Elvira Dones - Sworn Virgin

She sits on her bed without touching the vest. Uncle Gjergj is coughing downstairs. She lets him. When the silence wraps itself around the walls she decides to go down.

They sit curled up on the cushions. Hana has forgotten her hunger. He goes on smoking. She falls asleep.

Gjergj starts wheezing around dawn. He groans and rattles, and asks her to pass him a spray for his throat. The spray smells really strong; it’s terrible. He is sweating and trembling. He finds it hard to breathe but doesn’t want any help.

‘Just go and check on Enver,’ he manages to say to Hana. ‘I don’t know if he has eaten, poor creature.’

Hana leaves the room and goes to the animal pen in the courtyard where their goat and sheep live. The sheep is sleeping, the goat is not. As soon as he sees Hana he starts bleating.

‘Hi Enver,’ Hana says, stroking his beard. ‘How’re you doing?’

She looks around her. The hay is fresh, the water pail has been filled. Somebody has taken care of everything before leaving. The nearest neighbor’s kulla , to the left, is ten minutes away. Nobody lives on the right, there’s just the sharply rising mountain.

A woman who came to Katrina’s funeral brought the traditional offerings of tobacco, sugar, and coffee. Maybe she cried, and then went to take care of the animals. It must have been Dille, Ndué Zega’s wife. The two families help each other out, without making a show of it. The Zegas have a son who works in the Party as a member of the Citizens’ Committee in Lezhë. He doesn’t approve of the Dodas. They are a little too Catholic to be politically reliable.

The communists have always doubted Gjergj’s faith in the regime, but they have never caught him out in any way. Gjergj Doda is canny. He has never expressed a point of view regarding the government. Better not to talk at all than to say something against them. He’s a good peasant. He sticks to the communist rules, except for the name he has given his goat. He has secretly called him Enver, like the dear departed leader, but this small detail nobody knows about.

‘See you later, Enver,’ Hana says as she leaves the pen. ‘I’ll come by and visit tomorrow when I have more time.’

The next morning she goes on her own to the village cemetery. The sun is shining and the tractors from the agricultural cooperative are already plowing their way up and down the few tracts of amenable land. The rest is so steep it can only be farmed by hand.

Katrina’s grave is easy to spot. There are fresh flowers stuck into jam jars and bottles.

She touches the freshly turned earth and quickly pulls her hand away. Then she touches it again, this time digging her fingers in and leaving them there.

‘Thank you for my vest, Auntie,’ she says out loud. The collar of her blouse is dripping with sweat. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t get here in time.’

She realizes that she should be in the exam room right now, in the auditorium next to the dean’s office.

She sits down on the ground. Her knees are killing her. She pushes her other hand into the earth and bows her head until her chin touches her breasts.

She tries, but can’t seem to make herself cry. Suddenly tears of anger that she doesn’t feel like crying fill her eyes.

After an hour, she goes home.

Uncle Gjergj is hunched up, trying to keep the spasms of pain under control. He can hardly speak or move his arms.

‘My whole body is hurting. Leave this house, Hana. Stop looking at me.’

In the daylight she can see the mess left by the mourners after the funeral. Aunt Katrina wouldn’t have stood for it.

‘But Uncle Gjergj …’

‘Go away, I said. Get out of here. Did you leave your obedience in the city? Have you forgotten your manners?’

She leaves the room. She starts boiling a pan of water, in which she’ll throw the ash from the fireplace. Aunt Katrina always saved it to use instead of soap when the shops in Rrnajë are out. She goes into the storeroom and looks for the aluminum pail full of ash. If you boil sheets in water and ash they come out white as snow.

She opens the upstairs windows wide. There are three big rooms under the gables. She would be coming out of her exam now. She would be admitted to the second year. She would be happy.

The day continues to be marked by the heat and the sounds of their animals. From the Dodas’ kulla you can’t see the village. Hana can start cleaning; she can take off her blouse and wear only a camisole without looking indecent. Nobody will see her.

Would Ben, her classmate in French, have finished his last exam? She likes the way he looks at her. She tries to focus on wiping the glass in the tiny window.

When she has finished cleaning the house it looks like new. Gjergj is still. The pain has let up for a while and he’s finally gone to sleep. Hana is pleased with herself, with how she organized her day and how she managed to enjoy the sun upstairs while she cleaned and tidied things up. Her arms are pink, slightly sunburnt.

The girls in Tirana strip off in the park, as much as they can, as much as the laws imposed on them by men and communist morality allow. The girls in Tirana cut classes and go to the beach in Durrës. One day she’d like to go herself, but she doesn’t have a bathing suit.

Goodbye, my brother sea.

The doctor arrives while she is cooking dinner.

‘I’m here to give Gjergj his drugs, but since you’re here I’ll show you what to do,’ he says.

Hana asks him to step outside where they can talk, as her uncle is sleeping.

‘I’m sorry about Katrina,’ he says. ‘My condolences. And Gjergj is sick, Hana. The operation didn’t help much.’

She says brusquely that she doesn’t want to know and he answers that maybe she should listen to what he’s saying because soon she’ll be on her own and that’s the truth. He hands her three boxes of medicine.

‘I’m sorry, Doctor. I’m really confused right now.’

Silence.

‘Do you remember, Hana? You were the first person I met here in Rrnajë, the day I arrived.’

She feels sorry for him.

‘Yes, I remember. You smelled of aftershave. The whole village knew you were arriving that Tuesday.’

He clenches his jaw. She looks at his profile.

‘I like you,’ the doctor says. ‘I’m getting to like you more and more. I thought it would blow over, but you’ve stayed in my mind.’

Hana turns away. The mountain is growing dark, preparing to be abandoned by the sun.

‘How can you like someone like me?’ she asks caustically. ‘Don’t you ‌city people call us malokë ? 10Don’t you always look down on us mountain people?’

He doesn’t feel he can contradict her. He’s honest enough to admit it to himself, at least, if not out loud. That’s better than nothing, Hana thinks.

‘What were you reading before coming up to Rrnajë?’ he asks, trying to buy some time.

‘ Death of a Traveling Salesman .’

Hana puts her hands in her pants pockets. They are black, made of light flannel. She thinks they look quite good on her. She found them in a shop in Tirana, and the mother of a classmate of hers, a seamstress by trade, took them in a little. The doctor waits for her to say something and, when she doesn’t, he asks if by any chance she has anything to say about what he has just said.

‘You’re a regular kind of guy; you must have had a lot of beautiful girls,’ she snaps, without even looking at him, almost turning away from him. ‘Why are you bothering with me? Or is it just because I’m around?’

‘That’s pretty mean,’ the doctor protests.

Hana would like to rest her head on his chest to see what it feels like, to see what a man smells like close to.