Christos Ikonomou - Something Will Happen, You'll See

Iraklis put out his cigarette and got up.

I’m going, he said. I have an early morning tomorrow.

As he left his foot caught on a chair and it fell to the floor. He didn’t even look back.

The admiral tipped his glass back and emptied it then filled it again. His hands were shaking. He looked out the window at Iraklis who had bent over next to a car trying to light a cigarette out of the wind. He took a sip then bowed his head and shut his eyes and started to speak with his eyes closed.

I still believe, he said. I really do. Recently I’ve been lying in bed at night making up stories. Like I’ve discovered some magic potion that makes me invisible and I steal money from the banks and distribute it to everyone. Or that I buy a big estate high up over the sea and build a house that would make you stare. Villa Constantina. That’s what I call it. And I build five or six more little houses out of stone and I give one to everyone and we all live there together a happy life. My daughter takes charge of the garden and the trees and the flowers. I make my son the foreman. He’s the foreman together with Iraklis’s kid and Mao. I give them each a solid wage and a nice car and they’re real happy. Mao’s mother and older sister are in charge of the kitchen. They go out shopping and decide what to cook stuff like that. And the other sister the younger one plays music for us at night while we’re eating and having a good time. Sure. I’ve thought of everything. Down to the smallest detail. And I’ve built all kinds of things on the estate. A huge room out of stone on the ground floor with big windows all around. And inside there’s a swimming pool one of those heated ones. So you can swim even in winter and look out the window and see it raining and snowing. Beautiful things. Just beautiful. There’s this other building as tall as a castle and it has glass all around too. That’s where we have our parties. The floor is all parquet and I’ve put a table in there that goes all the way from one side to the other and seats thirty or forty people easy. There’s a fireplace and a dance floor. And the best stereo system but of course we don’t even need it since we’ll have live music from Thomai. And then there’s a special computer that splits the ceiling in two when I touch it and all the glass on the sides comes down. That’s a trick for summer so we don’t get too hot even though I’ve also put in the best air conditioner there is. On summer nights we gather up there and eat and drink as much as we want and dance until the sun comes up. And I’m sitting there in a corner watching you all having a great time and I’m so happy even though there’s something burning me up inside. Because you guys don’t know. You think I won millions in the lottery or something. That’s what I told you. You don’t know that I’ve found this magic potion that makes me invisible and I’ve been robbing banks without ever getting caught. And you also don’t know that every time I drink that potion I lose a year off my life. That’s the deal. Every time I drink the potion my life gets another year shorter. But you don’t know anything about that. I don’t ever let you find out. And we clink glasses and you make toasts to me, may the admiral live a thousand years. And I watch you from my corner and I’m so happy. I look at the kids having fun and I’m happy. I look around at all the things I built and I say, things are just fine. And when the party ends and you all go to sleep I get up and go down to the beach and sit all by myself and stare at the sea for hours. And I feel a sadness like you wouldn’t believe because I’ve drunk a lot of that potion and I don’t have much time left. And I think how in the end what I did is pretty cowardly. But I don’t regret it. No. Because I’ve seen your faces and I know. I know that sometimes good doesn’t walk the same road as truth. And I know that good is sometimes more important than true. I know.

He stopped talking but didn’t open his eyes. His cheeks were yellow. Vayios looked at us and pursed his lips and shook his head. He pushed the admiral’s glass to the far edge of the table and gestured to Satanas, who came out from behind the bar and picked up the chair Iraklis had knocked over and then came over to us. He tore at a rib with his teeth.

What’s going to happen with you assholes here every night, he said. Don’t you guys have homes?

The admiral raised his head and looked at him. He blinked his eyes like a frightened animal.

Bring us another half kilo. And whatever the guys are drinking. And something else to snack on.

Satanas tossed the bone on the table and sniffed and leaned heavily on the admiral’s chair.

What sort of snack would the gentlemen care for? He asked. We’ve got shrimp testicles stuffed with wild rice and crocodile saganaki with four kinds of cheese. Or perhaps you’d prefer something sweet? I prepared a special ice cream today with kangaroo milk and syrup from wild berries.

He looked at us and then at the admiral who had bowed his head again. He grabbed the admiral under the armpits and abruptly lifted him out of the chair.

Take him home, he said to Vayios. Get going. Get lost. Beat it already.

At the door he called to us and we turned around.

And listen. You’ll have to invite me sometime to that estate for one of those parties, okay? I want to swim in that pool, too. Here’s to you, Pavlakos, invisible bank robber. I’m expecting an invitation, you hear? Look at these guys. Just look at these guys, wanting villas and pools. He’s a real number, that one. You all are.

• • •

Yesterday morning we found Mao’s cat hanging from the mulberry tree in front of his house. They’d tied her up by her hind legs and thrown salt in her eyes. She was covered in blood. She’d clawed out her own eyes. By the time we found her the blood had dried on the sidewalk and flies had eaten half her head. The place stank.

We all stood around in a circle and looked without speaking. Only the deafmute tried to say something with his hands but no one was paying attention so he left.

Michalis untied the cat from the branch and wrapped her in newspaper and went to throw her in the field behind the church of Osia Xeni.

When the crowd dispersed Michalis’s mother brought a bucket and mop and started scrubbing the blood off the sidewalk. She kept murmuring to herself and wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her jacket.

Poor Mao, she said. What did those awful people do to you. My strong young man. Poor Mao.

HUNGER WOKE HIM. He’d had a pain in his belly all night. He had his son with him, too. His son was sleeping beside him in the bed with his mouth open and his fingers gripping the edge of the blanket as if he had fallen asleep afraid that someone might try to take the blanket away. He turned over slowly and propped himself on his elbow and looked down at his son. The kid looked nothing like him. Nothing at all. For starters, the boy was blond. Not blond blond but still blond. And he was very beautiful, with a narrow face and eyes the color of the sky when a north wind is blowing. He had a little mole under his right eye. In the dark the blond fuzz by his ear shone as if all night someone had been stroking him right there with fingers covered in gold dust. The kid was so beautiful that it hurt his heart to look at him. And yet he couldn’t get his fill of looking, he looked and forgot his hunger. When he grows up. When he grows up he’ll look at me and ask why I had to be his father why he had to grow up in a place like this and sleep in a bed like this. Why. Why.

He closed his eyes. That pain again. He felt a movement in his belly as if there were something alive in there.

Dad?

The kid was awake and looking at him with blurry eyes.