Кристиан Новак - Dark Mother Earth

It was getting dark when the car pulled up at our house, and out stepped a woman a little older and plumper than Mom and a small man with combed, oily hair, in jeans and a blazer. He might have been the shortest grown-up I’d ever seen. He was wearing shoes with thick heels, but it was clear that he was only a bit taller than my sister. If I answered every question right, maybe they’d take me away, and then they would be my new parents. I liked that thought; maybe Bacawk and Chickichee would stop the killing then, or they’d kill the new parents, and that would keep my family here safe.

They sat at the kitchen table across from me and immediately lit cigarettes. Mom brought them an ashtray and asked if she should leave us alone. The woman nodded. This was a first for me, talking to strangers alone, and something prompted me to behave like I did with the teacher at school.

“How are you, Matej? We’ve been hearing about you for some time now. Do you know why we’re here?” said the man. He spoke slowly, enunciating very clearly, and with a cloying condescension as if speaking to a very young child.

“My name’s Matija.”

“Sorry,” coughed the man. “I have a son named Matej, and you remind me of him.”

These people won’t be my new parents, I thought. Nobody needs two strange kids.

“Matija, so. Do people call you by a nickname? What do your friends at school call you? Matko? Matek?”

“Nobody calls me nothing,” I said.

“Your teacher says you’ve been withdrawn lately and you’re not socializing with the other children. Why is that? Huh, Matija? Matija?” The lady thought I’d answer more readily if she showed she’d gotten my name right.

There was no good answer to her question. I couldn’t just say, “Yes, the other kids don’t want to play with me because I tried to throw my best friend in the river so I could exchange him for my dead dad, and they all think I’m some kind of monster.”

“Well, I dunno,” I muttered.

“We would like to hear from you about what’s going on. You can tell us, I promise we won’t breathe a word of what you say to anyone,” said the woman.

“Not your mom, not your sister—nobody,” added the man.

“Is there something you’re scared of? Is there anyone threatening you or anyone who hurt you recently?” The woman went on, occasionally glancing at the notebook open in front of her. “Did somebody hurt your feelings? You know, not all pain is pain you feel on your body.”

“Nobody’s hurting me at school. And I ain’t talking to anybody.”

“And why is that, Matija?”

“It just is.”

“Your mom told us you have bruises on your body, as if you banged yourself up somewhere, or as if somebody was hitting you.”

“Nope.”

“But I can see the scratch on your face. Where’s that from?”

“I slipped and fell at Granny’s, near the chickens.”

“Matija, I have a feeling you’re lying to us. I was like that when I was small. Two bigger boys from my street always pushed me around… They hit me and shoved me and hurt my feelings, and I never told anybody about it because I was ashamed. And then I told my daddy, and he walloped them, and they never touched me again. Look, we are here to help you solve every single problem you have.”

“Do you know where your daddy is?” said the woman.

“Up in heaven with the angels and my granddaddy.”

“Do you miss your daddy? You must miss him. And how is it with your mommy and sister? They talk with you every day. Do they ask if you’re okay?”

“Yep. They talk plenty with me.”

“How would you describe your mom? What are three things you love about your mommy?”

“When she puts her hair up in a ponytail. And when we went to a fish restaurant and she asked if I’d like another Coke. And I love her because… she loves me a lot.”

“Two of the things you mentioned happened before, while your daddy was still here. What’s changed since then? Is your mommy still here for you, do you think?”

“Yep.”

“Every day? Maybe one day you went to school dirty and hungry?”

“Yep, but…”

“Other kids don’t come to school looking like that.”

“But other kids…”

“Matija, your mommy loves you, I know she does, but maybe lately she hasn’t been able to see to everything. Your house, your sister, you… Maybe she could use a little break, and we can see to it that you go live somewhere else for a bit with other kids. Maybe that’s what your mommy wants. Hmm, Matija? Don’t you think your mommy and sister might find it easier if you were staying somewhere else? Huh, Matija?”

“Leave me alone.”

The man broke in loudly. “We’ve got to—”

“No, look,” interrupted the woman. “Matija, listen to me… Tell me three things that aren’t so good when you talk with your mom.”

“I ain’t talking with you.”

The woman sighed and wrote something down in her notebook. She took another good look at me, as if gauging whether I was a 150-pound hog or a 220-pounder, and whispered something to the man.

“Fine, Matija, no need to be afraid of us. We just came to chat. Let’s try it this way.” And the man extended his hand, which I did not accept, and then he patted me on the shoulder. “You give a little thought to whether there’s something or somebody you’re afraid of, and if you tell us, I think the three of us can put our heads together and figure it out.”

I imagined Bacawk and Chickichee knocking the man and woman to their knees and slashing them with knives. The man would be pleading desperately while trying to scoop his guts back into his belly through a big gash, while the woman would be trying to discuss something with him until her voice broke in her last shudder. They told me to go play in my room and asked Mom and my sister to come to the kitchen. The damned blinds were up again. I heard voices being raised a few times, but I couldn’t tell whose they were. All I knew was that my sister wasn’t saying anything.

“…physical violence? You saying I beat my boy…?”

“…now, now, we’re on your side…”

“…he has food on his plate, he’s in good health…”

“…never have heard of such a small child running away…”

“…I ain’t saying, but I also don’t figure…”

“…abuse…”

“…and injures himself to attract…”

“…you’s saying I’m a no-good mother…”

They came out of the kitchen after a spell, and Mom, no longer making any effort to speak properly, said: “Now listen you here, I can’t rightly say what I’ve a mind to do, but this treatment you speak of… I ain’t got the money for such a thing. Understand? And if the village hears of this, that I’m taking him to…” Mom was interrupted by the sound of her own quavering voice.

The woman wrote something else down in her notebook and said to my mom and sister: “We’ll be in touch,” and for my sake she added, with her face stretched in a sour smile, “Bye bye, Matija. You be good now, okay?”

There was nothing I wanted more than to be like all the other kids, like Dejan Kunčec or even Goran Brezovec. I’d pretend there was nobody there when I saw Bacawk and Chickichee. But when they murdered Granny and killed Uncle and his wife, people would see for themselves that something weird really was going on. After the social workers left, Mom and my sister cried in Mom’s bedroom, and I clenched my fists and told myself that no matter what I’d act like a normal kid.

When the house went still, I prayed, staring up at the ceiling, just so I wouldn’t look at the windows, because Mom had forgotten to lower the blinds. After a while I heard a dog barking, and I knew they were near because that always betrayed their presence. When I think back, it’s possible my terrified mind conjured those characters whenever there was barking, and that the two fiends were never there at all… but then so many other things wouldn’t make sense. Glancing at the window, I spotted their shadows, still and mute. Bacawk was back in his overcoat.