Miljenko Jergovic - Mama Leone

A tear runs down Hans’s face, turns at the nose, and descends on his plumpy tamarisk lip. Then there’s a second drop on the other side of his face, again turning at the nose and falling on his lip. Then a third and a fourth. Hans is funny even when he’s not making a joke, like something sweet and dear that makes you smile. I’m sorry, Franjo, I didn’t know, I just wanted to say how sad it is without children, I didn’t know I’d upset you . It seems Hans can actually speak our language quietly. You didn’t upset me, it’s just the southerly, and that I can damn hardly breathe , said Grandpa, and you, little man, out from under the table, scram. Eavesdropping on your elders’ conversations, you’re a bloody disgrace .

I ran into the yard. Grandma was showing Staka our bougainvillea. Staka was stroking a leaf with her index finger, the same finger she’d wanted to kill Hans with. I’m going to play , I said, and ran out onto the road. Grandma whispers lucky the little one doesn’t understand German . I heard that because I always hear her when she’s whispering. She doesn’t know how to whisper so I don’t hear. However quiet or far away she is, I can always hear her whispering, and when you whisper it’s because there’s a secret to be kept, it’s just that this time I don’t know what the secret’s about, what I wasn’t supposed to hear, why it’s lucky I don’t understand German, what Grandpa yelled at Hans and why he got so mad at him just because Hans said how sad it was without children. I can’t make head or tail of any of this, but one day I’ll find out and then I’ll tell everyone.

The next year the building inspectorate demolished Hans’s weekend house. I mean, they demolished the hut, the camp trailer they hauled up on a big truck and carted off to Makarska. The concrete foundation, mangled roses, and uprooted oleander and lemon trees were all that was left. Grandpa phoned Hans and Staka in Smederevo. He said don’t cry, my dear , and then switched back to German. I only understood two words, Kamerad and Freunde . The first he said coldly, the second warmly, so I thought the second word sounded lovely and meant something like see you soon , and the first word sounded cold and meant something like they found a loophole in the law and demolished your house . But Hans wasn’t afraid of cold words, just like he wasn’t afraid of the cold sea. Hans is never cold. He’s not even cold when crabs freeze in the February shallows.

Hans and Staka never came to Drvenik again. Idiot Kraut, he says you can never go back where they demolished your house , said Grandpa, sitting down to write Hans a letter. What do you want to say to Hans, dictate it to me , and it was then I had to compose my first letter: Dear Hans, thank you for not killing Sava Kovačević, it’s cold here like the cold when you sit with your bare bottom in an empty bath. We’ve all caught colds without you. You’re funny, be funny for us again .

The almond trees bloomed in February and Grandpa said here we go again, spring in midwinter . He said that every February, never getting used to winters finishing so early at the seaside, the rules of nature of a lifetime no longer applied. The rules didn’t apply because he wasn’t in Travnik, where in February the snows fall on Mount Vlašić, and he wasn’t in Sarajevo, where they cover Trebević, Igman, and Tolmin, the whole world a whiteout. He was in Drvenik now and the only things to go white were the blossoming almond flowers, which he called the buds of spring. He’d sing snow falls on the buds of spring and we’d all think nostalgia had got the better of old Franjo, and that he was summoning his native soil to leap the Biokovo range and cover the sea in snow. Do you think the sea will ever freeze over? I ask. I don’t think so, but it’s possible. . Does something that’s possible ever happen?. . Of course such things happen. That’s why we say it’s possible. . So the sea will freeze over?. . I don’t think so, but let’s say it does. What’s it to you?. . Well, then we could walk across the sea to Sućuraj. You could buy a newspaper and then we’d come back. . We can buy a newspaper here. . Yeah, but it’s not the same. We’ve never walked to Sućuraj, but if the sea froze over we could. . That wouldn’t be a good thing. The fish wouldn’t have any air. . But they don’t need air. What do they need air for when they don’t breathe?. . They need air. You’ll learn this stuff at school. If the sea froze over the mackerel would die, and then what would happen to the dolphins, it’s not worth thinking about. Dolphins are like humans, they come out of the water to breathe. . Where do they get out, on the beach?. . No, they jump up above the surface, breathe, and then dive back down again. They’re very practical. . Why don’t they come right out, wouldn’t that be better than all that jumping?. . They’d die if they were always out in the air. Their skin needs the sea, their lungs the air. They don’t live in the sea or out of it, they live somewhere in between. . Like we do?. . What do you mean, like we do?. . You know, we don’t live in Sarajevo or in Drvenik, but somewhere in between, because you’d die of asthma if we were always in Sarajevo. . You could put it like that. I’d die because I’d be breathing fog and smog. . And do dolphins feel sorry they’re not always out in the air?. . Why would they feel sorry about that?. . Because you’re always sorry about not being in Sarajevo and that you don’t get to see the snow fall or the whiteness of the mountains anymore. . I’m not sorry about that. . Then why do you start singing about snow falling on the buds of spring the minute the almond flowers blossom?. . Because that’s my song and I’ve got every right to sing it, even if it doesn’t snow and the sea never freezes over .

Grandpa tells everyone he doesn’t fear death. When he’s coughing away in the morning thinking he’s never going to catch his breath again, he murmurs oh death, sweet death , as if he were wooing it because he’s fallen in love with it, but death’s not interested. Does death hurt? I ask. I don’t care if it hurts, just as long as it doesn’t suffocate . Grandpa doesn’t believe in pain and so nothing ever hurts him. Any kind of pain is something strange, like it’s got nothing to do with him. When he had a tooth out he told Leitner the dentist, our neighbor, take it out, but no injections , and Leitner said to him but Mr. Rejc, it’s not the Middle Ages . Grandpa ignored him and said I don’t care what age we’re in , so Leitner took his tooth out just like that and Grandpa didn’t even clench his fist in pain. My Franjo’s no hero , said Grandma, he’s just scared of the anesthetic. . I’m not scared of anesthetic, I just want to know what’s happening to me .

But Nikola, who’s from Ćmilj, he’s afraid of pain and dying and anesthetic. He comes over to see Grandpa and says Signore Franjo, I’m a dead dog am I , and Grandpa replies Nikola, buddy, get yourself off to the doctor , and Nikola mopes: I can’t, I don’t know if I’m more scared or more ashamed . After that Grandpa doesn’t say anything, just pours him a rakia and they just stare at each other until Nikola drinks up and leaves. Nikola comes over to our place so someone actually looks at him because in the village people have been looking straight through him for years. They go by him looking at the tips of their toes or out to sea, giving Nikola and his fears and his shame the widest berth. Some people say hi and look away at the same time, but most just make like he’s not even there, like he’s committed some terrible crime and you can’t forgive his just being alive.