and polite, I didn’t know the girl knew how to talk to old ladies. I know … when they get together, to chat … sit a young woman down with them, one like Černá, and it can get sadistic, because sometimes, and especially at night, and in these kinds of cafés, the night opens farther, right through the heart … it goes into the grate, into the shit.

Outside, I babbled, a touch sentimental and blinking back tears, she shoved me away and said: Moron! They’re dead! They’re already goners! Shoved me again. What’s got into you, I said pointlessly. Besides, you’re gonna be like that too! Not me, what do you know, you don’t understand. She waited for me at her building and gave me a hug: Sorry. I was talkin crap. No, you weren’t at all.

We didn’t miss it … the Dóm, Galactic, Černá’s, friends. Friends of friends. People. Quite often we’d just go out strollin at night. That was enough. It would’ve been pretty hard for us to deal with anyone else.

Sometimes I’d tell her where I got my cash and what I did. I’d drop hints. She didn’t seem interested. Even though we both lived off of it. Maybe it’s a certain kinda person, the ones that’re used to livin alone … they’re more on the lookout, don’t like idle talk, too many questions, they guard their freedom and the other’s too. Even when maybe they’d just as soon be rid of it.

Sometimes we’d tell each other sagas from our past lives … I sometimes talked about myself in the third person, my former life seemed so unbelievable. But it was complicated to say anything about my last crew. She also had a lot to tell … I listened. And that guy on the stairs … I only got a glance from behind, he was older. Probly an ex.

Chess … I told her where I’d learned to play, patched a few ballads together for her, rambling on …

Occasionally we’d interrupt our game and go for a stroll, look at the people … nothing struck fear into me, we held hands, sometimes. After walking around the block, we’d come back to our coats, tossed over the chairs, to our never-ending match and whatever else we happened to get the urge for.

So what kina contract you got with those little thugs from the attic … what was that boss a theirs goin on about?

If you mean those little darlings, before I started at Cerná’s I used to be the super … those youngsters had a rehearsal space there.

You’re always gettin tangled up in your lies … check!

Those’re my truths, and not anymore, your move!

Sometimes though … sometimes Smoothy and his bandits gave me heavy-duty circles. It was too much. We’d just picked up a fella who’d spent a couple years in Cambodia, tank driver, and Smoothy says: Not only is our faith in you unshakable but, as you may have noticed, despite your admirable modesty, duly acknowledged financially, my dear and esteemed friend … I’d gnash my teeth, by this point I was just about as fed up with his politeness as I was with his horror stories, and he knew it, he would torture me until we … burst out laughin, usually … modesty, I say, for I must add that you have returned faith in Czech man to some of our boys, yes, through your flawless work, there it is, Mr. Potok, and that is no small thing … the tank driver jumped in: Toi da tung song voi puli pozikan tyaap! … our friend here, said Smoothy, wishes to inform you that he met a compatriot of yours in the United States, some Paulina Porizkova … Chek gurl, gut gurl! the tank driver smacked his lips. I pulled over and ran off into the woods. My nerves’re startin to go, I told Smoothy, both a you shut up or I’m gonna wreck this thing.

He could only hold back for a while. Just imagine, Mr. Potok, take a left here, we will be driving day and night this time and … Huh? Are you afraid your girlfriend will be worried about you? You can call her of course. You see, our tank driver here is truthfully the next-to-last, we need to bring back one more … relative and then we can say our goodbyes … of course it is my hope that we may soon welcome you as a guest of honor in our liberated homeland … turn! … General Vang would like to express his gratitude to you in person.