The first

(…)

It’s the second day of the year nineteen hundred and eighty nine, although in fact everything is the first, you just don’t realize it yet. You are agitated because you can sense it, but you don’t realize that either. A line has been drawn under the dead Tatras, which you refuse to look back at. With rigid determination, so you won’t end up as that abandoned blind kitten again. It’s time to live your life, you’re growing into a mature woman – and that’s something that is crystal clear to you, pleasing you in a purely physically way. You want to be wanted, it is an intense desire which you have to satisfy, otherwise you’ll go mad. The fear of those lines drawn sometimes tap at your insides, loosening your bowels, but the desire to be wanted is much stronger. You realize what a shame it is that Běla isn’t there with you, but you tell yourself you are finally ahead in something. You are alone with a guy in Bratislava, staying at his friend’s. You were supposed to share a bed, but you looked so confused that he lay down on the floor. You were grateful and felt like a coward. You still have a good few nights ahead of you. You can trust that guy, and you do, gratefully.

In the evening you all go over to Sígr’s. Saša has mentioned several times that Sígr cooks. You don’t understand, but you figure she doesn’t mean potatoes. A cord pulls at your gut – you hold onto Patrik and leave. Saša bangs on the door and a weird guy opens it. He has an impassive expression. He just nods and waits in the doorway. Patrik pulls five bags with Solutan written on them out of his pocket. The guy, who probably isn’t Sígr, takes them and lets you in. The flat stinks and it’s a shambles, but you’d been expecting that. Someone’s in the toilet, flushing, a girl comes out of the bathroom and says hello to Saša – Patrik and the two of you might as well be invisible. You all go into a room where there are four other people, but Sígr isn’t there. How many of them are there altogether? You count the number of people in the flat – maybe one (or more) in the toilet, one (or more) in the bathroom, four in the room and one (or more) somewhere else, and the three of you. You’re in deep shit. Běla, will you do my homework for me? You sit on the floor, there’s nowhere else. They’re smoking and passing round grass, but no-one’s smiling much, instead everyone’s listening to music. The two on the sofa are talking about something, but it’s impossible to understand them. And not because of the music.

When it’s your turn to indulge, you just pretend to inhale, but you are careful, you don’t want to let yourself go completely. Patrik inhales for real. Sígr comes in carrying something, but you can’t see what. He and another guy are bent over something and you can’t see what’s going on because of their long hair, but it takes quite a while. Then the guy sits down, takes something long and sticks it up his nose, blocks up his other nostril and snorts something up through the tube from a small plate on a tray. You look at Patrik in horror – you really don’t want to be here! Patrik strokes your shoulder reassuringly and kisses your ear. He whispers not to worry, that everything will be all right. You get up, no-one notices you, you don’t know what exactly you want to do. You open the door to the toilet and there’s a girl sitting on it with the lid down, her trousers at her ankles. She’s shaking and breathing really fast. You slam the door and go to the chair where you quickly dig out your jacket from the tangled pile. You put it on, get your shoes and turn the handle. You rattle the door, but it’s locked. Shit! You look for the key – in a chaotic shoe cupboard, a cabinet… You go through the pockets of the only coat hanging on the coat rack, but you can’t find it. You go into the kitchen, where you haven’t been yet. You see loads of different flasks, crumpled packets of pills lying around everywhere and lots of old pans on the cooker. It makes you shudder more than anything you’ve seen so far.

“What’re you doing snooping around?” says someone behind you in Slovak. The voice is harsh and loud – it belongs to Sígr. You turn to face him and say nothing.

“Who are you? Are you here to shoot up or to spy on us? You wanted to do a runner, didn’t you?”

You shake your head. Finally you manage to say something. “Sabina, I’m Sabina.”

This annoys Sígr. He comes right up in your face and you have to lean back. “That’s not what I fucking asked. How come you’re here? What’re you looking for?”

“I came here with Patrik, I… I’m from Prague… I don’t know anything. I don’t know anything about this.”

“So you’re with Patrik? And what about the jacket? You wanted to do a runner?” Smack! He raises his hand and hits you in the face. You didn’t expect it, so you stagger and fall against the kitchen unit. You’re terrified. Sígr grabs you and drags you back into the other room.

“Pat!” he shouts, “come and teach her a lesson, she wanted to run off on you!” Patrik lifts his head, he’s holding a thin tube in one hand and wiping his nose with the other, then he sticks the remainder of the powder onto his fingertips, licks them and coats his gums with it. He has a wild expression. Sígr flings you towards him.

