Ivan Klima - No Saints or Angels

'I don't know what you expect,' I tell him. 'That I'll advise you? Or that I'll go back to bed with you?'

He hesitates. Then he asks if he ought to go.

I tell him I'd appreciate it if he did.

7

My new nick was called Sunnyside and it immediately struck me that Graveside might be a better name, because the nearest thing was an old abandoned graveyard. Though I have to admit that the sun really did beat down all the time — I got quite a tan during the first few days of my nonenforced stay. You see I had to declare that I'd chosen that nick voluntarily I played up a bit at first but I knew I'd go anywhere to get rid of those vampire witches and where I wouldn't have to listen to the crap from that platinum blonde cow who meant it all for our good. But I said I wasn't going to any loony bin in the middle of a forest; I'd sooner hang myself. Mum tried to persuade me it was for my own good and told me what a fantastic place it was. Dad was born not far from there and lived there at my age, and apparently some of his great-great-great-aunts still live around there somewhere, though I couldn't have given a toss. Mum went on to tell me I wouldn't be there long and it wasn't the end of the world because they had electricity there. I told her that was really something: electricity — I was trembling all over in anticipation. And I asked Mum if they had any fantastic things such as electric chairs, or whether they gave themselves electric shocks after breakfast for fun. Mum got pissed off and said there was no talking to me and told me if I wanted to stay where I was, I could. I started to panic that she might just leave me in that nuthouse and so I told her OK she could send me by rocket to the moon for my own good if she liked.

There were eight of us detoxers at the Graveside by my reckoning — that's including me. Some of them had already been stuck there for six months. Monika was the only one who was just starting her second month and she was planning to split. She told me that before she came there, she'd worked in a hospital. It had been heaven, she said: there were drugs everywhere you looked. They used to nick Rohypnol, for instance, and give the sick old ladies a placebo instead, and then they'd have great trips. From time to time they even managed to get hold of morphine; that was super because then they didn't have to buy expensive muck from Arab dealers. She was screwing some married doctor that she was in love with, but when it got out, the nerd packed her in and all she had left was the dope. She's come to realize that life without drugs has no point anyway and that people are vile by nature.

So I expect we'll do a bunk together.

Pavel, who has already done his military service and astounded us with card tricks and by making tea disappear from a cup in front of our very eyes, says this place is just like the sort of hassle they got in the army: fatigue duty, kitchen rota, pigs and goats. And the punishments are the same: most often being confined to barracks. I wasn't allowed a leave pass yet anyway, so they couldn't take it away from me. Whenever our dear Radek, who was helping us to be normal people again, found that the floor wasn't completely clean, it had to be washed again. In the first week alone I had to scrub our bedroom floor three times. I was also put in charge of our four hens and a duck with some ducklings. They were always running away from me, especially the little ones, and last week a pine marten got one of them. Radek said it was fate and told me not to be too upset; pine martens were God's creatures too. I wasn't upset at all: I was glad I had one little bugger less to keep an eye on. I called the pigs 'sausage dogs' 'cos they were so tiny, and when they were hungry, which was all the time, they squealed and set all the dogs around barking.

Apart from that, Radek is great, and he's cool in a way. He's got about eighteen children of his own and he still finds time to visit us in the evening. Sometimes he tells us about his life. He wasn't allowed to study 'cos he went to church — he was in a secret church or something, so he had to work for a living and has done almost every possible kind of job: roofing, laying pavements, doing deliveries, and working in a dry-cleaner's where they used to boil up clothes in some acid; when it evaporated it was more narcotic than regular dope. Sometimes his life was a bit like in an action movie 'cos he was always doing stuff with that church. Once, the Communist cops picked him up and tried to make out he'd got drunk and run over some kid. He told them he couldn't have run anyone over 'cos he didn't have a car and had never driven and those creeps said that was even more suspicious so they were arresting him. They told him they were taking him to the nick for interrogation and on the way they talked about how they'd say he'd been shot trying to escape. He didn't really believe them, 'cos if they'd been meaning to shoot him they wouldn't talk about it in front of him, but even so when they got there he refused to get out and they had to carry him. And that really happened: they carried him out and chucked him in some cell and left him there all night in the total cold without food and then they let him go the next evening. And he told us as well that he never even lost his rag over those cops 'cos according to him they didn't know what they were doing, and they were just totally demented due to the training they'd been given and also because of TV.

The thing is that Radek really knows how to take people apart. That allows them to form an attitude about themselves. He doesn't rabbit on about drug-taking being dreadful, he just helps us to think positively and realize why we needed to take dope and others didn't. I've already realized that I took dope to spite Dad because he thought that after they discovered the Big Bang it was all right to do your own thing and not give a damn about others. And that's what

he did. Radek had the feeling that what I'd wanted to be was different from him, and different from Mum too.

I get the feeling that I now know almost everything there is to know about me, as well as about Mum and Dad. It's really crucial to have an attitude to yourself and to people around you.

I really enjoy it when we sit and talk about each of us. Pavel, for instance, told us seriously that once when he was on a trip he wanted to bonk his own mum, and she was in such a state of shock she kept saying, Pavel, you must have mistaken me for someone; it's me, your mum — simply horrendous.

Last week when I was on kitchen rota I forgot to order the spaghetti that was supposed to be for lunch and as a punishment I was put on kitchen rota again the next day and in the evening I had to muck out the animals. I felt like dumping the shit under Radek's window, but it wouldn't have done me any good 'cos I'd have had to clear it up and then wash the lawn with a rag. So at least I broke two plates instead and then pretended to be all upset and said they'd slipped out of my hands by accident because they were wet.

The boys here are fairly ace and I think they fancy me. The other day Pavel picked me some daisies and swept the kitchen for me. And Lojza, who's due to go home soon, offered to help me with maths. But I told him I hadn't yet reached the stage where I could do any swotting. For the time being I have to concentrate my efforts on fighting with myself and beating my bad habits. Another time he told me he was sure I'd get over it; he told me I needed to believe in myself. I don't know whether I'll get over it; what I want is to get out of here. But apart from that I believe in myself.

One little crud who came here right after me did a runner two weeks later. I was curious what Radek would say about it, but all he said was if someone didn't want to stay here he was welcome to