Jón Gnarr - The Indian

— Can I join in now?

— No, in a minute…

When I’m sick of waiting I puke on the soccer pitch. I can honestly puke when I want. I learned how to do that when I was practicing burping and talking at the same time. It’s fun to talk while burping. I just contract my stomach and belch, and then the food comes up and I have complete control over it. When they leave me out too long I pull this trick and I vomit on the pitch so they can’t play.

— Yuck! Man, you’re disgusting!

After that, we start doing something else that I’m allowed to do.

When a lot of time has passed, Mom comes out onto the sidewalk and calls me home.

The other kids are beginning to drift off home, too.

I brush my teeth and kiss Grandma good night. I go to my room. But I don’t go to sleep immediately. I play Fisheries for a bit. I crawl into bed and read. I read a book about Paddington that I took out from the library. I can’t stop reading until it’s over. Only then can I go to sleep. I close my eyes and imagine I’m in a strange city. I often do that.

I’m standing on the street. There’s no one there, even though there usually is.

I know this neighborhood. If you go left, you come to the big house with many rooms and lots of windows facing the street. No one lives in the house.

You can go up some stairs that lead all the way up to the roof. On the roof there’s all kinds of shit, like it’s a rubbish dump. I sometimes lie on the roof, throwing stones at the soldiers walking past below. I have to take care they don’t shoot me.

If you go right, you come to a big palace. There are stairs leading up to it. When you enter, you see two large rooms downstairs. They’re empty. That’s because no one lives in the palace.

From the entrance, two stairways lead to the upper floor. They’re curved. They’re to either side of the entrance but they curve together by the time you reach the upper floor. It doesn’t matter which set of stairs you choose: they end up in the same place.

On the upper floor there’s nothing but a balcony facing out to the street.

Behind the right-hand stairs, on the ground floor, is a secret door made of the same wood as the stairs. It’s not visible; you have to know about it to be able to open the door. Through it, a passage goes under the road and into the big house. It ends inside a wardrobe in one of the rooms.

The only way out of the neighborhood is at the end of the street. There’s a tall fence. First, you need to go past three automatic guns. They’re buried in the ground. You can’t see them, except for the convex cover over them. If someone chances to come close, they spring up from the ground and shoot them.

I have to be careful. Sometimes there are lions and polar bears in the neighborhood. They hide in one of the rooms of the house or in the shadows where they aren’t visible.

I run into the house. There are two polar bears in the hallway. As soon as they see me they come running towards me. I turn around and run across the street and into the palace. They follow me. I go through the secret door and into the tunnel. I heave a sigh of relief. I hear them scrape and growl outside the door. They smell me. I run off.

I open the closet carefully. There’s no one in the room. I sneak out of it and close it quietly behind me. Lions hear so well. At the least sound, they come running.

I look out of the window and across the street. Polar bears are still looking for me in the hall.

There is no one in the corridor. I run to the stairs and up them. Once I’m up high, the lions come for me. They scream and start chasing me up the stairs. But they can’t reach me; I’ve come so high.

Finally I come to the roof. I lock the roof door, which is made of iron. Here, I’m safe. Wild animals can’t get up here, nor the soldiers. I relax and fall asleep..

— There’s a fight today after school!

This is wonderful news.

— Kúrland and Kjalarland against Hörðaland and Hulduland.

Street battles are a regular occurrence in Fossvogur. They’re fought with swords and shields. Crazy kids clash with each other. You’re not allowed any iron weapons. One time, a boy got hit in the head with an iron pipe and got a concussion.

The sides are divided by streets. I have friends on Hörðaland and Hulduland. But friendships don’t exist during a street fight.

I run home right after school to prepare myself.

I stop at a construction site on the way and find some material for a sword. I choose a long, thick plank.

Some of the kids have a cool sword and even a shield with a picture on it. Gummi’s dad helped him make a shield. It’s large and triangular with a black eagle on the front. Behind it there’s a handle made of a leather strap. Gummi also has a super sword.

Dad doesn’t know anything about carpentry and doesn’t have time to help me. I’d like a real sword, something that doesn’t break right away when you start fencing with it.

I wind string around the end of the wood and cover it with duct tape. That’s my handle. I saw a little stump off the end, and put it crossways. That’s the hilt which protects your hand from getting hit. I fasten it carefully by covering it with duct tape. I know that it’s not a good idea to hammer nails into such a narrow piece of wood. First, there’s nothing for them to hold on to, and second, the wood splits easily. Tape is much better.

My plank is longer than most swords. That makes it a better weapon. But stabbing and thrusting gets more tiring quicker with a long sword rather than a short blade.

It doesn’t mean anything to be stabbed by a sword. It’s not the same rules as war. You aren’t dead, not even if you get stabbed. You have to give up, instead.

It’s different in shoot and run or cops and robbers. Then if you shoot someone he’s dead. Though some kids never admit they’re dead.

You have to be well prepared. Fossvogur is full of all kinds of gangs, many of which I don’t know. Street fights can be dangerous.

The teen gangs are from Grímsbær. Grímsbær gangs are dangerous. They own a motorcycle and they punch. They take captives who they treat like prisoners down in a basement; they get tortured. They cut you and put salt in the wound. If they do that, it never heals. I’ve also heard that some gangs brand people. If you want to join the gang you need to jump between two roofs and also to drink pee.

I don’t intend to let anyone take me prisoner.

The warring factions meet at the basketball court at one end of Hörðaland. The teams set themselves up at either end of the court. There are no girl teams, but a few girls sit on the slope and watch eagerly. It’s a great incentive to have the girls close by. It builds courage and resilience in your crew. You don’t complain or howl in front of girls.

There’re five on my team. There’s me, Stebbi, Gummi, Alli Jens, and Kristján Þór. Kristján Þór actually lives on Hörðaland, but he has no friends there and since I’m his only friend, he’s on our side.

Stebbi and Gummi have cool swords and shields. Gummi even has an iron helmet. I have my plank of wood, and Kristján Þór has a broken broomstick. Alli Jens doesn’t have a sword. Instead, he has a length of rope with a knot at the end, a modern suburban version of an olden-day flail.

The other team has two more kids than us. I only know Bjöggi. He’s my friend. Sometimes we play Action Man together. Bjöggi is a pussy and he’s easily scared. I’m not concerned about him. But the others are pretty fearsome. I’m especially afraid of the two smirking brothers I recognize from school. They’re famously crazy guys who always fight together. There’s also a big kid on their team. He’s two years older than the rest of us. I immediately pipe up.