“Patrik, what’s wrong with you? What in God’s name are you doing?” you ask desperately.

“Calm down. You’ll get some too and it’ll all be fine. It’s ice – it’s much better than grass.” Ice? Ice!

You’re running across a green lawn, carrying a boiled potato in one hand and some ice in the other. You blissfully bite into the potato and lick the ice.

You want to leave and hear yourself saying it out loud. At least find the key for me! Patrik, I want to go! But Patrik is out of it, he starts to twitch, breathing like a dog, he has the eyes of a drowning man, large and wild, the music blares, everything blares. You won’t get out of here, you won’t get past that line, and so you do your lessons like a good girl. It’s like being shot into space, your lungs are stretched so far that they fly out of your ribcage, your heart starts drumming somewhere in your head, you notice your hair is growing at a dizzying rate, soon it’ll be down at your ankles, you have to find your way out of it, you have to jump out. Suddenly you can see into all the rooms, you can even see out onto the street, you can hear the grass grow. You dare to look beyond the line: you are Krakonoš, stepping between the Furkotka and Važec valleys, heading towards that tiny cottage and spitting on it. The saliva flies through the roof and lands with a splat on Denisa’s disgusting pregnant belly. You did it! You can do anything. Běla will be amazed! She’s a small puppet by your feet, which will soon reach Prague. That evening you lost your virginity somewhere between Bratislava, the Tatras and Prague – twice, in fact, if that’s even possible, but if it’s only half an hour later then it probably is. A double deflowering. A broken hymen, a broken future. But that was just a detail.

The second

(…)

I open our fifth-floor window and look out over the smoky, ramshackle town. How I believed in it in those days! There’s no-one beneath the window, so I carefully take the towel by the corners and shake out the children’s hair. The strands fly off slowly in all directions and I’m surprised by how beautiful they are! I shake it for a while, watching as if in a trance. I’m still capable of taking joy in the smallest things, just as God intended. A child screams – my granddaughter, who is only seven years younger than my little Sněžanka. We’ve got so many kids here! It’s true that my Vitaly has really stepped up. The youth today have it different from when Karel and I were going out. These days they’re not in such a hurry, but he fell headlong in love. But I can understand that. And she’s not that bad, she’s a nice girl his Nadya, it’s just a pity she’s Ukrainian. Though the people of Bohemka no longer marry amongst their own, things are different now. If only Vitaly didn’t go to the Orthodox church, that really breaks my heart. He thinks Karel and I don’t know, but we weren’t born yesterday. From time to time he goes with her to see the Batushka. God forgive him.

“Muuuum, when’ll Dad be home?”

“Sněžanka, take some bread and go and help Aunt Nadya with the little one. Dad’ll be home soon.” I close the window – I’m not even sure when my Karel will be back. As I’m putting the scissors away in the drawer, I have to grip the table as I remember what it was like when he was in Prague and Sněžanka used to ask that and I’d start blubbing. I didn’t know anything. He only called us once a month, we said we loved each other, he’d hang up and I didn’t know anything. He went away for three months, but he didn’t send anything back and I was up to my eyes in debt. I didn’t miss his salary – the state hadn’t given him a karbovanet, not even a ruble in two years – but he helped me, he brought food from his ma in Bohemka: a little whey, bread, lard, a moorhen. When I was left here alone… Better not to think about it.

I tidy away the towel, picking a few of Sněžanka’s hair off it. And then the way he returned! My God! No, Czechs aren’t our people, we were so wrong about that. It’s just as well Dad didn’t experience it. Here we’re mangy Czechs and there we’re mangy Ukrainians, no-one cared that we were originally Czech, nobody helped him. He worked like a mule, he couldn’t even bring himself to tell me the half of it, he had a two-hundred-gram tin of fish from a customer each day, and he saved what he could from his thirty crowns an hour to repay our debts. He came home as thin as paper, weak, sick, just skin and bones. How in God’s name did he carry those bricks?! I hope he won’t go back, I don’t want him to go there anymore. We can get by, the children are healthy and Vitaly has a job where they sometimes even give him something, and we have our own place.

