Jáchym Topol - City, Sister, Silver

Into the field, I said. One, two, five steps, an hold it. Turn around. An you hurry up, kill im! You went down on him plenty a times. Now you’ll see … how he goes down. Do it, Evie! I order you … kill him!

I turned around and time came to a standstill … I realized … that woman aiming the gun at me, Černá, now I knew who she was … the mist ripped open behind their backs, somebody was standing there … I hoped, but it was only a scarecrow, made of straw, the mist swallowed him up again … I know now my sister is death … I’d searched for her and now she had me … I closed my eyes and heard: bang! and then one more time … this is my sister, it’s death, and this is the end.

I stood there, still deaf from the gunshots. A sharp dry wind sliced into my face … I heard a scream, like … an animal, and opened my eyes … he was flat on his back and Černá was kicking him, kicking him in the face, and then she jumped up and came down on her heels … I ran over and knocked her off … screaming, out of her wits … What? What? I bleated, somehow I managed to drag her off … the pistol lay on the ground, its barrel hot, stuck it in my pocket and hauled Černá away … we went and lay down in the woods, out of sight of the car … and of him.

She lay facedown in the moss, shoulders twitching … we gotta get outta here, shoulda taken the car, shoulda stuck him in that haystack, I didn’t know what to say, held her … then I heard an engine, somebody drivin down the road, what if it’s … yeah, let it be them, the yellow guys, I shoved her forward, stumbling, but we made it deeper into the woods … somehow I had to break through her silence, I gave her a shake and tore off her shades … her eyes looked like they were inside out, sharp and deep, but it was her, I hugged her on the ground, she’d fallen down, and I said: Thanks, you’re mine … you’re brave … you got tangled up with em, doesn’t matter, it’s gone.

Idiot, she said, that was my father.

Him? Aha. What month is it? I asked.

What’d you say?

I donno. Just wonderin if it’ll be cold tonight.

We both knew we couldn’t go anywhere.

Do we stay here? I wanted to talk to her.

Doesn’t matter to me.

No, c’mon, before it gets dark.

I don’t want it, she screamed.

But you got it.

Know what I was thinkin the whole way?

No.

That I was growin into the car, that I was the car, like upholstery or somethin.

Aha.

There’s no way to put it.

But now … it’s gonna be all right. I thought you were death. Not just mine, just … death … hey, look at that stump, it’s like a person.

She screamed.

No … aright, it’s not. C’mon.

We spent the night in the forest, in the leaves. I fell asleep, regardless of the fact that my sister lay, eyes open, trembling next to me. But then I was the one who couldn’t sleep. Because She-Dog came for me.

I saw her when I got up … it was the forest that had woken me, it wanted me to keep going, somewhere, I knew it. What I didn’t know is it would be so close. First she was hanging up in the trees, then she came down. The moon at her back. Standing before me. Little She-Dog. Her head by my shoulders. But I didn’t dare touch it. She was smiling. In a white dress with her hair down. She was beautiful.

You see, she said, you found her.

An you, She-Dog … have you forgiven me?

I have. It hurt, you know. But I was too tied to you. I think it was true love. So even after … I wanted to see you.

I wanted to see you too, I still love you.

I know.

Why did it happen? She-Dog … I donno!

Me either.

An She-Dog … did it hurt a lot …

No. I was mostly just startled. You’re fast … an I, somehow I forgot about it … it happens … things’re different out our way. That was to make you laugh. You know that one, right?

Yeah … that was a dream. She-Dog?

Hm?

Is this a dream too?

Guess away, guesser. You talk too much. Get ready, you’ve gotta go now.

But I can’t … not with her here! … not yet. You know what she did!

Don’t worry, you can still go back. For her sake.

Can I ask somethin … before we go?

Make it fast.

Do you like her?

Well … She-Dog scowled, I knew that face so well! That serious look of hers … her lips.

Well … you guys’re … a little different now. Something’s changed. But go now! An don’t worry … I’ll protect her when you’re not around. Trust me an don’t worry about her. As for me, my loved one, you’ll never see me again.

I flew. Her last words echoed inside me … hurting, and I felt like a scoundrel and a lost dog, but then all of a sudden … a wave came crashing over it … a wave of joy, an I think it was her who sent it, cause as long as I’m flyin an goin … somewhere, wherever I have to go … an She-Dog’s keepin watch or whatever … over poor miserable Černá, then Sister is safe … I could sense that … then I was walking, in snow, but I felt light, walking hard and my breath was sharp, I was going in a straight line, the path of the warrior, I knew it, mountains, maybe she was trying to give me a dream … I walked a long time, growing stronger with the motion, then I was lifted up again so I could see what I had to see … my footprints in a circle … so that’s my straight line, I nearly groaned, and then there was grass around me again … I stood on a hill, houses below me. Smoke rising out of them. It was summer, it was warm, and my tattered jacket was just right. I touched Madonna and walked on. I had a hunch where she’d sent me … I didn’t know why. But I really, really wanted to see him.

He stood out in the garden, at his side an old woman … and oh my god, slipped out of me old-fashionedly … the woman was steering him toward a chair … he shuffled along.

See him? She-Dog hissed in my ear.

Yes. But what … what do I do?

You’ll see, said She-Dog. Go on.

Something gave me a nudge from behind … a wing, a breath …

She-Dog, is … is he better? That lady’s steerin him around.

That’s what they do with idiots. Go on! An do it.

I took a step, and then didn’t hear from She-Dog again.

Dogs came charging out, sheepdogs, I stopped in my tracks. A man walked out the door of the … estate. He peered at me suspiciously, but chased off the dogs.

C’mon in! Here fir that icebox?

No sir … Mr. Losín. I … I’m here to see David.

His eyes popped … he dashed inside, I walked into the yard.

David! Buddy, it’s me! … he sat in the chair looking straight ahead, the old woman screamed … the man charged out the door with a rifle.

Step aside, Maw! It’s one a thim gangstirs! Ah’ll kill yew!

She wrenched the rifle out of his hands. No! Came on his own, yew donno why. C’mon in, son. Let David be.

I … stood next to him and when I touched him he was like ice, didn’t notice me at all … his folks were arguing, the old man wanted to shoot me, I remembered how David had told us his dream … exaggerating the dialect to make us vain city hooligans laugh …

I stayed on … and in time I began to lap up their tongue, it was old, but they’d been living out here cut off for so long it had mutated … it was impure, and then I discovered that over the hills and up in the mountains, in all kindsa hovels and tarpaper shacks, the people spoke … Czech … I discovered the tongue was different all over, warped differently, like time here had gone through a grater … I noticed, for one thing, they called the old tree fungus they washed the dishes with detergents, and the plates they called frisbees. That was the underground influence.

After I’d settled in a bit and David’s bros were no longer a threat, one day Abram and Kubik, with much important conspiratorial winking, took me out to the Cave, which belonged to the Holecek estate, and the young Holeceks, with more significant winking and putting of fingers to lips, led me inside … to the underground, as they called it … there were some youngsters there from the settlements, even girls, who darted, squealing, off to the sides, and there was a television.