The jingle of a key! Kosťa and Sněžanka dash wildly to the door and I don’t know if it’s Karel or Vitaly. I’m expecting them both and looking forward to seeing them both. It’s my husband, I hear him now. I’m so glad to hear him! His hair’s getting greyer, it’s no longer so black, but he’s still handsome. I get some borscht ready, I’ve even added peppers to it today. Vitaly brought them back from the market, Karel will love it! We even have cream that I brought from Bohemka. Goat’s cream, but it’s still good.

“You didn’t even wash your hands!” I pretend to scold him.

“Hush!” and he continues slurping. He wolfs down my borscht, the animal! I watch eagerly for him to finish and get another ladleful ready. But he stops me! He doesn’t want any more. What on earth?!

“Lidinka, I’m going back to Prague. I’ve decided.” What? Karel stands up and goes to wash his hands. Just like that, as though he was telling me the borscht was good, which he never even did. No, not this! I run after him.

“You’re not going anywhere! You came back to me half-dead, and what good did those crowns do us? We paid off our debts, and if we hadn’t paid them off nothing would have happened. The state doesn’t pay what it owes, so they can’t throw us out. There’s no point, Karel. Things’ll get better here, it has to change.”

Karel dries his hands and goes to sit in front of the TV.

“Karel!” I shout. Sněžanka peeks in at us curiously, leaning against the door frame.

Karel looks at me with his tired eyes, they’re just as worn out as his hands, there’s no difference. “I’ve said my piece and that’s how it’s going to be. I’m not just going to watch as we all die here like rats, Lidka. They’ll give me something there, I can earn something. I’m going some time next week. Viktor from Veselynivka’s going too.”

I realize I can’t change his mind. Sometimes I can, sometimes I can’t. This time I can’t. I burst into tears and no-one cares because I’m just a hysterical woman and everyone knows it. I go to tidy up the dishes and I’m blinded by the tears, but I can do it from memory. Another key jingles in the lock.

“Mum, what’s wrong?” My Vitaly’s made of different stuff – he isn’t as hard as him.

“Dad’s going to Czechia again.”

“Really?” Vitaly goes to sit beside Karel and I can see the enthusiasm in his face, and I start to shake all over. God, don’t take him too! It won’t turn out well! But they’re already discussing it and all I can do is wash the pots.

“Mum, don’t worry about us. Me and Dad’ll be together and we can earn more. It’ll be better, you’ll see. We’re Czechs after all!”

That really annoys me. “You knucklehead, ‘we’re Czechs’! We were all born here and we’ve never been anywhere else. This is our home! Do you think there’s someone waiting there for you? Just ask your dad what it was like the first time! Everybody’ll treat you like scum from Ukraine. One look at your passport and name will be enough, you get it? To them we’re just riffraff! You can make something of yourself here – you could start a firm, you’re smart…”

“What kind of a firm, Mum? It’s all gone to shit here. If it wasn’t for Bohemka we wouldn’t even have anything to eat! I mean, how long is it since we last paid the electricity and water? When are they going to cut us off? And what then? I have a baby, Mum. I can’t just stand by and watch!”

“So move to Bohemka then. You can have our house. You’ll have a field and livestock!”

“So Elinka can spend the whole summer drying cow dung like you did your whole life, Mum? Thanks, but no thanks!” Crash! Vitaly slams the door and all goes quiet, except for my blubbing mixed with the sounds from the TV. Karel puts his arm around me. At least that. Dear God, let them come back safely! Both of them.

“Yeah, she was checking you out, that woman from the house today!”

Viktor said nothing and continued to eat, his snout stuffed in a small pot, guzzling rice with tinned meat while biting off some bread.

“Of course she was!” chipped in Ludvík. He was enjoying it. He enjoyed all the banter. They were shut in there like animals, like sex-starved bulls. All of them had a wife at home, but how long was it since they’d last had a shag? The same as me. Four months. Four months!

Vitaly gazed at his swill and thought of his wife. He loved her so much! She was like a tiny flower, her petals just asking to be crushed. And she was always up for it. His mum didn’t like her much. Apparently she couldn’t stick at anything. She didn’t change the bedsheets every week, she spoiled their kid. Maybe it was true. But she was always up for it and he appreciated that. The guys grumbled that after their kids were born, their wives lost interest, and so they had no choice but to go elsewhere. But not Nadya. A couple of weeks after giving birth, Nadya was fucking away noisily, relishing every moment. The fact that they were doing it with just a thin wall between them and her mum had stopped bothering her long ago. Vitaly liked how small she was in his arms, like an affectionate kitten. His crotch grew tight.

“Come on then, get your arses in gear, clean-up time. It’s the first today, so Mr Luboš is coming!” shouted his father, and some people got up even though they hadn’t finished their grub. Vitaly didn’t budge. He continued sitting on the case, his hand tightly gripping his grubby spoon.

They’re all pussies, he thought. The only tough guy was Uncle Viktor – he always kept his mouth firmly shut when everyone else was praising Mr Luboš, even his father. How they were supposedly lucky cos he gave them cash in hand, didn’t keep them under lock and key and took some of their rags away to be washed once a month so they didn’t stink up the house. But he was a bastard. Like all Czechs. We’re not Czechs, we would never treat people like that, we wouldn’t let them live like that. God would punish us. The God none of us believe in. Apart from Nadya. When she was getting ready for church on Sunday, he had liked helping her put on her headscarf. At first he was hopeless at it. The whole thing shifted round and her hair ended up poking out. But then he learned how to do it: he found the exact middle of the headscarf, held it against her forehead using his chin, crossed the ends by her throat, gently and cautiously pulled them tight, wound them round the back of her head and crossed them again, making sure that the whole scarf didn’t slip down on her head. Only then did he take his head away, watching carefully as he tied a knot in the front under her chin. Nadya stood there like a trusting child whose father was getting her ready for school. It had never occurred to her that he might suddenly pull it tight, really tight, and not let go. It had occurred to him, but the thought caused him almost physical pain. He was worried about her. Thank God she was with his mother. She would keep an eye on her for him so that no-one else would tie her headscarf. Vitaly shivered with revulsion and put down his bowl with the leftovers.

“What’s up with you, Vitaly? You not finishing that?” asked Ludvík, eyeing up the bowl.

“No,” said Vitaly, standing up, and without another word he went to help his father move the bricks into the corner. Usually at this time they’d arrange them to make a place for sleeping. They’d pile them up into neat stacks and place boards on top of them. They’d got used to doing that in winter when they arrived and there was a draft from the floor. Now they could maybe sleep on the floor, but they’d already established a routine. However, Mr Luboš was coming for the rent today, so everything had to look right. As if it would make any difference.

“Ouch! Watch where you’re going, Vitaly!” His father had to grab hold of the bunk bed as Vitaly barged into him with his shoulder. Vitaly just raised his hand in apology and again the sight of him cut him to the quick. His dad was by no means an old man – he was only forty-one – but it seemed as if all his strength had left him. What was he thinking about when he was so quiet all the time? About Mum?

“Here you are, Karel, so we don’t have to do it in front of him,” said Viktor, handing Dad some money. There were lots of notes instead of just two – again he’d used small banknotes, which Dad didn’t like. But he just frowned, took the money and went to the bunk bed – as the boss he was entitled to sleep there. He took out a clear folder from under the pillow and put the money in it. Dad was the boss because it was his second time there, while the rest of us – relatives and friends from Bohemka and Veselynivka – were dependent on him, as though he knew how things operated here. But that was rubbish – he didn’t know anything.

A banging on the door. We all looked at each other, suddenly anxious as if it might be the police. At the same time we knew it was only Mr Luboš.

Dad went to open the door, involuntarily running his hand through his unwashed, greasy hair. Mr Luboš was so fat that three of us could have fitted inside him. Not all ten of us who were there, but definitely three. He was smiling as always.

“Christ, it stinks like a zoo in here! Don’t you know how to ventilate. Ven-til-ate? And what’s that shit you’re cooking. You can smell it through the whole building. This can’t go on – I don’t need the publicity, and if anyone talks about you, you’re fucked.” Mr Luboš stopped in the middle of the room, clutching a leather man-bag with the strap looped around his wrist, and looked around. It seemed to Vitaly that he was taken aback. Quite a sight, eh? Each month you must wonder how we all squeeze in here. It’s not easy, but we do. Now you must be trying to figure out where we all sleep since there are only two bunks and one small cupboard with a two-ring electric hotplate on it.

“OK, let’s count this and get it over with,” ordered Luboš. Dad brought out his folder again and meekly handed it to him. Without protesting. Mr Luboš took it and looked around again for somewhere to sit, but ended up standing. He pulled out a wad of cash and started to count it slowly out loud.

“Two…four…six…Twenty.” He tossed the folder onto the floor and, satisfied, put the money in the leather bag and turned to leave.

“Oh yeah, I’ve got some stuff in the car I need a hand with. You, youngster, come on!” Vitaly got up reluctantly and followed Luboš out of the flat.

In the yard Luboš opened the van door. Inside were three toilet bowls still in their packaging.

“Grab them and we’ll stick them in the cellar. Careful you don’t break them!” Vitaly carried all of them down to the cage in the basement, Luboš following behind him like a dog. When he was locking up, Vitaly resolved to say something.

“There’s an awful lot of us in that flat.” Silence. Luboš didn’t react and continued carefully inspecting the padlock. He turned round and left. A sudden burst of rage filled Vitaly’s chest as he had the feeling things couldn’t get any worse.

“Did you hear me? We can’t even get into the bog in the morning. This is worse than in Ukraine. We’re like rats in here!”

Luboš turned around angrily and got within ten inches of Vitaly, who had to lean back to avoid touching him.

“So the little lords don’t like it, eh? And what the fuck would you like? A hotel with clean towels? All of my flats are full at the moment, but if something becomes available, I’ll let you know. You and your dad can stay there alone as long as you pay me the same I get from the ten of you. Where are you gonna get that from, eh? D’you think I’m going to lose out even more on this deal? Are you fucking crazy?”

“How could you lose out? We get thirty crowns an hour and we work ten hours a day. How much of that do you see? I bet you’re getting a decent cut of that, right?”

“Don’t get me fucking started. Who d’you think you are? Instead of being grateful you’ve all got work and a warm place to stay, you start bitching! And who else would employ you anyway? Who’d give you digs? Who’d wash your stinking rags?”

Vitaly moved back towards the bins. He couldn’t stand the fuming of that tub of lard a second longer.

“I’ll go to the police! We’re Czechs after all! We’re not Ukrainians! Maybe if we showed them our papers, we’d get permanent residency!”
Luboš straightened up, but the anger seemed to have left him. He searched in his pocket, pulled out a packet of cigarettes and when he was about to put them back he stopped and offered Vitaly one. Surprised, he took it, greedily inhaling the smoke.

“OK, you don’t have it easy. But fuck the police! D’you understand? You don’t understand a thing. What papers? You don’t have any! The cops would turf you out, all of you, and in cuffs, and you’d never get back here again. All that crap about you being Czech doesn’t interest anyone. You’ve got a Ukrainian passport, for fuck’s sake, so you’re Ukrainian and that’s that. It’s nice that you speak Czech, but plenty of your lot learn it here, that’s why there’s so bloody many of you. But you’re still Ukrainians.

Vitaly fell into a dismayed silence and tried to focus, but the cigarette made it difficult. How long was it since he’d had one? If he’d bought any cigarettes, his dad would have killed him – they were saving up.

“Look, I’m doing my best for you, young lad. Everyone else’d want rid of you, no-one gives a shit, but I employ you, give you a place to stay, clothes. Listen, if you want permanent residency and the cops to leave you alone, then you should get married here. Marry a Czech girl and you’re sorted.”

Vitaly looked at him in surprise – he had never thought of that! Marry a Czech girl? Just like Mum had always wanted?

“But I’m already married!”

“Well, that’s that fucked. At least a Czech sprog then. If you’re down on the birth certificate as the father, no-one can chuck you out. That’s your security right there.”

(…)

Vitaly looked nervously at the digital alarm clock shoved into the corner of the bunk bed, where all of his stuff formed an overflowing heap. Ten past two. Only fifty minutes! Where to put all these disgusting old shoes? There was no way they’d fit on the bunk, he couldn’t clean them all, and they’d just get covered in mud outside again anyway! Vitaly ran to the hall and stood helplessly looking at the pile of slippers, trainers and old worn-out leather boots. There was only one pair of work boots there, and they had a hole clumsily carved out with a kitchen knife where the big toe should have been. His dad went nuts that he’d destroyed them, but it was a thousand times better to squelch about in mud all day than to suffer that pain a moment longer. It was that moment longer he couldn’t take any more. He carried away four pairs, went back into the room, looked at the bunk and then decided to stuff them under the bed, but even when he pushed really hard it was impossible to fit them between the suitcases and rucksacks crammed in there. He angrily threw them down, went over to the electric hotplate on the cupboard and lifted it up to make sure that the crisp thousand-crown note was still there.

How could a doctor cost exactly one thousand? There should be something left over. Vitaly started to go through the pockets of the two jackets hanging in the hall, then nervously climbed onto the lower bed and began to throw things out of the bunk and go through the pockets of all the clothes. All he found was two two-crown pieces. So it might cost…nine hundred and ninety six? Dad didn’t know shit. The horrendous tension and shooting pain in his foot was working its way up towards his head. He would have to cut it open, but later. He put the two-crown pieces on the hob, threw the clothes back onto the bunk and stood helplessly again for a while. Two seventeen, quick! He got a sponge that had once been yellow out of the cupboard and ran to the bathroom, where he began to scrub the sink and, when that looked half-decent, the toilet bowl. Couldn’t that arsehole even get them a toilet seat! That would eat into the twenty a month, right? Just as long as the arsehole didn’t forget the bandage, or he’d be fucked. Two twenty-eight. Disgusting things that had once been toothbrushes for what had once been teeth. Vitaly took a handful of them and squeezed them under the pile of stuff below the bunk. Where the fuck to put all the shoes? What about behind the bog? They wouldn’t fit, she’d see them. Shit! Two thirty-two.

What if someone came back? That would be the end of him, his mother would never speak to him again. No-one was going to come back. He couldn’t be that unlucky. No, that wasn’t going to happen. Vitaly poured some water into a bucket, added some washing-up liquid, dipped in a cloth that was more holes than material and began quickly wiping the floor. When he knelt down and put his weight on his toes, the pain was so great that everything went black and he curled up beside the bucket like a kitten. He had to breathe, calm himself down and not think about it, then he’d cut it open after it was all over. Christ, what if he couldn’t get it up? What if he just stared at a naked woman and nothing happened? A stressed-out loser with a sore foot who wasn’t even capable of shagging. Vitaly undid his flies and, with his wet hand still warm from the water for the floor, grasped his soft worm, trembling, cowardly, which would happily have hidden somewhere behind his balls. He quickened his pace and forced himself to think of Nadya, but it didn’t work! It didn’t work! No! God, he could take that blue piece of paper from under the hotplate and go to the clinic, get away from here, but Luboš would make his life hell. He’d fucked everything up.

Vitaly took his hand out of his pants, turned from his side onto his back and stared wide-eyed at the maps on the ceiling. With his left hand he groped around for the wet cloth and wiped his brow with it. He could feel specks of dirt sticking to his skin. He slowly got up, zipped up his trousers, emptied the bucket with its still fairly clean water, grinned ruefully at the sight of the pile of shoes, which he eventually left just as it was, and went out into the yard. It wasn’t long before he heard the sound of the gate opening and a car. His stomach turned, and all that was left of his throat was a tiny hole just wide enough for a straw. Luboš’s car slowly entered the yard and a figure could be made out in the passenger seat… Vitaly staggered in confusion and hared his way up the stairs to the flat. He may even have weaved from side to side a bit.

Vitaly’s hand opened the door as if it didn’t belong to him. Luboš laughed, of course, patted him meaningfully on the shoulder and yanked the girl into the hall. By the look of her, she was not Vitaly’s fantasy, but a real human being.

“So, young man, this is Bibi,” said Luboš, breaking the silence, though it was possible he’d been blabbering on the whole time, Vitaly couldn’t say. Luboš put his hand under Bibi’s chin, turned her face closer towards his own, kissed her and firmly grabbed her backside.

“Fuck off!” she exclaimed, “or pay.”

Vitaly felt such a blow to his heart that it made his big toe burn. He took a good look. She was horribly thin. No, she was emaciated. She was so emaciated that not even her knees could be made out in her jeans – they were wasted away too. Her shoulders were hunched – the only time she straightened up was when she was swearing at Luboš, just for a second, and then she let them drop back down to her ankles. She was wearing thick eyeliner and there were remnants of lipstick around the outline of her thin lips. Some make-up had been applied to her skin too, but it wasn’t able to mask the spots, both large and small, which formed unruly bumps all over, protruding into that beautiful landscape of her strangely…green?…eyes. Her hair was in a ponytail, but it was horrible – he couldn’t begin to describe the colour. It was more like a rag on her head than hair, thought Vitaly. She was standing on ridiculous high heels, as thick as chopping blocks, definitely thicker than her calves. She tottered about on them, though perhaps they were holding her up and without them she’d fall to the ground and disintegrate into the small specks of dirt he hadn’t wiped up. It surprised Vitaly that they were standing there, just him and her – Luboš was gone. When had he left?

“What are you gawking at? Do you speak Czech? They said you speak Czech. So say something!”

 

Translated by Graeme Dibble